Small Victories

Slowly, our summer improves. Since summer easily extends through September, there is still plenty of time to enjoy weekend afternoons and many evenings on the patio. Last Sunday, we finished off a batch of Limoncello Fizzy Sangria that we had made for a lab member’s moving away party. It was a big success at the party and very refreshing. It also looks good photographed with the sun shining through it:

We got the recipe from 101 Sangrias and Pitcher Drinks by Kim Haasarud. The publisher is Wiley, who I thought published mostly textbooks. Hmmm….

I also finished knitting a crazy sock:

The pattern is Chouwa from Knitted Socks East and West by Judy Sumner. Chouwa means harmony, and this sock obviously bypasses that concept, but since I have so few wild socks, I say it’s a keeper. The best part of knitting this sock was that I figured out how to knit stockinette in the round while reading. Using my iPad, and making the text large, I was able to read and knit simultaneously! This made the stockinette portion fly by, and I didn’t have to decide whether I wanted to read or knit.

Now, I can knit many of my more vividly colored variegated sock yarns into simple stockinette socks without becoming bored to tears. That is a victory in my book. I even started a new sock in that very vein:

That yarn is Seacoast Panda (merino/bamboo) in Cinco de Mayo. And it’s stripey!

Kitty #34 would like me to say that reading and knitting is nothing compared to her victory. She made it up onto M’s lap!

Usually as she walks around she keeps up a constant meowing commentary, but one morning she was quiet, and she took M by surprise (I’m told she was in “super secret kitty, silent, stealth, invisibility mode”–something beyond human comprehension). He let her stay up there, blissed out, for several minutes; he even pet her a bit, being careful not to rub his eyes before washing his hands. Lucky for Kitty #34, he isn’t super allergic to her. She purred, which she informs me was real love-purring, whereas when she sits on my lap, she pity purrs. Hmmm… Pity Purring…like one of my babysitters when I was little would say when she thought we were fibbing about something, “My Great Aunt Fanny.”