Weavings

Hello Everyone! Laba diena!

Soon after we arrived, Liz was the first to discover the network of little streets nearby, in what was the ghetto neighborhood across the street from us.

On the left is the Embassy of Austria. And across Gaon Street (named for the great Jewish teacher who lived on this street) -

is the Stikliai Hotel, a five-star member of the Relais and Chateaux chain. (We look in the windows.)

The painting above the hotel's front door - glass blowers (stikliai). I'm guessing that the hotel once was a glass blowers' workshop, or that there were one or more shops on the street beside the hotel, which is also called Stikliai.

With the hotel on the right, and a nice bakery there on the left, you can walk down a few doors to Bistro 18, where, with friends Deb and Marty, we had a very nice meal a few days ago. At the end of the street stands the Church of the Holy Spirit, originally a Dominican monastery, now a mostly Polish congregation.

The same spot, just looking a different direction -

and on one of these little streets there's a weaving studio that Liz has been peeking into off and on for weeks and weeks, and the other day we finally stopped in.

We had seen strips of weaving like this at the national museum - sashes for the national costumes display.

We had to make some small purchases, of course.

The weaver told us that Maria - adorned with rosary beads - is her faithful companion in what is certainly a lonely occupation.

If we haven't mentioned it before, amber seems to be the number one souvenir here in the Baltics.

This shop window is one of dozens and dozens. Yesterday we visited two amber museums where we learned how amber becomes amber - basically it's fossil resin that fifty million years ago, more or less, flowed to the sea, where most of it is found.

Another item is the nesting dolls - matrioshkas - which are traditionally Russian and not Lithuanian. But you can spend hundreds of litas on some pretty fancy ones -

I bought a very plain one - just because I no longer have the one I remember from Moscow days.

And finally, if you're hungry -

these larger-than-life cepelinai (sausage-filled potato dumplings) should dampen the hunger pains!

I sveikata!