I've moved ...

Come see me at my new space.

Most Excellent Video

A friend sent me this video on YouTube. Most of the time, I think these videos are silly. This one had me from the first minute. So, I haven't been around much, here's how the end of the summer shaped up for me: July 27: I go in for an outpatient procedure and end up spending the night in the hospital because of a drug-pushing nurse who couldn't leave well enough alone. Pain meds on a 24-hour empty stomach? Don't. Do. It. August 3: Hub leaves for Alaska for what is to be a 4.5 week trip. He is going to fly-fishing guide school and has a chance to stay on afterwards and guide clients. August 10: Jillian and I leave for Stitches Midwest August 12: Little Big Man calls frantic because someone smashed into him at football practice and his knee is swollen to twice its normal size. August 13: J and I leave Stitches to drive home for me to take care of Little Big Man August 15: MR on LBM's knee. August 18: Orthopod tells us that he completely tore his ACL, there's a small tear in his medial collateral ligament, and his lateral meniscus has a partial tear. August 23: Lynne Vogel comes in for a fabulous knitting/spinning class. Totally. Amazing. (More on that later.) August 29: Second orthopedic opinion on LBM's knee. August 30: Meniscus surgery for LBM. September 5: School starts for everyone (Sassy, Little Big Man, and me). September 6: Hub calls from Alaska and casually mentions that the lodge where he's staying has another group of fishermen coming in and could he stay for another "week or so"? How many times can one say fuck in a 15 minute long conversation? As it turns out, plenty. September 16: Hub calls from airport saying, "I'm here, come pick me up." September 19: I leave for a business trip to (seriously) Milwaukee. Please, "Jane!!!! Stop this crazy thing!!!"

What did I learn?

What color does this look like to you? It's supposed to be shades of purple. I think it looks "purple-like", but I hesitate to call it purple. Hub thinks I'm crazy, but I think it looks more blue. This was the last of the Chasing Rainbows hanks that I had. The other 4 hanks spun beautifully. This one seemed to have clumps of silk that made drafting difficult. There are sections of slubby gray-purple silk that have tightly twisted purple wool wrapped around them. Not my favorite skein, but useable. I had 2 opportunities to dye while the TdF was going on. Jillian and I took a Friday and got busy in my back yard and then the next Saturday, I worked alone with the left over dye. I'll say that while it may be more peaceful dyeing alone, it's not much fun. There was no one at my house to ooh and ahh over my color choices. There was no one to take a turn at rinsing out the fiber and there was no one to share a latte with. I had a bump of natural colored Polworth/Silk mix that I split into 2 oz bundles. These are my 2 favorites from the 6 I dyed. This mixture took the the dye beautifully. One thing J and I learned is that fewer is better. We both liked the bits that we had used only 3 colors on. The top bump is turquoise, mallard green, and grasshopper. I poured the colors on and then "encouraged" them to blend together. I did the same on the bottom bump with turkey red, paprika, and grasshopper. There are some very cool bright green spots on this roving. I plan on taking these with me to spin on my downtime when we're at Stitches Midwest next week. Yes, it did sneak up on me thanks. At least I have some idea of what I'm packing, right? Lastly, I am in love with cashmere and silk blends. This is some I bought on eBay last week. Isn't it luscious? I love the feel of this stuff in the ball like this, but what's amazing to me is how soft it is when it's spun. I haven't actually tried this, but have spun this blend before. I'll let you know how it goes.

Tour de Fleece Fait Accompli!!

As Floyd persevered, so did I. My goal was to spin the equivalent of 1 oz of wool/silk fiber per day - 23 oz in total. While I didn't spin 1 oz every day, I did spin every day of the tour, including the rest days. Yesterday, I woke up knowing that I had roughly 2 oz left to spin to complete the race. I spun it, plied it and rushed to measure. The boys were already circling the Champs Elysees and my time was running short. Twenty-three oz translates to 1.44 pounds. This is what I got - see the little turquoise numbers on the right of the picture? It says 1.42. What??? Back to the wheel. I figured that there wasn't enough time to spin and ply, so I had to come up with a compromise. I thought I could spin the rest of the weight I needed, but I'd have to leave it on the bobbin to count it as yarn. Not wanting to throw off the count, my tare weight changed a little. I went back to the wheel, determined to make up the lost weight and complete the race with the maillot jaune. I actually have gotten fairly good at spinning while not watching my hands during this counter-clockwise tour around France, but at the end of the race with the sprinters rushing to the front of the peleton and my boys from Discovery, George and Eki, attempting the stage win, I had to stop spinning and just watch. When the action was over and Floyd had finally won, it was time for the moment of truth. Success!!

Favorite Color Swap Questionnaire

Favorite Color Swap Questionnaire 1. What are your top three favorite colors? Orange, green, blue 2. What crafts do you really enjoy? Knitting, spinning (both wheel and spindle), dyeing, scrapbooking 3. What products do you really covet? an upgrade on my drum carder, Bosworth spindles, cashmere and silk fiber 4. What other activities do you enjoy besides your favorite crafty things? Reading, Tour de France 5. Is there anything you collect? Besides fiber and yarn? No. 6. What is your zodiac sign and/or Chinese zodiac symbol? Libra 7.What are your favorite� �scents/smells? patchouli, vanilla, orange (nothing flower-y) �types of music and/or bands? Dave Matthews Band, Indigo Girls, Black Eyed Peas, Patsy Cline, Maria Callas, Pink, Will Smith, Queen Latifah, Bare Naked Ladies, Johnny Cash (almost everything) �authors? Sara Paretsky, Patricia Cornwell, Anthony Bourdain, Gregory Maguire, John Irving, Amy Tan, Barbara Kingsolver �animals? sheep, alpacas, musk ox �places to shop? a good yarn shop, SOAR market, Target �season? fall �yarn/fabric/paper/other craft supplies? online, locally owned, Michaels, JoAnne's �candies or goodies? Scharfenberger chocolate, caramels, orange slices, peppermint 8. Do you have any wish lists? Amazon 9. Are you allergic to anything? latex, bananas, kiwi 10. Do you have any pets? What are they? 2 dogs and a cat (not really mine, but they live in my house) 11. Please include anything else you would like your secret pal to know about you- anything that would be helpful in finding you little gifts that you will really enjoy. I can't think of anything. I recently have been dyeing fiber and now have the black fingernails to go with it. I can't find anything to get rid of the dye (even nail brushes). Since I can't wear latex, all the kitchen gloves are out. I don't like cartoon-y things. My favorite scrapbook papers are from Close to My Heart or Basic Grey. I blew out 3 hand-knit socks this winter and haven't the heart to replace my stash. Since the winters here are cold, I need to get busy and make some socks for myself. Thanks Secret Color Pal!!

SHUT UP!!

After cracking in yesterday's stage, losing a little more than 10 minutes and all hope for a podium finish in Paris(and breaking my heart into more pieces than an impressionist's dropped vase) Floyd took the stage win today and came out in 3rd place. Hub had to call me at work to tell me the news. Unbelievable!!

Empath?

I rarely do these quiz thingies, but this one makes sense to me (okay, except for the kind and merciful).

You scored as Judge. You are a Judge Empath, one who is a "truthsayer". You can tell truth from lies, good from evil. You do not tolerate wrong doing. You are a defender of the good and the innocent. You are kind and merciful but do not play foolish games. (from "The Book of Storms" by Jad Alexander at MySilentEcho.com) Judge 95% Artist 80% Fallen Angel 75% Healer 70% Traveler 60% Precog 60% Universal 50% Shaman 45% What Kind of Empath Are You? created with QuizFarm.com

And a shout-out to Emma: Girlfriend, if you want to be thought of as a pain in the ass around here, you're going to have to work a little harder!!

Lush Summer

With the wet spring we've had, everything is taller, greener, and fuller. These are some tiger lillies that I moved ages ago and every year they fill in with more and more flowers. I love coming up my driveway at the end of the day - all that orange and green. It's gorgeous!

Mmmm, raspberries!

When we moved into our house 14 years ago there were lots of plants that we either didn't know were there or knew they were there, but didn't know what they were. At the end of our driveway was an old wooden fence with a bunch of spiked vines all twisted around it. Hub hated the way it looked and pulled it out, vines, fence, and all. Turns out they were raspberry plants. Fortunately, he didn't get them all and every year we have a couple handfuls of raspberries. This year, it's a bumper crop. Sassy and I went down this morning and filled this container with the luscious little things and gorged ourselves on the way into work/field hockey camp. They were so good, it makes the 73 mosquito bites I've been scratching all day worth it.

Spectator on the Course!!

I sat down on Saturday ready for the Prologue of the Tour and had my wheel and roving in place for a quick breakaway when the race started. Then chaos busted loose. I was blithely preparing my roving and had quite a large pile of fluff on the floor next to my chair. The next thing I knew, Hub was mildly announcing that someone was making off with my pile of fluff in her pointy toothed mouth. I started screaming at the thief and she took off running ... with the fluff in her mouth. Hub chased her down and brought it back, "Um is that technical difficulties? No, it's a spectator on the course." And then proceeded to laugh himself sick. Who me? I set a goal for myself of spinning 1 ounce per day of silk/wool blend. What I've been spinning so far is 50/50 merino and bombyx. It is so gorgeous that I may have just ordered more on line, despite my fiber spending moratorium. I have to have enough to last for the whole tour don't I? These are the skeins from a 2 ounce bundle of Chasing Rainbows. The lighter is brick and the greener one is forest. I'm pretty consistent with 50 yards in each skein. I think they'll be lovely accents for something. Maybe I'll just put them up for sale in the guild Fleece Fair in September. Any suggestions? Since I only have one more bundle of it left, I decided to spin that little purple bump. Turns out that it's short staple wool carded with multi-colored silk noil. It's an interesting yarn, but not what I like to spin. I really prefer smooth yarn and with all the short bits in the roving, it's very bumpy and uneven. Someone will love it, I'm sure. It will definitely be going to the Fleece Fair. Tonight, I'm hoping to finish up the purple bump and move back to the blue Chasing Rainbows that I have. I have been meeting my goal of 1 ounce/night. Five down, 18 to go!

Almost Here!!

Here's the route for the race this year. I hope everyone is as excited as I am about the whole thing! Seems to me with all the fur flying, we're going to have one heck of a race. Wide open friends, wide open!

Language Weirdness

I made it to the Ann Arbor Knit-In on Tuesday night and think I remember it snowing the last time I was there. Time is flying so fast now, I'll be moving at light speed when I'm 80. Lynne mentioned that she was garage saling over the weekend and saw, "One of those long, tube instruments from Australia." Everyone else said, "Didgeridoo?" Which is this: I said, "Billabong?" Immediately after I said it, I thought, "WTF is a billabong?" Then Lynne turned to me and said, "What IS a billabong?" Being in polite company, I said, "Um, I'm not really sure." Now I know. What I really want to know is this: 1. Do they really speak English in Australia? 2. What causes those weird connections in your brain to mis-fire and supply a completely wrong word to your tongue that you immediately have to spit out and .5 seconds later wonder if that really was your voice you heard?

Amazing

"Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to reduce inequities and improve lives around the world" First, I can't imagine having that much money to be able to give away. I applaud Warren Buffet for giving his fortune to the Gates Foundation and trusting them to spend it to benefit the greatest number of people. I wonder if the Gates Foundation is taking applications. How great would it be to be involved with giving away the largest philanthropic donation ever??

Monday, Monday

This is the shelving unit in my studio* that mostly holds fiber. The ceiling in this room is 20 feet. (I think - I just kept buying those plastic shelving units until it couldn't go any higher.) It was a little overwhelming to try and find anything in all those boxes, but I persevered. Sassy helped me by holding boxes and filtering through some of them on her own. "Wow," she said, "this is a lot of stuff. How are you ever going to ..." I stopped her right there. No need to head down that road. *It's actually a corner of our garage that Hub insulated, dry walled, and painted in order to house his own hobby paraphernalia. He graciously gave me half of the room for my own hobby storage when I threatened to take over the dining room. Here's the fiber that made the cut. The giant white skein is from Widdershin Woolworks. I'm quite certain I bought it at Maryland way back in 2000. Ms. Widdershin does not have an online presence, she only goes to a few shows a year and apparently Maryland is not one of them anymore. If you see her at a show, buy. It's dreamy, soft fiber and I wish I had more than 2 oz. I came across an alpaca/silk blend of hers in the box with this skein and I tucked it carefully back to work on later. The Chasing Rainbows skeins are the blue, green, and terra cotta bundles. Now that I see them in a photo instead of in the fiber, I'm thinking I should have taken a picture with them laid out so you could see the amazing variation in colors. The terra cotta looks one-toned and it's definitely not. There's green and red and yellow all mixed in - much lovlier than it appears. The purple bump is from Ozark Carding. On closer inspection, this bump is mostly wool with silk noils thrown in. I may bump this off the Tour list and pick up some merino/silk that I dyed in my Lynne Vogel workshop last summer. I just need to find it now. (see above photo of the shelving unit) In related news, I had sandals and beer with Jillian on Friday and we agreed to a dye date within the next couple of weeks. I have all the bottles saved up to mix the dye, now I just need to do it. Maybe if I finish spinning the Widdershin blend first, that will be the first in the dye pot. I also have a giant bump of pure merino roving that needs to be jazzed up - all the possibilities there! Puppy P*or*n: This is the sandbox that Hub made for our offspring many years ago. You can see from all the weeds that it doesn't get much action. My niece Stella has come over in the past and upon seeing all the weeds, will go to other spots in our yard, pull up weeds, and "plant" them in the "box garden." Anyway, the pup likes to dig there. She found this small bit of plastic in her manic digging and after growling at it, picked it up and shook her head to kill it. Then she tossed it aside and went back to digging. She's a little too cute for her own good.

Can You Stand It??

All that is cuteness in a small puppy. It's difficult to take a picture of her because she's moving all the time ... until she stops, drops, and snores - a bit like a 3-year-old. We've all been sleepless for the last 3-4 nights. Moving her cage into Little Big Man's room seemed to help, she just wants to be able to lift up her head and see a body near her. Ready for the name? Dolly Varden. My naming rule for pets is that it has to come from a book. We have Maisie from Horton Hatches the Egg, and Sophie, from Sophie's Choice - yeah, I didn't tell the 8-year-old who Sophie was, she just liked the name. Anyway, Dolly Varden was a character in a Charles Dickens novel called Barnaby Rudge - it's also the name of a type of Alaskan salmon. Hub likes the way we managed to combine a few of our hobbies into a small dog. Tour de Fleece I've been thinking about what to spin during the tour. It hit me that I should pick a fiber blend and see what I have in the stash. I picked 50/50 wool/silk blend - how much could there be? As it turns out LOTS. So I decided on merino/silk and came out with 3 two oz dyed bundles from Chasing Rainbows, a 2 oz skein of white from Widdershin Woolworks, and a 1.8 bundle from Ozark Carding Mill. I'm still searching to see if there's anymore of this blend in my stash. If there is, I'll have to narrow the search parameters yet again.

Woohoo!

She has read my mind I tell you! I've joined Le Tour de Fleece and couldn't be more excited about it. I just have to come up with my challenge to complete during the race and I'll be off and ... biking.

