Weekending

This weekend was busy! Saturday was the dance recital, and it went really well, but it was a very long day. I ended up going to bed pretty early, which I'm sure I needed. It was great to catch up with the dance studio team, and one of our old teachers came back to visit for the day as well, and it was great to see them.

Yesterday I got myself into a cleaning mood. My kitchen has been a disaster for a while—mail piled up, food not put in cupboards, pans piled on the stove. I promise I have been trying to keep it tidy the last few months, but I've only ever managed to clear a small part of the counter or put a few pans away. Yesterday I put everything away, cleaned out my fridge, wiped down counters, the works. It feels so much better in there now, and hopefully we won't see Disaster Kitchen again for a while.

I don't really have plans for this week yet. I'm still resting up after the semester, and I don't know when I'll figure out my new regular schedule. Next week I go back to work in the library full-time, which will be good, but a big adjustment, so maybe I'll hold off trying to figure out my normal for a couple more weeks. 

Friday By the Numbers

1. I finally took a picture of my baby doll setup (most of my dolls are on a table in my bedroom, but the babies sit on this painted trunk by my dining table). On the left are my grandmother's doll and my mother's doll, and then the two on the right are ones that I found myself over the past year or so. 

2. Tech rehearsals for the dance recital went great, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow. It's going to be a long day, but I've really been enjoying hanging out with all my pals from the dance studio again.

3. My apartment is a bit of a disaster. I haven't really had a chance to seriously tidy up in a while and you can tell. Hopefully I'll have some time on Sunday to tackle the worst areas.

4. One of my friends retired this week, so we're having a couple of little outdoor celebrations for her this weekend. I'm looking forward to them—these are the first gatherings I'll be going to in over a year, so it feels a little weird, but I'm mostly really excited to see everyone.

I'm Back!

Hello, friends!

It's been a while, hasn't it? I had to take a break from the blog at the end of spring semester—I was exhausted and burnt out, and something needed to give. I missed being here with you all though, and I'm feeling a lot better now that we're about a week out from finals. I don't have my final grades for this semester yet, but based on all my assignments I should be in a very good place.

I've started a couple projects that I had set aside for the summer—I have a pair of antique quilts to clean up and mend, and the first one has already been cleaned and is waiting for me to sit down and look at where can be sewn up and where needs darning. I also started catching up on tv—I have a list that's almost three pages long in my journal of shows that my friends are insisting I need to watch, and while most of my free time has been spent catching up on sleep, I've at least started working my way down the list.

I also roasted a chicken yesterday. I've been really craving a roast chicken for a few weeks now, and I also have been wanting to make a batch of bone broth. I don't know if it's the fact that I've been mostly living off of eggs and quesadillas for the past several months or not, but this chicken was the best one I've ever made. I have the carcass in my stock pot now and hopefully I will have several quarts of delicious broth in a few hours.

This week I'm helping out with the dance recital and calling cues—I've missed working at the dance studio this year, and I'm really looking forward to seeing my instructor friends and all my little dancers. It means I'll have tech rehearsals the next four nights, and I'll be busy over the weekend, but I'm really looking forward to it. 

Mooreville Chalk

Mooreville Chalk is named for the Mooreville Chalk Formation in Alabama and Mississippi. The formation dates from the late Cretaceous period, and is a rich source of dinosaur, mosasaur, turtle, and fish fossils.

Mooreville Chalk is a slightly cropped, boxy top, in-tended to be worn with 0-4in/0-10cm of positive ease. The top is knit from the bottom up and seamed, then stitches are picked up for the collar, which is worked in the round.

Mooreville Chalk is now available on Payhip and Ravelry and is 20% off with code CRETACEOUS.

Kat's Perfect Beanie

I love a good beanie, and I’ve thought a lot about what my perfect beanie might look like. There’s nothing as beautiful to me as a simple project with thoughtful details, where the yarn can really shine, and Kat’s Perfect Beanie hits the mark.

Starting off with a folded knit hem and ending with charming pi crown decreases, Kat’s Perfect Beanie is both a simple and a quick knit, and it looks beautiful in everything from wooly natural yarns to your wildest hand dyed skeins.

Kat's Perfect Beanie is available on Ravelry and Payhip, and is 20% off through April 13th with code PERFECT.

Of Hats and Birds

I hope you all had a refreshing weekend! Honestly, parts of Saturday were rough, especially as I struggled through one of my assignments, but I finally made it and had time for some hauswitchery and relaxation on Sunday. I finished my perfect beanie and got the pattern draft to my tech editor, so my most pressing design-related dilemma right now is what to call the thing, other than "Kat's Perfect Beanie."

Hopefully this week won't be too busy school-wise. I have a pile of mending that really needs some attention, and it's supposed to warm up quite a bit the end of the week and I'd love to get out to a park. We have a four-day weekend (the state gave us Friday and Monday off), so I should be able to find some time to get out in nature and find some cool rocks to look at.

