a smaller life

in which we have a joyful list

Any excuse to make a list, right?

Things That Make Me Happy, Right Now, In No Particular Order

• Kiddo going to her high school orientation, and looking forward to calling her about it tomorrow
• Sweet emails from Sam
• The Perfect Red Lipstick, on extreme clearance (Besame, people, and many thanks to Sweet Sassafras)
• My sister emailing me, to tell me she sent me a letter- hooray, mail!
• A small bottle of Sam's cologne, to use very sparingly as a linen spray
• Neil Gaiman (just finished Neverwhere)
• The Wire
• My part of a yarn swap arriving in the mail today
• Sucessfully negotiating a different, even awesome- er swap
• Ruth having seen Fido, and thinking of me
• Work, which is great
• The team, which is really coming together
• Spinning laceweight while watching movies
• The Avett Brothers
• Waking up early and feeling awesome

A few pictures, to illustrate the yarn-y points...

This is what I received in the mail today- a caked skein of Sundara Sock in Port Over Nectar, which I swapped a skein of Wollmeise for. (Stop gasping. I just like Sundara more, is all.)

This is going to be a pair of gift socks, for certain. Even Psuh was carried away by its luscious shiny squishy almost- solid goodness.

I know the non- yarn types won't get the crafty adoration, but seriously, you have to touch this stuff. It's drrreeeeaaaaaammmmy, in the way that boy who sat next to you in freshman Honors Biology Lab was. You know the one.

And I've been spinning, while watching The Wire, to which I am utterly hopelessly addicted. At this point I'm just trying to stagger episodes, so I don't burn through them too fast. I'm spinning laceweight out of some lovely Zen String fiber I received last year, as part of her fiber club- tencel and wool, I think? I've misplaced the tag. Shiny, though. 4 ounces of silky, shiny purples, greys and blues.

Outside of making a light fingering/ heavy laceweight out of this, no ideas for the finished yarn yet, other than that it'll be a 2- ply. Maybe I'll just gift/ raffle the yarn? Loving the process, though.

Things are good. Life is good. It's good to know I can be happy and homesick at the same time.

in which we meet Psuh, and I finish a long- standing project

Meet Psuh., originally uploaded by sarah.eyre.

Meet Psuh.

Psuh came home with me from bazaar a week or so ago. I had planned on just looking all day, but how can I resist a teeny sheep statue?

The real reason I'm posting, though, is to make a finished object post. Hooray! How long has it been, right? I just finished blocking the hell out of a scarf I made using the Old Shale/ Feather and Fan stitch (stockinette version). I wanted something simple that was pretty but wouldn't overshadow the color variations in the yarn, and it worked brilliantly.

The yarn was some of my handspun; I spun up 4 oz of Mama E's c*eye*ber fiber in Butterscotch, which is 50% superwash merino, 50% tencel.  I bought the fiber at Spinster Yarn and Fibers, and started spinning it up in April, before I left for Afghanistan. Since then, I worked on the yarn in my home, in the Dulles airport, in Qatar, and on work breaks in Afghanistan. The yarn itself is an imperfect 2- ply, going from almost lace- weight to heavy fingering weight, but it perfectly reflects the last 3, 3.5 months of my life, and I love it.

Blocking this took a little creativity, too. I live in a teeny, tiny, 8x10 room, and I use a lot of my wall space for storage- hooks for coat, clothes, towels, everything. I got a ton of tacks at the Px, painted them all with clear nailpolish to fight rust (I don't know if that would actually help, but there was no rust, thank goodness) and a new trashcan for soaking the scarf. When it came time to actually block it, I had two real options: the ceiling (ouch!) or my bookshelf.

Thank Whomever it was hot in the huts that night, so I could go back to using the top of my bookshelf as a nightstand the next night. Also, thank Psuh for some outstanding foreman work.

Currently on my needles: the Transition Gloves, from ShibuiKnits. Lovely pattern, my first so- far- successful attempt at Fair Isle knitting, although I guess the proof will be after it's blocked. I'm using Ink (completely my new favorite color, a deep indigo that looks almost black) and Rapids, hich are both very slightly variegated. It's not perfect, again- apparently, if it's not cabling, I specialize in Not Perfect- but it seems pretty damned good to me. The mistakes appear to be on the inside, so forgive me if I don't show that until both are finished.

(Also, secretly working on Mr. Greenjeans sweater that Sam sent me in my last package, but only when I'm watching movies.)