Month: November 2017

Expect the Unexpected

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Last evening we’d planned to go, as a family, to see the new Murder on the Orient Express. Poirot mysteries are kind of my thing. When Mr. Ink got home, he said “Why don’t we go out to dinner as well? It’ll be a tight turn around, so we should leave now, but it’s doable.”

So, we went out to dinner. And, as it turns out, we didn’t get our food until half an hour after the movie started. Movie was skipped. However, it was trivia night at the place we were eating. While we didn’t formally participate, we all listened to the questions and tried to answer them, and had a wonderful time together! Miss Butterfly was initially quite irritated about missing the movie, but even she had a lovely time. We even had a 3 way split on a brownie sundae, as a consolation prize. Not what we expected for the evening, but great time spent together nonetheless.

I got photos of my worsted weight 3 ply!

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I could not be more pleased with this end result. I ended up with 440 yards of this stuff, and I am having a hard time not balling it up immediately and casting on. The only thing stopping me really is simply that I haven’t located the correct project. This one may never make it into stash.

Tuesday night we finally sprung for a prime membership. Know what that means? Doctor Who with Miss Butterfly again.

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Everyone seemed rather thrilled with the decision. Lizzie’s pretty much into any TV if it means she gets to spend time with Miss Butterfly. While Mr. Ink wants nothing to do with Doctor Who, he’s pretty pleased to try Man in the High Tower, so I got plenty of spinning time on Tuesday night!

Tonight Mr. Ink goes to see a live show. He wanted me to go, badly, but I’d get him to play this band’s music for me, and every single song went like this: “Oh, that’s kind of nice, I could get into that.” and then by the end of the song?” WHAT IS THIS WALL OF SOUND ASSAULTING MY SENSES!” So, he’s gotta go alone. I don’t know yet if Miss Butterfly will be home, her father usually takes her on Wednesdays but he had to work last night. So, it might be a nice quiet evening for me!

From the Show

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As soon as I finished my autowrap handspun last weekend, I divided up 8 ounces of fiber I’d purchased at the guild show at the start of my vacation. And I divided up 12 ounces of fiber I’d purchased on small business Saturday. Then I got to spinning the 8 ounces with the intent to have a 3 ply worsted weight yarn.

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I forget just how fast 8 ounces will spin when I am not trying for a fingering weight 3 ply! This spun up in no time at all, here’s two bobbins full. The colorway is Sari not Sorry from The Dyeing Arts. Fiber content was superwash merino, nylon, and stellina. The stellina gives it quite a lot of sparkle, but I noticed that it also gives it quite a lot of unexpected shine on top of all that sparkle. I have used this fiber base before, in a two ply that I paired with a non sparkle fiber braid of the same colorway. Let’s see if I can find it:

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I really loved this spin as well and really should knit with it! I did get the Sari not Sorry plied, and it should be dry by this evening so I can have a picture tomorrow.

That’s about it from around here. It’s been a busy but lovely week so far!

What can that wheel do?

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When I was asking Mr. Ink about what he thought about me getting the kromski prelude, he asked “What can that wheel do that your current wheel cannot?” I told him…nothing. The rose is a great wheel that does everything I need it to do. And, when it cannot do something, there are generally additions I can get from majacraft that will make the wheel do what I want it to do. I explained that the kromski was an opportunity to own another wheel that was a traditional style. But that was it.

I was wrong. I just didn’t realize it until my vacation. And even the way I realized it was a bit of a surprise. You see, I don’t really wear make up. But since we were going to a thanksgiving party, I decided to wear make up. But, our main bathroom is THE WORST for make up application, as there is no way to get near enough to the mirror to get the job done. The master bathroom is better, but there’s not enough room in there, and no surfaces to hold the make up while I apply it. So I’ve been bringing a small mirror out to the kitchen when I wear make up, and applying it on the kitchen table. However, even that is annoying because the mirror is never at the level I need it to be.

This time, since I had plenty of time to do my face, I decided to raise the mirror a bit. I pulled out some larger books I had around. There was a weaving book, The Fleece and Fiber Source Book, and A Spinner’s Book of Yarn Designs. I stacked them up trying to raise the mirror a bit, which only partly worked, but make up got applied and off we went to the party.

The next day I went to put away the books, and realized I had all these pages tagged in the yarn designs book, but I haven’t looked through the book in years. There was a time when work was great and I was creative with my spinning. But then the time of the problematic coworker arrived, and my spinning became routine stress relief rather than creative time. I began to look through the book, figuring maybe it’s time to work on some of these yarns I wanted to create. And I found it. Autowrapped singles. A thing the rose cannot do because of the design of the orifice. But my kromski can do it! So, I went in stash and pulled out some fiber and a skein of habu textiles bamboo laceweight I’ve had in stash for many years now, and made some autowrap singles.

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417 yards later, I had a new and interesting yarn! The autowrap process was fun and easy, and it’s likely I’ll do it again. The resulting skein is interesting as well, and since it’s a pretty consistent color, I think it’ll make a great item. It’s probably about a DK weight yarn, though I didn’t measure that yet. I’ll certainly do this again, maybe with a couple different autowrap threads. It was easy and interesting and fast too.

What else? Oh, pics of the dog getting a bath at home.

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It consistently surprises me how extremely small she is under that thick fancy fur coat. We tried an at home bath this time which seemed to stress her far less than going out of the house to do it. It was a project, as that coat takes ages to dry, but when she was dry she was also so silky soft and smooth!

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And white! Those white areas just gleamed. She’s always had a very soft head, but the bath and the conditioner I used made her entire coat equally soft. The only problem? I think she might be allergic to either the shampoo or conditioner. Ever since her bath she’s been doing a ton of the reverse sneezing that some dogs do. She did this often when she arrived at our house, but then it tapered off. Now she’s doing it more than ever. It’s just I can’t remember if that started before the bath or after!

