The (Winter)Green

 Two things of note:

1. I sold my mountain bike. Last post I talked about, this post I'm reporting that it's been done. It felt good, freeing, and honest. Not to mention that it opened up a lot of space in the back building. Now I can focus on my road bike and look into what it will take to get my cruiser project bike up to ride-ability. 

2. Today I finished a knitting project that I started on my birthday last year. The rest of this post is devoted to that project: The (Winter)Green

Awhile back I stumbled across a sweater pattern called The Green by ANKESTRiCK on Ravelry. It was loose, it was fluffy, it was cozy, it was beautifully textured... I decided that I wanted to make one for myself. So I toyed around with the idea for awhile, eventually deciding that what I wanted was a summer sweater, and that a summer sweater would be made up of cotton and alpaca. I found two separate yarns that would achieve this, but then: I found Knit Picks Kindred, a brand new yarn at the time that combined cotton and alpaca, was the size I needed for the pattern, and had two lovely shades of green available. Having been a Knit Picks customer for quite some time, I knew with 95% certitude that green yarns would go on sale in March. So I waited. 

When March 1st hit, I logged onto Knit Picks, and saw that only one of the two shades of green qualified for the sale, so that was the color I bought: Wintergreen. (By the way, if this yarn sounds delicious to you, it looks like it was only a short-run product; they're currently selling the final stock of it for a few bucks less per skein. And no, I'm not getting paid for this promotion.)

The overall pattern of this sweater is a slip-stitch rib that is such a breeze to knit, with collar, cuffs, and hem done in a twisted 1x1 rib, a texture that I discovered in the Fantastitch shawl that I knit last year and which I find absolutely titillating. This was the sweater that I brought on that cross-country road trip with my mother-in-law last year because, once you're past all the upper body shaping, the body is pretty mindless to knit up. The sleeves are similarly so, but in order to get through those I had to use removable stitch markers to keep track of my decreases. But the hardest thing to keep track of with this sweater? Which side is the front and which is the back!?! When I finished, I tried it on both ways, chose the side I preferred, and sewed a little contrasting thread at the base of the collar on the inside back so I don't have to keep guessing all the time. 

This sweater sat dormant from about the time I got back from Michigan until the winter. I picked it up here and there, but only really got serious about finishing it when we had finished our move to Washington. I finished one sleeve, then a second, then undid and reknit the bottom hem. I had tried to cheat and not change needle sizes for the bottom hem the first time around, but didn't like how it looked. Thanks to my mom gifting me the correct needle size for the hem, I was able to try again, and lengthen it! So now we've been in this house for about half a dozen weeks and I've finished my first knitting project in this house and my first knitting project of 2022!

And I love it! Now, this pattern was designed to be much more loosey-goosey than mine turned out. I was in between sizes and I decided to take the smaller option to make sure I had enough yarn (pretty good call, I ended up with 1 1/2 skeins leftover), and that meant that I only had a few inches of ease, most of which disappears in my bust. Oh well. It's still got a nice drape-y feel, something that cotton and alpaca yarns are both known for, so no surprise there! I made the sleeves a tad long, which only adds to the snuggle factor. The whole thing is RIDICULOUSLY SOFT! And even though it's warm, it feels cool to the touch - basically my instincts seem to be proving right that this will be an ideal summer sweater! Now I just have to wait patiently for the summer weather to come so I can test it out!

I'll do my best not to rush it. Last week was sunny and relatively warm - I even went for a bike ride! But this week is back to cold, wet, and cloudy. But I'm embracing the season, my vitamin D tablets, and the encouragement to nestle in to create - and hopefully this winter, to complete! - some more handicrafts.

Until next time!

Motion

The raised embankment of Dike Rd, location of this week's bike ride

How good it feels to be alive.

(I have to warn you - this is a pretty didactic post, not very poetic at all.)

The theme of this month has been motion. As we've settled into this new place (house, town, region) I've nestled into some nice grooves. It was a goal of mine, once the move was finished, to get back on the bandwagon with regards to my workouts. While it took awhile to get everything aligned, I continually reminded myself not to fall prey to feelings of failure: perhaps not now, but it will align soon enough and then you will achieve your goal.

