W.I.P. update

You know, school is REALLY cutting into my knitting time, and I am REALLY not happy about that!  I am afraid I don't have much to update about my projects this week.  I'm done with the yoke, finally, on my latest knit up of Swing (+1 ease for this one), so the rest will practically knit itself, I expect (See cardi pattern on the left sidebar for a picture).  The raglan part of a top-down sweater is always a slow process for me--I tend to drop or lose my markers every time I have to M1, and there are a lot of M1s.  I've been trying to think of a good way to avoid that constant clumsiness, but so far, nothing has come to mind.

I've started on a new pair of Elegy gloves for the Etsy store, size L.  This pair is also that gorgeous blue pictured in the pattern.  I have one pair available already, size M, and more of the fantastic merino in gorgeous colors for this project on the way to my house as we speak.  I'm thinking of offering a kit for this pattern; but I'm still on the fence.  I haven't gotten much action for this pattern; but it is also still summer.  I guess the DIY kit will just have to wait until it gets a little cooler.

I have made NO progress on the lace scarf or the top-down, toe-up, 2-at-a-time socks.  And the Reconstruction sweater hasn't seen much action, either.  I want to, but my life has gotten in the way.  The more I work at being a teacher this year, the more I want to just quit and open a yarn shop.  I could knit all day.  Hmmmmm.

Anyway, that's what's knitting, or not, this week.  And since I've already mentioned how I'm not very happy being back at school, I guess I might as well mention that I am decidedly unhappy with the way school recycling programs run.  First of all, ours is done through our county recycling post.  We have about 1500 students in our building, and that's a lot of wasted paper and plastic and stuff.  So, they give us one little trash can, not really even as big as my two classroom trash cans, and they send kids around MAYBE once a week to pick up the recycling "bins"--a bin in my mind is a much bigger receptacle.  Well, my recycling bin has been full of assorted things to be recycled (and some gum--gross!) for two weeks now, and no one comes around to collect it, so the kids have stopped recycling.  I could complain, but the poor teacher in charge isn't getting much support from the administration this year with using students to empty the bins.  It's becoming a vicious cycle, and we used to be the #1 paper recycling school in our county.  I think that the worse the economy gets, the less people care about the environment.  I'm seeing it in my kids, too.  Since we've gone back to school, no one wants to recycle at home, either.  I'm going to have to step in, I think, and do something about this--at home and at school--before it gets much more out of hand.