swish and stress

I am blogging rarely this summer because I feel my seams coming undone, strained by life transitions, bad news, and graduate school. In the midst of this, though, I am sustained by beautiful moments. Here's one.

Last week I received a Knitpicks order with several skeins of 'Swish', their new superwash wool. Deep blues and greens for a baby blanket for one of Mountain Man's friends and rich, chocolate brown for a baby sweater for one of my friends (another placket sweater, this time with rustic wooden buttons). Here's my quick yarn review, since I haven't seen many out there yet: respectably soft, lovely colors, and blessedly machine washable and dryable, at an excellent price. I've been searching for a yarn like this for quite some time.

Anyways, I swatched and cast on for the sweater that evening. I pulled it out again a few days later while in the throes of paper-writing. Everytime I wanted to throw a tantrum about the paper, I knit a few rows to take my mind off it. To give you a sense of how frustrated I was, I finished the entire lower body of the sweater (one ball) this way! No paper yet, but the knitting feels like legitimate progress. And it sits quite peacefully among the watermelon vines.