Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Getting Excited

Dick and I leave for France on Friday. We'll be joining our daughter, Jackie in Orleans and will be walking from village to village in the Loire Valley. Dick has worked for weeks figuring the mileage and searching the internet for small hotels or B & B's. He's lined up all the walks and the accomodations for the first 10 days. Then Jackie will go back to Paris and Dick and I will continue for a few more days on our own.

We've done this kind of trip before using an outfitter that booked the hotels and ferried the luggage. This time we will be carrying everything we need on our backs. I've carefully selected things for my pack and it weighs about 17 pounds. I think we will manage fine.

It's a strange time for me. My last day of work is October 12 so I will work two more weeks after we return home. There are a lot of loose ends to tie up. The powers that be at the agency are already campaigning for me to stay on in some capacity doing home studies or staff training or both. I will be negotiating with them when I come back. I'm so ambivalent. I want some time off to play but doing a bit of contract work would sure help pay for my health insurance. I have to COBRA for ten months and it is really expensive!!

I'm hard at work on Sonnet. I've finished the second arm hole and am nearing the finish of the front shoulder. It's almost time to decrease for the neck. I don't think I will finish before we leave (I have to do the sleeves) and I won't be bringing it to France because everything I bring I have to carry. I'm going to bring the sock project instead because it's small.

Wednesday, September 5, 2007

Sonnet


Browsing on Knitty and on Flickr I've seen many versions of Haiku and Sonnet, cardigans knit sideways. I made a version of Haiku for my granddaughter and now I'm making Sonnet for myself. It's an easy knit and I love the yarn I chose. The LYS near my sister's home is closing for good (this is very sad because my sister loves the shop and I like to stop there as well whenever I visit her) and everything is marked down. The friendly, helpful owner figured out how much yarn I would need (I'm substituting for the Knitty recommended yarn) and I left happily with the makings of my Sonnet sweater. The yarn is Rosina King Kelly, a blend of cotton and acrylic in color 101. I've searched online for the name of the colorway, but Yarndex and Yarnmarket refer to it only by number. It's a wonderful combination of hot pink blending to purple. I don't think my photo does it justice.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Beginning

I've spent the past few weeks immersed in blog reading, particularly knitting blogs. I think it's time for me to have a blog of my own. Since I am about to embark on my second retirement, I'll have more time to post, to knit and to comment on things in the world.