It Is A Far, Far Better Thing

Um, sleeve, than I did last time.  Really, I like this one much better, and I think I'll find a more jacket-like, structured cardigan ultimately more useful than a sloppy, lacy, large-gauge cardigan, at least, that's my belief right now. I'm pleased to be able to incorporate all the odds and ends I was planning on interspersing in the original and horribly dated (ack! Dated before it even hits the closet - that's awful) and oversized cardigan, and in such a practical way too: as cuffs and other edges to disguise the dinge that invariably strikes in these places.

Yesterday was our monthly eating, uh, spinning day, and I completed all the carded SOAR conglomerations.

Like the others I have previously shown here, they're all (except the corally-orangey-browny skein, which was spun fat and plied with a never-ending cone of variegated rayon flake yarn) sportweight three-ply yarns. I guess they'll go with something sometime, which is usually the case for my odds and sods. Plan? What plan? Surely you jest!

So now I can start on this, a small lot of polypay which I randomly dyed in three different reds and had carded, but not blended. I probably have about enough for a smallish sweater as long as I spin it dk weight or finer. Not a problem.

So for yesterday's eat-a-thon, which was actually rather restrained since a few participants were excused from food duty (though really food is rarely a duty, except in the case of children who are picky eaters but must still be fed every night), I made Lamb Stew With Lemon and Figs, except I used venison, and I have plenty left over. It was rather good, though the heat of the cayenne simmered out a bit more than I would have liked, and I think next time I'd go light on the crushed tomato and perhaps up the lemon a bit.

On Saturday I was quite focused, making the sample and packing kit beads for this new colourway:

I also completed the sample (started some months back and shelved after the class was taught) and packed beads into incomplete kits (I'm out of the not-seed beads, I hate that) for this necklace:

It's partially based on what I suspect was a standard Victorian design (but the colour is decidedly modern), though the dangles (which I think were traditionally bead-wrapped wooden beads or something equally bulky) are my own, as is the bit in the front where it looks as though it fastens, but doesn't, as it's permanently closed and slips over the head. How do you say that in five words or less? I haven't a clue.

Only four (after today) more days of sloth and indolence, and Friday almost doesn't count, as I'm teaching all day in Miami.