Now THAT Was a Weekend

It's been a while since I had a truly restful weekend when it wasn't because someone was unwell, but we finally had one -- though it didn't start out great. My parents invited us over for dinner on Friday night, and I thought we should take Ruthie so I could give her a dose of medicine due at 7 p.m., but she spent most of the evening being crazy, barking at everyone, and then pooped on their floor. Fortunately, she made up for being so naughty by sleeping in both Saturday and Sunday -- I actually had to wake her up at 7 to take her medicine! I'm sure it's a result of being on a sedative continuously, but part of me hopes she's adjusting to the later sunrise. Either way, I had two good nights' worth of sleep and am feeling the benefits of it.

I did manage to get a batch of challah baked up on Saturday -- and resisted eating any of it!

These two raisin loaves are in the freezer now. I'll bake two plain loaves next weekend, for which I will need to make some room in the freezer (which is really why I didn't try to do it all at once -- just no room!).

Much of my weekend was spent like this:

Ruthie normally takes a good nap in the afternoon, but with the addition of the medications she's on, she is really zonking out. That makes for good reading and knitting time for me, especially when I don't also need to keep an eye on my work inbox. This weekend I managed to finish the heel of my Penwings sock and get through a good portion of a really good book.

Another side effect of the medication is that it seems to make Ruthie less interested in going to the bathroom, so much of our trips outside end up like this:

Her incision site seems to be healing well, and it's been virtually impossible to keep from running around while playing at home, so it's going to be a long week plus that we have left until she can be free of the donut and the onesie. At least after Tuesday we can go for walks again! I'm sure she'd like some fresh smells, and I would like a little more of the exercise I'm used to. Here's hoping the week ahead brings healing and more good news for all of us!

Unraveled, Week 37/2025

It is Wednesday, and that means it's time to join Kat and the Unravelers to talk making and reading. But first, a thank-you for all the well wishes for Ruthie. She made it through her surgery with no problems and is now home in a onesie and an inflatable donut. I think she will not be very happy with me for the next two weeks as her activity is limited, but I am thankful that she's now spayed and I didn't have to deal with a heat cycle.

Back to the usual blog content! I have been working on my two projects a bit every day. I didn't take another photo of my socks, though they look pretty much the same as they did on Monday except that there's an additional repeat. The shawl, on the other hand, has grown quite a bit:

I was a bit worried at first because it didn't look like the pattern pictures and I thought I was doing something wrong, but it turns out that you can't really see the zig-zag effect unless you look at it at a distance or squint your eyes a bit. I am still referring to the pattern because I don't yet have it memorized (and I do have to keep track of repeats of each chart because they switch back and forth each section), but I can at least see the logic of the stitch pattern and can kind of intuit the next step. I will say that although the pattern does have both written and charted directions, one thing it seems to be missing is any indication of a repeat for when the stitch count exceeds the stitches shown on the chart. Understanding how the pattern works is how I figured out how to proceed, but a less-experienced knitter might find it challenging.

Something I did not manage to get a photo of (though there's really not much to photograph at this point) is that I started spinning something on my wheel yesterday while Ruthie was at the vet! I pulled out the Shaniko wool that I brought home from SSK and started spinning off one end of the braid. I'm planning to spin the whole thing onto one bobbin, wind the singles into a cake, and then ply from both ends. But I have a feeling that's a ways off yet. The important thing is that I am trying to actually use what came home with me from Nashville rather than just tossing it into the stash. As I did with my acquisitions last time, I took a photo of everything, and I'm crossing off what I've used:

It's worth noting that three skeins of yarn you see here are currently being used in projects, and the fiber at the bottom is what I'm spinning. I have plants for the gray cake with the three minis at the top, the other self-striping skein, and the skein of dark green, so really that leaves me with just one skein of yarn without a plan. Not bad!

My reading was not as prolific or as wonderful this week compared to last, but after a week with three 5-star books, anything is going to be a letdown! Let's just say I finished three books that were fine (they all earned 3 stars from me).

My parents are both fans of Fredrik Backman's books, so I was not at all surprised to get handed down a hardback copy of his latest, My Friends. As is the case with all of his books that I've read (I've read most of them), you don't get the full picture or the full story until the end, but pretty early on you're plopped right in the middle of it. This novel centers around a famous painting and the group of teenage friends responsible for it. An 18-year-old named Louisa, who has recently aged out of the foster care system, is the impetus for the story being told, as she has long adored the painting and wanted to know the story behind it. So the reader learns the story as she does, and it's not a completely happy one. There is a lot of darkness in this book -- domestic abuse, depression, suicidal ideation, death -- but there's also art and beauty and friendship and love. I think it's probably my least favorite of Backman's books that I read.

I have a bad habit of not having a queue of audiobooks I want to listen to so that I'm not rushing to pick something right before I need it, so sometimes I don't make the best choices. That's what happened to me last Friday, when I needed something in my ears for my run. I'd just heard someone mention The Wedding People, so I thought I'd see if the author had any other books. Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance is her previous novel, and it is told from the point of view of Sally Holt and addressed toward her older sister, Kathy, who dies in an accident pretty early in the book (this isn't a spoiler; we know from the beginning that Sally is looking back from her late 20s and that Kathy died when the two were 13 and 16). What this novel is, at its heart, is a book about grief and the ways people deal with it. I thought the characters were well written and multifaceted, but I also wanted to yell at many of them to go get some therapy. I think The Wedding People, which also has a dark side, is a much better book.

