Almost wordless Wednesday

Extra layers for shoveling on Monday

This morning's commute - leaving us wondering if the thermometer stops at that temp

White stuff in January?

After several weeks - or at least what seemed like several weeks - without any white stuff, we had a delightful storm pass through last Friday. Light and fluffy, and not accompanied by any ice that disrupted our electricity. A delightful time was had by all.

The other white stuff on my radar is the counterpane.I've already decided that my Dallas trip this April will be accompanied by counterpane knitting.  The squares are small, portable, and I don't need the pattern. 

Except - I only have 15 squares left to knit.  And the borders, and the edging.  Those are going to be LONG strips, not anywhere near as nicely portable as the squares.  Not to be foiled in my travel knitting plans, I decided to seam together the 64 squares I had done, calculate how long a border needed to be, and start work on those. 

The observant reader will notice that 64 squares + 15  = 79, a very odd number of squares to need.  That's because seaming a queen-sized counterpane - in white - is NOT appropriate knitting for stationary bicycling, so I started, and finished, a 65th square.

Based on photos in Mary Walker Phillip's Counterpane book, the border seems to be seamed to the bias edge of the squares at about a 3:5 ratio. And since there are 159 rows in a square, that translates 1064 rows in a border.  With 47 stitches per row - maybe 21 hours for a short border?  Maybe a bit more, since the bobbles and wheat ears do add stitches , and there's a lot of turning. 

In other news, Filia and I have finished the Third Degree Martial Arts Black Belt Sudoku book.  We've had fun, and have some new strategies firmly in our store of tricks.  We've a fresh book of 300 puzzles to start tonight, and a goal - master the Y-Wing!

Until next time ...

First Finished Object of 2019

The subtitle of this post could well be "What a difference a dyelot makes".

Just over a week before Christmas, it came to my attention that Filia's favorite mittens were getting rather threadbare. I mended the hole which called this fact to my attention, and decided to knit her a new pair for Christmas.  And when one has 8 days to knit a pair of mittens (and live the rest of one's life), of course, one picks a nice Norwegian design in fingering yarn on size 1 needles, and uses yarn from the stash. 

But I ran out.  And ordered more, knowing that there's likely be a dyelot difference.  The base wool would be from a different shearing, as well.  Still -- what's a mitten without a thumb and a tip?  In Minnesota?  It's not a mitten. 

The yarn arrived with all deliberate speed, and Filia now has proper mittens, making them the first Finished Object of 2019!

Mending has also been happening.  My 2016 Sanquhar gloves were getting a bit thin in the thumb, so I duplicate-stitched a small area before anything actually became a hole.  While those were in the mending pile, I wore a different pair of gloves...

And they, too, attracted my attention for mending.  I reknit the thumb (it had been previously mended) and added some reinforcement to the other thumb, which hadn't given way - yet.

My goal of thrift/recycle/tossing an item each day has been happening, as have technique exercises on the harp.  Current audiobook is Augustine's Confessions (which is going along MUCH better than trying to read the Great Books version, in which I bog down in the second paragraph). 

Until next time ...

Happy New Year!

Reading Challenge 2018 was successfully completed, thanks to the library's prompt sending of and postal delivery of Arabella of Mars.  I'm all set for 2019 with the Modern Mrs Darcy's reading categories, and may well save A Gentleman in Moscow for my Christmas Eve reading this year.

Although I'd like to call the Sanquhar gloves my first finished object of 2019, they were finished in 2018, on the 29th.  And my next finished object was also finished in December. When the calendar changed to 2019, I had no projects on the needle.  

Twined Fingerless Mitts

That's only because I was between squares on the counterpane.  59 squares down, 21 to go -- and then the borders, and then perhaps an edging. My counterpane listening is The Laughing Cavalier, by Baroness Orczy.  I've two chapters left, and am looking forward to my listening time today.  There's a damsel in distress to rescue!

Today's thing to ponder: "Give heed to yourself..."  What an interesting way to start an instruction.  It's not "give heed to this instruction", but "give heed to yourself".  And so I contemplate -- why?   And what's the etymology of 'give heed' anyway?  What's a heed?  

Destashing 2019 is moving along nicely.

Happy New Year, dear reader!