The Siren Song of Solitude

ManCandy left for his brother's wedding in Florida on Thursday morning, and returned this afternoon. He's currently crashed out after having been awake for 30 hours,* so my solitary stint continues in name, at least.

I am of a melancholy disposition. Not Byronic, or even Blakesian, but I do need time alone in my own space in order to feel comfortable and calm. This need doesn't mesh well with my terminal morning sickness, as ManCandy usually leaves an hour or two before I get up and gets home before I arrive back at Chez Us. So when he is called out of town - as infrequently as it happens - I tend to hole up in my apartment and enjoy the solitude.

This weekend was no different. I spent a blissful day and a half listening to nothing but the silence, the whirring of my Sonata, and the dulcet tones of Blair Waldorf freaking out.

During the Gossip Girl marathon, I managed to finish some things. I noticed that my new system of working on one project every day is productive, but slow going. I have the sense that a lot of things will get finished all at the same time, but meanwhile I am sadly lacking in yards to add to my 12-Mile Quest total. But in addition to spinning, I finished the stranded pattern on my EZ Seamless Yoke Sweater, and I'm currently charging up the collar. I'm a little scared that it'll be too big, so I'm going to do the final decreases and then a loose bind-off so I can try it on properly. I may have to rip back, and if so, I'm going to dramatically change the top of the sweater. But that's all in the future.

For now, here's what I've actually completed!

406 yds. of natural grey Lincoln/Corridale, 2-ply

For some reason, this yarn took up WAY more room than I expected. I filled 2 bobbins unto bursting with singles, then had to do the same in order to ply it. As you can see, I had to spill over into a third bobbin:

And yet, it still only came out to 406 yards. I don't get it, but it's still a lovely yarn. It's not as soft as I would like, but I think that's partly to do with the fleece and partly to do with how I spun it. I tried to spin woolen, but there's not a huge amount of crimp here so it didn't puff up like most yarns do. And also, I really have no experience with woolen spinning, so it was an experiment all 'round. In any case, it was satisfying and I'm glad this set is done - next time around I'll put more twist in the singles in the first place so I don't have to add it later!

I also finished 4 oz of Blackberry Truffle BFL roving from Dragonfibers. I got this roving probably about a year ago, and pulled it out using a very sophisticated system: dig out the bottom-most bin of fiber, pick a number, and use whatever ends up being the (in this case) 17th thing I pull out of the tub. I'm quite happy with it!

~341 yds., 2-ply

I should really start measuring my WPI, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.

In addition to all of that, I also worked on a Super Secret project (secret only because the recipient occasionally reads here). AND, on Sunday night, my good friends Jer and Elizabeth announced that they're due on October 12! I'll have to dig really deep to find something appropriate for their spawn...


* Numbers like this always make me happy that I can sleep on planes. I may not sleep deeply or well, and might occasionally have woken up with drool on my shirt, but I can sleep. Thank goodness!