I wish I could say we had a wonderful holiday & a great visit with Kate. It was an OK holiday, and Rusty & I are enjoying a visit with Kate... but those photos of the kids on Christmas Day? That's the only time since she arrived on Dec 11th that Kate's seen Ali & her family. Ali's household has been cycling through various illnesses since even before Kate's arrival, and by that weekend, we were making a grocery/meds delivery because Rod was so sick that Ali didn't feel she could leave him in charge!

They were all "good enough" that Christmas Day happened, and they even set some future Kate + Kiddo "dates," but Rusty was beginning to soothe a sore throat a few days prior, and over the last week he's felt a bit worse, and Kate started to not feel good, and Ali's clan relapsed -- same stuff, sore throat, then head & chest congestion, headache and fatigue.

Oh, and PINK EYE decided to drop by our house yesterday, because, y'know, WHY NOT??

I'm glad that Kate had a couple of "good" weeks -- she was able to make a quick business trip to Chicago & Madison, got together with some local friends -- so it wasn't a total bust. 

Somehow, miraculously, luckily, I AM STILL STANDING! I haven't had even a tickle in my throat. I don't know whether to be happy or afraid!

Anyway, we're all looking forward to summer and a big ol' DO OVER!!

Meanwhile, with the holiday, bad weather at Christmas, and others' scheduling needs, I've had a couple of nice, long, mostly relaxing weekends!

I got a fair bit of knitting done:

I knit both the button & buttonhole band, and pocket edgings. I wanted to block the button band before commencing with the other, to make sure it was the right number of stitches & to see how it shaped up... it's dreamy! That can be such a tricky bit, and I'm just thrilled. I had started the collar and was almost half-way when I had a little dilemma and ended up tearing it all out. I spent a couple of hours yesterday getting Annie's house ready for their return later today (mostly laundry, as usual) and got things back on track. I am truly at the half-way mark as of last night! I'm going to need to go hunting for buttons soon! So far, resulting from a query on FB/IG, I like the thought of navy, orange or "rusty-reddish... with a little touch of blue" buttons. I'll first be digging into my button stash, shopping only if I need to... I'm gonna need eight!

Kate & I ventured out to Rusty's studio yesterday and helped him remove this gigantic painting (25' long) from the wall! He's getting ready to ship it to Mexico, along with some of the supplies we'll need, because in just over a month we'll be heading down there for the install! The gallery will also be hosting an event for him, and I think he's also planning to do a demo/class. I'll be doing warm weather & sunshine!