Plus, I have a design coming out in Charlene Schurch and Beth Parrot's new book, Sock Club: Join the Knitting Adventure. Here's a picture of the sock when it was in its infancy. It's called Zigs and Zags.
I'm currently knitting a couple of lace shawls -- an Escher-style design by Kalinumba and Moni's Panama shawl -- and also a test-knit sweater.
a picture of a squirrel at the corner of the back porch..... In the back is a row of evergreens lining the back of our property. The squirrels (and, in summer, the chipmunks also) act as though they own the place.
This year it seems that I've been doing different kinds of projects in spurts. I hadn't knit any dishcloths since February -- except for the 2 k1b ones in October, including a honeycomb one -- and those were just to try out patterns. In the last week, I've knit 6 of them -- all Maile's designs.
I had trouble with Just Fancy. I couldn't wrap my mind out of how to do the stitch in Row 6. So, I finally figured out another way, I think, of getting 2 sts from 3. First I k2tog'ed. Then I moved the second of the 2 sts in the k2tog back to the left hand needle -- as shown in the picture. Then I knit that st and the next through back loop.
The Washburne raglan is coming along nicely. It's based on Wash's sweater. I hate piecing and seaming and so decided to rework it as a raglan from the top down. I'm almost done with the sweater body. I'll have to get more yarn (Vanna's Choice chocolate). I'd forgotten that cables take more yarn than regular stockinette.
I've finally finished redoing a quilt for my DS2. The back to the quilt was falling apart, and the edging already had completely fallen apart. My MIL made it about 20 years ago. It was obviously made to be used -- and was made out of left-over scraps from other quilts. It's the only one of her quilts that was tied instead of quilted.
I'm finally getting Fjordland finished to my liking. Here is a picture of the sock redone with a slightly different color scheme than before (KnitPicks grass, pine, and buckskin and two size 1 circs). I was planning on changing the heel from a short-row heel to a reverse heel-flap heel (because I have a high arch) -- but then decided to take the easy way out and work a Fleegle heel. (I made gusset increases in the background color.)
I've also been working on finishing the second sock of the pair for socks I test knitted. It's great at stash busting. In fact, I got to the bottom of my sock yarn bin and found some Wavelet Socks. I had knit the first one as a test knit. But, I had knit the second of the pair longer than the first -- just to use up yarn -- and had planned to reknit the first to match. Well, I finally have. Here's what they look like -- in KnitPicks Essential (now Stroll) Tweed flint and size 1 needles.
First, an update: I'm finishing up some old projects. I'm finishing up the second sock in a pair to some test knits (Great Plains and after that Fjordland from Chrissy Gardiner's book and Crevasse by Angela Johnson). I've got some tv knitting to work on -- scalloped placemats, one pictured. And I'm working off and on, on a shawl - Inconceivable by Katherine Vaughan.
This was our last day in China. DD's flight was in the morning. Our flight wasn't until late afternoon -- which meant that even though we'd cross the International Date Line, we didn't go forward to Tuesday before going back to Monday. Though, it is possible we may have gone back to Sunday before returning to Monday again. DS2 thinks it's most likely that we went forward to Tuesday before crossing the date line. ... It's academic since we slept most of the way back, and DD's flight didn't cross the Date Line. For us, midnight in Beijing to midnight in Chicago was 37 hours.
... I see from my previous posts that I hadn't included any pics of lions -- which is odd since people on the tour were kidding me that I was trying to take a pic of every lion statue in China. So, here's one. It's from the Ghost City on the Yangtze. And, yes, there is a carved ball inside the lion's mouth. That's fairly common.
Our visit to China was great. It was sad when it was time to leave. 
And here is a picture of a traffic light in Chongqing. We saw traffic lights like these in many of the larger cities. There were countdowns for both green and red lights.
Our last full day in China was another day packed with things to see and do. Our first stop was a cloisonne showroom. Cloisonne patterns are formed by soldering copper wire on top of a copper object. Glazes are then added and the object fired and polished several times. Here is a picture of glaze being added to a vase.
Our next stop was the Ming Dynasty Tombs. There are quite a few large statues on the Sacred (or Spirit) Way leading to the tomb area. Different animals as well as officials guard the path. Here is a pic of an elephant resting from his guard duty. We supposed that guards were needed because the path is straight instead of angled. We also learned that lions are mythological creatures -- or, at least, the lions prominent in Chinese statuary. (This was the only place I saw any birds in China. In fact, there were bird feeders on the grounds. We didn't see any pigeons at all in our stay in China.)
Next was the highlight of the trip, a visit to the Great Wall of China. I was prepared to be underwhelmed by the wall. But, it was even more imposing than I had imagined. Here is a pic of the wall near the Badaling Gate.
On the way back to our hotel, we stopped along the highway so we could get out and take pictures of the Bird's Nest, the Beijing National Stadium. It must have been a popular place to stop -- since there was someone there selling kites.
Saturday started out with a visit to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. This being a Saturday, there were large crowds there. In Tiananmen Square, people were lined up to visit Mao's mausoleum. The mausoleum is large with a gold yellow colored roof (which color, in previous times, had been reserved for the emperor).
The Forbidden City is huge (178 acres -- .6 miles long by .47 miles wide). It took us a couple of hours to go from the southern entrance to the northern one. And we didn't look at even half the buildings there. In the background is the Hall of Supreme Harmony.
Here is one of the thrones inside the grounds -- in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, I think. It was the most popular of the sights there.
After lunch, we went to the Summer Palace. This picture of the palace was taken from Kunming Lake, which was created in order to get enough earth to create the hill on which the palace sits.
In the evening, we attended a show at the Beijing Night Theater. It included fabulous costumes, dancing, and acrobatic performances.