Last night was an extremely pleasant evening. Mr. Ink decided we might as well get that firepit going immediately. He started a fire and fired up the grill. Miss Butterfly is now in the midst of extra show choir practices so my firepit time was intermittent, with the picking her up and walking the dog and so on. However, Miss Butterfly was THRILLED with the fire in our backyard when she got home, so we sat outside together for a bit.

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And unexpectedly, that was an item crossed off my list already!

And one more cute photo of a clean dog and a recovering kiddo. Kiddo watches TV and tries to eat some bland food. Doggo watches kiddo and hopes for scraps. A sweet moment in our house.

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This Week November 27-December 3

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Last week:

  • Step goals 6 out of 7 days
    • I hesitate to cross this one off, as I didn’t wear my step counter. On the other hand, I have a pretty good idea how long a walk it takes for me to get my goals these days, and I did those.
  • 1 bike ride
    • It wasn’t much of a ride, since I let Lizzie run along beside me, but the bike was out and I did ride it.
  • At least 1 walk around a lake with Lizzie
    • Didn’t get this one done for multiple reasons
  • Finish the deep cleaning of the house
    • All except the basement, but I wasn’t sure I’d do the basement anyhow.
  • Get started on a basement cleaning and organizing
    • Yeah no, though I did get the steps to the basement swept and washed.
  • Run all the errands currently in my day planner
  • Get the tree up. Doesn’t have to be decorated, just up
    • Up and decorated
  • Take photos of new yarn and fiber, get that entered on Ravelry
    • This happened, and was complete, until I bought more. Funny how that works. But I plan to just use the new stuff immediately so it never has to go into Rav as stash.

Miss Butterfly woke up Sunday morning at 11 after having been up a good portion of the night sick. I was up far earlier, as was Lizzie. I think 7? When I am up and around, so is Lizzie, so she was up half the night with me. At one point she just looked at me, rolled her eyes, and went back to sleep despite the fact I was leaving my bedroom to check on Miss Butterfly. Needless to say, we were all a little exhausted yesterday. Lizzie demonstrated how to catch up on sleep, taking so many naps I actually got a little worried about her.

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Once Miss Butterfly woke up we found out that her entire family on her father’s side had the illness. It was definitely a virus, as some of the kids also spread it to extended family upon their return home. Thankfully, it was fairly short lived. We took it easy most of yesterday, and by this morning Miss Butterfly said “It’s so amazing, I can’t believe it. I feel ABSOLUTELY fine this morning, like completely normal. Except my back hurts. I think I must have pulled a muscle.” Which sounds about right.

Lizzie stayed very attentive to Miss Butterfly yesterday, pretty much anytime she was laying down, Lizzie was up on the couch with her. She keeps her smallest human comforted if she can. Miss Butterfly was feeling enough better that we were able to get the tree up and decorated. Miss Butterfly sat and unwrapped ornaments, while I decorated the tree. She was pleased with the way it worked out. Then we washed Lizzie, I’ve got a photo of that too for later. You would not believe what a tiny dog Lizzie actually is. Washing her at home went FAR better than doing so at a local shop which I tried last time. She was much less stressed in our own home, and really just sat there tolerating it. Once she was done with the bath, she even seemed to enjoy the blow dryer on her, with all the extra pets and attention it gave her. Once done, she felt amazing! And smelled good too. So that was a win. It’s a bit of a long process but absolutely worth it in the end.

Let’s talk spinning. Here’s another promised photo of handspun.

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This is colorway Mordor’s fire from Three Waters Farm. It’s one of the fibers I got from Introvertedknitter. I spun half this on my new wheel and the other half on support spindles. Then I plied it all on the new wheel.  Because of that, I’ve got a lovely even skein of 2 ply from the wheel, and a skein of far less even yarn from the spindle spun stuff. My spindle spinning is so out of practice. But, I ended up with 535 yards which is a lovely large amount. I think if I alternate skeins on some project, the differing yarns won’t be too problematic.

And now, for next week, I admit I haven’t thought out a list very far at all. Mostly it’ll be trying to get back in the swing of things, and adjusting to additional show choir practices on Miss Butterfly’s schedule.

  • Finish pair of socks that should have gotten done in October. With 3 work training sessions this week that should really help.
  • Ply some handspun singles.
  • Use the new firepit.
  • Step goals, 5 out of 7, and start wearing activity tracker again.
  • Work on basement clean up/clean out/reorg.

That’s all from me, adjusting back to work is the name of the game this week!

Another Interrupt

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I went to pick Miss Butterfly up from her grandmother’s home yesterday. I’d told her since it was small business saturday, we could go to yarn shops if she’d like. She said I could just go on my way to pick her up. I had thought I wouldn’t, but I did hit up two out of the three on the way out there. I bought a ball of yarn at one, which led to a very long period of time in line so I ended up picking Miss Butterfly up almost half an hour late. I still wanted to get to the third shop, so I promised her a trip to a local coffee shop if we could stop at the third shop too.

We stopped for coffee (smoothie for her) and then hit up the third shop, which is my absolute favorite. I got my name entered in a drawing for a prize, and Miss Butterfly drew 15% off for me on the 3 bumps of malabrigo nube I picked up for another combo spin.

An aside about that, I keep saying that I won’t purchase nube anymore. It arrives so compacted and a bit felty around the edges. Certainly not the perfectly prepped top that I get from all our wonderful indie dyer shop owners. I guess the colors really get to me. After dividing those 3 bumps for the combo spin yesterday, I am renewing my vow. It’s irritating. But the price is really good, especially with 15% off.

