Knitting Indecisions

I didn't mean to be incommunicado for so long.  I thought I'd post over the long weekend, but obviously that never happened.

The weekend was nice, but exhausting, at least for me.  The weather was so nice here on Saturday, we went for walk in the afternoon.  It wasn't that far, but since I haven't really been walking around outside with my crutches and cast, it was more effort than it would have been otherwise.  Sunday, I also decided to take a little walk while The Tim was at work.  Sunday evening, we had tickets for "Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs" and since I was off work the next day, and the evening was lovely, we walked back and forth from the concert.

Which by the way was WONDERFUL!  We are fans of Alan Cumming's and he did not in any way disappoint.  He mostly sang, but it was interspersed with stories and anecdotes and he can be really hilarious when he gets going.  He was on stage for 2 1/2 hours straight with no intermission.  It's also funny when you have seen him on American TV shows (such as "The Good Wife"), and then his normal speaking voice is with a Scottish accent.

Monday, The Tim wasn't on the schedule to work, and he wanted to go over to NJ to an outlet mall there.  One of the stores is a Corning Ware outlet, and he had a coupon, so he wanted to use it for some things he'd been wanting to get.  I went along for the outing.  So even though it wasn't constant coming and going, it was a lot of activity for me, and so my other activity involved sitting.  A LOT!  :-)

I'm knitting away on my Hermione's Socks, and am nearly finished with the first one.  I like it, but it's funny when you have been knitting so much with either variegated yarns or using several colors, how knitting with a single color seems weird.  The yarn I'm using is pretty, but I keep thinking, "Wow it's just blue all the time" - which shouldn't be so surprising!

The other project I had re-started has been frogged and the yarn discarded.  I managed to memorize the stitch pattern, so that problem had been resolved, but the yarn kept breaking every two rows or so.  There was no sign of moths, so I don't know if it had been wound in a center pull ball for too long, or if it was just not that strong to begin with.  It was disappointing, because I really loved the colors in the yarn.  But after I had 10+ ends after 15 rows, I decided it was just not gonna happen.

Which means I have to decide what I want my "other" project besides socks to be.  There are about 5 things I'm really itching to try, but not a single one is crying out to be knit.  If I haven't decided by the weekend, I'm going to put the pattern names in a hat and draw one ...

I'm also busy taking out the messed up border of my Park Slope Blackbird (aka Multnomah Shawl), which is both tedious and time-consuming.  I'm trying to be really careful, so I don't confuse myself even further once I get to the point where I'm good again.  I really really really want to get it right, as I love the way it was looking and the finished one that inspired me a few years back at Maryland Sheep and Wool was stunning.  If once I can finally start the border over again, I can't get it right, I may consider just leaving it off.  It wouldn't look as nice, but I could finish it and enjoy it.  We'll see.

I think part of the problem with making the decisions on what I should/should not knit, or how I should try to knit it, has to do with the fact that I'm knitting for me!  It's much easier for me to decide on things when they are for other people, even when knitting isn't involved.  But let it be about me, and I change my mind a million times, and then fret unnecessarily once I make a decision.  Because my brain enjoys obsessing over every little thing whenever possible ...

At least I have the cats to distract me.

A Most Lovely Summertime Weekend

Before going any further into this week, I wanted to share some pictures from last weekend, which was one of those weekends in the summer when the weather and your activities work together to make it just slightly more special than the average weekend.

I may have mentioned here something I've been calling Operation Reclaim the Garden.  To provide brief background: we have a garden area on the side of our house, where at some point in time another row house existed.  It's truly lovely, walled-in and very private, and was one of the huge selling points for us for the house.  For various reasons - construction and/or street repairs on our block, surgery and recovery, etc. - over the past few years, it has only gotten the most minimal care, and had the look of returning to the wild (well, as wild as an inner city plot can get).  This year I have been determined to fix it up and return it to the lovely outside area where we could sit and enjoy being outside when the weather permitted.

