Day 14 and a Lot More (mostly Stream of Consciousness)

Today’s offering: a zipper pull or stitch marker

While in Innsbruck, we had some time to explore and shop on our own. On the main square where we were meeting up was a yarn and fabric shop, Kapferer. They had some lovely embroidered goods, fabrics, and upstairs sewing notions and yarn.

Their window display is what caught my eye.

What?? Yarn on the cozy chair?? I had to explore…

Early on our trip a fellow knitter asked me if I had knit my hat. She, too, was wearing a Musselburgh. Rebecca and I became instant knit buddies.

She also sported her striped, Where’s Waldo scarf and I wore my green Swallowail shawlette and Latvian mittens.

I knew I had to find her and tell her about the yarn shop. 

Once I found her, we went inside to explore. A couple of days earlier, one of the ladies selling her hand-knit items at a booth showed me the yarn she was using to knit a pair of socks. I certainly don’t need to add to my sock yarn stash but this yarn had yak content. You don’t see that every day. I was intrigued.

(Scroll down to red text to avoid knitting content)

I found it at Kapferer! Regia 4-ply Merino Yak Color - 58% merino wool, 28% nylon, 14% yak. 

And the label gives the name for wool in 24 languages, nylon in 18, and yak in 14!

I have never seen this yarn here in North America. Granted I haven’t really been doing any yarn shopping in the last 10 or 15 years except for particular projects.

With that amount of nylon content, the socks should be very durable. The yak and merino content will make them very cozy.

When I knit a heel flap/wedge heel, I usually do an eye of partridge (EOP) pattern - a staggered rib as follows;

Row 1:* sl1, K1. Repeat from * to the last stitch, K1.

Row 2: Sl1, Purl

Row 3: Sl1, *Sl1, K1. Repeat from * to the last stitch, K1.

Row 4: Sl1, Purl

Repeat these 4 rows until the heel flap is square.

After that, I knit to 1 stitch past the centre, K2tog, K1 and turn. 

Then I continue the EOP until I’ve decreased back down to the desired number of sts for the foot:

Purl row: Sl1 purl to end.

Row 1: *Sl1, K1. Repeat until 1 st before the gap, K2tog, K1

Row 2: Sl1, purl to end.

Row 3: Sl1, * Sl1, K1. Repeat from * to 1 st before the gap, k2tog, K1

Row 4: Sl1, Purl to end

This gives you a double thickness on the bottom of the heel (where I wear holes in mine).

If you also wear holes on the balls of your feet, you could do the EOP on the sole sts when you get to that part of the foot, maintaining the pattern for the top of the foot.

Wow! I sure digressed there. But I hope you got my drift.

Oh ya, the old town square where the yarn shop was is also where the building with the famed Golden Roof is located. Maximilian I had it built between 1497 and 1500.

There are 2,657 gilded copper shingles, and fresco and relief decorations. 

Even the sewer access covers depict the Golden Roof as well as the ski jump as Innsbruck hosted the Winter Olympics in 1964 and 1976.

Around the old town, children’s stories are depicted on buildings’ exteriors, for example, Rapunzel’s long braid:

and Pinocchio’s illuminated nose:

This whole building’s facade looked like an Advent calendar.

That night, after a delicious meal, we attended a Tyrolean show. There was lots of singing, yodeling, accordion and zither playing, and dancing. But the highlight for me was the alphorns.(tap the play button twice)

I was hoping they’d ask for a volunteer from the audience to play one. It would have been my opportunity to reprise my epic alphorn playing in 1981 on a boat cruise on Lake Lucern.

Sadly, they didn’t call me up.

Next stop, sunny Lindau, Germany. A delightful little island in Bodensee aka Lake Constance.

Last night was supposed to be a meteor shower. I went outside and in spite of the cloudless sky, full moon, and all the ambient light in my suburban locale, I actually saw one, the first thing I got out there. 

Some Assembly Required

I ordered a mobile bookshelf from Amazon to organize my painting supplies. This is how I had been storing them. Higglety pigglety.

It arrived the next day - a box in a box. The instructions were pretty decipherable so I set to work. The necessary tools were included - a wee Philips screwdriver and a little wrench for tightening the casters. 

The screws would NOT go into the holes so I had to resort to using my cordless drill with the extra long Philips bit and a LOT of downward pressure. The extra power was required to force the screws into the holes.

Thank GOD the casters went in easily because there’s no way I could have exerted enough torque to get them into place. I was actually able to use the cheesy little wrench to tighten them up.

Ta-da!

Much better. 

I might even do some painting this weekend.

Day 13

I was intrigued by the shape and size of this package. The contents were small and lumpy.

How cute! Three charms: 2025, mittens, an a teacup.

Are they a hint of things to come? We shall see…

Today would have been Skip’s 80th birthday. Of course, I still miss him terribly but all the wonderful things and people in my life help me hurt a little less. There are so many fun things to look forward to and of course, I always have some new activity in the planning stages.

The Christmas Market trip really helped boost my spirits. I feel all Christmassy now. I’ve been saving a Christmassy jigsaw puzzle to do and found another one in my stash that I started and completed yesterday.

