Well.

The yarn didn't turn up until after 2 – I had nearly despaired. I thought the postie would bring it mid-morning.

­I opened the box with avidity and pulled the plastic-wrapped packageof yarn out upside down. I had time to think, in rapid succession, before I turned it over: Oh, dear, there's no brown in that grey at all...The yarn looks awfully fine for DK...They've sent the wrong order; I'm going to have a struggle, sending it back.

Then I looked. It's the Tokyo shawl, in the dark colourway I wanted.

The card – with a nice design of slightly abstract-looking southwestern sheep – says “A gift from all your very loyal followers. Please enjoy!” The shop it comes from is not Webs at all, of course (who are sending me the madelinetosh order), but Tutto in Santa Fe. I wouldn't mind browsing there.

It may be from all of you as it claims, but some one individual must have thought of the idea and executed it. Thanks are inadequate. The yarn is more precious to me than spun gold. I will knit it in alternate sessions with the Sous Sous and wrap it around myself in all the winters left to me.

I rather dislike descending to the mundane, after that.

Nothing came from Loop except an email to say they had dispatched my order. Maybe they're not open on Monday. It will require a signature but if our usual postie is on duty she will sign for me while I enjoy the supermarket.

And as for knitting, I have now done everything else on Archie's sweater, and am approaching with trepidation the infamous neck edging. Beverly, I did email Bruce Weinstein, on your excellent suggestion. No response yet. And, Judith, I looked at the Ravelry discussion you referred me to, and I agree that Bruce's own Henley looks as if the edging goes all the way across the top of the placket.

So I started off that way, and have picked up 20 stitches from the placket edge to the first false raglan seam. If I go on at about the present rate, I will have 70 stitches by the time I reach the back-neck mid-point. The instruction says to pick up 112 in all. I would allow myself a certain latitude on that – say, perhaps, 110 to 120, but 140 is too many in a pattern so carefully written.

So I'll start again, this time omitting the placket. The top of the placket, after all, looks finished. What follows is not finished at all – I was adding stitches at the beginning or end, or both, of many rows and the result looks ragged. From the raglan seam on there's a chain, representing the 76-stitch original cast-on.

I'm thinking aloud here. A little mental arithmetic based on the figure in the last paragraph suggests that I should pick up 23 stitches on each front. Perhaps I'll do a bit more counting, after all, before I take out what I've done already.

We didn't go out yesterday, as hoped. The snow melted, but it stayed very cold. I got a bit done, other than cooking and knitting and making the bed, for the first time in quite a while. I repotted my cactuses (I have three) and sowed some chilli seeds and paced about the house with a tape measure looking for a spot six feet x six feet, unimpeded by furniture and not part of a major traffic avenue, where I could block the Unst Bridal Shawl.

Not easy. And the spot had to allow room at the edges for the blocker to crawl about. I have decided to try pushing the two single beds in the spare room together and doing it there. If it works, it will eliminate crawling. That's good. I must get it done before the end-of-month travel, so that my husband and Alexander can take it to London.

All that, and a new follower! the first for many a day. Welcome!