by Kat | Jan 15, 2025 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Greetings dearest Unravelers!
We are halfway through January… the days are just steadily marching along.
I have some finishes to share with you all today and a new beginning! Or should I say a finished project and a “technically finished, but still lacking” project.
It is the perfect length
First up… the Marled Sequence Scarf! This scarf is entirely based on MDK Field Guide No. 19: Marls with patterns by Cecelia Campochiarro. Originally, this sequence of stitches was used in the Color Explosion Throw… lovely… truly lovely. But what might happen if you just focused on the throw as a scarf?! Pure joy… 1000% pure joy, that’s what! Cecelia put together the kits with Ito Kinu… 6 colors eager to become 15 unique marls.
A peek inside my new way of tracking my making this year…
I mapped out my journey, cast on and soon the pattern became a meditative mantra as I knit and purled my way across the rows. To say I loved this project is an understatement… it was pure knitting joy! A project to bring myself back to the most basic of knitting… just simple knits and purls in sequences. I truly wish you could feel how this scarf feels… it is soft and the silk “stickiness” makes your hand want to linger. It is brilliantly warm… I gave it a test drive pre-wash on a walk with Frankie and it is perfectly cozy… with not one bit of the tingly-ness that wool sometimes feels like.
And yes! I did not run out of any of the yarns though some got close…
I love how the colors flow one to another.
And there is no right or wrong side… which makes it even better!
With all that is perfect about the scarf, I share my December Gnome that is currently feeling less than perfect to me. While Gnana the Gnome is technically done… she feels incomplete.
My finished Gnana… she seems lacking to me… unfinished.
She needs some tweaking… I want her hooded cape to be different. I have this vision in my head of the cape attached with the hood hanging down, but I have not been able to accomplish that without some further fixes that I have not yet figured out (what I have tried has not worked thus far.) It needs a clasp of some sort. The hood needs a small tassel as well, I think. And her “attached” gnome hat needs some help as well. I am at the drawing phase of trying to figure out what might work/look best currently.
The hood needs a tassel and some way to hold the front closed.
However, I do know that Gnana is going to be a welcome addition to the Gnome Village… she is the bringer of Christmas (as you can see by her wreath) and everyone is very excited about her arrival in the Blue Cupboard.
I also swatched and began a new sweater. After a few fits and starts on the cast on, I settled on an entirely different cast on (Thanks, Patty Lyons) and I like how it looks! I am inching along on 2×2 ribbing and am very happy.
If anyone is wondering how spacing out my reading is going… well, wonder no more! I am loving the “digestion time” and I just finished listening to Niall Williams Time of the Child (and really, I don’t want to depart from Faha… so I am lingering) I loved it… the writing was perfection! At night I am reading a chapter or two from a Netgalley read… a new novel by Jo Nesbø, Blood Ties. Fantastic writing, a riveting story as only Nesbø can do! I have miles to go before I finish it… so good thing I am enjoying it! Ha!
So there you have my week of making! What about you all… what is exciting you about your January days?
As always, if you wrote a post to share please leave your link below and thank you!
by Kat | Jan 13, 2025 | General, In This Moment
Is for reveling in winter!
Yes, we have snow! Yes, it is cold! (although this morning’s 31°F felt downright balmy!!)
I cannot tell you the last time we here had snow that stayed on the ground for more than a day or two! It is simply delightful.
Winter might be even more delightful because I finished one Marled Sequence Scarf over the weekend! And, to be entirely honest with you, I was more than a bit sad to bind off that last stitch! This was truly knitting perfection… the colors pair with simple knits and purls. Glamor shots coming!
But… I had also signed up for Patty Lyons Beginnings and Endings Class last Friday. I got through one part, with two more to go but can I just say… Patty Lyons is a treasure! I could sit and just listen to her talk for hours! She has encyclopedic knitting knowledge! Anyways, I also swatched over the weekend and cast on a couple of times… with “meh” results. But once I deployed Patty’s first cast on… with rousing success… I knew I found my new knit project to see me through this month!
So, my dearest Mother Nature, when you bring the drop in temperatures later today with those “need all the layers” teens, I will have lots to keep me occupied inside where it is cosy and warm! And, I will have a freshly washed scarf to keep me warm!
