Swatch

Last night I suddenly, and yes, blessedly, found myself in possession of a little knitting time, where there had been none since Tuesday.

But there was nothing to knit.  I would have settled for some hand-sewing but there was nothing to sew either, or at least nothing at that level of preparedness where I could just sit down and let my hands do the work.

I can't even say the week was that stressful or that bad, just busy and filled with other things.  Of course there was that lovely Valentine's dinner and bottle of Cotes du Rhone that eliminated the possibility of productive work on Thursday evening.

Rage Management was in limbo:  I finished the sleeves on Tuesday but had not yet managed to get them pinned out for blocking and I had not yet measured and marked the front so that I could un-knit and re-knit the pattern.  The measuring and marking just required too much precision to be done after a long, somewhat stressful day when I really wanted to be watching Monk.

Luckily I remembered that I had a collection of summer tweed sitting in my knitting basket, just waiting for me to make a swatch.

An hour later I had this lovely little treat to contemplate.  I am in love, even though the swatch is not finished and I don't know if I have gauge yet. 

This is always the problem with knitting, once something is started I become obsessed with it and want to do nothing more than spend all my time with that precious bit of fiber.  All other projects flee out of my brain as I concentrate on my current infatuation. 

Well, it took me long enough.  This is the swatch for Maggie:
Which, I believe is from two summers ago.  And here I am dreaming of sweaters from the new Rowan spring book while I still have projects two-year-old projects sitting around.

I suppose this is always the way.  I might be rearranging my knitting schedule.  Oh Maggie has long been in the queue, but now that I have started she has just moved up, besides this looks and feels like it will be a wonderful transition into spring and later back into fall type of cardigan.

But first, I MUST block and reknit Rage Management so that I can wear it while it is still cold.  Of course at the moment it doesn't look like "still cold" is something that is going to disappear soon.

And there is a growing pile of fabric on the cutting table, and a growing list of items that should be sewed, if I want to go out of the house that is.  Of course if I don't have clothes that I can wear in public I might just have to stay indoors in my jammies and knit.  Don't think I haven't considered the possibility,  I have merely reconciled myself to the unfortunate fact that it won't work.