A Bluestocking Knits

Books to Movies and Back to Books

I got on a bit of a mysteries kick after watching Kenneth Branagh's new version of "Death on the Nile".  I confess that I did not like it much -- it not only didn't compare well to the 1978 version with Peter Ustinov as Poirot, but even if I hadn't been familiar with the earlier one, I would have been dismayed at many of Branagh's changes.  The moustache backstory was illogical and unnecessary, the attempts at "modernizing" the characters historically jarring -- and also unnecessary -- and the background details historically absurd (the maid in evening dress at a celebratory dance party? no! female crew members on the boat? no! and in shorts? no!! -- and why on earth would they wrap the bodies of the murder victims like mummies?! good heavens). 

Undoubtedly, my dismay at the movie is what compelled me to dash to the public library and raid the Christie section.  While I was there, since I knew that the three I chose are fairly quick reads, I looked at the Georgette Heyer shelf as well, and borrowed two of those as well.  I had read all of the Christies many years ago -- I went through her entire oeuvre, possibly after seeing the charming "Tommy and Tuppence" series with Francesca Annis and James Warwick, if not earlier! -- but these Heyers were new to me, at least.

First, of course, was Death on the Nile.  The 1978 movie is perhaps my second-favorite of the Christies -- for the lovely and authentic (cough) scenery, for the wonderful clothing, the superb cast.  Although David Suchet will forever in my mind, as in many others', be Hercule Poirot, Peter Ustinov makes a charming and appealing Poirot.  It was interesting to read the book knowing very well how the murder was accomplished, and see all of the clues that Christie planted along the way, both in people's characters and their actions.

After that, I read Heyer's 1939 No Wind of Blame, which I enjoyed very much.  The dialogue sparkles, the characterizations are deft, and the Scotland Yard inspector -- who, rather surprisingly, doesn't make an entrance until halfway through the book -- is appealingly snappy at times, with a teasing sense of humor that to me is quite unusual in a literary detective.  I fell for a red herring, too, trying to work out how one of the charming characters could have done it, when it turned out to be one of the less-charming ones (and I hope that isn't much of a spoiler!).

"Murder on the Orient Express" is my favorite of all of the Christie movies, a stand-out in every respect.  Obviously, I was well aware of the plot as I read the book, but it also struck me how well the screenwriter, as that of "Death on the Nile" (John Dehn and Anthony Shaffer, respectively) concentrated the plot and the number of characters without sacrificing any plot points, and indeed, in many respects actually improving the tightness of the story.  It's also telling, cinematically, that while Kenneth Branagh felt that his 2017 version (even less successful in my eyes than his "Death on the Nile," but perhaps this is inversely proportional to the perfection of the 1974 version ...) needed exterior chase scenes (!), the earlier one makes even the splendidly luxurious Orient Express feel claustrophobic, both in the flashback to the murder scene and in Poirot's summation of the events.

Envious Casca I found somewhat less appealing than the other Heyer, most likely because the Herriard family is constantly sniping at each other, or outright arguing, but of course it is equally well-written and tightly-plotted as is the first one, with an admirably clever clue (if somewhat less obvious to those of us reading a century or so later) to the locked-room problem given quite early on.

The 1982 film of "Evil Under the Sun" is one of those that I enjoy watching but don't seek out, for some reason -- it just doesn't speak to me as much as the other two.  The book had somewhat the same effect on me -- it's clever, but ... not really a favorite of mine.  I can see why readers find Christie rather slight compared to, say, Dorothy L. Sayers, but then, one doesn't read Sayers if one is in the mood for Christie, either!

I don't quite see, by the way, why so many reviewers find Branagh-Poirot's moustache so absurd -- it's supposed to be absurd, except of course to Poirot himself, who is quite proud of it.  Christie describes it in Orient Express as "enormous moustaches" (note the plural!), and in other novels as "gigantic," "immense," and "amazing" (there is even a page devoted to it at AgathaChristie.com!) -- and Branagh-Poirot's is far more amazing than Ustinov-Poirot's surprisingly average moustache or Suchet-Poirot's foppishly dainty one.  If you look at a selection of Victorian moustaches, most likely Poirot's generation, what is remarkable about Branagh-Poirot's is not so much its enormity as the mouche under his lower lip, which in my admittedly-small survey is never seen.  Mutton-chops, yes, goatees, yes, the rather "newer" Van Dyke as on George V, etc. etc. etc., but not the little patch.  Branagh-Poirot's moustache might actually be one of the few historically-accurate things about his movie!

