Antsypants

I've been feeling a tad out-of-sorts lately so haven't been blogging much. Part of it is just the end of summer, when I always feel all this pressure to Make It Last and to Do All The Things before fall hits. I love fall and everything that comes with it, but I still experience that end-of-season antsyness. I think it's particularly bad this year because there are a lot of big changes coming up this fall. The biggest change is that I will be unemployed. I have 9 work days left at my current job and it's quite unusual for me not to have a plan for the next step. Thank goodness the Fiasco will be starting his teaching job... Lots of things coming up, lots of things to do, lots of things to look forward to, I just have to be patient. I'm bad at patient, but I'm trying.

Anyway, onwards and upwards! I did a bunch of winding this week and I'm still in love with my new nostepinne:

My, what lovely balls! ;)

It's much more soothing and calming to use than a hand-crank ball winder. It does take longer, but I really like it. See that undyed ball of 100% worsted weight alpaca yarn on the bottom left? That became this:

First attempt.

That is a preliminary swatch for a new hat design I am working on. I met the owner of Burgis Brook Alpacas, an alpaca farm in Connecticut, at a local fair and she generously gave me a skein of her lovely yarn and requested that I design a pattern to be sold as part of a kit with her yarns... at Rhinebeck. Say what?! I am so excited. We are still working out the details but if all goes well my little patterns will reach a whole bunch of people at one one of the biggest wool festivals of the season. Woohoo!