Before I started knitting reading was my main hobby but I was cheap and wouldn’t buy books. My mom and I have very similar taste in books so I’d just wait for her to send a box of books when she had finished a handful. Then I discovered PBS and before I knew it I had like 80 books (from there and mom), it was nice because I could get books I was interested in that I knew my mom wasn’t going to be reading and sending. The problem was right as I discovered PBS I also taught myself to knit. Take a guess which got more of my love? I still have a shitton of books in my bedroom closet and in my nightstand waiting to be read as well as books I want to get and read. So I joined 52 books in 52 weeks on Ravelry. The kids are getting older and I’m finding more and more time to actually do things I want to while they are awake (though I still rarely knit with them around because they both love yarn and mess with me, where as I can read a little, I read part of my book to them, they get bored and go play heh).

I made a page to keep track of the books I’ve read. It will probably be full of boringness for anyone else since I will just be making list with general “like, dislike, hate, love” statements since I generally don’t like to analyze the hell out of books. If a book strikes my “hey, I’d like to talk about this” fancy, I’ll just blog it like normal

Just like last year here is a mosaic of FO’s from the past year. All that dyeing has cut into knitting, there are less than last year.

Also, I’ve really gotten out of reading blogs. I’m very sorry if I haven’t stopped by and left a comment in a long time. I lost the blogs I read list and I don’t really like checking friends blog activity on Ravelry, so if you have a blog or I used to read your blog please leave me a comment with a link so I can save your blogs again and try to get back into reading them. Thanks!

First pkg for PDY’s Dead Poets Sock Club. The featured poet was revealed to be Langston Hughes.

The yarn is named after Hughes and inspired by him and his poem Dreams

I actually got to keep yarn this round (my test skein and a skein that got mangled in the spin dryer), I used the mangled yarn to cast on some Charade ankel socks-

The kids were thoroughly spoiled, after each gift they’d yell out Thank You Santa! My kids may be terrors but they are the politest terrors

Ben worked midnights so he came home, napped for about half an hour, the kids woke up, we opened gifts then he went to bed for a little bit while the kids and I ate candy and played with or new toys. Then we went to his parents for a few hours (couldn’t stay long Ben had to go home and get a nap before going to work at 10) to eat and open more gifts. This is my favorite picture from the night-

He makes this face a lot lately, it’s not mad or sad or anything it’s a little wrinkled brow of unapproval. ha.

Anna’s Christmas present to Eli, she said she wanted to get him a necklace so I picked this up for 99cents at Joann’s, it had 3 skull beads but one was broken, oh well. Anna strung the beads and I strung the skulls since their holes were small

I finally blocked my Seraphim Shawl! I finished it back in June for fucks sake. I love it.

Pattern- Seraphim Shawl
Yarn- Knit Picks Palette, colorway- Garnet Heather
Needles- Knit Picks Options US5

So I’m finally better, still have bit of a cough but that’s nothing compared to the last month, ugh, that sucked.

But now, I’m getting depressed. Ok, I’m always depressed, I have depression, it just gets stronger, like now. I’m feeling uber lost and lonely right now. I don’t believe it has anything to do with the holidays, I know it’s popular to get depressed around Christmas. Sure I miss my family, but no more than I usually do. I love Christmas. I’m to the point where I’m practically an atheist (I guess agnostic would suit me better) and Christmas isn’t religious to me but I love love love Holiday music (the older stuff), the stories, the movies, the decorations, the giving, the gifts, the food, etc. I can tell when the depression starts getting worse than usual, I don’t enjoy the usual things, I haven’t knit in days but I have to right now till the kids wake up or I’ll never have Christmas gifts done.

Speaking of the kids I have to go put candy and a little toy in their shoes for Saint Nicholas Day.

I’ve been sick for like a month now, I’m so tired and just sick of being sick that I’m about ready to buy a grave plot, crawl in and say Fini.

Hi guys! PDY turns 1 this month! We have kicked off our last contest, one lucky person will win- a skein of our new Sonnet Sport in Ocean of Storms and a skein of our new Silver Freckle Sock in Evening Star!!

The contest runs till Friday at 11:59am (EST) with a winner being drawn at noon! Stop by that blog sometime this week and throw your name in the hat!

A new colorway inspired by the Sylvia Plath poem of the same name, this is my new favorite colorway I’m so in love with it. (it’s on our bamboo blend base)

Lady Lazarus
by Sylvia Plath

I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it—-

A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot

A paperweight,
My face a featureless, fine
Jew linen.

Peel off the napkin
0 my enemy.
Do I terrify?—-

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth?
The sour breath
Will vanish in a day.

Soon, soon the flesh
The grave cave ate will be
At home on me

And I a smiling woman.
I am only thirty.
And like the cat I have nine times to die.

This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

What a million filaments.
The peanut-crunching crowd
Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand and foot
The big strip tease.
Gentlemen, ladies

These are my hands
My knees.
I may be skin and bone,

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else,
I do it exceptionally well.

I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I’ve a call.

It’s easy enough to do it in a cell.
It’s easy enough to do it and stay put.
It’s the theatrical

Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:

‘A miracle!’
That knocks me out.
There is a charge

For the eying of my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart—-
It really goes.

And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood

Or a piece of my hair or my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.

I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.

Ash, ash —
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there—-

A cake of soap,
A wedding ring,
A gold filling.

Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.