We got home, Miss Butterfly wanted to have a friend over so she walked Lizzie to pick up her friend. And then about an hour later she made the friend go home because she said she wasn’t feeling well. Ever since then, we’ve been doing another round of tummy bug for her. It’s been awful, the poor kid threw up every 20 minutes 11 times (by her count, I couldn’t keep counting.) But no fever, so there’s that. But she’s pretty miserable, and extremely annoyed since just a month ago she was doing a week with the flu. She’s had a mostly sleepless night but this morning the worst seems to have passed, and she’s dealing with the after effects. I don’t know if she picked up some food poisoning at her grandparents home or what, but I do hope it passes quickly as we’ve only just gotten all her grades back to normal after the last illness. We’ve really had more than our fair share of sickness this fall, I really hope it all ends soon.

So, our day was interrupted, and today probably will be too. Unlikely we’ll spend today putting up the tree and washing the dog and taking her for a long walk. Just…rest today.

So, here’s some pretty handspun for today.

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This is a classy squid columbia batt spun into 937 yards of laceweight singles. These were spun on my rose, and are more on the energized side. I’ve come to the realization if I want good, low energy singles, the prelude is my wheel. If I want great singles for plying projects, the rose is where it’s at. But, for real, both wheels are fantastic, and I am really enjoying them! I had no idea that I really did “need” another wheel in my life.

Would you believe I’ve already got two more finished skeins to show off in the upcoming days? And more on the wheel as well. One of those finished skeins is even one I chose to spin from knitter’s book of yarn designs. So, it’s more interesting than your average handspun as well. I guess my vacation has been highlighted with spinning unexpectedly, and I like it, I really like it!

First Up

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Another lovely vacation day was had yesterday. I am not a shopper, and I am certainly not a black friday shopper. It’s not really for me, someone who is always trying to figure out what I can get rid of doesn’t really want to go out and brave crowds for stuff. Mr. Ink did take me out to dinner after he got home from work and doing his black friday shopping. He had a coupon for a hardware store and we needed a new kitchen garbage can, so he carefully planned his trip and got exactly what he wanted. A very nice garbage can similar to what I’d been looking at for $60, but it was $16 with his coupon and the “scratch and dent” discount. Perfect purchase if you ask me, as I kept complaining about the prices of the ones I had been looking at.

I mostly finished my kitchen/dining room deep cleaning. All that’s left is to wash the floors, which I can do today but I just couldn’t get inspired about yesterday. And that brings the entire house to completion. Including the basement steps. I had the basement on my list, but it’s not that necessary so I am probably going to skip it. Miss Butterfly comes home this morning and I’ve got activities to do with her. Such as setting up the christmas tree.

What else did I do? Well, Lizzie has been asking me to run with her and I don’t really run. So yesterday I took her out to a little used part of a trail with my bike, and let her run beside me while I rode. She doesn’t have a great deal of endurance at the moment, she’ll run full out for a bit, and then stop to go sniff things. But the joy on her face when she is running full speed was unmistakable and really fun.

And now for that spinning I promised. I took photos of these singles while they were still on the bobbins awhile back, and there they sat because I wasn’t sure if I’d leave them as singles or ply them. I decided to leave them as singles, I’ve got 877 yards.

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These are pretty great singles actually, not over spun and they lay nicely in the skein. That kromski prelude has turned out to be a really fabulous spinning machine, making me some very even and nicely spun yarn. I am glad to have it. Not sure what the resulting skein will be yet, but I don’t have any high yardage laceweight singles left in my stash with projects unplanned, so I thought I’d add these.

Tomorrow, more handspun! I mean, I even created some yesterday and probably will again today, so those handspun photos may just keep coming.

 

Happy Thanksgiving

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Hello all! I hope you are able to spend a lovely thanksgiving in a way which is important to you. As for us, we keep things pretty low key. No traditional turkey for us, neither of us like it. Instead, we go downtown to a friend’s flat to watch the downtown area christmas lights get turned on. There’s a ceremony and it’s lovely, but we stay inside and warm with good company and conversation. This year Mr. Ink and I are taking one of my friends from work as she has no family in the area. This will be her first time meeting our crazy biking friends, and I think it’s quite courageous to want to go to a party with lots of people she doesn’t know.

Yesterday was a good day, a productive day finally. I deep cleaned both bathrooms and almost finished deep cleaning my craft room. It was great! I was so happy to be back at it. And Mr. Ink noticed immediately when he got home. “Those bathrooms look amazing!” so the feedback was a really nice bonus. Just the kitchen and dining room left now, and I’ll do those tomorrow. I have to have Mr. Ink out of the house for the kitchen cleaning, and I have to get my mind wrapped around the fact that it’s just going to get messed up again. Kitchens can be tough.

Know what else I did? I knit a cowl. An entire cowl! Of course, it was out of bulky handspun yarn so it’s not THAT amazing. The pattern is Mecha cowl, and it had a technique I was curious about. Turns out it was super fun! The pattern itself is just done in bulky commercial yarn, but I used a gradient handspun. The pattern itself calls for just 3 panels, I knit 6 because that’s how much yarn I had for it. Then I alternated panels to mix up the gradient.

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And this is what I ended up with! It’s really interesting, and those braid things were very simple too. If I were to do it all over again, I’d do a crochet cast on in order to make the cast on look like the bind off. In fact, I probably will do it again because this one was really fun and fast. And it could easily be done in scrap handspuns too, matching some up that looked reasonably like each other.

That’s about it from here, enjoy your day!

 

Yeah No

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My momentum stayed off yesterday. I just had a really hard time motivating. Though my family was happy to see me as up and around as I was. I got some spinning done, the bare minimum of housework, and 2 out of the house errands run. But no deep cleaning at all.

I also got knitting done. The second part of the rikaart shawl pattern came out yesterday morning so I jumped right on that and got it done.

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It was basically what I did over coffee in the morning. I also took the extra time to fastidiously weave in all my ends. It was starting to look a little goofy, as I kept forgetting to carry my yarns up the sides and had to break the yarn way more often than the pattern calls for.

