Free John Travolta!

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you - just one word.
Ben: Yes sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Ben: Yes I am.
Mr. McGuire: 'Plastics.'
Ben: Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?
Ben: Yes I will.
Mr. McGuire: Shh! Enough said. That's a deal.

Clearly, Warminster, PA took this advice, and ran with it. Not only did they run with it, they scored with it, soared with it, taken plastics to completely new heights. Yes, folks, I have spent four days, four whole days in the suburbs, the land of strips malls (and yes, there's even a knitting store in a strip mall, but you can't touch anything because everything is covered in plastic) plastic covered living room furniture and you guessed it, luxury Christmas decorations - that are now, plastic! By day, your neighbor's lawn looks like an innocent place, a pile of leaves here, a pile of leaves there because this year's suburban toy of choice is apparently the leaf blower which everyone powers up at 8:00 a.m. on Sunday morning, but when the sun goes down, you suddenly hear a whooshing sound, air. Are we drowning? Is there a flood? Do I hear the sound of an inflatable raft? No, of course not! It's Santa. Santa growing to 8 ft., 12 ft., 22 ft heights - leaping from the ground, lawn by lawn, until there are plastic snowglobes, and snowmen, and snowwomen, and Santa's looming down the street, scarier than any Macy's Day M&M balloon:
Has anyone seen this gigantuan monstrosity? The next thing you know, I'm going to see John Travolta rolling down the street in a blowup plastic snow globe!
And, if that's not bad enough . . . before I get to the tragedy of my mom's knitting bag, let me remind everyone what her birthday present looked like: Does everyone remember this photo?















This stylish bag, this beautiful yarn? Can you imagine my heart stoppage when I saw this: And, I opened it to find this! And, when I asked what had happened to beautiful Anne and Kid Silk, my mom said that she had to get this second scarf done. Second scarf???? I choked. There are two of these out there? Oh yes, I'm made one for Laurie, and now I'm making one for Danielle. Mother/daughter puke scarves??? Say it isn't so! And, when my niece saw it this weekend, and she couldn't her 2 1/2 year old hands off of the plastic yarn, I knew I had better get knitting. She needs saving, and needs it now! As much as I hate to knit kid things, it must be done, for the sake of her future.

And mom, well, she did finish Lion Brand seed stitch coat. You'll recall mine, done in Noro:
And here is hers, which although it weighs 5,000 lbs, and I did have to sew the whole thing up, after she somehow sewed the arm up the length of the back, is actually pretty nice, and shows what promise mom truly has
So, what was a girl to do, surrounded by synthetics? Finish Silk Garden Reincarnate of course. Warminster is also the land of Blockbuster and late night t.v., so after sitting around the t.v. watching Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the evening news, etc., whipping up those last five blocks was a snap, then . . . picking up the 700+ stitches for the garter border in a pretty jewel toned pink a la Grace. That was fun. But, what was even more fun was sewing in the 110+ ends that I hadn't bothered to weave in while I was knitting: And, sometime around 2:00 a.m. this morning, the last little end was tucked away, and I was able to put my feet up: And here is finished Silk Garden Reincarnate, definitely definitely a higher caste than that silly suit:

And, coming later in the week, making Chicken Soup in the 'burbs with Barbara (which of course, I brought home in little plastic containers!)