Still knitting ... slowly, slowly.

Christmas finally cycled around to the end for us as of yesterday.  We host a yearly holiday party for a group of friends my husband has known for decades and who we see for gaming every month.  Yesterday was that gathering.

Our tree will come down today.  Holiday decorating has been minimized with each passing year so putting the decorations away takes very little time.  But getting the boxes back in the storage closet is what takes the time.  I do a “clean sweep” of that closet as part of storing Christmas away.  It is a pretty large walk in closet that by November is no longer “walk in.”  So a yearly clean out after the holiday seems appropriate.

Over the last year and a half my knitting has been minimized as well.  Surgery, doctor appointments, medical tests, physical therapy, normal household maintenance just kept building into a mountain of tasks ending the year with Christmas prep  ... it really socked a hole in available time and energy.  But now we are in the slow season and medical demands are slowing.  Knitting and blogging should pick up speed - I hope! 

As usual the yarn color is not quite right.  But the bead color is perfect and the beads are exactly
the same shade as the yarn in person.

Looking at the possible works in progress I could pick up - this project seemed like a good place to start.  This is yarn from deep deep stash maybe 20 years ago.  I believe it is Plymouth Yarn - super wash worsted weight wool.  I don’t seem to have the paper sleeve, so I am guessing.  And I may have blogged about the project previously.  

  

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This yarn has a story.  At least 20 years ago I was traveling to Ocean City, Maryland to visit with family. I researched in advance that a yarn store was just north of Ocean City and since I was early arriving at the shore, I had time to swing by the shop.  

The shop was so congested with yarn you could hardly focus on anything.  A bit discouraging.  But this sandy color did catch my eye.  And it was gently variegated in intensity - as the sand at the shore is dark and light in color too.  So I snapped it up and I found perfectly matched beads for it.  I didn’t have a pattern but the yarn just seemed a perfect purchase for this ocean trip.

And a pattern did finally show up a few years ago.  Set Sail Shawl by Erin Johnson.  It is a pretty simple design but its name seemed to fit the theme.  It seemed to say - “Pick me, I am the one for your sandy yarn!”  When I stopped working on it, I had only about 10 inches out of 61 inches in length completed.  When I found it packed away, again it seemed to say “Pick me.  I am the one to help you return to your much loved hobby, because I am simple to do and as you can see my beautiful sandy shading in this pattern.”  Do my yarns talk to me like this?  Not routinely, but it certainly seemed like a knitting command from the knitting gods. 

I have more to tell with another project in the works - and a fun tracking tool I purchased at a fair last November.  This tracking tool seemed also to be just the right thing to keep me focused.

Next Time!