I am in the home stretch of TdF2016 and I have had a fantastic time. The spinning has been varied and educational. While I have not spun that many yards (3570 yds to date, i.e. 2.02 miles) I have spun a variety of yarns. From worsted to woolen, including about 2100 yards of fingering weigh sock yarn!
I am finishing up a nice lofty Coopworth currently, which will be done sometime tomorrow. I have decided that this will complete my tour and I will move back to my regularly scheduled knitting, which I have been largely ignoring over the past couple of weeks!
I need to get myself back on track for my Summer Knit Along because we are about to enter the home stretch for that as well!
I still have the following items that I need to complete:
2 Jen Lucas Mystery Shawls
Triticum
Nahant
Pincha
Tales from the Isle of Purbeck
Puskinia sock mates for 2 bachelorette socks.
As you can see, there is quite a bit of knitting left to do! Panic might be setting in, but apparently I am easily distracted. I saw this stunning beauty and all I wanted to do was to drop everything and cast on. FYI, I have looked at yarn and I am strongly considering ordering something. I keep telling myself this will be the perfect prize knitting to start when I have completed the above list…
Friday Links:
For all the shrub lovers, Arne and Carlos have some great ideas here. (like celery and white wine vinegar, or strawberry balsamic with a hint of black peppercorn…)
Abundance is not something we acquire. It is something we tune into. ~ Wayne Dyer
In my ongoing attempts to increase my daily gratitude I have really honed in on being aware of the abundance that is everywhere, but especially that abundance that is around me.
Some days that is incredibly easy – when I walk out to my garden and I am surrounded by a bumper crop of tomatoes, peppers, and beans. Then there are the onions that appear to be doing well and the potatoes that seem to be flourishing in their containers. I am stunned also with the fact that all four eggplants have baby eggplants growing on them, and they just don’t seem to be ready to stop blooming yet, so there will surely be more.
However, there is just no way for us to utilize all of this bounty ourselves, so Steve’s office is loving us as we are sharing the overflow of vegetables. I am grateful that we have an abundance to share.
But, the abundance does not stop in my garden.
Yesterday, in my struggle to come up with books to fit bingo squares, you all gave me an abundance of recommendations. I am grateful for the community here.
The search for gratitude has changed my perspective and opened my eyes to the abundance around me.
Knitting has been on the back burner here at Casa del KatKnits in the fervor of Tour de Fleece. My sock grows slowly, but it is simple “pick up and just knit” knitting that is so simply satisfying.
Over the weekend, I began the epic bind off of TTL Mystery Shawl, but I still have not finished. I am about half way done. It is absolutely glorious outside this morning so before I get my work done, I might sit out under the pergola and work on that a bit. Head’s up fellow MKAL knitters – the bind off is slow going, but I love how the picots look!
I am honing in on my first Bingo – I finished Doc and, while this is not a typical genre for me, I really enjoyed it. I loved the narrator’s voice which seemed so perfect to be relating the story of Doc Holliday. There were times I chuckled at the antics and hearing the fabled story of the west. There were also poignant parts that endeared Doc to me. If you are looking for a “western”, I recommend this highly.
I also started and finished listening to Charlotte’s Web – read by E.B. White (Thanks Bonny for this stellar recommendation!!) I loved this book as much as I did the first time I read it a million years ago. I was able to “become my children” – listening attentively as they did when I read it to them when they were little. I now understand their begging for “just one more chapter,” as I listened to the book in one sitting.
I started listening to The Book Thief (Told by a child narrator) and reading My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry (With a family member in the title). This will give me my first bingo! I am also reading The Inner Circle (Hated by someone you know) on my kindle at night.
Books in the wings:
My Kitchen Year (With food as the theme)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Published in the year I was born)
Knitlandia (With a one-word title)
On the Pulse of the Morning (Poetry Collection)
I am still working out what to read for those final “practically impossible” squares. I have 3 squares that I am struggling with – ‘Manga’, ‘By or about a member of the LGBTQ community’, and ‘From the Harvard Classics 5 foot shelf’. I will head down to find something from the “top shelf’ of my bookcase, hopefully there is something besides a knitting book there!
As usual, I am joining in Ginny’s Yarn Along, where you will find beautiful knitting and diverse reading going on.
Have a fantastic Wednesday in a week that is filled with those perfect lazy days of summer. How is your knitting and reading coming?
Although we desperately need the rain, a gloomy Monday makes for a slow starting week.
So, let’s spend a moment reliving the weekend which was the antithesis of gloomy!
There was spinning, and knitting, and cocktails, and reading.
I listened to Doc by Mary Doria Russell and I am about half-way through. I am enjoying it tremendously, and I really love the narrator’s voice. I started reading The Inner Circle by Brad Meltzer.
I watched Spotlight and The Big Short.
I harvested the first tomatoes from the garden.
I almost finished spinning all the Montadale and I got the first bump plied up.
And, the epic bind off began…
All in all, it was a fantastic weekend. I hope yours was too.