My last finish was The Emporer of Gladness, which I'd put on hold after Kat raved about it. I had a little trouble getting into it but was determined to persevere. This is a story set in a run-down Connecticut town that starts with a thwarted suicide attempt, when Grazina, an aging widow with dementia, spots Hai, a 19-year-old Vietnamese immigrant, on a bridge and talks him down. Hai ends up living with and caring for Grazina and going to work with his autistic cousin, Sony, at a chain restaurant that seems a lot like Boston Market and that employs its own cast of misfits and outcasts. It's a story about found family and about the lasting impacts of trauma. The writing is strong, but I found it to be depressing. There's a lot about drug addiction, poverty, death, etc. There was a scene in the middle with a pig slaughtering operation that was particularly hard to read. I might give Ocean Vuong's poetry a try, but I don't think his novels are for me.

I'm currently rereading Mrs. Dalloway -- even using the copy I read my senior year of high school with my notes in it! -- and just started Night Watch. I'll be in the market for an audiobook later this week, so let me know if you have any good recommendations!

Recovery Days

It was another quiet weekend here, which I think we all needed. The Mister has been feeling better, though he still has a lingering cough. I've had what I'm pretty sure was a sinus infection that's been getting better day by day but has been giving me a sinus headache pretty much every day for the past week. And Molly is still adjusting to being back at school and worked a five-hour shift on Saturday. Needless to say, we all were in need of rest. We did manage to get ourselves cleaned up and out to dinner on Saturday night, but other than a couple of walks and taking Ruthie out, I spent the weekend relaxing.

Saturday was pretty gloomy after some rain early in the day, but yesterday was a gorgeous fall day -- the sun was out, there was a light breeze, and because the high was only in the upper 60s, it was cool enough to wear wool socks. I decided to give my most recently finished pair their inaugural wearing:

I cast on some new projects over the weekend, but before I could do that, I wanted to finish up a lingering WIP that had some issues. If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen this scary-looking photo:

This is the hat I was knitting using the two 50 g skeins of Loopy Ewe yarn I picked up from the giveaway table at SSK. I did weigh them before I started and saw that one was slightly heavier than the other, but I figured I'd just use a little less of that yarn. It wasn't until I switched from the pink to the blue, however, that I realized that the blue was noticeably thicker than the pink, and that meant that it didn't go as far. So when I finished the blue half, it was shorter than the pink. To make the hat work, I needed to take some fabric out of the pink half, which I thought I'd do by running needles through two points, removing the fabric between them, and then grafting the stitches back together. In reality, my eyesight is now apparently bad enough that I didn't follow a round of stitches the whole way, so when I tried to pull the excess yarn out, I ended up having to undo it stitch by stitch to get to one continuous round. At that point, it was easier to just reconnect the yarn from the part I'd pulled off and knit up the crown again. It took much longer than it should have, but it's done now. Next time, I'll remember to count rounds or at least measure so that the length is the same!

This is going into the charity pile, unless someone I know expresses interest. And it's two skeins used up!

The two new projects are also using SSK yarn -- I'm determined to use it all as soon as possible so it doesn't linger in the stash. First, a pair of socks using superwash Targhee/nylon fingering from Woolens & Nosh. The colorway is called Penwings, and I don't know the meaning or inspiration, but it sure is pretty! I also didn't expect it to stripe this way, so that was a fun surprise.

I also cast on a new shawl using a semisolid from the giveaway table and one of the skeins of Lorna's Laces that was a doorprize. The pattern is Tessella (Ravelry link), and it's a lot more straightforward than it looks. What you're seeing here is actually a second version; I had started it with the colors switched and realized it was messing with my brain to have the darker color associated with the light squares in the chart and vice versa, so I ripped it out and started again. There's not as much contrast between my two colors as the samples in the pattern, so it may be that the patterning doesn't show up as well as it could, but who can argue with using free yarn? And I can always make another one.

I'll leave you for the day with a little bit of eye candy: After nurturing it all summer, my one sunflower finally bloomed late last week, and this weekend, the bees found it.

Tomorrow Ruthie is getting spayed. I'm sure she'll be fine, but if you can send a good thought or two her way (and then a good thought or two my way as I take care of her after), I'd appreciate her!

Refreshed but Not Quite Rested

We had a truly spectacular weekend of weather here -- very low humidity, blue skies, and highs in the upper 70s/low 80s. It was so nice not to be melting every time I was out with Ruthie. Less nice was that she had me up before sunrise both days, at 5:45 on Saturday and 5:15 on Sunday. She's supposedly an adolescent now at 7 months old, but unlike my human teenager, who didn't wake up until well after noon yesterday, she doesn't seem to like sleeping in. I'm sure it's just a phase, but it sure is tiring!

Thankfully, we didn't have a whole lot on the docket this weekend, so I was able to squeeze in some cat naps and a fair amount of knitting and reading time. And I finished my socks!

Although I did start at the same exact spot in the stripe sequence, they're not a perfect match, probably because I started the heel on the second sock where it looked like I did it on the first rather than measuring. This was partly due to laziness but also because the old measuring tape in my sock bag, one from my now-closed former LYS, decided it was done. The pull completely separated from the tape, rendering it completely useless, and as I was ready to start the heel when I had a puppy sleeping on me, I couldn't really go get a replacement. Really the only way you can tell they're not a perfect match is if you look at the very tip of the toes and notice that there are two short rounds of of gray on one toe and not the other. And really, how many people are going to be looking at that part of my feet?

