Knitlove

All week I've been poking away at my Halloween socks and am almost up to the heel on one of them!

I'm either starting now, or in ten rounds, depending on what my recount tells me. 

I've dropped this fine book into today's lead photo because it's never too early for Christmas shopping and omigosh Francesco Marciuliano's work on cat (and now dog) communication is so funny. This one, You Need More Sleep, is just an honest caption for practically anyone. We also have an earlier poetry collection, I Could Pee On This, and highly recommend it. 

Back to Knit Love: My arm still gets sore if I work too long at my needles so I am having to accept the snail's pace...

... and for totally unrelated reasons I may have vacuumed off about seven years' dust on my spinning wheel this week. Spinning might be easier on that irritated nerve, right? Like I have *so* much time for spinning, and relearning spinning, I'm sure. When I unfolded it for the dust removal I realized I no longer remember which bits go where and why. Thank goodness it's an Ashford, with loads of how-to videos on YouTube.

Because I can't knit sweaters now, I feel highly justified in buying them, and was very pleased to find this Eileen Fisher beauty, pre-loved, on eBay. 

It's worn purl side out which is such a a fave thing of mine! Two or three stitches in the front were looking frail so I reinforced them with black button thread in a duplicate stitch. I should have used wool really, but the button thread was the exact size and texture for the black yarn used in the sweater.

(this pic is from before I did the fix, and I'm not sure what that greyish blob is in the lower left. maybe a pulled thread I tugged back into place? there were one or two of those needing attention.)

If I'd needed to fix more stitches I'd have had to use wool instead... as it is, the rigid cotton thread is like a brace on that fluid drape. I've done so much with textiles over the years, I was surprised to be surprised by what a difference it made!

The week ahead is going to be very busy here, starting pretty much as soon as I post this, so I've decided in advance I will not post next Saturday. I mean, maybe a single photo, but no chat! Gotta keep my head clear for a ton of revisions on my current manuscript. 

When I come back I might have a sock heel to share. Well, honestly, what I'm really hoping for is a LOT of sock heels to share because I am long overdue for a serious darning fest. 

Either way, I hope you have a lovely couple of weeks and a delightful pair of weekends too! Thanks so much for spending this time with me.

And aren't you grateful you don't have this pile of stripes to fix up before the temps drop?