"This Needlework of Mine"

Progress as of today.  The colors seem very vivid to me, after a string of "faded" samplers!  The little blue splodge behind Young Mr. Wisdom's head is the beginnings of a bird, but I think I might change the colors to browns, as with the two blue birds right there at the sides that is a lot of blue birds in a row, it seems to me.

Just finished re-reading Coot Club,

the fifth book in the "Swallows and Amazons" series.  Wonderful comfort reading!  The picture is I guess a publicity photo from the 1984 film, which actually isn't bad -- that sounds a bit snarky, but one never knows with films of favorite books.  The children aren't quite what I'd pictured in my mind, especially Dorothea and Tom, and I don't think that either of the films I've seen (this and the 2016 "Swallows and Amazons") really capture the intelligence and sensibility of the children*, but I'm impressed that they found actual twins for Port and Starboard!  And at least this one didn't feel the need to invent silly subplots involving Russian spies (for heaven's sake).

*Poor Susan!  I can never think without shuddering of how the 2016 version of "Swallows and Amazons" both let Susan get whacked on the head by the boom when John takes "Swallow" about and turned her into a squealing sissy when faced with the prospect of gutting a fish. 

I've just started reading C.K. Chau's modern re-telling of Pride and Prejudice,

now titled Good Fortune and set in New York's Chinatown.  There was a very good review of it in the Los Angeles Times not long ago, and then only a week or so later there was an article by Chau on LitHub about setting and society in Austen's novel.  It was heartening to read Chau's thoughts, which make it obvious that she thoroughly respects the original novel, so that I felt it much more likely that she wouldn't change characters' motivations or personalities so much that they conflict with Austen's plot (cough -- 2022 "Persuasion"! -- cough).

A Suit for Bel

Oh, it's been so long since I've knitted that I completely forgot to participate in my own virtual knitalong!  Here, then -- better late than never -- is my newest contribution to "Knitting with D.E. Stevenson," for my recent re-read of Fletchers End.  The book was published in 1962, and I had to take some time finding a pattern that would suit the classic "shrinking violet" character of Bel Brownlee, née Lamington.  I doubt that Bel -- unlike, perhaps, her friend Louise -- would throw herself into Swinging Sixties fashions much, and so this modest-yet-au-courant suit works rather well for her.  (I don't think that a metallic Christmas tree is at all Bel's thing, though, so to that fellow leaning out of the window we'll just have to say, sorry, that will not do!)

"Floral" Ho!

Despite having a modest-but-tantalizing list of new sampler charts at my elbow, I dug out my poor half-worked "Floral Sampler" the other day, and my bundle of potential thread substitutions, and began the onerous task of picking it all out a band at a time, from the ribbonwork that seemed the best place to start, then on upwards.  I've now re-started the large floral band, and re-worked the red Montenegrin-stitch divider and the last line of the motto in the new colors.  Queen stitch is a bit of a pain to work, but it's rather hellish to pick out, I must say -- I am not looking forward to that little floral band about a third of the way down from the top, but I like the "Charlotte's Pink" miles better than the bubble-gum "Victorian Pink," so I'll just have to get on with it.

Well, the new issue of "Piecework" has a rather handsome pair of knitted mitts from a 1909 Weldon's magazine, and I must say that I'm tempted to dig out some needles and see if I have a suitable wool --

I wanted some comfort reading last week, and so as I was heading out the door I went to my shelf of D.E. Stevensons and chose one of my favorites, Fletchers End.  I like the main character, Bel (Lamington in her eponymous earlier story, now Brownlee and happily newly-wed) but I love stories about houses, and Fletchers End charmingly combines both.  Fletchers End is a cottage in a small village somewhere in the Cotswolds, which has been in the Lestrange family for generations but has been left by the late owner to her nephew, a navy man away in foreign parts who, being chronically short of funds, has not only neglected the cottage but wants to get it off his hands as soon as possible.  Louise Armstrong, one of Stevenson's characters who reappears in other novels, comes to see Fletchers End, looking for a house for Bel and her husband.

An abandoned cottage on the outskirts of Aston-on-Clun, Shropshire, 2018 (Jeremy Bolwell, Geograph.org.uk, CC BY-SA 2.0).

