Keep it Secret, Keep it Safe

My twitter friend Toby came for a week-long visit this past week. He came to see The Hobbit with me (the midnight showing, Imax 3D, totally epic), and we had an incredible time!

Right after picking him up at the airport I took him to all sorts of Jewish shops in Brookline because we needed various things for Chanukkah - sufganiyot (jelly donuts), candles, and dreydels among other things. And then I took him to our kosher Chinese restaurant. Mmmmm!

Monday night we had FHE on Skype with Heavyn and the Curtis Family (who I'm going to see on Monday!!!!)

Thursday night was time for the movie! I can't remember where we took this picture...but I think it was before we had dinner. Toby is dressed as a hobbit and I am dressed as Arwen (who isn't even seen in this movie, but I have the costume and it looked nice.)

This was us waiting in line for the movie. We got there around 9pm for the midnight showing and there were at least 100 people in line ahead of us. Luckily we got AMAZING seats. Probably best in the house.

This was also while waiting in line. We got these sweet posters, and Toby's also showing off his Hobbit magazine.

Saturday night we went back to see The Hobbit again with Shmuel, Melanie and Ariel. This was Toby's first trip on a subway!

After the movie we took some pictures with Gandalf...

For this showing I dressed as a hobbit. :-)

On our last day together we went to the Science Museum and spent several hours there having a blast. Toby got hungry and had a burrito. YUM!

All in all, it was fantastic to finally meet him in person. He got along great with the kids and with Shmuel, and it was a pleasure to have him visit. We hope he comes again soon!! But the coolest part is that he drove to Missouri, where I'm going to be visiting Heavyn next week. He's spending a few days with Heavyn before I get there and then we're going to have Monday together - the three of us. It's going to be incredible!

As for the title of this post, you'll have to wait a few days at least for an explanation. For now, you can remember that its original usage referred to the One Ring in Fellowship of the Ring.

Easy Scarf Pattern

I'm not exactly the most creative person. In fact I am terrible at anything having to do with my hands and creating art, but about a year ago I somehow got into knitting and thoroughly enjoyed it. For me, at least, it's pretty difficult to screw up as long as you can follow a pattern. I stopped knitting for a while because I was too concentrated on school but I decided to go find my old knitting things now that my semester is over. I started this scarf goodness only knows when and had no idea what the pattern was, but I was able to figure it out just by looking at what I had already accomplished. I was very, very close to being done with it, so I took it up and finished the scarf in less than half an hour. Here is the final product with the pattern.

Size 11 needles

1) Bind on 24 stitches (depending on how wide you want your scarf)

2) Knit 8 rows

3) P1, K1 2 rows

4) K1, P1 2 rows

5) Repeat steps 3 - 4 three more times

6) Repeat steps 2 - 5 until desired length, then bind off

Nice and simple, and comes out so pretty!