I was sitting here, on the loveseat in my studio sorting out a tangle of circular needles, both fixed length and convertible, and I realized that I had intended to write a blog post today. Oops. It seems all in keeping however, as I have somehow felt a little bit scattered this past week. I've worked on lots of things, and that may be part of the problem, I hop from stop to stop, idea to idea, and here I am at the end of the week looking out the window and dithering.
I've actually been puttering with a bunch of things: garden planning, some basement pantry organization, various sorting and exercises in contemplation in the studio if not that much actual sewing or knitting. I did work on some kind of needlework every day, but it seems like this week was all set up, or assembly but with no finished objects to show off.
I had hoped to finish the Autumn vine pillow sham in January, and I almost made it. I finished the knitting, and got it all nicely blocked. I could have sewn it up on the 31st, but somehow I got distracted. Wednesday I finally got around to sewing and Thursday I found my button stash and searched for buttons.
There was a bit of a miscalculation on my part however, so the sham sits, empty and waiting. I thought I had an appropriate pillow. Remember I started this project in a workshop so it really bears no relation to the actual size of pillows in my house. I knew that I had some large square pillows in my house and I kind of held my knitting up loosely up against one and said to myself "that will work", and forgot about it. Did I check the actual size of the pillow against the finished dimensions of the sham I was knitting? No. It was like my brain and my fingers were in two completely different worlds, oblivious of each other.
So I finished the sham, sewed it together and voila! It is too small for the pillow I had in mind. It is too small for the alternate (second choice) plan as well. The sham is 18" square. The pillows in question are 22" and 24" square. You would think I would have noticed this. You would be wrong. So above you see a slightly stretched pillow sham, waiting to be whole, waiting to become one with a pillow.
This unification of pillow and sham will happen soon, but not today. I ordered a feather pillow from Pottery Barn. It is ready for curbside pickup as I write, but I decided I was already scattered enough this week and the thought of getting in the car and going somewhere was more than I could bear, even to finish a project that I have ended up loving (surprise there, not that long ago I would have said I would never knit a pillow). Besides I am trying to be conscientious, to not just drop in the car and drive willy-nilly just because I can. I am trying to consolidate trip and errand days so that I go out fewer days per week. This might change when the world returns to normal, whatever that new normal may be, but I am finding that this system works for me; I actually get more time to work on things I want to work on.
In other knitting-related news, the second camelid blanket is on hold because the dark gray Plymouth Baby Alpaca Grande I need is currently out of stock. It is a pretty basic color however, so I assume it will be back in stock one of these days. This is probably a good thing anyway because I have now finished, or almost finished, three projects for the house and I want to knit something for myself.
To that end I have sorted through parts of my yarn and project stashes, have even photographed a few things and started thinking about how they should best be cataloged for the future, the idea being that having some kind of photographic accounting means that I will not go into the closet, pull everything out, pile it all up on the floor, and then have to put it all away when I am done. Having chosen a project, the reason I was sitting on the loveseat sorting circular needles becomes evident. Now I need to determine if I have appropriate needles for the project I wish to knit.
Onward.
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