Cologne and the Cathedral

The shopping streets in Cologne look pretty much like those in any big city, except the signs are in German. People seem to dress a little better in Europe than in the US - I think in the whole trip we only saw a couple of teenage boys with baggy shorts hanging around their hips. We saw one store window with a display of what they called "rap" clothes. Well-fitting jeans were the usual dress code. And European men commonly wear scarves, women too.This is the cathedral, one of the largest medieval cathedrals in Europe. Gorgeous, isn't it.

And here's what is right next to it. Also note the graffitti, which is everywhere in all the cities. Not on the cathedral, at least!

Impossible to get a picture of the interior - this is a sample.

And these are the original medieval stained glass windows - most of them were damaged in the War and replaced. The older ones are more intricate and beautiful.

This is allegedly the tomb of one of the Wise Men of the Christmas story. We'd like to believe he is in this beautiful gold casket, but who really knows.

Next time, cruising down the Rhine to Koblenz.

From Amsterdam to Germany

Leaving Amsterdam, we traveled a small waterway down to the Rhine, where we next visited the German town of Xanten. Here's one of the pretty shopping streets. Xanten was a Roman garrison town 2000 years ago, and most of the Roman ruins are gone. What is here to see are medieval buildings, including the town gate, below. From the gate, you could see the remains of the town's moat.

Every German city has its church, and Xanten was no exception. These are two views of the Gothic church, with some older Romanesque elements as well.

I love this guy standing under his little porch.

And there's the only windmill we saw up close. I didn't realize they are so huge.

Next, we travel down the Rhine to Cologne (German spelling Koln). Check back in a few days.

Amsterdam Streets, Canals and Bikes

This was my first impression of Amsterdam - bikes everywhere! Amsterdam has narrow crowded streets,

and wide thoroughfares. Trolley lines go down the middle.

These buildings and cafe are on the edge of one of the many canals. It was a drizzly day, which is pretty common in this low-lying, oceanside city. Then sudden bursts of heavy rain, followed by brief sunshine.

Old and new buildings side by side. The hooks at the roofline allow furniture, etc., to be hauled up, avoiding the narrow winding stairs.

We took a canal ride, circling and winding through the city. Lots of bridges. Note the bikes.

A view from the canal boat. Houses are built right on the canal with boat access, like Venice.

A visit to one of the world's famous museums, the Rijksmuseum.

No pictures were allowed, but I sneaked this one of the fabulous Delft porcelain. Sorry I couldn't photograph the Rembrandt and Vermeer.

And another famous spot, the Heineken brewery.

Invitation to a European River Cruise

The next few weeks of this blog will take you on the cruise Hubster and I took down several rivers in the heart of Europe the first two weeks of September.
First is an introduction to our ship, the Casanova. It was owned and operated by a German company, and the crew was mostly German and Hungarian, who spoke English much better then I spoke German (which is not at all). We were with an Elderhostel group of 18 other people (all extremely nice, I might add); there were also a large group of Canadians and a few Germans on the cruise.
So here's what the boat looks like, with room for just over 100 passengers and 40 crew members. with a shot from the sundeck, with our bartender Attila bringing us our "wishes", also interior photos of the registration desk, the lounge and bar, and the dining room. And I should add that we had a 4-course meal plus salad bar twice a day, huge buffet breakfast, and snacks in between.

Here's the little cabin where we lived for 14 days. The couches were made into beds while we were at dinner, and back into seating during breakfast. There's a bathroom with shower to the right of the door to the hall which you see below. We had wonderful views through floor-to-ceiling french doors.

And these are the people who made our trip so wonderful - the captain is on the left (I only saw him dressed up like this twice), the restaurant and housekeeping managers, the purser, etc. Not a great photo, but you get the idea.

So if you'd like to continue the tour, please check in every few days for another episode. Next up is Amsterdam, where we started our journey.

Cruise Knitting

Hubster and I are back from our two-week European river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest, and selected pictures will be posted in the next few weeks. I was on the lookout for yarn to buy as souvenirs, and managed to spot only one yarn store - it was actually a guilt shop but she also had a shelf of yarn. I bought two balls of Kaffe Fassett colorway sock yarn, which I could have gotten anywhere locally but this is my souvenir from Germany.I also knitted a few feet on what has become my standard travel knitting, lace weight yarn for a feather-and-fan scarf. I haven't finished this yet, but it will go to Indiana with me in November. This photo is actually last years scarf - the current one is rose red, but I didn't take a photo before I tucked it away in my suitcase for the next trip.

