Wednesday, April 18, 2012

yarn along: Christening dress and ...


Joining Ginny over at Small Things for the regular Wednesday Yarn Along!
Two of my favorite things are knitting and reading, and the evidence of this often shows up in my photographs. I love seeing what other people are knitting and reading as well. So, what are you knitting or crocheting right now? What are you reading? ~ Ginny Sheller from Small Things




Knitting
A while ago I came upon this little gem of a book at a thrift store: The Family Knitting Book by James Norbury, copyright 1969, London. And I fell in love with the darling Christening Robe featured on page 166. I finally got to use a stash of creamy antique Patons 3 Ply baby wool that I picked up at a yard sale. I dutifully followed the directions and cast on with size 13 needles... and thought oh dear, this doesn't look quite right. My dear friend Ginger was on hand to let me know that British sizes are definitely NOT American sizes. Thank you handy dandy conversion chart for letting me know that I actually wanted to use American size 1 needles. Makes a huge difference! And I realize that this will take me some time, considering the rate I'm going. But I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will be finished in time...

Reading
I recently read The Sweet Life in Paris by David Lebovitz, recommended by my dear friend, Nancy. He is funny and observant and fills my need to hoard information about beautiful France. And yet, there is something about his sense of humor that reminds me a bit of my dad... not that it's necessarily a bad thing. But still.
Truthfully, for the past few weeks I haven't been reading at all (somehow seems to take too much energy) and have been indulging in a little discovery: Downton Abbey. I know I'm a bit late hopping on the bandwagon; it seems every woman I know has watched the past two seasons. But thanks to Amazon I was able to catch up. A fluffy historical soap opera with good writing and excellent acting? What's not to love? And I admit that there were a couple afternoons that found me too exhausted to do anything by watch a couple episodes on the computer using headphones while I let Miss Maya watch an episode or two of Diego on the TV. Admirable mothering, I know.

5 comments:

Hailey said...

Ben has a big old crush on David Lebovitz and talks about him all the time. Also, why do you need to finish a christening dress?!!

ginger said...

Somehow :) doesn't accurately express the smile on my face.

MamaD said...

Have you just discovered Downton Abbey? I swore I told you about it before. I still haven't gotten around to watching the second season and the first season seems like ages ago. I have some catching up to do...

Pomegranategrl said...

Beautiful knit! That is a gorgeous dress!
Gosh, don't forget about the sets and costumes on Downton Abbey! I haven't seen season 2 yet- only 1 with netflix. One of my top shows for sure!

Stew said...

I didn't realize stumbling upon your page would bring so much memories of my grandma knitting clothes for me as a baby. I wish I could do that art (or science?) as well but I am only hands-on with catimini childrens clothing and couldn't really get my two left hands to coordinate.