For a knitting blog, this one has been pretty pathetic with the content of late. I am knitting, I am. I just can’t show you much of the Shibui project, and the little boy sweater I’ve been cooking up needs a good stiff blocking before it will lie still for photography. In desperation, I offer you a scintillating glimpse of… stockinet and 2×2 ribbing!

This, friends, is the better part of a Frost Flowers sleeve. More mindless knitting can scarcely be conceived of, but it’s about what I’ve been good for this week under the dread thumb of the virus. I was afraid this Trendsetter Spiral (and I hereby swear it’s the last time you’ll see me knit with such unnatural fiber – I trusted Norah Gaughan, but now I think her patrons told her she had to do something with this yarn and she just gave the salute and did the best she could. If I hadn’t been so wet behind the ears as a knitter when I took this project on, I would have substituted a decent cotton at least.) was going to look like a pox victim knit up, but I’ve decided it’s more like the hide of some desert-dwelling feline. The African Plastic Sand Leopard, recently extinct and known to Western science only through the appearance of its skin in ceremonial robes among the native tribal elders.

But hey, check out those surprise flowers that suddenly popped up in my garden! I’ve been so tickled all year to see what my new yard is going to do next. I’ve added almost nothing to it because every month brings something unexpected sprouting up just where I’d thought about putting some new plant or other. Who knew I was the owner of a foxglove and a calla lily?

I’m also the owner of some fabulous discount Rowan Plaid in Soft Kelp:

I’m thinking Leaf Lace Pullover ala Teva Durham. I loved knitting with Rowan Plaid so much during the construction of Lightning and my very first sweater for my mom that I had to spring for some more at half price. And a skein of sock yarn, because who can resist discount sock yarn? I love you, Webs. In the interest of full disclosure, this is not my own stash enhancement of late. On the whole, I’ve been pretty good, considering that I work in a yarn store and they give me a wicked discount. Last night I caved and came home with a skein of Artyarns Supermerino 4 in colorway 139, the most enchanting mix of sky blues and grass greens. It was new in the store and I could tell that it wanted so badly to be a wee baby hat for our neighbors’ firstborn, due in September. I had to take pity on it and give it what it wanted. And then there was Habu bamboo laceweight. Oh, the happy knitter born into an era where technology makes such treasure possible. Get thee to Knit/Purl, on foot or online (it might not be up on the site until Monday or Tuesday), if you don’t have easy access to Habu itself. It’s new, it’s fabulous, you’ll wonder where it’s been all your lace-knitting life. I brought home a skein of shimmery, sleek charcoal, 515 yards for the absurdly reasonable price of $15 and a nickel. It’s so pretty I almost don’t trust myself to photograph it. I want to mail it off to Jared so it can have its portrait taken properly, but I know he’d never give it back. Victorian Lace Today, here I come!

I’m happy to report that two-year anniversaries are just as nice as one-year anniversaries. Last year we spent June 18 at Mr. G’s parents’ beach house. It was kind of grey and drizzly for June, and the coast tends to sock in with fog, but that just made for more cozy indoor snuggling. This year we went upscale. We traipsed out the Columbia Gorge, and the weather turned beautiful. It’s hard to top the Gorge for scenic splendor:

Here’s the hubby’s two-years-of-wedlock portrait. He looks miserable, right?

…and mine…

(Pssst… that’s my newly sewn skirt. I heart Amy Butler fabrics. My attraction made all kinds of sense when I realized she works for Rowan.) We took the old Columbia Gorge Highway, a twisty little two-lane road built in the early 1900s that clings to the skirts of the cliff. The modern I-84 runs just below (all the way to Boston), and it’s about as pretty a trip as you can make on an interstate, but the historic road has more charm and spins you right past the feet of numerous waterfalls and grandpappy conifers.

Here’s where we were going:

Nothing like a little old-fashioned romance in a 1920s hotel above the river. There was strolling in the gardens, watching the cliff swallows wheel and dart over the waterfall, a vodka gimlet at the bar before supper (for me; abstemious Mr. Garter had iced tea), dressing for dinner (the wedding stole made an appearance), a slow dance on the lawn under the stars (we needed a little gentle exercise after the endless dinner courses), the bed turned down with a rose and tasty little cakes on the bedside tables… in short, the works. Next year we’ll probably go camp out in the wilderness for contrast, but it was fun to treat ourselves this once.

