I'm back.

Break was good, but too short. Sixteen hours each way on a train (if things are on time) is too long to travel for only a week's vacation.

I did get a few FOs cranked out:

First, I finished the Hawaii socks. I used a round heel on these and a round-toe shaping (as described in Folk Socks, this is the one where you k 6, k 2 tog, then knit a bunch of rows, then k5, k2 tog, and so on). The round toe is my new favorite toe shaping, it fits well and is fairly easy to do. And it looks good. And it doesn't involve the Kitchener stitch.

Then, I finished the Huron Mountain socks. I did these as per the the pattern, except I added one more repeat of the last lice row, because my feet are apparently longer than the "women's medium" that Nancy Bush writes her patterns to.

I also made the Corps of Discovery hat that I got a kit for at Christmas. This one was fun - I now know how to do a two-color cabled cast on, and I am now really sure of how to do short rows with wraps (and how best to pick up those wraps). The directions on this one were really good and clear. The yarn is interesting too - it comes from a crossbreed (called Columbia) that is used both for meat and wool. The wool is a bit scratchier than some, but it "feels" right for the hat. Oh yeah, my hands really softened up knitting it too, because the wool still had the lanolin in it.

I did take a little break from my Lenten stashdiet. I bought a few books at the Border's up there (no knitting books though; they didn't have the ones I was looking for). I got the Crosswicks Journal set by Madeline L'Engle and a copy of Insect Dreams (supposedly a "sequel" to Kafka's "Metamorphosis" as if Gregor had survived..). I also bought a book on tulips. I got some fabric, too, although I was told some of it was a "late birthday present" (and I didn't have to pay for it myself).

But now, it's back to austerity. Although, I am exempting garden purchases, because this is getting to be now-or-never time for topsoil addition and lawn fertilizing. I'm going to try to spend at least 1/2 hour at the end of each day weeding or cultivating or planting flower seeds so that I will have a good garden this year.