Unraveled, Week 18/2023

First, thank you for all the congratulations on my new nephew! He's absolutely adorable (no, we're not biased at all), and my sister-in-law seems to have had a fairly easy delivery. They expect to be going home today, and I think everyone is anxious to see what the dog thinks of his new brother.

It's Wednesday, which means it's time for my weekly Unraveled post. There's no link-up this week, as Kat is off enjoying vacation, but that won't stop me from posting, even if for my own accountability. It's been an extremely busy work week, to the point where I didn't even get to shower yesterday until almost 6 p.m., so there hasn't been a whole lot of progress on either knitting or reading. Though I'm focusing mainly on my sister-in-law's Mother's Day socks, yesterday I decided to cast on a new project. I didn't think that my nephew would need any woolly handknits right after he was born (who would have predicted we'd be seeing snow in May?), but seeing as he's arrived in the middle of a cold snap, I though I could whip up a quick hat for him.

The hat is Go Big or Go Gnome, a pattern I already had in my library because my brother has a thing for gnomes. I was able to pull some fingering scraps from my bag 'o scraps in appropriate colors, and I should be able to finish it today (I just have another round or two to knit before I start the crown decreases). It'll need a good blocking and chances are he'll outgrow it pretty quickly, but I figured it would be useful for a week or two and then my brother and sister-in-law can put it away to remember how small he was.

The socks have grown thanks to a round or two here and there during the day; thankfully my sister-in-law has pretty small feet.

I've only been able to finish one book this week thanks to all the work stuff, though I'm getting closer to finishing two others. Over the weekend, I listened to Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy; it seemed like the next logical thing to read after listening to Ann Patchett's memoir of her friendship with the author. I didn't enjoy this as much (there is an awful lot of detail about how sick she got from chemotherapy, which in turn made me feel a bit ill), but if you don't mind that sort of thing, I think it's a worthwhile read if only for the perspective of what it's like to be a child who is so ill and yet doesn't fully understand their condition. I gave it 3 stars.

I'm hoping that work calms down a bit and I can get back to my reading, because a few minutes before bed is really not cutting it -- and the reading I've been doing during the day for work is just not bringing me any joy.

I hope your Wednesday is off to a good start! What are you making and reading this week?