The other thing that happened yesterday was numerous walks with Lizzie Bean. I was so grumpy I didn’t get more than a walk around the block early in the morning the day I was sick, and had to leave the task to the rest of my family. So I was just as eager as she was yesterday to get out there and walk. Except it was cold. And extremely windy. So we counteracted this by going out for short walks numerous times. I think I’ll try to remember that trick through the winter.

Today? Who Knows! I am not promising anything but knitting and spinning. I was so uninspired yesterday. But, the cleaning mood could still strike. Might be best to hope for the craft room clean up actually. In which case, maybe I could even get some weaving done too. Or drum carding. Or anything that tends to happen in the craft room but isn’t because it’s just too full in there to think right now.

 

Baby Mine

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A tiny sweater, newborn size, was completed last week.

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I didn’t get around to getting it soaked until midday Saturday, and then it took forever to dry since it’s a nice heavy cotton. Now it’s a bit stiff feeling, but it’ll wear well and loosen up nicely with a real wash and a run through the dryer I think.

Not a lot new to report. When I got up yesterday morning Lizzie and I walked Miss Butterfly to school. I was feeling extremely foggy brained, and not particularly well. I got back and had breakfast with Mr. Ink, but didn’t really want it. I sat down and got a cup of coffee in me, as well as a blog post up, and then? Realized that fighting that feeling of “What I really need is sleep” was too much. I mean really, why force myself to get up, stay up, and clean when I am ON VACATION! So I went back to bed even before Mr. Ink left for work. Woke up with a stomach bug. So, that explained it. (If I think real hard about it, I realize I wasn’t feeling particularly well the night before either, I was just ignoring it.)

I spent the majority of the day awfully woozy, napping on and off, and generally trying to just get the bare minimum done. Lizzie Bean, my constant companion, did as she always does when someone in the house is ill, she wouldn’t leave my side. So, that’s one day of vacation wasted. OR, it’s one day of sick I didn’t have to try to suffer through at work. Either way, I am glad I was at home and resting. And very glad it seems short lived.

Now today I’ll have to get back after it. Though somehow my momentum feels a bit off now. Hah. But I am sure I’ll muddle through and be glad I did!

This Week November 20-26

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Last week:

  • Step goals 5 out of 7 days.
    • Got 6 out of 7.
  • Clean the edges of the floors in the bedroom.
    • Well, I went ahead and deep cleaned the bedroom, so the edges and MUCH more got done.
  • Dust living room and bedroom
    • I did dust the living room on Sunday, as it was part of the living room deep clean.
  • Get a load of Miss Butterfly’s outgrown clothing to donation.
  • Begin a knit-to be felted-spinning bag for new wheel.
  • Knitting and spinning on the weekend!

I’d kept my list pretty light since I had planned to go to Okoboji. But that fell through, so my list was pretty easy. I did spin and knit over the weekend. I also got about 1/3 of the house deep cleaned in my vacation deep clean project.

I also had a list of stores I needed to visit today, but Miss Butterfly and I got two of them done yesterday. That’s a funny story all it’s own. Miss Butterfly had asked repeatedly if she could call her grandmother and spend some time there yesterday. Now, I knew she was headed out there tomorrow evening after school to babysit one of her cousins on Wednesday. I’d planned to spend the day with her on Wednesday. So, instead I wanted to spend the day with her yesterday knowing full well I was unlikely to see her over thanksgiving holiday. She told me there was nothing to do around the house. Which was sort of true as I was deep cleaning. I gave her a bunch of chores, which she did. And then I thought maybe she’d like to go shopping with me. So I offered that and she told me she didn’t want to go. Repeatedly. Eventually she got a shower, and I got a shower, and then I got back in work around the house clothing since it was clear we weren’t going anywhere. Then she said “When are we leaving?” as if the previous conversations about how she didn’t want to go had never even happened! Teenagers, right?

So in the end I crossed two stores off my list, and that was good. Less for me to worry about today. Do you know what’s on the big list for deep cleaning today? Both bathrooms. Which actually shouldn’t be too bad since I did them last weekend. And tomorrow is kitchen and dining room. Wednesday is craft room, which I thought would be a huge chore as I’d left it very messy. But, BUT, I worked on it a ton on Saturday. I didn’t clean, but I did put things away and get it to a place where cleaning would be possible.

Mr. Ink got his figurines dusted, which is wonderful. I only bug him about it once a year, and so it’s quite a chore of a job. All in all, the house is in much better shape than it generally is during a deep cleaning week, as I’d done so much cleaning when we got the new furniture and moved around the area rugs.

Anyhow! Pictures. Here’s my bulky vest.

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I do still wish it were longer! Also, I don’t love the high neckline. While I think it’s unlikely that I’ll take it all the way back to add length, I do think I may remove the neckline and lower it significantly. It’s just not my favorite. I also think that may balance the entire thing a bit, and maybe the shortness won’t worry me so much.

All in all though, not a bad knit. Glad it’s done though! (If we don’t count the idea of me ripping back the neckline anyhow.)

This week:

  • Step goals 6 out of 7 days
  • 1 bike ride
  • At least 1 walk around a lake with Lizzie
  • Finish the deep cleaning of the house
  • Get started on a basement cleaning and organizing
  • Run all the errands currently in my day planner
  • Get the tree up. Doesn’t have to be decorated, just up
  • Take photos of new yarn and fiber, get that entered on Ravelry

I think I’ll leave it there for now. Tomorrow, a baby sweater! And then there’s also handspun singles to show off. Yep, it’s clearly not been all chores around here.

A Tiny Project

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I decided the new wheel needed a new felted wheel bag. And what better to make such a thing out of than handspun? I grabbed some leftover fatcatknits batt handspun, held it double, and knit a quick bag. I made it smaller than called for as my previous bag is a little too large for my Rose. It was a one evening project, knitting up so quickly. But then it took all week for me to grab a photo. Once I did, I figured I might as well put the knit photo and the felted photo side by side, so I waited until yesterday to grab the felted photo.

