Life's a Stitch

Willow Cowl

Pattern: Willow by Amelia Lyon

Yarn: Patons Kroy Socks Stripe, 2 skeins Colour: Cyan

Needles: US Size 5

Thoughts: Great pattern! Being a woman of a certain age, with a tendency toward overheating, I've avoided knitting cowls, thinking their close fit might inhibit my ability to pull one off quickly in hot desperation. Au contrare. This one is light in weight and half of the stitches are a lace patten, making it very comfortable. 

This particular Willow only had four repeats of the lace pattern due to the skimpy yardage in each skein. Cast on 150 stitches and ended with 90. It works fine as the yarn has body which gives it some spine. While you knit Willow the thought occurs that you are knitting a cowl for a giraffe, however, it accordions nicely onto itself. 

Made for my sister from yarn my mother gave me this past summer. 

 

It's beginning to look a bit like Christmas

Once again, and in consideration of the this year's blue Christmas, we are going for minimalism. I'm liking it. The best part for me is the cleanup. The ceramic Christmas tree and Nativity take about five minutes of work to dismantle. The essence of the holiday without the stress.

We're still hosting our annual Danish Julefrokost for 16. In preparation, and in recognition of our mixed heritages, we hit our favourite Polish deli:

Two kinds of sausage - double and triple smoked, rye bread, pickled beets, red cabbage, ginger bread cookies, marzipan and poppy seed cake. All that's left are the fish, cheese and the akvavit. Skoal!

How much is that sheepy in the window?

Location: Bremen, Germany. Sweet little Nativity sheep in the Schnoor. I believe next door to the place I found the hat from my last post. Bremen is special to us, not just for the location, but for the family we have become close to as the result of the German exchange program in which our daughters were involved 13 years ago.

Location: Willersdorf, Germany. Pottery sheep in the Offnungszeiten Restaurant at the Hotel Rittmayer, that's been run by the same family since the 1700's. Besides their brewery, their pond full of carp is their dining room specialty, strange as it sounds it was the best meal of our trip.

Location: Rome, Italy. We probably walked ten miles that day determined to show Chuck what he missed when his detached retina kept him from accompanying us in 2008. These were located between the Vatican and the Piazza Navona. Following this picture we hit the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Roman Forum, Colosseum, and the Circus Maximus. Thank goodness for gel insoled shoes.

Location: Monterosse, Cinque Terre, Italy, the day before the floods. It started raining while we were there.

Location: Barcelona, Spain in the window of an optical store. Must have been a knitter involved.

Once, after a trip to Connecticut, I regretted not buying some particularly sweet sheep. This time I bought a pair to remember our trip.  What did I buy?

Location: Murano, Italy. Sweet tiny blown glass sheep. 

The 10,000 mile hat

Here's the story of the 10,000 mile hat. While strolling Bremen's Schnoor with my friend, Ingrid, she showed me a hat, knitted from Noro Silk Garden, with a price tag of 79 Euro. She told me she's contemplated buying it for two years now. What's a knitter to do? Offer to knit it, of course. 

Blogless Marsha kindly poses for the model shot:

The hat was my travel companion, knit in eight countries, sailing across the Atlantic, accompanying me home to Vancouver, then back to the east coast, finally sent by post back to Germany, hopefully to arrive soon. 

My 10,000 mile hat

Yarn: Noro Silk Garden, 2 skeins Needles: US size 6 

Thoughts: Lots of fun, like a knitting sampler in a hat. Not enough nupps or cables to be exasperating. I'm on my second with so many modifications that I'm sure it qualifies as a new pattern. Photos to follow when finished.  

One last view, with the addition of glass beads from Murano: