Not In Touch

It's been really difficult, my local telephone lines are so crowded, I guess, that it's often difficult to sign on. I don't recall that happening at all in Seattle, it'll be good to get there.

The prayer shawls have been turned in, and when they're blessed, they'll be given out by the various people who act as ministers of care and stay in touch with the shut in ill. I remember how happy the people from Oak Park were when they came to visit Jim and had with them a quilt that had been made in St. Giles. A lap-robe, I guess.

The prayers suggested for use, while you're working with your hands, were a terrific guide. Placing more importance on how much prayer goes into the work impressed me. It was interesting to see the prayer shawls that are prepared by expert knitters have patterns beyond the fundamental recommended.

So if I add no more for a while, it's only because I can't usually touch base.

Just a time of year thing

It may be the middle of January, but the weather here has not been forbidding, it's been calm, steady, today it's sunny, and the sidewalks and driveways are dry. Yet I'm castled up as though there were ten feet of snow. I'm staying in bed mornings, I'm sitting with knitting needles and choir CDs, I'm not even interested in putting anything into this page. No reaching out, all hibernation.

Can't be the actual weather, but I think it's calendar reaction. I'm ready to be cooped in, will-he, nil-he.

Choir CDs? The church choir in Lake Forest did a great production. That's the one that Joe and Kathleen sing in. And it's just fine.

Happy New Year

The whole concept of New year's Resolutions probably arises from the "clean it up now" feelings that we have this week. Of course, clean the holiday trimmings away that have begun to feel excessive and worn; clean the house up so this pale sunshine will still gleam. I look at the notebook of Daily Sudoku that I've accumulated learning to enjoy the puzzles, and think it's about time to stop studying the explanations and saving the careful annotations. Do I understand the xy wing yet? Probably not, but do I any longer care?

The pile of prayer shawls got too much to be hanging in the closet and it's sitting out in the dining room. I guess there's ten? eleven? The stock of wool is getting used up. I even began one in the official knitting pattern, and I find myself planning to learn how to hold the yarn in my left hand while I knit, it would be a better ergonomic method, I'm sure. Actually, I found that this exists as a common alternative called the continental method, and using it would make the stitches be twisted the other way, so I can't just change in midstream and start practicing the new way. Well, maybe I can switch like that on one. I'm starting one more of that dark burgundy I really like best, and when I go to Seattle, I'm not making ones for LaGrange.

A whole feeling of New Year.