Blocking helps a lot.

Or maybe, blocking plus time for the "sweater letdown" to dissipate helps a lot:



Here's a truer-color shot of it - no flash. The collar's a little rumpled so it's not a PERFECT photo but you get the idea.

Even though this is cute "bare" (no top on underneath), I think I will usually/always wear it over a t-shirt or turtleneck. For several reasons:

1. I don't relish the thought of washing the thing every time I wear it. And not-washing-it after I've worn it all day offends my sensibilities.

2. The classrooms where I teach vary widely in temperature. Some will be too hot, even in the dead of winter, for this sweater. I want to be able to take it off. (Without causing a scandal, I mean.)

3. I had to do some pretty serious strap-adjustment so I didn't have VBS with this. And if I were, say, waving my arms around like they were cilia, the straps would move back to their standard locations. (I'm not a "stand there and look pretty and never move" kind of woman). (And no, braless is NOT an option. Just look at the picture. And I'm unwilling to subject myself to an underwire strapless just to look cute in a sweater.)

there's also the fact that the collar's just loose enough, if I bent TOO far forward, you can see "all the way to Christmas" (as the old punchline goes). So I think modesty is going to require a t-shirt (or perhaps a nice camisole) under this.

Here's another shot. I'm mainly showing this because my expression is so odd...the camera caught me before I had a chance to put my face into position. (I use the timer function on my camera.)



I realize from these both that I'm considerably higher-busted than the model that the sweater was shown on in the book. (Well, I'm fatter, too, but that kind of goes without saying). I've had to alter sewing patterns because the neckline was too low for me, and I have certain RTW things that I have to use strategically-placed brooches with (again: to avoid the "seeing all the way to Christmas" when I bend forward. When you teach - particularly when you teach young men who are not far off in age from you - you become quite conscious of that.)

I also made muffins this morning:



Mmmm, muffins.

This is a recipe my mom used to make a lot when my brother and I were kids. It's pretty simple:

2 cups standard baking mix (e.g., "Bisquik." If you have moral objections to baking mixes or don't keep it around, you can take 2 cups of flour and add a tablespoon or so of baking powder, and probably 3/4 teaspoon salt, and maybe a little oil as well..)

Mix this with 1/4 cup sugar and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon.

In another bowl, beat an egg slightly (just until it's mixed) and add 1/2 cup applesauce and 1/4 cup of milk (richer milk makes them better; I usually use skim so they're a little bit less tender. You could probably add a tablespoon of melted butter as well if you like). Mix these things up and add them to the dry ingredients.

Spoon it into a prepared (greased) muffin tin or into muffin cups. (it makes 12 standard sized muffins). Bake at 400 degrees for about 12-15 minutes.

When the muffins come out of the oven, mix about a 1/2 cup of sugar with 1/2 teaspon cinnamon (I usually use more but then I like cinnamon). Also melt some butter or margarine (I use that Smart Balance stuff which is really pretty good and it also doesn't have trans fats or as much saturated fat as butter...). Dip the tops of the muffins in the butter and then in the cinnamon sugar.

They're best hot but you can heat them back up.

*******

I wound up going to Denison after all. Got to a couple of antique stores and the lovely used-book store (I do not get there often enough). (The owners of the bookstore are very active in the local Orthodox Church and I have also seen the Orthodox priest in the bookstore - not sure if he's a co-owner, or was helping out, or just visiting. But he was there. I also love that there's an Orthodox Church in Denison. Not that I'm Orthodox or necessarily would ever become Orthodox, but it just makes me happy that a group with such a rich history and such a tradition of honoring learning has a presence near me.)

Bought a bunch of things, including 3 Ngaio Marsh mysteries I did not own and had not read yet. And a David Quammen book of essays, and The Dante Club (which I had been wanting to read but didn't quite want to spring for in full trade-paperback price). And something called "The Uses of the Past," which is apparently a philisophical history tracing ideas from ancient societies up to today. (This was the store where I found that wonderful history of Roman Britain I read this summer. Alas, no new fascinating books on ancient history quite like that, but "The Uses of the Past" looks to be good and challenging in a Great Books kind of way.)

For the rest of the afternoon/day, I've got a novel propped up in front of me and I'm doing whatever simple stockinette knitting I have. (It's a Jeffrey Farnol novel - he was apparently a fairly prolific writer of historical novels/historical romances. I bought a copy of "The Happy Harvest" some months ago at an antique store simply because I liked the dust jacket and I opened it up and read a couple pages and it sounded fun. I'm actually reading one of his earlier novels called "The Broad Highway." I had been led to believe it was a pre-quel to the book I had - and Powell's had an ex-library copy for like $3 so I bought it when I was ordering some other stuff. It's not, as far as I can tell, a true prequel, but it's still good. Good in the kind of "I can picture the landscape, I can imagine what the characters look like" way. A FUN book. An escapist book. It's set in Regency [or perhaps just pre-Regency] Britain and it's about an educated young man who, after being insulted by his rich uncle's will [all the riches to a profligate cousin; 10 guineas to Peter, the hero of the piece] takes off on a walk across Britain to "find himself" [or so they'd say in modern times; Peter is rather more seeking employment and a place in the world]).

It constantly amazes me how many writers there were out there who are not known today. (Farnol has a small, perhaps developed partly as a couple's in-joke, "Appreciation Society".)

But - after all, before the television age, books were many people's main form of recreation. And so there are SO many books out there that came out from perhaps the 1890s to 1955 or so...I know my grandma had lots of them - some inherited from her father, who taught himself to read as an adult and then was never without some kind of reading material for the rest of his life. Others that she doubtless bought. I wonder...living in the TINY town that she did, without a car - she never learned to drive and when her husband was off at the lumber camps everyone in the family walked everywhere...where did they sell books? Did they mail-order them? Did Sears and Roebuck sell them? Or were they acquired on the rare trips to Green Bay or Chicago, and saved and savored one by one? I have such a plethora of books, such an overabundance. I can't quite imagine getting, say, four books to read a year and having to stretch them out to last...or bargaining with friends to swap books but get the ones I really loved back...)