Mrs. Warmer, a local woman who has been looking after Fletchers End during the long absence of the new owner, has grown unexpectedly fond of the house during her six years there, finding herself strangely reluctant to show the house to prospective buyers -- though of course she does, honestly and dutifully, but she is secretly relieved when they go away again and don't come back -- and it soon becomes an indicator in the story of her approval of a certain few of these prospective buyers that she offers them tea, which includes freshly-baked whole-meal scones.  Now, being a reader who also appreciates good food in books, and better still being able to make something very like that good food myself, I had a go at some whole-meal scones.  These are my own bash of a couple of different recipes -- not quite up to Mrs. Warmer's yet, I expect, but not bad, even without clotted cream --

And for something completely different, a Lemoyne Star block auditioning for a 1:12 quilt, with some small-pattern fabrics I picked up on Etsy (the brown ones).  I think this turned out well, so I will throw a backing on it and see how it goes --

Thursday, Mostly Sunny

The downside -- one of the downsides, I guess -- to not blogging for a while is that you end up with a half-dozen or so posts coming down the pike, and you wonder, should I post them one-by-one or all at once?!  And of course you forget things, or end up with a photo that you can't remember why you took, &c. &c. &c.  All of the above.

Here is the "Pink Sparrow" sampler by Brenda Gervais of With Thy Needle & Thread.  Unlike "Philadelphia Vine," which sang to me joyfully at once, metaphorically speaking, the "Pink Sparrow" whispered softly, and I thought about it a number of times as I kept coming across it on various journeys around the interwebs, and eventually succumbed to its quiet charms.  Started, I admit, the same day that I finished "Philadelphia Vine" ...

This has been on my to-be-read list for quite some time -- since it was new, I guess.  I couldn't find the book I wanted to start, which was Stalky & Co., and so for a complete non sequitur -- no, not really, it was just nearby on the shelf where Stalky should have been -- I started this.  It's very dense, and I'm afraid that Greek names still puzzle me more than a little, so that it's hard to keep everything straight.  My only quibble with the book from an editorial perspective is the maps -- there are many, but they are pretty clearly cropped down from some antique map so that often there is a great deal of extraneous detail, when one is hoping to focus on the particular episode at hand -- the Peleponnesian War was ten years long, so a very great deal happened -- but worse, there is no highlighting of what we are supposed to be looking at.  If a map is called "The Corcyrean Revolution," say, and it has just a vaguely topographic map with Corcyrea in one corner, I still have no idea what is going on!  But Lendon writes wonderfully, and sometimes he slips into Homeric mode and we get sentences like this, on the very first page: "A few days later unfolded the thousands-strong procession from Athens to holy Eleusis, when the initiates carried branches of myrtle tied with wool and bellowed as they marched the sacred roar Iaccho! Iacche!"  That is certainly not a stuffy-academic sentence!  I can almost forgive him the grating ones that start with "For," when he gives me sentences like that. 

I came across Brendon Chase after reading about the "Swallows and Amazons" series -- I don't remember now quite why it piqued my interest, but I managed to get hold of a second-hand copy, and began reading it a week or so ago, as a bit of light relief from the Peleponnesian War.  I suppose I can see the connection to Ransome's books, in that it centers around children off on their own in the countryside for weeks on end, but certainly the Walkers are doing so with the full permission and approval (because the children are seasoned sailors and campers, mind you) of their parents, whereas the three brothers in Brendon Chase have run away from what is called somewhat sneeringly, about a third of the way along the story, "petticoat government."  Perhaps it is because I am now a parent, but it seems to me that the boys -- whose parents are in India, so they are staying with a spinster aunt, apparently somewhat elderly -- don't have a particularly onerous life with their aunt (certainly not an Oliver-Twist existence), but just have a thing for Thoreau and Tom Sawyer and Robin Hood, and I can't help feeling quite a lot of sympathy for Aunt Ellen, who naturally is worried about them and very cross indeed.

I must have been crazy to agree, as there are a ton of rehearsals and at a considerable distance, but my choir was asked for volunteers to join up with another for a grand-scale production of "Carmina Burana," and I was one of the dozen or so who said yes.  It's a weird piece, and challenging, and loud, but wow, is it ever fun to sing!  I spent a whole semester on it in college, and then have done it at least twice since then, so luckily for me I know it pretty well, and got to jump right in. I still have some post-pandemic creepies about singing and therefore wear a mask, which is a bit of a downer, but there it is (I am in the minority in the very large group) -- it's not so much about me as about the possibility of my passing something all unknowingly along to someone else. Well, on the lighter subject -- after years of venturing to suggest to my director that I be freed from the first-soprano section after a decade, back to my beloved first-alto, it was at last agreed that I may do so, and I am happily back where I feel most at home.  The soprano section is a nice place to visit, but, no, I don't want to live there!  And in the "Carmina" theme, here is a clip of one of my favorite bits -- I've chosen one of the more spirited versions on YouTube! --

The State of the Cross-Stitch, and Some Other Things on a Reflective October Afternoon

"Samplings V" by Ellen Chester, one of her five-chart "Quaker Samplings" series, here in Gentle Art's "French Lilac" thread on coffee-dyed Edinburgh linen.  I gave it a bit of a steam-press after finishing, but clearly it needs a bit more!  A very enjoyable chart to work.