Not a Puppy

She's a Brittany Spaniel and she's 7 weeks old tomorrow. We're picking her up from the breeder on Sunday. Sassy is almost jumping out of her skin ready to smother this not a pup with smooches. This is a full grown Brittany from Wikipedia. They're very good tempered, extremely smart dogs. They also tend to be willful. Our 8-year-old Brittany will take it into her head that if she's more than 25-feet away from you, she doesn't have to listen to you calling her. She frequently disappears into the fields around our house. Then she'll come back hanging her head and looking pathetic. Funny dogs.

Proof of Life

Jillian twisted my arm and forced me to sign up for Stitches Midwest. One of the classes I'm taking is Lining a la Chanel with Jean Frost. Is Trip-Trap a jacket? Maybe. I think it will do. Here's the back. I love the purple scheme of the yarn, but I was worried about the turquoise and gold that line the blocks. They look smashing together. If I ever see her, I'm going to kiss Vivian Hoxbro on the mouth. It's a gorgeous design and lots of fun to knit. I've also been spinning. I think I bought this roving at Threadbear. (I'm in my blue phase.) It's lovely stuff, beautifully prepared - my own prep consists of fluffing it up a bit and I'm spinning away. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of leaving the ball of roving on the couch. Apparently the cat decided that it was a nice napping spot. Here's what she did to it. It better be salvageable, or I'll be making me a cat-pelt pillow very soon.

Who can resist?

When Hub started talking about getting a puppy, I knew I was done for. I knew that I would lose any argument about why we don't need to bring another living thing into our house. So, I just gave up and referred to the upcoming blessed event as "Not a puppy." As in, "When can we go look at not a puppy?" Or, "We're not getting a puppy, but are you thinking of names?" We went yesterday to look at them. Does he look over the moon or what?

Yes, it's yarn

This is the yarn I've managed to spin in stolen moments at lunch. It's the cashmere/silk blend I bought in Maryland and spun on my gorgeous Grafton Fibership. One cop, Andean plied created approximately 6 yarns of yarn. The picture is weird (strange camera), but it's quite fine and a few slubs of silk really give it some great character. Aside from the silk sticking to my hands, it was fun to spin - and there's lots more in the bag! I hung it up on the bulletin board over my desk to see if there would be a reaction. {crickets} Because I'm not the sort to sit by and let lovely yarn be ignored, I mentioned it to anyone who happened by my office. Lots of "wow" and "it's so soft!" Then, of course, I had to haul out the spindle and show them how it's done. Lots of fun. In other news, I finished reading Angels and Demons last night. It's by Dan Brown (of The Da Vinci Code fame) and it was good! I'm usually a little leary about reading anything my sister or my mom recommend to me. It's not that they read bad stuff, it's just that our tastes don't always mesh. A quick read, lots of action and enough of a mystery to keep me reading to the last page (and keep me awake late into the night). I've been neglecting the reading lately - mostly because I can't read and knit at the same time. I think it's time for some more books on tape. Suggestions?

Favorite Blogs

Because I'm still overwhelmed at trying to fit back into my life, you get a lame post about my favorite blogs. Each of these people inspires me to be more creative and more accepting of my own creations. Here are my favorites: I'm lucky enough not only to be able to read about her knitting and spinning, but to actually witness it in person - Knittingfrau inspires me most. She's always supportive and suggests additions or subtractions or substitutions. It's been some time, but Curlypurl is back. I've always loved reading her creation stories interspersed with her family stories. She tells great tales about creating and the eventual mishaps that happen along the way. Lately, I've been obsessively reading Franklin's tales of Dolores and laughing out loud at my desk. If you haven't seen his blog - really, go take a look. You're going to have to trust that I'm knitting and spinning - really I am. I'll have pictures next week, maybe.

Um, that's mine ...

Hub is getting ready to make his annual fishing pilgrimmage to Alaska, so he's tying flies. I came home to this the other day. See those beauties in the lower right corner? He happened across some roving I've been spinning from Hand Painted Yarn. The balls of yarn you see in the photo? Mine too. Every now and again he'll ask, "do you have {fill in a color here} yarn? I scoff, "Of course, what do you want?" Then we walk back to the yarn stash and he feels up whatever color he wants and makes a choice. On this particular day, he snatched the roving from its place near my wheel. "I hope you don't mind," he explained, "it's a great blend of colors and it really does look like salmon eggs, doesn't it? This is him in action. Apparently, he's unfamiliar with the click of a camera lens and couldn't stand being still for one more second. And before you can say it Jillian, I don't wonder where Little Big Man gets his metrosexuality from anymore. On another note, I finished something. This is Sassy modeling a scarf made from Great Adirondack Texas Bighorn yarn. It's 60% mohair and 40% wool and lusciously soft. The best part is that it comes in a 325 yard skein! I don't remember how much it cost (and can't find a price online anywhere) but I assure you, it's a great value. I knit on this thing for months and never once had to splice it. Plus, the colors are amazing. If you find it, buy it!

Lunchtime Spinning

What's this? Why it's my fiber stash at work. I got tired of hearing about how people spin on their downtime or their lunch hours and I wanted some of that. After Jillian picked what she wanted from the booty, this lovely Grafton Fibership was officially mine. The fiber is some yummy cashmere and silk that I picked up from Liberty Ridge. It's absolutely dreamy to spin. Here's a close up of the spindle whorl. Isn't it gorgeous? Sorry about the flash - the spindle is so shiny, there's no way to take a photo without it being overexposed. The photo is pretty true to color - it really is almost pink.

Maryland Photo Essay

The first time I went to Maryland in 1999, everyone said, "Get in line for a t-shirt before you do anything else. Nancy and I got to the fairgrounds at a little after 8:00 am (offically the place opens at 9:00). We got a great parking space and moseyed on in. These are the people who lined up behind us - the line in front of us is just about as long. They aren't kidding - get in line for a t-shirt first thing! I will show a picture of all the stuff I bought, but I wanted to let Jillian see it first. That way, she gets the thrill of the market. I do have other pictures for you though. The parking lot is actually a farmer's field. We saw him cutting the last of his hay on Friday in order to get out of the way of all the cars. It looks impossibly big and I thought, "please, do we really need this much space?" Yes, yes we do. This was the parking lot when Nancy and I went to drop stuff at the car at approximately noon. There were still cars streaming in at that point. My skills as an enabler are world renown. I can talk almost anyone into buying just about anything. When my friend Lynne was wavering about buying a Journey Wheel, I told her how wonderful they are to travel with, how easy they are to spin on, and how beautiful they are (she didn't need me to tell her that - she'd already seen them). She went to the Bosworths' booth and sat to spin and she really fell in love. She called me on my cell phone about an hour later and said, "Do you want to see it?" Here she is all loaded up to walk back to her car. That giant bump of fiber is for her Hands on Color Workshop at the Taos Wool Festival this October. If you're going to be in the area, I'd suggest you take her class. She's an amazing teacher. I'd be going if it weren't for this cursed graduate school! These lovely women are Lynne, Dynese, and Ann. They also drove out to experience Maryland and doesn't it look like they had a good time? They had so much stuff in their car that they couldn't see out of the back window (that's stuff they bought - not their clothes and things they brought with them!). They asked Nancy and me to take some of their stuff back - they only gave us fleece. I don't think they trusted us with their combed fiber. We drove past this sign for 3 days before I asked Nancy to stop so I could take a picture. Do the people of Maryland know how to name their roads or what? Right after I got out of the car, I heard giant "woofs" from across the road. There were 2 huge dogs eyeing me, so I snapped the picture quick and got back in the car.




Last, but certainly not least - here's the gem I brought home yesterday. This is my Sassy this morning giving it a go. I left the room to get the camera and I could hear the wheel going faster and faster. I said, "Hey! Slow it down in there!" She laughed and said, "Sorry, I just wanted to see how fast it would go." Fast, it goes very fast.

Cross Your Fingers

On Saturday at the Sheep and Wool Festival, I saw this: This, my friends, is a 30" Schacht-Reeves double treadle, cherry wheel. It is beyond gorgeous. It is also approximately $1,500. While fondling this lovely wheel, a woman who worked in the booth said, "I need to get rid of that wheel. Make me an offer." I told her I'd think about it. What sort of offer do you make on a $1,500 wheel? Nancy and I discussed it on Saturday night and I decided to offer her $800 for it on Sunday. All she could do was say no, right? When we got back to the booth on Sunday, it was gone. No big deal - it's huge and I wasn't sure where I'd put it anyway. Last night, my phone rang with Nancy shouting into it "Go read your e-mail!!" A local is moving to Europe next month and is getting rid of all his stuff. He's offering his 30" Schacht-Reeves single treadle wheel at an obscenely low price. I immediately called and made an appointment to look at it this afternoon. Anyone want to lay odds on how long it will take me to wrestle it into my car?

Oy

Feet hurt. Back hurts. Best. Day. Ever. Will provide pictures of the haul when we get it unpacked from the car. Think spindles (5 - though not all for me) Woolee Winder with 2 extra bobbins Cashmere Silk Angora ...and more. Must swallow pain killers and drink a gallon of water.

T minus 1 and counting

Today we took it easy and wandered around Maryland's antique shops. We stopped in a little town called Mt. Airy and while we didn't actually go into any antique shops, we did find this: I spotted the sign from the road and screeched, "Yarn Shoooop." We made a bee-line for the parking lot. Inside was a tiny 2-room shop, but what this woman had in there!! Of course I bought yarn - I dare you not to. I know, I made a point of saying, "I really don't need this, but...." So here's the rundown starting at the 9:00 position in the photo. This single ball of lushness is Knit One Crochet Two's Paintbox in the Thistle colorway. It's 100% wool. What you can't see in the photo is the incredibly subtle colors - it's sort of a periwinkle/lavender/sage green. Dahlia (yes, we're on a first name basis) assures me it is self striping in the most wonderful way. Two balls will make an adult sized hat. I just wanted to play with it, but Nancy bought 2 balls of a different colorway for the hat. Next up (going clockwise) is Elsebeth Lavold's Chunky Al. It is 50% alpaca/50% wool. Long time readers know that I feel the love for Elsebeth's yarns. This is softer than soft with a light alpaca halo. These 4 balls will be a scarf - I'm thinking yellow cable up the middle surrounded by the sage. Fabulous! At 3:00 is Louisa Harding's Sari Ribbon - 90% nylon/10% metallic (that's what the label says). It's a gorgeous 3/4 inch wide ribbon that doesn't feel like it will be too hard on the hands. J - you up for some of this? The last of the batch is what I blogged about the other day. It's Nashua's Creative Focus Chunky. Isn't it the most lovely shade of blue? It's 75% wool/25% alpaca (notice a trend here?). Again, I'm going for a scarf - can't resist that softness against the neck. The shop is called Eleganza and is in Frederick, Maryland - just up the road from where we're staying. The owner was very friendly and gave us a tip on how to get into the Howard County Fairgrounds to avoid the traffic. One more thing, please say hello to my newest friend, Lily June. She was born on Wednesday around 7:00 am. Isn't she gorgeous?

What did we see today?

Amazing things: We started the day off at the Textile Museum. It's the most amazing place!! You can't take pictures of the textiles, so you'll have to take my word for it that it was way cool. If you haven't been - go.








Then we went over to the National Zoo. Here are my new friends, the baby turtles.










and their neighbors, the prairie dogs.













This young giraffe was desperately trying to reach the leaves on the tree above it. It wandered around and stretched its neck, then stuck out its incredibly long tongue - and the leaves were that far out of reach. Giraffe hell?













One of the crown jewels of the National Zoo - the mama panda. She was coming out to dine on bamboo for lunch. We could hear the crack of the bamboo stalks as she chomped into each one. Way cool. The baby was hanging out in the tree next to her, but declined to show his face.












What's this? The National Cathedral - and yes, Jillian, it is still standing even though we went in and had a tour. Even though I'm a heathen, it was an amazing, peaceful place. It's built in the style of a gothic cathedral (shape of a cross) and while it's officially the seat of the DC Episcopalian diocese, it's a non-denominational house of worship. This is the largest of 4 rose windows in the cathedral (another cornerstone of the European gothic cathedral). I'm not sure if you can see it or not, but in the center is a 6' tall Jesus.













In the crypt, there is a small prayer room completely done in mosaics. This is the only one that was bright enough to photograph. They were so beautiful, that when we walked in, both of us caught our breath.

We have arrived!

We're in Frederick, Maryland tonight. Just came back from a fabulous Italian dinner. The cabrese salad was so good, I just knew the tiramisu would be out of this world. It was. A crime to leave even a bite on the plate. I thought about taking a picture of it, but realized I had left my camera in the hotel room. What a blogging lame ass I've become! Found a teeny, tiny yarn shop that I'll tell you about tomorrow. Left the bag in the car - sorry. I will tell you about the yarn I picked up. It's called Nashua - a chunky yarn that's 75% wool and 25% alpaca (100% soft). I picked up 3 balls of it and will whip it into a quick scarf. Yummy stuff. Here's one picture for you, but back story first. Every year the Hub goes to a fishing tournament. They have a drawing with raffle prizes and every so often I knit him a pair of giant socks to take for the raffle prize table. This year, I realized I was getting low on my favorite yarn for this project (Bryspun Kid-n-Ewe) and went out hunting for it. It's been discontinued! Put out a call to see if anyone had some and this bag is what I found. This will keep them in socks for years!

Two Months??!!!?

Good god, has it been that long? I'm sorry, but it has. Can I blame it on graduate school and the pathological need to do well? I am pleased to announce that grades came through for the term and I have an A-SS on my report card. My mom was very proud. So to celebrate, I'm going to Maryland! Sheep and Wool Festival that is. Nancy and I are in the wilds of Pennsylvania right now. We don't like to drive until we're falling down dead, so we stop and find a clean place to lie our heads and look at the locals. A place is considered good if there's a bookstore nearby. Barnes and Noble qualifies - ran to the knitting department to look for Big Girl Knits and wasn't disappointed. Okay, I was, but only because they had it faced out on the second tier of a rack. Mmm-hmm, I fixed it. Moved the crappy crochet book from in front and Big Girls is rocking now. It's fabulous - no kidding, and I'm not biased or anything. I have the camera and we have free wifi in our ultimate destination hotel, so you'll hear more from me in the coming days. Shopping list? WoolLee Winder Golding Spindle maybe a Hatchtown Spindle I'm looking at everything and I will take no prisoners. Nothing is safe.

Citrus Festival

My mother sent me an e-mail filled with pictures of things created with lemons, oranges, and grapefruits in a small town in Italy. This one cracked me up.

Could this be truer???

Carla -- [noun]: A hermit living in the big city 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Where's my black arm band?

I was feeling kind of sorry for myself last night. I knew that I was about to finish the book I've been reading for pleasure - A Breath of Snow and Ashes - the last in the Outlander series. I started reading Outlander over Thanksgiving break and loved it so much that I bought the rest and have been racing through them. They're not the greatest books, but I love the characters so much that I had to find out what happened to them. Please tell me I'm not the only one who mourns at the end of a good book! So I get home to finish the book with a heavy heart and find Hub and Little Big Man with this in the living room. Hub said, "Well, I'm 40 now and there are things that I want to do and I can't if I'm fat." Cool! We all tried it out and Sassy thinks it's the coolest thing. Hub even got up early this morning and watched bird hunting shows while he was elipting away. I got into work this morning and there was an envelope in my mailbox and a message on my voice mail. I'm cranky, I'm in mourning - and there's work to do. The envelope was from a friend I haven't seen in a very long time with a note and a picture of this. The note said, "Saw this and thought of you ... give me a call when you get a minute." Talking to her was the coolest thing. We made plans to meet for lunch when it gets warm and my day is starting to look up. The voice mail message was Jillian. I'm on spring break next week and wanted to go play. We're going to do lunch and a movie. Woohoo! I'm starting to pull out of my funk a little more. Then I go online and find Diana Gabaldon's official website. There is at least 1 more book in the series and possibly 2. Some days it does pay to get out of bed.

