Optimism

Yarns and plants helped me through tough periods of my life.

I turn to them again, as it seems that I will live with an autoimmune disease. The symptoms and blood-tests show that I might have Sjögren Syndrome. If it will remain at this stage my life will not become harder.
But the thought of depending of medication for the rest of my life is frightening. And I now probably have a disease about which I had no idea last Friday morning, and in the evening I exercised the pronunciation of it.
When I went for the Ravelry-challenge this year I had no idea about having such a motivation. For sure there will be 19+2 finished projects.
And I will arrange the balcony with lots of plants, which I did not do in 2018, due to our rushing way of life. I will slow it down a bit.
But this will have to wait, as it is still snow on the hill near the city,

and mud on the streets. There is wet, dripping whiteness left only in the shade.

And this melting is OK for me now, I need some colors and warm and light. It helps to be more optimistic when there is color in the grayness. (although I like gray)
So I dug out an old WIP-sock for portable project

(photo from July 2016) 

and there is another WIP going on: a rusty pullover. I cannot make photos, as there is still not enough light for this.
And we have blooming Kalanchoe and Hippeastrum at home...

Snowy

Life at the countryside is different.

The winter at the countryside is also different. I love seeing traces of last year's life - and knowing that down in the soil there is the new bud for these dry stuff.

I love everything about it - too bad, that tomorrow we have to go back to the city.
But I hope, winter isn't over yet. And also hope, that we will come again soon.
It is gray here as well, even if the sun tried to break through the clouds.
It was snowing,

but there was a bit of sunshine.

Just moments of it.
The kids are enjoying the snow. We tried to build snowmen, but couldn't, so we only made "molcanoes" (volcanoes, as Poppy says it).
If one is looking for it, can find some colors. This yellow...

It is gorgeous...
And there is green, hidden in the sea of gray.

Or just under the snow-cover.

Inside there is so much color.
I am knitting in the mornings and in the evenings. Yellow and red and rust.

And when I am alone, I am listening to Einaudi.
And there are some thin Geranium-flowers, lost in time.

The evenings are so different in this quietness.

And nights are calmer.

January

I am at home, spending some days of vacation I have left from last year.
It is winter, with some snow and temperature below 0. I needed this, after last year's spring-like winter.

During daytime I am playing with the kids, we go out, I cook a bit, and I enjoy it.
In the evenings (after the small one is sleeping, if we succeed to put him to bed) I am knitting and enjoy the lights of the Christmas-tree (we still have it, and it will stay this week).

I have knit a scarf for myself. It is finished, but I do not have a photo of it while wearing it.

Then I made wristlets for Klári (finished, but no photo).
Then mittens for Poppy (he had 2 pairs, but the cuff was too short, so they kept falling).

And after knitting so much with acrylic I craved the touch of merino, and when Klári asked for a scarf I took some remaining of handdyed by Buci and bamboo knitting needles, and now I am knitting and knitting and it feels oh so good.

We went for a walk in the woods on Sunday.

I know now why I tend to be bored by this kind of winter after Christmas: I miss the light. I love winter, I love gray, but I miss the sparkling lights.

We enjoyed the walk though, we pulled the kids on the sleigh and they were running a bit in the snow.
We will go to the countryside tomorrow. We hope for a bit more snow and temperatures below freezing, so we will go outside and enjoy nature.
I keep planning my yarn-related adventures for this year
I saw a pullover. Crocheted, but I just fell in love. So much, that I already made a swatch for it.

I will have one.
B. wants socks. He will have a pair for his size 45 feet. Speaking of socks: a good friend of ours still haven't got nothing handmade by me. So he will have his first pair of my handknitted socks for his birthday (in October).
And I have a huge quantity of acrylic yarns, I got them from a colleague. I think a part of them will become a crochet blanket. The yarns are thinner, but I will make a smaller blanket for summertime, for Klári. She would love it, I know.
And now back to my coffee and knitting needles in the morning calmness (Poppy came here and he is sleeping by my side now)...

Stripes

After the sock-invasion last year, this year started with... socks. We need them, the temperature outside is -20 C, so all the family wears knitted socks right now. Both indoors on the carpet and outdoors in our boots.
I especially need them, as I walk to the office - only 3 km-s but it takes 35 minutes -, and then back home, and believe me: to make it a nice walk I need knitted socks, knitted gloves and lined hat.
This time I made striped socks. And not one, but two pairs.

I have this love-and-hate relationship with selfstriping sockyarn. I love striped socks IF they look the same and maintain the rhythm of the stripes. Which is sometimes quite difficult to obtain.
First: how do socks look the same? If one finds the EXACT similar spot on the yarn-segments. I am perfecting myself in this, anyhow, there are occasions when I must restart a sock many times. Like 5-6 times. Which is really annoying.
This time it was quite easy, as the striping was regular and easy to understand and follow.
Then, there is another issue, of having the yarn tails the same length on both socks. I use to compare them, after having the initial knot done (I use to position it a few times).
I made Judy's magic cast-on, and the socks for myself started their evolution on my needles.

The other issue is harder to cope with: maintaining the rhythm of the stripes. It is easy on the socks' tube-like parts, but it is impossible to make the heels with the same yarn and have the stripes as they went before.

But this time I was really lucky: I had to start the heels at a pink part, so I introduced a new yarn, just for the heels. I had this pink, which is not exactly the same color, but it is much closer to the sockyarn's pink that I could find for any other color on the yarn. (I had the idea for the blue also, but it was much darker than this one, so I am glad that heels were made in pink.)
My socks were finished in 5 days, and then I started the small ones. But: if I wanted to have them quite similar I had to calculate what part of the yarn to use for CO to have pink heels. This took me some time.
But eventually they are done.

So we have another pair of mother-daughter socks.
PS1: two-at-a-time, toe-up on 2.5 mm needles.
PS2: I have a yarn that I could not identify a pattern in its striping, so knitting socks of it that I like will be especially hard...