A Girl, 27, and 28

When I went to bed last night, I knew I'd wake up to an adult monarch this morning. The chrysalis had turned dark so I knew it was only a matter of hours 'til the last stage in the metamorphosis.

Sure enough, this morning, I found this waiting for me.

There is no problem having it enclosed in the container for several hours as it gives it time to dry its wings and exercise them a bit.

I took the container outside and got the butterfly to sit on a plant I have in a planter on the table on the deck.

This is what the empty chrysalis looks like - transparent with some markings on it from the wings.

There is a way to determine the sex of the chrysalis but I can't be bothered as it involves the use of magnification and I have misplaced my magnifying glass. I'm happy to wait until it opens its wings after emergence.

Because of the thick black veining on the wings, I know this is a female.

She sat on that plant for a couple of hours, then flew away when I wasn't looking. Hopefully her great-granddaughters will come back here next summer to lay eggs on our milkweed plants.

I have finished two more squares and only have two more out of the thirty to do. This one is the cable pattern from Fiona Ellis' 'Ruddington' cardigan.

Last week I was couldn't find my Carol Feller book, "Contemporary Irish Knits". I hunted high and low, in all the usual places and several of the unusual places. I'm really quite organized when it comes to my knitting books, but I just couldn't find this one.

Finally on Friday night, I looked down between the sofa where I sit to knit and the end table and there it was! So the next square I did was the cable pattern from 'Ardara'.

So that's numbers 27 and 28 done.

Now to decide what cables I'll do for the last two squares.