Dang

Highlights

So, I've been a little busy lately. Even though I dropped microceconomics {spitting over right shoulder} I'm still dealing with statistics. Send me any good number-crunching vibes you have lying around. Would you mind if I just hit the highlights of the last couple of months? This lovely stuff comes curtesy of the Ann Arbor Knit In. It's a group of knitters who meet on Tuesdays and Thursdays for social knitting and good coffee drinking. We had a gathering at Freddyknits' house back before Christmas, ate good food, and traded gifts. It's Koigu - in my most favoritest color. This was my Christmas gift from Hub. Lest you think he's that in tune with my hobbies, I opened several websites and told him to pick something off one of them. He chose the Zuni Medicine Woman basket spindle from Gabe Jaramillo. I saw the interview in Spindlicity and then went to his website. It's impossible to tell in the picture how big the spindle is. I guess I should have known because he lists all the weights on the site, but when I opened the box and pulled it out, I realized how big a 4.5 oz spindle is. It is great for plying! I called Gabe to order it and he couldn't have been nicer. He apologized over and over that he didn't have any spindles in stock at that moment because they bought all the spindles he took to SOAR a couple of weeks before. He seemed a little shocked at that. I laughed and told him that it wouldn't have mattered how many he brought - they would have bought them all! Lastly, this is my haul from the Fleece Fair: I wish I had taken my camera to show you how much stuff was in one place. It was almost impossible to choose and I found myself touching, picking up, and putting things back down on tables because I didn't want to go over my budget. I actually came in under my budget - for once!! Here's the run down moving clockwise from that giant green/blue blob in the upper right. The green/blue is 8 oz of a Corriedale/Mohair blend. My friend Edie did this and named the color Midnight Forest - she has the most gorgeous colors! Next is a 2 oz ball of white Rambouillet combed top. It was so soft and smelled so good, I had to have some. Pauline also had some brown (that Kim picked up) and I wanted some of that too, but decided to spin this up first and then buy some brown. Then comes 4 oz of wool and angora in that lovely 2-toned green. I have lots of green, but the softness of this cannot be beat. And speaking of softness, that tomato-y red is 4 oz. of alpaca. Jillian practically shoved this in my bag. I didn't resist. Next is 4 more oz of wool and angora dyed by Jane Purcell - who also did the 2-tone green from above. I can't wait to spin this and may break with the studying to do just that. I'm moving into a blue phase with my spinning and I'm dying to see how this turns out as yarn. The lovely orange/red/yellow is also from Edie. She had larger balls of this, but I do have lots of red and orange and thought this might make a nice accent yarn for something. It's Corriedale and mohair as well. Lastly, the first ball that Jillian thrust into my hands when I met her at the tables is alpaca and wool. I don't know that the colors show up well, but they're a lovely black/purple swirl. It's another ball that's so soft I can't wait to spin it. I have lots of projects lined up for when classes finish (on April 18). I can't wait to finish the schooling and get back to my life. There are too many more interesting things to do!

Hey! I was tagged!

4 Jobs I've had in my life: * editor * book store manager * car crash researcher * Girl Scout Cookie Mom 4 Movies I can watch over and over: * Godfather I * Godfather II * Pride and Prejudice - the BBC miniseries * Kindergarten Cop (shut up) 4 TV Shows I love to watch: * Law and Order - Criminal Intent * West Wing * Crossing Jordan * House 4 Places I have lived: * Michigan * Sunny for about 10 minutes Michigan * Cold Michigan * Cold, wet, gray Michigan 4 Places I have been on holiday (this was hard to only pick 4!): * Antarctica * Moscow and St. Petersburg * Portugal * Colorado 4 of my favorite dishes: * Soup (I could talk about soup forever) * Delmonico steak * mashed potatoes * that spongy Ethiopian bread and some spicy beef or goat 4 Websites I visit daily: * Pesky Apostrophe * Snowball in Hell * Fresh Pepper * D-listed * Post Secret (I added this one in because they only post once a week - on Sunday - so I figured I could sneak it in) 4 Places I would rather be right now: * Antarctica * Colorado * Morocco * my toasty warm bed reading a book for fun 4 Bloggers I am tagging: * Is there anyone left? Anyone? Bueller?

What's this??

Lance and Sheryl have called it quits. Oh noooooo!

Woohoo!!

I mentioned to the Hub on Friday last week that I'd really like a laptop. I talked about how in Statistics this term, we have to use a statistical software package and how convenient it would be if I had a laptop to load the program into and work on my homework anywhere. I talked about how I had a couple of big papers to write and how it would be cool to take a laptop with me and work whenever I got a few minutes. What's this? My new laptop. Now I need a backpack, because carrying this thing around in my messenger bag is making my back hurt. Could I possibly whine anymore because I got what I wanted? Shyeah, like that's going to stop me.

Smells Like Teen Angst

This morning I witnessed a most hysterical display of teenage temper. I was chatting with Sassy who was standing on the landing between the basement and the main floor of our house. Little Big Man, who had been in the basement, was leaping up the stairs with a pile of clothing in his arms when he mis-stepped and fell. {He unfortunately has inherited my sister�s trait of being able to fall up stairs.} I winced and said, �Are you okay?� He leapt to his feet, pointed his finger at Sassy and screamed, �It�s HER fault!!! Why are you standing at the top of the stairs? I looked up and saw you there and lost my balance! I never would have fallen if you hadn�t been standing there!� I fixed my face into neutral and said, �Come on, how is it HER fault that YOU fell?� �If she hadn�t been standing there, I never would have fallen!!� Spittle was flying out of his mouth and he struck a crazy pose � arms akimbo and taking up space. Discretion being the better part of valor, I gave him the Scottish noise and walked away. By the time I reached the other room, I was shaking from laughter. When Sassy came into my room a few minutes later, I fell dramatically on the bed and said, �Stop it! You just gave me the �fall down eye� and now I can�t get up,� and laughed like a maniac. She looked at me, disgusted, and walked back out. At the end of the driveway waiting for the bus, Little Big Man said �Be good today Sassy � don�t give anyone the death ray.� Then when he was getting out of the car, he fake stumbled a little and said, �See? She�s dangerous!� I laughed out loud. She was incensed. �He�s so mean to me!� �Nope,� I said, �he realized how ridiculous he was being this morning and that was his apology.� Damn, he�s growing up way too fast.

Graduate School Sucks

It's only 3 weeks into the semester and already I'm overwhelmed. I understand this isn't supposed to be a picnic - I'm all set to work hard. What I want from all this hard work is some semblance of understanding. I mean, really, if you read a chapter, is it too much to ask to be able to understand what you've read? I'm not a stupid person, but I have to read my microeconomics text 3 times to just understand what it says. Which is not to say that I understand the concept - just that I understand all the labels on the colorful pictures. I'm also spending 10 hours sitting in class for 1 measly 3 credit course - and 2 of those hours are on a Sunday! For those of you playing along on the scorecard at home, yes I took Micro last term. This is the cost-benefit analysis part of the course - it only looks the same, it isn't really the same. So, despite nary an understanding of what a cost-benefit analysis is...I did one and came up with "Drop the fucking class." Dang, that was easy. Now I just have to make it through Statistics and I'm home free. One more thing, the person who invented Sudoku - truly an evil soul. This is the worst time sucking game ever!

Hooked on a Feeling

I made the mistake of clicking on that awful Hasselhoff video that's making the rounds and haven't been able to get this terrible song out of my head for 2 days. That teaches me to click on something for the morbid curiosity. If you must, go here. Don't say I didn't warn you. So, I'm back in school. I'm trying to get studying done as well as a bit of spinning and/or knitting every night. I didn't knit at all last semester and almost lost my mind. The needles soothe me and I was crazy to give them up. Send me your good statistics and cost-benefit analysis vibes. I think I'm going to need them. One more housekeeping detail. Last year around this time lots of people were signing up to read 50 books over the course of 2005. I didn't sign up, but thought "I can do that - I read all the time." I actually read 25 books last year. Not bad considering I was in school, but I'm a little surprised it wasn't more. Anyone else try this? How many books did you read last year? I'm going to keep track again this year and see where I am in December. My 'to read' shelf is huge (Sue Grafton, Patricia Cornwell, Anthony Bourdain, Amy Tan, Gregory Maguire, Diana Gabaldon). There is no shortage of books in my house!

Hooky Day!!!

Since our trip to Threadbear last week was postponed due to bugs (stomach and head), I played hooky from work and Jillian played hooky from her family and we made the trek yesterday. It's always fun to see what the boys have done with the store. Everytime I'm there, I swear they can't fit anymore yarn anywhere and when I go back, they have. An overwhelming feast for my color and fiber starved (ha!) self. They had tons of gorgeous, new Schaefer Yarns. These are the 2 skeins that followed me home. At one point, I had 7 skeins in my arms before I dropped them on one of the infamous black tables and sorted through. When I made my final selections, J looked them over and said, "You know, I think you have that one in Mountain Colors..." It's pretty sad when my friend can remember what I have in my stash better than I can. Do I need any more roving? No, but I like to encourage vendors to have things that I want to buy (yeah, that's it). Are these gorgeous? That orange/yellow/pink ball is destined for socks. I picked the blue up because I'm currently in a blue phase. Can't wait to spin it up! Last, but certainly not least, what's this? It is the yarn for a Vivian Hoxbro sweater that I have affectionately called the Histogram sweater for close to a year now (Vivian has actually named it the Trip-Trap Jacket). I love this sweater and J reminded me yesterday that I had finished my first term of school and I needed to buy something to celebrate (like I ever need an excuse). I believe, between the spinning and sleeping, I'll be knitting on this for the next week or two. Now if I could only convince my family to bring me food and Coke while I knit in bed, I would be a truly happy woman! Here's a picture of the back of the Trip-Trap Jacket:

What makes the holiday all happy??

I give to you my grades for the first term of Graduate School: Class Grade Calculus B+ Microeconomics B Values&Ethics B+ History of Public Policy A I was worried about Calculus when I applied to the program. It's a required course and I hadn't been in a math class since spring 1983 - longer than some of my classmates have been alive (no kidding). While it wasn't painless, it was much more clear than I expected it to be. What's my favorite gift for X-mess this year? That B up there in Microeconomics. A serious gift. I hated this class with the firey burning passion usually reserved for ex-husbands and mothers-in-law. The professor was entertaining and quite friendly, just not a very good teacher. What's in store for next term? Statistics and the cost-benefit analysis part of Microeconomics. Can anyone explain to me what the hell chi-square is????

Spindle Ho...

Guilty! This is my newest. It's a Tom Forrester Granny Spindle that I bought from Gemini Fibres after I saw the one Jillian got on her most recent excursion to Toronto. When she thrust hers into my hands and demanded that I spin - I was a goner. It's a little lighter than I usually buy (41.2 grams/1.45 ounces) so the resulting yarn is thinner than I usually spin - but change is good. The best news is that it spins and spins and spins. Apparently these little babies fly off the shelves so fast that Gemini can't even get pictures up on their website before they're gone. I sent an e-mail asking what they had in this style and got a very prompt (and extremely friendly) reply in just a few hours. They had 7 to choose from, but no pictures. I picked the rock maple whorl with a black walnut shaft (10 holes in the whorl). The fiber is some that J shared with me, but my brain is still dreaming of Calculus, so I can't remember where she got it from. Normally, I rip off a hand of roving and just start to spin - it works for me. Someone is a fiend for pre-drafting, so I'm trying that. As much as I hate to pre-draft, I must admit the spinning is very enjoyable when all I'm worrying about is putting in the twist. The yarn seems to be much smoother too. Even the joins are smooth! I guess it pays to have your world shaken up a bit and be forced to think about things in a different way.

What's This?

Remember back a bit when I went to the Sewing Expo? Well, I forgot to take a camera with me. (Usually, when I go somewhere with Jillian, she remembers to bring all the stuff I've forgotten, but she couldn't go with me that day.) Anyway, my table-mate, Lorraine, had one of those one-shot dealies and she told me to go and take any pictures I wanted with it. She promised to develop the pictures and send copies to me. Guess what came in the mail yesterday? Yes, that's me at the feet of the master. He deigned to look up and smile.

I'm still alive!

Plus, I just finished my final assignment. It's a paper based on what has to be the most needlessly long novel in existance - All the King's Men. If anyone tells you that it's the greatest American political novel, look them in the eye and tell them they're full of shit. I have lots of things to show and I'll have more when I'm back from Threadbear with Jillian on Saturday, I'm sure. For now, amuse yourself with this:

Microeconomics professor
Circle I Limbo

General asshats
Circle II Whirling in a Dark & Stormy Wind

Liars
Circle III Mud, Rain, Cold, Hail & Snow

Creationists
Circle IV Rolling Weights

People who are mean to my kids
Circle V Stuck in Mud, Mangled

River Styx

People who drive slowly in the passing lane
Circle VI Buried for Eternity

River Phlegyas

Sexist asshat men
Circle VII Burning Sands

My brother's wife
Circle IIX Immersed in Excrement

My mother-in-law
Circle IX Frozen in Ice

Design your own hell

Just do it

In light of my recent birthday, on Friday I had my first experience with the mammogram. I don't care what anyone says about it being uncomfortable...it fucking hurt!!!. This from a woman who gave birth with no drugs, twice. But you know what, it's a damn site more comfortable than what Twisty is going through. I'll take the mammogram. Have you scheduled yours for the year??

Birthday Loot

My husband has never been good at surprises. He usually gets a good one in every 4-5 years. He got me this year. I was convinced he hadn't bought anything for my birthday and prepared to hold it over his head for a good long time. {Come on, it was a BIG birthday!} Apparently, he conspired with my mother, to buy this: It's a Russian lacquer box. The soda cap is in there for scale (okay, that was a mistake, but it does provide scale!). Several years ago, my mother, sister, and I went on a Baltic Sea cruise and discovered these little gems. They are the most exquisite pieces. The masters paint with a single hair from a squirrel tail. It's a perfect gift - and the best part was he surprised me! Here's what I bought for myself. It's a Kundert handspindle. A friend of mine was spinning on one at the last spinner's guild meeting I went to. (Her's has the checkerboard pattern on it.) I ordered it on a Monday and had it by the following Monday. Spins like a dream - I love it when my tools are this gorgeous. And how's this for potential? A woman who took the Lynne Vogel workshop with me decided to do a huge order and several of us went in on a bunch of dyes. I have an amazing amount of dyes in every color of the rainbow. If I could just squeeze out a weekend, I may get to this before spring! My mother entered the 21st century and bought a bunch of books from my Amazon wishlist and my sister made me a kick-ass coconut cake. It was a good day.

Back the bus up

A knitted rabbit...a dead knitted rabbit...with its entrails leaking all over the mountain...that you're supposed to climb...and be happy about this giant dead rabbit. Please forgive the ellipses, I'm gobsmacked. Just because you can... It's in the new Knitnet, down at the bottom of the page.