The past couple of weekends, I've done quite a bit to clean it up, and though it is a small space, a lot needed to be done.  I finally have it to the point where it just needs some fine tuning and last touches to be "habitable" again, and last weekend I was able to make real progress.  I had some plants and flowers and was able to put them into pots so that the garden would actually look more like a garden!  I also fixed up some pots to put at one of the fronts of our house. ***

 A geranium and an impatiens at  the side of the door

 A gerbera daisy and a sweet potato vine next to the carport door

The garden, 90% cleaned up and ready with some flowers and the bird feeder.  The flower in the foreground is a mandevilla, and in the other pot are some pretty lavender flowers whose name currently escapes me, and another sweet potato vine.

I'm hoping that I can find some more flowers/plants to join these, but even if not, they look nice out there, and if we can find some garden chairs, etc. on sale this July 4th weekend, we'll be pretty well set.  And at a minimum, if we have to wait until next summer for that part, I won't be starting from scratch again as far as getting things ready!

So that was a pleasing endeavor, I have to tell you. :-)

Then on Saturday night, we went to the Mann Music Center here in Philadelphia for an outdoor concert.  We'd bought the tickets months ago, and had been waiting for it to actually happen.

 Paul Simon!  This is the large screen that was set up for the people with lawn seats (us), so that we could see better what was happening on the stage.

This is a (blurry) shot of the actual stage from our seats.  (I told The Tim that I felt bad that Paul Simon looked like such a little speck from where we were, but then realized that even close up, he's a small guy!)

It was one of the best concerts ever.  He and his band came out about 8:15 p.m., and played/sang without stopping until 10:45.  There were songs from his new album, as well as some of the oldies everyone loves.  The audience consisted of people of all ages, which was nice to see.  The weather cooperated, and was perfect - you know, the kind of night you hope for when you know you'll be outside.

I think one of my favorite parts was when they got to "You Can Call Me Al," and the audience was up dancing and singing the chorus.  It was so much fun when every person was enjoying the same thing and singing along!

It's gonna be hard to top last weekend, I've gotta say ... :-)


***our house is two row houses joined back to back.  So we have two "main" entrances.  The entrance where the plants are is the one we use most often, since it's where the entry to the carport is as well.  We technically live at three addresses:  our mailing address on one street, and then our house and carport/garden/lot on the other street, where some of the utilities are registered.  

What Are You Up To This Weekend?

Hello there ~ I don't know about where you are, but here in Philadelphia it is a rare July day.  Temperature in the 80s.  Virtually no humidity.  Cooling off this evening down to the 60s, which is perfect for sleeping with the windows open.  If summer could be like this most of the time, I'd be on board.  But I plan to enjoy this as much as I can.  Tomorrow is supposed to be similar, so there's one more day to this lovely summer weather.

I took a day off today, and with the weather as it is, I can't believe that worked out!  Dug and I just got back from a lunch date.  We  went to a little cafe near our house and had a lovely lunch outside, in the shade.  There was a group of about 8 twenty-somethings at the table next to us, and they were in love with the Doodle Dog, and needless to say, he soaked up all of the attention like the happy love bug that he is.  Then after that, we went to the bakery next door and got a puppy treat for Dug, and some of their amazing Chocolate-Cherry Bread for us.

Later this afternoon, my niece Amanda and her husband Patrick will come up from Baltimore, and we'll head to dinner and then the a Diana Krall concert, at an outdoor venue here (again, who could have imagined we'd have a perfect weather evening for this towards the end of July?).  Then we'll meet them tomorrow morning before they head out for breakfast.  They have to leave early for another commitment later on Saturday.  We don't have any specific plans for the rest of Saturday, which is just fine with me.  Then The Tim works during the day on Sunday, and I'll do the usual exciting stuff - clean up, laundry, etc.

Not a bad weekend, right?

What about you?  Anything fun and/or exciting coming up?  Whatever you do or don't do, I hope you have a lovely weekend, and have a chance to relax!