All the Pretty Words

I got a Palm Leaf Tote when we were in Victoria, BC this January and have loved it ever since. It’s a great size for a knitting bag, especially for traveling, since I can throw all kinds of maps, a project, a book, my Nintendo DS, and even a water bottle in there. I’ve used it almost daily since I got it, but disaster struck a couple of weeks ago…a row of palm leaves snapped in half and I’ve no idea what caused it. I sent an email to Lantern Moon asking whether I could have it repaired or replaced, and today I got an email from them saying that they’re going to send me a new one. Sweet!

I’m also making (slow) progress with the Log Cabin blanket. I dearly love the thing, but the gauge and garter stitch are making it a bit mind-numbing, so I posted about it here on Mason-Dixon Knitting’s slogalong. It’s like a knitalong, but for projects that seemingly never end. You know the sort–single-color plain sweaters for 6′6″ men, gigantic afghans, stockinette stitch shawls, and the like. I’ve never done a knitalong before, but I’ve received all sorts of positive comments and encouragement on this one, so I’d really like to join another one sometime.

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Om Yoga Mat Bag

Originally uploaded by Trinity.
The saga of the wrists continues, as partially told by this project. I saw the hand surgeon a couple of weeks ago, and she said that I have no mechanical problems with my wrists. No carpal tunnel syndrome, no arthritis, no weird bone issues, nothing she could find at all. She then passed me on to an occupational therapist, who I saw last week. She said that my pain seems to be due to overly tense muscles. She gave me some stretches to do, said that I should try to walk about 15 minutes a day, and told me to start taking weekly yoga classes at their clinic. They were out of yoga mats, so I had to go get my own, and of course this called for a project! I went with the Om Yoga Mat Bag out of Stitch ‘n Bitch Nation. I used Peaches ‘n Cream cotton yarn because it was all I could find in a brick-and-mortar store on short notice. It turns out I’m not terribly crazy about this yarn, because it *loves* to overtwist. I was a bit worried about the colors pooling, but now that it’s finished I think it looks alright.

Oh, and the pain? Almost gone! My wrists still hurt a bit, but the combination of stretches, walking and yoga seems to help quite a lot. I think that it will eventually go away altogether as I keep working at the stretches and exercise. If nothing else, at least I don’t have to deal with surgery and expensive medicines unless for some reason it gets a lot worse in the future, so that’s good :).

There’s also another bit of good news I’d like to share, which Bryan has already written about. He’s coming to visit again early next month, and this time he’ll be staying until the end of November! This means I’ll have to share him with my family for a few days over Thanksgiving, but I think that’s well-balanced by the fact that he’ll be here for my birthday. That’s a major holiday, no? *wanders off to check the nearest calendar…*

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