Don't Hate Me Because I Have Beautiful Fabric

Can I just say that when I saw this fabric online and in catalogs, I thought, "Ewww, could that be any uglier?!?" In person, it's gorgeous. The colors have a depth that just doesn't come across in a flat photo. I told Brandon what I thought when I saw the pictures and he looked a little shocked, but agreed with me that they're so much more pretty in person. More of the paperweight fabric with some glorious flowery stuff. I would have walked past this, not being a flowery kind of girl. The woman in front of me at the cutting table had it and when it was all spread out, it sang to me. To be honest, I would have bought more of every fabric the woman in front of me had, but I did go with a budget. She got a yard of everything (at $8-9/yard!!). And because I'm a ho for the orange, I had to have both of these. I love stripes. It's the symmetry. The oranges just glow. {As an aside here, does anyone else remember H.R. Puffinstuff and Witchiepoo who sang the song "Oranges, Poranges" - I think of her dancing around every time I think of orange.} More stripes. Kaffe has 2 different stripes, the wider and the narrower (I'm sure there's a more 'marketing' type name, but for the life of me, I can't remember it). I loved them all. I'm telling you, it was a very tough choice. So, now I have a fabric stash that is the equivalent of single balls of yarn. I can't wait to finish school, so I can put all this time I've been studying to really good use.

American Sewing Expo Loot

I can't remember now if I promised to show what I bought at the American Sewing Expo market or not. Anyway, here they are, and prepare to have your socks knocked off. The market wasn't as big as some show markets I've been to, but it was overwhelming in its own way. I'm a very beginning quilter, so almost everything I saw was new and I quickly went into over-stimulated after the first aisle. Is this fun, or what? The woman had a very small booth, but it was chock full of really cool primitive-type fabric. She even had mud-cloth, but I couldn't figure out what I would use it for, so I didn't buy any. I love the tie-dye effect and all the 'happy people'. This is a silk blend fabric. The amazing thing about this fabric is that the warp and weft are 2 different colors. You can't tell in the photo, but the fabric switches from one to the other when you move the swatch. The depth in these is so amazing. I think they'd make nice, sturdy pillow covers - but I don't want anyone putting his head on them! At the same booth as the above silk swatches was this gorgeous stuff. It's Japanese indigo dying - it also looks ikat to me (and maybe it is, I didn't think to ask). They actually had yardage of this, but it was well over $30/yard and it's only about 21 inches wide. I was so tempted to buy yardage, but had absolutely no idea what to do with it, so contented myself with fondling it instead. I was checking out with the silk and saw they had little "try-me" packs of it for $10. I rummaged through the basket and each packet was more beautiful than the last. Since I couldn't decide which one to buy, I literally closed my eyes and just stuck my hand in. Homework calls, give me another day or 2 and I'll post the grand-daddy of all fabric designers' swatches.

What's this??

You read that right...85. I didn't believe it myself. Still don't. Must be all the good living I'm doing. {snort}

WTF??

is Lifegem??? Carbon of your loved one?? Ewwwwwwwww.

Brandon Mably is God

Last Friday I took a day off from work and school and just knit. This was the result: Okay, so I didn't just knit, I took a class with Brandon Mably. This is Kaffe Fassett's Persian Poppies pattern. Jillian saw that The American Sewing Expo was coming to a town near us and twisted my arm into signing up for the one and only knitting class that was being offered. Then her husband was called out of town. There really wasn't anyone else that I wanted to spend an entire day sitting next to, so I went on my own. Brandon was warm and funny and referred to everyone as his friend. As in "Oh, my friend over at that table has the most gorgeous color to add to your ball. Come with me, my friend, and we'll get you some." All in a wonderful British accent. He was constantly complimenting people on what they were knitting and encouraging them to step off their personal color paths and "be outrageous, my friend." We also had a guest lecturer, none other than Kaffe Fassett. He spoke about using color and experimenting before we started knitting. Then he encouraged us to listen to "our" Brandon and "do what he tells you to do." The market was overwhelming. Since I'm just starting to quilt, a lot of the stuff was beyond me. I did manage to pick up some gorgeous fabrics and the newest Kaffe book Quilt Road. When I came back from market, Brandon wanted to see what was in the bag. When I pulled out the book, he grabbed it and showed me his gorgeous quilt based on the umbrellas in My Fair Lady. Both Kaffe and Brandon signed it for me. It was exhausting and I spent a lot of the day mentally elbowing J, but well worth going.

76 Trombones in the Big Parade

That's what my mother always sings to him. She played trombone when she was in high school (about 1,000 years ago, when trombones were still made from stone). This picture was in our little town newspaper and didn't have his name on it, but doesn't he look handsome? Okay, as handsome as you can look with a trombone sticking out of your mouth?

Dear Microeconomics

It's not you, it's me. I'm sorry to do this in a letter, but you don't seem to listen to me anymore. All you do is talk, you never stop to see if I'm with you, you just keep going and expect me to be there. Well, I can't do it anymore. I'm tired of beating my head against the wall. It's over. Please stop calling me, I've met someone new. It's the funniest story, how we met. He coughed all over me in Math Camp, without once covering his mouth. Now we have something in common. Best of luck to you. I hope I never see you again.

It's Official

I am now officially a fabric whore. This is a photo of the fat quarter Amy Butler packet I picked up on eBay last week. I must say, the fabrics are very pretty in the pictures I've seen. It didn't prepare me for how gorgeous they are when you hold them in your hands. They are luminous. I bow down before the genius that is Amy Butler. These may become a permanent part of my collection. I don't know that anything I make from them will ever measure up to their promise. Jillian showed you the yarn we used at our Yarn Tasting at Threadbear on Saturday. I also took a picture, but apparently I can't quite use the digital camera as well as I thought. I'll try again tonight. You'll just have to satisfy yourselves with the purchase photo. This is Adrienne Vittadini Trini and Great Adirondack Texas Bighorn. The Vittadini is a cabled merino and is lucious to knit with. Not terribly expensive in individual balls (I don't remember how much, but under $10), but it only had 71 yards. The Texas Bighorn, on the other hand, comes with a whopping 325 yards! It was a comforting, easy knit on US 9s. J picked out the color for me - you can't see the orange that's hidden in this skein. It's beautiful. And what's this? My very own orange calculator. It has all the higher functions needed to figure out how lucky you are to have a friend who listens to you when you whine and commiserates about how miserable things are right now. And then assures you that graduate school won't kill you and it will be over sooner than you think.

Katrina

Every morning I listen to NPR on the way into work. I breathed such a sigh of relief when New Orleans was passed over by the hurricane. It seems now that they were spared the storm, but really are taking the brunt of it after the rain and wind has stopped. I grumbled this morning about paying $3.25 for a gallon of gas and then bit my lip when I thought about the mothers who were worrying how and what they were going to feed their children. Etsy is a clearing house of sorts for us crafty types. You can have your own store and sell things from their site. Many, many crafters are donating items with the proceeds going to the Red Cross hurricane relief fund. There are tons of cool things ranging from yarn to jewelry to beauty products. Also, if you're of a mind, America's Second Harvest is a worthy place. No one should be hungry on top of everything else.

Graduate School

I went to orientation yesterday. Guess what you get for shelling out lots of $$$ (or in my case, borrowing lots of $$$)...this but wait, there's more!! The best part? I also received an invitation to Math Camp. That's right, Math Camp. It is the place where all the math-phobic, didn't take an undergraduate math course, suck at Algebra pretty people go. There is no campfire, no mixed drinks, no filthy, cute guy singing with his guitar. On the upside, I get to sleep in my own bed at night and don't have to take communal showers.

Now I Remember

What it is I've always hated about sewing: a Photo Essay. I finished the last couple of blocks for the Kimono quilt and Sassy and I spent a few minutes moving blocks around to find the best placement. I was so excited to start the sashing...the first set of blocks held together with sashing: Ooooh, aaaaaaaah - to paraphrase Jeff Goldblum, "Yeah, that's always how it starts, 'oooh, aaaah'. Then pretty soon, there's running and screaming." Here, I give you 2 rows held together by horizontal sashing: But what's this? Um, a slight mismatch in the blocks, leading to this: Fuck. Where's my knitting?

A Few More Snaps

I had pictures of these the other day, but either forgot to upload them, or Blogger ate them. Here are the last 2 kimonos for the quilt. I really like these 2 because when I first put the fabrics together, I thought, "ewww red and green - like Xmess." When they were finished, they were much more subtle than that. These are the fabrics for the last block. My plan is to make 2 and then play with the placement of all the blocks. I only need 9 to complete the piece. Since I'm still a little ambivalent about the flowery blocks, I may chuck those and make a couple more in different fabrics. I can see how this quilting thing can get out of hand..."just one more block". Jillian made the suggestion that I farm out the quilting part. I believe I will do that for my queen-sized bed quilt. I feel like I have to do at least one - to understand the whole process. Will I do it by hand? No, I do not have the desire to understand it quite that much. From her August 16, 2005 post, Carolyn's suggestion is to practice, practice, practice. She says "Get a bunch of muslin and some batting, and a can of spray baste. Spray baste some 18" square practice quilt sandwiches and just try it." This sounds like a good plan to me, besides, I like the sound of spray baste. So this is my plan for the day - finish those last (ha!) 2 blocks and give quilting a try. I'm sure you're dying to see how it all turns out.

Things I Love

In no particular order: 1. The financial aid department at UM. Seriously, the Public Policy department let me in a little later than everyone else and I've been playing catch up ever since. I didn't know where to turn in my financial aid documents and as a result they were late. I missed all the deadlines for grants, so I was only applying for loans. They came through for me. The year of hell will be paid for up front. I'll be paying out the back end for a long time, but at least I don't have to worry about where the $$$ will come from while I'm trying to get my brain around Calculus (obsess much?). 2. Little Big Man. I sure hope he realizes that for me to go to a football game to watch him play in the band at halftime is a huge sacrifice. Especially since the last time we went to see him play, I accosted no less than 2 dozen people about their atrocious public behavior. Does Miss Manners answer questions about how to stop overshares from strangers in the bleachers? 3. Auntie Twister: If you need something to make you laugh out loud, check out this blog. Hub walked away from me last night, mostly because I was reading it out loud to him, but he couldn't understand what I was saying.... I was laughing too hard. 4. Harry Potter. Am I the last person on the planet to take this little test? How cool is that? I lurve me some Hermione! Go take your own HP character quiz.

Better late than never...right?

Finally, I finished my bag from the Lynne Vogel workshop. Here it is in all its twisty goodness. I was a little worried as the yarn sat on the bobbin a little long (still less than the 4 days or bust period), but it didn't look so twisty while I was kniting. Fortunately, I can't tell where that bit of knitting is on the finished bag. This is from my Early Pumpkin Patch roving dyed in class. I love the colors, but wish there was more of each one - I guess so the stripes would be wider. I'm looking for a pumpkin charm to put on the drawstring. Sassy loves it and wants to claim it as her own. Have you seen Jillian's twisty project? Go have a look and let her know how gorgeous her barberpole yarn is. Here's what else I've been up to in the last 2 weeks. The Kimono quilt pattern calls for 9 kimonos. I have 8 finished. What I tried to do was have them be complimentary, so I used 3 fat quarters for each pair. One of them has a fabric for the kimono and a complimentary fabric for the obi and the other switches them. The third fat quarter is used for the long strip down the front of the kimono skirt and short strips on the bodice. I love, love, love the red fabric in these 2. It's got darker red ginko leaves printed on it with a gold leaf scattered about randomly. The pieces are so small, that I had to work to get a gold leaf in every now and again. I'm not sure I was entirely successful with that - but I'm happy with the squares. These are a little busy I think. I didn't like them at all while I was putting them together. Hub said, "they aren't so bad." Um, thanks for that bit of confidence. I told myself to keep going and if I really hated them at the end, I could call it practice and make a couple more. I still think they're busy, but not in a terrible way. These are my favorites. They're also the first 2 I did. The orange-leafy fabric is so beautiful. I was tempted to go and get more of each of these fabrics and make all the kimonos the same. Good sense prevailed. How many places can you hang an orange and purple quilt? I have a gray/black fabric for the sashing and 3 more fat quarters for another pair. I think I'll make 2 more and use one of them for actual quilting practice. I think Sassy's Kit doll will enjoy a small quilt for her bed. Does anyone have any tips for the actual quilting? I find that the closer I get to that part, the slower I'm beginning to work. I've had no trouble cutting and sewing, but the quilting is intimidating me. I think I'll be machine quilting in the ditch, but what color thread do I use? Do I buy eleventy-thousand different spools to match all the fabric? What patterns? Do I outline the kimonos, put something inside them? Has anyone else been paralyzed by these choices or am I the only freak?

I'm Exhausted

I never knew it was possible to be this tired and this content at the same time. Lynne Vogel is a Goddess. No, seriously, GODDESS! She came in on Wednesday night to stay at my house. {A Goddess stayed at my house!} There are very few people I am at ease with instantly - count Lynne among the handful. We talked constantly (almost so much that my throat hurt). I spent Friday, Saturday, and Sunday with an incredible group of women doing something I truly love to do. Best part? Sitting next to Jillian for 3 whole days. We mumbled, we laughed, we sang, we ate...it's good to have a great friend. Friday, we spun. Saturday, we dyed. Sunday, we spun, knit and compared notes like crazy. I have no pictures as Hub took the camera on vacation with him. I'll snap shots of my roving and my knitting tonight and have them up in a flash. I love it when my expectations are exceeded so far that I won't be able to take a class for a while because this one was so good. I couldn't sleep last night despite being exhausted because I had too many things in my head. There are so many colors, fibers, things to knit. I don't want to have to sleep ever again. On a related note, Lynne wanted to go to Trader Joe's because she loves the place and there isn't one near her. You wanna know what ambrosia is? I can hear the angels singing now.

Cranky with a Side of Stream of Consciousness

Man, I wish I was anywhere but here today. I'm thinking of all the things I could be doing at home and wishing I was there. Do I need another new hobby????? I asked Jillian the other day what a good starter cookbook was. She recommended How to Cook Everything, by Mark Bittman. I immediately went to my favorite book sites and nabbed a used copy of this tome. I knew I could trust her, she has every cookbook known to woman at her fingertips. This book is amazing. I pulled open the package and skimmed through. Then sat down and opened the book at the very beginning and started to read. How very 1950s - sitting down to read a cookbook. You gotta love a man who tells you that you don't need to spend $3,000 getting the best of everything before you can cook edible stuff. And because once I'm obsessed with something, I take it all the way...I've been perusing food blogs for a couple weeks. I can't tell you how hungry this makes me. All that good food and I have to live with the cafeteria upstairs. Anyway, someone recommended Pie, by Ken Haedrich. It came yesterday. Who knew there were this many kinds of pie? Really. My mother makes apple (with 2 kinds of top crust), blueberry, pecan, and pumpkin. This morning I found a recipe for fig and grape pie. Fig. And. Grape. Pie. Have I mentioned my obsession with figs lately? Now if I could just find a receipe for goat cheese and fig pie... I finished registering for graduate school yesterday. Yes, ma'am, I said Graduate School - at the renowned Ford School of Public Policy. It's a one-year program that I'm sure will age me 10 years. I have to take calculus. Let me just explain that I have a BA in English Language and Literature. I managed to go my entire undergraduate career without ever having to take a class from the mathematics department. Calculus. Does your head hurt yet? One thing to look forward to this weekend. Lynne Vogel is coming to do a workshop that yours truly organized. She'll be here for 3 days - allowing me to spin, dye, and knit like crazy. What fun. I will say there's a special place in hell for anyone who commits to something and then backs out at the very last minute. Suffice it to say that the woman who did this will not be invited to attend an event I organize again. Ever. Did I mention I was cranky?

