I Was Already On To It

Remember yesterday how excited I was to have discovered a new stitch to try?  Well, I took the book out into the autumn sunshine, like I said I would, to flip through and look at all the pretty projects and there, near the back, was a photo that looked familiar.  I just looked at my Ravelry queue (line-up of projects I want to do [which is too long and will never be completely accomplished if I retire today and devote the rest of my life to knitting constantly AND grow four extra pairs of hands]) and right there Project #6 is the Inside-Outside Scarf.  (it's a free one if you'd like to try it too)  She means you to use two of the same skeins of long-repeat variegated yarn but I see I have planned to use two different skeins of the same yarn.  I think I'll stick with my original idea of using dishcloth cotton--one plain, one variegated--to learn the stitch technique.  Just to be safe.

I'm excited about tomorrow's program at Bay Lakes Knitting Guild.  LQ is a real color maven and she's going to talk all about choosing colors and blending colors and... and... I don't know what but I'm really looking forward to it.  I need to gather up my 12 balls of solid or semi-solid yarns to take along; I'll do that tonight.

You need to see the cool stuff my roomie, CA, gave me at The Clearing.  It's a spatula (everyone knows I have a blue-million spatulas thanks to Durwood) with a decal of the Eifel Tower and "Paris" on the blade and a Monet-motif pen from Giverney where she was last spring.  Thanks, CA, I love them.

For my own self I bought a couple things in The Clearing's bookstore.  The oddball looking wood one is a hand presser for when you're sewing and don't want to hop up every minute to press open a seam.  DD bought one when she was up there in July and I coveted it, so I got my own.  And they've got cards of buttons made from clay so I picked out this card of six in a kind of silvery gray.  They should be good for closing a sweater someday.

The garden is pretty much done.  Now I just have to wait for the squash and gourd vines to completely die and the thick stems of the fruits to dry too.  It occurred to me that there's a reason (beyond laziness) that farmers leave those squash in the fields.  It's because the darned things aren't ripe until all the vines are dead and the stems aren't green anymore.  (ask me how I know...)  So now we wait, probably until the first frost, to pick them.

October 7--Philip H. Coblenz, Enjo National Park, CA.  The road toward the mountain was wide, gravel-paved, and lit gold by the sun through the aspen leaves.  Becky and Amelia walked along, backpacks cinched up tight, their steps quick and confident.  They had tied bear bells onto their packs, not that they really expected to meet a bear but to warn off any cougar that might be lurking nearby.  "Did you hear about that runner in Colorado that was stalked and killed by a cougar?" Amelia said.  "Oh, Amos, don't be such a scaredy cat," Becky said, and then giggled, "Cat."  She slid her hand under Amelia's arm.  "Look how bright and open this trail is.  No self-respecting cougar's going to bother us here."  Amelia shrugged a shoulder but didn't shake off her friend's hand.

That's when I feel fast asleep, dang it, because they were just about to come around a curve and see the trail narrow and get very dark a few yards ahead.  That's when things would really happen.  But, no, I had to be all tired and fall asleep barely after 10 o'clock.  Oh well, I'll get 'em next time.  I get to go get my bones rearranged before work today (I just love that!) and we got a "maybe you'll like this" cookbook in the mail that I'll drop off at the post office on the way.  Gotta run!
--Barbara