Life's a Stitch

A good long weekend to you all, Labour Day here in Canada, and Labor Day south of the border. And wishes and prayers that life improves soon for those in the South.

Time to get back into serious knitting, maybe even time to pick up Marina again in hopes of wearing it this fall. I took some time away from the needles to read. I’ve just finished Angels and Demons – reminds me of an Indiana Jones movie with all its twists and turns. It would make a great Disney ride!

Another vacation photo, I found this in a rack outside of a ladies’ room at a Turkish restaurant in  Gottingen, Germany:

First it was the washer and dryer, then the garbage disposal, now it’s the fridge that needs to be replaced. I usually buy the best I can afford, adhering to my father’s advice of quality before quantity. But I’m beginning to realize, that like cars, at the end of ten to fifteen years or so, even the more expensive model is nearly worthless.

I would like to justify a stainless steel cabinet looking fancy schmancy fridge, but thought it’s just not worth an additional $80 per year of refrigerator life expectancy for good looks. I opted for practicality and hit the Sears outlet store to find a helluva deal on a Jennair fridge with a tiny dent on the side. I got a taste of what I wanted – the handles are stainless steel. A high quality fridge at a low price, my kind of bargain. OK, so we have to raise the cupboard an inch so it can fit, but what price glory?

Problem solved, right? Not that easy. Upon examination of the specs we discovered that although it fit widthwise, the door won’t open a full 90 degrees, not to mention enough to remove the drawers for cleaning. Back to the drawing board.

It’s a trivial problem in the scheme of things. I’ve been following a knitting blog for a while and discovered that Max, a fellow knitter, is now blogging about his transition from life into death. He has been diagnosed with untreatable cancer at age 40. Puts things into perspective. Max’s candid posts are important lessons that remind me that dying is a part of living.

Here is a photo taken in Germany. Butterflies are often used as symbols of the transition from life to death to rebirth:

Forget what I said about getting over the jet lag in one fell swoop, it’s taken me far longer than I expected to get over it. A luxurious complaint indeed.

The best part of our dream vacation was when our friends took us to the island of Usedom, in the northeast corner of Germany, on the border of Poland. At the turn of the century it was vacation spot for the rich and famous and summer "houses" a.k.a. mansions were built in a row for miles facing the Baltic Sea. Being in East Germany, these homes deteriorated during times of socialist rule. Now they have been renovated into vacation condos and this is where we stayed:

Our view:

Thank you Ingrid and Ulrich!

It is also the place where Kiri, now happily blocking, was finished:

It’s back to work this week, my next post will be later this week. I love my job, but don’t you hate the first week back after vacation?

This is a story of an errant water bottle. Somebody on our flight from Amsterdam to Seattle did a poor job of packing a one litre water bottle. As her luggage was being loaded onto the plane, said bottle escaped her bag and fell into an open panel into an irretrievable position causing a significant delay. You see, it required unloading all the baggage, disassembling part of the plane, retrieving the bottle, fixing the plane and reloading the luggage. I forgot, a chunk of time was spent on paper work to record the water bottle incident. Three hundred passengers and the crew were not happy with a woman named Nicky. I was especially miserable as I was forced into an unplanned knitting detox that stretched from ten hours to eleven and a half. I thought I had planned well with my plastic Denise needles, however, I attached the incorrect size to the project in progress.

On our arrival in Seattle I enthusiastically dug through my luggage for the correct size in anticipation of our long layover. I didn’t notice the sign above my head which read that is was illegal to open any luggage prior to customs inspection under penalty of fine! I sweated through the line up convinced I was caught on camera or by some knitting needle sniffing pooch. After waiting for the rest of the luggage, lines for immigration, customs, rechecking of luggage…I never did get to knit even one stitch.

Another happy trip photo, after a couple of nights of sleep it seems like a dream. This is in the bell tower of a cathedral in Stralsund, up a narrow passageway and a couple of ladders – 366 steps in all. I think I left dents in the guard rail and I most definitely did not look down:

Look what was waiting for me at home. I won a contest on Michele’s blog – Beknitted. Thanks, Michele! You know it will be put to good use.

We’re back in North America after a wonderful three weeks in Europe. I’ve been up for a record 25 hours in an attempt to whip jet lag in one fell swoop.  It’s easier in this direction since we gained nine hours. I’m hoping to stay up late enough to get a full night’s sleep.

The best parts of the trip? Spending time with our friends, Ingrid and Ulrich, who were our guides and ultimate hosts throughout northern Germany and into Poland; precious time with family in Denmark; meeting up with former language students who have lived with us in Canada; and Bryant’s enthusiasm about his adventure travelling with a church group from Spain back to Germany for World Youth Day. As for the knitting content – the wool shops in every German village and town, no matter how small; Addi needles for $4-7 euros; and yarn for half of Cdn prices.

