Friday Faves / vol. 14
Hellooo!!
Happy 2023!! I’m having a nice cosy winter so far over here: lots of reading, jigsaw puzzles, knitting, and list-making for 2023.
We’ve had a mild winter so far with a bit of snow in December that all melted away after Christmas. Hugo was expressing his displeasure at the lack of snow on our walk home from school yesterday, and I agree; it’s been weirdly warm. I’m putting a photo of Hugo in the snow in this roundup in the hopes that January will serve us up a few inches for him to play in.
It’s been a few months since I popped in with my Friday Faves, but I have a few things to share…
reading: These Precious Days by Ann Patchett; I had really enjoyed the essay of the same name when it was published in Harper’s a year ago, and finally sitting down to read the rest of these essays was a treat. There’s an essay about knitting that’s great!
knitting: For Christmas, I knitted a Mountain Mist Sweater for Elliot (pattern by TinCanKnits) with Mota by Wooldreamer’s (via Spun, of course), plus a bit of Brooklyn Tweed for the navy and purple. He picked out the colors himself! Now for the suspense: will he or won’t he wear it??
watching: Gilmore Girls reruns, nightly with Clementine. GG has its pros and cons, but I love the portrayal of the mother-daughter relationship, and it’s been lovely to bond over the characters, obscure pop references and plot with my own teenage girl. She’s team Jess, btw, and I’m team Kirk, in case you were wondering.
Oh! Mr Rae and I went to see Decision to Leave at the State Theater here in Ann Arbor on Sunday. GAH SO GOOD.
eating: I asked for the Weekday Vegetarians by Jenny Rosenstrach for Christmas. While I am not the primary cook in our family, many of the meals I do make for dinner are vegetarian. My rotation is getting a bit stale so I'm excited to try out some new veg-centric recipes. Shown above with matching yarn, which was also a Christmas gift: Mad Hatter by Wonderland Yarns, color Mustard Mine, no concrete plans yet…
puzzling: SO many jigsaw puzzles. I’m a big Piecework fan, and Field Day (below) was a lot of fun this past weekend. Also in the mix: a winter scene puzzle (above), a puzzle made from a photo my mom took of her mother’s vintage sewing notions, and a Rainbow Brite puzzle.
traveling: OK, not quite…but hear me out: I borrowed Magical Venice: The Hedonist’s Guide from our library, and spent the better part of entire day a few weekends ago paging through the beautiful photographs and using Google Earth 3D view to look up landmarks, canals, and squares in Venice. When we traveled to Italy in 2009 we didn’t make it to Venice, so just visiting virtually and paging through the gorgeous photos from my couch was pretty neat. Of course, now I really want to go IRL!!
learning: I spur-of-the-moment signed up for a virtual class this week on the Making App and learned how to use Procreate to make a floral bouquet in an hour. See my bouquet, shown below. I was frankly shocked at how much I learned in one hour. Teacher Rachel Simmons was great, and I’d recommend the app for taking all kinds of crafty classes. I keep toying with the idea of teaching on there myself — some kind of sewing series?
Wishing you all a cozy weekend! I’m taking down my Christmas tree and signing kids up for summer camps, how about you?
xo,
Rae
PS. see all of my Friday Faves here.