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Dear Ellen,

It’s easier to bear knitting disasters when in paradise…or at least with a  “Blue Hawaii” in your hand.  I suffered grim loss on our trip to Hawaii…having left the project bag with my German Stockings on the airplane when we de-planed.  (You should always take it seriously when they say look around for any personal items…I didn’t.)  I never even took a picture of it, poor stocking.  It’s not a tremendous loss of quantity of knitting…only about 6 inches on one leg…and the needles were Hiya circulars (inexpensive ones to try the socks on circs method).  But, I did lose the Wollmeise out of which I was knitting them and, as you can guess, am not having great luck replacing it.  I did leave the second skein at home…maybe a pair of regular socks will now be it’s future.

Though the alcohol definitely helped, the fact that Dale helped me find a little yarn shop to buy replacement yarn was probably more effective.  And I do still have the pattern, so when I’m over my mourning I can recommence.  I wonder what other folks do when they lose a project.  Do they try to recreate the lost project?  Do they simply mourn and move on to other projects?  These questions may be akin to that of, “When your dog dies, do you run out and get a new puppy?”  (Readers, I’d be interested in hearing about your lost projects and what you did about them…if you are as absent-minded as me, that is.)  To help the recovery, Dale has also agreed to let me get a kitten…a thought that makes me feel much better.  Maybe the real lesson about comfort is to seek out small animals.

I did bring a second project with me — the Clapotis that I’m making out of Handmaiden Sea Silk.  It’s coming along very well and I loved knitting it in the sunshine.  I thought it looked pretty cool spread out on my leg.  (That’s the wrong side showing.)  I have 1-2 repeats left and then the decrease section so it should be done soon.  I plan on wearing it at one of the wedding functions…not sure it goes with the dress I have planned for the wedding itself, but we’ll see.

Overall, the Hawaii trip was fabulous.  We only had 4 days to ourselves, but we took full advantage of them.  I did a lot of resting and we didn’t feel compelled to go anywhere or do any tourist objectives since we had been in Hawaii just 2 years ago and checked all the boxes then.  We did walk about Waikiki window shopping all the high end stores and what-not.  And I got my picture taken with a movie star.   One day we drove around the island and managed to score a table at sunset at Jameson’s, the best sunset viewing restaurant on the island…very romantic.  Normally you have to have reservations days ahead of time.  Our kharma must have been doing well for us to just walk up and score an outside table with a perfect view.

I don’t think I had time to say before, but we really had a good time with Jenny.  She truly impressed Uncle Dale when she ordered Guiness at the Irish Pub at which we had dinner.  As you can see, we did have fun.  I was thoroughly impressed with the dress she is knitting…just stunning with great yarn choices and Jenny’s amazing craftsmanship.  I hope she’ll come back for a longer visit so we can connect more.  It was nice to have her exclusively to ourselves and to have full focus on her.  I love her personality and outlook…she’s the kind of spirit that influences people to be better people.

If I’m going to have any time to work on that Clapotis, I’d better go — many, many chores on which to catch up before bedtime tonight!

Love, Jan

Post-post-edit to let you know:  Yes, I did register with the airlines lost and found…in both Denver and Honolulu.  The nice lady in Denver tried to pretend that sometimes these things do show up.