Feel the Burn

Why did I ever put those shawls down? I remember now! Pain!

One row in this pattern is almost 200 stitches, times two shawls = about 400 stitches. Add in rayon yarn, and the weight of these (they're as tall as me right now) and that comes to... a very numb middle finger on my right hand about halfway through the second row. I could be knitting more in one sitting, but I really like it when my hands can grab stuff. It's something I've grown accustomed to. But where's the pain, you ask? Yes, numbness is pretty much the opposite of pain, I admit. Remember what happens when numbness goes away? That pins and needles feeling? Not pleasant.

Now that I've been working on these again, and figured out why I put them down in the first place, I can forgive myself for taking so freaking long, and limit myself to one row at a sitting. It is frustrating, but I'm determined.

On the home front, The Monkey is almost one! One whole year. Hard to believe he's that old, even though he's walking, and making sounds that could (if the listener has enough imagination) sound like words. Preparations are under way for a family birthday party. Just cake and ice cream, nothing fancy. Unfortunately, even though I've started a new cleaning regimen and the house was clean and orderly for company at Christmas, the house is now a wreck. And I notice that when there's only one week till the party to do something about it...

Hmmm, saying "new cleaning regimen" makes it sound like there was an old regimen, which isn't exactly true unless you count shoving everything into the guest room and master bedroom 15 minutes before company arrives. It's a great system, as long as you know when company is coming in advance, and you're not adverse to digging through the piles to find the overdue bills that accidentally got shoved into the armoire with the "leftover" section of the yarn stash. I'm not very organized, but I'm getting into a routine where 2 or 3 rooms are kept relatively useable more than 50% of the time. Pretty proud of that. We'll worry about the other 7 rooms later. Good guests let you know they're coming anyway, right?

Cleaning, organizing, finishing difficult projects... I think that kind of dedication deserves a treat, don't you? Darn right! I got these in the mail today:

Wahoo!