Fabulous Weekend

I had a fantastic weekend full of knitting! Friday night Johanna (not Jofrog, but another Johanna) had people over to knit at her house. I was there all evening and had a fabulous time. There were lots of people I hadn't seen in quite a while and lots of cool people I hadn't knit before. Everyone was working on something cool and it was neat to see so many different projects.

One woman was seaming her St. Brigid sweater knit in a beautiful dark rose color. She made it out of the now-discontinued Alice Starmore yarn it was written for, and as a tight, British knitter, didn't have trouble getting gauge. It was incredible and I'm excited to work on it for my mom. I'll just have to get over the needle issue. I'm feeling stubborn about getting gauge with this yarn, though! I feel like I should be able to manage it because my mom did for my sweater, and because using a different yarn than she did would mean I'm not actually making the sweater she made for me. We'll see if that's how I continue to feel after I try another few tricks and swatches.

Saturday was a long but great day. A Prairie Home Companion was broadcasting live from Boston and I hadn't gotten a ticket before they sold out. I dropped by the box office in the early afternoon to ask about returned tickets and they said there weren't any and they didn't expect any. I decided that, instead of bugging them every hour I should go check out a new yarn store in Jamaica Plain called Circles. This was a great plan. I went down, fondled fabulous yarns, drank free tea, and picked out two books and a pattern (Jean Moss' Sculptured Knits, Elsebeth Lavold's Designer's Choice: Book One, and Chris Bylsma's High Tide). Then I sat down and worked on the baby sweater for a while, and knit and chatted with the staff and other customers for three hours. Aaaahhh. I bought my books (oh, and four skeins of Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool for a shell from her book -- justification: just four skeins, which makes the smallest sweater in the book!) and headed back up to the Wang Center to hope for a ticket to the show.

There were people standing out front with little signs, "Need 2 tickets." I realized that I had no sign, but maybe I'd luck out. Someone with a sign came up to a couple without a sign, saying that he had just gotten two tickets and gave away his sign. Instantly someone came up to this couple and offered them two tickets! They started going through their wallets looking for cash. I opened my wallet. Not enough to buy even the cheapest tickets! Oops! It's about 25 minutes before the broadcast starts and I have to run to the ATM. My card doesn't seem to open the door, but the gentleman behind me can open it with his. While we're getting money out the machines he asks if I'm going to see the show. I tell him I'd like to, but I need a ticket.

"Hang on," he says, and pulls out his walkie-talkie. "Eric?"

"Yeah," says the voice through the walkie-talkie.

"Do you still have that extra ticket?" "Yeah." "Great. I'd like to send a friend over for it?

"Gretchen?" asks the voice in the walkie-talkie.

"No, someone else." "Ok, send 'em over."

Yes! Success! A ticket, and the money to pay for it! We walk out of the ATM and the gentleman says, "Go to the theater and ask for Eric the Theater Manager. Tell him you're a friend of Phil's and that he has a ticket for you." I was thrilled and thanked him and dashed off. "Eric the theater manager, friend of Phil. Eric the theater manager, friend of Phil." I got there, was pointed from the doorman to the ticket rippers to a little podium with a woman sitting behind it. I managed to say my line and she said, "here," ripped the ticket and handed me the stub.

Free ticket! How cool is that? ! I couldn't tell where the seat was from the ticket, but the ushers pointed me right toward my seat -- a box, front row, seat closest to the center. I totally lucked out. Great seat, free, and a fabulous concert! The audio will be up on their website on Tuesday. I highly recommend listening to the Boston Blues near the beginning of the show, and to the four songs by Susan Graham (Metropolitan Opera mezzo) at the end of the first hour and beginning of the second hour. Most of the stuff about Boston was also very good. The blues harmonica (electric harmonica, from what I could tell) was awesome, and you could listen to those, too. I had a fantastic time.

After the show I hurried off to a square dance, ran into someone I haven't seen in years, and stayed out late for food with people. I got to bed late and got up earlyish to go have dim sum (mmmmm), go to a chorus meeting (worked on my sock) and then met a friend from work so that we could go to the yarn store and start a scarf with the stitch pattern she'd admired in these socks. We went to Knitsmiths and had a great time, and of course I knit all the way home! So here are my accomplishments for the weekend:

• Lingerie: Seamed the cups, sewed them on, and Amber did half of the elastic casing for me. Just need to finish the casing, put in the elastic, put in the buttons, and measure and crochet the straps!
  
• Baby Sweater: completed the first pattern repeat! 24 rows of cables in slippery superwash. As I get better at reading the knitting, seeing the cable pattern, and become more facile with a cable needle the work progresses more quickly.
  
• Mist: Finished the back and did about 2" on the left front.
  
• Sock: I've finished 6-7" of the foot, so I should get to the toe decreases soon.
  

I'm hoping to take a lot of pictures tomorrow, with my new camera, which DHL still reports in Ohio. I'm hoping that they just haven't updated the tracking. If there isn't a camera, I'll do a lot of scanning. I'd ask you to keep your fingers crossed, but I don't want it to impede your knitting. ;)