The European adventures have concluded, and I’m back in familiar New York. I’ve bailed my cat out of jail and returned to the routine of packing boxes for the Big Move Out West. Talk about post-vacation reality checks! We’re still working on loading our photos onto the computer – we shot raw images and the computer is apparently a little more geriatric than I would have believed. So unfortunately, we haven’t gotten up to the one of me knitting at the hockey game, or displaying my incredible yarn haul in Milan. But here I am at La Droguerie:

Note the paper bag in my left hand, which contains a modest two skeins of yarn, some beads, and some buttons. We had the Ryan Air baggage restrictions to consider for our flight to Milan, so I held myself well in check. Such was not the case once we reached Milan, which contains what must be one of the best-kept secrets in the knitting world: Lanar. This unassuming shop, tucked back in a courtyard on a street that receives little tourist traffic, caters to a lot of machine knitters and offers some of the best deals on bulk quantities of high-end yarn I’ve ever seen. The yarn appears to come straight from the mill, and they sell it by the half kilo. Friends, I made out like a bandit. For a mere 60 euro, I came away with enough lush chocolate tweed 80% wool / 20% alpaca to make a Teva Durham Cabled Riding Jacket and some soft wine-colored DK/worsted wool/angora for a simple sweater. Pictures of that to come, I promise.

I also finished my Olympic knitting project. I’m not going to display it here just yet because I haven’t come to a decision about whether to submit it for publication. I’m leaning towards just offering the pattern here, and it needs some reworking anyway, but my Spiders will see it in person and the rest of you will see it sooner or later. Sorry to be all mysterious! And now my allotted blogging time is up and I need to dive back into the boxes and wrappings for another hour or so. The blog may be sporadic over the next few weeks, but I promise more consistency beginning in April, when we’re settled in Portland! Thanks for your patience, everyone.