I've pretty much finished, bar the backstitches, the lower part of the "window" in the "Japanese View" cross-stitch, and am doing the second of the three swallows as a bit of light relief.  I'd forgotten, in my fascination with samplers, how easy it is to lose one's way in the painterly kind of chart.  But it's really starting to come together now, I'm happy to find.  The original has the landscape part in half-cross, but I like the more solid look of full crosses, so am doing it that way.  I think I will go back with a mid-purple shade and soften the line at the top of that hill on the far right, so that it's more like the other hills ....

I'd had Maggie Lane's Growing Older with Jane Austen on my wish list for quite a few years now, but for some reason all of the used-book sellers have been charging nearly three figures for it, and so when not long ago I saw a copy for only slightly more than its original price I did not wait for some kind gift-giver but bought it immediately myself.  It is certainly worth the wait, though, as it is well-written and insightful, on a subject that does not usually feature much in literary criticism, but clearly was important to Austen, both simply as a means of delineating a particular character and, perhaps as she grew older herself, a way of pointing out the effects of one's relative age on a person's -- more often than not a woman's -- place in her family and social circle and in the society of the time.

After the thorough treat of being able to compare in person every single color of Kona Cotton and Bella Solids at a new-to-me fabric store, I came home with a not-quite navy blue solid to surround my six mini quilts, so have pieced together both a backing and batting -- have been thinking of calling this "No Scrap Left Behind"! -- and am pondering how best to quilt it. 

A Little Bit Here, a Little Bit There ...

Well, it has been over a month since I posted, and I didn't even realize it.  I finished the "Honeysuckle Sampler" ages ago, enjoyed it very much despite the egregious number of queen-stitch flowers in that border (!) -- haven't blocked it yet, though, obviously.  I made some very slight changes, re-positioning the signature line a little, and centering the date by moving it down a single thread -- feeling a bit of an outlaw as I did so, as nobody ever seems willing to suggest that sort of thing even though sometimes a motif looks quite strange with two two-thread rows below it and only one above.  (I think I made the "J" a stitch wider as well -- and why not?!)  These thread colors look very well against the natural linen, I think!

Also unblocked, "Samplings IV" by Ellen Chester, from her "Quaker Samplings series.  This is on the 36-count Edinburgh linen that I coffee-dyed over the summer.  I enjoyed working this little sampler very much, and the thread is quite handsome -- Gentle Art's "Brethren Blue" -- and so I look forward to the rest of the series, which I will do in a selection of different colors.  I've started the "Samplings V" -- in Gentle Art's "French Lilac" but got distracted ...

I got a new phone for free so felt entirely justified in splurging a bit on a new case, the first one I've ever bought, since all my others were hand-me-downs.  Some folks might recognize the place names as being in the Lake District, others might realize, from, say the campsite just there near the compass rose, and the Amazon Boathouse across the lake, that it is actually Swallows and Amazons!  It makes me happy every time I see it, and that's the first time I've ever said that about a phone, to be sure, so well worth the extra few dollars.  And it has prompted me to start rereading the series -- I'm now in the middle of Pigeon Post, so about halfway along.

I had a bag of Jaeger Baby Merino in the bottom of a box, that I kept passing over because while the yarn is delicious, the color was just kind of meh.  I debated with myself for months about overdyeing it -- what if it went badly? aaugh -- but a few weeks ago, I said to myself, "Right, just do it."  I wound into skeins and dyed it with one envelope each of grape-flavored Kool-Aid, and was pleased to see that everything turned out rather well.  It's a bit more mottled than I was expecting -- that was really the only surprise. 

