A New Pair of Socks

Yep, I have a new pair of socks. I finished them yesterday while watching a couple of movies. I had hoped they would have been done last weekend, but sadly they weren't. Oh well, the important thing is that they are finished now. The picture to the left is a little dark...obviously...since it was taken in front of the window. I got this cool thing at one of the stores here (the kind of store that sells things for the home like dishes, cleaning things, towels, etc.) and you hook it over a rod and it has little "arms" that hang off it (about 6 or 8) with plastic clothes pins on the end. You use it to hang your fine delicates up to dry. I thought it might come in hand to hang the socks up for a picture. I think I'll take it home with me when I go back to Canada in the fall and use it to hang my knitted socks up to dry in the winter. The lighter picture below is with natural light coming in the window with the socks laying on top of my washer. What I hate about doing laundry here is that there are no dryers (very few people have them and I think they are only small anyway). I have a pair of jeans I bought new before I came here and they are big on me now (I've lost about 10 lbs since coming to Korea) and I would love a dryer to dry them in so they'd shrink a little bit. Oh welll, I digress.

Ok, so back to the knitting and yarn. These are the plain knit socks I made with the Claudia Hand Painted. I liked using this yarn and found it to be soft. There was no splitting or knots in the yarn, and I always enjoy that. The only thing I found was one skein (the right sock in the picture of the socks on the washer) was a little darker than the other. It's not a big deal and won't stop me from wearing them. But, I would definitely use this kind of yarn again!

I've started another pair of socks with some Fleece Artist (don't know what colourway it is) that I brought with me from Canada. I got this last spring or summer I think...maybe the winter. I have only got the cuff and about 3 or 4 rows of knitting done so far, so not really picture worthy yet. I think these are going to be mindless knitting socks again - just a plain knitted sock. My problem (well one of many, lol) is that I don't have a printer here. There is one the five of us foreign teachers use in the building (we have to share it...and the one who currently has had it for a few months is never around), but it's just such a hassel and I don't know if it will work with my computer since it's from Canada, and the printer is from Korea...I'm not technologically inclined so I have no idea...it might though. Anyway, in order for me to get some sock patterns I'd have to print them out, and the only printer I use mostly is at school...don't think they'd enjoy me printing out the patterns there. Oh welll, I might try it sometime. But for now, with this new sock, it'll just be a mindless knit.

Here's one of my pictures from Egypt. This is Abu Simbel and was built by Ramses II...I think. I totally forget, lol. This temple was closer to Lake Nasser, but in the '60s (I think), it was moved back so that it wasn't so close to the edge of the lake. In the process, the statue 2nd front the left lost it's head - it fell off. That's me in front of the temple, but don't look too close...I'll probably scare you.

Anyway, we had to get up at 3:00 AM to go to this place. It was about a three to three and a half hour drive from where we were in Aswan. One of the reasons they do the tours so early is because it gets rather hot during the afternoon; that and tons of tourists visit it so the earlier in the day you go, the better. Unfortunately, you're not allowed to take pictures inside.

For those of you not on Facebook to see my current profile picture, here it is. This is me all bundled up (knee high tights, a pair of my hand knit wool socks, leggins, jeans, 2 tshirts, a sweater, my winter coat, a scarf around my neck (inside my coat), ear muffs, a pashmina/scarf around my head, and a winter scarf around my neck and head...oh, and gloves...and up on the mountain I was wrapped up in a blanket as well) to climb Mount Sinai at 2:30 AM. I went half way up on camel, then the last half you have to actually climb yourself. It is all steps. Uneven, different sized, stone steps. Hard. Unless you are in tip top physical shape (unlike myself), this is a difficult climb. I had to stop 4 or 5 times to catch my breath, but I made it to the top. It was FREEZING up there!

This is turning into a longer post than I had thought, but I will leave you with one last picture from atop Mount Sinai.