It was fun to do. 500 piece puzzles are my preferred size, too. They fit on my table well and don’t take me too long to complete. I have lots stacked up for future puzzling.

Advent Stitchy Box Day 12

Today’s treat was a beautiful skein of Classic Colorworks Caroling

Previous skeins in the box went with cross-stitch charts from subsequent days. Let’s see if this is the case for this one. 

My Epic Alpine Christmas Market Tour - Part One

Last spring, I watched a couple of videos that Kara and Nate produced about their visit to 9 countries' Christmas markets in 9 days. It intrigued me to the point I thought it would be fun to do. At our stitch day in July, I mused out loud, "I'm kinda interested in doing one of those Christmas market tours in Europe". My friend, Marilyn, immediately popped up like a prairie dog and said, "I'll go with you". We booked the Insight Alpine Christmas Markets tour two days later.

We decided to fly to Munich a day earlier so we'd have a day to somewhat recover from the flight. I later decided to book a business class seat for the overnight flight. I really wanted to try to sleep for the 8 hour flight. 

A benefit of being in business class is the use of the airport lounges before the flight. I first went to the Signature Suite and had an outstanding gourmet meal of a Winter Salad - maple sherry vinaigrette, whipped ricotta, pumpkin seed pesto, and crispy spaghetti squash; 

Beef Tenderloin with matchstick potatoes, roasted turnip, Romanesco, horseradish butter, and red wine jus; 

dessert was an Apple Mousse Dome with white chocolate yuzu cream, apple chip, and puff pastry. 

Of course I had a tasty rum-based cocktail. Then I headed over to the Maple Leaf lounge to sit in a comfy leather chair until boarding time. 

Once I boarded I got situated in my pod. I was provided with a bottle of water, pillow, quilted seat cover, duvet, and toiletry kit which contained socks, ear plugs, eye mask, toothbrush and toothpaste, Acqua di Parma lip balm and hand cream. 

The TV was at least 20". 

There were also controls for the seat to sit up, recline, or lie flat. And a massage feature which I, of course, employed.

One thing that surprised me was that I was not offered anything to drink upon boarding. Nor anything for over 1.5h after takeoff. I watched the first episode of "Presumed Innocent" on the inflight entertainment channel and listened to an Audible podcast about the invention of e-cigarettes. Although I had brought my own earphones, I used the ones provided.

The flight was pretty smooth but I just couldn't get really comfortable. The seat in the lay flat position was very hard, so my hips and butt weren't that comfortable for sleeping. Oh well, first world problems. I have seen videos of other airlines' business class accommodations and in my limited experience, Air Canada didn't really measure up.

Once we arrived in Munich we made our way through Customs and Immigration. It was not like any airport I'd been in as we were not funneled in the right direction, rather free to roam around and easily could have just left the building before going through the regular government channels. There was a LOT of walking during which I was very grateful to still be ambulatory and able to manage very well. 

One more thing, I used to get bad cramps and achy calves after a couple of previous flights I'd taken. It was to the point that I was concerned enough that I considered seeking medical attention. I now have adopted the use of compression stockings (knee highs) for my air travel since my return flight from Denver last September. It has made a big difference - no more sore legs.

Once I retrieved my suitcase we headed for the airport shuttle bus that would take us to a station only a couple of blocks from our hotel, to which we could easily walk. And it was only 13€.

The Munich Marriott was very modern and nice. The room was huge and had all the amenities including many USB ports for us to plug in our devices for charging. We were too far from the city centre to explore there and instead rested in our room, then later ventured to a nearby grocery store for some snacks to sustain us until breakfast the next morning. We both had a meal on the plane before landing. 

We were both happy to take it easy and enjoyed an evening snack of herbed cream cheese, hummus, sesame bread sticks, and a drink. 

I don't remember much of what we did the next day until meeting up with our tour group in the lobby at 3pm. We were introduced to our guide, Denise, and driver Istvan. We then piled into the bus for a trip to the city centre and the Munich Christmas Market at Marienplaz. 

(to be continued...)

My Advent Stitchy Box So Far

While I was at the Simply Stitching retreat sponsored by Pastime Pieces back in October, I purchased Marlene's curated Advent Stitchy Box. Because I was going to be away at the beginning of December, I entrusted it to Barb to open each day's treat. She then sent me a photo of what was contained in each envelope for the 9 days I was away (more about my trip later).

Day 1 - Mitten-shaped floss drops

Day 2 - Hand-dyed floss - CC Old Blue Jeans

Day 3 - A cozy cross-stitch pattern

Day 4 - hand-dyed floss for the pattern from Day 3

Day 5 - a cozy pair of socks

Day 6 - a pack of #26 Pony tapestry needles with painted white eyes.

Day 7 - the three DMC floss colours to complete the pattern from Day 3 and the backing fabric for the project.

Day 8 - a wooden box with matches and a striker

Day 9 - the pattern and perforated paper that goes with Day 8's box.

Day 10 - A scented soy wax candle - I opened it at Barb's when I dropped in to pick up the box.

Day 11 - A wee bottle of Aleene's Clear Gel Tacky Glue

13 more to go!

Marlene has really done a good job making up these boxes. I've seen some others and this one definitely is right up there with the best ones.