I'm joining Kat & the Unravelers today for Unraveled Wednesday! After last week's off-the-chart excitement, things are back to normal around here, and I'm...

KNITTING:

A blanket.

More like a throw.

My Temperature Blanket is on hold while I whip this up! I've been posting about it on IG/FB -- I even took it to Mexico -- but I've been cagey about saying exactly what it is... because the recipient, a certain young man who graduates high school this year, follows me over there and has "liked" most of those posts. Just wait until he finds out it's his!

When I learned that his favorite color is blue, I knew that I finally had a use for the bagful of mini skeins I'd purchased... in 2019. They were test skeins for someone working out dye formulas, so each skein is a slightly different color, but they all "go." I decided to split them into lights & darks, and I'm riffing a bit on Kay Gardiner's A Light in the Window (Rav) pattern. I wind a skein into a ball, knit until it runs out (usually), knit between one & five garter ridges of natural/undyed yarn (there's sort of a pattern), wind another skein into a ball (alternating light & dark), knit until it's time to make a "window," then carry on... using the remainder of the previous light or dark ball to start the next square.

It reminds me, in a very abstract way, of indigo tie-dye, and if that isn't one of the most perfect unintended happenstances for a project ever, I don't know what is!

So, I'm halfway through the fourth row -- each row has five squares -- and I'm hoping for six rows altogether! Seven would be great, but I'd be OK with six. I have a few more skeins of light than dark, so visited a new-to-me yarn store when we were in Fond du Lac on Saturday in search of supplemental yarn. (Be Prepared!) Knitty Gritty Shop is a very nice store, dangerously located right off the interstate, but not at an exit which makes it just a little bit less perilous. heh. Eventually, I'll knit a border around the whole thing (supplemental yarn may come into play there, if not in the squares).

READING:

I'm still reading The Miracle of the Bells, by Russell Janney (only a couple chapters to go!), and still listening to A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life by George Saunders. Thankfully, I just finished "The Nose" section of the Saunders book and hope there aren't any more stories like that! Just over three hours of listening to go.

What can I say? Life is busy.

Pretty sure I'll be watching The Shipping News again rather than reading it for the upcoming discussion...

I looked up after taking the blanket photo in the Garden Room this morning and just had to take another! It'll be dark again next week at leaving-for-work time but, as I recall, it won't be for too long. Don't forget to "Spring Forward" this weekend!