You might ask. Since I don’t have much to show except further progress on the first of John’s Undulating Rib Socks.
But most of that was done yesterday. I did make a lot of progress on my Blue Optic Waves Shawl last night at knitting group, but it still looks pretty much like the previous pics.
If you’re wondering what that funny line just above the toe is, (not sure you can actually see it, but believe me, it’s there) it’s a lifeline.
My knitting friend Meredith told me about lifelines last night and I thought I’d try one, since I’m not sure whether I have enough yarn to make this sock quite as long as I’d like to. If I need to take out the toe to add some more rows I can happily frog it to the lifeline that I created by inserting a line of crochet thread, and easily pick up the stitches. She uses them on complicated lace patterns about every 10 rows. What a great idea. I wouldn’t ordinarily use them on something as simple as a sock, but in this case it may be a good idea.
Anyway, so, what have I been doing? Well, first you need to know that yesterday, John dragged me over to the bicycle shop to look at mountain bikes. He’s been looking for several weeks at the shop and online. I said, “We’re just looking,” and he said, “Of course.” About an hour later we had two mountain bikes set aside to be tuned up and ready to go today. How did I know this was going to happen?
After grocery shopping this morning and all that entails–you know the drill, make the list, go to the store, pay the bill, load it in the truck, unload the truck, then figure out where to put it–we headed back over to the bicycle shop and took delivery of our new bikes.
We’ve been riding road bikes for the last couple of years, and John has been much more faithful than I about riding here. You need to understand that (1) We’re at 7,000+ feet elevation, and (2) The roads in Taos are really bad and quite a challenge for road bikes with their skinny tires. The roads are a mixture of paved (with prerequisite potholes) and dirt, even in town, and without warning you can be cruising along on a very nice road and end up on gravel. For example, just a couple blocks past the hospital, on the same road, it becomes dirt road.
We took them (the bikes) out for a spin a bit ago–for just short of an hour–and made some pretty decent climbs in elevation, and played a little on some dirt roads and little side cut-offs (not quite dirt trails, but I’m not ready for those yet). At the same time we were treated to spectacular views of the mountains and the valley, beautiful sunshine, and twenty-five mile an hour winds. Hey, this is Taos.
Incidentally, while we were on the upper road that goes to the hospital (dirt) some people in an SUV from out of state stopped us and asked us how to get to the hospital. We said, “Just follow the road around,” and you could see how incredulous they were. I’m sure they were thinking, “Oh no! We don’t want to go to a hospital that is on a dirt road.” It’s not, but I’m sure they were thinking that.
It was great fun, though, and I think I’m going to like this new bike. Now we can go out on some of the forest roads, we’ve been four-wheel driving on and take our bikes, too. WhoooHooo!
Here I am in all my gear with my new bike. I always feel like I’m getting ready to go into outer space when I get suited up for a bike ride. It’s not like when I was 10, for sure.
Now, to get back to fibers. One of my other knitting friends, Laura, sent me this morning a link to a to-die-for yarn hand-dyed in a color called tulip.
The sock yarn would be so fabulous for the Twisted Tulip Socks designed by Chrissy Gardiner in this month’s Interweave Knits. I just can’t bring myself to spend that much for a pair of socks, because I don’t think one skein is quite enough. Sigh.
