Monday morning things

* Working up the motivation to finish the tables today. Once that's done, a little rewriting, and....well, the paper should be done.

I am thinking hard though about my advisor's comment once about how you could keep revising forever and at some point you just have to call a thing done and submit it. I think he and I worked well together because we had some of the same failings in re: doing research (namely: being a little perfectionistic about our writing)

* I'm essentially half-done with the Hygge (that's the name of the yarn) blanket. This has been fun to work on and I think I'm gonna win at yarn chicken. (I have used up about half of the yarn. I bought what the pattern called for but you never know if a particular skein ran JUST short enough to affect your outcome, especially if the pattern requirements are close to begin with).

The pattern I'm using is the free cabled throw that's on the ballband. I don't know why but for me there's something particularly....appealing?...about finding a pattern I like on the ballband of a yarn I want to try out, and knowing exactly how much of it I have to buy then and there. I think it pleases the slightly completist, compulsive part of me ....kind of like how being able to knit socks out of a single ball of yarn with no ends to weave in pleases me.

Anyway. I like how the pattern is turning out, I like the softness of the yarn (and that it's a soft acrylic and is machine-washable and will be durable - I have my gigantic Homespun blanket over in my office now, I brought it in this past winter when I was always cold in my office and I'm just going to keep it here because it's acrylic so it won't fall prey to our periodic meal-moth outbreaks - they come in on the animal chow). And I like the color of the yarn - the official color name is "Wisteria" and it's a soft purple, kind of like wisteria flowers.

After I finish this one I'm going to do one of those simple ripple-stitch crocheted afghans, but the "gimmick" I will use will be to use one of those color-changing "cakes" of yarn. (I have 2000-some yards of Lion Brand "Cupcake" in some bright pastels I want to use).

* I am a real sucker for yarn cakes like that - I think the colors appeal to me. I have the "Cupcake" one and then I have a few single cakes of other colors, with the idea of making hats or skinny scarves or whatever. (I have some "Ferris Wheel" in a pink combination that I am contemplating using some kind of reversible-stitch pattern on and just making a simple long scarf). I also have a couple cakes of the new-ish marled one in a couple different green/blue-green combos; probably enough for a shawl or maybe I make a lap blanket out of those.

(Yes, for someone who lives in a hot climate, I make a lot of warm things. It's a psychological thing, I think - like a blanket fort, only with crafting)

* I also started cutting out the Vignère Cipher quilt - I have eight of the twenty-six fabrics all cut. And once I get them all cut I can figure out the best order - right now my plan is to alternate darker and lighter fabrics as much as is practicable but not worry TOO much about the "perfect" arrangement. It pleases me to finally be working on this, though - this is an idea I had *years* ago (like in 2014 or 2013) after reading a book on code-breaking. I will say part of it was that it took me a good long time to accumulate 26 different fabrics with a typographic design (and in some cases, the fabrics stretch the definiton of "typography" a little: I have one that also has musical notation and symbols (like wingdings, only the old-style printer's version) throughout, and some of those blocks will just have THAT on it). But I also have a fabric or two in French and one in German, both languages I can more-or-less read. (French more than German.)

And of course once I figure out the "order" (that is, which fabric represents A, which represents B, and so on), sewing up the quilt will be simple - no laying out, just having to keep straight which fabric is which. (I suppose if I wanted to waste a lot of Ziplock bags* I could label 26 of them, one with each letter, and put the fabrics in them....that might be the best way of preventing errors)

(*Then again: I could reuse them to hold quilt pieces again for another quilt, so not really that much of a waste)

I even have a BIG piece of a different typographic fabric for the back, and I think this might be one I hand-quilt.

* Another thing I should do is set myself timers on projects - like, the quilt that's languished in the frame, instead of working sporadically on it for maybe a couple hours some weekend then not touching it for months, I should set a 30 minute timer and quilt for 30 minutes a day. Build my quilting callus back up with less pain...and maybe get it done and be able to get another one in.

I do sometimes kind of despair about finishing my big "difficult" and long-term projects (I still have Celestarium and the owl sweater on the needles) and maybe what I need to do is just set a timer and go "Okay, for a half-hour [or for something like 'the length of one episode of 'Parks and Recreation' or some other show] and work on that for that time." Sort of like what I sometimes do for cleaning - I set a timer and tell myself, "When it rings, you can quit, unless you've gotten into the groove and want to keep going" and that helps.