January: Books and Knits

The Books

The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society. C. M. Waggoner*

How to Love a Forest: the Bittersweet Work of Tending A Changing World. Ethan Tapper*

Black Pill: How I Witnessed the Darkest Corners of the Internet Come to Life, Poison Society, and Capture American Politics. Elle Reeve*

Diving Into the Wreck: Poem 1971-1972. Adrienne Rich

The Longmire Defense. Craig Johnson*

Night Shift. Charlaine Harris.

The Stone Witch of Florence. Anna Rasche*

Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive. Eliot Stein.*

Small Wonder: Essays. Barbara Kingsolver.

The Knits

Mostly hats.  I made the Braided Cable Hat out of some stash and the Hinterland Hat with a skein of Lion Brand Wool-Ease as some belated birthday presents.  

I even mailed them off. 

Seen here with another mailed-off birthday present. 

 

I also made two Antler Hats with a skein of Wool-Easer.  I haven't mailed them yet.  I made them in the Baby size and the Child size.  They're belated 'congratulations on being born' and 'congratulations on being a big sibling' gifts.

They both look like this. Just trust me.

I started the Rogers-esque Cardigan for myself.

The Rest

It snowed.  We stayed home.

I've been trying to go outside more.  Snow and Artic blasts aside, I think I've done it as much as I can. 

I've been thinking a lot about shrinking my world a little.  Shopping local more often, going to community events, that kind of thing.  I want my dollars to stay a little closer to home and so I've been trying to shift my spending to locally owned stores and even went to the farmers market last weekend. They don't have as much in the winter months, but I bought pickled carrots, mushrooms, duck eggs, and baked treat. 

It look like shrinking my world down a bit might include pulling back from social media.  Never before have I been so bored while staying so sucked in.  Some of the accounts I actually like following are pulling back as well as they shift to newsletters or personal blogs.  I might be able to whittle my online world into something that fits into my email inbox.   I'm not sure how feasible this really is, but even working toward the goal seems better than using the internet the way I currently do.

January was a pretty full month--snow, work, school, and dozens of pressing obligations.  But now that it's February and the hurdles are cleared, I just remember the restaurants we went to, the child finishing some big projects in school, and laundry.