"A Lot Goes On"

Well, friends, I'm back so to speak. I haven't been doing much knitting, but at least I am feeling things calm down. Soon the universe will line up the way I like it and I can feel good about knitting, spinning, and tea drinking again.

Well, the tea drinking always felt good. Right now my obsession is Ume Konbucha, which is a powdered tea made from kelp, umeboshi, and salt. It's not an everyday kind of tea, but kind of fun to share with friends as it is a bit of a shock to the tastebuds. For most people "salty" and "tea" don't mix, that's all. :) Supposedly, it's good for you...seaweed and all...

I've been a bit adventurous with my spinning as well, which means I've tried a new technique. Navajo plying. It was one of those things that I couldn't figure out when I was thinking about it, but once I just said "screw it" and gave it a try, I immediately understood. It's not anywhere near perfect I'm sure, but here is the result of my first attempt:


That's only about 42 yards. I have a singles left over that will probably create about the same length of navajo plied yarn, plus roving that I never got around to spinning up. I will eventually.

I got a new spindle:


oooh, purty...

And no, I haven't been knitting very much at all lately. I ripped back my mother's shirt and have been trying to focus on it. However, instead of working on it (which I realized I hated doing) I didn't work on anything at all, not even other projects. I still need to rip back my Icarus to the place where it snagged and ripped about 10 rows down. That is my knitting goal for this week. Ripping Icarus. Poor Icarus, always facing certain doom. My hero.

Also, a little birdie told me (that's you, Captain!) that there will be a World Wide Knit in Public Day event in Chicago this Saturday. I had no idea there was such a thing and I will not be able to resist! This is my real motivation for ripping the Icarus. I really want to be able to work on it on Saturday! It's quite an easy pattern and I'll be able to "socialize" (hah!) while not screwing it all up. lol. I'm going to try to sucker some of my "non-knitting-but-with-a-desire-to-learn" friends into coming too. There might be Rum??

Speaking of ripping, we ripped out our carpet and now have nice wood-lookin' laminate flooring. Already, the air feels much cleaner. Today, I have to put everything back in it's place. Just looking at my progress so far, I can see that this will take a lifetime. Ugh, and I have to clean in the process. But all is well, because I have snazzy new floors and a smile on my face!

It's not only the floors that has me smiling. Someone got accepted into a master's program!!!! I can't wait to register for my first classes (July 23 is registration, I believe), although paying for them will be interesting. Soon, I will be well on my way to a dazzling career in Library and Information Science! Woot! My goal is to work with rare collections, possibly/preferably in a museum. Sigh...that would be heaven...