Ready to Relax

I'm not quite on vacation (as in I'm not out of town just yet), but I'm officially on vacation from work until January 5, and that goes a long way toward helping me unwind! Ruthie is being picked up by the dog sitter later this morning, and Molly is done with school at noon, so this afternoon will be all about cleaning the house (so I don't have to do it when I come home) and packing. I plan to drop the handmade gifts off at my brother's later on, and this evening we're getting together with the Mister's brother and his family to do our gift exchange. Tomorrow we'll be up at what I'm now referring to as "OMG o'clock" to get the airport for our 6:45 a.m. flight. It's supposed to be sunny with a high of 81ºF in Naples tomorrow!

I have to share one gift I received from the Mister for Chanukah that I think you will all appreciate:

This can sit on my bookshelf and I can update the number as I finish books. It felt pretty fun to be able to start with a big number, but of course it'll all reset come January 1.

My knitting for vacation is mostly set, though I'll have to wind a lot of yarn today. I'm taking supplies for two design projects (both colorwork cowls, one using mini skeins), a hat for me, and a pair of socks for my mother. I figure if I finish all of that, I'll go to the local Michaels and get some kitchen cotton for dishcloths.

And that's where I'm going to leave things for now, because I've got a lot of things to get done today and I need to go to bed early! I hope you have a great weekend, and I'll be back on Monday with a full wrapup of the holiday knitting and perhaps some shots of sunny Florida.

Unraveled, Week 51/2025

This is my last Wednesday working this year(!), and I'm joining in with Kat and the Unravelers with a brief update because everything has been busy as I prepare to be on vacation for a couple of weeks.

Last week got so busy at work that I didn't finish all the knitting I'd hoped, but I do have one FO this week:

Pattern: Gnome News Is Good News by Sarah Schira
Yarn: Fibernymph Dye Works Beguiled (75% superwash merino, 20% nylon, 5% Stellina) in Love Notes, Fibernymph Dye Works Bona Fide (100% superwash merino) in Light Silver Green, and two mystery white yarns
Needles: US 3 (3.25 mm) and US 4 (3.5 mm)
Started/Completed: December 5/December 13
Mods: sized up

This gnome is a gift for my youngest nephew, and because he's only 2 1/2, I decided not to attach one of his hands to the end of his hat because I thought it was likely to get ripped apart. Other than that, my only real modification was to knit him in DK-weight yarn rather than the called-for fingering so that he would be a more playable size. The self-striping yarn I used for the body was technically a Valentine's Day colorway, but with the sparkle I thought it looked like a festive candy cane. And there's still a fair amount of it left, which brings to me my WIP:

This is the current state of my niece's Cat Stack. I decided to use the leftovers of the sparkly striped yarn for her largest cat, even if it's not quite cat colored. I'm nearly done with it and can also finish up the medium-sized cat soon (the stitch holder is keeping live stitches for the tail). I still have to find a third batch of yarn for the smallest cat, though I suppose if I'm making one that's pink and gray striped, it doesn't necessarily need to be a realistic cat color. Some digging in the stash will be required.

The aforementioned busy-ness at work has meant very little reading and I've only managed to finish one book. Never fear -- the two weeks when I read more than any other time in the year are coming!

I have a number of books in a "to read" list on Libby for when I want to start something but don't have time to look through long lists of available books, and that's how I ended up borrowing the audio of You Are Here. This is a quiet book where not a lot happens, but I like those sorts of books. It focuses on Michael, a geology teacher in the process of getting divorced from his wife following their struggles with infertility who has decided to walk across England, and Marnie, a divorced book editor from London who has been convinced to come on a hiking trip by a mutual friend. The two end up being the last of the party to continue the walk and find themselves with long days to fill with conversation, and as they traverse the varied terrain, they're able to reflect on some of their heartaches and life mistakes -- and perhaps imagine what might come in the future. The audiobook had two narrators, which make for an enjoyable listen. I gave it 3.5 stars, rounded up.

I've now got two days of work left, haven't started packing, and still want to finish the cats so they and the other handmade gifts can be delivered before we leave. Stay tuned to see if I can manage it!

Birthday Weekending

It was quite a weekend here -- birthday celebrations and a snowstorm! They were predicting snow for Saturday afternoon and night, but I think we ended up with more than anticipated. It's pretty, but it also got very cold, which meant the roads were a mess. Fortunately Molly's party wasn't affected, and we didn't have anywhere far to go on Sunday. Ruthie and I got bundled up to go for our walks!

The deepest snow was most of the way up her legs -- it's a good thing she didn't get the stumpy Jack Russell legs!