I love it! It is super fuzzy, and the pieces in the handspun that were basically dyed locks lightly spun are kind of just hanging out of the bag fabric. It’s so perfect for a spinning wheel bag! In the end, this smaller one went on the Rose and the old larger one went on the Kromski where it fits better.

The guild show yesterday morning was great, I brought home a lot of lovely fiber, and one handknit ornament. I kind of overdid it, as my fiber cabinet is super light, but second guessed myself as I was being rung up and sent Miss Butterfly back with a couple bumps to hang back up. It’s just that there was more color variety this year than there usually is and I was really struggling to choose! Of course I purchased mostly 8 oz. amounts, since I tend to prefer to work in larger quantities.

I do think you’ll see some finished spinning from me soon, since I also spent the morning with Miss Marja, chatting, and getting some wheel spinning done. Once that current project is done, I’ll probably leave it as singles. It’s pretty close.

I did begin my deep cleaning project as well. I began on our bedroom and have a bit of a funny story to tell about it. This summer my mom gave Miss Butterfly a nice fat check for birthday and christmas. This was while we were on vacation. I came home, put the check somewhere “safe” and never saw it again. It was quite distressing, and I looked all over the house and could not find it. Finally, I had to own up to this and tell my mom, who was kind enough to send another check. Well, as I pulled out my dresser to dust the wall behind it, I saw a tiny corner of paper peeking out from behind the heating vent. I was like “What on earth could that be?!?!” So I pulled that corner, and out pops the check. I told Mr. Ink and he was like “That’s the kind of thing that happens that you never find it, and someone who decides to tear out the walls in 80 years finds and it boggles their minds!”

Anyhow, deep cleaning of the bedroom happened, including windows inside and out. Then even though it wasn’t on the list, I figured it was a pretty easy job so I cleaned the hallway too. Today’s list is the living room which was recently well cleaned so it should go quickly, and Mr. Ink’s den. Which will be a bit of a nightmare. He has to dust all his tiny figurines himself, but he did agree to do it. It shouldn’t be as bad as some rooms to deep clean though, as I did that when we rearranged this summer.

And of course, if I could get a bit ahead of schedule today, that just sets me up nicely for the rest of the week!  Am I supposed to get this much joy from cleaning?!?!

Busy Bee

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I’ve been a busy little knitting bee this week, it’s been fun! Except for that time when I came home from work, dragged all my new projects outside, took pictures of them, took them inside, only to realize late at night that none of my pictures stayed in my phone. (My phone has issues, it’s getting old.)

That’s ok, it just delayed a blog post. The day was super wet and gloomy anyhow and photos for today are better anyhow.

So, I knew the KAL for the Rikaart shawl started on Tuesday. And I was done with my vest Sunday night. I didn’t want to start any other large project. So I knit a spinning bag for felting for the new wheel, that was a one evening project. I am saving that photo for a separate post, once it’s felted. Then I began a baby sweater for Miss Butterfly’s best friend, who is getting a baby sister in January. We are keeping this a surprise from the mom, but both the girls know.

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It’s another baby mine sweater, and I am using rowan cotton glace. I already had it in stash, and nothing is easier to care for than cotton really. I only got this far on the sleeve before the Rikaart shawl started, so I got the first clue of that done:

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Doesn’t that just look like the colors of a vintage afghan? The orange is handspun from Miss Marja, and the other two are my own handspun yarns. It’s been a fun little knit along so far, there are a lot of direction changes that I think will keep me very interested.

My Okoboji plans fell through, my friend who is moving is just too swamped for the plans we had made now that her move date is set. I had a suspicion that might happen. So instead, Miss Marja and I are heading to the local yearly guild show. I told her I plan to also put on make up so she’ll take photos of at LEAST my new vest, if not the finished sweater too, if the buttons arrive in time.

And in other news, work is going SO well right now that I just decided this morning to take all of next week off. Obviously I haven’t made any big plans, as it’s a new thought, but I think I’ll do my deep cleaning of the house, as usual, that week. I always feel like doing so during thanksgiving week really makes me feel cozy and happy and at home during the busy holiday season.

This Week November 13-19

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Last week:

  • Find buttons for the sweater, sew on, and get a finished object photo.
    • I ended up ordering them online, so I am waiting for them to arrive.
  • Start new sweater. Which is more of a vest. In bulky yarn. So it’ll fly.
  • Clean the corners of the house. When you have hardwood floors and area rugs, the corners get really dusty. When you are using an area rug in the living room that refuses to stop shedding, the corners get VERY dusty. I need to clean the corners.
    • I should add that I only cleaned the living room corners, but those were what I was referring to in the above task.
  • Do some spinning
  • Do a clothing switch out, the weather is cold and I need more work shirts which are all packed away in the basement.
  • Get a bike ride in.
  • Work on step goals, let’s say 5 out of the 7 days meet step goals.
    • Got 7 out of 7 done!

I don’t have any photos for today. But I can give you an update. I finished my bulky knit vest last evening. Before dinner even! Which meant I could weave in ends, soak it, and block it last night. I did so, and though it’s still damp, I tried it on this morning. It fits! I mean, it COULD use more length, and I had the yarn for that. But it doesn’t look wrong as is either. I do need to do two things. First, there’s a hole at the underarm seam that needs a quick re-seaming. And more importantly, though I can get the thing over my head, it’s not particularly comfortable. I need to pick out the bind off, and then bind off with Jeny’s surprisingly stretchy.

I pulled out the rose when I was cleaning the edges of the living room yesterday and had intended to do some spinning on it. But then didn’t. I still haven’t made any decisions about the singles I just finished either. Now, I knew I had planned to go to Okoboji this month, but in the middle of the night I woke up realizing that it was THIS WEEKEND that I planned to go! Color me surprised. So, I am keeping this week’s list pretty light as I don’t think I’ll be home to do stuff over the weekend. But, I DO know that I should have a nice amount of time for knitting and spinning!