I had been half-planning to make a Christmas-present afghan with it for Laura -- whose favorite color is purple -- and I liked the "Modern Classic Baby Blanket" by Kirsten Holloway, though I've stalled a bit after working the first end section.  It seems to me that the mottled color of the yarn obscures the intricacy of the design -- the purple is a bit darker in real life than in the photo -- ironically, the yarn and the pattern would most likely have suited each other better with the yarn in its original state.  The stitches are on the complex side, and it took me a while to puzzle through some of them, but it worked out well -- but the other thing that is giving me pause is that it's very yardage-hungry, and this bit alone used up a whole ball and a good portion of another, and I've got only ten!  So my choices are to forge ahead and hope for the best, to try out the "plain" panel and see if the yarn goes further, as I could omit the inner fancy-work, or try something else altogether.  Ten skeins sounds like a lot; I can hardly believe that I couldn't make a lap blanket out of ten skeins!

In my indecision, I came across this "Japanese View" cross-stitch chart, available free at Smart Cross Stitch, and thought it also might make a good present for Laura --

and so as I have accumulated a considerable stash of 28-count Monaco in the past few decades, I thought, "Go for it!"  But I have had the dickens of a time with it -- counted wrong and somehow couldn't figure out where, picked out all of the mountain bits I'd done, got off again and picked it all out a second time (luckily not so far along as before), ran out of the medium-purple (of course, half of it was in shreds on the floor), did it a third time using a couple of in-betweens I had in my needle case as re-positionable guide lines.  Now at last I feel like I'm getting somewhere and it looks like the beginnings of a mountain view instead of a bunch of random specks, which is encouraging.

(Why multiple presents for Laura?  She has just gone off for her first year away at university, after spending her post-high-school years thus far at the local community college.  She is still in the same time-zone, but far enough away that I know she isn't living at home any more.  The compulsion to make things for her is especially strong.)

Lest you think I do not knit anymore -- I have been working on this scarf (which is "Camptown Races"), albeit for what seems an eternity.  I might rename it "Grandmother's Footsteps" as I keep finding that I've been daydreaming and lost track of which row I was on, so that some of the sections have far too many stitches, and I have to rip back to the point where it went wrong.  It's very nice yarn and lovely to knit with, thank goodness, and doesn't seem to mind my two-steps-forward, one-step-back.  If we take the train to visit Laura, this will be a perfect carry-along!

And there is the binding on my "Persuasion" quilt, which binding is very long (somewhat over queen-sized), but of course would probably be finished already if I didn't keep getting distracted ...

Experimenting

Well, we might be heading at what feels these days like breakneck speed towards normality, what with now-readily-available vaccinations here in California, but I am still stress-crafting, clearly.  I rarely have less than a half-dozen things going at once, some of them new to me or mostly-new.  Some are things that I've been thinking about for a while, others are admittedly impulsive but no less fascinating.

These two skeins of yarn have been sitting on my dresser since Christmas, caressed now and then while I pondered what to make with them.  I was amused to see the differences in the look of this yarn from skein to ball to knitted fabric -- it is "Gluttony Sock" superwash merino/nylond blend from Forbidden Fiber Co. in the "When Presents Explode" colorway.  I have no idea what these colors have to do with exploding presents, but there it is.

It is now becoming a modified "Camptown Races" cowl -- "modified" because I don't need to change colors, of course!

This is the first time I have encountered "print on demand" fabrics -- it's a bit disconcerting, to be honest, but one must move with the times I suppose, at least occasionally.  This particular selection, from Spoonflower, came out a bit more turquoise than I was expecting, but I was certainly looking for midcentury-modern prints, that is true.  I like them all, but the two on the far left at least are too big for the quilt I have in mind, so that the design would get lost.  I'm definitely interested in the three on the right, but will have to see how they work with screen-printed fabrics, as the feel is noticeably different.

David built two more "Victory Garden" beds this spring, in the patch of sunlight made by cutting down an old tree (both decrepit and vile) in our backyard, and I planted them with vegetables, and at the recent tomato sale at our local arboretum, managed to score five young tomato plants, now residing in our sunny front garden.  This one is "Uluru Ochre".  I haven't had much luck with tomatoes in previous years, thanks to an inordinate amount of suburban wild- and semi-wildlife, but we're trying some (non-chemical, of course) methods of protection, so we'll see how it goes!

The Furrowed Middlebrow imprint of Dean Street Press has just reissued a spate of previously-long-out-of-print Molly Clavering books from the 1930s.  I splurged on three of them, since I had enjoyed Mrs. Lorimer's Quiet Summer and perhaps even more, Near Neighbours (which was a few years ago reprinted by Greyladies, alas now gone from their catalog, though I believe some copies are still available from Anglophile Books).  These new editions themselves are handsomely put-together with covers featuring details from artwork contemporary-ish to the novels -- my only quibble is that, since the text has been re-set, presumably to conserve space, the gutters are very narrow, meaning that to actually read the book puts the reader at risk of breaking the spine, certainly of distorting the covers.  But it's what's inside that counts the most, of course -- so I'm off to read for a bit --

Reading Days

Susannah Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell was a strange and wonderful delight of a book, that as massive as it is I did not want to end but for that if it didn't I would never know what happened.  Her new book is different, and yet the same in that it seems be of a world in which time moves differently.

