Textileophile

The last week or so has been a whirlwind.  I've been packing a bit every day and finally the end is in sight.  There's quite a bit of spare time though, in the evenings.  So, there's been crafting time, indeed. I finished my hat from last time:   This is White Frost by Babette Ulmer. And then I worked quite monogamously on socks for my MIL: This is just the first one.  The second one has a cuff and about three rounds. And then a few days ago I picked up my cross stitching for the first time in awhile: I am very pleased with the progress on my new cross stitch lady.  I've been doing quite a bit of jumping around and changing colors frequently, but progress is being made. And finally yesterday I went down to my Local Yarn Store (LYS) for one last time and got one last local yarn souvenir.   So, maybe I went a little overboard.  But to be fair (to be fair, to be fair, to be fair), there isn't an LYS near where I'm moving.  Plus, I've been packing the whole hous

We're about to enter the thick of everything.  I have movers scheduled, flights booked and I am ready.  But I still have some down time.  Starting this process so early has ensured that.  Unfortunately, I've been so stressed, it's really hard to settle myself. I always have my sweater to work on, and I'm about 6 inches down the body.  I put that on hold for a few days to work on some mittens.  I had a pair of Chrysanthemum mittens that I made a few years ago.  The yarn was, I don't know, I think it was too soft.  Which sounds insane, but it was an odd quality.  And the mittens themselves, while beautiful, didn't really fit all that well.  So, when I was running short of dark gray yarn on the gold and gray socks I finished in January, I borrowed some from the mittens. But that meant I don't have those ill-fitting mittens anymore. A few weeks ago, I ordered some yarn to make more mittens.  I was going to do a different pattern, but these ones had a certain pul

 Everyone I've been talking to has said I'm as busy as a bee. They certainly aren't wrong.  I finished the enormous task of painting the house (well, touching up where it needed it, I'm not insane!)  It was a lot of work though. I've finished getting rid of all the big things I can't do alone as well as several dozen bags of stuff I don't want to bring with us.  All I have left is to pack the rest of my stuff. busy bee, indeed. Well, this bee needs a break now and then! I've been working a lot on my Nightscape sweater.  The upper front and back pieces have been joined and it's a tube of knitting at the moment: This is actually a fairly color accurate representation. I'm working on this sweater in a helical fashion to minimize pooling. Pooling is a phenomenon where certain tones or colors end up collecting together in a part of the knitted fabric.  It can be a neat effect in socks, sometimes spiraling around the leg.  I don't worry about pooli