Now that these are done, I need another project to work on while Ruthie naps and I read, so I cast on another charity hat using the yarn from the SSK goodie bag:

The colors are a bit more vibrant in better lighting, maybe a little too vibrant for the people I knit for, but I think they'll make a great hat. I finished the crown during nap time yesterday, so I should be good for the week -- and I'm feeling pretty virtuous for using some SSK yarn right away!

We've got a pretty typical week ahead, and we're looking forward to a visit from some cousins next weekend. I'm hoping Ruthie will sleep a little later and let me catch up!

Unraveled, Week 31/2025

It is another steamy morning here in SW PA, and as it's Wednesday, that means it's time to join Kat and the Unravelers! I've been strangely monogamous with my knitting this week; though I've knit up a swatch with the Shibui Linen I brought home from Nashville (still to be measured, blocked, and measured again), mainly what I've been working on is the socks I started on the way there. The first sock was finished up Monday and the second immediately cast on.

If you click to embiggen the photo and look closely, you might notice a fun bit of serendipity. When I finished the first sock, I had just started a new color, so I wound off the yarn until I got to the start of the next stripe and cast on for the second sock at that point. It was not until yesterday afternoon, when I pulled out the first sock to compare the cuff length, that I realized I had managed to start both socks at exactly the same point in the stripe sequence without planning it! In all honesty, I'd planned on not trying to get the socks to match because the stripe sequence is so long, so this was a pretty fun thing to happen.

I've finished another two books this past week:

Some of you who are also on NetGalley likely recently got an email about What We Can Know. This new novel from Ian McEwan tells its story in two parts. First, we follow Tom Metcalfe, a humanities professor in the 22nd century whose scholarship focuses on 21st-century British poet and the famous lost poem he wrote as a tribute to his wife, Vivien. Tom's research is made all the more difficult by the fact that climate change has led to rising seas and dangerous travel. Relying on the poet's archives, which include Vivien's journals, he is convinced that he will be the one to find the missing poem and that it will make his career, but he is so focused on his work and his obsession with the poem and Vivien that he neglects his wife and fails to notice that his students don't appreciate his fixation on the past. In the second part, we get to read the memoir Vivien left behind and learn that the story of her life, as told to us by Tom, was not entirely accurate and that the famous poem written for her might best be left in the past. This book is billed as speculative fiction, but the only thing speculative I found in it was the creation of the world transformed by climate change -- and even that doesn't seem so uncertain these days. The prevailing message of the novel, to me, is that often what we know of history is biased based upon who is telling the story of the past and that even when we tell our own stories, we're not under any obligation to be entirely truthful. I gave it 3 stars. Thank you to Knopf and NetGalley for providing me with digital ARC of this book in return for an honest review. This book will be published September 23, 2025.

Broken Country is one of those buzzy new books that seems to be popping up a lot of places. I'd heard of it and thought it sounded interesting but wasn't going out of my way to read it -- but then my mother passed along her copy and I thought I'd see what all the fuss was about. This novel is set primarily in 1968 in the English countryside, with flashbacks to a decade earlier. At its heart is a love triangle. Beth, the main character, fell in love with Gabriel as a teenager, but miscommunication and a difference in social class drove them apart. In the present day, she is married to Frank, a farmer who quietly loved her from a distance for years. They are living on his family's farm, still mourning the tragic death of their young son, when Gabriel, now with his own young son, returns to his family home and it's apparent that the feelings of the past aren't entirely in the past. Amid all of this, we know someone has been killed and someone is on trial for murder, but we don't know who (and don't find out their fate or what actually happened) until much later in the book. I can see why this book is making the rounds: It's an easy, propulsive read. Perhaps it's a bit predictable, too, though there were a couple of twists toward the end I didn't see coming. I enjoyed it (4 stars), but I don't think it'll make my list of favorites for the year.

I'm currently reading a book my brother lent me after we adopted Ruthie called Dog Is Love, which is fascinating both as a dog owner and as someone who majored in psychology in college, and another ARC -- the forthcoming ninth book in Ann Cleeves's Shetland series!

What are you making and reading this week?

Ready to Rest

I am thankful to have made it to the end of this week. The trip was a lot of fun but not particularly restful, and of course coming back on Sunday afternoon meant we were thrown right back into the usual schedule on Monday morning. I am getting this post ready ahead of time because I have an early appointment for my mammogram this morning and then have to get back for more (pointless) work meetings.

Since my last post, I have been able to finish up the hat I started just ahead of the trip, so now I have two for the charity pile that are ready to be washed, blocked, and put safely away:

And I've added some more stripes to my sock WIP and am almost to the heel (unfortunately they're only a small fraction of a Ruthie long):

We have a quiet weekend planned. It's going to be hot again, like upper-90s-with-heat-index hot, with a chance of rain every day, so it'll be a good weekend to stay in the cool and relax. Molly and I talked about maybe going to a local farmer's market tomorrow morning; she has a hankering for fresh cherries, and maybe we'll find some other yummy things to eat for lunch or dinner. The Mister has a high school friend in town on Sunday and they're getting together for dinner with friends (I may or may not go along). Other than that, the weekend is wide open and that's just fine with me. I need to clean bathrooms after skipping a week and would like to maybe sneak in a nap, as I doubt Ruthie will let me sleep in.

Whatever's on tap for you this weekend, I hope it's enjoyable. I will see you back here on Monday for my July One Little Word post -- can't believe this month is almost over!

Unraveled, Week 30/2025

Time continues its forward march and here we are again on a Wednesday. Time to link up with Kat and the Unravelers!

