A new stitch for Miss Silver

Miss Silver was inclined to see the hand of Providence in trifles. Her first contact with the Pilgrim Case occurred when she had just finished working out a new and elaborate stitch for the jumper which she intended for her niece Ethel's birthday. This she regarded as providential, for though she could, and did, knit her way serenely through all the complications which murder produces, she found it difficult to concentrate upon a really elaborate new pattern at the same time. Ethel Burkett's annual jumper provided sufficient mental exercise without being brought into competition with a criminal case.'

from Pilgrim's Rest by Patricia Wentworth (1948)

There's someone who has her priorities right!

I'm still plugging on with the green cardigan. Now I've finished the back and right front and have started the left front (important not to muddle them up because the cables twist in opposite directions).

Last weekend we were in France. We spent the first night in Lille and then went on to stay with friends who had hired a small chateau in Beauvais for a 50th birthday celebration. The chateau was very pretty but I forgot to take any photos there! A high point was the presence of a red squirrel in the garden. A real Nutkin moment for me!

However, I did take one relevant photo in Lille:

I had a lovely time in there! I bought a couple of pattern books (one in English, one in French) and the wool to make a baby's jumper with an intarsia hen on it and also some tweed yarn for me. The shop is so attractive and different from other yarn shops. There's a whole wall of buttons and beads in glass jars and another wall of hanks of yarn. When you've decided what you want an assistant weighs out your yarn and winds it up for you. It's a bit like buying sweeties in an old-fashioned shop. When more yarn is needed from the stock room a trap door opens in the floor and the assistant clambers down into the depths to get it. My French gave out pretty quickly but the assistant spoke fairly good English. I want to go back!