The view from the end of our street

It felt appropriate to stay in and bake during a cold, snowy weekend. One of Molly's friends stay over Saturday night, and they collaborated to bake a bûche de Noël to get extra credit in French class:

The swirl might not have been as pretty as the picture, but I was impressed! It tasted good, too (we got to eat the cut-off ends). Once the cake was done, I whipped up a batch of cookies for Molly to take to a potluck this week:

It seems a bit rude that both these baking projects made the house smell great and we don't get to enjoy them, but I'll survive.

Today, of course, is Molly's 16th birthday. Hard to believe it! She was not particularly excited about her birthday falling on a Monday, but it happens to all of us from time to time. It'll be a low-key birthday, not least because she's had three celebrations already. It's going to be a busy week for all of us -- she's got her holiday concert tomorrow evening, then has a math test and a research paper due the next day; the Mister has his work holiday party; I've got a dentist appointment -- but we just have to get through it and early Saturday morning we'll be on our way to vacation!

Five More Days

TGIF! What a long, chaotic week this has been. We've had rain, we've had snow, we've had wind. But it has not been without accomplishments. First, the commencement program is done! We had gremlins in the file that caused text to disappear and a comma to randomly appear where it wasn't wanted, but all the powers that be signed off on it and it was posted online Wednesday. Second, I successfully donated blood for the sixth time in 2025 yesterday. That's the first time I've ever managed to donate the maximum number of times in one calendar year, and it feels really good.

I've also finished most of a gnome:

All that's left is a beard, a nose, two arms, and two feet. Those all seem very likely to get done soon. What's less certain is whether my niece's Cat Stack will get done -- I'm only about halfway through the first cat. I'm hoping that once the gnome is done, I can focus more on the cats and see some real progress.

The title of this post is how many days of work I have remaining this year (I'm taking a few days of vacation to start the break early), and Molly has five and a half days of school remaining. But we have a lot to get through before we're officially on vacation! For starters, this evening we start a multi-day celebration for Molly's birthday. Tonight the three of us are going to to dinner with my in-laws. Tomorrow, Molly is have a small group of friends over for a birthday brunch, and then one is staying to sleep over that evening. On Sunday, we're getting together with my parents and my brother and his family for a joint birthday/Chanukah dinner. And Monday is her actual birthday, so I'll make whatever she wants for dinner.

It looks like it's going to be a snowy weekend here, so it will be good for staying inside and knitting cats. I hope you have something good planned, and feel free to use Molly's birthday as an excuse to have a treat!

Unraveled, Week 50/2025

It seems that once again I got off count in what number Wednesday it is, so my apologies if you got several weeks' worth of my posts in your feed or reader today; I just went back to correct the mistakes. At least all of those posts have appeared on Wednesday, and I'm here again this week to join in with Kat and the Unravelers.

This week is all about the gift knitting. I've started my nephew's gnome, which is being knit from the pattern Gnome News Is Good News. Because he's a toddler, though, I'm knitting in DK rather than fingering so that this gnome is more of stuffed animal than a shelf ornament. As usual, I'm so delighted by Sarah Schirra's creativity and smarts in her shaping.

The body is knit from a self-striping yarn from Fibernymph Dye Works that was created as a Valentine's Day colorway, but I thought it looked a bit like a candy cane. And while you really can't tell from the photo, it's sparkly! The hat is also FDW, Lisa's Bona Fide DK base in a semisolid light green. I'm likely going to use a fuzzy synthetic yarn for the beard -- something from a big box store that I bought for unknown reasons years ago.

I don't have a WIP photo yet, but I'm also working on a Cat Stack (Ravelry link) for my niece. They're essentially knit balls with faces, ears, and tails, and I think they'll be good for her to pick up and toss around.

The past week has been busy at work, but I've been able to finish three books thanks to two of them being on audio.

I've read my fair share of speculative fiction, but I'm fairly certain that Moon of the Crusted Snow is the first one I've read that set within an Indigenous community. It's fall, winter is coming, and in this Anishinaabe community in northern Ontario, the cable and then cell service have gone out. The landlines and power soon follow, and without any way to contact anyone outside the community, they can't know if this is a temporary or permanent situation -- until two teen boys who were in the city for school return and tell tales of chaos in the wider world. The community has a generator and an emergency store of food, but their fuel and food won't last forever. And then a white outsider shows up, but is he a white savior or the Windigo? This novel tells a bleak story, but there is hope in seeing a community come together and rely on their traditional knowledge to survive. I also greatly appreciated the use of an Indigenous reader for the audio, as he was able to read the Anishinaabe words and also capture the cadence that is so unique to Indigenous people. I gave it 4 stars -- and I think my reading experience was truly enhanced by listening primarily while I was outside in the winter weather!

