Unraveled, Week 31/2024

It's the last day of July, and it's a Wednesday, so that means it's time to check in with Kat and the Unravelers. And I'd like to start off by introducing you to a new friend:

Friends, meet Ann Hatch It*, my Emotional Support Chicken. Like me, she loves nothing more than curling up with a good book. She's also a little bottom heavy like me (ha) thanks to a bag of poly pellets inside to help her sit upright. I made her a little more petite than my last one, in part because the yarn I was using was a bit thinner but also because I went down to a US 5/3.75 mm needle for a tighter fabric. I am quite happy with that decision, as I don't really need an enormous stuffed chicken (but a smaller one is okay).

I used yarn from two local dyers (both of whom are friends, too!). The variegated gray was a one-of-a-kind skein that I won from Lisa of Fibernymph Dye Works as part of her yearly make-along. The burgundy is HipStrings Buoy DK leftover from this sweater. Mo gave me a bit of acrylic yarn she had leftover from a crochet project for the beak. As I did in the first one, I omitted the wattle from mine; I don't think it's needed and would be likely to get pulled off easily if I made it, so I just left it off.

In knitting this pattern a second time, and anticipating that I very well might knit it again, I'm glad that I made notes on it the first time around so that I had some guideposts along the way. I wouldn't call it a very well-written pattern, or at least it's not written the way I would write it, but I know what I'm doing with it now. This time around, I'm making some notes to myself about leaving some of the ends un-woven-in so that I can use them in the sewing up.

Now that Ann is done, the only project I have on the needles is a rather boring pair of socks for my father-in-law. That means I'll likely be casting on something new soon.

Reading has been good the past week, though I have only finished one book:

The Ministry of Time is the next Read With Us selection, and I've been looking forward to reading it. I'm glad that I bought it on Kindle because it's the kind of book I have a feeling I'm going to want to go back and read. I know a lot of you have either already read this or are planning to read it ahead of our RWU discussion, so I won't get into the plot or too much discussion because I don't want to give too much away. I will say that I really enjoyed it, I think mainly because the writing felt to me more like a book from the 18th or 19th century (very much my comfort zone), and I thought it was really smart, which I always appreciate. Although a lot of what I've read about this book seems to be focused on the time travel aspect, I think the author really has some interesting and meaningful things to say about displacement and being a refugee, whether that's in your own time or a different time. This would have been a five-star read for me had things not fallen apart a bit at the end, which I didn't feel fit with the rest of the book, so I gave it 4 stars. I'm looking forward to our discussion and to rereading it (eventually!) because there is a lot going on it in and I know a discussion will make me appreciate it more.

I'm still keeping up with my weekly pages in A Suitable Boy, and I've started reading Persepolis, which my brother gave me for my birthday this year, on paper and True Biz on Kindle. They're both books I've been wanting to read, but I got the kick in the pants I needed from a summer bingo from a podcast I recently started listening to. They'll fulfill squares for "Read a book in translation" and "Read something by or about a person with a disability," respectively.

That's all I've got, folks! Today my in-laws are moving to their new condo, so tonight we'll be taking dinner to them because I'm sure they'll be exhausted and overwhelmed. Frankly, as it's supposed to be hot and humid today and it's a running day for me, I'm sure I'll be feeling much the same.

*The accepted practice for these chickens seems to be giving them a punny name, so I decided to get some inspiration from one of my favorite writers.