Stuck in the middle with you

 Hey friends!

I feel like I'm due for a new post, here!  Like usual, I'm not sure how to introduce things, so I suppose I'll just jump in!

I finished my handspun fire socks!

I didn't get one of the fancee pictures with the sock blockers, but I think you can see the effect nicely here anyway.  I adore the way these turned out.  And fortunately the temperature is finally starting to come down a ways.  Last week one of the highs during the day was 117!  (recorded at the elementary school)  And today the high is only 81! It hasn't been that cool since May. I actually don't mind summer all that much, but when you're talking weeks of 100+ degree weather, I get a bit cranky.  The place we're in right now has terrible insulation and it's expensive just doing the barest minimum staying comfortable. 

And speaking of moving house, I have a few updates on the house!

Here's where it was about two weeks ago, right around the time I last posted.

And here's where it was last week!

According to my house guy, we're about 6-8 weeks from the closing!  And as a result there's a bit of a rush for some last minute paperwork, which has been a real stress point for me.  But, we'll deal.

Worth it!

And while I'm on a roll with good news for my family, I wanted to shout out to Zac!  He got the promotion at work!  Last week it meant a few very shitty shifts between day, swing, and night shifts, and now he's doing quite the stretch of night shifts before getting a few days off.  Indeed, he's doing so much overtime in these few weeks that our moving expenses aren't going to be anything to worry about.  It's very exciting, but fairly exhausting, let's be honest.

Now, I did spend about 4 days replaying my favorite game that I'm sure you're all sick of hearing about. But afterward I jumped right back on my cross stitching:

I finished Freya yesterday!  And I started on Garnet/Dagger!  The transition was one of the most difficult things I've had to do for this.  The 'page' separations where I turned the picture into a pattern fell right between the two of them.  I should have made a separate pattern of this part, but alas, I did not. (and to be honest, I didn't even think about doing that until just now.  So here we are.)  I figured it out, as you can see, and I'm well on my way to finishing Dagger's hair!

Next will come our favorite man with a tail, Zidane, and I'll officially be halfway done with the characters!

In sock knitting news, I started some socks:

And finished the first one in about a week.  This was before Zac went on shift work. I love this yarn, by the way.  It's Must Stash Yarns in the Kama colorway, and it is delightful.  It's rainbow without being over the top rainbow. Also, I mentioned this with the other Must Stash yarn from a few months ago, but the skein comes in two identical 50 gram skeins, so the socks will be perfectly matching, which I love.

The second sock is about halfway down the leg now.  I pretty much only work on it while I'm picking Toby up from school, so it will take a bit longer than the first one.  But that's Ok.  I'm not rushing through things, I don't mind taking my time.

And that, my friends, is all that's going on in my life in the last few weeks.  The next few weeks are more of the same.  In the beginning of October, the kids will have a few weeks off of school, which will be nice.  Hopefully we'll have another walk-through of the house soon, and hopefully Zac will get some meaningful sleep in the meantime.

Cheers!