I spent most of my knitting time when we were away working on a charity hat, and I'm quickly approaching its end. As of yesterday afternoon's nap time, when I snapped this photo, it was about 4/5 of a Ruthie:

Funny story: She actually woke up when I first draped it on her, and I thought she was going to try to eat it and quickly snatched it back, but she almost immediately closed her eyes again. I guess the desire to sleep was stronger than her desire to chew! This yarn is Fibernymph Dye Works Bedazzled, which is 438 yards per 100 g, but as is usually the case with the skeins I get from Lisa, this one was a bit overweight at 106 g, so I've actually got about 464 yards to work with. I'll use most if not all of it, and that should make for a nice slouchy hat for someone.

I also worked a bit on the socks I started in the car on the way to the airport, but I was holding back a bit so that Molly and I could do heels at the same time. I was very pleasantly surprised to see how much she got done on hers considering that this is probably the first time she's ever worked on such small needles (her sock on the left is on a US 1/2.25 mm; mine on the right is on a US 0/2.0 mm).

While I'm working on these smaller projects, I'm also pondering what to cast on next. I think I may try to knit another summer top, specifically this one (Ravelry link), which was my original plan for the Miss Babs silk/linen I used on my Midsommarkrans. In fact, the Shibui linen yarn I found on the giveaway table at SSK should be pretty perfect for it. I may start swatching that soon.

I didn't read as much while we were away as I would have at home, but I've still managed to finish two (short) books in the past week:

Continuing my exploration of the work of Nobel literature laureate Han Kang, I read her latest, We Do Not Part. In terms of the subject matter, this felt like a logical continuation of Human Acts in that a large part of the book explores the trauma of massacres in Korea, this time on Jeju Island. (Note: If you've read The Island of Sea Women, then the history of this island will not be new to you.) The way this history is presented, however, is a bit strange. We start with Kyungha, who is struggling with nightmares in the wake of writing a book about another massacre (presumably the one depicted in Human Acts) when she gets a call from her friend Inseon, who is in a hospital in Seoul after a carpentry accident and begs Kyungha to come see her. When they meet, Inseon begs Kyungha to go to her house on Jeju to take care of her bird, and Kyungha makes the long journey in a treacherous snowstorm. When she awakes in her friend's house, with the power out, she is surprised to see Inseon there, all signs of her injury gone, and the two begin going through Inseon's extensive research on the massacres on Jeju and her intimate connection to them. The writing (or at least the translation of the writing) is beautiful, but the story itself is odd and at times hard to follow, and I felt a bit frustrated when I finished and found there was no explanation for how Inseon could be both in a hospital in Seoul and in a house on Jeju. The novel does serve as a vehicle for communicating the impact of the generational trauma of the events of 1948 and 1950-52, and presumably a Korean audience would have more knowledge of those events than I did; I felt at more than one point that I should stop and read about some of the history in order to have a more complete picture of the period. It's a hard book to read for a number of reasons, and it's one that perhaps I will revisit once I have a better handle on the context. I gave it 3.5 stars, rounded up.

Shortly after we got to Nashville, I got a notification that my library hold on Intimacies was ready. This relatively short novel follows a woman who works as an interpreter in the international court in the Hague and details her personal and professional relationships. There's her friend Jana, who lives in a seedy neighborhood and witnesses a violent mugging. There's Adriaan, the man she's seeing who she soon learns is a married (but separated) father. And there are the incarcerated individuals on trial at the court she translates for and whose accused heinous acts she has to listen to as part of her job. There's a bit of a plot to this book, but overall I wasn't sure what the point of it was -- not to mention that the author seems to use the word "intimacy" a little too much for the title to have any subtlety. Maybe I would feel different if I read with my eyes rather than my ears. In any case, I didn't care for it much. I gave it 2 stars.

On the way home, I started an ARC of Ian McEwan's forthcoming novel, which is being billed as speculative fiction. And I've also started Broken Country, one of those buzzy books you've seen everywhere lately and which I was lucky to get passed by my mother.

What are you making and reading this week?

Unraveled, Week 20/2025

Happy Wednesday, friends! We are having another soggy week after that beautiful weekend, so while I'm still outside a lot (in a raincoat), it feels like a good week to be inside with my books and my knitting. Time to link up with Kat and the Unravelers and give you an update!

I have an FO this week -- a finished pair of socks! They're obviously not blocked yet, but the knitting is done and the ends have been woven in. They won't be given to their recipient for more than a month, so there's plenty of time for blocking.

Thanks to the gloomy weather, the colors aren't quite right here; what looks like a dark purple is really more of a navy, and what looks like a navy is more of a dark teal. I have to say that I wasn't too impressed with this batch of Felici -- incidentally, they were the last two skeins in my stash -- because in addition to the badly tied knot, I also noticed a lot of white spots in some of the darker stripes where the yarn wasn't fully dyed. Oh well! I think my mother-in-law will like them just fine, and while I do have a fair amount of leftovers, it does feel good to use up a small part of the stash.

I've been continuing to work on my Sugar Maple tee in the evenings while we watch TV (Molly and I have returned to Season 3 of The West Wing and the Mister and I have finally gotten to the last episode of The Pitt), and I'm now in the middle of the decreases that form the waist shaping. Yesterday I decided to give it a try-on and also put it on Matilda, my dress form, for a progress photo while I was at it:

What you can't see here is how much shorter it is in the back because the shaping on the front causes the fabric to bias and thus elongate at that point. So while it may look like I'm almost done, there's still quite a bit to go because the length you need to reach before doing the ribbing and binding off on the body is measured on the back. That said, I'm feeling more confident that this will get done, especially if Ruthie keeps sleeping as well as she has!