This week:

  • Step goals 5 out of 7 days.
  • Clean the edges of the floors in the bedroom.
  • Dust living room and bedroom
  • Get a load of Miss Butterfly’s outgrown clothing to donation.
  • Begin a knit-to be felted-spinning bag for new wheel.
  • Knitting and spinning on the weekend!

Oh, and I forgot this picture from the weekend. On Saturday, Lizzie finally destroyed her beloved toy, the stuffed pineapple with a pull rope and squeaker. She loves this toy far above all others, and it’s also lasted the longest despite being used the most. I told Mr. Ink he’d better go get another one. And this happened:

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Yep, that’s TWO new pineapple toys, one for now and one for later. Spoiled thing!

I Think

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My vest is going to be ok. In fact, last night I was so confident of this that I went ahead and began putting the sleeves on it and knitting the yoke. Mr. Ink and I stayed up WAY late watching a movie, and I just kept working on it. So, it’s in great shape, but my hands are not. Nope, not at all. I am waiting for some ibuprofen to kick in. But really, this may be a good thing, as I really didn’t get much useful stuff done yesterday. Maybe today I’ll get something off my list complete.

I did do some spinning on my kromski though!

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I finished the batt I put on there a couple weeks ago. I’ve finally got that wheel adjusted “just so” and as it turns out, it’s a fabulous little spinner. I do think I’ll get a nice amount of use out of it. But now I have to decide if I want to chain ply the above batt or leave it as singles. I love the length I can get with laceweight singles, and I don’t have much in stash right now that isn’t already queued with nice large yardage amounts. On the other side of this, I realize that what’s at the beginning of the pink bobbin may be slightly overspun for singles, as I was still adjust and readjusting the wheel to get it “just so.” So I think I’ll let it sit for a day or two and see what I think.

That’s it from here, I am just hoping to motivate to get something useful done, and hoping my hands stop hurting so I can get back to the knitting. And really, I need to keep bulky yarn right OUT of my stash.

Quiet Saturday

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So, our final team member has now joined as of Friday. She’s someone already known to us, and so that makes training a bit easier. The team member who started at the beginning of October is doing great as well, and our office is beginning to settle in. It’s quite exciting, and everyone seems to get along pretty well and be respectful personalities. While training two new people is mentally taxing, it’s not nearly as mentally taxing as dealing with a particularly disruptive personality, so life is already quite a bit better at work.

I’ve kind of just been doing my best to really take TIME to concentrate on my own job again, a thing that often got lost in the chaos we’ve experienced for a few years now. And, when I get home, I am pretty tired, but in a good way? Like, I am working toward something exciting. I can absolutely see a difference in my own mental state, in the sense that I really look forward to going in to work, and I am eager to assist those around me, and I am overall more ready to deal with anything that comes up in a gracious and optimistic way. It’s like I am me again! And it’s refreshing. Mr. Ink said one morning this week, as I was kind of dancing around the house getting ready for work, “Well, looks to me like this work change has made a whole new Shells.”

I’ve been working almost exclusively on a cabled vest out of bulky yarn. I’ll be honest, I am not loving it. I wanted to get the yarn out of stash, so I began this project. But, I suspect it may be ill conceived. And, add to that the fact that knitting with bulky yarn really bothers my hands, so I am hurting as well. I am not quite sure what to do about it, if I knit it as written I fear that I won’t have enough length in the vest to wear it. If I knit extra length, I may not have enough yarn to complete the project, which isn’t ideal either. I mean, the idea was to GET RID of that yarn, not buy more. Plus, the color is discontinued, so I’d have to hunt destashes.  I’ve gone over this many times, and I think the plan is to knit as written to the point at which I add sleeves. Then I stop, and soak and block the project to see if I can figure out if it will block long enough for me to wear. It might! Often times knitting blocks further than I imagine it will. I have only 19 more rows until it’s time to block.

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It just does NOT look long enough! Once blocked, I will further decide what can be done, I think. (Because if it doesn’t block to appropriate length in the body of the sweater, it’s not going to fit in the top area either.)

19 more rows to see if this one gets frogged completely. I swear, if this project doesn’t work out? I am making a blanket for Lizzie out of this yarn and calling it good. Hah. After all, she loves a good scratchy yarn.

It’s cold here, and my crazy nut of a kiddo is in a tent outside in the yard. I think I should be grateful though that she’s not in annoying me. Mr. Ink is working this morning, so it’s very quiet. I am hoping to find some motivation today to get something done around the house other than the normal laundry/dishes routine.

That’s about it for here on a quiet day. Have a great weekend!

Venomous

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I guess I haven’t taken a photo of venomous tentacula in a bit, so here she is!

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I’ve made some great progress on this one. And actually? I don’t think the casting on casting off thing really annoys me nearly as much as I imagined. I really particularly love how the light and dark of the handspun all mushed together sort of gives the overall project highlights. It creates kind off odd shadows in the darker areas. I am genuinely surprised at how much I am enjoying this project! Bonus points, I just bought a new flannel shirt. I didn’t mean to, but it’s the exact colors that are in this scarf, except for the yellow. So I’ll just have to keep after this one in order to have something to wear with my new flannel!

This particular shade of a purpley burgundy in the scarf above seems to be one I am really digging lately. My favorite pair of work pants are that color. And the vest I began in bulky yarn the other day is also that color. I can’t seem to stop! I’d show that off, but like, I’ve got 4 pieces, all ribbing, and none of the amazing cables that I will eventually be knitting done yet.

