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Is This What Summer is Like?

Posting again from my vacation spot in Palm Desert, CA.  The Weather Channel says that there might be a record high temperature today in this area.  The old record was 87F.  Not bad for January, huh?

This morning DH and I went for a nice bike ride.  It's really flat here and there are bike lanes on some of the busy streets, so that's nice.  There are also very wide sidewalks, meant for golf carts I guess, and no one walks here, so you can ride freely on them.  I try to get a run or walk in frequently and it's truly California; everyone drives everywhere.  You really have to watch out crossing streets since drivers aren't used to pedestrians.

Anyway, we were riding down El Paseo (the Rodeo Drive of Palm Desert) and I heard a woman ask, "Is this what summer is like?"  (The temperature was in the 70s when were riding.)  I wanted to answer, since I've been here in July and August a few times, "No, at 9:00 in the morning in the summer, it would be 110!"  That's not my favorite time to be here.

I've been doing some knitting and spinning.  One thing about being here at this time of year is that it gets dark early.  The sun goes behind the mountains about 4:30 and it gets cool, so there's lots of indoor time to knit and spin.  I started this beautiful merino/bamboo two days ago and have finished half of it.  I'm doing a semi-woolen, supported long draw so it's going much faster than my usual worsted spinning does.


It's from Zen String (now Wildflower Whimsey) and is spinning beautifully.

I finished my plain vanilla socks that I was making for the YOSS group on Ravelry.  To recap, they're made from Wollmeise 100% superwash merino in the Saami colorway.  I think they look kind of like bright tiger stripes!



I'm working on DH's bedsocks still; they keep fooling me into making them too short, and I've started the Herbivore shawl by Stephen West. I took a class from him when he was in Seattle last year and fell in love with some of his designs.  



 I'm knitting this out of The Sanguine Gryphon Bugga! in the Fairy Wren colorway and love both the pattern and the yarn.  I haven't used any of the Bugga or Skinny Bugga I've collected and now I'll have to.  It's wonderful.  Here's a photo from the other day before I had to go out and find some needles with a longer cable.  I bought some Signature circulars but got 24" cables.  I should have gotten 32" as they probably would have been more useful for more projects, but oh well.  

Time to go to the pool!

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