Knitting - pleasure and pain

I've almost finished the second side of the Brea bag, which looks exactly the same as the first side!

Yesterday I took it out with me. I often do that when Tai Chi Man is driving - even if it's a short drive, I can grab a few extra minutes of knitting time. When we do our Saturday errands, there are a few places to go that aren't very far apart, so I was only able to snatch a few stitches here and there. And I was swearing away, because every time we accelerated or turned a corner, my pencil or pattern or cable needle would fly off the shelf or my lap and end up on the floor.

We were nearly back home when I got confused - it seemed I had crossed off a row that I hadn't yet knitted. I put it away and finally got around to looking at it today. It took me a while, but then I realised what I had done. For the first time ever, I had picked up my knitting in the car and started to knit back across the row instead of continuing in the correct direction. The result of this was a couple of short rows and a knitting mystery, which I'm glad to say was easily solved with a little un-knitting.

Tai Chi Man and I spent a couple of hours in the garden this afternoon. He was digging some potatoes and beets, hoeing and spreading straw. I had the edge trimmer out and was a very noisy neighbour as I tidied up the overgrown bits around the yard. Then I pulled all the weeds out from around the tomato plants (thanks, Sheila, for mentioning this - it makes sense to let those green tomatoes get as much sun as they can at this time of the year).

It was 4pm by the time we'd finished, but a trip into town was in the plans too, so I grabbed the boys' swimming things, a snack, some water, my knitting (and a knitting book, paper, pencils etc) and my husband dropped us off at the beach while he went off to the hardware store.

The lake temperature has dropped in the last week but it wasn't as cold at this beach compared to Friday. Lego Nut and Ninja Boy went in a couple of times and when they weren't in the water they were running around with towel "capes" or a soccer ball, climbing on the playground equipment or dissecting a round seed head from a plane tree (I knew that pocket knife of mine would come in useful).

I enjoyed a lovely couple of hours (could have stayed longer) designing a knitted vest with the help of this book and knitting my bag. When the sun was out, it was just perfect - I had to resort to a hoodie when the occasional cloud blocked the sun.

Tomorrow is a public holiday (Labour Day) so we are planning a bit of a road trip. Hoping to find lots of cheap tomatoes at the fruit stands on the way.