latest books

listen, about evelyn glennie was interesting and informative; the sentence by louise erdrich was fun and mornings in jenin was heartbreaking. the latter two were compelling and i read them through in two weeks.

breakfast, knitting, gifts and the book club

oats soaked in kefir overnight (with honey, cinnamon, chia seeds and flax seeds) with a dab of peanut butter on top and rasa grain coffee in the cup chanda brought back for me from positano.

denise bayron's wave of change jacket knit with quince and co's linen kestrel yarn. i need to pick up stitches for the second buttonband and knit two sleeves. picking up linen stitches is not easy.

 

a pretty candle lucia brought back from dornach, switzerland (i think she bought it in dornach). she visited the goetheanum with tsamaret when they were there. it was very nice  . . with a lovely cafe. it was fun to see the photos.

and this chocolate was delicious!!!

i also had a book club meeting today . . except the three of us who were able to attend ended up discussing current personal concerns. my one friend has been traveling back and forth to new mexico helping her elderly mom who has been ill, and my other friend is preparing her daughter to begin college in september while also working, looking for a house to buy and packing up her apartment because her lease is up august 31st. my other dear friend was unable to attend today because she is also dealing with very, very difficult housing circumstances :(

 

i forgot completely what book we were reading, and only just a few hours ago did i find it on the library's website and put it on hold: unbowed, a memoir by wangari maathai.

pichinku!

i've been following this fiber company on instagram for over a year now. it's a small company of several women in peru. they collect plant material from the surrounding countryside and boil it up in a courtyard in cusco. you can see their short kickstarter video here (scroll down), and their website here. they don't always have their beautiful dyed baby alpaca wool available but a few weeks ago they announced that the iskay dk weight was up in the shop. i took a few days to decide on a pattern and colors, and then finally placed an order. it came today and i am very excited! i'm really pleased with the colors i picked (it's not easy choosing from a computer screen) and am glad i took my time and thought carefully at how they would work together. i hope to make joji locatelli's odyssey shawl. i was first going to put the brown in between the greens, but am now considering having the greens next to each other. should the brown be the top color of the shawl, or the bottom?

i love how they include the plant on the label.

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greg made us an omelette for dinner.

i also had a wonderful book club meeting with homeschooling friends in the afternoon . . we'll be reading braiding sweetgrass by robin wall kimmerer for the next meet-up on february 23rd.