I haven’t been quite as exhausted this week as I was last week, thankfully. I realized that I was over-thinking things and tried harder to relax in class, which is a much less stressful way to deal with school. I’m still tired at the end of the day, but not that all-consuming exhaustion, the one that scares me. (I was close to exhaustion yesterday, but not the same.)

I want to be able to write more, but I don’t know what about.

I also want to be able to turn off the computer more, but I can never get over the feeling of being desperately needed. It’s good that I’m going away next week. I won’t take my computer, either. Hopefully that will help me get back to myself.

This week for class I’ve been watching an excruciatingly long mini-series called: Heimat: A Chronicle of Germany.

So, Opal Zwergergarn in stockinette stitch it is. Nice and German to go with the German history. Nice and easy to go with the level of knitting I can handle right now.

Yes, the second mitten is finally moving along. I’m past the thumb gusset, so as long as I concentrate it should all be done soon. Maybe it’ll be done and ready for an FO post on the Monday or Tuesday after I get back?

Last week the snow here was up to my waist. Now you can actually walk on the tennis courts… Spring this year seems like birth: extremely messy and ugly in the process of transforming from winter to spring. Actual spring will be beautiful. Though I am not discounting the possibility of another snowstorm before the month is over. This is Minnesota. Winter lasts a long, long time.

My thought is, if I had taken a nap when I got home (that is, lain down for half an hour, trying not to think so much), would I have relaxed enough to knit later? To do some work later? To not have a throbbing, pounding head later?

I think I’m going to try it on Friday, especially as I’ll be staying up ‘late’ to go to a big semi-formal event at school. Wish me luck? And energy?

I can’t wait to have more energy for knitting and blogging, because right now I’m just drained.

Which is just as well as I’m also getting a little irritated at the slog-y-ness of my projects. I need an FO boost.

My most recent thought was that I was close to finishing mara, so that would be an FO, but then I did the increase row.

The increase row doubled the number of stitches, so the rows are even longer now. Like 400 stitches long? I have quite a bit of knitting left. (I almost want to abandon mara for a bit and cast on for some socks.)

Finishing parts seem to stall me up. Time to find an hour or so to just finish this mitten up so I can start the next. I absolutely refuse to show you the back part of the mitten until it’s all blocked—I hope it look much more even and pretty then. Until then I’m too embarrassed!

If I didn’t have a paper due on Monday I’d say, maybe I’ll devote an afternoon this weekend to finishing up that vest I was working on… since I have yarn and pattern to start a lovely sweater… I’d like to get more things officially DONE and keeping me warm. But I have a paper due. I’ll settle for one mitten completely finished and the second one on the needles by the end of the weekend?

Since unpinning and fixing that pesky dropped stitch, this shawl has only left my shoulders for me to clean the kitchen. It feels wonderful and beautiful and I can only barely believe that something like this could be a product of my fingers.

Maybe it’s the lovely variegation of the yarn (which you can’t see well from the pictures—drat), or maybe the yarn itself blocking so beautifully (with real T-pins at every point instead of a few marking pins at various points). I don’t know what it is, but I am absolutely enchanted with this shawl. Enchanted, and hardly feel worth such a piece.

Ishbel. No modifications. Just size small. (Blocked out pretty big though, fairly bigger than my last.)

Ishbel (Ravelry):
Pattern: Ishbel again by Ysolda Teague
Yarn: Dream in Color Smooshy – in Night Watch, I think
Needles: Bamboo US 6, again.

Seeing it all laid out the past couple of days made my heart jump every time. So beautiful. I get it. Lace is magic. What shawl pattern should I knit next?

So hey, how about a FO post over the weekend? I’d like that.

There is, however, one problem.

I can’t believe I’m hoping this is a dropped stitch, because then I might be able to wrangle my two inches of leftover yarn (the rest is at home in California) into securing it into place. If it’s fraying yarn what am I supposed to do? How could the yarn be breaking already??

At least it’s mesmerizingly beautiful to look at the shawl as a whole.

Oh, I’ve been working on that mitten too.

My 2-stranded tension is wonky (as usual—I guess I just need to practice more…) and you can’t really tell that it’s supposed to be an image. I’m choosing to be enchanted anyway. :)

Once again I don’t have pictures of what I’m working on, because they’ll look remarkably like the pictures you’ve seen already. miss mara looks like a great big garter blob (of love) and last night I ripped the mittens to start over again on the smallest needles I own (which hadn’t been used up until now out of fear). I believe they’ll progress better now though, and miss mara is getting reeeeally close to time to work on the edging. Since it’s just knitting I kind of plow through it with my brain off (why is that happening a lot lately?).

Problem: finishing miss mara means I won’t have that lovely break project that’s only knit stitch.

Solution: fish out the skein of sock yarn in the yarn drawer (the last full skein of yarn in there… the last of the stash… this is haunting me) and start a pair of stockinette socks. That has to last longer than miss mara has.

Or, after the Knitty surprise showed up, even better solution: fish out the same skein of sock yarn and knit Skew sock. Still mostly stockinette but with a weird construction that makes it a little more intriguing. What do you think?

And what do I do when that is done? Well, I’ve been thinking about that. And fearing of that. And daydreaming in class a bit. Since it’s still freakin’ cold I’m still thinking about sweaters, despite my usual reluctance to think about them. (I think the fact that a sweater I received for Christmas and only worn three times has a HUGE hole right in the armpit is also driving my motivation to knit myself a sweater, because I’d know it’s made better than a sweater I could buy.)

So I doodled a bit in a notebook as to what kind of sweater I’d like, and I think I settled on wanting a crew-neck pullover, or maybe an almost tunic-length pullover with long sleeves. Despite how much I like 3/4 length sweaters I’ve realized that I’ve only worn long sleeves since coming back to Minnesota. (Wonder why?) So I need a sweater that’s not too thick, since I overheat easily, and works with the crew-neck shirts I have already.

Most of the patterns I looked through on Ravelry do not have crew necks. (Although few of those are yoked, and I’m wondering if it’s worth it to look through some yoked sweaters…) So for this very theoretical meandering, does anyone have any tips or pattern ideas for a crew-neck not-bulky pullover?

I can’t believe I successfully wrote 423 words of speculation about knitting a sweater, which I’m really hesitant to do anyway because I’m so scared of getting something that’s not at all flattering or fit right. I need a real-life knit-along or something.