Look Ma...

no hands!!

Thursday?

Dang! What the hell happened to my week? Okay, here's what I got done on Monday: These are 2 stairs to the left of the photo I showed a couple of days ago. They go from the landing right inside the back door up to the hallway. Hub put all these stairs in when we re-did the kitchen. He was looking for the "distressed pine" look. I love them. There are marks and indentations and the scruffed up pine took the stain beautifully. Now I just have to put eleventy-million coats of polyurethane on them. I managed to get only 1 complete door polyurethaned on Monday. When I started the door to Sassy's room, I saw watermarks all over it (like a wet dog shook near the door). I had a fit. Hub said, "Well, just put the varnish on and we'll see what it looks like." I said, "Fuck that! You think I want to re-do what I've already done????" He called the lumber company and they've ordered a new door blank. Here's what I spent all day Tuesday doing: Hub was working at his mother's house and when he came in to get water I said, "Hey, I've been using my rotary cutter" (in an effort to distract him from no varnish smells). He said, "Cool." Never mentioned that I'd taken the week off to finish up home improvement. The man is incapable of throwing guilt. It's a good thing I can take care of that on my own. And, ummm, yesterday? I put all those blocks together - and knit a little bit. So, today, I've taken myself firmly in hand and said, "Self? It's time to get some WORK done. Get busy." Yeah, when I'm done surfing the blogs.

The Promise of a Whole Week

I took the week off. On the surface it was because both Sassy and Little Big Man have day camps going next week. Sassy will be riding and LBM will be at band camp. (I have been torturing him for the last week or so that he will come home and say, "This one time...at band camp...".) So, I will be ferrying them around, but I also have my own agenda at home. Herewith, I present my photo essay of what I'll be doing this week. 1. Get rid of books I've already registered with Book Crossing: I really love leaving this things all over the place. I'll admit, I'm vain enough to leave them in places where I can go back and check to make sure they've been rescued. It's fun thinking that someone gets to read a book I liked and it beats the hell out of pricing them for a garage sale. 2. I've been looking at this nightmare since we re-did our kitchen (about 3 years ago): They are the stairs that lead from my back door down into my basement. Hub pulled out the old stairs and built these new ones. I should have stained and varnished them 3 years ago. I did not. I'm paying the price now. They need to be sanded to get all the ground in dirt off and then stained and varnished. 3. I have 8 of these mothers staring me in the face: You can see that this representative door has been stained (Minwax Puritan Pine) as are the other 7. However, now I have to put 2 coats of polyurethane on each and every door. My excuse has been that it's been so hot that I can't get proper ventilation - if I open the windows the heat and humidity seap in and the polyurethane will NEVER dry. Time's up - they will be shiny and sealed this week. Will I kill enough brain cells to prevent me doing something fun with these? I cannot resist the allure of the fat quarters. Hub and I took Sassy in to get heeled shoes for her camp (some sort of stacked heel prevents the foot from slipping through the stirrup). Well, there's a JoAnne's right next door and I just slipped in for a minute. I scored a self healing cutting mat for $7.50 (50% off a clearance price of $15.00) and also a rotary cutter - seen in all its rotary goodness above. Sassy's camp goes from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm. I figure I'll work while she's camping and then have fun after I pick her up. It's a good balance, right? One last shot. These are the initial fabrics I've picked up for my Kimono quilt. I signed up for the class and the first one is on Sunday. I can't wait!

Quilt Blocks and a Fugly

What do you think? I think Carolyn was right. {Ignore the small swatches of white you see under the blocks, that's the paper still attached.} While I like the above blocks (and maybe the white pillowcase wasn't the best idea I've had today) there's something wrong with them. I'm not sure what - they don't hold me somehow. The blue below somehow pops the red and orange off the background and is soothing at the same time. Thanks Curlypurl!! The more I look at these blocks, the better I like the pattern. I will say, however, that it's a real bitch trying to pin the fabric to the paper in such a way that the seam allowance is 1/4" AND the chunk of pattern is covered once I've done the sewing. I won't bother to tell you how many pieces I've screwed up. My very first blocks were done by just eyeballing the paper piece to be covered and then hacking out a piece from my fat quarters. My anal-retentive nature didn't work too well with this approach. So I measured the pieces in this new pattern and figured in the seam allowance. In my zeal to be master of the rotary cutter, I cut up a bunch of pieces that are exactly 3" x 9" and while they stack beautifully and look lovely on my table, they really should have been 3.5" x 9" - but then I would have gotten fewer pieces from my fabric! At the time, I thought, "how hard can it be? I'll just move them around until I get the placement figured out and do it the same way every time" Yeah, it so doesn't work out like that. Anyone have ideas on how to measure and cut these pieces so they fit without wrestling? And in the category of Back away from the crack pipe I give you... What the fuck was he thinking???

One more day?

Just allow me one more day with this. I promise I'll be good and post no more on the man who won seven. A couple of weeks ago, Jillian and I went to lunch (and then to a yarn shop, natch). I bought 2 skeins of this. It is the lovely beaded rayon yarn from Blue Heron. I also bought the pattern for the Shoalwater Shawl. I'll admit, I've loved this yarn for a very long time. It is silky and warm and has a sheen that just sings. It didn't hurt that they had a shop model and it was gorgeous!! I got through the first 76 rows without a problem. Now, I can't get past the second repeat of row 37. I've counted, ripped, knit, counted, ripped, knit...I threw it aside in disgust on Friday. I'm going to have to rip again and figure out where those damn extra 4 stitches came from. So, I've been paper piecing instead. {As an aside, I really think I'm taking up quilting because there's a whole list of things I've never bought for myself and as we all know...it's the stuff that attracts me to crafting.} I took Carolyn's suggestion and bought a couple of yards of indigo fabric to tone down the red and orange of my planned quilt. I don't have a photo yet - it's in the wash. I also signed up for the class the shop is holding for the Kimonos pattern I bought a while back. I ask you, how can learning new things be bad?

What a Long, Strange Trip It's Been

But, man, has it been fun. Thanks for the last 7 years. May your retirement be all you wish it to be.

Please Mr. Sandman

I love naps, really I do. However, I should never take a nap after normal working hours. I just laid down for a minute and passed out for over an hour. Now I can't sleep. It sucks. I just got back from 3 days in Boston (which also sucked, but that's a different story) and I'm exhausted from being with the same people for 72 hours straight. Yet, here I am, awake in the middle of the night. At least there's time for show and tell. Here's what I picked up while in Boston. I only had about an hour and a half to myself the whole time I was there. Luckily, we were right next to a T-station and the stop for Mind's Eye Yarns was only 3 stops away from where I got on. I ran out the door after Wednesday's meeting and was back in time to have dinner with people that I don't really like, but must be nice to in order to keep my job. The fiber is a yummy wool/tencel blend that I've bought from Mind's Eye before and loved so much that I needed more. There was a pair of fingerless gloves in the latest issue of Spin-Off that I loved. The other merino/tencel blend I have was spun on my little Hatchtown spindle and since it came in 4 oz tufts, there isn't much of it. I think a pair of these gloves would be gorgeous made from this stuff. Remember when I said that I was thinking about making a quilt for my bed? What do you think of these fabrics? There's a pattern called the Two-Dollar Star that I love. I got it from a website called Quilter's Cache. I bought a yard of each fabric and I'll mess around with a couple of blocks to see if I like it. I want to paint my bedroom a spicy orange color (sort of like pumpkin, but with more curry added in). Hub says he doesn't think he'll be able to sleep in it - I said, "close your eyes, you won't even see it." And like yarn, you can't just buy a couple of yards when you go into a fabric store... Who knows what it will be, but I knew I couldn't just leave it there. Last, but not least. What happens when you give a 10-year-old with some moxie access to a digital camera and a cool paper fan? J, tell Isobel that she loves it and wouldn't put it down all weekend long. Thanks!

Someone's Knocking at the Door

Hub and my dad trying to figure out how to get the closet door into the opening. There's a lot of hemming and hawing at my house this weekend. Trying to figure out the best way to do something. This is my mother trying to figure out the best way to have 2 colors meet in the corner without looking like "someone just slopped the paint on. This is Sassy's room being painted in her signature colors of purple and purple. Yup, everyone in my house is working...except me. This is Sassy after she pulled weeds in the garden and slapped every single bug that landed on her. We sent her to the showers.

Who's Quilting Who?

So this was my next attempt at paper piecing. It's actually 4 smaller blocks sewn together to make 1 big block. Here's what I learned: 1. I need a self healing mat and circular cutter. No matter how careful I am, I CANNOT cut a straight line. Why make myself crazy? Besides, I'm thinking about making a quilt for my own bed - that's going to take a lot of cutting. 2. The paper piecing tutorials I've read say that you shouldn't tear the paper off each block until they're sewn together. I've discovered it's nearly impossible to line up the points while the small blocks are still on the paper. They're close and maybe you can't see them in the photo well enough, but they don't exactly line up. I'll have to try another couple without the paper to make sure. 3. No matter how much you love the first set of fat quarters you buy, you're going to get sick of looking at them for several mornings in a row. It's time for me to get a fabric stash. Be afraid. Be very afraid. One more thing, Curlypurl says that you don't have to buy special paper for paper piecing. She says copy paper works just fine and if there's any scraps left in the seams - they wash out! Thanks Carolyn!!

Tie a yellow ribbon

It's a sweet, sweet thing.

Swatch Talk

Even when I don't exactly feel like knitting, there's still something on the needles. This is a swatch I started looking for a sturdy lace scarf/stole. I've worked with a man for over 8 years whose wife has MS. We speak almost daily (and sometimes several times a day) about work issues and often family issues creep in. Everytime his wife hits a milestone in her disease, I hear about it. They've been dealing with this for almost 20 years now, so you can imagine where she is in her progression. I feel helpless to do anything to help them. My offers of help/cleaning/food are always gently turned down. Now, I'm not one of those who believes that knitting heals all, but I want his wife (whom I've met on many social occasions) to know that I'm thinking of her. Since I know she is often cold, I hit upon the idea of this scarf/stole to drape over herself when she needs it. I pulled out my copy of Susanna Lewis' Knitting Lace to see what I could find. Toward the back of the book is a section of faggot patterns that are the coolest. The first section (at the bottom) is a 4 row pattern with a double decrease knit on US 3s. The patterning happens on the odd rows and the even rows are purled. The holes are supposed to be square. Since the decreases are all made the same way (left leaning), you can see that it biases badly to the left. The second section is also 4 rows with the even rows being purled also knit on US 3s. The decreases are paired (meaning one leans left and one leans right). It doesn't bias as badly as the first swatch, but the fabric was a little firmer than I wanted. I was really looking for more drape. Also, the edge stitches were a little sloppy, so I decided I needed some sort of edging. The third section is knit on US 4s with a double moss stitch border. I'm fairly happy with this section. I haven't blocked it, so you can't see the lace very well (and the scanner smooshes it anyway), but it seems to be a sturdy-looking fabric with some drape to it. Now I just need to do the math and cast on. It's rather mindless knitting, so I can work on it while I'm watching the Tour de France coverage (you knew I'd work that in here somewhere right?). The yarn is some I bought in Portugal almost 2 years ago - it's aged long enough in the stash. It's a 60/40 wool/polyester blend, but I'm pretty certain that it will hold a light blocking well.

Walk this Way

You may drool as you see fit. Paper piecing is insanely easy. Apparently it makes a difference what paper you use to draft your lines. I bought Papers for Foundation Piecing which was $8.95 for 100 sheets. I was going to try it with regular printer paper, but every website I read said "DON'T DO IT." I also picked up a set of fat quarters to mess around with. {Who said never buy more than you're going to use on one project? I laugh in your face.} I downloaded a very easy pattern and printed it on the pages and then went to town. The whole thing took less than 30 minutes. If you're going to do something huge (like a whole quilt top), it makes sense to have a whole bunch of shapes pre-cut and then you can just stitch and stitch and stitch and have a big pile of squares to put together. Then I started thinking about coloring book shapes or even some simple Celtic patterns. The possibilities...

Lucky Star

Have I ever mentioned how lucky I am? Truly, I am one lucky girl. Last week, Jillian was finishing a giant project and was ready for a break. "Threadbear?" I suggested. She jumped on the idea like a thirsty woman in the desert staggering toward an oasis and we set out on Friday for a jaunt to Lansing. Last time we were there, they had a bunch of bags from Dancing Cat. They were lovely, but not quite what I was looking for. Rob suggested going to the website to pick out my favorite fabric and voila. . Is it not lovely? He ordered it for me and I've been waiting (not so patiently), but it was well worth the wait. I can't fill it yet. Weird, I know, but I just want to look at it and touch it. Also picked up this accessory bag. I wanted them to match in a complementary way. Dancing Cat has the most beautiful fabrics it's hard to choose just one. Great textures, shiney bits...lots of fun to dig through the basket. I found no less than 3 accessory bags that I wanted and had to narrow it down to this one. Good choice, no? We actually went to the store in order to sit with the spinners in the back. We did do some spinning, ate Chinese food, and met some terrific spinners (whose names have completely fallen out of my head). J shared her Japanese pattern books and we talked lace spinning and alpaca. Look what found its way into my new bag. It was a toss up between this jet black and some cool silvery/dark gray. I wanted both (of course I did - you would too), but opted for just one. How much more spinning fiber does one need? I ended up with bits of alpaca all over my pants, but it spins beautifully on my little Hatchtown spindle. I will definitely go back for more. I ask again, Threadbear, spinning, new friends, Chinese food, new bag, 2 hour drive with a cool pal, am I lucky or what?

Let's Start with This

They're still the leaders of the long blue train. Go Lance!! More eye candy...what could this be? Cashmere from School Products, of course. Courtesy of my friend Jillian who just came back from a jaunt in New York. Does the woman know me or what? All that cashmerey goodness with an orange kicker. It's a boucle and it's lovely and soft. I can't decide whether to knit with it or just pet it forever. And speaking of pets, a little sympathy here. This is Hub's dog. She's a Brittany Spaniel and quite the little bird dog. Anyway, he took her for a ride in his monster ATV and she got bored. What's a little dog to do? She jumped off...while he was moving. She limped around for a couple of days and when he took her to the vet they discovered a toe so broken that they took it off. Now she just looks pathetic all day. I had to remind her that she's not 20 anymore, but I don't think she believes it.

It's happening

What's that curse about living in interesting times? We've got a Supreme Court Justice retiring. Do I need to tell you how important it is for us to make sure our reproductive rights continue? My daughter is 10 - do I ever want her to have to make this choice? No. Do I want the choice available to her, just in case? Absolutely. I've thrown money at these 2 organizations: Planned Parenthood and NARAL Please donate if you're so inclined.

