greetings from our nation's capital

(and our nation's Capitol!)

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Family and Stuff

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I had to be in the States for a meeting the week of October 6, so I took the opportunity to stop by and see the parents in DC. As a surprise for me, Dad invited Jae come to town too, so we had all three kids there for a few days, and it was great!  Dad is doing really well after his 'scare' earlier this year, gaining strength and stamina, working with PT and occupational therapy every week. Mom is taking good care of him, but also taking care of herself, going to the gym and water aerobics and such. (We didn't plan to have all of us wearing red, it just happened. :) )  On Thursday, after Jae arrived (poor guy took the red-eye and landed in DC around 10am) , he joined me for lunch at the Silver Diner in Ballston , and then we hit a couple of stores for some of the random things I wanted to bring back to Barcelona -- chili powder, swiffer dusters, decaf black tea, and corn holders, among other things. They sell corn on the cob in the grocery store, but we couldn't find th...
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Defeating the sweater curse

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A few weeks ago I completely "frogged" the cursed purple sweater I made for Samantha (I finished it the first time in February , and had started again in June, to no avail) ... I borrowed Dani's ballwinder and made pretty little yarn cakes. :) Here are the yarn cakes, and just for comparison, one regular unused skein of the lovely Filatura Lanarota D.K. yarn I'm using. This sweater was just plain unwilling to be completed. So, I gave up on that pattern, found another , and started again, in pink. Fortunately, I believe Samantha likes pink a LOT. So here's a pic of how it's coming along. I like this sweater pattern because it goes side-to-side (funny enough, the crochet cardigan I made for her last year also went side-to-side. hmm..) I pinned the armhole together so it wouldn't get too stretched out. I'm also doing the regular part of the pattern in stockinette instead of garter stitch -- I just plain don't like garter stitch. The color is a little...
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End of the Year fun (part 2)

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On Sunday Dec 21, we kicked off our winter holiday adventure. First, taking the train to Paris! Sadly, as soon as we were north of Barcelona, we were basically engulfed in rain and fog for most of the trip, but we did get to travel along the Mediterranean coast for a good while.  When we got to Paris, it was already dark (after 4pm) and rainy. We had no trouble getting on the metro to find our hotel in the Marais area of Paris. We were a little soggy when we got to the hotel! I used Chase Rewards points to book the Hotel de JoBo --  the hotel website made it seem like it was much too chic for us, but it's a nice little boutique hotel. We were on the Josephine's roses floor - everything was covered in rose prints from floor to ceiling. There was a cute little box of macarons to welcome us. The room was tiny, but this is Paris... you're supposed to go out and see things.  We bundled up and walked through the Marais, which is full of high-end shops and cafes along narrow li...
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