Knitting and books

On Wednesdays I go to Bowen's class and knit with them. Today we had a meeting and decided to do a blanket made of 18 stitch squares. The children felt a 12" square (approximately 36 stitches) would be too overwhelming. This way, if they are excited about the squares they can do a few, and if it feels too laborious one will probably suffice.

Here are their home-made needles:



I didn't give them any guidance on the size of the balls on the end of the needles. I probably should have, but most of my other advice was met with, "I know, I know!" so I decided against it.

I finished the Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd last night (well, this morning actually) at 12:45 am. At 11:30 pm I had tears streaming down my cheeks and thought, I'll never be able to sleep if I stop now anyway, so I went ahead and finished it. It has sad parts, but not Dorothy Allison, Bastard out of Carolina sad (that book left me wrung out emotionally). I recommend both of them, but if edgy books aren't your cup of tea, stay away from Bastard out of Carolina.

One of my Christmas presents was Teacher Man by Frank McCourt. I had the good fortune to see him when he came to Durham several years ago and enjoyed him very much. I've liked his two previous books, and have only just started Teacher Man, but am laughing already. The lovely thing about him is that he is completely untouched by pretention - he's humble, funny, gracious, and probably because he was older when he ascended into fame - he sees the trappings. Plus he was a teacher, how cool is that?

Right now, it's off to watch season two, disc four of the West Wing while I work on the fingers and thumb my second glove (yep, watched a movie, finished a glove, and a book last night - very productive).