Mountain, Meet Mohammed, and the (Garden) Plot Thickens

When I left to teach this morning, I noticed that at least one bud on each of my daffodil plants has now bloomed. When I bought the bulbs last fall, I bought a pack of fancy daffodils. Three bulbs each of a yellow and orange, a frilly white and peach, and a pink and white. I was particularly looking forward to the pink and white, because I've never seen them before. So today I took a look at all my pretty blooms.

Do you see any pink? I don't.

So apparently I was mistaken about the adoption of the jonquils, and we're looking at a hostage situation, in which my pink daffodils were taken in exchange for the little yellow jonquils. Does anyone have any experience in daffodil hostage negotiation? I really wanted pink daffodils!!!

To be honest, the situation could have escalated at any time in the past week, as I've been a bit distracted. I haven't seen my husband in nearly a month, and only for a few days then, because of his wildly insane and abusive work requirements. Well, it turns out that he's busy at work about 100 miles from here this week, which is too far for a commute on top of a ten hour work day, but is not too far for a two day visit when you're only slightly employed. Mohammed couldn't get to the mountain, the mountain had to go to Mohammed. So I drove down to see him Tuesday, and spent Wednesday in the hotel room getting some much needed sleep (I tend to sleep a bit like a rock when I'm not home, since we live too close to train tracks here) and taking a little time to knit something just for me.

It's my New Beginnings Project from the Knitters Review Retreat last fall. The requirements were I think just that it be something for us, and this is one of the very few sweaters that I love everything about (Alice Starmore's Durrow from Celtic Collection). Almost every pattern I see I think I would change something about - the sleeves, the neckline, something. Not this one. And even though I didn't do the colors that it was designed for, I would if I could find them! These colors aren't quite right in the photo - I had to do some adjusting to get the cable to show up, they aren't quite so day-glo in real life. I'm using the sadly discontinued but really lovely Rowan Shetland Aran, which is an alpaca/wool blend, and the colored yarn is actually AC Moore's cashmere yarn, because it matched the gauge so well for me.

I had just finished the ribbing section along the bottom there, so did the cable and color work Wednesday. It was lots of fun to get to the point that the cable and color looked intentional and like something rather than those messy beginning periods where you can't really tell what's going on. I found myself stopping almost everyother row to giggle and fawn over the beauty. The yarn is fantastic, the pattern is fun, and I'm very much looking forward to getting it done... which is going to have to wait. I have a few things that involve income that have minor deadlines to them, so they have to come first... but Durrow will be waiting in the wings, ready to fly...