Jenna, the neglectful blogger.

Sometimes my blogging mojo dissipates for a while. Which is generally because I'm knitting a lot. Fancy that.

I've been able to work a lot more lately. I even had a 5 day week. Last week was 4 days, but it probably could have been 5 - it's just that all the schools were closed on Friday. We've had some seriously fucked up weather lately. Oh, nothing will happen, BAM 60 MPH WINDS AND 5 INCHES OF RAIN. Oh, it's gonna come back tonight, HA JUST KIDDING NOTHING HAPPENED AND YOU STAYED HOME FOR NOTHING. I can't follow it any more. It's like May all over again, with the added bonus of potential freezing. So even though Friday was lovely, there were a lot of power outages and flooded roads from Thursday night's opening of the hellmouth.

On Saturday, I went to New England Textile Arts' Spin, Knit and Spa. It's a little bit like a craft fair, but just yarn and fiber and notions. People come up here and stay, and hang out in hotel lobbies and knit and spin. I went last year and I spent an obscene amount of money, back when I actually had some, and back when I felt a moral obligation to bolster the economy. Now, not so much. I had actually made a goal about not buying yarn until March, and of course had forgotten about Spa, which is the next-to-last day of February.

I actually didn’t buy any yarn – I just bought one batt that I will eventually spin into yarn. It was expensive, but I’ve been coveting it for a while. And I only bought the one thing, deciding that instead of buying the other one I wanted as well, I’d see if I’d really spun up a lot by this time next year. I did go home and do some practice spinning on my practice roving. I think I'm getting a little better at it, but I'm still pretty much doing worsted singles with my spindle. But it's something. Someday I'll be brave enough to set a twist. I'm not even going to pretend I'll knit with it any time soon, though. Let's be realistic. I'm kind of a hoarder.

I had originally said “March” for my goal because I was planning to take a trip for a “knitting weekend” with some Yarmouth knitters. I’ve since cancelled that trip and gotten a full refund. Basically, it was shaping up to be something like $300 before I ever spent a dime on yarn. And it’s in my same state, not across the country. I could see if I was making a big road trip of it and going down to WEBS, but not for something that's just an hour and a half or so away, once I started thinking about my current financial situation. And none of that included food, booze, or gas. And those are my three favorite things. So after March, I guess my no-buying goal will just be a “see how long until I break” kind of thing. I really have enough to keep me going for a long time, and it’s so satisfying to watch the stash bin start to fall down a little. When I decide to have willpower, it's scary how good I am at self-denial. I’ve also been knitting more gifts, so I’m getting this stuff out of my house for good, not just changing it from a yarn stash to a scarf stash.

I finished a bunch more stuff lately. I'll put that up in separate blog entries, but I've got a sweater, some sockmarks, regular socks. Working on another St. James sweater right now - this time, with 3/4 sleeves and in alpaca/wool blend.