Kninja Knitter

I’m sorry I missed my post schedule last week. I had a very, very busy weekend that I needed to recover from. Then, I was dealing with headaches throughout the rest of the week. Ugh. That means this will be an extra-long post as I have LOTS to share!

Stitched or Still-in-Progress

First off, I finished two of my projects during the week. The clock is winding down on the Zombie Knitpocalypse (ZK) craft-along, so I need to finish some things! I completed the scarf test knit that I was working on, and I beat my self-imposed deadline of Flag Day in time for the designer to release the pattern to celebrate the holiday!

Then, I finished my fun summery striped tee. I’ll be wearing this one at ZK, so I’m glad I have time to block it.

Next up, the vanilla socks that I’d started for movie-going. This week, I didn’t see any movies in the theater, but I did make progress thanks to a couple of dentist appointments. Both dentists I saw were very impressed, though I opted not to continue knitting while they did their work – I’d rather not distract them! I finished the first sock and cast on its mate – this week I have one last dentist appointment and at least one movie for knitting.

The last of the WIPs I can share here is the ZK-specific shawl I had started before my last post. It’s growing a lot, thanks to the shaping in the current section, and then I scaled up my needle so I can use more yarn faster, lol. The change in fabric due to the needle size is negligible.

Oh, I can also share my progress on the SWC socks, though I opted to stall on the project because of my other priorities. I would’ve had to stop basically everything to finish these on time, and it just wasn’t worth it. This will be one of my ZK projects – the pattern is not intuitive though, so I need to work with the chart here.

I also have another test knit that’s nearing completion, but I can’t share it here yet. I’m hoping it will be released shortly after our deadline!

Cast-on Conversations

Shortly after I posted my last blog entry on June 1, I cast on my June project for Camp Loopy. The theme for the month is Flower Gardens, so I opted for a simple two-color shawl using a flower colorway name as my main color. I’m a smidge behind schedule, but this one doesn’t need to be finished ahead of ZK. As much as I’d love to have the yardage completed for the craft-along, my schedule is too busy for that to happen.

I found I needed “one more” vanilla-type project besides socks, and I’d seen someone share a project using this pattern. It’s a great project for using up leftovers, plus I had planned one final hat for the Year of Projects. So here you have it! In the first week, I didn’t quite get through the contrast color of the brim, but once I finished the brim and upped the needle size, I’ve been able to fly through several rounds in a go!

My last project in active status is a cowl I cast on this weekend, having finished the flag-inspired scarf. I have a fair amount of all three colors left over, but not enough for the various shawl options I’ve seen that continue to mimic the US flag. Instead, this cowl uses an equal amount of blue vs a combined red & white split. I’ve modified the design slightly to add attached i-cord on both sides of the cowl, and this makes it so much easier to hide the yarn switch between the red and white stripes. I want to have this one done before my trip next month, as I’d like to wear it for the photo when I board my cruise.

While June is only half over, I’ve already got plans for July projects, lol. The current Year of Projects ends this month, too, so that absolutely jibes. 😉 Today I received yarn I ordered for a couple of those June projects. In particular, I received my supplies for the July Camp Loopy project:

And July also brings the fun event Shark Week, hosted by KnittyNatty of the Love in Stitches podcast. I’ll have eight days, immediately following my cruise, to knit socks, earning one prize entry per sock completed. While there’s no obligation to order yarn from the event sponsors, I couldn’t pass up this lovely set!

And the last tidbit to share here before I move on to non-yarn topics, I finished up the 2026 Black Cat Chaos adventure last week! I was proud of myself for demonstrating restraint, only opening one envelope per day! (Only once did I open one before going to bed, but only because it was after midnight!) I’ve put a couple sets of stitch markers to use with active projects, but the tin that I received on Day 2 is holding the rest of the sets.

Grandson Glimpses

This section might be even longer than the knitting content this time! I have two weeks of adventures to share, and they were full of fun. As I mentioned at the start, I was worn out last Monday, recovering from the weekend.

I took the munchkin to a neighborhood park (after we went through the car wash) so he could enjoy the warm-but-not-sweltering weather. I felt bad for him, as the first thing he did was approach a group of kids who were playing. He waved and said hi to everyone, but they weren’t interested in playing with him and basically ignored him. That made me sad… but I redirected him to climb on the playground we’d come to visit. I’m not sure, but this might have been his first experience ascending a rock climbing wall! He wasn’t ready for the taller vertical one they had, but he scaled this shorter angled one a couple times.

The next day, we trekked out to Pataskala for their “Dog Days of Summer” event which came up when I was looking for Touch-a-Truck opportunities. While the venue was supposed to have emergency vehicles on display, we didn’t see many… they did host a K-9 demonstration which I was interested in, but the kiddo wasn’t engaged with what was happening, and a heavy storm was blowing in midway through the demo. My grandson actually had the most fun at this event with their giant bubble station!

