by Kat | Jul 25, 2018 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Greetings Unravelers!
I have a FO to share with you all today! Yes, my Beekeeper Cardigan is done! I love how it turned out, and especially the hack of knitting the sleeves flat and seaming them! Thank you, Mary for being the encouragement I needed to step out of the box and try something different! With all the adjustments, this sweater took me 8 days to knit, including the unraveling of the first sleeve and reknitting it. Yes, 8 days to a finished sweater! You can see all the details here.
And, I am back to plugging away at my Vodka Lemonade and making headway through mystery knitting clues. All in all, a very good knitting week!
Did you all see that the Man Booker Longlist was out yesterday? I got very excited to see Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight on the list! Of course, my “want to read” list has expanded but in a very good way!
Now, ready for something really exciting??
I have my Cover All for Book Bingo! That’s right… Bingo Card One is DONE!
I had a good week for finishes:
The Weight of Ink: 4-stars. I really enjoyed this novel, very much! It is well written, and I loved how it posed the two time periods and the two remarkable women, Ester and Helen. If you like history, you’ll love this novel.
Anna Karenina: 4 stars. While it was long (and wordy), but it was an interesting look into life in Russia. If you have not read this classic, you should!
Hillbilly Elegy: 5-stars. This is a well written, and at times, painful look into life for a forgotten segment of society. It is narrated by the author and I highly recommend.
Out Chasing Horses: 4-stars. I have had this book on my “to read” list ever since I finished Ashes in My Mouth, Sand in My Shoes. This novel did not disappoint at all.
The Long Winter: 4-stars. I have read this book dozens of times and each time something new speaks to me. Also, I am profoundly grateful that we don’t get winters like they did in Nebraska!
Six of Crows: 2-stars. I had higher hopes for this YA novel. I thought it might be a bit like the Magicians, but for me it fell flat.
Ariel: 4-stars. Honestly, I picked this because it was short and really, I knew nothing about Sylvia Plath’s writing (outside of The Bell Curve) and I did not know she was a poet. Some of the poems in Ariel blew me away and I will be looking for more of her poetry to read!
Now, for the current reads: I just started listening to Ready Player One and started reading So Long, See You Tomorrow – both of which I was able to fit in to my second bingo card!
There you have my week! What about you? What are you making and reading this week?
If you wrote a post to share, please leave your link below!
[inlinkz_linkup id=791204 mode=1]
by Kat | Jul 18, 2018 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Into all lives some unraveling must fall…
Yes, there was some significant unraveling in this house in the past week…and there is a bit more unraveling to do before the week is over! Yes, the Beekeeper Cardigan is still in process, but I am moving forward with flat knit sleeves, but I will still have to rip back the left sleeve and then re-knit it flat. Seaming is much easier than purling in the round!
I am almost finished with Clue Three of KK’s MKAL and Clue Four is printed out and ready to go! I am really loving how this is working up and no unraveling at all once I got my sk2p’s and k3tog’s figured out! It brings me great joy that my ball of yarn is smaller, but I am experiencing none of the I am worried I don’t have enough yarn angst that others did.
I also began the Button Hole Refresher… even though this is a “semi-automatic” process per my machine, it is still not intuitive to me. Vicki is way smarter than me in doing snaps, just saying! I am going to make a stop at Joann’s to see if I can find some red buttons and then I will be ready to do some real buttonholes!
Reading is feeling a bit slog-like this week. I am immersed in Anna Karenina and while it is beautifully written – it is long. Tolstoy’s attention to detail is stunning… or perhaps it is his ability to use way more words to explain things other authors do with less words – I don’t know, but I am enjoying the story. However, for a long book with insane details? My vote is with Pat Conroy and, in my opinion, his writing is better. He is equally attentive to detail yet he managed to never make any of the stories feel slog-like.
Thus… I have NOT finished ONE book this week. I know!! But!! I have less than 15 hours to go in Anna Karenina (so maybe 3 more days to go!) I am so focused to get this done, because I just got Hillbilly Elegy from the library and it is also for a square on my bingo card. I am eager to move on.
I am close to being done with The Weight of Ink… I have about 25% left to read.
So… my final books for my bingo card: Sylvia Plath’s Ariel for the “Collection of poetry” square, Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo for the “Number in the title” square, Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson for “Bird or animal on the cover” square, and Laura Ingalls Wilder’s The Long Winter for “Set in a different season”. My cover all is in sight!
What about you? What are you making or reading this week?
If you wrote a post to share today, please leave your link below!
[inlinkz_linkup id=790428 mode=1]
by Kat | Jul 11, 2018 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
No unraveling this week, but just barely!
I am making progress on my Beekeeper Cardigan, but I have had to tink back a few times when I was not paying attention and my bees got out of sync! However, today I have about 5 inches to go in the body, but I won’t get any knitting time on this project until Friday. My “days” of knitting on this have had to be adjusted because of pesky things like making meals as Steve is home so I have not had much uninterrupted time to knit. However, Steve is gone for a work function this weekend and I am selfishly looking forward to having the house to myself. And, with some luck – I will have a completed sweater before the weekend is over!
The reading had mixed reviews this week. I finished Backman’s Us Against You and The Picture of Dorian Gray.
After reading Bonny’s review of Us Against You, I was concerned but I forged ahead and began to read it. I, like Bonny, loved Beartown and it was a beautifully told story! However, Us Against You fell short for me and I gave it just 3-stars. It is a bit of a disjointed story and it felt quite chopped up as I read it and I think it could have been better if it the writing had flowed better. But, it is a dysfunctional story about some very dysfunctional characters. It leaves you feeling very uncomfortable and the story feels very unfinished, but I am hoping that the final book of the Beartown trilogy fixes these issues and my suggestion is to wait to read Us Against You until the third book of the trilogy is released.