The next morning we took a little spin up out of the Gorge and into the surrounding farmland before we had to mosey back to the city. The views are just as marvelous when you’re not looking at the river, it turns out:

For those of you who haven’t been to Oregon yet, this is Mt. Hood. You can see her from lots of places in Portland, but not quite this close and personal. Hood is only 11,289 feet high — nothing to many of the Rockies; a footstool beside the Himalayas — but because of the way she rears up out of the hills alone, she’s absolutely majestic. This mountain always makes me think of the ancient Greeks and their gods on Olympus. If we have local gods, I suspect they call this peak home.

Back in Stumptown, I scampered off to meet my girl Katrin for an afternoon of window shopping and manicures, partly to make up for the way we botched her birthday over the weekend and partly just because it was a Tuesday and it happened that neither of us had to work. I believe this was our first outing that didn’t involve knitting — we realized too late that we could have been wielding the needles whilst we soaked our feet in the pedicure spa, alas. I have got a little knitting to show you, but this post runneth over and needeth no more pictures. I’ll save it for tomorrow or Sunday. Happy Summer, everybody. The Farmer’s Almanac would like to offer you this advice for your weekend: Grate potatoes and apply to sunburned skin. The starch will cool and soothe the burn. They’d also like you to know that tomorrow is the best day to cut hair to encourage growth.

Sorry for the long silence. There was a week of extraordinary busy-ness, with two jobs, much report editing, a final exam paper, a final sewing class, a mad dash to the airport. Delays. Wailing babies. No sleep. Inter-terminal sprints (an Olympic event in the making, should the Games ever come to Newark, NJ), with pauses to be air-jetted in some really obnoxious new security machines. Boston, braving the Harvard commencement mayhem. The excellent Fogg Art Museum (my boy Inness, Whistler, David Smith, and many other favorites). The Worcester Art Museum (Hi, Mrs. Perez Morton! Hi! Hi, all you other old buddies from art history class – I didn’t know so many of you lived in Worcester!). And then, a wedding:

(Click for ginormous and not blurry)

This is my bestest four-year roommate, confidante, instructor in fashion and craftiness, and co-conspirator in all facets of college life, Mia. She wed her sweetheart Eric last Saturday and is pretty much the happiest woman on the planet. (At least I hope she still is. She is a newly minted doctor and started her internship on Wednesday. Pray for her, my friends.) And as you can see, I am very happy to see her so happy. I was also just about this gleeful when she let me play with her spinning wheel on Tuesday when we met up back in Boston after the nuptial festivities. The extremely ugly little woolturds I spun in no way reflect the loveliness and seductive qualities of her Majacraft Rose. Even the gentlemen present were hypnotized by its awesome dual-treadle action. Eric’s status as a suitor worthy of my beloved friend was sealed when he gave her this wonder on her last birthday.

In the midst of all this fun was a dash through two other states, a memorial party for my grandmother that became a full-blown reunion of both sides of the family, and a visit to the legendary Webs (I wanted to pitch a tent and move in). We came home. I got laid out by a vicious sore throat, which is still gnawing at my vocal cords with its nasty pointy teeth, but is giving way to a cough. Huzzah.

Anyway, it’s been a busy time. I’ll show you some piddly little scraps of knitting soon, and the skirt I just finished in my beginner’s sewing class. It’s actually pretty cute, even though I didn’t get the zipper exactly right. But right now I need some beauty rest. Tomorrow is Anniversary Day chez Garter, and the hubby has lined up a lovely romantic getaway at the Columbia Gorge Hotel. Scraps of knitting and skirts with wobbly lines of stitching totally look better in luxe jazz-age hotels, right? Right. I somehow suspect there are very few papas among my readers, but if you’re out there, Happy Father’s Day, dudes.

After exactly three weeks, our furry little adventurer is home. He’s safe and sound, but for a couple of little abscesses and 15% of his body weight. A kind soul who lives more than a mile away saw our poster in a coffee shop and realized this was the cat who’d been hanging around his place, demanding lap time on the front porch and fighting with his own cat. I was away at an educational symposium all morning with the car; Mr. Garter leapt onto his bicycle and pedaled up there, and this fellow had our kitty in his arms in the driveway. He passed Mingus over, and the little booger hissed, realized who Mr. G was, and started purring like mad. The neighbor was kind enough to lend his cat carrier and chauffeur Mingus back to our doorstep.

Thanks to each one of you for your prayers and good wishes to us and our errant kitty, and for all your little kindnesses to strangers. As much as the news might make you think otherwise, the world is full of good people helping one another, and that makes it a beautiful place. Especially right now.