Ted comes home. Isn’t that lovely?

Leslie, yes, Rams & Yowes is described in the pattern as a blanket, 3’ by 3’, just the size for Ted if I can finish before he’s ready for college. I’m not going to line it. We talked about this when we were on Shetland – Kristie says she will line hers.

I weave as I go, and I don’t think (a) that there’s anything here to endanger tiny fingers, especially after blocking; and (b) that it looks at all bad.

You’ll remember that Rachel’s son Joe was with us a couple of weeks ago, doing some energetic tidying of nature in Strathardle. I noticed as he left to go up to the station that he was wearing the Grandson Sweater inside out – an affectation? Or carelessness? I didn’t ask. It looked fine.

(That's Joe, when the sweater was new, trying -- rather successfully -- to look Scandinavian like the man in the book. Sometimes I suspect them of getting sweaters out from the bottom of the drawer when they know I'm going to be about, but that one, I am sure, has had several years hard wear since that picture was taken.)

I was indeed wondering only yesterday whether it is possible to weave-as-you-go if you are carrying both yarns over your left index finger (or whatever). I discovered the technique from a passage in Mary Thomas’ Knitting Book, sometime in the late ‘60’s. It depends, at least as executed by me, on having one yarn in each hand. It was that discovery which launched me on my Fair Isle career. It meant that I could weave without letting go. I'm sure you could find it on the internet nowadays. How our lives have been transformed!

And – don’t tell Kate Davies – not only am I not going to line the blankie, I’m not going to secure the steek. This yarn is nature’s answer to Velcro, and anyway knitting doesn’t tend to unravel sideways, and anyway the cut edges will be secured inside the hem. I was worried about the armhole steeks in Joe's Grandson Sweater -- see above. I can't remember the details. But they have held up fine.

As for actual knitting, I moved forward on all fronts yesterday. The idea is to do three rounds of Rams & Yowes before anything else. Then I knit the next piece (third of ten) of the Silly Christmas Project – how I wish I could tell you what it is! How I hope I will one day have a picture to show you! And then, the cherry on the cake, some more Milano.

I have decided, for the purposes of the progress bars, to assign six percentage points to each of the ten pieces of the SCP, regardless of size. That leaves 40% for embroidering, assembling, and stuffing.

Miscellaneous

Here’s another nice pattern for you. But it worries me slightly that so many of the pics on Ravelry by people who have knit it, show it from behind or being spread out for admiration. What’s it like to wear?

You’ll have noticed from yesterday’s comments that Kristie fears I may already have the little book about the Shetland Museum textile collection which I ordered from them yesterday morning. She says she got hers in the museum shop that day. All I can say is, I have no memory of it. We went to the museum on the first day, and surely I would have read such a book before supper on one of the subsequent evenings? And it’s not with my carefully preserved Shetland Papers.  Who would like a copy, if it does turn out to be a duplicate?