I've been so busy, what with trying to finish my project for Big Girl Knits 2 and planning for our family's pending move to Italy*, that I almost forgot:  the fall Knitty will contain one of my patterns, for a pullover.  Woohoo!  Of course, I can't say much more than that, but I offer this photo as a hint. *Travel bulletin:  I've been on a dozen flights in the last 3 months, both transatlantic and within Europe, with both metal dpns and circs, and with not a peep from a single security checkpoint.

I was thinking that my visit to Milan would yield photos of tempting and imaginative knit confections, so I was surprised that several afternoons of  window shopping yielded only three (3!) windows containing any knitwear at all (and not much crochet, even though that seems especially big in the U.S. this season).  Pictured is the best of the bunch, if you can believe it.  Knitwear designers, if we want to keep the popularity of original knitwear high, apparently we aren't going to get huge amounts of help from the Italians.  Or maybe come fall those windows will tell a different story--I hope so. Oh, and the post title?  Checked my e-mail and found out that my two pattern submissions to Knitty were rejected.  And in the time it took me shake myself, hard, and tell myself to get on with it, I got another e-mail, this time accepting my pattern submission for Big Girl Knits 2.  HOORAY! 

I stopped into an interesting LYS today, in Bellagio.  No, not that parody of classic Italian design in the Las Vegas desert!  I mean the Bellagio on Lake Como, in northern Italy, where George Clooney likes to hang out.  In fact, I saw him by the boat dock...not really.  Yes, those are indeed baby bibs; along with yarn, this store also sells bibs, T-shirts and other sundry items of clothing.  I didn't recognize any of the yarn brands (where's the Filatura di Crosa?  the Filati?  the Berroco*?).  No needles or patterns, or at least none visible, and the yarn, aside from the tempting window display, was stacked in boxes on a high shelf behind the counter--no tactile temptation there!  And although I loitered in the store for nearly ten minutes (a really long time in these kinds of circumstances), no one ever appeared to sell anything to me!  No wonder they keep the yarn out of reach. Oh well.  After a splurge at the latest WEBS online sale, I'm finally on the dreaded yarn diet, anyway.  I wish my husband would go on a cigar diet.  This is his favorite store in Heathrow airport.  As one can see from the cigar box labels, the husband likes to practice the art of ignoring good advice.  These labels go on cigarettes in the U.K. too, and they hit every angle, from the high to the low:  motherly and fatherly instinct ("don't make your children breathe your smoke"), consideration for others ("smoking seriously harms you and others around you"), fear of death ("smoking kills"), vanity ("smoking causes ageing [sic] of the skin"), and the dreaded below-the-belt "smoking decreases blood flow and may cause impotence." *Ha ha.  Although it sounds Italian, Berroco is actually a Massachusetts company.

Vacation does that to you--disorients you so you don't know which day it is.  And then there is THIS (pictured), which was totally unexpected; I just wanted to make sure this sweater wouldn't be too small for me, so I did a quick WIP wet-block, and.

Attention Flying Knitters:  I just flew Song from Boston to Florida two days ago and carried on, with no questions asked, a set of metal Skacel double-pointed needles and a small pair of scissors.  I also noticed that just before passing through the security line at Logan Airport, there is now a kiosk where you can purchase a mailer for any items they won't let you carry on (in case TSA suddenly changes their mind about allowable items once again). 

  I just love being simultaneously wide-awake and exhausted at 4 a.m., simply because your body thinks it's still in Paris.  Oh well; if the husband insists that you accompany him on one of his business trips, then it's hard* to complain about being dragged to the City of Light (see why it got that name?).  Incidentally, this photo was taken from our hotel room balcony; the man does like to travel in style. So here I am in my pajamas, blogging, working away on the happy cat hat and trying not to wake the children.  No photos of the hat just now, sorry; it's supposed to be an Xmas gift for the teenaged stepdaughter, and she has been granted blog access (although I'm sure she has better things to do than snoop around in Stepmom's blog).  "Trying not to wake...?"  Yes, those rabies tags clink together quite musically, reminding me of...sleigh bells?!  I fully expect the small ones to come racing down the stairs at any moment, yelling "Santa's early!" *but clearly not impossible