long week

Not a good week, although I got an awful lot done at work. Had a sudden two-day meltdown over money. Not fun. It took 4 hours of concentrated knitting before I was in a state of mind to actually sleep when I went to bed last night. The worst part is the dogs--they don't know what's going on. Bless their hearts, they're so sweet and so good about tolerating me when I go to pieces on them. I've found no solutions to the problems, but at least I've regained my equilibrium, more or less, for the time being.

Tonight I paid bills and made my shopping list. Tomorrow will be busy--between about 9 and 10 I'll pop the dogs into the van and we'll go to the bank to deposit a cat-sitting check, stop by the courthouse to put the water bill in the drop-box, and stop by Walgreens to pick up some things. Then we'll come home and listen to Wait Wait Don't Tell Me (my favorite program on NPR--it often makes me laugh out loud). Then we'll have to go to the grocery store, K-Mart, and (*koff*) Walmart, because I have to get buttons for my grey sweater. So they'll at least get to ride along and watch people while I'm in the stores.

THEN I hope to sew on buttons and tackle the blue sweater with the steam iron. Also do some laundry.

And somewhere in there I hope to knit!

I'm on the sleeves for the shawl-collared sweater for the third time. The first time the sleeve cap was too big (I'm picking up stitches around the armhole to work from the top down). The 2nd time I tried doing it like a drop sleeve which, naturally, didn't work. So this time I modified the way I worked the cap and am hoping that third time's the charm. I'm also considering re-knitting the collar--I knit it as a separate piece, but now that I understand how it's made, I'm wondering if I couldn't pick up stitches around the neck and down the fronts and knit it that way, sort of inside out.

I'm also already thinking of future projects. For one thing, I really want to tackle this Christmas KAL lace scarf. You have to buy the pattern now (and I'm thinking of getting the one for 2007), but it was free before Christmas, and I printed it off as it appeared. I would like to have worked it day by day as each pattern was posted, but I was so involved with my sweater-knitting and didn't want to spare the time. But it would be fun to do a pattern every evening now, relaxing and challenging at once. I'll have to see if I have any yarn I could use.

Also I was looking through some Kaffe Fasset books before bed the other night, and thought it might be fun to go through my stash and see if I could put together a collection of yarns that might work for a Fasset-style sweater. Anything for an excuse to go through the stash! *lol* It would be wonderful to have the entire collection of Rowan Yarns at your fingertips, wouldn't it? I notice he mixes his yarns considerably--wools, wool/silk blends, mohair/silk, chenille--but you don't get a Wild Stuff effect, no doubt because there's really no novelty yarns, no eyelash or things. So I've been turning things over in my mind, wondering what I could put together. Like--shades of grey--some heathery pinks and blues--a thin navy chenille. A sharp green might work with that, except I don't have one. Well, it's an idea, something to play with.

So much knitting, so little time!!