Daring and Square-ish

Dear Mandella,

I'm scheduled to go over to my mom's today (instead of on Sunday, which has been the usual day for sewing) because I'll be at a "personal shower" for my friend M on Sunday afternoon/evening. I found a copy of Naughty Needles for M, which I wrapped up with three little skeins of Debbie Bliss Pure Silk. I was going to get Knitting Lingerie Style, but the local bookstores didn't have it. I was only notified of the shower on Thursday evening, so there wasn't time to order it.

So, the coffee is brewing and I'm trying to wake up and type at the same time. I am grateful that we get an extra hour of sleep this weekend (Daylight Savings Time ends here tonight).

We had extraordinarily good weather for the Trick-or-Treaters last night. Most of the time Hallowe'en night is cold and wet; this year it was pleasant and dry. How I remember having the wear a pullover with my costume, and always debating whether to wear it underneath would the costume still fit?) or over the costume (would the costume allow that?). We didn't open our home to the Trick-or-Treaters, though. It's been too busy, and for the past several years there have been very few children coming by. In fact, most people bring their kids to planned venue for trick-or-treats -- the office, shopping malls -- or just stay in their own neighborhoods. In the little town where I grew up we went to every house we could get to! Good heavens, we'd have gone to farmhouses out in the country if we'd had a car and a license to drive!

I've been looking through books of knitting patterns and have happened upon several that make me think it would be fun to knit up a bunch of squares in different colors and textures (i.e., to use up the leftovers of my Cascade 220 stash) and then make them into a blanket. I've knit 1 so far, a bright yellow mostly-square that uses a triangle type of pattern in knits and purls. The 2nd one I've started is called "sand stitch" and it's even easier than the triangle pattern. In fact, I'm rather liking this because it's giving me exposure to some knew knitting textures but in small enough swatches that I don't have to commit to a whole pullover in case I find it too tiring to keep up with. I suppose it's sort of like *gasp!* swatching, except that I'm not working it out on the yarn I intend to use for the final project. And these are much larger swatches (about 7" square-ish).

Well, no time to be thinking about that now. The coffee is done and I've got to get to my mom's and start sewing up that dress if I want to have it to wear to a wedding on the 7th! (AUGH!)

Hugs and good knitting to you!

Judith