How lucky am I that both my primary care physician and my gynecologist are both located near yarn stores? After my physical this morning (everything looks fine, thank you for asking) I was able to walk just 2 blocks to The Woolgathering on E. 84th Street and picked up the yarn bobbins I need. I looked at all the pretty yarns they had (nothing I hadn't seen before really) and petted some nice baby alpaca, but I didn't buy any fiber. I have plenty at home waiting for projects, and I am sure I will end up finding some in France and/or Italy. (Ryan already said he won't try and stop me!)

I did actually pick up the Spring/Summer issue of Family Circle Easy Knits because I fell in love with the whale baby blanket on page 57. Can't find a photo online, but I'll try to remember to scan it later when I am at home. There are also a few cute tops in there that look like quick and easy knits (well, duh, "easy" is in the title!)

Ryan just IMed me with great news - we are going to go on a balloon flight when we're in France! I am very excited, as I have always wanted to do that! His Dad asked him to check into it and make reservations. Cool!

Last night I got tired of futzing with the Topas yarn, so instead I decided to start the Moo blanket. Even though Jill's baby won't be born until October, I figured this blanket could take a while and why not be prepared? I got maybe 12 rows into it (113 stitches across) before I got to the point of needing more yarn bobbins. I thought I had more than I did. There are only two colors, but because of the cow spots, the color changes a bunch of times in each row. So far I am being very diligent about weaving in my ends as I go along, because I know this will be a giant monkey on my back at the end if I don't! It's hard to see much in this photo, because it's curling so much at the moment, but here's the progress so far - you can see the photo from the pattern book, too:



The Mission Falls 1824 Cotton I'm using for this (it's their pattern, too) is really nice to work with. It's so soft! And at 4 stitches per inch, it knits up relatively quickly for baby stuff. I can't wait to get further on this blankie - it's just going to be so cute!

I also started working on the little purse kit that came with my Rowan International membership. I wish I had gotten the colors in the photo, but instead I have brown and peach. Not the combination I'd have picked, but they look OK together, and I wanted to have something to work on in the waiting room at the doctor's office this morning! I'm just going for a physical - no big deal. After working on this cholesterol-lowering drug for a few months, I really feel like I need to get my cholesterol checked! It's always been good, but now I'm all paranoid. :-)

This Topas yarn is starting to really irk me. I love the way it feels and looks, but I can't get a consistent gauge with it. I was getting 5 stitches per inch, so I figured I could do Bonne Marie's boat neck shell. I scaled the pattern back a bit to make the size work, and I cast on, starting with a garter stitch edge. Humongous! OK, frog those few rows, swatch again. Now it's just about 4 stitches per inch with garter stitch, 4.5 with stockinette. That's on #6 needles. I don't have any 5s, so I'm at a bit of a standstill. The fabric looks OK at this gauge, but now I have to re-think the pattern. Either use something different, or whip out the calculator and do some more math. I think I got spoiled working on that Summer Tweed stuff, since I was actually using patterns made for that yarn - a first! I actually like this halter pattern that the Yarn Company has on their site, but I'm at a loss as to how to obtain the thing and I kind of don't feel like buying it when it would be easy enough to figure it out on my own. I'm just being lazy and cranky, maybe because it's hot.

Busy day here, not much time to blog. And I can't make it to Stitch-n-Bitch tonight because my Mom and Dad came into town for the day (her real birthday is today) and want to go to dinner. At the Seaport. I'm sure it will be fun, it's just that right now I am feeling swamped.

If you want a chuckle, check out South Park Betsy & Ryan. :-)

U.S. Arrests American Accused of Planning 'Dirty Bomb' Attack. This really did nothing to improve my mood today.

How irritating - I decided to post directly into blogger (usually I write my posts in a word doc and cut & paste it) and of course it loses the post. Grr.

Well, what I said was that Mom loved her sweater, and it looked really nice on her, as you can see for yourself.



I'm not very chatty today. Work is looking like it's going to get busy, which is a good thing, since I have had many dull days lately. And in general I just have a lot spinning through my head and haven't had a lot of time to focus on it lately. Been doing lots of fun stuff, but right now I feel like I need to do something a little deeper. I might spend some time writing (not blog writing) tonight. I've been itching to get some things down on "paper," and some quiet hours tonight would be a good start.

Of course there's always my apartment to clean, or knitting to do. But at some point, I need to put that stuff aside if I am going to get anything else done. Lately I feel like I've become a bit one-dimensional, and I'm not liking it so much. Time for a little bit of change - nothing drastic, just need to bring some neglected pursuits back to the priority list.