Last evening Mr. Ink and Miss Butterfly headed to some second hand shops to look for a desk and nightstand for her, and a plant stand of some sort for him. Now, I did not go. I did not go because I wanted these things purchased, but I did not want to do the mental work of making decisions about them. I also did not want to shop. And finally, I needed a little downtime after a rough day. (Work is better, I promise! But, still, some days are rougher than others.) Anyhow, they left and I decided I could just, you know, close my eyes for a minute? Do a reboot? I mean, I used to do that all the time, end my work day with a 20 minute nap. But since we got the dog, that hasn’t happened and my evenings really suffer for it. All of a sudden my phone begins receiving multiple text messages. Yep, it’s Miss Butterfly, sending me picture after picture of various choices from the second hand shop wanting my opinion. Um….that’s NOT how this was supposed to go?!!? I told her I was shutting off my phone.

They came home with a serviceable wooden folding table for Miss Butterfly’s nightstand, and a very nice round end table to use as a plant stand for Mr. Ink’s plants. The living room was rearranged, and now all that’s left for in there is a new area rug. Hopefully I’ll get the motivation to go looking fairly soon.

And that’s all from here, happy hump day!

 

Lizzie Heavy Post

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I don’t have any crafting photos today. I blocked my sweater last evening. It looks great and looks like something I’ll get quite a lot of use out of. Hopefully as much as my boxy and buttony sweater which I am wearing today. Yay cool weather! I did begin a vest out of bulky yarn yesterday. However, I restarted it 3 times because I didn’t bother with a gauge swatch. Plus, it’s one of those items that I am knitting so that yarn is no longer sitting in my stash, moreso than something I am excited about actually wearing and having complete. No photos yet, but it should be a fun cabled thing to show off once I really get going. First there’s what feels like miles of ribbing to get done.

I had a but of a mix up yesterday. I’d decided to look for buttons online for my new sweater. I am rather partial to czech glass buttons. I know they are typically a larger size but I thought I’d go hunting for ones small enough for my sweater. I thought I had found some, and ordered them. Only to realize after the fact that they were listed incorrectly on the website. So, a refund was asked for and received. This morning I went back to look at the same site, as their customer service was great, and found some buttons I believe will work. So now I just have to wait for them to come in.

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I think I mentioned, in passing, that Miss Butterfly was quite ill for awhile there. I don’t think I went into great detail though, as the week was very busy for me, and with her being sick on top of it, there was very little blogging time to be had. In any case, she had a fever for a solid week, missing an entire week of school. The above photo was taken on a Monday morning before I knew she was sick. I just thought it was sweet that she was resting on her doggo. It wasn’t too much time later that I realized that she had developed quite the fever. I suspect she had the flu, with that long fever and her body aches. “It hurts to move mom, every muscle hurts!”

Lizzie Bean played nursemaid all week, hanging out with Miss Butterfly when she was sleeping and resting, and entertaining her in the brief moments she felt a little better. Then when I’d get home, Lizzie would get a break, and I’d be the one to fuss.

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Here’s Lizzie taking a break on her “throne” which is my ottoman. With the old couch, I used to sit on it with my feet up, and Lizzie would lay at my feet on the couch sometimes. Now? The ottoman isn’t large enough for both my feet and the dog, so when she decides she wants up there, I have to decide I want to allow it.

Anyhow, Miss Butterfly missed a week of school, which then put her very far behind in her school work. Her grades are a mess, and we are working on it now, but it’s been a week and a half and we aren’t there yet. This combined with my irritation at her use of her phone has led to a moratorium on phone use in the evenings as well as friend time in the evenings. If her grades go up, we’ll reconsider. Once her schoolwork is done in the evenings, she’s gotten down to business cleaning her room. It’s been great. And I think she’s learning that everything gets done more quickly if you aren’t distracted by what is going on with social media. In fact, she came out last evening positively glowing over the fact that her room got done so fast and looked so good.

The agreement was that if her room got done, she could go with Mr. Ink to shop for a used desk for her room. She’s convinced him that this evening is the correct time for that. So, they’ve got a shopping date tonight. She was so excited about this that she could not stop talking all evening long. It was nuts! Or, that too may be a result of no phone use.

Here’s another phone use story. Miss Butterfly came to me last week in great distress because a friend had posted on social media that she’d been shot while in a car with her family. I immediately reacted with skepticism. Miss Butterfly didn’t understand why I wasn’t getting her level of worked up about it. Miss Butterfly told Mr. Ink. Later on, Mr. Ink came to me and said “Did you hear what happened to her classmate?” I again refused to rise to the level of emotional involvement they were requesting out of me. I heard nothing more about it for a few days, so I then asked Miss Butterfly about the situation, and she said “Oh, my friend said someone else was posting from her account. It never happened.” Which led me to a lecture in how we can’t believe everything we see on social media and we need to stay skeptical until there are facts involved. Later on, I told Mr. Ink the end result of this situation. He said “You had this figured out all along! I was trying to understand why you weren’t more concerned about kids being randomly shot in cars with their families in our neighborhood!!!”

I think that’s about it for stories from me today. Just a few more Lizzie photos. She’s gotten in the habit lately of hopping up on the bed for a short time when I go to bed. She waits for Mr. Ink to come to bed, and then gets back on the floor. However, this weekend when I made the bed after washing the sheets, she decided NOW was the time to get on the bed.

Apparently she’ll never get on a dog bed, but our bed is just fine.

This Week November 6-12

/ shellssells / 2 Comments

Last week’s list:

  • Disconnect sink drain and clean out hair in the drain so it drains nicely again.
    • I am still crowing over this one!
  • Deep cleaning of bathroom. (It got a pretty good cleaning this weekend, but because of the sink drain issue, I didn’t complete the job.)
  • Clean microwave. What an uninspiring job that is, right?
    • Mr. Ink said “It sparkles!”
  • Ride bikes this weekend.
    • Got two rides in actually, one on Thursday night and one on Sunday.
  • Finish body of current in progress sweater.
    • I’ll talk more about this below.
  • Finish the singles on at least one of the 3 current spins.
  • Go look for either a rug or a plant stand for the living room this weekend.
    • I didn’t even remotely get these last two points done.

