now i’m satisfied

i know i’ve been obsessing about the blue mitts. i have restarted them about 7 times, no lie.
the only thing i have been sure about is that i’m boring you to death with them. but you’ll be happy to kow that now, finally, i’m happy. they’re not quite done (still have to finish the ribbing and do the thumb), but the agony of how to get them done is done.

these have such a nice fit—i’m in love with the way they feel on the hand. kinda like the cabled mitts. the yarn is very fine sock yarn. it is a different weight from the other lace mitts. only a little, but it makes a big difference when i slip them on. i also wrote a pattern for the other lace mitts, and am making one more pair of those to test the instructions. i made a couple of tweaks too

i changed the rib so that the lace “flows” out of it, and lengthened the lace panel down over the wrist a bit further. you can’t tell any of that from the photo yet, but in a day or two, it will show. i’m making this pair in some leftover alpaca handspun. it is yarn that i spun way back when i was a new spinner—my first alpaca! the fiber was exquisite—a gift from my friend annette. and i haven’t spun such nice alpaca since . . . so lustrous and sooo soft.

(OMG—it just started snowing like crazy—finally; guess i won’t be riing my bike to classes today).

so i have a little knitting, but mostly for the last couple of days, i’ve been either working or spinning. i got asked on friday afternoon to format 18 pages of long equations, and i decided to get those out of the way. they are just so much better when they’re over.

so i treated myself to some spinning in my newly-organized workroom. i love my workroom. i feel really good in there. it’s quiet, cozy, and has everything within reach, pretty much. but mostly, it is a haven. even though we live alone and don’t have a noisy house, this room feels most hospitable to me when i want to work. i’m glad i cleaned it up and got back in there. i need to respect and appreciate that that i am lucky enough to have such a place of my own . . .

anyway, what i chose to work with this weekend was some spunky eclectic dyed BFL that debbie gave me a while ago. in my experience, BFL makes great, long-wearing socks, so i split the roving in half, to divide onto two bobbins. i split each half into three strips and started spinning a fine singles. BFL also poofs up a lot with washing, so i like to keep it pretty fine, with a firm twist in the spinning to get good sock yarn at the end.

i love these colors—they really do look like those in a navajo rug. i think they will make some wonderful striping on socks. i’m going to do a 2-ply yarn; some of the colors will meet up and some will make tweedy barber-pole twists, and i’m hoping then to have yarn which stripes in approximately 2-to-4-row repeats. we’ll see . . .

i listened to a beautiful book while i worked on the first bobbin—the rug merchant. go read it.

at my desk, i also got some more done on my brown sock. the thing is, i really didn’t think i’d stay interested in these socks for long. i always finish my socks, but they are not always joyful. however, these are revealing themselves slowly as i go to be luscious, beautiful, and intoxicating to my hands—it’s all i can do to keep my hands off them while i do my job each day

whaddaya know!