Friday morning we took a flight from Xi'an to Beijing. So, we had only half a day's worth of sightseeing in Beijing this day. We stayed at the Peninsula Hotel.
Our first stop was the bell and drum towers near the old entrance to the Inner City. This is a picture of the old gate (Zhengyangmen, but now called Qianmen) to the Inner City, as taken from inside the Bell Tower. This was the first time in our trip that it was rainy.
Then we took a pedicab tour of a nearby hudong. Here is a view of one of the streets in the hudong. This neighborhood is one that is going to be kept as is instead of making way for high-rises.
Our first stop on our tour of Xi'an was the Great Wild Goose Pagoda. There is much more on the grounds than just the pagoda. There are several Buddhist temples and a small cemetery.
After that we went to eat lunch at a dumpling restaurant inside the city walls. The dumplings were shaped in the form of the type of meat/vegetable that they contained -- chicken-shaped for chicken, etc.
After lunch, we drove out to the Terracotta Museum where Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of a united China, had statues constructed of his army -- an estimated 8,000 soldiers plus quite a few horses and also court officials and entertainers. His tomb lies nearby, undisturbed. Construction began in 246 BC. The picture shows part of the largest excavated pit.
Then, in the evening, we went to a performance celebrating the Tang Dynasty. Costumes were based on paintings and carvings from that time. We stayed at the Shangri-La Hotel.
Early in the morning buses took the group to Wuhan Bioengineering Institute, where we would hopefully be able to watch the total solar eclipse. The earliest group arrived at the site before sunrise in order to be able to get their cameras set up properly. The cameras were designed and programed to follow the sun through the sky. Others, like me, had low-tech cameras. There were professional and amateur astronomers in our group as well as people who just like solar eclipses.
The wind was still except for a rush of wind 20 to 30 minutes before 2nd contact and another one 20 to 30 minutes after 3rd contact. Unfortunately, there was a partial cloud cover. We could see only the last minute and a half of the eclipse.
After the eclipse, we ate at the university and then traveled back to Wuhan. We saw rice paddies on the way. Before boarding a plane for Xi'an, we visited the Rock and Bonsai Museum in Wuhan. Here is a picture of some carvings of different rocks and crystals displayed in the museum. -- It's not food in the picture. It's carvings in the shape of food as served Lazy Susan style.
It's strange when the reality of death finally hits. It hit me when the emergency vet's office called this morning to say that our cat's ashes had arrived and were available for pickup.
Our last stop on the cruise ship was Chongqing (Chungking), a busy commerce center. Chongqing has a registered population of over 30 million. However, the urban population is "only" 5 million plus. The registered population includes people living in rural areas around Chongqing. Also, just because a person is registered as living in a certain place, it doesn't mean s/he actually lives there. S/he may be living and working elsewhere in the country. The first pic is a view of the city from the cruise ship.
Our first stop was the zoo. The weather was so hot (around 100F) that the pandas weren't going to be let out after noon. Lan Xing, in the picture, had to be lured out of the shelter with an apple by a zoo employee. Another zoo employee lured Liang Liang (who lives in a separate area) out to pose for photographs, again using an apple. So, we got to see 2 pandas at the zoo.
Then we went to another part of the zoo for an exhibition on painting. The artist (in black) painted the entire painting during the course of the lecture. There were other paintings for sale there including ones done on Banyan leaves.
Afterward, we visited a local food market. There was quite a variety of products, including live eels (not in the picture) and lotus. Lotus is surprisingly good.
Finally, we went to look at the main square which is dominated by the Great Hall of the People.
Still traveling up the Yangtze River, we took an excursion to a ghost city, Fengdu. It isn't a ghost town in the western sense. Rather, it's a place souls go after the body dies (evidently, the only one in China). There a person is judged for what s/he did in life and then given the appropriate punishment.
The next pic is of a pagoda.
The last pic is of masks sold near the entrance to Fengdu. They are masks of some of the "demons" who punish evil doers.
After breakfast, we went on an excursion to Shen Nong Stream, a tributary of the Yangtze. We went on a tourist ferry boat to the mouth of the stream and then boarded small boats to travel up the stream. The scenery was breathtaking -- even though what had been a fast-moving stream had become a lazy river because of the Three Gorges Dam.
After returning to the ship, we went a little further upriver. Here is a miscellaneous picture of the Yangtze, with a small fishing boat in the river and farmland on the shore. We also saw quite a few barges on the river, some carrying coal, one carrying new cars, some carrying other goods. We saw fields and fields of corn throughout our travels in China. Our tour guide said that winter wheat and rice are also widely grown. We didn't see any wheat, but we did see rice paddies later in the tour and also fields of soybeans.
We went through two of the three gorges this day, Wu Gorge and Qutang Gorge. Qutang Gorge is the most interesting and beautiful. Here is the exit/entrance to Qutang Gorge - taken from upriver. (A similar picture is on the back of the 5 Yuan note.)
In the afternoon, we took an optional tour to Baidicheng or City of the White Emperor. The city is now on an island due to the river level rising because of the dam. Several people decided to pay to be carried up to the top of the island to tour the buildings there. Most decided to walk.
Finally, here is a pic of our guide there and a dragon where I evidently doomed my children. I was busy looking at the interesting sights and missed the guide's talk about the dragon. My DD said I was supposed to touch the dragon for good luck for my children. However, she neglected to tell me I was supposed to touch the dragon with my right hand. Well, I touched it with my left hand. My DD said "wrong hand", and so I quickly took my hand off the dragon and touched it with my right hand. Then while my DD was explaining to me how I had doomed her and her brothers, I leaned on the figure with my left hand. (I hope it was just a tale.)
