Saturday, November 03, 2007

Saturday ramblings

It is Saturday and I'm home from the week's travels. As usual, there is a pile of mail waiting and I'm noting the catalog surge has begun. However, one catalog was a bit of a surprise. A seed catalog arrived this week.....about two months ahead of schedule! This is a new to me catalog but with the words kitchen garden in the title, it has the potential to warm my heart. I'll have to put this in a safe place to look at after the holidays. I haven't even put my current garden to bed yet! Now is not the time for planning the next one. Today, I will be pulling the old plants and putting away the tomato cages for next year. It will be a lovely day for it, too!Img_1708

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At the beginning of the week, I made a decision to not connect to the Internet in the evenings in the hotel but to knit or read. I should find it no surprise that I can actually make good knitting progress if I am not reading blogs or surfing. I knit through almost two balls of the fuschia yarn when I finally took note of the little warning lights going off. The (virtual) warning lights were blinking because this sweater project was spreading over my lap. Really spreading. So, I threaded through some waste yarn, slipped my work off the circular needle and proceeded into the hotel room bathroom to evaluate.
Img_1709 Here are the evaluation results: 1) My gauge is off just a smidge. I had planned for a 49 inch circumference and I got 50 inches. Not so bad. 2) A 50 inch circumference is way too big for me, especially in a bulky yarn. I miscalculated the amount of ease I should add, obviously. 3) I like the fabric of the yarn. 4) I like the colors....but not next to my face. 5) I like knitting in the round. It is great mindless knitting, which is a real soother.

This project is going to transform from a fuschia sweater into a great fuschia felted bag. I plan on knitting an EZ raglan seamless sweater.....sometime. But, I'll use a lighter weight yarn, for sure. I'll concentrate my sweater knitting on Williamsro. Thursday night, I set aside my knitting and started to read a fantasy paperback, The Hallowed Hunt by Lois McMaster Bujold. I haven't read the earlier two books in the series and this one stands alone nicely. I enjoy this author's tales and this book is certainly holding my interest. Nice mind candy and good for my current feelling of being close to burn-out.

The burn-out feeling refers to work, which (for good reasons you all know) won't be discussed in any detail here. However, it has been a busy year with a lot of responsibilities and next year looks the same in many respects. DH and I work on the same team, and he's under many of the same pressures that I am. In one way that is fortunate because we understand what the other is going through at work. On the other hand, it leaves two very tired/burned-out people in the same house with no one else to pick up the slack. We'll have an opportunity to recharge during the deer hunting season in about two weeks. We both hunt and sitting in a tree all day surrounded by nature can untie knots no massage therapist or glass of wine can touch.

I may as well address hunting here briefly. I've hunted with my family since I've been a child. Frankly, I view it more like grocery shopping. I am a meat-eater and I think hunting is a very direct, and honest way of putting meat on the table. Enough said.

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Here is a bit more of my fushcia sweater bag:
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Monday, October 29, 2007

fuschia mulling on Monday

Thanks for the comments on the fuschia future sweater. I've cast on again but haven't made much progress. My knitting energy has been sucked up into the work black-hole energy vacuum. I'm anticipating the vacuum will wane soon and there will be more balance in my little work/knitting universe. At the moment, I'm contemplating a completely reversible EZ raglan seamless sweater. Purling or knitting, I'll get the best of both. I'm pretty sure I can do that but .... I'll let 'cha know!

I'm on the road for a few days so I've tucked Williamsro and the fuschia sweater into my knitting bag. The fuschia sweater also has a bit of obligation attached as my DMIL purchased some of the yarn as an early birthday gift to me. PRESSURE! *g* Results to be reported later this week.

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Happy Halloween!!