Tuesday, January 31, 2012

January Wrap-Up

socks! by gradschoolknitter
socks!, a photo by gradschoolknitter on Flickr.

No, I did not knit all of those in January.

I purposefully did not pick a January SIAC project, as I needed some time to work on some UFOs, as well as a few other things I had going on.

In terms of knitting UFOs I did finish a sweater for me and a pair of socks for DH (and yes, I did go back and rip out the first toe and re-knit it). I did not finish DH's colourwork mittens, in part because they're too complex to work on during thesis time, but the extra yarn did arrive.

And: the biggest UFO of all: my dissertation. I sent a revised draft of all of my chapters to my thesis advisor and second reader on Saturday night. Now I just need to whip up an introduction and conclusion and I should be set to defend—soon. It's exciting and scary and everything all at once!

Other January news: I had my 5 year blogiversary. I'm a little sad because I just found out this morning that the first prize winner received her prize package last night and it was empty. The card was there but the yarn was gone. Way to go USPS. I'm so disappointed and angry and I'm going to call them later and give them a real earful. I'm also going to try and call the distributing centers near to us both and see if they can't locate it. The silly thing is that the package was sealed back up, so it makes me wonder if someone noticed it was open. Or opened it. In any case, I'm once again disappointed in USPS. This is not the first time something in a package I've sent went missing, or took WAY TOO LONG to get to it's destination (disqualifying me from a job in Canada I would have died for)... the list goes on and on. I guess one of these times I'll learn my lesson and switch to fed ex or ups.

But let's end this on a happy note, and the reason for the many many socks pictured above: the international sock swap starts tomorrow!!! Which means you still have until tonight at midnight to sign up. (Probably really until tomorrow morning... I most likely won't be up at midnight to shut down the sign ups.) So if you're still on the fence COME JOIN US! It's a fun group and I have several pairs now of awesome socks that I love to wear all the more because they were made FOR me, instead of by me. I love my own socks too, of course (and really need to make a few more pairs soon as some of the older ones are getting threadbare), but there's something special about wearing socks that someone made especially for you.

Hope your January was just as good, and here's to an even better February!

2 comments:

Bronwyn Mroz Benson said...

Congratulations on your dissertation! That must feel wonderful. :)

I have a love hate relationship with the post office... Sometimes I'm amazed at how fast they are, other times they suck. My friend just got her invite to my wedding which was over a month ago (luckily she knew all about it and came). Grr... I hope you figure out what happened!

gradschoolknitter said...

Thanks for the commiseration... I know I'm not the only one having issues with USPS, and it seems like they are giving up with this whole "going bankrupt/out of business" thing that seems to be happening. Still, you pay for a service, you sort of expect it to work relatively smoothly.