But wait, there’s more! On Sunday we had a full family outing to the science museum, Center of Science and Industry (COSI) in downtown Columbus. Last summer I got a membership that includes the kiddo, his mom AND his sister. So we only had to pay for my son’s entry, and then I also paid for admission to their special touring exhibit: The Science of Pixar. The big draw to visit, though, was their brief exhibit The Science of Big Machines – volunteers were there, manning a variety of construction equipment, including several excavators! Munchkin even got to operate a couple of them! Everybody had a fun time wandering the exhibits, and the kiddo’s sister braved the unicycle! (The last time she’d visited with her class, she was too short.)

Along with getting bigger, it’s amazing to see how much the toddler is maturing emotionally. It started with getting braver about going to the car wash, so now it’s a fun distraction. I was pleasantly surprised when he excitedly donned the Spider-Man costume I’d purchased for him last year. The poor little guy had been terrified of the mask, and had no interest in wearing the costume when I brought it home. (Hence, shifting gears then to become Chase from Paw Patrol.) I grabbed the “old” costume, still in its bag, from the garage, and he practically dove into it!

This week we’ve got a fun adventure on the calendar, but for now I’m conserving energy.

Legacy Lens: Beliefs and Becoming

My prompt for this post is “What values define me in practice?” Honestly, I’ve struggled for a long time, deciding how to answer that question. I tried taking a values assessment quiz, but that approach felt very limiting in the end. Ultimately, I found that shifting my perspective helped a lot.

I think the values that define me most clearly are Presence, Intentionality, and Joy. They shape how I travel, how I learn, how I nurture relationships. Curiosity, Adventure, and Lifelong Learning are some of the ways those deeper values come to life for me.

I lead a fairly busy life. My blog’s central theme is knitting – the craft has brought so much enrichment into my life beyond my enjoyment of the craft. I’ve traveled to the Pacific Northwest, Down Under, and into several countries in South America, and more, all through knitting connections. The adventures of travel have been a source of joy throughout my adult life, and I’m determined to continue these adventures for years to come. Talk about being intentional!

While travel has long been one way I live out those values, my latest “life change” has given them an entirely new expression. Becoming a grandmother has expanded my understanding of what presence can look like in this new relationship. From his birth, I was determined to be as involved in my grandson’s life as his parents would permit. I am intentional about maintaining our relationship, and I look for ways we can have fun together, giving him joyful memories from quick trips to the car wash to day trips to the zoo.

I recently shared with my son a plan I have for a few years down the road to take my grandson on a trip. I hope to instill in the munchkin the same sense of wonder, curiosity and adventure that travel has given me. There are so many opportunities to learn through travel, and I don’t plan to stop.

And bringing this all back to the central theme of Legacy: I hope that when my son and grandson remember me, they won’t simply remember the places I traveled or the activities we shared. I hope they’ll remember that I showed up, that I chose joy, and that I encouraged them to remain curious about the world around them.

I hope my next segment in this series doesn’t take quite so long! The prompt for the next piece is: “How do others experience me consistently?”

Movie Moments

I went on a bit of a movie-watching spree at the theater in the first week of the month. That’s how I was able to make so much progress on that first vanilla sock, after all. I mixed it up a bit with a couple comedies broken up by a drama…

The Sheep Detectives is pretty hilarious, though sometimes a bit over-the-top. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The mystery-solving creatures component added a fun twist, and in some ways it reminded me of Knives Out. I was very proud of myself for recognizing about 80% of the vocal talent who voiced the sheep! The next night, I had a different kind of enjoyment watching Pressure, starring Andrew Scott and Brendan Fraser. This gave an intriguing perspective to the tactics behind the D-Day invasion. I remembered snippets from Band of Brothers as the timeline moved along, too. My final film of the week was Power Ballad, an entertaining comedy spotlighting Paul Rudd and Nick Jonas, and some fun Irish accents sprinkled in around them.

Random Ramblings

Winding down here so hopefully I can post before the end of the day! May was Mental Health Awareness month, and I forgot to share one more thing on the topic when I wrapped up my thoughts for that month. A few months ago, I came across a sweatshirt while scrolling on Facebook that caught my attention. It had a pretty important message, and it’s something I feel strongly about. I ordered a t-shirt and sweatshirt immediately, then followed up with two more tee orders over the next few weeks. Every time I wear one of these shirts, I have someone comment or compliment or thank me. Here are the two main shirts I’m now rotating:

If you’re interested in getting a shirt from this organization, I have a referral link that can give you a 15% discount. More importantly, I’d encourage anyone and everyone to share the message. In ten months, I’ll be recognizing the tenth anniversary of a friend’s suicide; it guts me every time I think of him, as he seemed to be such a happy and content guy. This just shows how much people hide, even from those closest to them. If I can help just one person in this quiet way, that would be enough.

Knit on. 🧶