I promised I would have book reviews this week and I do -- three of them!

Wild for Austen: A Rebellious, Subversive, and Untamed Jane is probably a must-read for any fan of Jane Austen who wants to know more about the writer, her works, and the context in which her books were written. It's hard to categorize this book other than generally referring to it as nonfiction. It's part literary analysis and criticism, as the author (an academic who specializes in Austen) examines all of Jane's works of fiction for clues they might hold about their writer. It's part biography, giving background on Jane Austen's immediate family and her wider circle and speculating on her views about controversial subjects. And it's part cultural commentary, with examples of how Austen has influenced popular culture in ways she never could have imagined. Throughout, it's well researched and entertaining, and it most definitely challenges the notion that Jane Austen was a sheltered and mild-mannered woman with little life experience to influence her writing. I gave it 4 stars. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me with a digital ARC in return for an honest review. This book will be published September 2, 2025.

I suspect none of you who has already read it will be surprised that I've finished Nesting, the next Read With Us selection, and now I understand why some of you stayed up past your bedtimes to finish it. To say that this book was an easy read is a bit misleading because it deals with very difficult things, namely spousal emotional abuse and how difficult it is for women -- especially women with children -- to leave and start over. I thought the author did a phenomenal job of showing first how difficult it is to leave a partner who has completely isolated you from your family and friends and made it so that their voice drowns out your own thoughts and then, when you do manage to leave, how hard it is to access the resources you need to survive. I was rooting for Ciara the whole time, and my heart broke each time she faced another barrier. I gave it 5 stars.

Finally, if you're a fan of Shakespeare, I highly recommend Judi Dench's Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent. It's technically an audiobook, but it feels more like an audio documentary. Dench and her coauthor, Brendan O'Hea, go through the many Shakespeare plays that she has appeared in over the course of her career. They discuss the plays and the writing and the roles, but it's also a wonderful look back at her career, the many talented actors and directors she's worked with, and her personal life. I wasn't familiar with a number of the plays, but they do such a great job of summarizing the plots that it really doesn't matter. It's thoroughly entertaining. I gave it 4 stars.

I'm at one of those points where all my library holds have come in at once, so I had to delay another audiobook but have started Onyx Storm. I'm not very far in just yet, and honestly I'm not terribly excited about it right now, mainly because I can't really remember much of what happened in the last book. And I'm deciding whether to go back to a physical book I already started (but was a little bored by) or start a new one.

What are you making and reading this week?

How I Spent My Mother's Day Weekend

The reality of weekends with a puppy, might like weekends with a baby, is that they're not that much different from weekdays, though at least there is no work to be done or, as was the case for me, no dinners to cook. Aside from the 40ºF weather that greeted me first thing on Saturday, it was as perfect a spring weekend as I could hope for -- beautiful blue skies, warm sunshine, low humidity. Of course, that meant that the Mister disappeared on his bike for several hours both days, but it's not like I wasn't going to be stuck at home most of the time anyway!

I did get out for a walk on Saturday morning in order to run a couple of errands. I finally figured out how to log in to our library's online system so that I could put physical books on hold, and there was one ready for me to pick up, so I figured I'd walk there to get it (the main branch is about a mile and a half, maybe a little less from our house). It not only gave me some exercise, but it also gave me some amusement for the weekend -- this is how I spent much of the two weekend afternoons:

I was on a long wait list for Nesting in ebook format from the library and was worried I wouldn't get it in time for the Read With Us discussion, but the catalog showed there were physical copies available, including one at the main branch. The print is pretty large and the hardcover stays open well enough that I've been able to knit while reading, and as a result, I've gotten close to finishing the second sock of this pair and read more than 2/3 of the book! I expect it will end up taking me longer to find a time to return it to the library than it will to read it.

Yesterday we had a delicious brunch at my brother- and sister-in-law's though it was a bit of chaos -- lots of little kids running around! It was a good excuse to do my hair and makeup and feel like a real person for a change. Molly and I took our annual photo and it's crazy to see how quickly she's growing up:

It turns out that the plants/flowers we ordered don't come in until next weekend, so I did not spend my afternoon planting -- which is just as well, because it was rather hot out! Instead, I got to read and knit while Ruthie snoozed, and that's really a perfect afternoon for me.

Here is your requisite photo of the pupper:

This week Molly has finals (can you believe her freshman year is almost over?), so while it's going to be stressful, at least the hours she has to be are curtailed. She has two exams this morning and one each the next three days. Friday is a makeup day, but barring any circumstance that causes her to need it to make up an exam, she'll be spending it at our local amusement park with friends. It's ostensibly a trip related to physics class, but really it's just a fun excuse to go. She's found a few other girls who don't do rollercoasters, so she won't feel left out, and I'm sure she'll get her fill of junk food. Next she has two weeks of mini courses (purely for fun), and then she's done for the year on May 30. And soon she'll start her summer job at a neighborhood juice/smoothie place! I'm looking forward to having her around more and having a helping hand with Ruthie and in the kitchen.

I hope your weekend was restful and that you also got some sunshine and blue skies. See you back here on Wednesday, when I promise I will have at least one book review!

Unraveled, Week 19/2025

Good morning and happy hump day! How are you all today? If I had to pick one word to describe things here over the past week, I'd pick DAMP. I honestly don't remember the last time we had a day without at least some rain. The grass seems to be liking it, at least!