Speaking of warming up, my neighborhood birds have been going crazy the past couple weeks! My feeder has been host to the usual house sparrows as well as a collection of warblers, robins have completely taken over the streets again, and I've been able to hear chickadees almost every morning. I'm not quite at the point where I need to refill my bird feeder every week yet, but once the grackles come back in another couple of weeks it'll really be a free-for-all! 

Friday, Friday, Gotta Write a Blog on Friday

Happy Friday, kittens! I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed with things right now, but looking at my lists it doesn't really seem too unmanageable. I have some readings to do for school, and an essay and a grant outline due next week. I also have an article analysis that's technically not due for a while, but I have the article picked out already, and the analysis never takes me long, but I'm going to put that off until the more pressing deadlines are met, but I do want to get it done soon, before I'm completely buried in my big semester projects. I also have to go into the library tomorrow morning to pull some books, which hopefully won't take too long.

On top of all that, Passover starts this weekend, so I'm trying to build in time for that on both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday evening I'm planning on celebrating by myself—I've planned a quiet, contemplative Seder, and then on Sunday I'll join in a zoom Seder with a bunch of other folks. 

One of my dear friends started a fortnightly zoom stitch-and-bitch back in the fall, and I've been fortunate enough to be able to join in pretty regularly. Last night I cast on a new hat with this really fun skein my friend Heather dyed. I've been thinking for a while about what my perfect stockinette beanie might look like, and I'm really excited about the details I'm putting into this. Fingers crossed for an early April pattern release, subject to school kicking my butt!

Quick Monday Numbers

 1. Taking the weekend off was a great idea. I got my kitchen cleaned up a little, finally put away my clothes from the last time I did laundry, and took several naps.

2. My sister finally returned my cake dish from her birthday, so hopefully coffee cake is in my near future.

3. I don't remember if I mentioned it here, but at my last dentist appointment I was approved for sealants and fluoride treatment. I've had painful tooth sensitivity for most of my life, and had to finally give up ice cream a few years ago, but the treatments helped a lot. I've only had ice cream a couple times since then, but yesterday I had A Craving and got a Heath Bar blizzard for the first time in ages. It was delicious. 

4. The birds are pretty much all back and ready for spring. I can hear them even from inside my apartment, and this weekend it was nice enough to sit out on the stoop for an hour or so each day to listen to them while Lee Lee got her sniffs in the garden.

Fridaying

Gosh, it's been a hot minute, hasn't it? I've had a busy week here, between school and work and a couple of routine doctor's appointments, but looking at my to-do list I think I'm in pretty good shape to take most of the weekend off. I've got six more readings for class and a physical book analysis to finish, and that's it for homework. Last weekend I had to go into the library to work, which meant I had to do homework on Sunday, and the report I had to do was like pulling teeth, so I think I've earned a couple days off from school. 

Lee Lee and I had a little adventure last Thursday—we were in the yard getting some sniffs in before I hopped onto my zoom knitting group and a big dog wandered right up to us! She had a collar but no tags, so I grabbed my extra leash and brought her inside. My apartment isn't set up for big dogs, but fortunately we found her owner through the power of Facebook after about an hour and a half, so I didn't have to make any kind of overnight plans. Lee Lee was a champ through most of the ordeal, but once the interloper was gone you could tell she wasn't thrilled about having a stranger in her home! 

We got hit with some heavy, wet snow at the beginning of this week, but it's mostly melted now. This weekend is looking pretty mild so far, so as long as the ground isn't too wet I might try and go to one of the parks for a little ramble. I might also put on a murder show and knit a little—my grey crop top is progressing nicely (almost at the three-quarters mark!) and it's a great "in class" project, but I have a few other things that could use some love as long as I'm taking a break from school. 

Numbers on a Monday

 1. This weekend my mum and I spontaneously went to the city to get takeout salads and go to the river. Turns out that was exactly what we both needed, and I'm so glad we went out. I've been very bad about getting outside and wandering around—my usual inclination is to be an Indoor Kat, but wandering outside and finding cool sticks and rocks is very good for me, so I need to get better about doing it more regularly. 

2. Saturday was my sister's birthday, and it was so good to spend a few hours with the whole family. I was very on top of things for once and ordered her birthday present with time to spare, but I forgot that Etsy is an international marketplace, and her present is coming from the UK, so it did not get here in time. It is currently either somewhere above the Atlantic ocean or stuck in a customs office.

3. School is going well, but I'm really missing having a spring break. I thought I'd be fine, but last week I hit burnout HARD, and I think part of it was because I couldn't just stop thinking about school for a week. Also, we're coming up on a year of being home here—March 13th last year we got an email at work that we were shutting down for spring break, and maybe longer, and I remember that the last hour and a half of that day we all just stood around wondering what was going to happen. It's been a long, strange year.

4. I have eaten 20% of my stash of Girl Scout cookies so far. I am currently holding fast in an effort to make the remaining packages last. My efforts may be futile.