T-minus 48 hours*

So far we are still on deck for our vacation. We did home covid tests yesterday just for reassurance (both negative), and had our ”official” lab tests this morning to enable us to get on a cruise ship by the end of the week.

This is my retirement trip, delayed from last summer due to covid. If anything screws this up, I may need to be put into restraints. We do have trip insurance, so if those covid tests surprise us, we’re covered. BUT. I’d be really pissed off. We’ve been REALLY careful about exposure in the past few weeks.

So, where are we going? We decided on a Scandinavian/Baltic cruise. We fell in love with Viking cruises when we did one just before the pandemic shutdown, and signed up for this before that cruise was over. We fly into London, spend a couple of days there, then the cruise goes to Scotland for a few stops. The majority of the trip is along the northern Norwegian coast, going up to the Arctic Circle before heading back, then to Denmark, one stop with a bus trip to Berlin, a stop in Gdansk, Poland, ending up in Sweden. We disembark in Stockholm. We’re making a short stop in Iceland on the flight back. We’ll be gone close to five weeks. The ship was supposed to dock in St. Petersburg, but obviously that’s not happening.

I have everything staged to pack. Not surprisingly, I’ve agonized more over the knitting/spinning projects than anything else. I do believe that there may be a few yarn-acquisition opportunities on the cruise (Shetland islands, all of Norway!). So I’m trying to not overpack and leave a little room for souvenir yarn.

After some dithering, here are the spinning projects I’m taking:

Fingers crossed for those Covid tests!

*And yes, the house, the cats, and the yarn stash will be carefully guarded while we’re away-we have a house sitter!

Mine Hill Cardigan

Oh my!! Another finished project!

Project Details

  • Pattern: Mine Hill Cardigan. This is another CustomFit design; you choose the basic pattern, which then uses your specific gauge and body measurements that you’ve entered.
  • Yarn: John Arbon Appledore DK, color Sheep’s Nose
  • Needles: 3.25 mm
  • Started/Finished: July 28, 2021/June 16/2022
  • For: Me
  • Rating: *****/***** for yarn and pattern. The yarn is wonderful. It’s a sheepy, slightly rustic yarn, which knit up into a nice, drapey fabric. The Custom Fit patterns are no-nonsense, no-handholding, but clear and straightforward. I’m also amazed at the fit of the sweaters that I’ve made using this method. I always tend to knit sweaters that are too big for me. The whole time I was knitting this, I was quite sure that it wasn’t going to fit, but there you are.
  • What I Learned: I’m learning more about sweater fit with each of these sweaters that I make. Baggy sweaters aren’t flattering for most people. I’m also learning how to be more particular about my finishing work. My seams aren’t perfect, but they are getting better. I’m also getting more selective about choosing patterns that I will actually wear. This will be one of those closet staples that will get a lot of use.

This is a tough color to photograph, especially since my corner of western Washington apparently didn’t get the memo that it is summertime. It’s in the mid-50’s and overcast here today, which makes taking pictures chancy. If we ever see sunshine again, I’ll get a photo outdoors so you can see the true color. Here it is still skeined up, which shows the color better:

And a close up of the front stitch pattern:

One last photo. We might be going somewhere next week.

Stay tuned!

Hansel Hap

Finally, the mystery project has been gifted, so I can show you what I’ve been up to.


It’s a baby blanket!

Project Details

Pattern: Hansel, by Gudrun Johnston

Yarn: Miss Babs Yummy 2ply, various colors

Started/Finished: February 2022/June 2022

For: Steph and Paraj’s baby girl

This is the medium size, and is plenty big for a baby blanket. I didn’t add the lace border, since it was big enough without, and I was running short on time. This is a straightforward, easy pattern, really only basic knitting skills required. The pattern was easy to follow. This would make a nice shawl also, there might be yarn in my stash for another one.
The baby isn’t here yet, but I’ve done my part.

Here’s one more photo.

