My Marled mystery has been done for a couple days now, though the weather has been less than cooperative for picture taking.

But, remember that day off I was going to give my kid if her braces were bothering her? Well, that sort of happened. Not a full day, but a half day. The nurse called yesterday to tell me she was struggling, and I went to pick her up. At that point, she’d had a wire that popped out that was tearing up the inside of her cheek, pain from getting them in the first place, and as did happen the last time she had braces, a mouth full of surprise canker sores. Not to mention the stretched chapped lips from getting them put on in the first place. Her pain killers had worn off, and so by the time I brought her home she was feeling pretty low.

She took meds, and rested for about 45 minutes. And then? She spent the rest of the afternoon doing the schoolwork she would have done at school. She made me teach her in the manner which her own teacher would have done that day. Then, when school was about to let out she decided she wanted to walk back to school to get a binder which had her language arts in it. We walked up there, got her binder, got home, and she proceeded to work on an essay that the class wasn’t even due to start until today.

We were back to the orthodontist this morning to fix the popped wire, so hopefully she’ll be far more comfortable in the near future.

In any case, that meant that I had a lovely free afternoon. Miss Butterfly modeled my marled mystery shawl for me.

She also wanted to show off her new braces. The shawl has quite a large wingspan, and it does seem to be getting used regularly by me or by Miss Butterfly, as I’ve just put it on the couch so anytime one of us feels cold we throw it over our shoulders. I really enjoyed the process of knitting this shawl. I am a pretty bold person when it comes to wearing color, but I am struggling to find the courage to actually wear it out of the house. It does look nice draped in the more kerchief manner. But it’s still a lot of weird.

That being said, what I love the most is seeing all the bits of handspun I’ve spun or knit with over the years. There’s lots of leftovers from projects, including some of Miss Marja’s handspun from leftovers. There are also a lot of handspuns I’ve done that just do not fit in any particular project or color scheme preference. Or, the samples were really too small once spun to actually become something. And so much of those handspuns are also things I created, whether that be something I dyed or created in the drum carder. There’s even some undyed handspun from a fleece I processed ages ago. So, the mystery shawl turned into a repository for memories. And that makes it worthwhile even if it never makes it out of the house.

Of course I did find more handspun in my stash that I could have used once the project was done and I was reorganizing my stash. That paired with quite a lot of scraps still left, I may end up doing another. Not in the near future, but again after I’ve finished up some more projects with appropriate handspun that I can add to the pile.

The other thought I had, and I may try this soonish, was that the bit that I liked the most was the brioche. So, I might also try a marled brioche scarf that is similar in nature to a baktus scarf at some point.

In any case, that was good fun, would do again.

Due to all the rain, not much has been happening in the yard. But, I did grab a photo of the rain barrel.

It looks ok there in my veggie garden! In the top is a place for soil and flowers, so it’ll get some annuals once it’s time to plant.

Last year, Mr. Ink and I made four long lists. One for the house, one for the yard, one for the motorbikes, and one for bikes. It was a list for short and long term goals. Mr. Ink requested we pull those out and look them over, so that’s what I did. Naturally, quite a bit that was to be done in the yard was already crossed off, or could be crossed off, or we had a good start on. We added some things. Then? The other three lists there was nothing on there that we could cross off at all. Not that we haven’t accomplished anything, just that nothing at all on the lists was accomplished. So, I think since Mr. Ink is so yard inspired, I am going to start on the house list and see where it gets me this year. Last year there were large yard projects I could assist with, but at this point there’s little left beyond just normal gardening for me to do. Yet I feel quite guilty spinning or knitting when he’s devoting so much time to the yard, even though it’s his hobby.

In any case, we are looking forward to the weekend again. Despite the fact that it’ll be another rainy one. To be honest, we could use that time to get some work done IN the house, so that’s my goal for the weekend!

Between work lunches, and a trip to the car dealership, and a trip to the orthodontist, Miss Marja’s Lintilla has gotten a little more work, and since it came home with me, it also got a decent photo.

One where you can actually see the colors as they are. If this shawl were at home, I’d probably never stop working on it. I love it. The color blending is fantastic, and it never ceases to interest me.