So, those last two points. I didn’t get any spinning done because I was too busy knitting my sweater. In fact, I finished the knitting portions last night, and finished weaving in the ends and sewing this morning. So, it’s currently soaking and I’ll block it tonight. That’ll leave only the 10 buttons to find and sew on, then I’ll be done. Which brings me to another task, starting the next sweater.

And, I didn’t get any shopping done due to the extra bike ride, and because Mr. Ink told Miss Butterfly that they could go shopping for a desk together if she finished her room. I told them that they should also shop for a plant stand of some sort together so that I didn’t have to bother. As for the rug, I kind of need Mr. Ink’s involvement in that one, and the weather was way too nice for him to concede to a shopping trip.

So, for this week:

  • Find buttons for the sweater, sew on, and get a finished object photo.
  • Start new sweater. Which is more of a vest. In bulky yarn. So it’ll fly.
  • Clean the corners of the house. When you have hardwood floors and area rugs, the corners get really dusty. When you are using an area rug in the living room that refuses to stop shedding, the corners get VERY dusty. I need to clean the corners.
  • Do some spinning
  • Do a clothing switch out, the weather is cold and I need more work shirts which are all packed away in the basement.
  • Get a bike ride in.
  • Work on step goals, let’s say 5 out of the 7 days meet step goals.

I think I’ll stop there, happy Monday!

An Extra Hour

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Guys! I never sleep in. I just basically have a terrible time with it. And, Lizzie doesn’t help either. I’ve, sadly, trained her to get up early too. But, last night in hopes to manage the time change, I fed her quite late. And then let her snack before bed. And she let me sleep in! Until 6:30, which was technically 7:30, and that’s the longest she’s ever let us sleep. I got an extra hour, it was wonderful!

And you know what? Somehow I even managed to sleep through my daughter’s alarm clock she must have accidentally turned on while cleaning her room. She headed to a sleep over yesterday, so she wasn’t home to turn it off. It had been ringing for ages. But I never heard it. Amazing.

I got quite a lot done yesterday as well. On my list for this week was to take the drain stopper in the bathroom sink off and try to clean out the drain. I’d done so a couple weeks ago but it was still running pretty slow. Better, but slow. So, I moved everything out from underneath the sink, removed the stopper, and gave it another go. Nothing. I thought maybe I wasn’t able to reach the clog with my cheapo clog remover tool, so I tried going after it through the hole under the sink where the drain stopper gets connected. No dice. Realizing this was a bigger job than I needed it to be, but REALLY wanting to not be fighting a drain again, I grabbed a large bowl and decided to remove the trap. Then I fished my clog remover in from under the sink, and out popped a putrid smelling rat sized ball of hair and gross. OMG. I got it! 2.5 years living in this house with a slow sink and I finally got it. And you know what I found in that rat sized ball of hair? A flexible plastic washer that doesn’t belong to any of the current plumbing. I am willing to bet that was the problem all along.

I basically crowed about this for the rest of the day. I kept telling Mr. Ink that this day had been life changing. Thankfully he laughs at my hyperbole. I was just so excited! I got to deep cleaning the bathroom with no sense of irritation about it, because at least now? The water would actually run down the sink, instead of me needing to wipe out the sink once the job was complete. Life changing!

I knit on my sweater yesterday almost exclusively, I guess I really want it done! I am about halfway through the second sleeve I’d say. So, really not much of note to show off. So, I took a picture of the fiber I have on the spindles right now. I haven’t done too much work on this, but it’s been floating around for those moments where I don’t want to knit and don’t want to drag the wheel over either.

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The fiber is edgewood garden, and it was another braid generously shared with me from Introverted Knitter. I love this colorway, it’s going to be gorgeous and I am having a terrible time deciding if it should be a 2 ply or 3.

And that’s it from here! Another bike ride will be had today I think, and some additional sweater sleeve knitting. Mr. Ink seems to think we need to mow the lawn, but I suspect he’ll be doing that job alone. It’s been a good weekend!

One Goal

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Or two really.

My goal for this week was to finish the body of the sweater I am working on. I tried it on, and it fit. On Monday evening I knit and knit on it. On Tuesday I finished the body, and started a sleeve. On Wednesday I kept knitting that sleeve. Thursday I went on a bike ride (another goal complete) which left no time for knitting. On Friday night? I finished the sleeve. This morning I tried on the sweater, decided the sleeve is ok, and began the second.

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Please excuse the crazy curling and the amazing amount of ends I haven’t even bothered to weave in. I am so insistent on not stalling out on the sleeves, my nemesis, that I haven’t taken the time to take care of those other details as I go.

The struggle now seems to be sleeve 2. I mean, the first sleeve was going pretty fast there toward the end, but now I have to deal with striping and a bunch of stitches on the needles again. It’s tough! I might take a break now.

We’ve got a busy Saturday coming right up, Miss Butterfly needs to get a birthday gift for a friend and then has a sleep over party later in the day. I’ve got a bunch of errands as well. I told Miss Butterfly she needs to clean her room and sort her stuff, which she’s been doing very well. But sadly, this was the point at which my 13 year old decided that it was time for her american girl dolls to leave her bedroom. I mean, it is true she hasn’t played with them at all lately. But, it’s sad for mom! She did wrap them up very carefully for their trip to the basement so that no bugs or spiders could get on them. And then she made space for a desk. She desperately wants a desk in her bedroom for her homework. So I told her if she cleaned and sorted the rest of the room, she could move one we already have into her room. Mr. Ink did her one better by telling her we could go to a second hand shop to see if we could find something for her to use, since the one in the garage is such a junky mess. But first, she has to clean that room. And she’s doing an awesome job currently.

That’s about all new to report from here! Hope a wonderful weekend is had by all!