Great big fun

I had a little out of town trip over the weekend. My great-niece Elise graduated from high school in Sacramento, and I flew down to join the festivities. Fun was had by all. Here are a few photos.

There weren’t a lot of masks in evidence, either on the airplanes, or in Sacramento. I’ve only been home for two days, but so far I’m testing negative for Covid. We have a big trip coming up in late June, so from here on out John and I will be trying to isolate as much as possible. This is my retirement trip that got postponed from last summer due to Covid, so I’m going to be really pissed off if it gets canceled again. More on that in a future post.

I have all the pieces for my newest sweater finished and blocked. I started seaming things together last night. I have one sleeve in, and am sewing up the side seam. Once it’s put together, there is a wide band that goes up and around the fronts, I suppose that will take forever, but I’m beginning to see the light at the end of the sweater tunnel. I might even have this finished to take on our trip. here’s a photo.

Those clip things to hold pieces together for seaming are one of the great knitting-world inventions. I tossed the packaging long ago, so have no idea of the brand or where I got them, but they really do make lining things up much easier.

I’m off to do more sewing! I do have a great big finished project to show you, but it is a surprise, so it needs to be gifted first.

Glitter pigeon

Or, here’s what I’ve been spinning lately.

My phone camera really doesn’t do justice to the beauty of that fiber. The fiber is from Abby’s Yarns, and is 50% merino, 49% silk, and 1% firestar. It looks pretty grey, but in natural light it has little highlights of pale green and lavender. And glitter, like a sparkly pigeon.

And how about that pretty spindle? That is a Greensleeves, a Damsel Monique. It holds a ton of yarn, yet is very lightweight considering the size of the whorl.

Glitter pigeon is the color name that Abby gave this. Just like a real pigeon, it looks like boring grey until you catch it in just the right light.

I promised you a new sock

That’s the yarn I hauled out of deep stash (aka the ”my precious” collection). It’s from Elliebelly yarns, though she sadly is no longer dyeing yarn. The color is Viper, and it really does look a bit like snakeskin knitted up.

These socks will be for me. I only wish I’d collected more of her yarn while it was available.

Blocking day

I’m getting closer to a finished sweater here. I have half a sleeve left to knit, and decided to block the other finished pieces this morning so I’m ready to start assembling.

This is the Mine Hill Cardigan, I’m knitting it up in John Arbon’s Appledore yarn, which is just gorgeous. Those photos show it mostly as grey, but it is a lovely light grey-blue heather color.

Here is the pattern photo so you can see what it will look like. I’m doing the sleeves longer, but otherwise it’s knit as written. Oh, and no pockets. This is a rather light, drapey yarn, and I think pockets would just be saggy. Saggy pockets are worse than no pockets.

That front band will take a little time, but I should have a finished sweater to wear soon! Here’s the other sleeve in progress.

New socks!

I did finish the Ukrainian flag socks last night. As usual, they are a welcome addition to my collection. Though my sock drawer runneth over, some of those pairs are perilously close to wearing through at the heels, and I have way too much sock yarn in the stash to spend time darning socks. I’d much rather cast on a new pair. I do have a pair of John’s socks on my desk that need a new toe, but that’s just reknitting, not mending, so that is acceptable.

Here are the finished new ones:

The color in photos looks a little bumblebee-ish, but it is really blue and sunflower yellow, not black and yellow.

The yarn is Biscotte Bis-sock, color Minions. I knit these with my in-my-head top down-flap & gusset heel pattern. I used Hiya Hiya bamboo double pointed needles, size 2.00mm. I’ve played around with different brands of dpn’s over the years, often claiming that “these are my very favorites”, but these really are among the best. They are lightweight, with very sharp tips, and seem durable. The current pair has lasted through at least a half dozen pairs of socks, and don’t seem to be particularly fragile. And there has been no fraying of the tips. I also love my Lykke dpns and will keep those in rotation as well.