It's Wednesday, and that means it's time to link up with Kat and the Unravelers!

First up, the knitting -- there has been some. For starters, after I shared that bad mid-stripe join on the socks the other day, I ripped it back to before the start of the stripe (the original color), wound off yarn from my ball until I got to that color again, and rejoined the yarn at that point. I've since knit well past where I was.

Apologies for the lighting again -- the rain makes for a lot of gloom

If you look closely, you may be able to see where the join is, as that section is a little thicker (I used a clasped weft join, so there's a section of stitches knit with a double thickness of yarn). I think it'll settle a bit after the socks are washed, and it's on the leg and thus unlikely to cause any discomfort in any case.

I also had a bit of an a-ha moment the other evening when I realized that Ruthie likes to spend the hour or so before we go to bed snoozing and is pretty much oblivious to what I'm doing during that time. So I got out my Sugar Maple tee and worked several rounds on it!

I'd really like to get this done this month so that it counts for the SSK make-along (and earns me some door prize tickets), but there's still quite a lot of knitting left to do, so we'll see. At least once I'm done with the body, I'm done with the whole thing, and there aren't any fiddly bits left. I think it's just a matter of prioritizing it when I am able to knit.

Sadly I have not finished any books this past week -- that hasn't happened in a long time! I am making progress on my current reads, but it's hard to sustain attention for long periods of time like I used to. I hope by next week I'll have something to report!

Early May Weekending

All too soon, it's Monday morning again. It was a wet weekend here, with rain on and off most of Saturday and part of Sunday. It was a good weekend for napping, and I did some of that on Saturday because Ruthie was up at 5:50 a.m. -- and so that meant that I was up that early! Aside from the early wakeup, though, it was a pretty good weekend. And I think the reason she was up so early is because she's started sleeping through the night, so despite getting up early, it means we've both slept for about 7 hours.

We started with an early lunch birthday party for my youngest nephew, who turned 2 on May 1. He entertained us with the amusing things he had to say, like asking my sister-in-law "Do you need a helping hand?" And we finished with chocolate cupcakes.

An added bonus for me was when we arrived, my niece was wearing the tee I knit for her last summer:

The Mister took Molly and her friend to see the show, and Ruthie and I took naps. Then we went out to dinner with my parents at a Turkish place in our neighborhood. 

Ruthie did a great job both times we were out, even though we were gone for about two hours both times. She's continuing to do really well with the house training -- which really means I'm doing really well at getting her out when she needs to go! Yesterday was the Pittsburgh Marathon, and the route comes close to our house, so I took her up to watch the runners for a bit. There were a lot of people, quite a few dogs, and a lot of noise. She was very nervous at first, but she soon adjusted, so it's clear that exposing her to new situations with people is good for her.

I managed to do a little bit of knitting this weekend, too. I started the second sock for my mother-in-law and was in a groove on the leg when I came across a knot in the yarn. I snipped it out and carried on as before, only to realize several rounds later that the two ends that were tied together were different colors.

I'm not sure if my mother-in-law would notice, but now that I've seen it, I can't not see it. So I'll likely be ripping back to the start of the stripe in the first blue and winding off yarn until I get to that point in the stripe sequence. So much for easy knitting!

A Finish on Friday

Happy Friday and happy May, friends! It's been a heck of a week here, though the puppy stuff has been the least of it. We had some strong storms move through on Tuesday that caused some major damage in the area from high winds, though amazingly we didn't lose power. So many people did, though, that the city and county are under disaster declarations and quite a few schools have been closed for multiple days this week. I saw our lights flicker once or twice but that was it. To Ruthie's delight, there were tons of sticks in the street on Wednesday, so a large part of our trips outside have involved taking them away from her (in addition to trying to keep her from eating various other things she finds on the ground).

On the positive side of things, I went for a run on Wednesday! I've been trying to get Ruthie to be more comfortable in her crate and not bark and cry the whole time, so I thought I'd give it a try to see how it went. I also had a couple of things to drop at the post office, so I ran there (it's about half a mile from our house) and back and then did some loops around the neighborhood. The last time I ran was on April 11! I didn't do my full distance because it was the first time I was leaving her alone, but it felt good to be out there again (until my knee started to hurt and it didn't feel so good). I was definitely sore yesterday, but it was nothing like after my first run following my broken foot, so that's a good sign.

My finish for the day isn't terribly exciting, but it's something. Since finishing up that second slipper sock, I've pulled out the socks I've been knitting for my mother-in-law again. I'd really like to get back to my Sugar Maple tee, but it's been safer to have something small (and with only one ball of yarn attached) that I can quickly put down and away. I've worked on it this week while Ruthie has been napping and managed to finish the first sock yesterday -- though she woke up as I was about 2/3 of the way through grafting the toe, so I had to put it down and finish it up later!

Again, terrible lighting that doesn't do it any justice, but it's what I could manage to do without putting her back in the crate.

This weekend we've got some actual plans on the calendar. My youngest nephew turned 2 yesterday, and his birthday party is on Saturday morning. It was supposed to be outside, but the weather is not looking good right now, so it will probably be moved indoors and we'll leave Ruthie at home. That afternoon we have tickets to see Come from Away; originally the three of us were supposed to go, but I don't think Ruthie can hold it that long, so given that I've seen the show before, I told Molly to see if she could find a friend from school who would want to use my ticket. Then my parents are taking us out to dinner Saturday night, just to a neighborhood restaurant so we'll be close. I don't know if it's some sort of special occasion or if they just feel like they haven't been giving us enough attention lately (my brother has been having terrible back problems the past several weeks, so my parents have been helping out a lot with my niblings).

