A fairly droopy day; no knitting.

But much yarn. “The Ministry of Truth Twisting” from Countess Ablaze. Socks for Rachel, perhaps; she’s got the smallest feet.

And a colourway – I haven’t confessed this one to you previously – from Meadow Yarn, for a MKAL The Stillness shawl by Helen Stewart. Meadow Yarn is my regular source for needles, but I have never bought yarn from them before. The colourway is called “Lupin stems arranged in a pewter jug”, three skeins of a beautiful 4-ply called Lythe fingering, 80% merino, 20% silk, 20% yak, utterly wonderful.

But this has got to be the end of my single-handed efforts to keep independent yarn-dyers afloat through these hard times. I am now so far beyond life expectancy that it doesn’t bear thinking of. I’ll photograph all this tomorrow.

I’ve never done a KAL before, let alone an M one. My vague feeling is that it should take up perhaps two days a week, and that real life could continue on the other five. That seems unlikely, just looking at those three skeins. The first clue will appear on the 25^th, so I’ve got a fortnight or so to press on with the EPS. That should surely get me to the first sleeve, at least.

Reading

I drooped around reading Strout’s “Abide With Me” today, and have finished it. It’s very good. Not cheerful. Shandy, I’m sure you’re right that the first chapter of “The Burgess Boys” is at the end of “Olive Kitteredge”. That would fully explain why I was so sure that it was familiar, when the rest of the book wasn’t.

Life

Poor Paradox got shut into the sitting room this morning. I heard her calling, and thought she was going into heat again, and called out words of encouragement from time to time, without abandoning my huddle in the kitchen. She was awfully glad to see me when I finally went in for something else, and has been even more clingy than usual this afternoon.