And no, it absolutely does not bug me that my socks are usually fraternal twins. There isn’t enough time in the day for me to try to match stripes exactly.

So there you are. I’ve already started the next pair. The yarn is from deep stash, you’ll just have to wait until I have a few rounds done to see what’s next.

One toe short

I fell off the blogging traincar for awhile there. Part of it is the general ennui that accompanies the grey and rainy spring we’ve had. No doubt some of it is all the political turmoil that has been sucking the soul out of everybody I know. It’s pretty easy to get dragged down into the news/social media cesspool these days. I finally decided to just delete my twitter account last week. There’s one less thing to be outraged over.

Another reason for the post-avoidance is the blog mess that happened two years ago when the blog got hacked, then I lost a whole bunch of photos when I managed to get it up and running again. I’ve been trying to upload those photos to the correct blog posts, but it’s a tedious process, and some of them have been unrecoverable. I decided last week to say just fuck it, and leave the old posts as is. Probably nobody goes back to look at those, and I do have project photos on Ravelry if anyone does get some burning desire to see them. It’s a bit like mourning a favorite possession that you’ve lost. Sometimes it’s just time to move on.

I have been knitting, but mostly I’ve been working on a secret baby project. Said baby is due in June, and I should be on track to finish that on time, as long as I don’t get all distracted and cast on dozens of new projects.

Those socks up there should be done by the end of the day today. I now have a sock drawer stuffed full of hand knit socks, which makes me a very happy person.

I have almost that many more in the sock laundry bin. And of course, John has his own sock drawer.

Next time I’ll drag out the other things I’ve been working on!

Happy blogiversary to me!

Oops. I actually let this one slip by me. 18 years ago yesterday, I did my first blog post! I’ve been a slacker for the past year, not for lack of knitting. I think part of it is that I’m a slow knitter in general. Endless posts about the same sock can get a bit boring. ”Oh WOW! I knit another four rows!”

I also still haven’t gotten out of the mode of keeping much of my personal thoughts and day to day activities private. I still remember the incident where I posted about being sick (“having the plague” was the phrase I used), and had a clinic manager get their knickers in a knot over it. There is also the pandemic, and being stuck at home for much of the past year. It doesn’t give one much exciting to report.

But 18 years! That’s a lot of blogging. And hopefully with spring here, and the pandemic looking at least a bit better, I’ll have more to talk about.

For now, you get this.

It’s a bag. With a knitting project in it. A secret knitting project that I can’t show you because it is a gift. It’s a gift with a deadline, so it’s pretty much all I’ve been working on, and I can’t even show it to you.

Here’s a tiny peak.

It will have a lot more pretty colors than that when it is finished.

I know that someone will ask about the bag, so here it is.

I got this on Etsy, but you can find similar bags all over online. Just google “bento knitting bag” and you’ll find lots of options. It’s a single layer cloth bag to hold a project. It stuffs nicely into whatever larger knitting bag you are toting around, and it keeps your project from being snagged on other things in your main bag. I highly recommend these.

Maybe I’ll go knit on that sock a bit so I have something to show you next time.

Tits Up!

Finished socks! The yarn is Adorn sock yarn, from Three Irish Girls. The color name is Tits Up!, which is from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel tv series. I love the show, so I had to buy the yarn.

I used the same pattern-in-my-head that I always use. 2.00 mm needles, as usual. Nothing fancy, just plain socks.

Here is where I am on the Get Out of Ukraine Socks.

The colors are more Ukraine Flag by Starlight than the real flag colors, but I like it.

And here’s a blast from the past.

Pretty exciting, eh? The really exciting part is that is the beginning of a sweater sleeve. Here are the rest of the sweater pieces.

Fronts and back done. I just have the sleeves and the front bands to do and this will be a finished sweater. This has been marinating a bit, but I’m determined to finish it soon. It will be a nice in-between-seasons piece to wear in the spring.

