Knitting, knitting, knitting.

Hello, internet! It's been an embarrassingly long time. This could be due to the exciting fact that I am no longer unemployed! In fact, I now have two jobs. One is a not-very-exciting seasonal position at a major retail store, the other is a much more exciting permanent position at a yarn shop! Three exclamation points in five sentences, can you tell I'm excited about this? In addition to getting to sit around and knit for most of the day, and having an awesome discount, I'm learning a lot about yarn and knitting techniques. I can take any class I want for free (education to better help customers), and I get to meet a lot of cool ladies. Luckily, the fact that I now work at a knitting shop hasn't at all slowed down my craft productivity. Here are some things I've been working on:

I had this project on needles for FOREVER. Seriously, like a year and a half. I started it when I went to France for a semester, as I knew there would be lots of train time to work on something. After setting it down and picking it up I don't even know how many times, I finally got the big push to finish it when my now-boss called me up to schedule an interview at the shop, and requested that I bring a couple pieces to show off my knitting skillz. Since I didn't really have any of my finished products available, I got to knitting and finished two projects, this one and a gray wrap/scarf:

With these two projects I was deemed worthy to work at the yarn shop, and started the following week. Being surrounded by yarn and beautiful knit things all day has only inspired me to come up with project after project. It seems like for every project I start, I find five more that I want to do. My favorite so far has been these cabled fingerless mitts:

Though they may look complicated, they were surprisingly easy, with just enough detail to keep me interested. Currently I'm working on a hat for Eric, which has detachable ear flaps, a knit version of my magic deck pouches and a shorter pair of lacy fingerless gloves. I've got countless projects on my mental list, including both stuff for myself and Christmas gifts. I should really get going on the latter! Good thing I get two days a week at the yarn shop to keep me focused...

In other news, I've been able to keep up the domesticity, despite my new jobs. I won an epic battle against fruit flies at my place, and another one against laundry at Eric's. Both of our places are relatively clean at the moment, I'm proud to say. And we've been cooking! The other night we made two things, an awesome curried lentil and spinach soup and a surprisingly easy cornbread, all from scratch! I am still amazed every time I make something from scratch that I used to know as only coming from a box; it's never that much more difficult and almost always tastes better.

I have also acquired a frozen turkey (apparently turkey bowling is a common pastime for those in the retail business during the busy season), which I have yet to find a purpose for. I'm caught between donating it and attempting to cook it myself, as both have the potential to be rewarding experiences. I would also love an excuse to take a stab at my great-grandmother's stuffing recipe, as I will sadly be missing it this year. An unfortunate side effect of working retail around Thanksgiving is that you're pretty much required to work Black Friday, despite any plans your family may have made to roadtrip it to Chicago for a big family gathering. Oh, well. There's always Eric's Thanksgiving to crash.