Unraveled Wednesday: 12/21/22

I'm happy to join Kat and fellow Unravelers for Unraveled Wednesday, with a finished hat and some other unsettled knitting. 

I finally prevailed over the Braided Hearts (ravelry link) hat pattern and managed to finish it. I knit it for Justin's girlfriend, Jess, and I've been afraid to try it on myself for fear that it might look goofy. I'm not knitting with super-bulky yarn again, so if Jess doesn't like it, she is free to donate or re-gift it. 

The rest of my knitting has been unsettled. I worked on the pink and green Hitchhiker that I was excited about, but after trying at least three different ways to change colors and being unhappy with all of them, it's now stuffed in a project bag for later. 

Then I remembered that when we visited Watkin's Glen last summer, we wandered through a yarn store after hiking the gorge. They had an 1898 hat (another ravelry link) knit as a store sample, and John was intrigued by the warm double-layer band over the ears. I told him I would knit him one, but when I searched my stash I couldn't find any suitable worsted weight. I went to a local yarn store, but the only worsted weight they carried was Encore. There's nothing wrong with it, but it's just not really nice warm wool. I got a skein anyway and after three false starts, I think I've settled on a real beginning for the hat. If John likes the hat, I can always knit him another one in nicer yarn.

This morning I finally really noticed these two skeins of Wollmeise from my last in-person visit to The Loopy Ewe. They have been sitting on the cedar chest in my bedroom for over a year, so I picked them up with the idea that maybe I would be happier knitting a colorful Hitchhiker. I think I'll try to concentrate on the 1898 hat with the possibility of finishing it before Christmas, but the Wollmeise is sitting next to me for inspiration. 

Reading has also been unsettled. I finished "comfort reading" in the form of Rosamunde Pilcher's Winter Solstice and some L.M. Montgomery stories and was ready to move on to something else. After trying a few books and finding that none of them felt right, I think I've settled on A Quiet Life. It's set in Bethlehem, PA where we lived until I was six and where my father's assisted living facility was located. That's a pretty loose connection, but it felt like enough for me. 

What are you making and reading this week?

(And a Happy and Peaceful Winter Solstice to all of you in the Northern Hemisphere!)