Grungy Basement and 16 Handknit Socks

Sorry for showing you my grungy basement. Hey, it's dry and functional, and that's really all I ask. But, I am very grateful for the little green bar someone hung up there a while ago. It's the perfect spot to hang 16 socks to dry at once!

My sis bought me that little octopus years ago at Ikea. I love it to bits.

So, I haven't dropped off the face if the earth, and I've been knitting socks.

A Little Spinning

I'm still trying to figure things out, but life is getting closer to normal. Which means, when my awesome sister sends me beautiful Coopworth wool dyed with indigo from the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, I can spin some of it without everything else going off the rails. 

So, I did. Hooray! I can't wait to ply it. (In return, I sent her some Ply magazines, and she loved them! You might, too. Go check them out.) 

Sometimes I Agree With Travis

Things are starting to settle down now, but it will probably be a while before things feel normal. I don't remember having this much trouble getting a house put back together before. Then again, maybe I'm feeling more pressure because I have more happening in other areas of my life than I did. I love the new direction my career is taking, but it is definitely a different kind of headspace.

Some days, I agree with my little scaredy-cat Travis.

I like it under the covers. It's nice there.

One thing I haven't found: the hard drive with all of the Journal Gazette Crafty Living patterns on it. I might have to spend some serious time downloading pdfs in the next few weeks! That will teach me not to back up to the cloud.

Modeknit Socks: Finished!

We bought a house! And moved into it! And now I have to climb over boxes to get to the coffee, but that's ok. 

Moving is a lot of work, but I'm excited about making a home again. Our apartment was really just a badly-jumbled collection of STUFF, not a real home. 

One thing that has helped with the craziness is my lovely pair of Modeknit socks. I knit a lot of plain, black socks. I'll admit - at first, those snazzy pops of color kind of freaked me out. But, I'm absolutely in love with them and I get a real kick out of seeing them on my feet. 

The pattern is unpublished but is based on a set of patterns I hope you will all be able to see before the end of 2014. 

I'm going to try to get back to blogging regularly. But, until all of the boxes are gone, I don't think it will be every day.

Yarnover!

If you have never been, you should go, because Yarnover is awesome! I didn't take very many pictures and I can only think it's because I was very overwhelmed. Basically, fibery vendors and teachers took over a local high school for a day. It's amazing. 

I took a Designing Cables class with Fiona Ellis. It was wonderful. She's a very clear teacher and her designs are beautiful. At the end of class, she had a little show-and-tell of some of her designs. She really blew my mind. 

I managed to only buy a little art batt from a (sort of) local sheep farm: Diamond D Farm. I can't find a website for them, but their information is listed here. I would have loved to shop a lot more, but we're moving from the apartment to our new house in less than a week and I'm starting to see every object in the apartment as an obstacle!

I stopped by the Modeknit booth to say hi to everyone and rave about my socks in progress. They should be finished very soon if I get any time at all to knit over lunch. 

I Got to Spin!

I finally unpacked ALL OF THE BOXES and decided to let myself spin for a bit! 

I have a different work schedule now, which means more time for myself and family at night - but it also means re-working when I will work on knit designs and spinning. Before, I always did all of that stuff in the morning before I went to work. 

The good news: even after a month off, it went pretty well. My little ladybug still rocks! 

A Big Part of Moving

A big part of moving, for me, is having to regain some of the things you can't take with you (like good friends and knitting groups) and replacing things you didn't bring for reasons of space and expense (like dish detergent and that couch we both hated, anyway). 

When I was packing some things for storage and some things to bring, I knew we would have less space in the apartment than in the house. We ended up with a little more than 1/4 of the square footage we had, so it's good that I was stingy about what I brought. I was a little crazy at the end of the move, so we ended up with fewer plates than we actually need (and tons of silverware, for some reason) in the apartment.

But, there are some things I simply can't do without. For a little while, when most of our stuff was still in boxes, I was worried that I had thrown out my precious bottles of Soak. Certainly, not irreplaceable. Not even all that expensive. I even found out with LYS here carries it, so I could go get it when I had a few minutes. 

This is a long-winded way of saying that I was entirely too excited when I finally found my little bottle, in the last box I unpacked. That's one less errand I have to do, because goodness knows I couldn't have lived without it!

Back

We made the move to the Twin Cities right at the change of the year. So far, despite the usual frustrations of moving, it's been a series of magical (if cold) experiences, including a snowy walk across Lake Harriet. 

There were a lot of wonderful opportunities in Fort Wayne. I made great friends, knit a lot, and grew a lot. But, I was always watching the horizon for the next sailing ship. Here, we're planning on putting down deep roots. 

I'm looking forward to seeing what the rest of 2014 brings us!

Boomer Says It's His Sock Now

I know it's hard to deal with moving sometimes. Your whole life is turned upside down and about 80% of your stuff will be in storage for a while. So, who can blame the kitty for wanting to cling to something, even if it is a lovely hand knit sock you want to keep your foot warm? (It's a secret pattern, for now...)

Safety First

Always buckle in your wheel on the road! :)

Almost Ready for the Road

Empty closet: the least embarrassing-looking area of our house at the moment.

Preparing to leave is always exciting, but strange. I love the life we have built here, but I'm looking forward to the next step, too. 

(BTW, that photo is square because I'm on Instagram, now. It's fun!)

Peace Fleece is Awesome

Hat knit in Peace Fleece, lined with another hat knit from random thrift-store boucle. Keeping me ridiculously warm and happy since the year 2000. Shown here repelling water (snow) through the power of 25% mohair.

Five, er, Seven Books

This is a photo of most of my knitting books. I'm trying to make myself pack only 5 or 7 for the apartment. The rest will come on a moving van after the house sells. 

Which five (or seven, I think five might not be realistic) of your books would you keep out? I'm definitely taking The Principles of Knitting and one or two Elizabeth Zimmermann books. Oh, and a few sock books. 

Soundtrack

We're getting ready to move. Soon. I haven't reached the point where I want to just take the cats, knitting, weaving, and spinning supplies and abandon everything else, but it's out there. It's coming.

I play Never Mind the Bollocks Here's the Sex Pistols on loop on my iPod. My copy was dubbed onto a tape from vinyl by my sister when we were in high school. About 5 years ago, I made a digital copy of the tape. It sounds smeary and strange compared to all of the crystal-clear downloaded versions of songs I have, but I don't want to replace it.

How do you keep going? Punk rock music from before I was born is my motivating vehicle of choice. Oh, and this version of Don Giovanni. Sometimes The Ting Tings or The Gossip make it in there. I know. I'm a bit strange.