Unraveled, Week 2/2023

I cannot tell you how many times today I have checked that it is, in fact, Wednesday. I started doubting it last night, when I took that trash can out (our pickup day is Wednesday) and noticed that none of our neighbors had done so yet. It's another one of those weeks when I am so busy with work that I lose track of what day it is! But thankfully technology has reassured me. It is Wednesday, and that means it's time for my weekly link-up with Kat and the Unravelers.

A couple of you expressed surprise last week that I had only one active WIP -- I was surprised myself! So I think it will come as a shock to no one that I cast on another project. It's a Beeswax Hat (Ravelry link) for charity -- a pattern I have been meaning to make for years!

I am about halfway through the main chart and hope to make some more progress during a Zoom staff meeting later today. Also pictured is Rainbow's second Felici sock, which, as you can see, is to the heel. I'm hoping to get through the heel and maybe the gusset before tomorrow evening so that I can have some good mindless knitting for a board meeting.

The yarn I am using for the hat is from a set of five DK-weight tweedy skeins I bought from Fibernymph Dye Works when Lisa was having her end-of-year sale in December (everything was 30% off, so I didn't feel too guilty). I do not have a lot of full skeins of solids/semisolids in my stash, especially as Rainbow has been using my scraps, and one of my goals this year is to knit more charity hats, so these fit in perfectly. Here are the rest of the skeins in the set:

I figure I'll use all the bright colors first and then incorporate some leftovers from them into whatever I make with the black.

I've also been spinning! I finished up my first bobbin of singles for the year and yesterday wound them into a center-pull ball so I can ply:

Though my reading time has been curtailed because of work busy-ness, the reading I have been doing this past week has been excellent. I've finished two very good books:

Though initially the predicted wait time for the 18th Inspector Gamache book was several months at my library, they wisely acquired more copies and the wait shrank significantly. And this was one I could not put down! A World of Curiosities centers on a case in the present time but also gives a significant view into the past and the first case Gamache and Beauvoir worked together. A great deal is revealed about their relationship, and as the relationships between the characters I've come to love so much are my favorite parts of this series, that made me very happy. The case itself was also brilliantly done and kept me guessing. This might be my favorite Gamache book yet! I gave it 5 stars.

The 12th book in the Maisie Dobbs series, Journey to Munich, takes us to Germany in 1938. Maisie has once again been enlisted by acquaintances in the British Secret Service to take on a case, this time posing as the daughter of a man imprisoned in Dachau who is valuable to the British government. Maisie soon has the opportunity to see just how dangerous things are becoming in Germany and for all of Europe. I listened to the audiobook over several days and found it to be quite entertaining and even a bit suspenseful. I'm already starting to dread getting to the end of the series, though I'm also eager to see how things go for Maisie! I gave this one 4 stars.

While I await my next hold from the library, I'm continuing to slowly make my way through The Transit of Venus. I'm about a quarter of the way through and am hoping to have more time to sit with it this weekend; this is a book that cannot be rushed through!

What are you making and reading this week?