Once upon a time, pre-Ravelry, when knitting blogs were more prevalent, Fridays were often alliteratively set aside for showing off finished projects. Today being Friday and all, I thought I’d show you what kept me busy in late May, June, and July.

This year I turned 40, which meant that my two dearest college friends also turned 40. Since I’d never given them any handknits, I thought this seemed like a good occasion to do so. (more…)

Three beautiful things from the past week:

1. Dinner with John and Nicole for the first time in a couple months.

2. An app I’ve been laboring over for a year at work is named by Apple new and noteworthy in its category.

3. Writing greetings means I get to break out my sticker collection, including, for the first time in 30 years, new scratch-and-sniff ones.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world this week?

I thought I’d share my most recent knitting success: I finished a new pair of socks on Aug. 31, a few days shy of a full year after starting them.

The yarn is Twisted Limone Tangy in Purple Rain.

It’s your run-of-the-mill picot, 64-stitch stockinette sock. I shifted the yarn on the second sock so they’d be opposites, because I thought that would be fun.

I can’t wait for it to be cool enough to wear them. Soon!

Three beautiful things from the past week:

1. Because of the heat wave, the city generously has kept the pool open an extra few days after the scheduled close of the season. I make it for one final swim and find myself floating on my back in the gloaming, staring up at the first star of the night.

2. The National Book Festival was Saturday and I got to spend nine hours listening to authors read their books and share stories and generally feel all bookish. It’s one of my favorite celebrations of the year.

3. I arrived home with the final section of a book to read and picked it back up as Rudi was heating me up some dinner. When he came over to hand me my bowl, he found me weeping with a handful of pages left in the book on my lap. He put the bowl down and wordlessly left me alone to finish the sad, sad ending to the novel.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world this week?

Oh, August… I had such grand plans for you, but the results were underwhelming:

• We did see a show. Two, in fact, while we were on our fantastic New York trip. Bullets over Broadway was well paced and tightly acted, while Rock of Ages was charming, if sexist. We agreed that we missed doing this, so will make an effort to see more traveling shows in D.C. and to regularly catch the bus north to see more things in their original runs on Broadway.
• I barely eked out a single pair of socks, although I did touch two others. On one, I started the second sock before remembering that the yarn had been a poor choice for the design and rapid progress was hindered by that and my inability to actually read a pattern. On the other, I’ve found contrasting yarn for the toe and am ready to bind off the first sock. (This would be more impressive if I hadn’t picked it up with only the toe left to knit.)
• I left my bike ride too late in the month, although in part that was due to being out of town most weekends. So when the final day of August was hot and hazy and humid with thunderstorms predicted for the afternoon, I’d run out of deferment time. I did go out. I should have eaten better beforehand. And I should have left earlier in the day. I made it to Old Town, but it took me nearly two hours to complete the 10 miles. I was so slow, molasses sped past me. There was a headwind, but that can’t have been all of it. I was just sluggish. And then because getting out there had been such an ordeal (and because I wasn’t looking in the right direction), I spent more time there than I should have and only made it a quarter of the way back before detecting lightning in front of me. (I am stupid about many things, but riding a metal vehicle through trees and along and over water during an electrical storm is not my brand of it.) Ultimately, I turned back to Braddock Road metro and took the train back to D.C., ending the day sopping wet and still about 3.5 miles short of my goal.

But the point of this goal-setting exercise is to not be bogged down by failure and ineptitude and weather and slow fingers, but instead to come up with new things each month to attempt. Here are my three goals for September:

1. Exercise twice a week. Last year at this time I was doing something active four times a week (admittedly as the final step in a three-month challenge, but still…); now I just feel sluggish and slow. I’d thought the pool being open during the summer would help, but I just didn’t make it over there during the week, although I was there nearly every weekend of the season. Volleyball starts back up again soon, so that’s once a week. Now I just need something else: at least 30 consecutive minutes of something else.
2. Update my resume. The grant that funds my job is coming to an end, and, while my boss continues to attempt to secure funding to keep us all employed, there are no promises past the end of the year. To keep as many options open as possible, it’s time to start looking at what else is out there.
3. Talk to a far-off friend once a week. It’s been ages since I’ve spoken with a couple of my friends and it’s time to get back in touch. Even if the conversations are short, at least the connections will be re-established.

What are you hoping to do this month?