That’s what the finished sweater will look like, although I’m making the sleeves longer. And I still haven’t decided on the pockets. I think I’d like the line of the sweater better without the pockets right over my hips, which certainly don’t need any accentuating.

I do love this yarn. It is Appledore DK, by John Arbon Textiles. It is one of those yarns that would work knit up into a wide gauge range. I’m trying to restrain myself from buying more of this in some other colors. I think it would make a lovely shawl. Or two.

Stay tuned!

Deep stash

Like (almost) everybody else in the world, I’ve been bummed out by the situation in Ukraine. The Meske side of my ancestry comes from a part of what used to be called Bessarabia, now in southern Ukraine, near Odessa. Here is where my great-grandparents emigrated from.

The pencil point is on the area where both sets of great-grandparents on my dad’s side came from. So I’m sure that I have very distant relatives in the middle of this war somewhere. The whole thing is just depressing, and maddening at the same time.

I’ve been knitting in the midst of watching all this unfold on the news. I decided that I needed some socks in the colors of the Ukraine flag. I had a shopping cart ready to hit the ”buy” button, and then had the bright idea to check my stash. 🙄

I think that will do nicely. It is Biscotte Bis-sock, in the color Minion. I bought this on a vacation to Newfoundland several years ago, and it’s been waiting for just the right moment.

The banjos have stopped*

Wintergrass is wrapped for another year. It was a great festival, with a nice variety of music styles, and a diverse cast of performers. It’s tough to pick a favorite, so I won’t. This is the first time in two years we’ve been out doing much of anything other than with our close family and friend ”pods”. It was REALLY nice to be in a concert venue with live music. The festival is in Bellevue, which is in King County to the north of us, and they are still requiring masks and proof of vaccination for indoor spaces. They also sold only about the half the usual number of tickets (intentionally), so we felt pretty safe, especially since the Covid numbers have dropped pretty dramatically here.

I did get some knitting done. Here’s the sock in progress.

I started the long weekend with just the cuff of that second sock started, so got about half a sock knit. I also worked on a secret project that will be a gift, so I can’t show it to you. That sock yarn is from Three Irish Girls, it is their Adorn sock yarn, color name ”Tits Up!” (reference to a character in Mrs. Maisel).

I realized while uploading that photo that I completely missed posting a finished project.

Those are socks for John. The yarn is John Arbon Exmoor Sock yarn, colors Mackerel Sky and Mizzle. It’s the same ”pattern” I always use for socks.

I really am going to try to be a better blogger. Really.

*That could be the first line in a banjo haiku.

I should just go back to bed

I woke up this morning after having a bad dream. I occasionally still get work dreams even though I’m retired. Usually, they involve being forced to go back to work in the hospital. Whoever is in charge gives me more patients to see than anyone else, and I can’t figure out how to get around the hospital or make the computer system work. (OK, that last was a reality most days at work when I was still doing hospital work.)

In this morning’s dream, I wasn’t feeling well, and finally keeled over and passed out on the floor in the middle of a busy clinic. Nobody paid any attention, just kept walking around me and going about their business.

On second thought, maybe I shouldn’t go back to bed.

Once I was awake, I looked at the news. The first piece I read was about how Republicans all over the country are targeting Dr. Fauci, to the point where he is getting death threats, as is his family. There was a link to an attack ad by some lunatic running for governor in Nebraska. I made the mistake of clicking on that link. You should too, so I’m not alone in my misery.

The next article I read is about the “big one” that is due to hit the Pacific Northwest any time now. It outlined in detail what will happen to all the people living on the Washington coast when the 9.0 earthquake hits us, as it eventually will.

Nice. Go back to bed, dream about work. Stay awake, brood about an earthquake and the massive wall of water loaded with houses and boulders headed my way.

I decided to get up and distract myself by reading knitting blogs. How depressing could that be?

And then straight away I dumped my cereal and milk on the kitchen floor.

I was planning on doing a few rows on that lace shawl that I’ve been working on forever. After the way the day has started, that is not happening.