Plus, I just REALLY LOVE knitting the Lintilla pattern.

As mentioned previously, the small skein of chain plied yarn that matches this shawl is going into my crazy marled mystery shawl. New clue out tomorrow! All I have to do is choose which yarn to pair with it, which I don’t think I’ll bother to do until I actually get the clue and see what I am up against. For the clue that particular yarn goes into, for consistency, I won’t be counting yardage, because it’s “New Yarn.” I only get to count the yards from the yarn paired with it. Can you tell I am really enjoying making up pointless rules for my pointless game? Hah.

In the meantime, I worked my way into the 5th color on the Find Your Fade shawl. It’s not completely worked in yet, I am still alternating with the 4th color. But, I am close, as was my hope!

There’s a pokemon go event going on right now as well, plus a nests change, which should seriously inspire Miss Butterfly and I to get outdoors and walking around. We’ll have to do so tonight, as it’s going to rain all day Friday, according to forecasts.

Are you looking forward to the weekend as much as I am?

I almost wrote the title as “fad finding” which would be entirely appropriate when speaking of the Find Your Fade shawl. I am well into the second skein of the fourth color now, and just completed the lace section last evening. The rows are very long. Thankfully, they are as long as they are going to get, I am no longer increasing stitches. But, I’ve 3 more colors to go after this one, so I’d better well get accustomed to these long rows!

My coworker, who is originally Finnish, and knows how to knit and crochet, but hasn’t made a habit of it over the years, has recently had a resurgence in her crafting desire. Last year I gave her some handspun yarn she had her eye on, and she was thrilled to bits. She crocheted it into a hat that I see her wearing almost daily.

After she made the hat, she decided she needed to crochet more things. Now, this is a woman who is a huge advocate for wildlife. And, she found some bird rehab/rescue places that were requesting various bird houses made out of yarn. She ordered some yarn from knitpicks, and set out to create birdhouses. She brought them in to me before sending them out, they were great! She soon ran out of yarn, but she says the itch to craft hasn’t disappeared and she was going to need to make another order. Well, knowing that I’ve got a bunch of one off balls of knitpicks hanging around from projects completed or gone by the wayside, I told her I’d donate to her cause. This means that 7 odd skeins of knitpicks yarn went to her this morning. She was thrilled, and I think that means I get to add 770 yards of “knit” yarn to my yearly total. Meaning  I haven’t been counting the knitting I am doing for Miss Marja, or the knitting I am doing with yarn that has arrived in my stash this year due to that not being “destash” yarn. I’ve knit far more than 770 yards that would fall under that category. But, in this case I destashed the yarn, so I get to add it as “knit.” Current totals, 3.88 miles knit, 1.75 miles spun. At the moment, what is leaving my stash is double what is going back in. That’s sort of where I’d like to be, overall. Can’t say I’ll be able to maintain that throughout spinning “season” but it’s a great start!

Miss Butterfly is getting braces again next week. We were in this morning for small spacers for her to wear this week, in order that she has the appropriate room for the mouth gear being installed next week. Also of note, she gets to throw out her retainer. Which is great, because it’s been used and abused so hard at this point that there’ve been bits falling off it for the last 6 months. The orthodontist didn’t want to replace it, as we were too close to phase 2 braces, so he’s been piecing the thing back together just to get us through those 6 months. If he could have used duct tape, I swear he would have. This is the second retainer she’s had, and amazingly enough we managed to get through both of them without losing one completely, or throwing one out completely, or breaking one beyond usability. I feel very fortunate. Then again, I told her from the start she has to buy the next one of she loses one. So, it might have been the correct incentive for her. In any case, I am as glad to be rid of the thing as she is at this point I think!

Tonight if it hasn’t rained too much (and it’s currently raining) we may try to get a dirt bike ride in. I have to admit, I’ve been less than inspired to ride dirt lately, so I am waffling back and forth between wanting it to rain hard, and wanting it to dry up so a dirt ride is possible. That being said, if I am not feeling it, I figure I’ll just take a nice dirt walk, and grab my step goal. That could easily make for a win win situation. It’s cold today, in fact the rain that happened this morning was really ice pellets at first. But tomorrow we are looking at 73? It’s so nutty out here in March!

