A woolly end to October

Hi friends! How’s your Tuesday going?

Things have been a litle glum around here today — Mr. N left this morning after a long weekend visit for my birthday, and I got some not-so-great work news.   Buuuuut I had a lovely weekend, filled with some excited wool-related things, so let’s talk about that, shall we?

The weekend was a busy mix of work and fun — October 15 through November 15 is the sort of high point of the academic job market (for History at least), so we both had lots of applications to finish up.  But we fit lots of fun stuff in between working (most of which I, once again, forgot to photograph).

There was, of course, knitting — with a cat no less!  I’m cat/apartment sitting in a fancy Philadelphia apartment, so we got to hang out in Center City all weekend:

And pretty views from our borrowed digs:

Philadelphia Sunrise

There was yummy food, like this Viatnemese-inspired beef salad, loosely based on this recipe, along with sheep-themed wine:

And there was wool!  Lots and lots of wool!

This lovely package arrived from a very dear friend in Devon:

Look at the beautiful, sheepy card!  And … the wool … I literally gasped when I opened the package.  Both yarns are beautiful, British, breed-specific, handspun yarns by Spindle and Skein, which my dear, dear friend found at Wool on the Exe. They are amazingly gorgeous.  The grey brown is Jacob Humbug Wool, a conservation breed — 100 glorious meters of chunky weight wool!  And the right is handdyed Wensleydale Wool in aran weight.  I’m going to have to find some very special project for this very, very special yarn — thank you dear friend, you know who you are!

Mr. N also took me to Loop as part of a day of birthday celebrations and got me a ball of this lovely yarn – Oslo by String, a 70-30 merino cashmere blend that I think is brand new.  Loop had a simple but adorable hat sample knit out of one ball  — I’m casting on for it ASAP:

And that wasn’t all! Mr. N got me … wait for it … WOOL SHOES!

The shoes are made by a company called Allbirds and were the idea of New Zealander Tim Brown, who runs the company with a San Franciso partner.  The uppers are made out of New Zealand merino wool, as are the insoles:

I have flat feet and struggle with shoes, and so far, these are incredibly comfy.  I wore them as we tootled all around Phily yesterday (we clocked up 18,000 steps) and my feet felt great!

As you might know, I love all things wool, so I was so excited to get wool sneakers, especially ones made by a company that seems to have a really cool mission — using natural fibers and focusing on sustainability — and a New Zealand connection.  I had never heard of Allbirds, and thought it was so cool that Mr. N found these!

We had a lovely weekend that seemed to go by even faster than the last one. We’ll be spending the time from Thanksgiving to New Year’s together, so a (temporary) end to the long distance blues is in sight!

One of the lovely views on your ramble around Philadelphia yesterday!

I felt so lucky for all the wonderful family and friends, near and far, who helped me celebrate the start of new year.  And, aside from being another year older, I reached another milestone this past week — fiber and sustenance is six months old!  This space is so special to me — I’m so thankful for the people I’ve met and the conversations I’ve had as a result of  this blog.  So I wanted to take a moment to say thank you to all of you who stop by and read, comment, and share a bit of your day with me!

Hope you had a nice weekend and that your week is off to a great start! More soon!