I was straightening up yesterday. Bustling through the house, tidying up, my mind in far off places as I went through the motions of housework when……

…when I picked my shoalwater shawl up off the back of my computer chair. I’ve been using the shawl a lot recently around the house, as it’s gotten colder. I lifted it, spread it, and that’s when I saw it.

And once I started breathing again, I took pictures.

You probably can’t see it there, but it’s a cool picture. My modern couch is instantly “grandma-fied”. It cracked me up.

How ’bout now?

And finally,

What the heck? My only asumption is that because Noro Kureyon isn’t the strongest of yarns, I happened to end up with a particularly weak spot in a stress point, and it snapped.

In the absolute dead center of my shawl.

I didn’t know how I was going to fuse the yarn together once I had it fixed, but I figured I’d start in on it and deal with each problem as I encountered it. Fortunately, Kureyon is a felted yarn, very sticky, so it hadn’t run too far or gotten out of hand. So I re-threaded it. It didn’t look right. I did it again. Bingo.

In the end, I pulled as much length through as I could and spit and spliced it. I hope it holds. I really didn’t know what else to do.

To celebrate, I finished washing my second romney fleece.

Is it really that neurotic of me to spend hours picking through the locks to remove all second cuts and roughage, arranging them parallel to each other by length (generally speaking), and washing them in small batches?

I think it must be, but wow! When it’s washed and dry and all tidy like that, my heart just flutters.

I’m going out today to pick up my serger, and to do something else that I’ve forgotten already. I’m hosting Thanksgiving again this year. Dinner will be significantly smaller than last year, I think we’re feeding about 22, but we’ll be back up to 38 or so for dessert.

I’m making lists and assigning days to tasks. I can’t figure out exactly why I love to host big parties. But I really, really do.