It was a pleasantly knitting filled morning for me yesterday, and I finished my clue 3.

I am back to being quite enchanted with the crazy thing, and will be truly looking forward to Friday so I have what I need to compete it. At this point, I have run out of loads of colors. Not that I am hurting for color to add, it’s just that all the smaller balls of color are gone, having been knit into the 4 sections where color changes were fast and furious. That’s ok, if I am guessing correctly, and I could easily not be, the next sections will be quite large and I’ll need the back up of bigger skeins of color. Since two of the “colors” I’ve been using are actually large loop batt handspun with multiple colors in them, there’s no danger whatsoever of running out of yarn.

While yesterday began quite cold, by the end of the day it was sunny and in the 50s. Mr. Ink spent all day digging. This weekend’s project seems to be digging out sod, moving it and laying it in new areas, and then digging up soil and amending that soil in anticipation of all the trees that should start arriving any minute now. He had mentioned to me that the soil is just perfect for this job, it’s easy to dig and easy to work with. Plus, it’s supposed to rain all week starting tomorrow or Tuesday. Well, I decided if the soil is perfect, I’d get my propagated lilies that went dormant into the ground. I’ve got more lilies, but they never did go dormant and are going nuts in our living room. I’ll wait until the end of April to put those outdoors.

I got a pretty pleasant walk in. Mr. Ink decided to go see some live music, it’s not a band I like so I stayed home. I pulled out wool and add ins for some new batts, and got started on those instead. All in all an extremely lovely day.

Now I am back to knitting on find your fade, but I am at a point where the rows are super long! So, I keep knitting a row and then wandering off to do something else. Not the most efficient way of getting a shawl done, but it does help keep my interest.

Talk soon!

Last Christmas I made black alpaca batts with pops of colored silk in them for Miss Marja’s christmas gift.

I think there ended up being over 7 ounces or something, but I admit I didn’t pay too much attention. Since alpaca turns out not to be my favorite thing to spin, and I really can’t wear it too easily either, I was happy to make my stash of black alpaca fiber into something pretty to pass on. Miss Marja spun it into a traditional 3 ply yarn. And then I got it back, in order to knit it into a large Lintilla scarf for her.

Thing is, there were actually two skeins. One of the traditional 3 ply, and the other the remainder of the singles chain plied. Well, I really wanted to use up ALL the yarn. So I weighed my skein, and then began with the chain plied yarn. Here’s how far I got:

And that’s when I stopped. Because I could tell that the pops of color were not going to mimic the rest of the shawl in any way. So we’d have this start with these large pops of color, and then the rest of the shawl would have well blended silk colors. I hated it. And, really, I didn’t think Miss Marja would love it either. So, I put it down and knit her reversible circles of lace, because I needed Lintilla to have a time out.

Over the weekend I yanked out this bit of knitting, balled it up, and added to it the rest of the chain plied yarn. I then asked Miss Marja if I could add the chain plied bits to my crazy mystery shawl, which she quickly said yes to. Then I got started on the latest lintilla, which looks exactly as I’d envisioned, and I am very well pleased with the project now. The photo is not the greatest due to the lack of decent light at work. But, I think you can get the idea of the blending and much more subtle color shifting that is happening now.

In other news, Mr. Ink purchased tickets for Miss Butterfly to go see Panic at the Disco for a christmas gift. The tickets were for the three of us to go as a family. But, as the date of the concert drew closer, she decided she’d much prefer to bring a friend, and so she asked Mr. Ink if he’d be willing to take her and Bestie, rather than her and me. He thought about it for about 24 hours, and decided indeed he could do that if it would make her happy. So, I got an evening at home alone, which I promptly used to take a long, hot, relaxing bath and Miss Butterfly got to see her band the way she wanted.

