Fiber Dreams

I’m sure you’ve noticed by the distinct lack of posts of late that I’ve been out of town. Yup. Once every ten years Dave and I go up to Ogden, Utah to celebrate the fact that he graduated high school and to see old friends. Last weekend was the celebration of having graduated 30 years ago. Thirty years. Egads. It seems like such a long time, doesn’t it? We drove up—well, I drove, he rode shotgun—on Thursday. It wasn’t too bad going through the desert, not much different temperature than it had been here, actually. Once we got into southern Utah, though, there these funny things called clouds in the sky, the temperature dropped about 30 degrees, and it was quite dark. Later all this water fell on us. What was that about?

As you can see, even Dave got into the spirit of the thing by taking a bunch of pictures of rain. Honestly, when you’re in a climate that’s normally as dry as ours, then cut the rainfall to about two inches for the entire season, seeing rain is rather an event. Pathetic, isn’t it? Yes, I was giggling because I was driving in the rain. See? Pathetic.

Anyway, on Friday evening there was a casual get together for the classmates at the school. Dave’s best friend from school, Mark, was there. He’s living in a distant state these days, and had just wrapped up a proposal project. The timing was perfect. You should have seen them. It’s like the two of them had never been apart. It was great. The powers that be opened up the school, so at some point everyone wandered around it, remembering, showing their spouses where their classes were, that sort of thing. The school’s going through a major remodel, so things were a bit odd, but it was unchanged enough for the memories to flow. The next night was the formal dinner. The elder sibling of a classmate owns a reception hall in a neighbor­ing town. It was a nice facility. Dinner was pretty good, too, especially for that sort of venue.

The real highlight of the trip, though, was getting to see Charlie and Cherrie, friends of Dave’s from one of his first jobs out of school. They’re absolutely marvelous. We were also lucky to catch them. Including today Cherrie has eight more days of work before she retires. The day after her last day they’re packing up the car and making their move to Montana official. We did a little celebrating. We had to. How could we possibly let an opportunity like that pass us by? As always, we had a fabulous time with them. They’ve even promised to come down to visit us after they get settled in their new home.

Moving on… We drove home on Monday. There were higher temperatures and less rain on the way south. There was a little rain, but not until we crossed into California, and most of that evaporated before it hit the ground. Once we hit the southern Utah mountains temps were in the triple digits. I had Dave create this photographic evidence of the temperature as we drove through Death Valley. Yup. You’re reading a temperature of 117°F (that’s 47.2°C for the rest of the world). That was at 4:12 in the afternoon. Realize two things: it was easily over 120°F earlier in the day, and it was nowhere near the hottest day of the year. People live there. On purpose. Can you imagine? I certainly can’t. Not this girl. No way.

While we were gone I didn’t get much reading done. I’m still only about half way done with Sense and Sensibility. I’m enjoying it a lot more now that it’s been a week since I put down Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I should be done with this Austin book in the next couple of days. Then I don’t know what I will read. I really should pick up a mystery by an author I haven’t read before, to keep up with the Summer Mystery Reading Challenge, but what I really feel like reading is fantasy. This is subject to change without notice.

Between events, driving, and meals, I mostly knit. I worked on the Mystery Stole quite a bit. I’m nearly done with the fourth clue. I’m starting to get tired of knitting flowers, but they’re looking quite delightful, and will be most beautiful when blocked, so I know it’ll be worth it. I’ll show you a photo of it when I get this clue done. I also worked a lot on the sweatshirt sweater. I only have a couple more inches to knit before I start the garter hem. Then I knit the sleeves. I’m still delighted with the fuzzy yarn. The red stripe, though, is a little odd. I’m currently wishing it was wider, and a couple rows higher. Oh well. The whole point of this particular sweater is to have something warm to cuddle in at home during the winter. It’s certainly cuddly.

I got home to discover that four more books had arrived that I’d requested through Book Mooch. I want to read them all. Now. Never mind the fact that one is book three of a trilogy, and two are books two and three of a set of four, and that I don’t have the other books in the two series. Yet. They’re coming. Even better was a very thoughtful gift from Robin (blogless). She saw these delightful little stitch markers on Etsy from Orinda5, and bought them for me. Wasn’t that sweet? What’s cool about these particular markers is that the loops are elastic, so they’ll stretch over a small needle and stay put, yet they’re supposed to be easy to transfer from one needle to the next. I can’t wait to try them! Thank you, Robin. You’re such a dear!

Instead of working on the mystery stole or the sweatshirt sweater, I finally cast on for Clapotis yesterday at lunch. I got quite a bit done. I also realized that the six balls of yarn I have won’t be enough, so I ordered three more from Helen (the same seller I got it from before). I was really bad, and ordered a set of Addi Lace needles from her while I was at it. In spite of the fact that she’s thousands of miles and an ocean away in the U.K., stuff I order from her usually gets here lickety-split. I just hope that nine balls of Rowan Tapestry will be enough to make a reasonably sized Clapotis shawl. Oh, and yes, I was eager to see how the dropped stitches would look. Score! I love it. This yarn is amazingly soft. It’s going to make a very cozy shawl.

Thank you all for your very kind comments about my Monkey socks. Dave asked, “Do you pass over the end stitches before you graft?” I responded to your query, Dave. Maybe you didn’t get it. I don’t know if I do that. Eek. No idea what you’re asking, really. I set up the first two stitches in the normal way before starting the actual graft, running the yarn through them as if they were the second half of the stitches and leaving them on the needles. I think it’s those two guys who are sticking up. Not sure, though.

Speaking of which, you should go see Dave’s blog. This isn’t my Dave, but a knitting Dave, and he knits all sorts of fabulous stuff. Including the adorable Elvis the Elephant with left over sock yarn.

One more thing. I saw that my Forget-Me-Not pattern has shown up on another free pattern index, Free Sock Patterns. If you like free sock patterns—really, who doesn’t?—be sure to take a look. It’s quite a list.

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