The Picture of Dorian Gray fills my “Classic you should have read” bingo square and wow… this story really blew me away. The writing is brilliant, and the premise of the story is fascinating – again, Dorian is an utterly dysfunctional character, but the story that plays out is thought provoking and, yes, disturbing. If you have not read this story, I don’t want to give anything away, but the concepts of vanity, youth, and the perceptions of how one looks make for great discussion and I think this would be an excellent book for a book club to read! I gave it 5-stars and highly recommend it!
I am more than half way through The Weight of Ink and loving it. And, I just started listening to Anna Karenina… and will be listening for a good bit of time yet (I have about 34 hours of listing time to go!) I have just 7 books to go for a coverall so perhaps August will see me get a bingo or two on my second card!
But, what about you? What are you making and reading today?
If you wrote a post to share today, please leave your link below!
[inlinkz_linkup id=789463 mode=1]
by Kat | Jul 4, 2018 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Greetings Unravelers!
Summertime and the knitting is varied! That’s right…when the weather gets unbearable – vary your knitting projects! On Monday I started my Knit a Beekeeper Cardigan in 4 days (okay, for my size I can take 6 days… but I think 5 days will be my sweet spot!) I am 15-ish rows from my “try on” point…which will hopefully mean I have arrived at the Great Sleeve Divide! I am still working out my next day of knitting (which might not happen until next Monday!)
Vodka Lemonade is in a bit of a holding pattern this week as I finish up Clue Two of KK’s MKAL…Clue two is a lovely chart that must be repeated three times and I am almost done with the second repeat and Clue Three will be out on Friday!
However, all this knitting has meant some very good listening this week!
I finished June strong with my finish of This is How it Always Is (which I deeply loved, and it got 5-stars) and that means I read 13 books in June…13 very good books! By my count I read 6 5-star books and 7 4-star books, and I highly recommend every single one of these books!
My July is starting out with a bit less enthusiasm – I finished Ohio, which was an ARC from NetGalley. It only got 3-stars from me and you can read my review here. As you can see, it was a difficult read.
Fortunately, Gilead is not that at all and I have about 2 hours of listening time left! I am enthralled with this lovely novel. It very much reminds me of The Secret Scripture in how the tale is told. It is wonderful writing and I will have it finished today.
I also began The Weight of Ink and Us Against You.
Up Next: The Picture of Dorian Gray.
That’s all I’ve got to share today…what are you knitting or reading?
If you wrote a post today, please leave your link below!
[inlinkz_linkup id=788414 mode=1]
P.S. One lucky person who comments today will get a free month of the Washington Post, I will use random.org to select that person! Good luck everyone!
by Kat | Jun 27, 2018 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Greetings Unravelers!
The knitting is slow and steady this week and please forgive the lame photo of said slow and steady knitting. I am just over half way through the arm increases for my Vodka Lemonade. I should be a bit further, but I was distracted by the first clue of KK’s MKAL! I got it done with some days to spare and clue two will be out on Friday! So far, so very good! I love the lace work and how it flows along. (No spoiler’s here… if you want to see how the MKAL is progressing, you can see photos here!)
I am also looking at the calendar and figuring out what days might work best for my participation in Marie Greene’s Sweater in 4-days KAL. I have not settled on the days yet, but this is something you absolutely need to plan out!
The reading has fortunately been much better, and I have a couple of finishes to share with you!
First up, I finished The Kremlin’s Candidate…this is perhaps the best series I have read in a very long time! (Outside of Armand Gamache, but more on him later) I will give no spoilers away here, but I will tell you that the ending made me cry. 5-stars all the way!
Next, I finished The Feather Thief for my “Set in a different county” square. This is an intriguing true story about a heist from the Tring Museum in London. It is well done and fascinating. 4-stars and I highly recommend this story!
Now, on to Armand Gamache who is my current “listen” for my Mystery square. The Nature of the Beast is the first book after dear Ralph Cosham passed away. I admit I am struggling mightily with the transition to the new narrator, Robert Bathurst. Now, don’t get me wrong, Mr. Bathurst is not a poor narrator at all, but he is not Ralph Cosham. And, I am finding myself deeply missing his way of reading – his inflection and how he related the story to the listener. I had hoped that I would ‘get used to’ Mr. Bathurst, but this will likely be the last story I listen to in the Armand Gamache series. For me, I would rather hear Ralph’s voice in my head as I read the story than be distracted by the voice I cannot get used to at all. However, Penny as usual, is doing a masterful job in this the eleventh book in the series and I should be finished with it later today!
Up next: This is How it Always Is for my ‘with a cover that matches a current WIP’ square and then Gilead fills the ‘one-word title’ box. And, Gilead does double duty as it is also on The Great American Read list!
This week I also started a second bingo card…I know! What the heck? But, The Kremlin’s Candidate helped me out by filling the “Thriller” square and I have books that have come in from the library that I did not have a square for, so it seemed logical to begin another card. As luck would have it the book that came from the library is Fredrik Backman’s new book, Us Against You, which will perfectly fit the “originally published this year” square on my new card. I am not sure how far I will get on this card, but there is still a good bit of time between now and Labor Day!
If you wrote a post to share today, please leave your link below!
And, what are you making and reading this week?
[inlinkz_linkup id=787231 mode=1]
