As promised

See, here's the Widge enjoying the Renaissance Fest. Isn't he cute? We had a great time, saw the jousting and Hack and Slash again, and walked and walked and walked...anyway, big fun and everybody should go.

Meanwhile, yesterday we went apple-picking, and that was great, and the day before was a trip to the farm/park to visit tractors. Widge had little or no interest in the cow milking, or watching the pigs get weighed. His true love is tractors, and he's very loyal. Ah, the romance of youth.

On the kids show front, the other day Donald was in a balloon race, and he somehow managed to get his balloon up too high, and ended up in outer space. In a hot air balloon. And while you ponder that, here's how he got down: he found a baby elephant, who was heavy enough to weigh the balloon back down to a normal range. Yes, after escaping the Earth's atmosphere in a balloon, he conjured up an elephant, to make the balloon heavy. In outer space.

So for those of you whose heads haven't exploded, more about the knitting. Before the Widge (B.W.) I had all sorts of time to knit, and I had no worries about knitting delicate lace, or handwash-only yarns. Now if I want to knit anything less sturdy than dishrags, I have to plot to knit in the evening, or during naptime, or in some stealthy location. If I were an alcoholic trying to hide it, I'd go through the same sort of contortions. Anyway, a while ago I said that I was working on something, and I am, I'm knitting a bag of bags. I've made a sort of "yarn" out of those annoying plastic grocery-store bags that everyone has a pile of, and I'm knitting a re-usable bag out of them. Yup, I'm all environmentally conscious now. I even use cloth diapers (its really just because Widge gets rashes). I wonder, however, if the extra laundry offsets the not throwing away diapers. Anyway, the bag project is a great opportunity to use up some bags, although I got a big donation of bags from mom, so I may be worse off than when I started. The thing is, plastic yarn isn't fun to knit with. There are knitters in the world who refuse to use the acrylic that you get in Wal-mart, because they think its too plastic-y. It also doesn't breath, so if you knit socks or a sweater or something you'll certainly be warm, and probably sweaty too, but it also doesn't get stretched out, can go in the wash, and your finished garment will last forever. Anyway, actual plastic is thicker and some bags are really stiff, which makes the knitting go slowly. I think the result is going to be good, though. But I've been seeing lately that plastic bottles are getting recycled into carpeting and polar fleece, and I wonder: can plastic bags be recycled into nice yarn? I challenge yarn producers to find a way to do this. I'll mail you my extra bags, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

And yes, thats me with the King and the Widge.