To my surprise, I don't think I'd ever read this -- Ancient Egypt and Agatha Christie!  It should come as no surprise that both the mystery and the setting are well-done.  The reading is also excellent, by Emilia Fox, who deftly conveys the different characters with individual voices and in some cases accents, that are natural and clear.

Read by the lovely Juliet Stevenson.  I suppose the only "problem" with this edition, other than the dislocation of picturing Mrs. Elton telling Emma's story (!), is that it is too short.  Did I know that it was abridged when I bought it?  I don't remember!

An old favorite, as delightful the umpteenth time as it was the first!

Again, I was looking for old friends, so found myself dipping into this, a few entries before bed.  She sounds very young in 1915.  I'm glad I have the Hogarth edition instead of the simple but rather dull American one -- the jacket illustration just seems to fit so much better.

For something completely different, an old paperback copy of one of Peters' "other" series heroines (not Amelia Peabody, I mean!).  Her writing is a bit pedestrian at times, perhaps, but you read it for the madcap adventures, really, and the almost ever-present archaeology!

To my pleasant surprise, I found when starting this for the DES list discussion recently, that I had not read it before!  It is noticeably more cheerful than the book it follows (Amberwell of 1955), which made it all the more pleasing for me to read, wanting some "comfort books" lately!

And for my "Knitting With D.E. Stevenson" virtual knitalong, here is a Shetland-type shawl from Patons Australia of an undated but pre-decimal vintage at least, free, written out and re-charted in modern terms.  To say more about its presence in the story would give away a plot point, so I won't!

I haven't listened to LibriVox recordings before, but am delving into various options while access to the public library is limited.  I had a hankering for some "Golden Age" mysteries, so chose this one from 1908 (!).  It's a bit disconcerting to find that different readers have recorded different chapters, apparently at random -- I was quite startled to hear, in an American novel set in a small East-Coast village with moneyed summer homes, the "maiden aunt narrator" suddenly cry out in broad Glaswegian tones, and male ones to boot, "'Och, Halsey, whaur ha'e ye bean?!'"  But I find it satisfying to knit or stitch while listening to an audio-book, so shall just remark on the absurdity and carry on!

Page 8

Finished page 8 of the "Quaker Virtues" sampler this morning!  The line runs down the center of that big motif just below "SIMPLICITY", with the top of the page through the word itself -- which isn't crooked, I assure you, the fabric is just a little stretched there!  I'm finding a rather surprising number of mistakes in the chart, and not just subjective things like spacing (which I admit to having tweaked here and there), but missing or extra stitches, one of which took me quite a bit of picking-out to fix, since the error was near where I started the particular motif, and I didn't realize it until I got to the next cardinal point.  Oh well.  I'm still enjoying the piece immensely!

Being so very near to finishing Laura's quilt (!), I felt justified the other day in starting a small knitting project (!!) -- having had a conversation with Brittany by way of the comments about Stephen Maturin's comforter, I thought, "well, I must have some suitable wool, let's just see what one of these 'comforters' looks like, eh?"  This one will be the "Figured Comforter" from the 1840 edition of Miss Watts's 1837 book -- about twenty-five years after the events of Desolation Island, but presumably things didn't change overmuch between.  This particular comforter's shape will narrow a bit where it rests at the back of the wearer's neck, then widen out again at the other end.  (I was a bit concerned at first that it wasn't going to lie flat, but once it got a bit of heft behind it, as it were, it settled down nicely.)

This miniature sampler was finished some weeks ago, and again I put off making the frame, had trouble with same, etc. etc. etc.  The chart is the "Heritage VI" by Annelle Ferguson -- I lightened all of the colors by one step, which result usually pleases me very much though in this case I suspect wasn't quite successful, but there it is.  I had great difficulty getting the picture-frame molding mitered properly, so rather than keep wasting it I ended up using plain strip wood (this is 1/8 x 1/4") and "scratch carving" a simple line around the opening to make it look like a home-made frame.  This didn't turn out too badly -- it looks old-ish, at any rate!

I have been reading quite a lot -- I keep meaning to write about that, then find myself absorbed in yet another book --