And because no post is complete without a puppy pic, here is an example of how dainty our little pup can be:

She's continuing to make good progress with house training (very few accidents, likely because she often goes to the door and sits when she needs to go out) and generally has been getting up only once in the middle of the night. What we really need to work on now is not barking and growling at other people, especially the Mister. And her DNA is on its way to a lab to be analyze, so soon we'll have a better idea what breeds are in her (and maybe how big we can expect her to be)!

I hope you have a wonderful first weekend in May -- and if you're headed to Maryland Sheep and Wool this weekend, kindly fondle some yarn and have some ribbon chips on my behalf!

Unraveled, Week 15/2025

Could someone please check in with Mother Nature? She appears to have turned spring off the last few days. Yesterday it was actually snowing while I walked into the office! Obviously I have plenty of wool to keep myself warm, but I'm tired of feeling cold.

Today, at least, it looks like the worst of the cold is over -- and today is Wednesday, which means it's time to link up with Kat and the Unravelers! If that doesn't lift my mood, I don't know what will.

There has been knitting and spinning chez Knit/Wit these past several days. I'd pulled out another braid of FatCatKnits fiber to spin a while ago but only actually split it up and started spinning last Friday afternoon. I did another fractal spin, though this time one bobbin was spun from the fiber as is and the other from three strips (the fiber was naturally breaking apart into thirds, so I decided to go with it). I spun the first bobbin of singles over Friday and Saturday and the second over Sunday and Monday, and I was able to get the whole skein plied yesterday afternoon. Winding it off and washing are on today's to-do list.

I've been knitting more on my Sugar Maple in the evenings, though I don't have a progress photo to share today (frankly it's slow going, so it doesn't look much different). Instead, here's the sock and sock-adjacent knitting I've done over the last week or so:

Once I'd finished the socks for my sister-in-law, I knew I needed to cast on another pair so I'd have something to work on those days I go into the office, so I got out the very last skeins of Knit Picks Felici (unless there are more hiding somewhere!) and cast on a pair for my mother-in-law. They'll either be for Mother's Day or her birthday in June, depending on how fast they get knit. On the left is a new pattern/design I've been meaning to cast on for months. The yarn is Ross Farm Funky that Amy asked me to use for a design back when I saw her in late November. I was originally going to use it with a neutral for some kind of colorwork, but the longer I looked at it, the more I realized that I was better suited for something else. So now it's becoming a pair of slipper socks that will be pretty easy and fast to knit up; what you see here is the work of Monday afternoon. It looks like the two will end up being different due to the colors in the wool, and I kind of like that.

There has been reading this week as well -- not great reads, but good ones.

First, a bit of necessary reading ahead of Ruthie's arrival: The Puppy Primer. I did a search for books about training puppies and this one was recommended frequently -- and now that I've read it, I can recommend it as well. The primary author is animal behaviorist, so she knows what she's talking about. And if all I've read is to be believed, training a puppy is hard work but not nearly as hard as raising a child; I'm certainly feeling much better about my abilities after reading it. I'm going to have Molly read it as well so that we can be consistent in our training and so that we can get started from day one. We are already well stocked on training treats! I gave this one 4 stars -- very helpful and informative.

I wanted some escapism next, so I went for some romantasy. Divine Rivals came highly recommended by Katie, and I was really looking forward to it. It tells the story of two rivals (you're shocked, I know) at a newspaper in a world where ancient gods are at war. Iris's brother has gone off to fight and her mother has sought comfort in alcohol. To deal with her grief, she's been typing letters to her brother on her grandmother's old typewriter and slipping them under the door of her wardrobe -- and then, one day, someone writes back. I liked the premise of the magic in the letter writing, but I felt confused about where and when the story was taking place and thought the characters were a bit one-dimensional. I also noticed at least three grammatical errors, which you all know get on my nerves. So it was an okay read, not great but not horrible. I gave it 3 stars.

Finally, I picked something light to listen to while running, cleaning the bathroom, and folding laundry. Margo's Got Money Troubles is a bit of an understatement. At 19, Margo finds herself pregnant after having an affair with her (married) professor. She decides to keep the baby but is forced to drop out of college and then gets fired from her job due to a lack of childcare. Then two of her roommates move out and she has a bigger rent bill than anticipated. And then her ex-pro wrestler father, fresh out of rehab, shows up on her doorstep needing a place to live. In need of cash, fast, Margo turns to OnlyFans, where it seems there's money to be made. As you would expect, problems arise and life gets even more complicated. I thought this was entertaining enough (especially as I listened -- Elle Fanning does an excellent narration) and I liked Margo's spunk, but much of the book made me feel a little icky. I also didn't understand why it kept shifting between first person and third person; it seemed it had something to do with the writing class Margo was taking with the professor who she had the affair with and made some sense at the beginning, but I think it went on too long. I gave it 3 stars.

I'm currently reading Time of the Flies on paper and Once There Were Wolves digitally, and I expect I'll be ready for another audiobook by the weekend.

What are you making and reading this week?

How to Spend a Rainy Weekend

That old rhyme about April showers is pretty true in my neck of the woods, but it does put a damper on doing things out of doors when you have the time. That was pretty much the case this weekend, when it rained on and off and then got downright chilly. It was a good weekend to stay inside!