As promised

the floor: As I said yesterday, it's gorgeous and it has a lot of character. I saw a modern Turkish rug for the living room that's going to look beautiful on it, I'm working on saving the $$ for it now. Here's an action shot of Hub imparting some of his flooring wisdom on Little Big Man. We were just finishing off the last couple of boards on Monday night when Hub called him over and started telling him the ins and outs of making sure everything was all snugged up before nailing it off. It's funny how interested LBM gets when he's learning something rather than just being a gopher. Then he decided that we all needed to watch Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I loved that movie when it came out and I still love it. The best part was listening to Little Big Man guffaw at the parts he thought were funny. Up next in the DVD player? Girl with a Pearl Earring and Ali. I finished the pearl earring book a few weeks ago - beautifully written and very pleasurable to read. Plus, you know, it has Colin Firth in it. Who can resist? Ali will be feeding my newly minted obsession with Will Smith. I'll let you know how they are.

Floors and Movies

We spent the weekend putting in new flooring all through the house. I had some great pictures of what we did, but they're on the Hub's new camera and I can't figure out how to get them off. Maybe I'll actually read the manual tonight. Anyway, it's been our idea for a while now to re-floor. Hub got a great deal on some gorgeous Australian Cypress that's a little lighter than our pine trim, but complements it beautifully. This is not my house, but it gives you an idea of the character of the wood. More Movies: The Razor's Edge I'm kind of "eh" about this one. It's an older film (1984), based on a novel by Somerset Maugham. I have the novel, I just never got around to reading it. It's set mostly in Paris about a man who has been to the trenches of World War I and how it changed his life. Bill Murray stars as the main character. This movie has the distinction of containing the absolute worst death scene I've ever seen in a movie or on television. Hub and I looked at each other and fell out. I really expected much more from Denholm Elliott. I didn't particularly like any of the characters, thought they were all self absorbed and despite being friends for most of their lives, didn't really seem to know each other at all. Plus, I couldn't quite get Caddyshack out of my mind for quite a bit of the movie. Bill Murray is hilarious, but that's not what I want to see in a serious dramatic role. I give it 3 stars, if only to watch that death scene and laugh hysterically. The Last September What the hell is it with English movies that they just start in the middle of the story and expect you to catch up with them? And why the hell do I continue to watch and enjoy these movies, patting myself on the back when I figure out who everyone is and why they're in that particular place at that particular time? This movie is set in 1920s Ireland about a dysfunctional family (is there any other kind of British movie family?). They're Irish, living on an estate with English relations and friends. Of course, this is during the time of the "the Troubles" and even on their estate, there is much upheavel and clashing of the classes. I love, love, love Maggie Smith and she's the shrewd matriarch of this clan. Just dotty enough so that her bad behavior is excused, but you know she's lived her whole life that way. Visually, it's a stunning movie. If you love scenes of the countryside, the movie is well worth seeing. Gorgeous greenery, wonderful costumes...I give it 4 stars and would recommend it to anyone who loves those crazy British movies.

Netflix

I joined Netflix (mostly because I hate the Blockbuster store that we used to go to). It's way cool to have the movies delivered right to your house. So, I've been watching a lot of movies these days. {I'm also doing the knitting equivalent of driving in circles - dish cloths. I know, but they're fast and I'm still doing something while watching all these movies!} Here's what's been in the DVD: Monster's Ball I can't say that I really liked this movie. It was powerful and emotional and hard to watch. Halle Berry is amazing. I always thought she was a good actress and after watching this, I'm sure of it. She so deserved the Oscar for this role. Not so much a Billy Bob Thornton fan, but he was interesting to watch. You know who amazed me in this? Peter Boyle. When he first came on the screen, all I could think of was "Hey, that's Young Frankenstein!" My mother said, "Isn't that the guy from Raymond?" I really hated his character in this film. If you haven't already seen it - go get it now. King Arthur Hmmm, yes, I enjoyed watching this movie...if only for the shots of a filthy dirty Clive Owen. I do love me some dirty European boys. Action scenes were good if you like that sort of thing. There did seem to be a lot of gratuitous blood splatter. Loved all the knights of the round table, somehow they seemed like real people rather than all pristine and holier than thou. Keira Knightly? It was a little difficult to see the white, white girl from Bend It Like Beckham be so...well, blue. She was completely believable in the dialogue and seduction scenes, but the action ones? Please. Her little skinny arms pulling on those giant bows to shoot the arrows that far? I don't think so. Over all, I liked the director's vision of the times. Again, it seemed more realistic than a film like Excalibur (which I totally loved when it came out, and actually still do). So, yea, if you're into action movies with filthy men, this one is for you.

Life Lesson

Sassy's last day of school was Friday. Since it was only a half day, I took the day off from work and hung out with Little Big Man until it was time to pick her up. Little Big Man suggested we see Madagascar on him! Being the guilty mom that I am, I tried to talk him out of it. "No, let's just go home and maybe when your Dad comes home, we'll all go see a movie." He was having none of it. We ended up seeing the new Star Wars. Sassy thought it was too long and boring. Little Big Man and I loved it. We called the Hub as we were leaving the theater and he said, "I came home early to pick Little Big Man up and take him to see Star Wars." "Yeah," I said, "we kinda just saw it." "Everyone?" "Well, everyone, but you." Little Big Man was bummed, "I shoulda listened to you Mom." I thought "you'd better remember that next time, boy." So now summer is upon me. Sassy is staying with my parents and Little Big Man is pretty much self sufficient. I'm free!!! Where's the sangria?

Quilting?

I think life is a series of wanting or looking for one thing and ending up with another. The trick is to make sure you're happy with "another." So, one of the hobbies I never wanted to try was quilting. Mostly because my mother-in-law was a quilter. She even owned a quilt shop for a while. I didn't want to do it, because I didn't want to have to ask for her advice when I got stuck on something. After a meeting here at work the other day, a woman who knows I'm a knitter brought me her knitting to show me. She had the greatest little quilted bag made from coordinating scraps. It was a flat-bottomed smallish bag, about 8 x 11 in size with little handles. She couldn't remember the name of the pattern, but told me where she got it. I went over to the store, but they couldn't help me because I didn't have the name of the pattern. I wander around a bit and come upon this: I love it. I want it. I bought the pattern and I'm thinking about signing up for the class the shop is offering in August. Do I need another hobby? No. Do I love the idea of a small* fabric stash? Yes. The last time I took a class to try something out, I was convinced that I'd knit one sweater and hate it so much I'd stop. Yeah, 13 years and a couple of designs later...not so much. *let's just ignore the huge self-deception at work here, okay?

Complicated Life

Yeah, so it's been a while. Life is more and more complicated every day. I keep expecting things to slow down and they haven't...so I must learn to deal with it better. Long story short, I was accepted into grad school and will start in the fall. Bad news is, I have to take a Calculus class. The last time I darkened the threshold of a math classroom was June 1983. Somehow, I managed to squeak through undergrad without ever having to take a math class. Anyway, I'm in the throes of hiring a tutor and buying books to get me up to speed in Algebra, Trig, and Calculus. Send me your good math karma. I was at a ceremony on Monday night for Little Big Man. He received High Honors from his Middle School. He kept trying to warn me that "maybe I'll only get Honors mom." I kept telling him that it didn't matter to me Honors/High Honors - I was just glad he was doing so well. When they announced his name and he got up to collect his certificate, several members of his class cheered for him. That meant more to me than the award, honestly. I was really worried that he would have trouble fitting in with these kids who've known each other since kindergarten. I got a little teary, but managed to hide it well. (Why do I never think to bring tissues to these things?) I'm knitting (a little), not spinning. I just want my summer vacation to start and it almost has. No more ballet, hockey practice, field hockey games...Friday is the last day of dropping off Sassy at school. I'm ready!

How do penguins get around?

Why, penguin super highways, of course: This rookery is in Neko Harbor and there are lots of glaciers ringing the harbor which calve quite frequently. This sends waves up the beach, washing out anything that's there. The Chinstraps lay their eggs further up on the rocks and find the easiest way up and down. They all use the same paths - which are about as wide as a penguin body. It was really funny to watch them waddling along and come chest to chest with someone else going the opposite direction. They'd hop from one foot to the other until one of them decided to hop to the side and they could continue on their way. This is Paradise Bay: Drop. Dead. Gorgeous. The water was like glass and it was breathtaking to see the mountains and glaciers reflected in it. Every now and again, we'd hear the CRACK of a glacier calving and everyone's head would swivel looking for the ice and snow to fall into the water. I felt like we could fall right off the edge of the earth if we just kept going. We got up close to some of these: After a while, I had to stop taking pictures of ice bergs. They're all different - different colors (who knew there were so many shades of white and blue?), different shapes...and every single one beautiful. I expected it to be very quiet in this bay - it's not. Between the Blue-eyed Shags and the calving glaciers, there are the icebergs. When you get up close to an iceberg - all you can hear is the water dripping. It was a little cloudy on this day, but it doesn't take much of a rise in temperature to set the ice melting. There's so much water dripping into the bay, it sounds like wind chimes. Here's a friend of mine doing a little sun bathing: This is a Leopard Seal. He (I really don't know the gender, but all these seals look like males to me - something about the sinister grin they have I think) was very aware that we were around his berg, but didn't seem to mind. He let us take pictures and lifted up his head every now and again. These animals get up to somewhere around 11 feet long and they love penguins (which are practically chickens). That's about as close as I ever want to get to one of them.

Were you hoping I forgot?

I think these are my favorite kind of penguins. These are Chinstraps...I love their little pink feet and their black line of feathers under their chins. This is a rookery on Hannah Point. There was one breeding pair of Macaroni penguins in this colony and we were lucky enough to see 1 of the pair. Doesn't he look like a crazy orchestra conductor? I love those yellow brow feathers! I thought it was cool that penguins of different types can co-exist very peacefully. Finally, we got to Antarctica itself. It was barely 4:30 am when this picture was taken and it's as bright as day. We had a gorgeous, sunny morning and Nancy and I couldn't wait to get up to the deck to see the place: I didn't even brush my hair!! The expedition leader happened to be walking past our cabin when we were crowding each other at the port hole and told us later, "You sounded like excited school girls! It was lovely to hear." Well worth the early wake up call.

WTF??

Is spring coming to every corner of the world but mine? Jillian and I went to a workshop this weekend and it snowed, rained, or sleeted the whole damn time. I'm cranky as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. That is all.

South Georgia

This is the cemetery at Grytviken where Ernest Shakelton is buried. It's a lovely little place, very green...only if you don't think about the whaling station that sits right next to it. The people were really nice and have a terrific little museum there. It's very nicely done with good taxidermy and great pictures of the animals that live in the area. However, when I think about all the whales that were killed, it gave me a serious case of the heebie-jeebies. I couldn't get off that place fast enough. Here's a typical zodiac landing: Every landing we had was wet. Waterproof boots and pants are a must. This was a relatively easy landing - nice smooth beach. Some of them had big slimy boulders and we landing in big waves - not so nice. Many years ago, I had a friend who have a 15 minute hospital rule. If there wasn't a hospital within 15 minutes of wherever she wanted to go - she didn't go. Jane, I'm pretty sure this is outside of the 15-minute zone: This is Cooper Bay. It was a little protected cove with tons of penguins and more than enough fur seals. The views were overwhelming. The surf was very rough on this particular day and on our way back to the ship, we were heading out of the protected area and crashed into a 20 foot wave. Everyone got soaked (I could feel the water trickling down the inside of my jacket). I wanted to turn around and do it again - more fun than a roller coaster! And lest you thought I forgot, more of my tuxedoed friends:

Baby Pictures...

This is a young King Penguin. All penguins have to stay on land until their down falls off and their feathers are all grown in. They aren't water proof until their feathers all come in. When explorers first saw these rookeries, they thought there were 2 different species of birds. They look so silly - especially the ones who just have bits of down clinging to their heads or backs. Not a baby, but a full grown female Elephant Seal. The naturalists called them 'blubber slugs.' They don't move very fast on land, but they're quite elegant when they swim. This one got a little crabby, but put her head back down and went back to sleep right after this picture. Poor thing was just worn out. From our stop on Prion Island in South Georgia, a gorgeous Wandering Albatross. This bird was sitting on its nest when we came up and its mate flew in right after we arrived. They do a bit of their mating dance to make sure they really know each other and then the one sitting on the nest flies away to feed. This bird was unfolding its wings in preparation for flight. Demonstrating the wingspan of a Wandering Albatross - they can get up to 11 feet wide! Unfortunately, this bird was dead. Chris (the one in the middle holding the bird) came across it while we were wandering. It was an apparently healthy, young bird and there were no signs of trauma to let him know how it died. He carried it back to the ship as our next stop was Gritviken (a former whaling station) and they had a bird specialist there. The Albatross population is shrinking and there doesn't seem to be any definitive reason why. Okay, last gratuitous penguin shot: This is a Gentoo Penguin. Don't you just love his crazy, orange feet?

Slowly, slowly

I have finally put all my pictures in order and I'm actually showing them to people. I really don't like obligating people to look at my vacation photos, but I think it was such an unusual trip that people are genuinely interested (or maybe I'm delusional). In any event - here are a few more: A view of some of the homes in Port Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands. It was a lovely warm day when we were there, but it did shower on us while we were walking about town. We managed to snag some Falkland's roving at the woolen shop and even found some handspun to take home. These were my first icebergs (on the right). Actually, it's one big iceberg (in the middle) - you can't see in the picture, but they're connected below the water. The land masses are called Shag Rock. There's a huge colony of Shags that live and breed here. I couldn't help giggling everytime they said "Shag Rock" over the intercom. Yes, I'm the mother of a 13-year-old who loves Austin Powers. These are fur seals. Yes, they look cute and cuddly. Yes, clubbing them over the head for their pelts is wrong. Make no mistake, these are the nastiest, smelliest creatures on the planet. We had a huge lecture about these animals before our landing on this beach. We were going to see a very large King Penguin rookery, but first we had to land about a mile away and hike over the beach - through the fur seals to get there. The naturalist told us "It's not the fur seal in front of you to watch out for...it's the one behind you. Don't back up when they charge you." As a result, I was terrified. These things will snap at you for even looking at them cross eyed. Plus, they'll chase you. Was wading through all that worth it? 200,000 breading pairs...you bet it was worth it.

Pictures!

...just not of knitting. I finally am organizing the photos from my trip and thought I'd share a few with you. This was the view from our hotel room. We stayed in a place called Las Niras in Ushuaia, Argentina. The morning we boarded the ship was a clear, sunny day - but cold. Even though it's their summer, the wind sliced right through us. We expected summer temperatures and weren't really dressed for the weather, but we were so excited about leaving that it didn't really matter. The view from the dining room at the hotel - this is the Beagle Channel that leads to the Atlantic Ocean. I fell in love with mountains when I visited Colorado about 10 years ago (yep, J - it's been that long!). The Andes are younger than the Rockies, so they're sharper looking. Every view was breathtaking. Once we left Ushuaia, we sailed for almost 24 hours toward the Falkland Islands (those seasickness bands - not so great for the swells of the Atlantic - ask me how I know). Our first stop was New Island. This is a Rock Hopper Penguin and Black Browed Albatross colony. Here are a couple of the inhabitants: Every time I heard someone say the name of these birds, I heard "Rock Opera Penguins." I figured they were called this because of their crazy yellow feathers. Felt like an idiot when I finally figured it out and was very glad that I never actually said "rock opera" out loud. I must clarify here that I am not a birder. In fact,I could quite happily live without birds. However, I fell in love with this bird. It's a Black Browed Albatross. They are the most graceful, gorgeous birds I've ever seen. They have a wingspan of around 8 1/2 feet. Watching them unfold their wings in preparation for take off is an amazing thing - they just keep unfolding and unfolding. Here's where I fell in love: This is another colony on West Point island. There was a ton of tussock grass that grows up a bit from the ground and the ground between the tussocks was muddy and peaty and difficult to walk on. I stayed on the fringes of the colony and just enjoyed the sunshine and wind from the ocean and snapped a few pictures. An albatross took off from the colony and was flying toward me. These birds glide on the currents of air coming up from the ocean. As I watched it flying, it dipped down a bit and I could hear the force of its body cutting through the air. The bird was so close to me that after I heard the whoooosh of it passing, I felt the wind hitting my face. It was one of those lifetime nature moments that I'll never forget. I'll leave you with my friend Frieda: She's a Striated Kara-Kara. It's an extremely rare bird that has been somewhat domesticated by one of the families that lives on West Point. She was very interested in us, and the expedition leaders warned us not to leave anything out in the open, as these birds will steal anything not nailed down.