First of all, I love these two lovely, excitable, screeching, intelligent, fun girls so much. For real. They are amazing children. And the man who would take those screeching girls to see a band he doesn’t even like is pretty fantastic too. I mean, I would totally be rolling my eyes if I had to do it, but I said to him “Have fun!” a bit sarcastically, as the girls were bouncing all over the house and being loud. And his extremely genuine response was “You know I will!”

I was asleep by the time they got home, so I’ll have to hear how it went today.

I am into the third color on the find your fade shawl, so I’ll be able to grab photos of that tonight. And then tomorrow? The next clue of the marled mystery will be revealed, so you know what my weekend will consist of! I know me, and I know that I am going to be just giddy to get home on Friday to work on it! In part because it’s a Friday, and in part because the shawl has been way too much fun. Happy Thursday Friends!

I got home a bit late yesterday, but I was definitely looking forward to it as I knew my family wouldn’t be home at that time. I needed 2 more rows to complete the lace section I was working on in Find Your Fade, and I really wanted to get that section done prior to grabbing a photo. Unfortunately, I also fell asleep on the couch in the sun. Sometimes that’s just irresistible. After a quick nap, and thanks to the fact that it’s light later now, I grabbed a photo.

I am so pleased with this so far! I worked my way into the third color last night. Surprisingly, I really don’t love knitting the lace sections. I think it’s because they aren’t charted, and I really love to be able to “see” my lace and how everything should line up. But, thankfully, after two sections I am pretty sure I can see if I am going wrong quite a bit earlier than I could in the first section.

Other thoughts of note. I began this one with the size needles called for in the pattern. I hate how it looked, my stitches were loose and sloppy, the garter stitch looking so messy. I went down one needle size and got the above gauge, which is entirely appropriate, tidy, and pleasant. It’s so amazing to me that such a tiny difference in needle sizes could make such a dramatic difference in end product.

How did I end up with this yarn? Well, for the first time ever, a facebook ad got to me. Somehow it popped up in my feed, I fell head over heels for the color combo, researched the company Expression Fiber Arts, and found the color combo on their site. It was a pre order, it had a date listed about a month in the future as to when my yarn would be ready. It was indeed ready and shipped on the very date listed. The yarn is merino and tencel. It’s super shiny, soft, and slippery. Mr. Ink says it almost looks metallic, but that’s just the high shine of tencel. I can just tell already that this is a shawl I am going to get a ton of use out of.

My additional story of the day is about work. My boss has rheumatoid arthritis. Her shoulders often hurt. I can always tell when she’s having quite a bit of pain, though she always hides it so well. Yesterday it was cold in the office. She was out talking to us, with her suit jacket thrown over her front, holding it up to her neck with her hands. She mentioned she was cold, and I gave her a bit of a funny look, she immediately knew I knew, and she said “I am in so much pain I can’t even stand to wear my jacket, it hurts too much.” So, I pulled my insanely HUGE handspun shawl I keep at work off my chair and handed it to her. She immediately looked relieved, put it over her shoulders, and went and sat at her desk. She quickly looked so much more relaxed. The power of a hand knit, I am telling you! It’s a big deal. I told her to borrow it any time, as it just sits over the back of my chair and I rarely use it. But, now that I am thinking it through, I may eventually just make her one of her own. We’ve worked together for a good 10 years now, and have always been friends. Furthermore, her mother is a knitter and she wears her mother’s  handknits frequently, she’s certainly knit worthy.

The shawl in question:

In any case, it felt great to be able to provide someone with a little bit of comfort during her long day. I guess that, as a knitter, is something I hope for when I give handknits away.

Miss Marja’s reversible circles of lace scarf is complete!I used every last bit of her handspun on this one, one of the distinct advantages of this particular pattern.

Not quite sure what else to say about this one! The knit was completely unremarkable. It went perfectly smoothly. I knit it almost entirely at work during lunch breaks, and the reason it took so long is that I go out at lunchtime far more often than I used to, for my sanity. My current coworker/coworkers don’t seem to be able to exist at work without being disruptive, so headphones in and knitting isn’t a sign they read as “Leave Shells Alone.” In any case, the knit turned out fine, the yarn is lovely, and the project is finished. I think I won’t jump at doing this particular pattern again, even though it’s a very nice one. This was two circles of lace scarves in very quick succession, and I am not eager to knit it again right now.

