Perfect on a Cold May Day

It was an incredibly cold and gray afternoon; perfect for meeting a friend after work for coffee and knitting:

The latte is decaf -- even Caffeine Girl has her limits -- and the hat is Gladys, a free pattern from Quince and Co. I'm knitting it in the called-for yarn, Quince's Chickadee. At the moment, I am liking the yarn more than the pattern. The yarn has a rustic look, but without the roughness that often comes with that type of yarn. Chickadee is really quite soft.

The lace pattern doesn't show up at all, at least not so far. Obviously I'm hoping that blocking with change that.

Later, I curled up in bed and opened up this :

Has anyone else tried My Struggle? It's an odd book, the first of a six-volume set. It's an autobiography written like a novel and has been compared to Proust's fictional In Search of Lost Time.

 I hit page 100 last night and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. The writing is incredible, but the amount of detail is overwhelming. I'm thinking I'll like it more when the author gets a little older. At the point where I'm reading, he's a teen-ager and there's a lot of teen-boy angst. Despite my ambiguous feelings, I'm not ready to give it up?

I'll be checking with Keep Calm and Craft On.

Casting On for Traveling

Even though I have a huge number of projects on the needles (I probably can't even count high enough to figure out how many), I felt the need to start one more to have the perfect travel knitting. I am going to have a long trip down and back to Miami because I'm taking the bus to O'Hare Airport, and that's a three-hour bus ride!

I'd already decided to take my Trellis Socks -- I always travel with socks -- but I decided I needed variety so I cast on for this pattern:

Gladys is a hat pattern by Melissa LaBarre, designed for Quince & Co. I picked it up a while ago, and even bought the Quince & Co yarn, Chickadee. It's exactly the kind of hat I love, lacy and slouchy. The lace is fairly simple, so I think it'll be a good travel pattern.

Spring has hinted that it is getting closer. Yesterday morning I went for a lovely walk with friends. Lisa is an avid (and talented!) photographer, so I was inspired to whip out my iPhone, which really does take decent pictures. Still, I'd like to get back into using my Rebel SLR.

Tomorrow I'm off to Miami and my daughter. Spring break is awesome!

Don't forget to check in with Nicole for Keep Calm Craft On.