Ponderings

Now I'm feeling like I need to get back to knitting. Yesterday morning on the Metro train I went diving into my backpack to look for my knitting bag, and realized that I'd left it at home. Rats. There's a sock that I'm trying to get going on; I'll have to remember to take it with me when we go out shopping for a new suit for Bruce and a nice winter coat and a pair of comfortable dress shoes (is there such an animal out there?) for me.

Our church, along with St. John the Baptist Orthodox Church are the beneficiaries of an annual event that is hosted by the Russian Embassy. This event is called “Maslentisa”. It is a winter festival that is traditionally celebrated in Russia, and takes place during the Cheesefare Week. In the Orthodox Church, we call the period before Pascha (which would be known as Easter in the West) the Great Fast. First, we start to abstain from meat, then, we start to abstain from dairy products. So in Russia, before the Revolution, Maslenitsa was a big holiday. Remember that back then they didn't have refrigerators and so forth, so they had to use up all the cheese, butter, etc. People would make blinis and serve sour cream and butter.

At this event there's going to be blinis, caviar, smoked fish, and other delicacies. I'm not so sure about caviar, but since this may well be my only opportunity to try Beluga caviar, I might as well go for it. There will also be entertainment. On the invitation it says business attire or Russian costume. Russian costumes - now that piques my interest! I'm going to have to remember to take my camera and make sure I have an extra disk.

I wonder if SecState Condoleeza Rice will show up? That would be really awesome if she really did show up . . .

I see that Meg Swansen has put up a picture of the Cuff-to-Cuff sweater at Schoolhouse Press. The technique used, intarsia in the round, looks very intriguing and I'm interested in how Meg does it. I haven't received the newsletter yet - hopefully it'll come today. Has anyone got it yet? What's the gauge?