A month has passed ...

since I managed to post anything. Part of that is probably that I've been having trouble with communications, but most of that is surely Christmas. But now the presents are either done or officially late, so I'm going to try and take a moment or two regularly to post here and I hope to get at least a handful of pictures posted before the holiday.

Since I was in Vienna when last I wrote, I'll report that it does not in fact rain every day there. Thursday was entirely dry. Hooray! I also had time that evening to go a yarn shop briefly. Through the good offices of Ravelry I found a place near a subway station and headed out. I found the shop only a few minutes before it closed but the owners, a man and a woman, stayed and helped me. They spoke no English and my fiber-related German is abysmal, but we managed fairly well.

The shop was tiny, smaller than my living room with an L-shaped counter that separated me from petting the yarn myself. Nonetheless, I enjoyed chatting with them about the similarities and differences in knitting practices in California and Austria. They told me that there are no producers of fiber in Austria, most of there stock was either from Germany or Italy. Sadly, none of it matched my current quest and since most of the brands they carry are available in the Bay Area at similar prices (despite the current exchange rate), so I bought only a few skeins of memento/gift yarn. For myself, I acquired a few skeins of Lang Seide (silk) in shades of rose that I think I'll use for gloves and a hat (or scarf) and couple of varigated skeins in fall colors. The latter are sadly acrylic, but the colors were so pretty and the owners so helpful that I decided it was worth the fairly small cost.

Better even than yarn shopping was waiting for me "am Graben", the main shopping street in the old part of Vienna. They turned the Christmas lights on! I had heard for years about how wonderful Vienna is a Christmas time and indeed it was. The lights are just incredible, the main street has incredible swags and chandeliers of lights looking very much like you might see Strauss himself wandering down the street. On the side streets, the displays are more modern with each having a different theme. There were traditional stars in white in some, snow flurries of little lights, or red bells, shooting stars or packages in others. Though the shops all close at six the streets were filled with people, mostly German-speaking, wandering downtown enjoying the season, the roasted chestnuts, potato puffs and Gluehwein (traditional mulled wine). I'm pretty sure I snacked with a fair number of folks from the Austrian ski team. Being in Vienna during the Christmas season had been one of the things on my life list and I wasn't disappointed.

I think I'll wrap it up for now, I promise I'll make it back in less than a month for the next post.