Ok, so it's not really cool, but it's cooler, which is good because I thought we were going to keel over with all this heat. Yesterday it actually rained big fat soppy raindrops which was nothing short of glorious. The kids and I walked up to take the bus to pick up some craft supplies for my next few articles and Evelyn looked up at the sky and said "it is so beautiful today!" That's my girl. Indeed it is.
Taking the bus, always a good way to fill up an afternoon, was highly entertaining. Mostly because Briton, who used to ride trains and buses every day of his life, kept saying "I've never been to a bus station before!" and "What is this cord thing?" while Evelyn, who hasn't ridden public transit since she was a baby, sat in her seat and looked like a pro.
Today it's creeping back up into hotter temps. Not the horrible three digits of last week, but warm none the less. Enough so that playing outside comes in short bursts. So in between playing (Briton informs me that he has secretly been training to be a wizard for the past several years and the red rubber ball he carries with him is actually a force field that protects him at all times. He's telling me now because it's time for Evie to start her training, and he thought I should know what they are up to) we've been baking cookies - this, by the way, is my new favorite recipe, although I add 1/4 rolled oats to it, building pillow forts and knitting up pillow cases for a project I'm writing up this week. Strange, but it almost feels like winter with all this indoor coziness, except that we're all wearing flip flops and shorts.
So here's the funny thing about the pillow cases. When I first started knitting, back in college when I was poor and didn't have much time (not that I do now, in fact, looking back, life was positively leisurely compared to now!) I picked up some absolutely enormous knitting needles at Goodwill. These things were huge, bigger around by far than my thumb. And then I set about trying to knit with regular old, cheapo acrylic yarn, what I now know would be sport or double knitting weight. But of course, then I had no clue that such distinctions existed. I wanted to knit, I had no money to buy anything fancy much less take lessons, so I started to knit. It turned out horribly, all holey an loose. Eventually I figured out that I needed smaller needles and went off to attempts simple scarves and hats. And I've never knit with big needles until last night.
This fall I made new throw pillows for the couch and they are already trashed. Pillows get a lot of use in our house, especially the ones on the couch, and they never last too long. The kids make piles of them to play in or lie on, Will and I bunch them up trying to get comfortable on the couch, even the dog gets into it, pulling them to one end or another of the couch she is allowed on and then kneading it until it's just right. So yeah, the pillows I made are looking pretty ratty. I should probably invest in some better quality fabric so they will last longer, but then again, they might not, so I don't. Since my little knitting crazy began I've been wanting to knit some covers for the pillows, something soft and squishy and definitely washable, so the kids helped me pick out some pretty burnt orange yarn as thick around as a woolly bugger caterpillar (so they informed me) and I picked up some honker needles. Not quite as big as the set I had in college, but thick enough. And wow, do they knit up fast. Who knew (I know, everyone but me probably). I might not have given up knitting if I'd had these babies. Live and learn...