My collection is now complete.
The book is read and I know how it all turns out. If you haven't read the book yet, stop now and go read the book.
As usual, JKR did a fantastic job. To read a nearly 800 page book in 2 days for me, the writing has to be good. I was a little surprised that 2 characters were killed in the first hundred pages. It wasn't a blood bath, but there were a number of deaths in this one, some expected, some not. As expected, good conquers evil. I was glad we finally found out why Dumbledore so implicitly trusted Snape. His belief that love is the strongest magic at the heart of it, of course. I wish there had been some interaction between Snape and Harry, did Harry forgive and accept Snape's role? I would also have liked more to the end of the story. The battle ends and then we skip forward 19 years, the kids of the trio are now heading off to Hogwarts. So obviously Hogwarts recovered, but how? Under who's guidance? And what finally became of the trio, besides getting married and having kids? Overall, I'm quite satisfied with the book as a whole though. I do hope the rumors that JKR will someday release a compendium type book are true. I would love to read full character descriptions and histories of the places and things in the books from her point of view.
I'm a bit sad now it's over. But I do believe this is one of the best series of books I've ever read. To mastermind such a complex story over 7 books so superbly is an astounding feat. My hat is off to JK Rowling and thank her heartily for her outstanding contribution to literature.
And now, normal activity can resume. I'm off to knit!
It's here!
See you in a few days.
It's 8:30 am, Saturday July 21. Deathly Hallows has been officially out for over 8 hours. I'm waiting, rather impatiently, for mine to arrive. I don't regret my decision not to attend a midnight release party, but I'm anxious to start reading nonetheless. According to Amazon's tracking, my book is being delivered UPS. Last time (HBP) it came USPS and I had it by 10. We rarely get UPS delivery on a Saturday and whenever we have, it hasn't been until late in the day. I just checked UPS's little tracking thing and it does not show "Out for delivery" yet. Argh! I hardly slept last night, such was my excitement. Rather than waste the morning pacing the floor, I'm going to try to get some work done. Dinner is in the crockpot so when the book does come I won't have to stop for such trivial things as feeding my husband. I've got the last load of laundry washing now. Maybe I'll try to squeeze a nap in so I can read into the wee hours. And yes, there's always knitting. I realized I didn't plan a project to knit while reading this time. For HBP I worked on the Landscape shawl. Lots of mindless knitting. Today, I have a bunch of stuff on the needles.
Some might work...
Footies in the Opal left from the Horcrux socks. Look! A short row heel!! 
The V-neck tank, still working the stockinette back.
The bamboo socks, which appear to be in black hole status right now. Seems no matter how much I knit, they aren't getting any longer.
Some that won't work...
The Huck Lace shawl, finally past the boring garter stitch and into the pattern. But you have to knit into stitches below the live stitches which means looking at your work. Not book knitting.
The tube socks, haven't knit a stitch on these in probably a month. The pattern shifts a stitch every two rows and I find if I'm not paying attention, I forget to shift.
The V-neck Cardi. It needs to be seamed before I can finish the hand work. Although if the book doesn't come by lunch, I may get some seaming done this afternoon.
While I'm at it taking pictures, here's some yarn porn for you. I haven't bought much yarn lately, but Carodan Farms had a really good sale last week and I snagged a ball of Regia Java in color 1177. It's another cotton blend sock yarn.
And here is a tiny ball of the new Treadsoft yarn that I dyed. I was aiming for a 50 g skein, but there was a knot in the hank so it's only about 40g.
This was kettle dyed by laying the skein around the perimeter of the pot and adding just enough water to cover. Then you pour the dye directly into the water over the section of yarn you want to dye. The colors sort of blend a bit more and its way less precise than hand painting. I got the idea here (although she used kool-aid rather than acid dye.) It was super easy and I might try this technique again. The results here were a bit iffy, but I think it will make fine socks. I'm hoping there's enough for a pair of footies.
It's now after 10. I had to run an errand and take all these pictures. Still no book.
My collection is now complete.
