Post in Three Parts

We are here at the lake for eleven days, and the plan was that Elliot was here with his mum and dad for the first week, and then off they’d go home (Alex has to work) and then the pace of things here would dramatically drop off. It would be me and Joe, Ken, Amanda and Joe’s mum and dad, and all of those people are considerably more amenable to me sitting down with my laptop or plowing through knitting, and each of them is able to swim in the lake without my direct help. In short, I thought getting to my computer for the first bit would be hard, but then it would be easy, and instead Meg decided to stay with Elliot, and just Alex went home and we are so delighted to have them both here a little longer, but the idea that these few days would be easy going has evaporated.

Today it’s raining and grim, and nobody is in the lake lest they be hit by lightning (that is actually a thing) and Joe and Ken (Poppy and Poppa) have Elliot off playing foozball, and I’ve got a few minutes to catch up here, and in the new spirit of trying to blog – here I am. I figure we’ve got a few minutes before it all goes sideways, but that’s still enough to tell you about a bit of knitting.

(Whoops. Wrong. The sun came out and it was suddenly a gorgeous day and I went for a quick dip and then Ken was going for a kayak and I went with him, and then I was coming back up but Amanda was ready to swim, and then I was absolutely coming up, but Megan came down with Elliot and then I took him in swimming – and then suddenly it was time to get supper on. Sorry about that.)

When I left to drive up here (about four hours north of Toronto, on the edge of Killarney, for anyone who’s into parks) I imagined tons of knitting time, a wild rumpus of knitting. Hours stretching into days of knitting. I packed a partial sweater to finish, a pair of socks that only had one done, another pair of socks where the first wasn’t even finished, a whole  sweater for Ken that wasn’t even a swatch yet, and then panicked as I imagined these hours of knitting and tossed in an insurance skein. The astute among you will note that this means I intended to (while cooking for 9 people three times a day, and doing my fair share of childcare) knit at least one thing a day. Obviously, this was bananas. Completely insane. I am a fast knitter but even I cannot get knitting done without knitting time, and despite decades of effort, remain unable to knit in my sleep.

Still, in between birthday parties delayed until we could be together, and rounds of champagne, games of “Guess Who” and swims in the lake and long paddles with Ellie tucked in the front of my kayak… I did manage to finish one thing, and start another. Voila, my Simple Summer Sweater.

Yarn is Rowan Cotton Cashmere, and I love it.

The idea of a summer sweater cracked me up – cotton or not, I simply cannot put the words “summer” and “sweater together. It’s more than 30 degrees in those pictures – Meg and I waited until sunset to keep them so it would be a bit cooler and I am still roasting in it.  The weather is set to turn in the evenings the next few days, so I know it will get loads of use eventually.

(Whoops again, dammit.  I was going to finish this post last night, but oh we had a lovely supper. A huge storm blew though with a tornado watch (no warning, don’t panic) and everything. We sat here, eating our suppers and watching a fierce thunderstorm roll in across the lake and batter the windows, and as we finished the storm ended, and minutes later we had a clear sky and a lovely sunset.  We knit and chatted into the evening and I didn’t finish this post. Sorry.)

Obviously I’m not going to get through a million projects while I’m here. Obviously I’m not going to post a thousand times. I have gotten as far as starting Ken’s sweater (Oshima for Him, which I seriously believed I’d finish on this trip, but it’s going a little slowly.

I’ve missed these people so much, and to have them all back with me makes it hard to say no to anything.