Thrihyrne

This has been a while coming, and I haven't really known how to post about it. I received a call from my mother this morning; my maternal grandmother, Mymable, died last night. She's been declining for a year now, and has been on hospice care for several months. Evan had kindly offered to drive us up there if I wanted to, but since she wasn't really recognizing people, I decided to keep my memories which were of seeing her a couple of years ago (she's been living in Bellevue, WA, outside of Seattle) at her 90th birthday party and during visits when I saw my aunt. Mymable was 92, and is quite likely why I became such an enthusiastic knitter. I have so many fond memories of visiting her and Grandaddy in Ruston, Louisiana- including the year we lived there in 1981-82. I'm not sad for her, but mostly for my own mother, who isn't doing very well health-wise herself, and neither is my stepdad. I feel a bit helpless in that I don't effectively how to be there for her. The rest of her siblings were in Bellevue with Mymable when she died, and mom was back in Virginia. Her choice, of course, but her own life is rather challenging. My own inability (or discomfort with) to reach out for help when I really need it, well, I do believe I came by that honestly from both sides of my family of origin. But it has made me very sad this morning that finally I'm in a solid place emotionally myself, with the very strong support of my own partner now, to reach out to her, and there were so many years when she and I didn't really relate as adult to adult.

All that said, I'm rather melancholy as I get ready to work remotely for the first time. I'm so grateful that I'll be swept into emails and in the comforting environment of Evan's living space, and that he's here and wants to comfort me as needed.

Eventually I'll get a hold of some pictures of me with Mymable and post them. I don't have any of my own photo albums right now, but I'll rectify that in the months to come, too.

I've been thinking about participating in a holiday fest (beyond Yuletide, which I'll gleefully participate in again as I have another fandom I can add!). You all know how I feel about H/D, and I'm not a Snarry writer, either. I believe I've told all of the H/R tales I have, and no more Elf slash for me for a while. So! I noticed that my Neville/George fic received a lot of favorable response during weasley_fest, including glowing comments from a lot of people who I suspect normally would never have heard about me due to it being from Neville's POV. If some of you here (or your friends) are Neville fans, is there a Neville-centric holiday fest? I'd enjoy writing another story with him as the focus. Maybe there's an HP-slash-rarepairs holiday fest? If only Merry Smutmas hadn't come to its end. :sigh:

Suggestions/guidance appreciated!

And in very troubling news, I was writing back to the designer of this great fingerless glove pattern I've been knitting (I've made two pairs, both as gifts so I'd been a bit hesitant to post a picture, but I will anyway!) who I'd met in person a few years back, and discovered, to my tremendous frustration and incomprehension, that the yarn store I've been frequenting since I moved here has closed its doors!! :::cries::: They have an online presence only now. It was Abundant Yarn and Dyeworks, and it had a cafe attached where I spent several hours on various projects, soaking up the positive vibe of the store. The last time I was there was to get my yarn balled up, including the yarn for a baby sweater I'm working on now and the gorgeous yarn pictured below:
( fingerless gloves, Spirogyra pattern by Lynne Vogel found via Knitty.com )
I meant to post about this at the time, but it was a rough day that day: it was a Friday and I'd just received Storm's extensive comments about my M+M revision. I went by there and the staff was great and balled up the yarn for me. What was fabulous, and made me happy, yet again, that I live in Portland and no longer a small college town in Virginia, is that there were three staff members there. All three of them were male. :)

And now they're closed! I'm so upset. I'm glad they have an online presence, though, as in my crazy state I've agreed to knit two more pair of the fingerless gloves, and I wanted that same brand of yarn, but a different colorway.

Phooey. Damn economy. Unless there was something else going on, which is entirely possible. But I'm heartbroken. That's two yarn stores I liked that I've seen close their doors. While living in Harrisonburg I saw the store literally across the street from Rosetta Stone open for business, I patronized it, and watched it close less than two years later. Then again, the owner was young and ended up having a baby and had other things to focus on. Still.