A Gaping Hole and A Big Mess

We've got a gaping hole in our house...

SO incredibly excited to be getting our new window and getting rid of that awful drafty monstrosity.  Not that the new window isn't a monstrosity.  It's going to fit into the same opening.  It's so big that the owner of the company came to measure a second time after we ordered it and he's here today to supervise.  (Bet the workers love that!)  And I bet you thought the "Big Mess" in the title of this post was referring to the mess they are making to put the window in.  Nope!

Here's the big mess:

I've gotten the center panel (8 repeats of the 52 row chart) of my Celes Shawl finished! It took me a lot less time than I thought (about a week).   And I've picked up the 530 stitches around the edge so I can start attaching the edging...

Hard to see it in this picture since I've only gotten two repeats of the edging done.  The blue yarn is another provisional cast on that had to be done at the beginning of the edging.  So, it's going to look like a big mess for a while, until I can get more of the edging done.... one stitch will come of this needle every other row.  So, the time I apparently saved getting the center panel done quickly, will likely be used getting this edging done.  Maybe I'll be surprised again at how quickly it goes....

In Other Knitting News....
I went to Connecticut over the weekend to visit my mom and my sister and my nephews.  We watched two of my nephews in a soccer tournament and I got to visit and chat with my other nephew while they played. I loved seeing them.  They are so cute, getting so tall and growing up so fast.  It was a lot of fun.

Oh yeah, the knitting.  While I was visiting, I helped my mom get re-started knitting a sock!  We got her cast on and started on the ribbing and I'll talk her through the rest on the phone when she gets to the sticky parts.  I forgot to take a picture.

In Book News:
I finished 212: A Novel (Ellie Hatcher) by Alafair Burke (click there to go to Amazon). Loved. It.  It was a great police detective mystery, trying to find out who killed a young college student.  Lots of twists and turns.   She writes very well, stringing you along and making you want to know what is happening next.

I also read Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1) by Stephenie Meyer (click there to go to amazon).  I was on the fence about whether or not to read this, knowing it was a young adult book.  BUT, I just read all the Hunger Games books and loved them and those were for young adults too.  My next reservation was that I knew it was about vampires and that's just not a subject I'm thrilled about. But, then my friend Elaine (hi Elaine! and Steve!) told me she and her sister both read the whole series and they loved it.  She didn't think it would be what I was thinking it would be.  So, I decided to read it.  It was great!  Much better than I thought it would be.  While I did have some eye-rolling moments with the teenage "I'm not talking to you because I shouldn't but now I'm talking to you because I can't help it but I really shouldn't because it's dangerous for you but you smell so good" parts, the other parts were very engaging.  There was adventure and excitement, especially toward the end when the bad guy is coming and Bella is in BIG trouble. (I don't think that's saying too much or spoiling anything....)

I had a discussion with my 13 year old nephew about the book this weekend and he agreed with me about the eye-rollling mushy stuff.  He has read the series and overall seemed to like them but had some other complaints about them.  He started to tell me about them but then I made him stop since I hadn't read the others yet.  We'll talk again when I've read them!