I am now three weeks in to an exercise regimen that I totally eased into, and I am quite pleased with myself. 6+ weeks in, really, if you count that I started doing yoga every morning again during the last couple weeks of December and into the present (travel days excluded). 

Falling off the exercise bandwagon in the autumn of 2020 hurt; I was so burnt out on so many levels, and exercise became one more intolerable thing that I seemed to be failing at. I wanted to try something different, but couldn't figure out what. I would try something here or there, but I let my routine go in the process and - not wanting to perform poorly - chose not to perform at all. A walk here, a hike there, the occasional bike ride or swim - all perfectly legitimate forms of motion, but nothing that I stuck to with any consistency. I at least was able to maintain my yoga practice, for the most part, but even that was on the rocks.

Moving to a new place and starting a new job was an opportunity for a reset, and I took it!

We bought a rowing machine, and I have been rowing twice a week, along with my old Viking Method workouts. First just one set, then two, then three, until I've worked my mind back up to being confident in my body's ability to complete the exercises without bursting. Svava Sigbertsdottir, the trainer who wrote The Viking Method book, spends a good amount of time talking about how much "training like a viking" needs to be paired with "thinking like a viking," and it really is true. My body probably could have blundered through all 4 sets of one of the workouts the first time. But my brain needed convincing. So I worked with it, tried to go with the flow but also to divert it, and I've tricked myself into getting back up to snuff. 

It's worth noting that I've also made some changes to what I'm doing. For one, I'm not timing my workouts anymore. That was really important to me when I did them before, always trying to see if I could beat my previous time as an emblem of my self-improvement. But I've decided that, for now at least, it's enough to know that I am doing something, without having to catalog it down to the second. Yet at the end of my second week of exercising, I decided that there had to be a happy medium between over-recording every movement and not writing anything down at all. I've heard the studies: they say you follow through more when you write stuff down. So I opened up my old Exercise Log notebook, turned to a blank page, and made a two-column chart, one side for my plan that week and one side for my reflections. Nothing too detailed. No boxes to check off. But a framework to adhere to in my brain when it's trying to get out of it, and a space to give myself a pat on the back when the week is done. And at the end of the week, after I've reflected, I'll come up with the plan for the following week.

My goal? Keep doing yoga every morning, and keep rowing/doing Viking Method workouts twice a week. That's it! Because the best way to form a habit is not to make it demand your all, but to make it so attainable that you couldn't help but do it anyway. And yes, I will sprinkle in bike rides, walks, swims, paddle boarding, roller skating, as weather and whims allow on the other days of the week, but they're not a requirement. My goal is to not beat myself up over this. I've been feeling guilty for over a year and it was a poor motivator. My goal is to set myself up for achievement rather than failure. No inflexible standards. No endless check boxes. Just keep in motion.

So enough of that. You get the picture. If you've read this far, kudos. I'm not even sure if it's that interesting, but it felt worthwhile to get it out there. 

On the topic of bicycling, my stable is getting out to pasture for the first time in awhile. I've taken my road bike on two short jaunts and it was positively scrumptious, aside from the rear shifter not wanting to go into the easy gears for some mysterious reason. I'm having a bit of a reckoning with regards to my mountain bike which is leaning towards "sell the darn beast". It was great for what I needed when I was commuting on old two-track up and down a mountain to get to and from work, but it's a lot more bike than I really want or need right now and I'm sure it would make someone else very happy. Now that I'm back in a place where road riding feels safe, I don't feel much need for a massive mountain bike anymore. That old project bike of a lady's Schwinn cruiser that Aunt Sherry let me have, though: that is enticing. I told Jack that if I do sell the mtb, I'll actually get that bike painted and rolling again this year. I love the mental image of the two of us noodling along on our cruisers around some beach town, stopping for ice cream, and pedaling off into the sunset.

Until next time!