Oh. My. God.

It was the best trip ever. I had no expectations about this trip - I figured whatever happened was going to happen and I was going to let it. The bottom line is, there are 2 people on the planet who, if they asked me to go anywhere (hell included), I would drop everything and go - no questions asked. One of them is my friend Nancy - who asked me to go with her to Antarctica. I never had any desire to go there. Please, it's all ice and snow and cold. Who in their right mind would consider it? Seriously...Best. Trip. Ever. Among other things, I learned to tell the difference between these: and these: and these: Those aren't my pictures, you understand. I didn't take the digital because I couldn't face carrying all those batteries. My photos are being developed now and I'll post a few when they come back. I'm still in the throes of unburying my desk (over 1400 e-mails, most of them spam!). I have many stories to tell - you'll be sick of hearing about them. Best. Trip. Ever.

I'm Off

I'm on my way to Antarctica today. No phones, no e-mail, no boss, no children. Yessiree Bob - three weeks of heaven. Play nice while I'm gone.

Happiest of New Years

to everyone!! I hope you all had a safe, fun celebration last night. I wanted to take a picture of my mother's kitchen this morning, but she wouldn't let me. Let's just leave you with the image of everyone playing Texas Hold 'Em until 2:00 am and not cleaning up a thing for at least 4 hours before then (which has to be a record for my mother). At least we had a good time!

Doing My Part

Here are the 2 newest members of our little club: That's Michelle on the left and Britt on the right. We were discussing knitting at our holiday party last week and Britt mentioned that she'd always wanted to learn. I told her that I'd be happy to teach her and a knitting circle was born. We had quite a few people walking past the conference room stop and chat about knitting. I was very sad to hear one nurse talk about her fear of knitting circularly. She said, "Oh my friends told me that it's just too hard. So I want to knit mittens, but I can't." I told her to come next Tuesday and I'll get her started. Too hard! What kind of teacher says that?? Here's what I've been working on: The picture is a little disappointing - you can't really see the depth of the pattern. This is the Lisa Knits scarf. I'm knitting it in the Canadian singles I bought in Baltimore. It's making a lumpy, bumpy scarf that's really interesting. The yarn is a little harsh, but I think washing will work wonders. I need a new, big project to take to Antarctica with me. Jillian and I are taking a trip over to Threadbear next week. Should it be a sweater? I imagine I could get quite a few pairs of socks done. Nancy wants to knit these. I'm sure one or two of them will come home with me.

I guess he can stay - but no crackers in bed!

So I get home from work last night and the Hub immediately begins to tease me. "I bought your present. I bought your present," in the sing-songy voice that makes me crazy. I figured I'd shut him up quickly and said, "I'll give you yours if you give me mine," thinking he'd nix the idea right there. To my surprise, he said, "Sure." Then I remembered that I'd sent his gift to my mother's house (wrapped) ready to slip under the tree for him to open on the 24th. He wanted me to have my gift so badly that he said, "Just tell me what it is and you can have yours." This is what he got me... Is that a little small? Here's a bigger picture... He told me, "I looked at the 40 gig ones, but they just seemed too big." ! Then he said, "but if you want to upgrade, here." He pulled out cash from his pocket and handed it over. What a guy! I'm a little frightened about what toy he might bring home next. Brochures for these have been showing up around the house lately.

I can breath again

On Friday, I took the GRE. For the uninitiated, that's the General Record Exam and almost every graduate program requires that you spend $115 and 2 months of your life in preparation. It's all computerized, so I got my score right away (600 verbal and 560 quantitative - if you're interested). There's also an analytical writing section which won't be graded for a couple of weeks. Overall, I'm pleased with the score and really, really, really glad it's over. To celebrate, I bought some of these: I love dark chocolate - the darker the better. Whenever I travel, I try to find the darkest chocolate in the region. My favorite up to this point has been Finnish. Scharffen Berger is now officially the best damn chocolate I've ever had. I also got a bar of the baking chocolate and showed Little Big Man the brownie recipe (he's a slave to brownies). He wanted to bake last night at 10:00 pm - I made him wait. On the knitting front - Clapotis is done. She's just waiting for a bath and slight blocking. I love Lorna's Laces Lion and Lamb. I have 8 skeins in a lovely brown that I'm eyeing. I don't know what I'll do with it, but I want to work with it now. I also started the Victorian Lace Scarf from Lisa Knits. It's a 28 row pattern, but is fairly simple - just what I need right now. I must say the pattern is extremely well written with easy to follow instructions. I will be knitting one of her patterns again. Happy Thanksgiving (and 3 day week) to those of you in the US. Pass the pumpkin cheesecake!

Best Little Yarn Shop in Michigan

Okay, so it's not so little, but Threadbear is really the best yarn shop I've been in (and I've been in a lot of yarn shops). Never mind that it's the biggest yarn shop I've been in. Rob and Matt carry all my favorite yarns and quite a few of my least favorite too! I think it's a shop that would make any knitter happy. On Saturday, I tripped up there with Jillian and Amy to attend a signing of KnitWit and hang out at the shop. Here's J waiting patiently for her total: And here's Amy - who only likes candid shots of herself: And who else was there? Shannon of Bitter Girl fame: I also met the Cakers' mom, Marcia (of Purls before Swine fame). A very nice woman. Go have a look at her blog and see her progress on a very Knitty scarf. Here's the image I can't get out of my head, Rob dancing around with 3 skeins of incredibly lovely Lion & Lamb, singing, "She's gonna catch the Clap, she's gonna catch the Clap!" Here's what I've done with the first skein: This is the very beginning of Clapotis, another very Knitty scarf. I love the feel of this yarn. It has a bit of a funky smell, but feels divine. It's the first real knitting I've done in months. I think being in the shop, surrounded by all that yarn and all that creativity just made me want to knit again. Whatever the reason - I'm glad to oblige the urge.

Baltimore

Has a very nice yarn shop called A Good Yarn. It is the tiniest shop I've ever been in, but it's packed with stuff like this: What you see is 4 skeins of lovely Canadian single-spun yarn and a skein of Noro Iro (75% wool and 25% silk). The Canadian yarn is sheepy smelling - very yummy. I picked up a skein of it to buy and then went around looking for a pattern to go with it. I must say that everytime I picked up a skein of yarn, Phyllis (who was working at the counter) showed me something that she had made from it. I was impressed with her knowledge and her knitting skills. When I asked where I could get a bite to eat, Phyllis checked with Lorraine (the shop owner). Lorraine pulled Floyd (her husband) out of the back room to walk me over to their favorite beer and burger joint - Kooper's. She said, "This lady is from out of town and we don't want her walking over there by herself - do we?" Floyd and I had a nice chat and the Guinness and burger were terrific!! I was in Baltimore for a work conference and really dreaded going. I remembered it as being dirty and not a nice place. I'm happy to say that my opinion has changed. The people in A Good Yarn were absolutely lovely and the cab drivers that took me back and forth that night were chatty and friendly in a good way. I'm not clammoring to go back, but if I have to - I know where to go.

Baryshnikov

On Saturday I took Sassy to see this man: dance. I expected ballet - silent leaps, powerful arabesques, classical music. I got something better. We saw Forbidden Christmas or the Doctor and the Patient. Initially, I must admit that I was a little disappointed. The sets and costumes were very simple (a car was painted on a backdrop and was dragged across stage on a set of wires - when the car reappeared to travel in the opposite direction - the painting was still facing the original direction). The action was a little slow and even though it was only 90 minutes long, I was worried that Sassy was getting antsy. The play has a very Russian sensibility. Once I realized that, the simplicity of the sets made sense. For me, it's a feeling of not only making do with what you have, but creating something extraordinary. Because I was not distracted by amazing scenery and costumes, I paid more attention to the actors and what they were telling me. Forbidden Christmas refers to the way the Communists tried to stamp out any signs of Christianity in their people. They actually cut all power on Christmas Eve, thinking that this would stop people from celebrating. I have to admire people who continued to believe despite the obstacles. It was worth sitting though the dogma just to see the grace and beauty Baryshnikov brings to the stage. I'm very glad we went and even more pleased that Sassy enjoyed herself so much. If you have the chance to see the show - go.

Driving in Michigan

This: Plus this: equals approximately $5,000 in damage. It happened on the way into work on Monday morning. Sassy was in the car and didn't see a thing, but heard the horrific noise. She was pretty shaken up and cried a bit, leading me to think she hit her head or something. Once I figured out she was fine, it was all okay. No airbags went off, but the left front quarter of the brand-new-only-made-one-payment-on-it vehicle is toast. Thank the goddess for decent insurance.

It's no secret

that when I get interested in something that it becomes almost an obsession. For some reason, I've been checking in on the Mount St. Helens VolcanoCam several times a day. I'm in the Eastern time zone, so when I get into work the vocano cam is pretty much black - sort of like this: Does this stop me from checking every morning? No. The camera updates every 5 minutes, so it's several hours before I can actually see anything, but I continue to look anyway. For some reason, this whole eruption thing fascinates me. I'll share one more obsession this morning - Tyler Hamilton. I can't believe that after everything he's gone through to reach the pinnacle of racing success that he would knowingly jeopardize his career and his life. I hope these allegations are cleared up quickly and he can get back to the business at hand. I'm looking forward to an epic race at the Tour next year. Send me good vibes this evening. What's the probability that I'll forget everything I've studied in the last 2 weeks and fail my statistics exam?

Reports of My Death

are greatly exaggerated. I'm not dead - just exhausted. Every September, I brace myself for the chaos that is "back to school." This year, I had the outlay of cash well in hand, but couldn't get myself into schedule mode. We have ballet, ice hockey, homework, various social groups, etc (you know it doesn't look like so much when it's written down...). I also have taken the plunge and am taking a Statistics course to ramp up to graduate school. I want to transfer the grade, so I'm being extra special anal about doing all the homework and being teacher's pet. I'm quite sure everyone in the class hates me - do I care? (okay, maybe a little) Anyway, there are dirty dishes all over the house, the laundry isn't done, and the dust bunnies are very threatening. Go check out Curlypurl - she's done a few entries that could have been written by me (if I were that together). As a result of the chaos, I haven't been working on much. I do have a finished sweater! Okay, it's a baby sweater that I started back in May - but it's progress. It's for my newest friend Bobby (here's where I would insert the picture of a very cute baby, but my e-mail's down right now - maybe you'll get to see him later). I also dyed the silk fabric I got for my Lance handbag. The fabric on the right was dyed with weld and those on the left were done with Osage orange. I love the clarity of the weld, but the Osage has such depth. I think that will be the inside fabric of the bag. Now, I need to get busy and re-work the top of the bag to fit in the handle I bought. Will it be done before the next Tour de France? Stay tuned.

Bag it

I must admit to procrastinating about my Spinning Study Group project. It's been so long, I wouldn't be surprised if you'd forgotten that I was in a spinning study group. I haven't forgotten, I just was avoiding it. I had to rewash my merino wool as I hadn't gotten all the grease out of it and I didn't want to do it. Well, we had a meeting last Saturday and I had to come with something done - some sort of progress. So, at the beginning of last week, I started washing a batch at a time in a bowl in my kitchen sink. I boiled water for 2 soapy washes and 3 rinses (okay, sometimes 4 rinses because I got a little carried away with the soap). Anyway, I got the wool clean and took it to the meeting to use my friend's motorized carder. The batts come off the carder and look like little loaves of wool: I fell in love with this wool all over again. The batt on the left came off Nancy's carder and the one on the right came off my hand cranked one. Aren't they lovely? They're fluffy and soft and I can't wait to get spinning. Maybe I can spend some time with the wheel this weekend. Here's my other project right now: That is one side of my Tour de France beaded knitting bag (second side is up to the pattern area at the top). I have some silk fabric on order from Aurora Silk - okay I ordered some weld too. I have in my mind exactly what I want for the lining of this bag and I can't find it in any of the fabric stores around here. Sooo, I ordered the weld and I'm going to try my hand at fabric dyeing. However, do you see my problem illustrated in the photo? I ordered a frame from Bag Lady and mis-calculated. When I looked at the measurements on the website, I was thinking that the measurement was taken across the top of the frame only. It's not. It's a measurement from one end to the other (which makes perfect sense, I just didn't think of it that way). Since I don't want to make the bag fit into this frame (I think it would be a little scrunched), I need to order a bigger size. I hate when that happens. Incidentally, I had a dream that Sheryl Crow saw this bag and wanted it. I told her no. She begged and pleaded with me. She may even have shed a tear. I told her to go away. Delusions of grandeur? Ummmm, yeah.

Yarn Photos and a Contest!

Here is the lovely Koigu I picked up from Threadbear on Friday. Does it remind you of anything?? If not, you haven't been reading carefully. Here's the other yarn I picked up on Friday: That's Cascade 220 on the left. The photo doesn't show it well, but this yarn has a lot of color in it (yellow, teal, deep green). I love Cascade in the first place, but when Matt showed me a felted bag made with the purple version of this yarn, I knew I had to have some. The depth of color is amazing - go have a look. The other yarn is Misti Alpaca from Peru - it's 100% baby alpaca and it's soooooo soft. I can't remember who brought it over for us to fondle, but I knew I had to have some right away. This company also makes a bulky alpaca that is just as gorgeous. I never know what to do with bulky yarn, so I passed on that, but I'm expecting something gorgeous from Jillian made from it! Okay, here's the contest. The Koigu above (go look again, I'll wait) wants to be Tour de Lance socks. Come up with a stitch pattern for me to use that incorporates those colors and you will win this: That's a yellow wrist band (maybe you saw all those cyclists wearing them in the Tour?). I bought them from the Lance Armstrong Foundation website during the race. They're now all on backorder, so you can wait to get one from them - or get creative with Barbara Walker and get your very own right now. I'll also throw in a copy of The Race: A Novel of Grit, Tactics, and the Tour de France, by Dave Shields. So here's the pithy version: show me a stitch pattern that looks good for socks incorporating the Koigu organized in attractive stripes and you walk away with a great book and a yellow "Live Strong" wristband. The contest will run for 2 weeks - so have your suggestions to me by August 17 and have fun!

