Where Do I Start?

I've been away at a family reunion for a week. It was a whirlwind trip to the Maritimes. First, I flew my favourite airline (Porter) to Moncton, NB, picked up a rental car and drove to Elizabeth's in Prince Edward Island. I stayed with her and her family for two nights.

We visited the Belfast Mini-Mill, had lunch in their tea room and got a tour of their facility. They were processing a $4500 bag of qiviut that someone had sent them after skinning a hide from a muskox from his herd. Of course, I had to buy some qiviut so I picked up 4 of these 2 oz. bags (called 'Evening Sparkle') containing a sparkly blend of silk, alpaca, merino and qiviut; two for me and two for Mo (who is going through a very difficult time right now).

The next day we went to 'town' (Charlottetown) to do some shopping at Fabricville (the eastern Canada version of Fabricland) and have lunch. At Fabricville, I discovered I could used my Fabricland Premier card. I discovered they were selling fat quarters for only $1.25! So I snagged a few:

We then had lunch and parted ways and I drove downtown. A trip to Northern Watters Knitwear had been recommended. There, I bought a skein of Kidazzle sock yarn. I recalled from my workshop with Cat Bordhi last year at about this time, that she had recommended it.

It was the only skein left. Fortunately I liked the autumnal colours.

I then drove back to New Brunswick to join my family members for our big family reunion. Basically we went from one huge meal to the next over the subsequent 5 days. It was a lot of fun and I look forward to visiting them all again sometime.

On Monday, I drove to Moncton to check out Cricket Cove and bought 2 skeins of tan Opal yarn for my Fauxberry scarf weaving

and a skein of Opal sock yarn in the Vincent van Gogh "Starry Night" colourway for my knitting on the flight home.

I then went to the Moncton Fabricville and found this very Mexican-looking fabric which I may use for place mats and napkins.

I also found this linen/cotton tea towelling. It wasn't as fancy as the stuff I had seen in Charlottetown (and passed up) but I've never seen linen/cotton tea towelling at any Fabricland in Ontario.

On the plane home I finished the second Practice Makes Perfect IV sock,

and this afternoon the second sleeve (and last piece) of my cabled cardigan. Now I just need to wet-block all the pieces in preparation for sewing up and knitting on the button band. This will be my 2012 Rhinebeck sweater if the weather cooperates.

I have tons of housework to catch up on since I got home. The most pressing issue is to get my office cleared out of sewing and knitting stuff and convert it back to an office/guest room.

I acquired a desk today which will make a good sewing table and Skip and I wrangled it downstairs into the basement where my new sewing area will be created.  I have out-of-town guests staying with us over Thanksgiving weekend and this is motivating me to get some things organized to prepare our house for receiving guests.

Skip's radiation therapy has started with 2 treatments down and 13 to go. I am very, very grateful we have skilled practitioners nearby at the cancer unit of the local hospital and that we don't have to get up at an ungodly hour to make the commute into Toronto for his treatments. It's a 10 minute drive for us and I have found a place where I can legally park on the street only a couple of blocks away. Things could be better but they certainly could be a lot worse. Skip went golfing after today's treatment and has a tee time arranged for after his treatment tomorrow.