Finished! (A book log)

 It's been a season since I last posted a book log, so here I give you a very paltry list of reads. Life was crazy the last few months and my reading was most productive when listening to audiobooks while traveling between Washi and Cali. So here goes:

The Secret Race by Tyler Hamilton and Daniel Coyle - this should've been on last book log, but somehow I think it fell off the list. Jack and I listened to it together and it was eye-opening, mind-spinning, and made me feel a lot better about the author, who had been my cycling hero back in my high school days.

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel - I just noticed that this is a tv show on HBO now... I'll have to look into that. I did not realize that this was a pandemic book when I picked it up, not until I was a chapter or two in. But I kept reading it because it was beautiful, it painted an interesting world, had lots of little ruminations on life sprinkled throughout, and reminded me that our current pandemic could've been so much worse. If you feel like leaning into pandemic fiction just a smidge (and no more than that!), I recommend this book.

How to Be Fine by Kristen Meinzer and Jolenta Greenberg - this is basically the book report of my favorite podcast. It summarizes what they learned by following the rules of over 50 self-help books and what they wish they saw more (and less) of in the self-help industry. It was a pleasant read, lots of short chapters. This would be a great bathroom or bedside reader, just gives you little tidbits to ponder each time. Not a great one for reading straight through as you don't get to digest it that way.

Anne of Windy Poplars by L.M. Montgomery - This is the 4th book sequentially in the series, but it was written at a much later date. And you can tell. It feels less like a through-line story and more like a collection of vignettes that the author wanted to publish but hadn't been able to fit into other stories. Very few of the characters appear in more than one part of the book, and Anne is mostly nosing into everybody else's business and solving their problems, which is frankly annoying. I still laughed out loud and possibly teared up here and there, but it was not as pleasurable as the previous books in the series.

Recipe for Persuasion & Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev - I read these two out of order; Recipe for Persuasion ended up on my list somehow (an NPR review?) and I devoured it in audiobook form when we drove up to Washington; then I realized it was a series and went back and listened to Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors, which is supposed to be the first book in the series. These delicious reworkings of classic Jane Austen novels are beyond phenomenal. The Indian American semi-royal family intermingling with Americans and Brits of various social backgrounds creates the same level of gossipy intrigue that you find in the original novels. Plus the author ties in so much more from tackling serious topics like marital rape to her emphasis on food and flavors that really makes you feel as though you're eating your way through the book instead of just reading (or listening) to it. The romance novel aspect is there, but steamy scenes tend to fade to black before they get too intimate. And if you are not familiar/comfortable with reading names, phrases, and other words out of India, might I suggest the audiobook? Hearing words read aloud by someone who knows how to properly pronounce them is a big bonus when you're broadening your literary horizons.

Finally, two books that I started but chose not to finish:

1. Give a Girl a Knife by Amy Thielan - I got this from the library and was enjoying it in the midst of our move; but when it came time to turn it in or renew, I chose to turn it in unfinished. As interesting as it was, and as well-written, it simply wasn't the type of narrative that was compelling me in that moment. I was satisfied after the several chapters I had read.

2. The Prey of Gods by Nicky Dreyden - This landed on my list because I liked a short story of Dreyden's as read by LeVar Burton in his LeVar Burton Reads podcast. It was intriguing, but I just couldn't get into the book. A main part of the premise is this recreational drug that makes you have crazy hallucinations and I guess I just couldn't really relate. There were definitely aspects of it that intrigued me, though, like the little robot companions everybody has (like if your phone walked around outside of your pocket), or the witch-not-witch in the beauty parlor... so curious about that woman!

And that's it for now. I've got a couple different books that I'm partway through reading which I hope to finish up soon; I received several new books for Christmas (Jólabókaflóð!); and perhaps now that we're settled in I will get back into a better reading rhythm and be able to report back more finished books every 2-3 months again instead of 2-3 times a year. My plan is to focus on reading the books I own (because I just moved several across state lines that I only moved BECAUSE I hadn't read them yet!) and avoiding the library as long as I can hold out. It will be good to read through what I have and pass them on so that I can clear my shelves a little more. :)

Until next time!

Unfinished

It turns out that I learned something important in adulthood. The last several years I had stuck pretty solidly to the rule of only doing one project at a time - particularly with knitting. Start something, see it through, get it done, start something else.

