How did it get to be Friday?

I swear we just got home from Cincinnati. How did Friday get here so quickly?

We had a wonderful weekend. It was so nice to get to spend time with our family, I just wish we could have stayed longer. We ate like royalty; my SIL is an amazing cook (pulled pork, mmm...) and made the kinds of things that I never make for myself (far too lazy), and I enjoyed every bite, plus a few I probably shouldn't have. She's a knitter, too, so we got to sit and knit and visit and watch our three girls play together, all of which was such a treat; they had a fabulous time, too, as you can see. Those three get along like a house on fire; it's pretty amazing to watch them when they get together. And my neice and Younger Daughter are two peas in a pod; both of them are active and incessent fantasists -- the ongoing story lines they have running in their heads are amazing, and when you put the two of them together, well! Let the good times roll.
(Note: These pictures are thieved from my lovely sister-in-law, who is far better with a camera than I'll ever be. Thanks, Geri!) We went for a couple of lovely walks, and I got to crunch my way through fallen leaves to my heart's content, as did the girls.
Pumpkins were carved.
The house was decorated.
And the girls got as much candy as any child could want, and more. It was a perfect weekend, and the only thing that would have made it better is if it could have lasted longer. But (as I reminded myself more than once as we worked our way home on Monday) something is much much better than nothing. Especially a something that was this much fun. We've just got to start saving up our miles at a faster rate somehow...

I did knit, as I said. And I finished one unbloggable project, which just needs to block. I also got Rick's socks further along, and am now nearly ready to turn the second heel. These poor socks are getting really short shrift, since they're my very plain meeting knitting and I don't pull them out for anything else. That would be fine and I'd normally make plenty of progress, especially given the number of meetings I've been attending lately (!), but Elektra is also plain and has taken up much of my meeting time, so the socks languish. I also wound up yarn and cast on for the Traveler Socks from Janel Laidman's new book, and then realized a) that I hadn't brought along a second set of dpns to knit the pocket and b) that the construction of the pocket necessitates three layers of knitted fabric on the side of the sock. I can see why (I spent a not-insignificant part of the quiet moments of my weekend attempting to think of alternate ways to knit the sock such that the pocket would only be two-layered, to no avail), but I'm not sure how I feel about those three layers of knitted fabric on the side of my leg, so I stalled out.

Taking a break from Elektra proved to be heartening, and on Tuesday night I commenced the frogging process. I completed it last night, and this is the current state of affairs.
Lots and lots of little balls. The whole frogging process took a little over six hours, and yes, the unpicking of all of the woven-in ends was just as bad as I'd thought it would be. The one silver lining to that particular cloud is my new-found appreciation for the durability of the woven-in end. Folks, those babies ain't going nowhere, no how, no way. (And no, four negatives do not make a positive.) I will never again fear that all of the ends of one of my sweaters are going to simultaneously spring forth at once, leaving me standing in a heap of unravelled yarn at some crucial and public moment.

I actually cast on for the back (again) before I finished frogging, just so I could see how badly trashed the yarn was going to be before I committed to ripping the whole thing. I think it's going to block out reasonably well.
If you embiggen, you can see that the stitches are much more uneven than they were before, but I think a good soak will take care of that. I have also rejiggered the row counts for each color to take care of those giant swathes of brown that were giving me fits, so all in all, I'm expecting much better things of Elektra Redux.

I'm also expecting to be able to make some serious progress this weekend, since it's going to be all soccer, all the time. It's playoffs, so we'll be at Older Daughter's three playoff games from before 8:00 tomorrow morning until about 11:30, and then at Younger Daughter's four playoff games from 1:45 until about 8:00 tomorrow night (!!). Depending on the results of those, there will be further eliminations and the final game on Sunday. This giant stretch of knitting time was one of the reasons why I wanted to get Elektra frogged sooner rather than later, since it's perfect knitting for watching something else. If you are of a mind, you could send some goal-oriented thoughts our way; the girls could use the extra energy for all of that playing, I'm sure!