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The Scarf and Irish Countryside

Let's start with the scarf, the UND scarf in particular.  When we last saw it, it was in the midst of the first UND logo being duplicate stitched on the front panel, it needed several more colour blocks and I was deciding if I would indeed do the logo on four sides rather than just two.  All is now complete, including the four sides of the logo.  (It is hard to photograph both sides so you will have to take my word for it, at 2-2.5 hours of duplicate stitching per logo, there are approximately 10 hours of UND on this scarf.)


This is a long (think 6 feet/2 meter) scarf made of wool so it needs to be worn in a cold weather location.  It will be perfect when my son wears it to cheer on his favourite college hockey team.  This one is now just waiting for the arrival of Christmas.  BTW there is one more ¨O¨ scarf to make for Paul's cousin, then I think it will be time to retire this pattern for a while.

Now for another helping of Ireland.  On the second day in Dublin there was much to do.  I took at tour about 40 minutes out of Dublin by bus to Glendalough (meaning valley between two lakes) where we visited the Monastic City.  The Round Tower pictured below was built in the 500's and stands 30 meters or approximately 33 yards tall.  As you can see the setting was lovely and it served as a great introduction to what was to come.


Although the cone on the top has been fixed in the 1800s the main tower as it stands is 1,500 years old.  What a tribute to the masonry skills of the time.  As if that weren't enough there were the first glimpses of what I found to be the beautiful countryside.


There is no Photo Shop trickery with the photo, this is what I saw as I took it in a moving bus.  Look at how pretty the green is with its multiple shades.  Sure the sky was cloudy, but this makes for perfect, non-bleached out pictures.  I have approximately 75 photos of the countryside in both Ireland and Scotland I was so taken by it.  That afternoon I took in The Book of Kells at Trinity College, Temple Bar, and found a hand knit vest on sale for approximately $40 ($34 EURO) in Dublin's main shopping area.  Oh, and that night I had my first on tap Guinness, and what they say it true, IMHO, it is far superior to the canned stuff we get in the U.S. and Canada.

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