Checkpoint

It's a little over midway through my summer vacation, and I've been rather productive, though not in the way I intended to be this summer. I meant to do a lot of reading and some studying, but haven't really started on that yet. I'm really gonna force myself to start, though, since school will be starting in a month and a half, and I want to make sure that I'm entering the school year with at least some new information under my belt. Maybe I'll start going to the library so it'll be harder for me to get distracted. It's hard to concentrate when there's TV and yarn so close by.

I have, however, started knitting up a storm this summer. I started my first sweater, and finished it within a week, with only 4 days of actual knitting. While that sounds super impressive, I didn't really do much else that week, so I spent much more time on it than I normally would if I had stuff to do. I'm really very pleased with it, and I'm looking forward to getting a lot of good use out of it in a few months when the weather gets colder. The pattern is "Textured Tunic with Side Buttons" from the book Fitted Knits, which I borrowed from the library. I did some tweaking to the pattern to fit me and my style better, but I was surprised with how relatively easy it was to make. I also enjoyed that just a few hours of knitting produced such a satisfying amount of fabric in such a short time. Nice instant gratification there, which was nice after doing the Cachoeira socks that had very little to show for the amount of time I spent grappling with it. (I ended up frogging those socks...) Really love the yarn I used for the sweater too, with the little flecks of color in amongst the dusty purple. And it's so soft! I hear this yarn pills easily, but for the money and the softness, I'm not too concerned. I even have 2 skeins left over, so I'm trying to think of what I can use them for. Winter socks maybe?

I've also completed a Lace Ribbon Scarf, which I don't have pictures for at the moment, since I have yet to block it. I used the forest green yarn from the frogged Cachoeira socks. The scarf looks like a long, green snake right now, but I'm hoping that blocking will work the wonders I hear it does. (I've never blocked anything before.) I'm really glad that I was able to use the yarn for something so pretty and practical, since it seemed like the yarn didn't want to be socks. Speaking of which, I'm also in the process of making some Baudelaire socks (I'm such a Knitty whore! Everything I make comes from there!), which are my first attempt at toe-up socks. I'm really pleased with how quickly the first sock went, and I'll be starting the second one today. No Second Sock Syndrome for me! The first sock is a little difficult to pull on, but once it's on, it fits wonderfully. I think I'd like to make more toe-up socks in the future. It seems like such a logical way to make socks! And, at least for these socks, they fit much better than the cuff-down socks I made before. I'm so pleased. I'll have pictures in a few days, I think.

No exercise or reading to report, unfortunately. As I said before, I've been really distracted about reading. And as far as exercise goes, I had an infection last month, and had to take antibiotics that weakened my tendons. There was a chance of tendon rupture, so I had to be really careful about not putting them under any amount of strain. So that really got me off my game as far as an exercise routine, and I've been pretty sedentary lately. I'm trying to get up the motivation to start that up again too. Just gotta make myself get up and do it, just like with studying. Hopefully, I'll have better progress to report next time...