Well in the winter of 2020-2021, I threw that out the window. Thought I'd try a little throwback to my teen years, I suppose. It did not go well.

So now I'm in the heart of the crafting season, we've just recently finished our move, and I have unfinished projects up the wazoo! Here's a little taste of all the would-be's that I have to finish before I'm allowed to start anything new:

1. The Green - I'm making this slouchy summer sweater with a cotton-alpaca yarn from Knit Picks called "Kindred" that I bought on sale and which I absolutely adore. What I don't adore is that I failed to make this slouchy at all - not being certain about my yarn quantities and being on the cusp of the suggested ease, I chose the smaller of two sizes and did not choose wisely. I appear to have a relatively form-fitting sweater on my hands. Except that I don't, because I put it down in June or July and never picked it up again 'til now. 1 1/2 sleeves to go (and that 1/2 that I did get done mostly happened this week). Plus, I'll likely need to tink the bottom hem and knit it a little longer because it really did come out a bit on the short side. We'll see how much yarn I have left to extend it with.

2. Sleeveless Taiga - this was going to be my take on the sweater vest. I'd lose the short sleeves in the pattern and make this to replace my much-loved puffy vest (the zipper finally went out or my bust got too big... either way it was 10 years old and it was time). I even fancied knitting up an interior lining with the bulky alpaca I bought for a failed nalbinding project a couple years ago (the texture was just off...). Trouble is, when I finished the vest my sleeveless look turned out to be more like snug little caps. What had I done wrong? Back to the drawing board... I have the zipper, I have the finished vest, I have the alpaca yarn if I ever do want to knit a liner for it... but I have GOT to do SOMETHING about those sleeves! Back to the drawing board... hopefully I can find a way to manipulate it that doesn't mean I have to undo the whole thing. Otherwise, it will be 2 points for Jack, who thought I wouldn't like this sweater when finished.

3. Roam Free Mittens - this is a pattern I'm designing that's inspired by the rams head symbol for official Icelandic sheep products. It's turned out very cute. Trouble is, I only made one mitten - and didn't even make the thumb! I've got everything I need to finish my pair, plus to make a pair for Jack with larger needles and bulkier yarn so that I can offer the pattern in different sizes. Yet there it sits...

4. Jack's Sweater, round 2 - The first one didn't go over very well. Too snug. Too dense. So we thought we'd try something different. I've got a lovely fisherman's sweater pattern called Stonecutter that I purchased and made for myself back in 2013. We decided to try and make the sweater for him. I gauged it and got going. But a couple dozen rows in, I wasn't liking the result - too dense (again) and the definition wasn't what I wanted. So I stopped. Also, it was using the same size needles as The Green, so that posed some issues as well. Anyway, this one needs to get a bit of a reassessment. Perhaps to be frogged and started over on a different size needle. TBD.

5. Artisan Dress - I bought the fabric and pattern for this when it caught my eye one day at JoAnn's. I cut out all the pieces, started sewing, got to the collar interfacing and froze. I don't do interfacing. It's plastic and stupid. But I learned recently, through watching Bernadette Banner's videos, about horsehair tailor's canvas. So I bought some and waited and put the dress on hold. And that was right before the fire season/detail/new job/moving craziness started. Needless to say, I never even cut out the horsehair fabric yet, let alone hand-sewed the pad stitching to connect it to the fabric (what a hot melty iron does for regular plastic interfacing). 

And this is to say nothing of the projects not yet started which have been on my list for some time: painting a label for our friend's new cider; making more envelopes out of calendars; making a rag rug (ok, this one JUST got on my radar and I already started the work for it... so yeah, I cheated a little bit...). I've also got yarn to knit more socks, a shirt, and other goodies. Not to mention I've got tons of other fabric (I packed at least 5 boxes full to bursting with fabric during our move) that would love to get used in SOMETHING!

So this year, 2022, I'm going to go back to what previous experience already taught me and finish what I started, rather than having half a dozen pies in the oven at the same time. Starting with that darn "summer sweater"! :P

Until next time!