I've been a fan of Steven Rowley's since reading The Guncle, and I've been wanting to read more of his backlist, so I took advantage of a Kindle deal not too long ago to buy Lily and the Octopus. This is a novel, but I imagine it's largely inspired by Rowley's experience with the loss of his dog, the real Lily. In this fictionalized account, the protagonist's beloved dachshund is terrorized not by a brain tumor byt by an actual octopus that has taken up residence on her head and is gradually taking away her life. In this world, Lily can talk to her owner (as can the octopus), and the two of them go to extremes to get the octopus to leave. While it gets a little over-the-top at one point, I found it to be a funny, touching, and also heartbreaking look at the bond between a person and their pet, especially when that beloved pet is that person's family. I'll admit I ugly-cried at the end, and if an animal dying is a no-go for you, you'll definitely want to skip this one. (I realize that's a bit of a spoiler, but given the dog's condition, which you know from the first chapter, it's pretty inevitable.) I wouldn't recommend this as widely as The Guncle, but I really enjoyed it -- and hugged my own puppy a little tighter at the end. I gave it 4 stars.

And speaking of trigger warnings, it takes real skill to make a book that deals with murder, suicide, the death of a child, alcoholism, divorce, and family estrangements funny and delightful, and that's what you get in The Road to Tender Hearts. PJ Halliday is an alcoholic in his 60s still mourning the accidental drowning of his teenage daughter. He's divorced but still friends with his ex-wife, who lives down the street from him and makes him breakfast every morning in addition to trimming all the sad stories out of the newspaper; PJ's already had three heart attacks and can't take any more bad news. But when his ex-wife leaves on a long trip with her boyfriend, PJ comes across an obituary for a former classmate -- who was married to a girl he's long thought of as the one who got away -- and he decides to drive to Arizona to woo her. Before he can leave, however, he finds that a orphaned pair of kids, his great-niece and great-nephew, have been left to him. And there's the slight complication that his license is still suspended from too many DUIs, so his estranged daughter, Sophie, is roped into coming along. As if this motley crew wasn't enough, they're joined by Pancakes the cat, who used to live at a nursing home and had a knack for predicting when someone was going to die soon and who showed up at PJ's house after breaking out of the animal shelter. As they drive from Massachusetts to Arizona, they all learn more about themselves and each other -- and they seem to dodge death regularly. This was excellent on audio. I gave it (you guessed it!) 4 stars.

What are you making and reading this week?

Felting, Finishing, and Failing a Little

It's Monday again, but I only have to work one more Monday after this one this year! And frankly I'm happy to have a day with a normal schedule after a weekend that was a bit all over the place.

On Saturday morning, Ruthie and I drove out to meet the woman who will be boarding her while we're away later this month. I'd gotten an anti-nausea medication from the vet ahead of time, but apparently it was no match for Ruthie delicate stomach, nor has she outgrown her carsickness yet. I felt so bad that I had to put her through a longer car ride twice, but the good news is that once we got there, there was another dog to play with and a big fenced-in yard to run around it. I'll get in touch with the vet to see if they have any more advice, but I think we may just need to not feed her before a car trip. (She got to have lunch when we got home, seeing as she didn't get much of a chance to digest breakfast, and she got some extra treats and extra snuggles as well. The only good thing about this situation is that as soon as we're out of the car, she's absolutely fine.)

As long as I was doing laundry (I had old towels under her in the car, as I always do), I decided to felt my mittens. Here's what they looked like freshly off the needles:

The pattern I used (Ravelry link) has you pick up and add the cuffs after felting. To ensure I had holes to pick those stitches up, I got out some cotton yarn and my crochet hook and worked it into the stitches all the way around the cast-on edge. I did single crochets into the fabric with a chain in between just to ensure I had enough wiggle room. The pattern just tells you to poke your needle through, but knowing how thick felted fabric can get, I though this would be easier. I promised Vera that I would share how I felt in the dryer, a method that I've found both works easier than using my front-load washer (because it can't be opened in the middle of the cycle to check on them) and that uses a heck of a lot less water. All you have to do is soak your item(s) to be felted so they're good and wet -- not dripping, but definitely soaked through. Then just toss them in the dryer with something else for some agitation. If you're worried about bleeding, use some old towels or jeans or anything that you don't care too much about. These went in first with the towels and then in the next load of laundry. Those two cycles were enough to felt the mittens sufficiently, and as I was already drying those two loads of laundry, they didn't require any extra effort or power. I let the mittens dry on the radiator overnight and then picked up and knit the cuffs yesterday. My apologies for the subpar photo of them, but I was trapped next to a sleeping dog at the time and knew the next chance I would have to take a photo before publishing this post would be after the sun had already set.

