I haven’t felt much like writing these past weeks. As I’ve said in the past, the 6 weeks between January 1 and February 15 are really crazy for our family, with birthdays, namesdays, several church feasts, and a memorial day.
The quarantine happened to fall over Old Calendar Christmas, so we had to miss church services that day, which was disappointing.
Sometimes, my life just feels like…a lot.
Anyway, we got something like a foot of snow and ice yesterday, so of course the city is shut down and the kids are off school. I’m hoping we can get our car out and reparked this week, since it is supposed to be very cold and I’d rather the kids not have to troop 20 minutes on either side of the commute to public transit as they usually do.
Have you been following the news from Kamchatka? Me neither. Our priest mentioned yesterday that the province has received a historic 7 feet (!!) of snow in the first two weeks of January, which is a lot, even for them. Someone sent a video of the city on our church group chat and the snow is up past the second floor on a lot of the buildings. They have built some pretty impressive sledding hills from the drifts, several stories high! (The link above has an embedded video of the sledding).
So our little bit doesn’t seem too bad by comparison! Below is our back patio, which includes the snow shoveled off the roof. That is a 55 gallon trash can, for reference. (We have a flat roof, so it needs shoveling every time we have significant snow). I told the boys to avoid hitting the raspberry canes if they could; if they break, we get no berries this summer. So far, so good.
Ponchik is ready to conquer the pile:
I’ve been meaning to post these pictures for a while; they are obviously taken before the harsh weather hit. The sweater might be familiar. It is the Lightweight Pullover that I finished in December or January of 2023, just as I was starting my most recent (and so far, most successful) weight loss journey. I’ve lost the equivalent of a 3rd grader: 60 or so pounds and 49”. I’ve been maintaining since the spring of 2024, so I think that is pretty good.
But about the sweater: it had got a hole near the shoulder blade in 2024 that I repaired badly, but was willing to overlook, but then the hem had some holes this fall and that was the straw. For the record, the hole repair was using the technique that everyone says to use for these sorts of holes, but it just didn’t look good when I finished.
I would have been better off repairing it the way I usually repair these sorts of things.
Anyway, I frogged the body of the sweater up to the arm holes and reknit the whole thing, making the body considerably longer. In retrospect, I wish I had added short rows to the back hem to make the back longer because my shoulders are so rounded forward, but I always forget to make this modification and then it seems like a lot to unravel and redo.
The original length never really worked for me, and even though I had lengthened the hem about 1/2” or so in 2024, it still was too short. I could probably have stood another inch or so in the body, but this is a fine length too.
I received two sweaters’ worth worsted wool yarn for Christmas and my namesday, so I’m working on a super snuggly sweater right now that I’m very eager to wear. I’m done the yoke and just about to put the sleeves on holders, so it’s been a quickish knit. (That autumnal red Dorchas sweater I mentioned in a previous post has been frogged and reknitted to a different pattern and I still don’t like it. I need to reassess my options for that yarn. Le sigh).
Usually the winter break is so nuts that I don’t get anything done, but somehow, even with all the illness in the house, I managed to find time to make an earring and necklace set for our choir director at church. She is really into preserving and making Russian folk costume and has a folk singing group for whom she made all the outfits:
Her work is really amazing; she makes stunning pieces, particularly these elaborate kokoshniks that she sells:
She’s also trying to work aspects of traditional folk costume into her everyday wear without looking costume-y, and I really love some of the pieces she’s come up with. (I’m also taking notes!)
Anyway, she has been wearing a lot of amber this fall, and I thought it would be fun to make her a set that featured amber and ivory.
I’m quite pleased with how it came out. The square glass beads are Czech glass, and the big brown bead is from a pair of earrings I took apart a long time ago. The beads on the wire are wood; everything else is amber or ivory.
Other news: Piglet turned 18 and we had a bit of a wrangle to get my proxy access for his health care stuff restored. Can I just say that I hate HIPPA laws with the white hot burning passion of a thousand suns? For the record, he wants me to help him manage all that stuff, so to just suddenly cut off access for him and me because he turned 18 and then make it hard to restore was super frustrating. The pediatrician’s office process was very straightforward and easy, but our other providers have been a bit of a pain.
Thankfully it is all up and running again. I imagine there will be another upheaval when he heads to college this fall. He got into his first choice college with a decent scholarship, so we are all happy and relieved about that!
I was telling a friend last week that I suddenly had this panicky feeling, like the fall semester had been the ski lift to the top of the mountain, but now we had summited, it was going to be a fast swoosh to the bottom and I’m not ready for that!