Here’s a photo of Ingrid, Helga (a former student of ours), me, Chuck, Bryant, Ulrich and in front, Lotta, Ingrid and Ulrich’s daughter who participated in the same Cdn/German exchange pgm as my daughter six years ago.

And my first stop on the day of our arrival:

This is the land of incredible wool shops! I’ll have lots of knitting content when I get back. Meanwhile it’s been great with good friends, beautiful scenery, and even a stop at a Medieval (sp?) torture museum for Bryant. We’ll be back in two weeks.

That old camp song is running through my brain as I head off for my last day of work before four weeks vacation! The work is handed over, the grants are in, I’m just cleaning up loose ends and ending the day with an acupuncture appointment so my neck feels good in advance of a ten hour flight.

The house sitters, dog walkers, plant waterers…are all in place at home, all that’s left is the packing. It’s amazing that there will be more people living here in our absence, than when we’re home, as my grown children have invited friends to bunk in with them while we’re gone. Hmmmm…

So, I’ll miss you all, Life’s a Stitch is on vacation for three weeks in August. If I get a chance to post, you bet I will. I think I’m beginning to feel blog withdrawal.

I gave in and tied a second skein onto Kiri, and wouldn’t you know it, I made a time consuming mistake. There was a reason I was supposed to save it for the trip. All’s well now though and hopefully it will be an FO upon my return:

If you follow my blog, you know I’ve had my share of issues with wild animals. Gracee and the bear, the skunks in our yard, our close encounters with a cougar, fox, raccoons, miscellaneous coyotes, a rat in the barbecue, dead mice in the dog food, and black Russian squirrels who ate through our power lines. Geez, I grew up outside of New York City and our wild animals were limited to cute fuzzy grey squirrels and an occasional bunny or a chipmunk while on an upstate camping trip.

Although my animal stories may be relatively tame, my friend, Lynn, told us of a friend’s encounter with a squirrel. While her friend was away, a squirrel apparently fell down her chimney and ransacked her house. There was evidence of squirrel damage in every room to the tune of $15,000! Her alarm system was set off, the police kicked in the door (mustn’t have been in our town, the police don’t answer home alarms anymore), and left her a note: "There is a squirrel in your house." Thank goodness for good insurance.

At the risk of sounding like an urban myth, I personally know of a family whose cockateil was carried off by an eagle. Honest to God, the bird had escaped the house and just as it was in reach, the eagle swooped down and flew off with it, in full view of all family members. How traumatic.

Knitting: this was supposed to be my European trip project but I’m letting myself do just one skein’s worth. Besides, it’s too hot for Marina right now. The subtle colour shifts in the Top Print make this an addicting project. I learned early on that I needed to use removable stitch markers as they have to be shifted one stitch over in each pattern row.

In preparation for our trip I was talking about how, when I shop for swimsuits anymore, I need ones with substantial tops. But, instead of saying "I need a substantial swimsuit," it came out "I need a substantial suitcase." Where did that come from? A prime example of middle age brain freeze. Or how about those tongue twisters – the other day I was reading a sign out loud that said "complete chicken dinner" and it came out "complete dickin chinner."  Lovely getting on in years, as they say, isn’t it.

On to my Summer of Lace KAL project. Here’s Kiri. True to form I didn’t follow the exact instructions, electing to do the cast on and first rows differently (no provisional cast on for me) and I’m doing the first and last three stitches in stockinette because I like the way it looks better. This is the Grignasco Top Print on 4.5mm needles. I had three false starts, but now I know the pattern well enough that I’m hoping there won’t be any further errors.

My turn for a sky photo – this is our sunset from a couple of nights ago:

I did it, I put a project out of its misery. Having returned the remaining seven skeins of Estelle Mystik, I haven’t decided if I’ll burn my two Autumn Silk Cardigan sweater pieces or if I’ll toss them in the garbage. You see, it’s not worth frogging as it becomes a split mess once knitted, and it knits up terribly to begin with, so there’s no way I’ll use it again. Every time I picked up that blasted project the yarn would catch on my skin unless I used an ample amount of hand cream. I couldn’t imagine being able to wear it without it catching and pulling on everything. I’ve finally freed up a good pair of Addi’s and some missed stitch markers. Good riddance cursed project! Those who know me will agree, it is so unlike me to throw away $24 worth of yarn, but I feel so liberated.

On a brighter note, having received a raise at work, I treated myself to the Spaceboard from Patternworks.

P.S. I’ve given in and joined the Summer of Lace KAL. Marina, with 21 colours, doesn’t travel well, requiring at least half a piece of luggage. So the knitting for THE trip will be a Kiri shawl, made from Grignaso in my stash.