I knit the adult small, and they fit -- but only just. I think I may make another pair and make the next size up, which would allow me to wear some thin gloves underneath on the really frigid days. These knit up so quickly on such big needles that it won't take long at all to make another pair -- but only after gift knitting is complete, so maybe not until we're on vacation.

I had another finish this weekend in the form of the hat for my brother, which is done but not yet blocked.

As I was knitting it, I couldn't figure out why I needed a higher stitch count than usual. At the time, I figured my gauge was just a little tighter than normal, which wouldn't be that surprising given all the stress I've been under at work. But when I was pulling the needles out of the project bag to put them away, I realized what had happened. Do you see it?

The needles I usually use for this hat are US 2.5, or 3 mm. A US 2.5 is not the same as a 2.5 mm, which is what I grabbed to use for the crown increases and decreases. And because the hat starts with a crown and it determines the stitch count for the entire hat, that meant that I was using a smaller diameter needle, leading to smaller stitches, leading to needing more of them. That means the resulting hat is probably a little wider than it needs to be. I'm not about to rip it out and start over, but when I block it, I will stretch it out a lot to make it narrower and longer. That should make it fit better and also enable my brother to have enough fabric to fold up an extra brim. And I have learned that I need to read labels a bit more carefully!

This week is shaping up to be another busy one, but at least the big commencement project should be wrapping up toward the beginning of it. Wednesday is my office holiday party, sort of -- they're asking all of us to bring in food for a potluck and cookies to share, which is a far cry from the holiday parties we used to have. That day we'll also be wrapping gifts for a local childcare center for which we sign up to "elf" for. The kid I shopped for is 2 and wanted balls and Pittsburgh-themed clothing, so that's exactly what I bought. Including today, I have nine more days of work this year!

Recent Reads

For a brief period of time yesterday, I was caught up at work, but that came too late for me to get these book reviews into my Unraveled Wednesday post. Lucky for you, I have time for them today -- and the delay allowed me to finish another book!

One of the first books I read this year was Love & Saffron, so I've been (somewhat) patiently waiting for the follow-up. Last I checked, my library hadn't yet gotten it, so I took advantage of a Kindle deal to add it to my shelf. Kate & Frida isn't really a sequel and you don't need to have read the other book to enjoy it (you'll just know who Frida is), but it's also an epistolary novel about two women who form a friendship through their letters. This time we're in the early '90s. Frida is in Paris, trying to figure out if she has it in her to be a "real" journalist, and connects with Kate when she writes to a Seattle bookstore in search of a particular book and gets a response to Kate. Over the next several years, the two women bond over books they love, give each other love advice, and help each other through hard times. Though there are both sad and scary moments, I found this novel to be delightful and an excellent palate cleanser after some heavier reads. I gave it 4 stars.

Bonny's recent review of Run for the Hills reminded me to check Hoopla for it again, as that's where I found two of Kevin Wilson's previous books that I listened to earlier in the fall. In his newest novel, we start out with Mad, who runs an organic farm in Tennessee with her mother after her father left them when she was younger. One day a man in a PT Cruiser shows up at the farm with the news that he's her half-brother and that their father left his family in Boston before showing up in Tennessee. What's more, their father apparently repeated this pattern at least twice more. The two siblings, Mad and Rube, set out on a road trip to find their father in California, along the way picking up their other two half-siblings, though they're not sure what they'll do when -- if -- they find him. The characters are all quirky but charming, and their journey leads them not only to finding their father but to understanding more about themselves and their personal narratives. I listened to this one, and the narration was great. I gave it 4 stars.

Bonny also inspired my next read. Finding Grace is a book that you can't really describe without giving too much away, so it's difficult to write a review with any discussion of plot. There is a dramatic and tragic event that occurs at the end of the very first chapter that drives the rest of the narrative, and it's something that's very unexpected, so I can't even hint at it. This book deals with a lot of topics that might necessitate trigger warnings, so if you'd like to avoid any of those, I'd recommend researching them before picking up this book. I thought the storyline was unusual and creative, certainly unlike anything I've read before, but I also was cringing regularly at the actions of one of the main characters and thought the story wrapped up a little too neatly, given the complexity of the rest of the plot. I gave it 3.5 stars.