Happy Monday Everyone!
by Kat | Jan 10, 2025 | General, Looking Back
It’s been A Week, hasn’t it?
In an attempt to keep my Clean Out List in my focus… I started with my closet yesterday while I watched the funeral service for President Carter.
I was percolating along at a pretty good clip until I discovered a box of loose photographs on the back of the shelf. I found it at the time that Steve Ford delivered his father’s moving eulogy. I spent the rest of the time remembering…
The box contained some envelopes of photos from my childhood but mostly they were photos of my kids that my ex decided were not “album” worthy. It is funny how a photo can instantly take you back… or maybe that only happens when you are decades past those children being small beings. One photo made me laugh and cry… There was a photo of 3 year old Heidi getting ice cubes from our brand new refrigerator that had an “in-door” ice dispenser! (a first for our household!) She would get ice cubes out for my beloved Clumber Spaniel, Picabo (yes, she was named after the skier!) Anyways, the image captured Picabo sitting patiently waiting for the next ice cube to come from Heidi. A treasured memory… I could hear her voice in my head.
I listened to people sharing such incredibly beautiful memories of President Carter as well… and while there were no stories about him feeding a beloved pet ice cubes… there were so many stories of he and Rosalynn working to make the lives better of people all over the world. It made me wonder how much more he did that we will never hear about… but I am sure that those tales are being shared where he and his beloved Rosalynn are.
Rest well, dear President Carter, rest well… you have earned it!
As for me, there will be no rest for me today… I have that closet to finish! Sigh.
Have a great weekend everyone! See you all back here on Monday!
Header photo by Miray Bostancı
by Kat | Jan 8, 2025 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
Greetings dear Unravelers and Happy Wednesday!
One week into January has brought winter racing in! Yes, we have snow and cold! And that makes me happy because it is exactly what January is supposed to be!
My son and daughter-in-law gave me a “Rolife Book Nook & Wonderland Garden House” for Christmas and I have been plugging away at it a little each morning. It has 24 pages of instructions and LOADS of teensy tiny parts but I am now on page 16… so I am getting close to finished!
All the fiddly bits, but soon this will live in the blue cupboard with the Gnomes!
I also have been feverishly knitting my marled scarf… I am on the second to last color and I am really eager to finish! I am having a bit of worry about having enough yarn for the last color change (I have not run out of any colors yet… but I got close on a couple of cones!) However, Cecelia said that following the color flow and not doing more than 118 rows with a color, I will have enough… so I am keeping the faith, despite having a niggling worry!
Also… in a huge note to myself regarding “eyeballing” my fabric piece for stitching last year… in the future, measure… measure… measure! As you can see, they are all different. I hope to get them pressed a bit, and evened up in size today. I am sure that at least one will need a bit of a fabric border.. how June is so dramatically smaller than all the others is beyond me.
2024 Daily Stitching
I finished a few books this week… The one I want to share with you today is Richard McGuire’s Here. It is a graphic novel, which is not my typical choice, and I have NO idea how this crossed my radar. But it was simply fascinating. I read through it twice… because I was certain I had missed things, and I did! Anyway… it is about “a corner of a room over a span of hundreds of thousands of years.” The book is based on his comic strip of the same name, which I was never aware of… but boy I am really sad I missed it! He has truly expanded my concept of “living room space”… who knew that a graphic novel would have me quietly thinking about all that a space can hold. I have not stopped thinking about it since. If you are looking for something to shake up your reading… try Here… it is a wonder of a book!
And there you have my first week of making and reading! Not a bad start… at all! What about you? What are you working on this week?
As always, if you wrote a post to share, leave your link below and thank you!
by Kat | Jan 6, 2025 | General, Welcome
JANUARY,
The first month of the year,
A perfect time to start all over again,
Changing energies and deserting old moods,
New beginnings, new attitudes
― Charmaine J Forde
And perhaps even knowing what actual day it is! Yes, hello, January!
Yes, I have spent the last two weeks in a “haze of days” where every day felt like a weekend. There were odd amounts of Monday’s as well, with each week having more than one… or so it felt!
But yesterday when I sat down to turn the page in my calendar to “peek into” this week… it felt very Sundayish and I am now ready to welcome a new month!
One that is not creeping in slowly, despite my “what day is it” confusion!
