Cowlabunga

Neither my laptop nor my phone were cooperating last night. The colors are ridiculously muted here. Maybe I should use something other than my paisley sheets as a backdrop. Skew the blues to teals and brighten the beige to gold, and you'll have a better idea of how snazzy this turned out.

In other good news, I was told the amount of my raise for 2018, and I am pleased. It becomes effective on February 24 and will show up in my checking account in mid-March, along with a bonus that is considerably better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

I've spent bits of the last several nights working on my spreadsheet and refining my budget. I set some financial goals on Monday night and began to plan out how to achieve them. I tweaked the spreadsheet a little night and no doubt will be doing more of that as the year progresses.

I go back to the doctor tomorrow afternoon for a recheck on last week's fall when my chair broke. I have felt immensely blessed all week, and I've been ferociously productive at work. Which means that tonight I am knackered but victorious, realizing that I could have done little without major help from above.

Theoretically I was going to sew on the RS project tonight, but instead I'm going to pour myself a glass of buttermilk and grab a handful of ginger cookies and make an early night of it.

Flying by the seat of my pants. More or less. And a finished object.

Crossing "rodeo cowgirl" off my bucket list. Friday my chair at work broke, tipping the seat perpendicular to the floor and bucking me off in the process. (Perfect three point landing!) All the pertinent parts were X-rayed to a fare-thee-well at an urgent care center after work. One tiny bruise, but otherwise nothing damaged but my dignity.

I was pretty stiff Friday but slept most of it off overnight. I had a six hour nap yesterday and woke refreshed and almost ache-free. However, I slept so long that I missed the window of opportunity at the pharmacy and had to get my prescription for industrial strength ibuprofen filled after sacrament meeting today.

Bonus of sorts: I learned that I have arthritis in my right hip and right hand at the thumb, which were both more tender than usual after my fall.

I didn't have too much difficulty standing up to lead the music in sacrament meeting today. Sitting down was slower and more painful. Plus, for the intermediate hymn and the closing hymn, I felt a little light-headed after standing. Not vertigo per se, just the slightest sense of disconnection.

I got a priesthood blessing after sacrament meeting from my good home teacher and another friend, and then I came home and grabbed what I thought was my prescription, but was not. So, in all, three roundtrips to the pharmacy to get that prescription filled, but it's done, and at no cost to me.

This is actually finished object #3 for the year, but I have a great pun for the second one, so it will get its own blog post.

I made this hat from the yarn leftover from the mitts that I made for Middlest last year. The ball band is long since history, and I don't feel like jumping over to Ravelry to see if I remembered to record it there.

The pattern is another Daniel Yuhas recipe, and it was a joy to knit. I've handed over the last dab of yarn to Middlest, along with the hat.

I have a good-sized ball of fat charcoal grey acrylic yarn that I used when knitting for the homeless in late 2016. I thought a hat from this same pattern would be a good idea to use up the yarn productively, but either the needles I chose were too small, or the yarn was insufficiently elastic for the multitude of K1fb increases. I knit until the crown was about 4" across, and it was a stiff and cranky bit of fabric, so I frogged it and put those needles away. There's the slightest possibility that I have a crochet hook of the proper size, but more than likely I will just hand it off to Fourthborn for her dolly rehab projects.

I'm feeling another nap coming on, so this is it for today.

Coordination.

The colors are skewed here. in real life, that skirt is russet verging on cranberry, as are the darker stripes in the shirt and the border on the scarf. The tights and lighter stripes are sort of an electric pumpkin. Items on the left are from Gudrun's catalogue. Scarf on the right courtesy of my sister, several years ago when she purged her closet.

This is me in my Knit Swirl. Corporate was wanting pictures of our favorite sweaters, but I procrastinated having a coworker snap a picture until after the link was gone. Oh well. Cheesy grin at no extra charge.

Last week at work was intense. Not brutal, but intense.It was with great relief that I wore Beloved's BYU shirt and jeans and sneakers to work on Friday. I got a whale of a lot accomplished each day, but I came home not wanting to write or think. Read a little. Knitted rather more. I finished my cowl and will be sending the leftover yarn to my sister on the way to Knit Night after work on Tuesday. I took the remaining yarn from when I knitted those infernally cabled mitts for Middlest last year and cast on a ribbed watch cap for said child. I'm using a recipe from my Daniel Yuhas "from the center out" book. Finished the increases before bedtime last night and have a little over two inches worked on the straightaway.

When this one is done, will cast on another from the super bulky charcoal grey acrylic I bought year before last to knit for the homeless. And then I will begin a new round of baby socks from the bag of yarn I brought home from church today. One of my friends is moving to Tennessee. I am the beneficiary of her sock yarn stash. There's some really good stuff in there, yarns I've always sort of wanted to try but never got around to. Now's my chance.

This is all I've got for you tonight. But I've missed y'all. Work is less stressful. My health appears to have stabilized. I've gotten two good naps in this weekend. And right now I just want to knit until I can no longer keep my eyes open. Later, gators.