In Love

I am in love with a neighbor's rose bush.

And to think I never liked the color orange before a became a knitter. 

Yeah Momma it was yarn that made you love orange. Not a handsome fuzzy boy. Right?

Sometimes you just have to look at the sky and fall in love with it too.

 And sometimes you have to look at a beautiful "coworker" and think hey we are doing ok, in this moment.

Knitting and Retail Therapy

Burt and I have been diligently knitting away. We got back into sock knitting since I needed something small to work on. Shawls are nice but big, especially shawls with three colors to carry around.

I managed to finish a project too. Momma now has rainbow socks to match Daddy's rainbow socks. He is actually wearing his pair today.I was just so thrilled with the way his turned out that I decided I needed a pair too. I love them so much. 

We went to a used book store a while back and I was lamenting not getting some knitting books back in the day. The thought occurred to me that I can indeed still go book shopping at Powell's Books, I just have to wait a bit to get them. OK fine Joyful Colorwork Socks is not a back in the day book, it is new but hey we all need joyful socks right now.

It used to be I had to want to knit a few patterns before I would buy a book. This is how I missed out on some great books, this time I picked some inspiration only books and one came with a bonus leaflet pattern. Thanks unknown knitter for weeding this book and bonus leaflet from your collection into mine.

I pulled out some totes from my yarn collection and it made me so happy to have color palettes to play with. I mean really how beautiful is all that yarn?

So I had to go out and add to the collection. I wanted to support a local yarn store and avoid tariffs. While I love color, I am learning I need more neutrals to work with also. But that orange? I had to have it.

I had been thinking and I really wanted another skein of that turquoise yarn I bought a while back. Alas the local yarn store didn't have any more so maybe a little online therapy was needed. And I really needed a few more state license plate stitch markers. I now have four of the six states we have lived in.  I could no longer resist a deck of colorwork cat patterns. Looks like a kitty cowl or mitts is in my future. I would love to get better at colorwork.

And yet here I am again knitting a plain sock with fantastic orange yarn. Some things and people are wonderfully consistent. Like new yarn just jumps on to my needles sometimes. Don't worry Burt has approved new sock knitting and current shawl knitting. But I will talk about that one next time.

 

True Colors Shawl

I've been wanting to make this shawl for quite a while, True Colors by Melanie Berg. I thought it would be an excellent way to use up left over yarn in my stash. But I used to have a real problem buying patterns. No not overconsumption of patterns, the opposite end of that pool. I really had to want to make something immediately, have the yarn on hand and be ready to go before hitting the purchase button. Better yet if it was in a book or a magazine that had other patterns I wanted to make, maybe then I could buy it... What can I say I come from frugel peasant stock. I understand wants vs needs a little too well. 

When I discovered Melanie had two books and one contained True Colors and I could get them on sale. Poof I was done. But first a couple of other shawls called my name. (And I loved knitting them almost as much as wearing them.)

I decided 2025 would be my True Colors year. I wanted to use up some of my Malabrigo Sock left over yarn but alas I did not have enough colors... what is a knitter to do. (You know what I did.)

But then it took some time to figure out what order they should be in and which two should have a right placement to have just the right pop of color.

I started with this combo.

And added this yarn, but something was not right.

I thought about changing my main color from grey to red, or is that orange? and I tried a variegated yarn. 

That did not work for me at ALL!

Oh this is nice, I like this combo...

 

Burt agreed with my plan, and we knit happily along.

But then our next big decision was upon us. We called in Auntie Kisknit and asked her opinion on grey to   orange to red progression of colors and that was just not quite right either. 

 

Oh that is much better. 

Indeed Momma it is much better.

Oh wait I think you missed some lines here. You need to fix that. 

Yes this is quite nice. We need to make a new shawl first thing every year. It is quite toasty sandwiched between your lap blanket and our shawl.

A very satisfying knit if I say so myself. Now all those ends to weave in. I think I am about a third done but my thumb is telling me we are on no ones' schedule ends will get woven in on a more tolerable schedule. Hey maybe decide what we should knit next instead? We have lots of nice yarn to choose from maybe squish some of it...

Loose Ends

I guess I mean that literally. I find myself at an odd stage of nothing on the needles, but a lot of finishing work to do. I don't think I hate finishing work but I really enjoy knitting more. I always find it so odd to have nothing on the needles, especially after a big project gets done. I'm never sure what I want to work on next but miss working on something. We shall see where the yarn takes me.

I decided the other day that I really need to work on getting my knitting journal up to date. So while D was out of the house I tracked down the journal and my pen, poured myself another cup of tea. I flipped through the journal and found only a few pages remaining. The last entry was Dec 2023! I started making a list of  all the things I knit and bought in 2024 and kept silencing the nagging feeling I had already done this... Then I remembered putting a sticker on another notebook and starting in that one. I had journaled at least part of 2024.

I searched high and low. I remembered writing on it in the office, I remembered moving it to the knitting cart beside my chair. Yes I repurposed one of my Ikea carts to being my knitting cart. Poor Mellie is none too thrilled. (That was my penthouse suite in Oregon, Momma and you know it.)

I searched my pile of notebooks upstairs. I searched my pile of knitting journals. I searched our puzzle cabinet. I searched my pile of new/old books. No knitting journal to be found. I gave up and had lunch. D came home and told him of the case of The Missing Knitting Journal!

I wondered away and started a load of laundry. Then I came back to my knitting cart, I pulled out all the books, there tucked between two books of similar size, it was.

But then did I go ahead and start journaling? No I did not, the journal has set right here next to me for a week now. At least I know where it is. I will have some down time soon so I can start catching up on those days. 

Now if I can just figure out what to knit next. That's turning out to be an issue so far. I just need to do a little stash toss to familiarize myself with what the yarn wants to be. In the meantime I will be over here weaving in so many ends.

Still kicking

Living life but missing writing here. That's where I have been for a while now. I've missed writing here and having a place to look back at how life has changed. So let's give you a wee update and tell you what the plan is. 

Burt was sad to say that I got a job. This requires me to leave every day. He is so disappointed in me, that he is resorting to sitting in dad's lap. Or gasp allowing his sister to cuddle. 

Hey! It was cold that day and you know it!

And that Momma can feed him from afar. Nice but still not right she isn't here!

We still knit together.

And she has tried working here. That is going pretty well. I can supervise her just fine when she is in house.

Even Mellie tried her paw at supervising. She's not great at it.

Then we got smart and moved upstairs. This room has a nice fluffy place to settle into.

I even get to go outside sometimes. There is nothing like the breeze and warm sunshine on your fur.

We've actually been knitting quite a bit and I love it. All her attention is directed on the string and I get a wee tuck in under a shawl sometimes. What is there not to like about that?
 

So yeah I've been missing the blog. I got behind and then got employed. I was trying to figure out how to restructure life and it just fell away. So my plan is to go back and write some posts in last year I want to be able to see what we did and I am the boss here so there is no reason I can't do that. See you in the memories maybe.