Miss Butterfly got her best friend playing pokemon now too. Yesterday, Buterfly and Bestie were at my place, and we had to run out and get some snacks for a class party they have happening today. We headed off to the store and went shopping, of course this was punctuated by stopping frequently for Bestie to catch pokemon, along with much screeching. We then went out for coffee as well, and then did a little drive around to continue to catch pokemon. It ended up being a pretty fun afternoon with those two. I can see why Bestie’s mom always takes them shopping. It’s a great way to actually spend time with them, when at home they are just off doing their own thing. The reality is, they are both such super awesome kids that spending time with them is great fun!

The rest of the evening was completely unremarkable and quiet, which is just fine with me. I’ve got a find your fade shawl start that I will be able to show off tomorrow. I am very excited about it, and the yarn choice is downright amazing. My entire family has off work tomorrow, and I am feeling quite irritable that I still have to work. Ah well, I guess I took extra time off when I really needed it, and now that things have slowed down slightly, I am not feeling too overwhelmed anymore.

Happy Tuesday blogland!

And again with the inability to follow pattern instructions. I got almost finished with the brioche section of the mystery shawl when I realized I’d been decreasing at a rate that was double what it should have been. That was ok though, as I also wasn’t digging what I’d done with some of the colors. Ripping and restarting was a setback, but resulted in a section I prefer over what I’d had. In this section I held a grey stand of yarn throughout, adding other colors for 4 rows. I chose every 4 rows the second time around simply because it meant it was easier to keep track of my decreasing.

The grey yarn I had been using was a gradient that ended up green, and that transition is seen at the tip of the shawl. I also used as one of my colors some silk hankies I had spun. Those are fairly textured, so it adds some interesting texture to that section.

Now, I know I said that I was only going to be using handspun for this project. But, here’s a little story. Yesterday, Miss Butterfly was very happily playing quietly in her room. It was one of those moments where I refused to disturb her as it was such quiet and productive play and she was being so good. So, any of the morning activities, chores, and errands I had planned flew right out the window. I did my own around the house chores practically tiptoeing around the house in hopes not to disturb this beautiful moment in which I was completely undisturbed. Mr. Ink was at work, so that was even less distraction than usual. At some point, Miss Butterfly had said “Mom, do you have any string I can use?” To which I laughed and said “Do *I* have any string??!?!!” And she laughed, and said “Well, I mean that I can cut up and use.” Before I was even able to stop what I was doing and get her some, she’d remembered that she has a bag full of her own that I’ve given her over the years. She showed me her bag full, and I noticed some old Noro Taiyo in there, in shades of orange, yellow, and brown. I was like “Butterfly, can I take this?!?” And she quickly said yes, they weren’t really colors she was interested in.

And that is how I ended up adding commercial yarn to my mystery shawl. I decided that my handspun yellow would work very well with the noro leftovers, and so that’s what I used for section 4.

Definitely an interesting departure from what I had been doing. At this point, this shawl is so westknits that I am ready to call it a monstrosity. A monstrosity that no one but me would ever wear. But, there are times we knit something just for the process of knitting it, right? And this is certainly one of those examples. And honestly? The yarns I’ve used in this are entirely yarns I’ve had small bits of all skeined together waiting for something to do with them. Except every time I tried, I’d get annoyed that they weren’t all precisely the same thickness/texture. And then I would quit knitting on any pattern I began. Holding yarns double really does solve that problem. I can achieve fairly similar thickness by choosing which yarns to hold together, and I barely notice the different textures.

We did go out and see our movie yesterday, after Mr. Ink got home, and he took us out to lunch as well since he’d noticed I was in the middle of a deep cleaning of our stove. All in all, a pretty relaxing and comfortable day in our home. We’ve gotten a lot of those lately on the weekends, and I am ever so grateful!

Oh, here’s a photo of the shawl in it’s entirety so far!

I’ve pulled out Miss Marja’s circles of lace scarf, and am hoping to find time to complete that today in between our other chores.