On Saturday morning, we had a "framily" brunch. We have a group that includes our siblings and their spouses as well as some longtime family friends. We all live nearby and have an ongoing group chat from the early days of the pandemic (we call it "Inappropriate Coronavirus Isolation and Other Topics Discussion" and share memes and other silly stuff), and periodically we get together either for dinner (just adults) or brunch (with kids). My brother couldn't join us this time because he did something to his back and was laid up in bed, but the rest of his family made it, so we all got baby snuggle time in. Actually, all the women were fighting over holding my niece -- I guess we all miss having a little one! I also gave my sister-in-law her socks, which she loved and insisted on putting on right away.

She said they fit perfectly and that she loved the colors, so I felt pretty darn good about making them.

We got takeout on Saturday night and the Mister and I spent the evening watching a couple of episodes of The Pitt (yes, we're finally getting around to it) while I worked on my Sugar Maple. It was slow going at first, but now that I've got the pattern memorized, it's going faster, even as the round are getting longer.

I did indeed decide to stripe the two colorways throughout the whole sweater, though I used just one for the twisted ribbing on the collar. I was a bit doubtful at first, but as I've made more progress, I'm really enjoying how the stripes look. I think there will be areas with high contrast and areas with low contrast, but it certainly will not look like any other sweater knit from this pattern, and I rather like that. I only just pulled out the excess cable when I took this photo (I was magic-looping to start), and I think not having to wrangle the needles every half round is going to add to my speed.

The other thing I did this weekend was stock up on some of the things we need to welcome Ruthie! We've now got a crate with a soft insert, food and water bowls, food, treats, a leash, poop bags, puppy pads, a couple of toys, and enzymatic cleaner for any accidents. We're still waiting on a personalized collar that should come later this week. It's going to be hard to get through the next six and a half days!

Good News to End the Week

When Friday morning comes, I always think of it as the start of the weekend (even with a day of work ahead of me), and who doesn't like starting off the weekend with good news for a change? I've got three items of that sort to share today.

Good Thing #1: I finished up my sister-in-law's socks Wednesday evening and blocked them yesterday, so they'll be ready to go to her tomorrow.

I'm a little miffed that the stripes matched all the way until the end, when they didn't, but I suppose that's down to how the yarn is dyed (they're knit from Knit Picks Felici, which is dyed by machine, as opposed to the hand-dyed self-striping yarn I use a lot). They're the same stitch count and the same length, maybe off a round or two, but that alone wouldn't have caused such a discrepancy. Oh well! She's a gracious recipient and if it bothers her, I doubt she'll tell me about it.

Good Thing #2: We are getting new ovens. I've already mentioned this in replies to some comments to my last post, but I'll share the whole story here for everyone. We have double wall ovens, and we're on our second set from the same company (JennAir) since we redid our kitchen in 2009. The first set lasted longer than the second, which had only just gone out of warranty at the end of February. The Mister called the appliance store where we bought them, and the store then directed him to JennAir, which told him the particular ovens we have are discontinued, so there's no way to fix them. But he then got directed to some alternate resolution group that JennAir has, and initially they offered to replace the ovens with different models at cost -- but when he mentioned to them that this is the second time we've had to replace both ovens in about five years, they said they'd replace them at about 1/4 of what we paid for the most recent set! I'd say that's just about the best outcome we could have gotten. The new ovens are on their way, to be installed by the local appliance store, and it's possible we could have them in time for the first Passover seder next Saturday, which we are supposed to be hosting (and for which we'd very much need functional ovens!). In the interim, we're planning meals that require cooking on the stove, in the microwave, or using a toaster oven -- did you know that you can bake a decent potato in a toaster oven? And if the ovens don't arrive in time, we'll just be extra cozy having seder at my parents' place.

Good Thing #3: Last weekend, the Mister bought a new car. That is not the good thing, but it's the impetus for what comes next. His previous car was still in good shape but was likely going to require some transmission work soon, and he decided he'd rather spend his money on something new. He's notorious for taking a long time to make up his mind about something, but the tariffs that just went into effect finally convinced him. He bought a plug-in hybrid, which I was quite happy about, but also a much fancier car than I would choose. When he was at the dealership, he texted to ask me if I wanted to talk it over with him before he made the deal, and I told him it was his decision because it would be his car -- and that if he got it, I felt it was time that I got a dog.

You see where this is going, right?

This sweet girl, an almost 4-month-old Jack Russell Terrier mix, will be coming to live with us next weekend. She's coming from a organization in Kentucky that rescues dogs from high-kill shelters; they have her mother and her four siblings. Their post for her describes her as "sweet, snuggly, and always looking for love and affection," which is pretty much exactly what we wanted in a dog. Her mother weighs less than 20 pounds, so we expect her to stay on the small side, too. The rescue organization named her Kitty (what a silly name for puppy!), but we will be calling her Ruthie -- full name, Ruth Barker Digsburg. 

Molly and I are ecstatic; the Mister seems to be accepting it. We girls will be going shopping this weekend to get everything we need to welcome her, and I've already read a book on puppy training. Although I grew up with a dog, she was about a year old and already housebroken when we got her (not to mention very meek and well behaved because she'd been adopted once before and then returned to the shelter when that family couldn't afford to keep her), so this is a whole new ball of wax. I'm hoping my boss will be amenable to cutting back my time in the office, at least for the first few weeks while we get her settled. Expect lots of puppy pictures and probably less knitting and reading than usual in the months ahead! And I welcome any advice those of you who have experience with puppies have to offer!

That's it from me for now. I hope you have some good things in your life this weekend!