Even though the Booker Prize for this year has already been awarded, I'm still reading some of the titles on the list that didn't win and that only recently became available here. The Land in Winter is one of those. Set in rural England in the early 1960s, this novel focuses on two couples who live near each other. Eric Parry is one of the local doctors and lives in a cottage with his wife, Irene. Across the field is farmer Bill Simmons, whose wife, Rita, seems an odd complement to him. Both women are pregnant and dealing with different challenges in their personal lives when an unusually cold winter sets in. I listened to this book, read by the author, and found the writing to be good -- "atmospheric" is the best word I can think to describe it. But I found it hard to keep track of the characters and their storylines and backgrounds. Perhaps the format caused some of this difficulty, but I not going to reread with my eyes to know for sure. I gave it 3 stars.

And there you have it! If you've read any of these books, I'd love to hear what you thought of them.

I hope to do some more reading this weekend -- hope it's a good one for you!

Unraveled, Week 49/2025

Greetings from a snowy Pittsburgh! A storm came through in the early hours of yesterday morning. I was woken up by my phone ringing at 5:30 a.m. -- a notification from Molly's school that they would be on a two-hour delay (about an hour and a half later, they cancelled altogether). But of course I didn't get a delay for work, and Ruthie had to go out in any case, so I was up at the normal time. I wish I could have filmed Ruthie's reaction to the snow! First she tried to eat it all, then she was running back and forth in our neighbors' yard, clearly delighted with it. I had to remind her several times that she was out to do her business! She continued to enjoy herself in the snow on our walks, and she must've eaten quite a bit because she didn't seem to drink as much as normal.

I unfortunately had to trudge to work in the snow, though I did get treated to some beautiful views along the way.

But enough about the snow -- time to link up with Kat and the Unravelers! While the current hat in progress is growing slowly (darn work getting in the way!), I've started a new project for my evening knitting that is going quite quickly thanks to some very large needles.

Sometime in the weekend before Thanksgiving, I lost one of my felted mittens, leaving my hands painfully cold on walks. So I've been making myself a pair of Snowball Throwin' Mittens (Ravelry link) using some yarn scraps. The pattern calls for worsted, but I'm using two strands of fingering held together, and I'm hoping they'll felt into a nice fabric. The pattern I used for the previous pair used superwash for the cuff and non-superwash for the hand, but this one calls for felting the hand first and then picking up for the cuff (for which the same yarn could be used, if desired). I'm planning to use some cotton yarn to crochet around the bottom edge to ensure that I have holes to pick up. I'm knitting on US 10/6 mm needles -- and DPNs! When was the last time you saw me knit on DPNs? The truth is that I don't think I have circular needles that big, so I had to make do with what I had.

I've finished several books this week, but I'm running out of time to get this post done, so I will share my reviews on Friday.

Back to the Mines

After two weekends and a full week off in between, it's going to be hard to get back to the usual schedule today, especially because I know there's a ton of work waiting for me. On top of all that, we're supposed to have some real winter weather (read: snow) this week, right when the Mister has to go on a quick work trip. At least I know that the number of work days before I'm off for a good two weeks is not very high!

We had a fairly quiet weekend after all the excitement of the holiday. It was just the three of us at home eating leftovers on Friday night, and we got together with some family friends on Saturday for pizza and salad. Last night we were invited over by some friends to kick off the holiday season, and the coasters I'd knit for them were all done:

Pattern: Worsted Tree Coasters by Amy Marie (Ravelry link)
Yarn: Knit Picks Dishie (100% cotton) in Swan and Kenai; 100 yds. used
Needles: US 5/3.75 mm
Started/Completed: November 22/November 27

These were fun and straightforward to knit, and had I given myself more time, I would have made more of them. I purposefully picked out colors that would read as wintery but not necessarily Christmas; though the green looks darker here, it's more of a pine-y green that can look a little teal in certain lights. I think it would be fun to take this pattern and widen it to make a towel or placemat, so maybe once the holiday knitting is done, I'll play around with it.

Speaking of holiday knitting, my brother's hat is about 2/3 of a Ruthie at the moment:

Once I finish this up, I will be on to this year's gnome for my nephew, which will be Gnome News Is Good News. I'm going to be making him in DK/worsted rather than fingering so that he's big and huggable, and I even found some sparkly self-striping in colors that remind me of candy canes that I think will be fun.

And now, time to get on with all the stuff I have to do today! I think the pumpkin pie is ready to get dumped, but the friends we had dinner with last night sent us home with coffee cake, so it's there if I need a little pick-me-up to get through the day. Enjoy your first day of meteorological winter, if you're in the Northern Hemisphere like I am!