Fruity Knitting is here! I’ve watched half of it and am ready to go to bed with my iPad and the interview with Ms Blacker. I don’t think I had ever consciously registered Blacker Yarns until they turned up as generous sponsors of the Edinburgh Yarn Festival. I bought some of their yarn this year, you may remember – for Carol Sunday’s Nancy’s Vest.

That was the yarn, you may also remember, which looked a beautiful dark russet red until I paid for it, and then turned brown. I suspect, still, that it will make a very good Nancy’s Vest once it gets a bit further forward in the queue.

But otherwise I know nothing about Blacker Yarns.

Today was not a day of progress. My dear Daniella, wife of Vasily, is ill, and couldn’t come. The result was that, although I more or less kept my head above water, I crossed off nothing from my list.

I did a bit of knitting, however. I have now done five scallops of the edging on the final side of the baby shawl – and the ball of yarn is looking weary, although I think it will see me out, edging-wise. There are 20 scallops per side, so five scallops represent half-way to half-way.

And last night I joined in the final colour, the 5^th,  of the gradients which form the “B” shade in the Soutache. Roughly speaking, you are meant to use each one for 8” until you get to the fifth, then knit that for 16”, then knit down the other side with the half-balls left over. Carol Sunday would have you weigh them, on the way up, to make sure that you have enough for a matching section on the way down.

But I don’t think that anyone will notice if you’re even as much as an inch or two out, so I didn’t do that.

The Arne & Carlos sock yarn arrived today. I have selected the non-Pairfect skein, chosen a more-or-less suitable odd-ball for finishing the toes, found the necessary needles, put the tout ensemble in the Palermo pile. That's something done, although not much.

Helen and I are going to talk to another kitchen designer tomorrow morning. It is hard to think of such things as Christmas and the solstice close in.