it must be august

Oh, hi!

All that stuff I said about how I'd have so much time to write in August... what was I talking about? Well, maybe I will have more time later in the month when I'm running low on things to do, but jeez, I am almost overwhelmed by how much there is to do right now! Happily, they are all things I want to do.

This sabbatical thing is great. I highly recommend it. But if I was thinking that I'd get "work" done this month... ha! Nothing is getting done around here. Well, not nothing... but nothing that shows. Tomatoes and figs are getting picked, dinner is getting cooked quite regularly, the cat is getting a lot of attention, and the funky knots in my back are getting worked out, but beyond that kind of thing, I really don't have much to show for myself. I obviously haven't yet let go of the need to be productive all the time.

I haven't even really found much knitting time yet. Though I did manage to make these little guys yesterday:



Inspired by many of you who suggested making toys with yarn scraps, I made a teeny dent in the stash with these two little toy mice, who are a gift for a friend with new kitties.

I'm also (slowly) working on a new-baby gift, and a short-sleeved sweater/blouse for myself that's been in the works all summer. I squeeze in knitting a row of it every now and then between other projects. But since it's a project for me, it gets shoved to the back burner when there are gifts to be made, which seems to be always.

One thing I have been making plenty of time for is yoga. My only real pledge for this month was that I would do yoga every day, and this is definitely not a pledge I will break. I bought an unlimited one-month pass for the yoga studio and have been getting my money's worth, though I think I overdid it a bit the first week. My core is sore. But today was a "gentle flow" class, which was just what I needed after six straight days of being wrung out like a damp washcloth in class.

I have been fretting about how much my mind is chattering in class. Today I think was the first class since my break started when there were actually some (short) stretches of time that I wasn't really thinking of anything besides breathing. It was cause for celebration. I hope that by the end of the month I can have one whole hour-long class like that.

The other thing I'm doing a fair bit of is reading. Here's my current reading list:

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver (I know, what took me so long?)
The Open Road: the Global Journey of the 14th Dalai Lama by Pico Iyer
Garden Primer by Barbara Damrosch
Essential Yoga Sutra by Michael Roach & Christie McNally

I also have ordered some books from Alibris and have some requests in at the library, so perhaps I'll share some thoughts about what I'm reading this month, too. I've been thinking about starting a short-term reading group when I go back to normal life this fall.

I've also been peeking in a bit on what everyone else is doing on Ravelry and Flickr and on your blogs. Summer is fun viewed through others' eyes as well, isn't it?