Yay for reading! I've had trouble reading in the past weeks, it's been hard to concentrate, so it's great that you've been getting lots of reading done. And it is indeed good for getting ideas, and it also builds up your sense of writing in other ways, story structure and characters and vocabulary and all that.

Hmm, interesting that you have an easier time writing on days you work than on days off! I suspect it might be because your mind is already in a more active state, so it's easier to apply that to writing as well. And sometimes it's easier for people to write when they've only got a specific time slot available for it, rather than knowing they could do it any time of the day. I've definitely heard about that happening to other writers.

Yay for getting help from crochet or knitting at hand! It's just like you describe, if I need to mull over things a bit, the crafting helps me not get distracted by something that takes my attention away.

Good luck getting back into the writing! But if you find that you need this break from the writing, that's all right, too!