Gift yarn

When I got back from Vermont, there was this lovely package waiting for me. It is two balls of Sausalito, color 8107, and the colors are a lot richer than the scan shows. It is a Merino/nylon blend, and it is hard to keep knitting what is currently on the needles and not immediately start this. Sigh, must be grownup and show some restraint. Thank you ever so much.

No project for this month. Went to Vermont for the Stowe Basketry Festival. It's the 20th anniversity. I missed the last two years (health), but this is the 17th year I've gone. It was great to catch up with old friends. If you want to see the baskets that were offered, go to http: www.roundhearth. com /files/ pg33 2011%20 SBF%20 Classes%20 and%20 Descriptions-final dot pdf - take out spaces and change dot to a period, hope I typed that correctly. If not, just google it if you are interested. But between seven days of weaving, five days of travel, and homework (still have one basket I'm rimming), project did not get done. At least this is not the first month I missed this year - otherwise I'd be staying up to finish this pair of socks. Instead, I'm catching up on stuff and resting, as it's off to Wyoming next week to dig fossil fish and make some jewelry.

Hope it is going well with everyone else. Regards, aj

Thank You

Here are the gifts from Susan and CP. There are two balls of each yarn, but the scanner would not readily hold them. The blue/purple/green one is Mochi Plus, and it is the softest yarn ever. That is destined to be socks for ME when I catch up on requested projects. The needles are for those socks, as the Mochi was definitely unhappy on 0s and 1s. The pink/green one is Pnada Cootn (sic) in Lullaby. It was to be socks for husband, who does not like wool ones. He objected to the color, until I said that's fine, I would knit them for Becky (requested project, in something bright). He decided he wanted them after all. They should be posted as a project in a few months, as his socks. The brown is a mohair in Fudge Brownie, which is the color of the socks I knit last year (and which qualified me for the CP drawing). No idea what they will be yet, but it is a pleasure to handle.

Project for February is well in hand. Socks for Peter's aunt, as requested. There are also some double knit mittens I'm playing with, adapting a Lucy Neatby pattern. Unfortunately the cat found them and I have some splicing to do. Ah, well, they can be March's project. I will be visiting my mother by then and she will not steal mittens, as she lives in Tennessee. Cannot take socks anywhere near there - when I go, I no longer even pack socks - she takes them out of the suitcase and strokes them, saying how pretty they are. Obviously they do not come back with me. Still have some store boughten socks for travel there.

This has been my lucky month. Never won anything before, and now all this wonderful yarn, plus I won a copy of my sister's new book, "Learning to Swim" - no, not a tutorial, but a mystery. I read the first draft of it years ago, and am curious how it has evolved. Now all I have to do is get husband signed up for Medicare and son (boomerang kid) moved out on his own. MIL's ashes are not going to be spread till summer, and then I can enjoy retirement.

Thanks again, aj