Country Roads Are Taking Me Home

I'm headed home to PA tomorrow morning, so things will be a little quiet around here. It's time for wedding planning and attending weddings and so on and so.

Knitting on the road? Socks, of course. I've been trying to do some spinning because this past Saturday I met a fantastic spinner (more on her to come) and I got my first roving! Pictures of such fantastic acquisitions are forthcoming.

But for now, dear knitters adieu. I hope your weeks are filled with fiber happiness.

For now, that's all the news that's fit to knit.

K

The Knitted News

Knitting! I did promise some knits for this blog. I'll tell ya, the summer has been unforgettable for me. The engagement is of course at the top of the list, but I've also knitted some really memorable socks, I've been hanging out with some great friends and traveling to some great places here in the US. What else can you ask for from a summer?

The sock to the left is a little summer sock that I knitted up - I used Wendy's toe up pattern, threw in the stripes and finishing touches from my own brain. I love them! I'm about 1/2 through finishing the second sock. I'm also working on:

The 5 hour baby sweater. This is for a friend's baby to come. I just can't seem to find the time to really concentrate on cranking this out. Of course, babies tend to move deadlines along, don't they? I love the vibrant colors of this yarn. It's a nice clean cotton that can easily be tossed into the wash. Mother's every where can rejoice!

For now, I'm off to the air conditioning and that means that this is all the news that's fit to knit, for now!

Plans Unraveled

Oh Lordy,lordy,lordy! My Ravelry invitation arrived!

Sorry, Sorry - I know You're ALL Mad...

Dear Park Slope Knitters:

On Saturday, it was me who purchased the very last copy of this book from the 7th Avenue Barnes & Noble. I held it in my hands debating purchasing the last copy and then I high tailed it out of the knitting section and up to the magazine rack to pick up a copy of the new Interweave Knits Issue and the Vogue Knitting 25th Anniv. Issue... but if you order it in, they usually get them very quickly.

I don't much sound like the kind of girl who's supposed to be saving every penny towards a wedding, does she? I swear, with the exception of the upcoming purchase of enough yarn to make one of the sweaters in this book, I am SAVING! Oh, I am trying to save money.

So I've been diligently working on my wedding planning. I've lined up three places to visit for reception venues. Two hotels and one country club. Let me tell you, everyone around me is so tired of any talk about the wedding. People don't want to hear about it, they don't want to talk to you about it - it's all kinds of general eye rolling in the greater New York area. I want to make it clear that I really don't think I'm going on and on every minute of the day. I'm usually pretty good at finding internal AND external fault and I'm just not doing too badly with this. But none-the-less I am officially planning on internalizing all of my wedding planning. I will write about it a bit here, but talking about it is just about out 'cause this sister can not take the eye rolling, people. Pluh-lease with the eye rolling.

Knitting is going to updated later tonight with more on this book, a picture of the sorbet socks and some more ideas here and there. Tonight - no wedding talk. Zip. Zip. Just come to the wedding to see what has been planned!

For now, that's all the news that's fit to knit!

The rest of the story

This is right after we came back to the house after getting engaged. We were waaaay out in the country when Chris proposed and we'd just rode back on a four-wheeler through mud, wearing helmets, etc... so we're not looking our best and our photographer had posed us with our arms linked - which was hugely uncomfortable. I tell you all of this by way of an explanation of our looking a bit confused - but can you see how happy we both are?

See the toasting glasses? My very thoughtful Sister-in-Law bought those for us and brought them (remember, the whole family was in on the surprise) as well as with several bottles of champagne. It was a big celebration! I had many, many glasses full!

This is the road that led us out to our engagement spot. Pennsylvania is so much more than just my home - its beauty overwhelms me. I can't imagine what my grandfather thought when he first found the acres that would come to be our family's special vacation spot.

40 years ago he bought this piece of land that would in later years become the meeting place of our family for generations. He made a place in the world for us that would see not only my engagement, but the engagement of my Aunt and Uncle, my Mom and Dad and one of my cousins. It is a place where all of the children in our family have been bathed in the kitchen sink - starting with my brother. It is full of friendly ghosts of my childhood. It is a place where we bring only our most cherished friends and it is still a place where we all come together to share and laugh and visit with each other. Can you repay that kind of gift? Does he know what the trees know? Some of those trees have been there since the civil war. These trees and these roads are the very fabric of my family - they know what we know - that sharing these moments together is what means the most to all of us. They provide the comfort and the quiet that we all need when the rest of the world squeezes a little too hard.

Thanks, Pop. Thank you for giving us this rare gift of a steadfast place to keep our family together forever. Even now that you and granny have gone on - we come here and we remember and we carry on the love and the lives that you provided for us. Thank you so very much.

All the news, that's fit to knit.