can yarn hold laughter?

i went to the yarn shop the other day for some glittery yarn to use in the weft of my reputation tea towels. i saw a vest that looked easy and ended up buying two colorways of yarn for knitting it (the yellow and the pink you can see in this basket). i started the yellow one the other night. i'm still a beginner and i have this habit of forgetting how to purl if i haven't done it for awhile. even looking at this picture, i can see some mistakes. 

i took it to the knitting/weaving group last evening. i admitted that i had forgotten how to purl. the lovely ladies laughed at me, and then they helped me. and they loved the colors i had chosen. we laughed a lot while i relearned how to purl and i hope that all that laughter got knitted right into my vest. the idea of that appeals to me. i want to feel that laughter when i wear the vest. 

 

good bones

my sister is back home at our parents' house. these days it belongs to her. she had rented it out for the past few years. the people who lived there tore out all the horrible carpet that was everywhere, including on the stairs. i always wondered if there wasn't some nice wood floors underneath all that 80s pile. and it seems there was. 

it's weird to see this room empty and the blinds open. my mother weirdly kept the blinds closed and that room was always so dark. i think she thought she was protecting the furniture from the sunlight. the wallpaper is the same wallpaper my mom put up years ago. it's not too bad, though generally, i have realized that my mom didn't have very good taste. 

my sister is thinking about making a big change in her life and moving back there. i find it comforting to think of her living in our childhood home. sanding and polishing those floors. and bringing it to life again. the house has good bones and it saw our family through many good times. it must be good for many more. 

at the end of a long weekend

husband should be home from his trip to ukraine in a few hours. i picked some roses and brought them in an attempt to have some serenity on the window sill that i haven't necessarily felt for the past week, worrying about him being only 30km from the front in eastern ukraine. that said, i am really looking forward to hearing about his adventures. now that i'm quite sure he'll be home safely. 

we've had a four day weekend, thanks to all those awesome spring holidays in denmark. i spent most of it in the company of yarn. getting started on my reputation era tea towels, planning the next ones, visiting the linen weaving museum, starting a summer knitting project (see above yarn) or two. it will be a vest. i started the yellow one and i want to make a pink one too.

i also picked a lot of rhubarb and made 9 bottles of rhubarb & ginger cordial. and you can't even see that i've picked any rhubarb. husband will be happy, as he loves my homemade cordial and we were getting dangerously low. 

got to weaving on the reputation tea towels. i tried a looser weave on the first one. i won't really know how it is until it's washed, but i already decided that i want to do my usual tighter weave, i think it's what makes my tea towels the lovely fabric that they are. 

i also spent some time trying to figure out what to name these two. butter & toast? peach & cobbler? peachbottom & featherstone? maybe something ukrainian, to commemorate that i got them while husband was traveling there? hmm...stronti & cesia after chernobyl? gogol & viy? perhaps a little too much existentialist dread. they're so sweet and i'm so happy to have ducks again. they're safely in the old chicken enclosure where no fox can get them. 

it's nice to be in this space again, jotting down a few things i'd like to remember. while i count down the minutes until husband is safely home again.