Already, I have accomplished BIG things… My new stitching is set up and I have even stitched every day!
Last year’s stitch pages have been washed and are now dry… ready for me to put them together.
And I have found a new rhythm with my Marled Scarf… I have just 3 color changes to go to completion!
So with all that already under my belt… what possibly else can this month hold?
Here are the other things I’d like to find space for this month:
- The Great Closet Clean Out! Yes, cold weather has finally set in so I need to put away the lingering “warmer weather” clothes and do a good sorting.
- The Great Pantry Clean Out! My pantry is the very bane of my existence, but I am determined to “start fresh” this month and bring some semblance of order to its shelves!
- The Great Desk Clean OFF! Ugh, really… just a huge ugh to this one. I want to find some “organizing accessories” to help me keep my space uncluttered, inviting, a space where I can write, read some poetry, and begin my day in a more orderly fashion… versus the absolute chaos it is right now!
And it is not just the “doing” of these things… it is the combination of doing them and keeping Frankie amused! Wish me luck!
Six days in… with a list that looks short but is really overly full! What about you? What do you hope to accomplish this month?
I will see you all back here on Wednesday with some unraveling!
Header photo by AS Photography
by Kat | Jan 3, 2025 | General, Words
As I said here, it is so sad that English words can be so lacking…
However, I aim to remedy that this year with my word choice! (or did this word choose me??)
I discovered Yutori last July when I was spending some time thinking about companion words for time. Of all the words I considered… most were not as symbiotic as Time & Space, which I found were almost always coupled together.
Time is a definite thing but space… what does that mean really? Outer space? Inner space? Personal space? Make space for…? Giving someone space? You see where I am going here… space is this unknown element. And I wondered how you could couple something so very definite with something seemingly boundless…
But in a rare moment of serendipity… the next “doom scroll” session I had on Instagram halted me in my tracks. A post giving homage to Yutori… with the most beautiful description of this Japanese word. And imagine my surprise when this post echoed the first a day later. (I know I should not be surprised… the algorithms are always at work and, for once, it was a good thing to have “them” paying attention!)
That led me to a quick Google search of Yutori… and I found this beautiful video with the most amazing explanation of what Yutori is in Japanese… a concept of space being both physical and emotional. A way to use space to stretch time. Making space (and holding) space as sacred. Yes, please!
A bit more Googling and I was reminded of this episode of On Being with Naomi Shihab Nye. She talked about Yutori as well! (Really, this conversation is just so moving… it is absolutely worth a listen or a relisten!)
I am very excited to spend a year with Yutori as opposed to saying I am going to just contemplate space, which seems a bit lacking. My hope is that in contemplating Yutori… I will have a new (and better) understanding for all the spaces in my life.
And… in the manner of Yü Chou… I am picking up my seed of time and taking a deep breath and continuing!
But, my hope is that YOU will decide to join us this year… contemplating a word over twelve months can be so much fun. It can be enlightening. It can be inspiring! I think that the hardest part is picking a word… but really, any word will do! Want more fun in your days? Do a quick search of the synonyms of fun… pick one and jump in! Want to learn about something? Pick a related word and begin your journey!
Perhaps you fear that 2025 will be The Year Without Joy… well you can make your own joy by making Joy your little word!
Perhaps you want something specific … take this test from the WaPo to find a word! (I have gifted you the article, read on with confidence!) (and if you are interested in the “other nudge word” article mentioned, here you go!)
It does not have to be hard! Really… you cannot pick a bad word! (Trust me, I have tried… I always have gotten something out of my word!)
If you want something more structured… let me know, I have some suggestions for you to get yourself started!
If you want word suggestions, let me know and I will gladly help you!
Carolyn still has her “how to get started” information on her website. She really helped me hone in on how to make my word work for me!
But, I think what is best about contemplating a word for twelve months… is the companionship of other people doing the same. I have learned so much from what they share each month.
Finally, there will be no change to the day we all share our progress… I will follow Carolyn’s schedule and will have the link up on the last Monday of the month.
I really hope you decide to join us!
If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to email me! I would love to help get you stared!
See you all back here on Monday! (is it just me or is everyone confused on what day it is? I have been off all week but I hope to get back on track and be here in a timely manner on Monday! Ha!)
