Happy Easter!

It's not quite Easter here in California, but it is back in Kansas City, so I'm here to wish you a very happy and relaxing day with family and friends or whatever your tradition might be. Growing up, we were always really far away from our extended family, so holidays like Easter and Thanksgiving usually included a collection of random strangers my parents decided to adopt from the church. It usually made for a very interesting holiday. The stories I could tell.

Today was spent in Sonora and Columbia, Calif., up in the mountains where the Gold Rush started in 1849. Sonora has the cutest little yarn shop, and I'm wishing now I'd taken pictures. It's called By Hand Yarn, and you'll have to google it because I'm blogging from my phone and I'm not sure how to put hyperlinks in the text. (I managed to leave my laptop charger in KC, so I'm attempting to conserve battery power.) Adorable shop, friendly and helpful staff, and a GREAT selection. My big purchase was Malabrigo sock -- enough for a sweater, and a different color for a pair of socks -- and my mom's big purchase was some Kureyon for a cute felted bag. Anyway, if you're ever in Sonora, I highly recommend the shop. We also went around Columbia, which is a cute little historic town with people in period costume and panning for gold and little shops where people were making candles or blacksmithing or working the soda fountain. We also visited the old schoolhouse and the cemetery. I will make a confession here and tell you that I love visiting really old cemeteries. I don't think a single person in this cemetery was born after 1900. It was great to walk around and read the names and see where people had come from, because almost everyone had come from somewhere else because of the gold rush. It was a great, educational day.

I'm making good progress on Green Gable. I've split for the armholes and am cruising down to the waist shaping with gusto. I'm debating whether to make it cap-sleeved or elbow-length sleeves. Opinions? I have plenty of yarn, so I could make it long-sleeved if I really wanted to, but I thought elbow-length sleeves might be more seasonally appropriate. I didn't bring any sock needles, so I have been prevented from casting on with my new Malabrigo sock yarn. Focusing on one project is really good for me, I think. I will confess, however, that Green Gable was not originally what I cast on to bring to California with me. No, I spent Tuesday evening casting on 238 sts by tubular cast on, which, while it is the most beautiful cast on ever devised, it is also the most fiddly cast on ever devised. It took me an entire disc of Arrested Development to complete the cast on alone. But of course, after so many of you told me to knit Green Gable... I decided to. Because I am the most fickle knitter in the history of the world.