Last Minute Stuff

We're leaving for a long-awaited vacation - cruising down the Rhine and Danube from Amsterdam to Budapest - on Friday. I'm hoping for some time to buy souvenir yarn and/or antiques, but last year they kept us pretty busy, and I had to shop on the fly.

This is my planned knitting project - a lacy mohair scarf (maybe two) on circular plastic needles which are easy to pack. A lot of knitting in a small ball and an easy feather-and-fan pattern. (This was one I made last year.)

I wanted to share this picture before I went - this is GD5 Maisie with a penguin, taken at Mystic Aquarium last weekend. She was thrilled to have these friendly birds come up to her finger underwater.

I'll be back in three weeks, and will share some photos.

Playing Blog Catch-up

I haven't written much knitting content lately, so I'm adding a bunch of stuff today that I've finished in the past month or so, or still have on the needles. First off is bit of ribbon in a lace pattern, which started out as a vest for me. I didn't like the way it was turning out, so I frogged it and started again by added alternating rows of grey mohair to the ribbon in just a simple garter stitch, and now it's becoming a prayer shawl. The mohair softens the ribbon and also adds strength - I'm loving it now. This is my completed letter "C", for the Poetry Society in London. It will join over 7000 other letters and spaces to form a poem. We haven't been told yet what the poem will be - the squares will be stitched together and unveiled in October. This is a huge project - my square measures approximately 12 inches square. I hadn't done intarsia in a long time, but this came out well - actually very smooth.

This is the pair of socks I knitted from the "flat feet" fabric which you unravel as you knit along. I used kitchener stitch on the toe ends - the first one came out just fine the first try, but for some reason I just couldn't do it again on the second sock. I made such a mess of it that I had to rip out the toe end three times and try again.

This is a photo of the final successful kitchener toe. At last! This is a little sweater I'm knitting from acrylic baby yarn in multi-pastel colors. I started it before I knew the sex of the expected baby - now I know it's a boy. This is not a frilly pattern so it will work well for the new babe, due at Christmas-time. I just have to sew it together and add the ribbing at the neck. This was a problem as well, because I had the front, back and half of a sleeve done when I took a close look and thought the front section was brighter than the other pieces, even though the lot number was the same. At first I thought "No one will notice but me", but then I had the semi-brilliant idea to rip back the sleeve raglans on the front, add some shaping, and turn it into a matching baby cap. I gave the prospective mother the baby cap at her shower, with a note that the sweater will be sent on later.

So since I now have two months left to finish this sweater, I started on another project. This is the Valley Log Cabin Blanket from WEBS. The pattern calls for 13 patches in each square, but I'm doing only nine - eight different colors and one used twice. I'm using stash yarn for this project - it's all wool yarns, but some are worsted and some are thinner yarns used doubled. There's a little different in texture, but I think it will work together when it's all sewn together. It's a little tricky to pick up the stitches evenly along the edges of the patches, but once that is done, it's just garter stitch and simple fun to do. Each square will be different by having the colors offset.

Horray for Alpacas

Last week, the Knitting Guild met at the

Shadow Pines Alpaca Farm, and here are

some photos of these cute and friendly critters.
They come in all shades of neutrals - black, white,

grey, and brown.

My favorite seems to have a little bit of all the colors.

Here's a Momma and a few little ones.

I bought a skein of wonderfully soft black alpaca,
from the fleece of an animal called Sharon.

Her picture is on the ball band.

I'm planning a lacy black

scarf, which will go well with my red coat.

Baptism for Lucas

Sunday was the baptism of my 3-month old great-grandson,

Lucas. He was so sweet through the long one-hour ceremony - the Deacon who performed the baptism certainly took his task seriously. He inserted so many special touches - responsive readings, a homily, special things for little brothers and sisters to help out with, you name it. The baptism itself was almost an anticlimax. All of the pictures I took in the church came out fuzzy, but here is a nice one of baby and parents.

This picture looks like Lucas is struggling to get away from me,

but I really think the expression on his face is adorable (and I don't think I'm biased).

This next photo is four generations, with me at the top of the family ladder (does that make me a matriarch now?)

This photo is special to me, as the little lacy dress is the one

my father was baptized in, in 1898. Lucas had another special outfit to wear, so we just put his great-great-grandfather's dress over him for the picture.