R's mum passed away yesterday. She was diagnosed with cancer in February, but we all thought she would have more time than this. I can't talk about it without crying so I'll stop now.
She will be missed.
Monday, April 24
Sunday, April 23
It is very difficult to get rye bread over here. Today I baked a loaf of rye and a loaf of wheat bread. I've been experimenting with sourdough rye before; so far the results have not been satisfactory. I have no such problems with wheat bread. The only thing that needs improving is the shape of the loaf, they've been very flat so far.
Rye bread on the left and wheat on the right.
I've grown tired of the tan design so I decided to go back to the old one.
P.S. I forgot to take the photo of the breads before I test-tasted them.
Tuesday, April 18
Nighttime flying is not my favourite way to travel, I've found. It will get you there, but if you're near dead afterwards it's no fun. The flight to Tallinn from Dublin takes three hours, thats not enough even if one could rest comfortably. Which I couldn't. Anyway, I'm an experience richer and wiser to fly during the day if I can.
I went to Tallinn partly to see my folks and partly to shop. The following are some of my purchases.
I love Lush and Body Shop products, but these soaps are pure joy. I got one each of my favourite scents: lemon, apple and lavender.
This is 'heie' meant for knitting. It is perfect for spinning, especially if your drafting skills are nil, like mine. 'Heie' is rowing in Estonian, but nowhere I've seen rowing so fine as this. The rainbow heie is ~3mm in diameter, the gray one is a little thicker. Rainbow heie will become 3ply sock yarn, what becomes of the gray, I don't know yet.
Some cotton yarn in spring colours. It is meant to become a shoulder bag to remind me of spring in Dublin.
Linen knitting yarn which I've repurposed for sewing and some cotton/viscose yarn for embroidery.
This pincushion is what they are for. I'd begun the embroidery with wool yarn that I had and it looked alright. When I saw the yarns above there was no question about what to do. I ripped out the wool and continued with the cotton instead. This motif comes from Göss vestments, the cope to be exact. Mine is but a poor copy, but it was meant to be a practice piece anyway.
Thursday, April 13
I am visiting Tallinn over the weekend. There will be catching up with family, shopping and good food. Not that you can't get good food over here, but the food that you grew up with is always the best.
R has visited his folks and the cats. He reports that the kitties have grown and are doing well. Mao is just as energetic and Ursus just as clumsy as before.
See you on Monday.
Monday, April 10
Vicious circle.
That's how it felt to get up this morning. My ordinary workday looks like this: get up at 5 AM, be at bus stop at 5:45, begin work at 6:30 (or whenever the bus arrives), breakfast at 7:00, lunch at 11:15, go home at 15:00, eat, do stuff, go to bed at 21:00. This provides 8 hours of sleep which is supposed to be enough for an adult.
Well, it's not enough for me; nine hours is minimum and ten is optimum. But. There are not enough hours in the day to get anything done if I get ten hours of sleep. So I go to bet at nine, be tired the whole week, sleep pretty much the whole day Saturday, get up late on Sunday and feel like a human being at 7 PM.
Except I must be in bed at nine to get at least some sleep. Of course, being all rested, I won't fall asleep until after midnight and be all tired in the morning. And so every week.
Vicious circle.
Saturday, April 1
Oh dear! Where did this week go? It feels like someone just removed a week from my life and I have no idea where it went.
Look what I got yesterday!
It is on a long term loan until the owner wants it back. The wheel is a modern copy of an antique spinning wheel. It is a castle type single-drive (aka Scotch tension), single treadle wheel. I've never spun on a Scotch tension wheel before so it'll be interesting to learn. Frustrating too, I bet. Double-drive is simple: you sit down and spin, when you want to ply you adjust one screw that makes the bobbin pull more. Simple and easy — no fiddling involved.
The spring is upon us and things are blooming.
I've tried to get some information about yarn stores in Dublin without any good results. The best list I found was this one: Wool Works: knitting stores in Ireland. It is quite out of date, but I'll be visiting these and post the results.