Tying knots with sticks.

My silence, blog-wise, of late can be largely attributed to my obsession with my latest hobby: knitting. My friend Jenn and I had been talking about our desire to learn to knit for several months when she actually went out and got some how-to books and dug in shortly after Christmas. The first book turned out to be a bust, but Jenn is nothing if not an intrepid researcher and found some on-line resources with videos. Check out www.knittinghelp.com if you too want to learn! A friend of Jenn's described it as "tying knots with sticks" and we figured we ought to be smart enough to tie knots, too.

Now, we are. Mostly. I can now knit, purl, cast on, bind off, increase and decrease. I'm just terrified of actually trying to follow a pattern so I'm making things up as I go along, with some success: I've finished a cushion cover! It was intended to be a scarf but somehow got wider than I'd intended and I ran out yarn before it was long enough to ever pretend to scarfness. Great cushion cover, though - matches our chairs. I'm now nearly done a big fuzzy shawl and then will start on a wool biking bandana for Rem.

I've spent a huge amount of time on this for the last couple months and am now happily to the place where I can knit and talk at the same time. The downside of this is that Anne's new boy, Florian (cute German fellow who's a few years younger than I) thought I was considerably older than I am... possibly because every time he's met me I've been ensconced in a rocking chair with my knitting.