A pair!

This is the post that almost didn't happen. There was no time during the day to take a break and post, and when I got home after taking Older Daughter to chess club and Younger Daughter to Irish dance, there was dinner to make, and homework to be done, and valentines to be made (the girls are required to bring only homemade valentines to class, and must bring one for each person). By the time I sat down to turn on my computer, I discovered that the internet wasn't working. I rebooted, checked the modem, and generally did what I know how to do, and then gave up until Rick could get home. He rebooted the computer and the modem, and finally gave up and called Cox. An hour later, we'd figured out that it was the wireless modem, and, after more rebooting and reconfiguring, managed to convince my computer to allow me to plug in to the modem. This means that I am now crouched over my computer, hardwired in to various electronic items the precise function of which I am unsure.

I then logged on to blogger, told it that I wanted to start a new post, and it froze and gave me an error message. I was starting to think that this post was not meant to be, but I seem to have caught a break, so here I go.

Look! A whole pair of socks!
I hereby confess that I not only wore them to work today, I also planned an entire outfit around them. (Someone in my knitting group said to me: "Your new socks match your outfit!", to which I responded, "No, my outfit matches my new socks." Does this mean I'm weird?)

I'm very happy with these, and am hoping that the yarn fares better than the other pair I knitted for myself some time ago which, for no readily discernible reason, fulled. Rick's pair hasn't, so I don't know why mine did, but suffice it to say that they now reside in Younger Daughter's drawer. While I like the look of the star toe on these, I've come to the conclusion that star-shaped toes don't work on my feet as well as a wider toe, as I have extremely wide feet (there are those who would say that they resemble the feet of a duck, to which I just respond that I don't fall over easily). But this is exactly why I joined the sock club: to have a chance to try pattern elements that I might not otherwise knit, so that I have a good sense of the possibilities out there.

To recap, these are the first installment of the Rockin' Sock Club, in a pattern called Serendipity, designed by Adrienne; the pattern goes perfectly with the colorway, which is called Dragon Dance. I knitted them on my size one Celtic Swan dpns.

Because I'd finished these last night while watching the first half of the Westminster dog show (I had to stay up 'til the end to see the herding dogs, which are some of my very favorite dog breeds in the world)(at least, my favorite dog breeds besides mutt, as I was careful to explain to Kia Ora, who watched with me), I was able to work on Gust today during knitting group, and while waiting for Younger Daughter to finish dancing. I'm more than a third of the way done.
I'm dying to see this blocked out; the pattern is so perfectly geometric, and such a nice counterpoint to the flowing colors and texture of the yarn. I can tell this is going to be one of those things that I take everywhere, because it's the right weight and goes with so much of what I wear.

On the non-knitting front, things at work are still insane, which I'm finding stressful. There's nothing worse than having no time in the office, and every time I have a second, finding forty new email messages waiting for me (I should say here that it's only the work emails that get me down; finding one in there from one of you out there in the real world is like finding a bit of gold among the dross). And of course the chaos means that, just as I feared, while I finished my knitting for the Loopy Swap ages ago, the mailing dates are between the tenth and the fifteenth, which falls this week, mid-insanity. I knew, just knew, that not being able to mail it right away immediately diminished the chances that I'd actually get to mail the package on time. And here I am, in the target week, with not a single space of time to get the box packed. I've got it scheduled into Thursday afternoon, and I can only hope that something doesn't come up during that time.

On a bright note, though, we had what I can only call a perfect early spring meal on Sunday (it is after Imbolc, and therefore counts as early spring in my book). Rick grilled lamb chops, as well as fresh baby brussels sprouts from the farmer's market tossed in walnut oil, with toasted chopped walnuts on top (thanks to Juno's blog for the idea). I steamed fresh English peas (my very favorite treat from the spring farmer's market), tossed with a bit of butter and salt and pepper, and then made polenta to go with. Perfect. The only thing that could have made it any better would have been if I'd had time to let the polenta set so it could be grilled, too. I do so love me a springtime farmer's market.

Thank you all so much for the encouragement and support around my public panic attack about Older Daughter's move to a new school. It really does help to hear unequivocal support, or at least a strong statement that while choices may change, caring about my parenting is a solid step in the right direction. We're all going to the open house at the new school tomorrow night, and Older Daughter is excited, which is all I can ask.