Well, with the westknits mystery shawl on the needles and my find your fade yarn in, seems like all I am doing is projects where colors fade into each other. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…

I finished the first clue of the mystery shawl this morning, and grabbed a quick photo.

I ended up grabbing a bunch more colors out of my stash. Stuff I’d thought of as usable, as well as stuff I’ve had balled up but never used and really am unsure what to do with. Adding them in as well has been great fun. Still all handspun! The next little section is brioche stitch, which I enjoy knitting quite a bit so I suspect that little section will go quickly. Then we are on to garter stitch.

I also received my find your fade shawl yarn in the mail, let me show you it!

I saw these colors together and it was love at first sight. I kept avoiding purchasing them, but they needled me until I did. So now they are here and technically I could start this weekend if I manage to get the second clue of the mystery shawl done.

However, I am very close to being done with Miss Marja’s circles of lace scarf as well. So much so, that while I’ve been knitting on it at work, I threw it in my work bag after lunch yesterday to see if I could get it finished up. I think I’ll focus on finishing that scarf before starting find your fade shawl. I could really use a different work project, circles of lace was starting to get really old. Next up for her is a lintilla shawl out of her handspun, and I think that’ll also be  my next work project. After all, that’s a shawl I love knitting, and I think it’ll be very pleasant to have at work.

Mr. Ink ended up having to work this morning, and then decided since he has to go in anyhow, he’ll get some work done on our civic. So no movie this morning. Also, no snow this morning, the storm didn’t bother to hit us at all. As for me and Miss Butterfly, I think we’ll spend the morning getting chores done so I can feel free to knit at leisure for the rest of the weekend!

Happy Saturday friends!

You know, for a gal who keeps saying “I am going to go straight home and knit” I don’t actually DO it very often! Yesterday was a little nutty. I’d indicated that I’d like to walk Miss Marja’s puppy Max at lunchtime, a task I do about once a week. It gets me out of the office at lunchtime, it forces me to take a walk and get fresh air, and it keeps Max comfortable with my presence, something that I expect to be helpful to Miss Marja over the years.

Well, this week and last have been so nutty that I’ve done things like switching vehicles, switching purses and work bags, etc. All to try to accommodate my busy schedule. What I failed to do yesterday was put my house keys in my work bag. Which meant, when it came time to walk Max, I didn’t have the keys to get him! So, instead we agreed I could go home after work, pick up Miss Butterfly, and then we’d head over to get Max and take him to a local park for a walk. Win win, right?

What we didn’t quite anticipate was the traffic. There was a major accident on the interstate that blocked off the interstate completely. It was causing major issues getting home, it caused major issues getting back to Marja’s, and it caused major issues going to the park. I’ve never seen traffic like that for so long without snow on the ground!

But we did make it to the park, and I think Max enjoyed both the car ride and his time with us.

We sure enjoyed our time with him! We had some trouble getting back to Miss Marja as well due to traffic, but once we left her place, the trip home was fine. And in the end, it was worth it! You can see the progression of Max’s comfort level. When we headed to the park he was like “I’ll just sit in the back, ok?” On the way home, he had his head sticking up between the front seats, so when Miss Butterfly offered a place on her lap, he hopped right up there quite contentedly.

By the time we got home it was getting a bit late. Mr. Ink headed to the store, and I had to assist Miss Butterfly with homework. Not a task we often have to do, but this time we did. I was still assisting when Mr. Ink returned home, and I was assisting when dinner was begun. After that, I worked on my part of the meal, we ate, and I looked at the clock and realized it was 9:30! So, basically after putting Miss Butterfly to bed, I fell in bed too. I’d really had enough. I am so glad today is Friday!

I did manage to get a photo of the shawl in progress though. Section 2 is seed stitch and I am nowhere near done with it. I doubt I am even halfway. But, it’s still fantastic and pretty and Clue 2 came out today and I am looking forward to figuring out what to do with colors next!

I plan to work on weaving in the ends this weekend in addition to making progress on it. I did see a post by the designer saying that if my right side looks ok even with the yarn ends over there, it’ll be ok to leave it that way, so I did decide that I wouldn’t restart the thing.

