Rachel phoned this morning to say that her younger
daughter Lizzie – the youngest of her four children – had an emergency
appendectomy yesterday. I have heard no more since, and although reluctant to
go to bed uninformed, I think that is what I will do.
Rachel was full of praise for the much-maligned NHS.
Appendectomies are done by keyhole surgery these days, and she hoped to have
Lizzie home today.
The other news is that England beat Wales in a fairly
close and exciting match; Ireland beat Italy by an awful lot. We play France
here in Edinburgh tomorrow, you will remember.
I have turned the heel of Archie’s first sock, rather
neatly, if I do say so. I weighed the yarn again and still had 62 grams (out of
100) so I thought it was safe to knit my way through the match. I’ll have to
check again tomorrow. I also did another 8-row repeat of the shawl centre
pattern.
The new IK turned up today. There’s nothing that grabs
me, and the issue is low on text, too.
I let KD persuade me to order “Marlisle: A New
Direction in Knitting”. She’s very keen. It seems to be about knitting with two
yarns held together, like KD’s own new pattern. I did that once, long, long ago
– a cardigan for my mother of two strands of what was then called “3-ply” and
would now be classed as sock or fingering yarn.
The result was very satisfactory. The fabric was
firmer and smoother than a single yarn would have been. My mother wore the
cardigan to death, over many years. I don’t think I have done anything
comparable since, although, on the other hand, I feel I must have held two yarns
together a few times through the years.
Cats
Joe-in-Wyoming: my mother went to Germany in the 20’s,
her first venture abroad. She was surprised and very pleased to discover that
all the cats spoke English.
Keyhole surgery - laparoscopy, over here - is a marvelous development. When I had my emergency appendectomy in the 1950s, I was in the hospital for most of a week (not really necessary but that was what they did then). Best wishes to Lizzie and her mother.
ReplyDelete"Marlisle" sounds interesting; I'm wondering how it is any different from ordinary Fairisle.
I hope Lizzie recovers quickly. I am sure they would have informed you had there been any. "No news is good news" as they say.
ReplyDeleteBTW All cats speak "Universal" and have an excellent understanding of English.
I did a workshop with Anna Maltz just over a year ago when she was working on some new patterns which are presumably in the book. It's a surprisingly simple and effective technique which I fully intended to apply to garter stitch projects but haven't so far got round to it. Along with so much else! Knitting with two yarns (giving the marl bit) you then strand one behind and knit the other in stocking stitch, to give whatever pattern you wish. In the class we did simple shapes - squares or circles, but I'm sure there will be lots of other ideas in the book.
ReplyDeleteWishing Lizzie a speedy recovery.
I always thought there had to be a way to knit vertical stripes without Fair Isle or Intarsia but I’m not as brilliant as Anna Maltz. Wish I had taken her class. Chloe
ReplyDeleteHope all is well with your granddaughter. No post today so sending best wishes to you and your family
ReplyDeleteI get my days mixed up. Of course your post last night is meant for today in the US. So I hope all is well
DeleteI love your anecdote about your mother and German cats. I think catdownunder may also be correct about "universal" - unless, of course, the feline is choosing to ignore you completely. Take care and I'm glad to read - in a later post - that Lizzie is recovering well from her surgery. Joe-in Wyoming
ReplyDelete