Summer is going at a warp speed ahead this year.  As I wade through the thick humid days, with my massive belly always leading the way, I often think of the saying, “The years are short, and the days are long”.  As cliche as it is, it really is motherhood in a nutshell.  Sometimes it feels like bedtime is an eternity away, and then in the same breath it takes to sigh about such a stretch of time, I get a glimpse of my toothless boy who was just a baby in my arms one minute ago and is now about to be the oldest of four.  How could this be?

The last few weeks, we celebrated a second birthday, spent the better part of two weeks at my grandparents, were sprinkled with the most adorable girl clothes under the sun at a surprise baby shower, swayed to the music of Alabama Shakes at the newport folk festival, spent quality, albeit crazy time, with our best friends (who are moving back to VT!), and I even snuck in a full day alone with some girlfriends.  Really truly packed days.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a true and complete update if I didn’t touch on the progress of my clanking needles.  I finished the camilla blanket and blocked a few older ones along with her.  The satisfaction of watching them waft in the wind on a summer day was impossibly glorious.  All those tiny soft stitches to be wrapped around a sweet smelling baby body in just a handful of weeks?  Yes, please.  I also dyed a few armfuls of roving with black eyed susan and plume poppy.  I loved the results, but I felted them up a bit which made spinning incredibly frustrating.  I intend on using the golden dyed plume poppy roving for a felting project rather than the minty green I tore at for a week to create at best a very uneven yarn.

And then last night, by the light of the fire, around a newly built “yurt” in the forest, I cast on to a farmhouse shawl by cabin four holding a strand of handspun Shetland with Angora goat fingering yarn I won in a raffle a few years ago.  It is precisely what I was looking for, and in order to finish, I believe I will have the perfect excuse to spin up the rest of the roving I have.

Alas, I realize and surrender to the idea that my fiber crafting days are coming to a close for the time being.  A babe in arms doesn’t require my distraction with counting stitches, and three little boys adjusting yet again to a new family member, would be better off with what attention is left in my brain after the sleepless newborn nights have begun, rather than dividing it.  So I am soaking this time up while I have it, and dreaming of this baby wiggling so well inside.