And that’s encouraging, because you know what is scheduled to show up tonight? My find your fade shawl yarn.

So, a weekend of knitting for me. Mr. Ink wants to take us to see a movie this weekend. I suspect I’ll be bitter about heading out of the house for that too. Maybe I can take my sock and work on that during the movie to ease the pain. 🙂 We are supposed to get some snow overnight as well. I doubt it’ll stick around for any time at all, but it’s nice it will be happening at a time where we don’t have to worry about cleaning it up to get to work!

So, on Tuesday evening I had a visitor on campus, which always makes for a very full and stressful day. After driving her to the airport at the end of the day, I headed home where I had about an hour break before we had to make dinner and then get Miss Butterfly off to district vocal festival. Now, I don’t know how it happened, but I failed completely to write down the vocal festival in my planner at the beginning of the year. Before I figured out there was a concert, Mr. Ink had asked if I’d be willing to go see a band that night. I said I would, after checking them out and making sure it was something I’d probably enjoy. He bought the tickets. And that night I came home to Miss Butterfly talking about vocal festival on the same night. Ooops? The vocal festival started at 7, the concert at 8. Thankfully there was an opening band. Because we weren’t sure that Miss Butterfly’s dad would attend, I arranged to go to the festival, then have Miss Butterfly go home with her friend’s family while we left straight after her performance.

Well, that evening, Miss Butterfly came home to tell me that her friend hadn’t even been in school, she’s sick. And so she wasn’t sure that she could go home with her friend. Friend’s mom called and said “I’ll pick her up anyhow, I won’t leave you hanging!” but it was a moment of trying to figure out our options. In the end, her father did show up for the festival and could take her home, making it so friend’s mom was off the hook.

During that one hour break, I’d balled up the yarn for the Marled Mystery shawl, and gotten started. And I am telling you I was dead chuffed with the project. It made me want to dance around the living room! I loved it. And, as with any obsession of mine, it was very painful to be torn away from it that evening. I dutifully put it away though, and went to the festival. Then we got to the concert midway through the opening band. And I hated them. And it was hot and I was tired and my feet hurt. It was crowded and there were people touching me. (Unintentionally, let me clarify.) And I was just NOT in the mood to be there. Mr. Ink asked me what was wrong and I told him I was just not in the mood to be there. And he said “Uh oh, I am destined to be stuck with a miserable date tonight!” And I told him he was right. And that he’d done nothing wrong. And then I said “Actually, I think this has to do with the perfect storm of a day being way too long and busy paired with a knitting project I am currently obsessed with and I am feeling unreasonably resentful about being out when I could be knitting. It doesn’t happen often these days, but I think that’s what’s going on.”  Acknowledging that was half the battle. Once the band we were there to see came on I did enjoy them quite a lot, they were extremely talented musicians. However, after about 45 of even a good band and all I was hearing was noise. I think the long day and just plain feeling anxious due to stress had me hearing nothing but noise. I endured until their finale, but when they said they were back out to sing “a couple more songs” I told Mr. Ink I’d meet him outside. I’d just plain had enough.

So yesterday when I got home, I decided I would do my evening “my” way. I started with a nap, seeing as we’d been out late the night before. Then grabbed a photo of the start of my marled mystery shawl, and then proceeded to knit on it for the rest of the evening.

This was the piece of knitting that had me in the obsessive grumpy mood, unable to enjoy myself when out with Mr. Ink. Can you see why? I mean, it’s completely fascinating, and there are so many color combinations to try!

I finished this entire section last evening. And once I finished it, I realized I had not read the instructions. All those yarn ends are supposed to be on the left side! I am not sure if this mistake is structural or not, so I am leaving it for now and knitting the next bit of the shawl. I am aware that I might have to rip everything out and start over. I hope not. But it could happen. In any case, I am having a great time with this knit, and I’ll grab a photo of the next section this evening.

You know what the best part about this shawl is, right? Since I am stash busting, and since it requires that I hold two yarns together, this will basically count double in stash busting yardage.