I think London tried to call this morning, but all I heard were a few clicks.  So, I had an email, instead!  She’s fine, but a little homesick, mostly because of "the total lack of familiarity with this huuuuge city" and "all the little things you don’t necessarily think about like the direction of the traffic or the currency or how all the cars are BMWs, Mercedes, and Peugeots… traffic is crazy. But I’ve found an ATM and I have yet to find somewhere to eat… I’ve slept one hour and that was last night on the plane, but it wasn’t good sleep. So I can’t wait until tonight!!"

If that doesn’t sound kind of excited, then I don’t know what does!  Woo (big sigh of relief).  Actually, I knew she’d arrived safe and sound and a half-hour late because I’d signed up for email notification of the arrival from the airline, so that was my first email today.  ; )

I had a good day yesterday, though didn’t get done nearly all that I’d hoped.  I did go to yoga, though, and, ooooh, that was nice.  It still feels nice today.

Oh, yeah, and I "visited" Anna in England this morning, myself, and treated myself to"Pippa!  You should go, too.  This is a classic sweater, beautifully worked.

I’m good; no tears.  (Cluuuuuuuck!  Bawk, bawk, bawk.)

We had a very fine bon voyage dinner for Katie last night.  We were seated at the table I wanted (cluck) and I didn’t have to get all hot under the collar about it (cluck, cluck).  It was so pretty with the big windows and the water — right there, right below us, even — and the moonlight; the girls want to live there.

Katie said she had the perfect day-before-departure day — lunch with a good friend, afternoon coffee with another, dinner with her family.  She’s been packing and unpacking and repacking for the past six days, relegating clothing to be either packed or worn (not both) these past few, so there wasn’t much last-minute angst in that department (she didn’t learn this packing method from me — BAWK!).  She can only take as much as she can carry herself and that’s hard packing for an extended trip.  She slept well and is now on her way to Chicago/O’Hare with London/Heathrow as her final destination "tomorrow morning."

So, there they are (cluck, peck, cluck, cluck, cluck).  The next time they’ll be all together, we’ll be in the midst of birthday season — Ali will have turned 19, Katie 21 (celebrating in Munich, no less), and Maddy will be on the very cusp of 15.  (BAWK!!!)  As I sent Katie off this morning, I just couldn’t help remember how different she was the last time she flew/returned and know that she will certainly return "different" this time, too, but how different/different how, and will there ever be so dramatic a change again?  (BAAAAWWWWWWK!!!!)  Um, yeah, okay, I better stop thinking about all the possiblities in that vein right now.

I needed a distraction in the knitting department last night.  (Obviously, "distraction" is going to be the name of the game for a little while here — let’s see if "concentration" might be worked in, too, however slowly!)  I still have not located the yarn I was looking for last weekend (BAWK!), but the Lana Grossa Luna that I received from my employer for Christmas has also been on my mind a lot.  I cast on 25 stitches or so and worked several inches of the Brooks Farm Four Play Scarf pattern (pdf file) before Ali came through and I nabbed her for an opinion.  (The camera is temporarily MIA, so pics have to wait, or I’d definitely be asking you, too.)  She said it was okay, but wouldn’t it be better as "one of those shawl thingies you wear all the time?"  I haven’t been wearing scarves because I don’t really have one, not because I don’t like them.  The Luna looks nice in the scarf pattern, but I have to admit that I thought of a shawlette, too, and wondered if perhaps it wouldn’t show the yarn to better advantage.  I’ve only got two balls of this, so it wouldn’t be a very big shawlette, but ette means smallish, and I don’t have a problem just knitting and seeing how it turns out.  It was purchased locally and I’m pretty sure that there’s more to be had if ette isn’t big enough.  Anyway, I didn’t rip the scarf yet, but I did grab the second ball and have a start on a shawlette.

Thank you, thank you (cluck!) for all your well wishes, comments, emails, the chucks under the chin and pick-me-ups and encouragement for me, as well as the well wishes for my daughter as she embarks on this fantastical adventure… far, far, FAR (cluck, BAWK!!) from home.  The apron strings are attached by only a few fraying threads now and it won’t be long before they just give out.  (Cluck.)

The electrical adapters arrived yesterday.  It helps to spend some time with Katie as she packs and prepares.  It’s not like I haven’t sent her off to a far-away place before — shoot, I even delivered her and, believe me, THAT was the hardest thing, driving away and leaving her behind.  She is so much better prepared.  I’m a mother hen, though, and my feathers have been ruffled, so I’ve just got to squawk and flap my wings ’round the barnyard for a little while.  That’s just me.  The cows and pigs and Farmer Brown all need to know that my nest is being disturbed.  Cluck, cluck.

I skipped my regularly scheduled second Monday of the month meeting and had Katie drive me to Old Navy, instead.  I had a tip from Holly yesterday (thank you!) about yoga wear and I scored; top and bottom.  Barnes & Noble was two doors down with their Gaiam display (I also needed a mat) and I scored there, too, finding a mat/carrying bag combo that turned out to be 50% off to boot.  Total opposite of shopping meltdown.

I knit a little at lunch time yesterday, but not at all last night.  I am mere stitches from a completed sock.  Did I tell you that I did a three-needle bind-off on the first?  Jury’s out ’til they’re actually worn, but it looks nice.

I had threatened to begin a new project over the weekend and I would have if I’d been able to the yarn.  I am loathe to admit that it may have happened, it might apply, I could possibly have Too Much Wool.  (Cassie, I didn’t think I’d ever share that problem, but I think this is clearly a sign.)  It’s gotta be somewhere…

Cluck.

Perhaps I should have stayed in my pajamas all day.  Instead, by 3:30 or so, I was dressed and riding around in the car with two of my girls, running errands, stopping here, stopping there.  Since some of the stopping was at stores, I thought I’d try to find something more comfortable to wear to yoga.  Perhaps I was extra tired from the previous week’s lingering sniffles & sneezes, the yoga workshop on Saturday, the dismantling of the Christmas tree* on Sunday morning, the fact that I already tried on 40,000 different yoga tops & pants without much success (why pockets, people, in the least flattering place of all?), so when the clerk at Target told me that I couldn’t take eight articles into the dressing room, I kind of lost it.  I just couldn’t think about which pieces to leave behind, where to leave them, how to get them when I needed them.  I suggested that it wasn’t that busy and would it really be so hard to keep track — couldn’t I have a "six" and a "two"?  She said that she couldn’t do it and offered no other suggestion.  I just dropped all eight pieces on the desk and left.  I didn’t melt down completely (as in start to cry), as I had to go find Kate & Ali on the other side of the store and we had to check out.

Perhaps I should wear a warning sign this week.

Please bear with me as it’s the final countdown to Katie’s departure on Friday for The London Adventure.  She will not return ’til nearly the end of April.  She will spend her 21st birthday in Munich, Germany.  I am riding the mother of all motherhood emotional rollercoasters this week — well, I’ve been riding it for a while, but now you’re along — elated, excited, happy, sad, depressed, worried, broke, protective, selfish, anxious, and many, many more.  Mostly, I can’t wait ’til I hear from her over there, hopefully next weekend, "London calling…"

I ought to have my second Jaywalker finished today but, alas, will not yet have a pair!

*I think I won the pictured ornament in a first grade spelling bee; Mom always insists that I made it in school.  Looks complicated to make, doesn’t it?