twisted olive trees, high on the scents of thyme

*nose pokes up from a burrow*

Oh hello there.  Yes, I am still alive and I do still occasionally do things other than listen to funk.

Like this.

where a too cursory reading discovers only dip and incline

Noro yarns are the brainchildren of Eisaku Noro, who runs his business from Aichi Prefecture, Japan. The 'brand concept' from the company web site reads:

a conversation of heels and toes

A few weeks ago I said I'd speak to the importance of socklets, and so I shall today. I'll also just note in passing that patterns for socklets are tragically rare.

I checked last week, and there were over 21,000 sock patterns in Ravelry's database. Over 16,000 of those are "mid-calf" -- that is, what are commonly called 'crew socks' or 'trouser socks' in the U.S.

With socks of lace and beaded ceintures

Summer is officially over in Cape Despair.

This has nothing to do with holiday weekends, or the coming of an equinox, or anything you could point to in the weather or the garden.

shepherds so long they walked like sheep.

Are you ready for more Tour de Fleece re-cap excitement?

(Humour me, people)

make a wardrobe with tufts of wool

Tour de Fleece Week 2!

(please, contain your enthusiasm)

hands making and unmaking promises

I keep telling myself that I'll sit down and write, or finish writing, a bunch of posts that have been in existing in the almost-but-not-quite-written limbo of my saved drafts folder.  I just haven't done it.

Some of you may remember that about this time last year I was playing a small but crucial role in Dr Goodhair's Crazy Deadlines Show.  This year, I am playing a similar role in a similar production, which sort of sucks up my 'writing for the blog' energies.  I am still doing and making, just more quietly.

What I am doing and making?

As the squirrel spins the acorn

Once, in high and far-off times, O best beloved, I was a wee little girl and my parents sent me to an 18th-C themed summer day camp held by a local historic site. There we campers dabbled in various historic crafts, like soap-making, candle-dipping, and spinning on drop spindles.

victory filled up the little rented boat

... and everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!

The rainbow, cloud imbiber

Did you read the article in the Toronto Star I linked last Friday? No? Well go do it. It will take less time than me trying to explain. I'll wait.

what a child does when he’s given something to keep

Let's finish up the Christmas knitting:

There is a fox in me

And now we can start talking about all the Christmas knitting.

First up is the hat I knit for Nephew the Younger. I warn you, it's almost lethally cute:

a traveler or a dweller in your lilac night

So here are some things I knitted.

Wait, let's go back a step.

charmed as I am by the sputter

Knitters talk about the affliction of 'startitis,' a condition in which the knitter casts on an irrational number of projects in a very short time. Many (if not most) of these projects then become Un-Finished Objects (UFOs) that haunt project baskets and closets for years to come.

Less common is 'finish-it-upitis' which presents, as you might expect, the opposite symptom: a maniacal urge to finish all the unfinished projects.

My mind’s made up

Oh Norway, you are adorable.

Inappropriate clothes, odd habits

Many of my peers greet the arrival of warm weather with a mix of joy and consternation, but not because of the wild temperature swings that afflict our beautiful capital.

Green moves through the tops of trees

Spring is finally here: there are daffodils and pink chionodoxas blooming in the garden, fresh green on the trees, blue skies and warm sunlight overheard.

Better to walk forth in the frozen air

Some of you might remember, if vaguely, that sometimes I knit things.

Lo, a thing I knitted:

Time for some thrilling heroics

In the run up to Christmas, I asked the Viking if he needed anything in the way of knitted goods -- it is as easy to buy 12 skeins of yarn as it is to buy 10, and often makes more sense when shipping charges are involved -- but he demurred. OK, I said, and was going back to my desk when he said but...

But?

like a red verb over the snow

One last entry in the 'things I knit but did not blog' category.