Fiber Fun

I took the day off on Friday and went to Threadbear with Jillian. Originally, we were going to shop, but the store isn't actually open yet. We went to help sort and count. I must say that Rob and Matt are really nice people. Not that I'm surprised, but I liked them both very much. I even liked the dogs - in spite of Tate's persistance in trying to kiss me. The space is absolutely huge!! If you go look on Sarah's blog, you can see some pictures of how it's all coming together. Sarah has been helping set things up by spending lots of time with balls of yarn and price tags. Go Sarah! So J and I spent several hours there, but I don't feel like I helped much. It was really more social than work. Besides, we were counting in Koigu land - that's not work at all. I did leave with some Koigu to make a pair of socks. I'll post the picture of the yarn and you can guess what I'll be calling the socks when they're done.

Let's Sing a Song of Six

How many is six???? Taken from Graham Watson's website. Go have a look, he's got some amazing stuff over there!

What's This?

Why, that's my boy winning Stage 15 yesterday. He pulled on the yellow jersey (his 61st!) at the end of this stage. Today, it's the uphill time trial. I'm listening right now. I do have to say how sorry I am for Thomas Voeckler. The guy has worn the maillot jaune for the last 10 days. He's been a lot of fun to watch. I'm going out on a limb here to say that we'll be seeing a lot of him in the years to come. He's made his mark this year, but he has a lot of years left. Allez Thomas!! Also, I want to extend sympathy to everyone who was hoping Tyler Hamilton would win the Tour this year. It was a sad moment on Saturday when OLN showed him riding up the row of team cars and waving to each one. I couldn't believe he was abandoning. He finished the Tour fourth last year (one place off the podium) with a broken collarbone. Now, that's worth repeating - he finished fourth with a broken bone!! Here's a picture of his back after the race on Saturday: Now, it may look like just a couple of bruises, but read his entry on his website to find out what was really going on. He took a big fall in Stage 6 and landed on his lower back. Basically, he had no power in those muscles and with no power in your lower back, you can't climb the mountains. I have no doubt that he'll be back next year. Heal well Ty, we'll see you next year!

Ya think?!??

You are the Hermit card. The Hermit has chosen a
solitary spiritual path. He shines light on his
inner self and, by this means, gains wisdom.
The Hermit's home is the natural world and it
is by being in tune with that world that he
learns the laws of nature and learn how they
operate within himself. His path is a lonely
one as he lives in silence and has for
companionship only his own internal rhythms.
But those crossing his path are touched by his
light and wisdom. Though often alone, he
manages nevertheless to instruct those who meet
him and guides those who chose to follow him on
a path towards enlightenment. Image from The Aleister Crowley tarot deck.

Which Tarot Card Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

What? This is a knitting blog???

So, yes, I've been knitting. Here's the most recently completed project. This is the scarf made from Fonty Velourine (54% cotton/46% viscose). I picked up a ball of this yarn just because I loved the color. I knew it would worm, doesn't all chenille worm? Nope, not this. It's lovely and cushy and feels great next to my neck. I went back and bought 2 more balls (lucky girl - they were 10% off!) to get a decent sized scarf. My sister claimed it. I think it's a Pavlovian response that when she sees me knitting something, she automatically asks, "Who's it for?" Since I just wanted to knit this, I didn't care who got it. She asked first, she gets it. My mother was not amused - she needs to be a little quicker on the draw. Here's what else I've been playing with: It's pretty much a swatch. I want to make a bag with this: but I'm not sure what sort of pattern to do. I want a bag that's approximately 4" wide and I want one of those big silver handle thingies that the Bag Lady sells, but beyond that I'm lost. So I started a swatch with some left over perl cotton that was already strung with beads. The bottom section is 5 beads with 3 stitches in between the bead sections. The middle section is 5 beads with 5 stitches between the bead sections. The top is 1 bead, 3 stitches staggered to the left every other row. I'm actually having fun just swatching for this. However, these yellow beads were purchased for Tour de France knitting and I don't even have them strung yet. What? What's the update on the Tour? How kind of you to ask. My boy is 9' 35" behind the leader (who is the way cute Frenchman Thomas Voeckler, see?...) There's been pretty much no change in the overall standings of the race for about 5 days now. They rode their first mountain stage today in the Massif Central region of France. Tomorrow they head down toward the Pyrenees. All the main contenders (Jan Ullrich, Tyler Hamilton, Levi Leipheimer, and of course, Lance) are within a couple of minutes of each other. This should begin shaking out very soon. Knitting and TdF updates on the same day...will wonders never cease?

Let me hear you say it...

* Maillot jaune...maillot jaune...maillot jaune (for the uninitiated, that means yellow jersey). The Posties pulled it off yesterday and beat all the other teams to finish the team time trial on top. Yeah, Lance will be giving the jersey to someone else within the next couple of days, but the mountains are coming. (*Graham Watson photo from LAF - Lance's official website) PS - Sheryl? Your 15 minutes of TdF fame are OVER. Please crawl back under your off-key singing, bad music writing rock now.

I hope you're watching...

The early stages of the Tour de France have been very exciting. At my house, we're all TdF all the time. I've been listening to the live coverage at work and then comparing notes with Hub as we watch later in the evening. OLN's coverage has been superb. Although I will take exception to the ugly American image the Cutters have been giving us. They're doing "color" commentary on the 5:00-7:00 show and they suck out loud. They've been harrassing people and generally giving us all a bad name. Today is team time trial day so send up good thoughts for the Blue Train. In other news, I received an advance copy of this: I read it in one afternoon. I wanted to finish it before the Tour started and it was a very quick read. The story was okay (boy meets girl, confronts personal crisis, realizes how much girl means to him, triumphs over personal crisis). The surrounding story was fabulous! The writer was involved in cycling at some point in his life and gives a real sense of the politics, the comaraderie, and the feel of the peleton. The race scenes are very exciting and even Hub finished it in under 8 hours. If someone happens to have a copy or you can get a used copy or you're a TdF freak (like us) - go ahead and read it.

Can You Stand It??

This is what I've been doing for the last 2 days at my parents' house. This is my niece Stella dressed like Lady Liberty. My nephew is marching in a 4th of July parade on Saturday with his Boy Scout Troop and since my sister is involved with the troop, she's marching and she wanted Stella to march too. Of course you can't march without a costume... My sister doesn't do sewing, so she talked me into "helping" her. She's so damn cute, I can't stand it.

It's that time of year again...

Strap yourselves in folks, the Tour starts in less than 8 days. July 3-25 - I'm glued to the live feed from OLN during the day and watching the coverage on OLN at night. Woohoo!! Go Lance!

Will I get Little Big Man's teacher's socks done in time? No. I knew I wouldn't, but I did give it a half-assed attempt. Here's my progress: It's a lovely colorway of Mountain Colors Bearfoot. I love this yarn. It's yummy to knit with and I can see myself making lots of socks from this stuff. This is the other thing I've been working on: It's basically a big swatch that's going to be a scarf when I get more yarn. It's Fonty Velourine (I never heard of it either), but it's 54% cotton and 46% viscose. A cotton chenille with a synthetic binder. Not a worm in site and it's lovely to work with. What's in this package? Ask Jillian later. Sassy decorated the package for me (how very Martha Stewart). I had no cute little gift bags and she said, "Mommy, I can make one!" So, there it is. Isn't she talented? This is my favorite tree in the whole world: It's a catalpa tree in my back yard. When we first moved into this house (12 years ago) I said to Hub, "We're going to have to take that dead tree out. It's going to fall on the house." He said, "It's not dead, it just takes a long time to leaf out." He was right. It is always the last tree in the yard to get leaves, but then it's gorgeous. I especially love the white flowers. Lastly, I treated myself yesterday. Aren't they lovely? Big thanks go out to June for showing me the value of a pedicure!

Reviews

It's Friday, and I don't want to be at work. Technically, I shouldn't be at work. See I work on a research project that's government funded (even though I work for a university). Since all government workers have been given the day off, I should have the day off too. Technically...yeah, it didn't work with my boss either. So anyway, I thought I'd share my opinion on the 2 movies I've seen this week. The first one was this: The best part was, we have an IMax screen pretty close to us. We got to see Harry Potter on a 65 foot tall screen! Sassy grabbed my arm several times (and nearly cut off the circulation) to tell me she was afraid. The werewolf scenes bothered her the most. I have to admit, it was a pretty scary werewolf. The three teens who play Harry, Hermione, and Ron are certainly growing up. They get better every film. I will say that Michael Gambon (who played Dumbledore) did an admirable job, but I really miss Richard Harris. He was the quintessential Dumbledore and anyone who comes after him has very big shoes to fill. All in all, we'd give it 2 thumbs up. Wednesday night, I took the kids to see this: Okay, I really wanted to see it too. I liked it better than the first one. There was more for adults in this movie and I enjoyed the inside humor. Little Big Man is old enough to "get" most of the jokes (nearly peed himself when the knights pulled the catnip off Puss in Boots). Sassy was just along for the ride - but she laughed as loudly as Little Big Man in some spots. A friend told me, "See it with another adult so you can laugh at the jokes with them." That was good advice, so I'm passing it along. Very enjoyable film, and another 2 thumbs up. I also recently finished this book: A couple of months ago I was bored with everything I was reading and asked for suggestions. I think it was Carolyn who suggested this book. It was hysterical. I was laughing so much reading this book that the Hub stole it from me when I put it down for a minute. He chewed through it in 2 days...and then taunted me with the knowledge. Many years ago, when the Last Temptation of Christ came out, my mother and I had a huge debate about whether Jesus would have suffered from temptations at all. Her argument was that he was god and therefore above the sins that tempted human beings. My argument was that he was sent down here to be human - not a god. Therefore, he had to be tempted by everything that humans are tempted by; only in that way would he know what it was like. Lamb had the ring of truth for me. Who knows what Jesus' childhood was like, but I really liked this version of it. He struggled, he made bad choices, in short, he was a human being. The book tells the story of Jesus' life, through the eyes of his childhood friend. Christopher Moore had a piece at the end of the book where he talked about the research he did and I think it shows in the reading. I was raised an Episcopalian and remember some of my Sunday school lessons. I did consider digging up a Bible and reading through it, just to catch some of the things I missed. It was an entertaining read and I highly recommend it whether you're a believer or not. I have a short list of reasons why you should read it. 1. you find out where the Shroud of Turin comes from 2. you find out what the "H" stands for in "Jesus H. Christ." Go forth and read.

Knitting?

Yes, I have been, thanks. I just haven't been talking about it. Last week was the week from hell - the last week of school. Plus, my sister-in-law (the normal one from Colorado) was in town visiting. What that added up to was something going every night, followed by 2 hours of chit-chat. Sister-in-law just returned from a trip to Italy. Did you know that limonata is lemon soda? I do, after she told me 15 times in an hour. After the first 2 hour chat I looked at Hub and started bitching. He put his hand up and said, "Would you rather spend time with the normal one or the crazy one?" I couldn't argue, so I put up with it. She only comes once a year, so I guess I can be nice for a week (although it was a stretch). Here's what I worked on: That's my new orange sock from Skacel Trekking XXL. It's 75% wool and 25% nylon (I think). This was the sock yarn I bought in DC from Knit Happens. I'm working it on US 2s and it's been a little splitty with my Inox needles. They will be a welcome addition to my knit sock drawer when they're done. I'm at the gusset decrease on the second sock. My next project is...socks. Little Big Man decided to leave the charter school he's been at for the last 5 years (stealing from me the pleasure of sobbing at the 8th grade graduation next year). Anyway, I've been in denial for the last couple of months, thinking that he would change his mind at the last minute. This left me with nothing to give his primary teacher at the end of the year. LBM picked some nice yarn from my Mountain Colors Bearfoot stash for the gifting socks. The teacher is leaving in 3 weeks to work in the slums of Bankok for 6 weeks. Will he want to take wool socks to Thailand? I don't know, but I plan on having them to him so he can make the choice. There's nothing like crunch knitting to get me going. One more thing...Reagan - enough. He sucked when he was president and now he's dead. Bury him already.

As promised

Here's the new yarn I bought on Friday with Jillian: The Interlacements is stretched across the left side of the photo. The pink looks electric in this photo and I guess it is a bit bright, but not quite so shocking. The new Maggi's Irish Yarn is in the 12 o'clock position. Maggi's Rags followed by Maggi's Linen (cotton/linen blend). I can't wait to get started on this yarn. It's going to be fun to work with. The tag on Rag says to use US 10 and the Linen says to use US 8. I think I'll be combining these in the same project and I'm going to be switching back and forth between the 2 needles - this should keep the gauge similar. Any thoughts? Last, but certainly not least, is the new Koigu. It's one of the new colors (in the 800s). I'm getting quite a stash of this yarn. This is a good thing. Had a fabulous weekend! We really did nothing but socialize, eat, and drink all weekend long. Okay, I did knit. I've been working on a gorgeous little Miss Bea's cable sweater and all the pieces are finished. I'll be seaming it up and I'll post a picture when it's finished. The baby's not due until July - I guess I'm early with this! Also got Hub to help me stain the pieces for my new desk. I bought a 2-drawer file cabinet and a CPU cabinet with 3 drawers from Naked Furniture and they came in last week. My plan is to get rid of the old metal/rusty file cabinet and dining room table I'm currently using as a desk. So, stain is finished, 2 coats of varnish to go. Lastly, I'm officially the parent of a teenager. Little Big Man turns 13 today. I can't believe what a whirlwind trip it's been so far. Strange times still ahead.

Crab cake

It's official, I need a long weekend. All week long, my co-workers have driven me so crazy. This is what I put up on my desktop yesterday after all the annoyances: Yeah, it's time for a long weekend. We're going shopping tonight to stock up on food, so we won't have to leave our house all weekend long. You can bet that this will be in the cart: I did have a lovely fibery lunch with Jillian today. It's always fun to see what other people are working on and J has the greatest ideas. I muddle along making swatch after swatch and have a good time, but don't come up with anything fabulous. J throws the coolest stuff together and it always looks great. She's my knit design inspiration. She talked me into buying some new Maggie Jackson yarns (yeah, twist my arm). I left them in the car, but I'll snap some pictures this weekend. One of them is a cotton/linen blend - very cool. It's a triple strand yarn that feels a little harsh, but I saw a swatch and it knits up soft. With that blend, it will only get softer as it's washed and worn. Saw some new colors of Koigu - gorgeous purples and oranges. I'm also an Interlacements slut. The colors they put together are so amazing. The skein I picked up has purple, pink, orange, and blends of those colors. I am in my glory with all the fabulous oranges I've been seeing. You can't have too many orange yarns - that's my motto these days. Interlacements has also cut their skeins in half. Instead of spending $40, the skein was only $15. Now I just want to go home and knit. In other news, I had this dream last night (don't you just hate when people start a conversation with this?). I weighed 700 pounds - don't ask me how I knew the number, it was just in my head. I was a pyramid of fat with my head on top. My hands were sticking out my sides (think Violet Beauregard in Willie Wonka) and my feet were buried under suet. All I could think about was "how am I going to drive to work like this?" I think that means I need to go back to the gym. I've been using my allergy attacks as an excuse to "baby" myself. I eat whatever I want and haven't worked out...well, in a while (months). Time to step up and be the stud that I am and start sweating again. Who's with me?

Pioneer, schmioneer

Yeah, we lost power in the gigantic storms last week. It went out on Friday afternoon. Let me just mention that I live in the frickin' country. My husband's criteria for living in a house is that we have so few neighbors that he can pee off the back deck, at any time, without anyone seeing him. Yes, my mother-in-law lives right next door to us - he doesn't actually pee off the back deck, but he wants the option. So, when you live out in BFE and there are only about 12 other houses on your dirt road, the power company doesn't care about you. Not when there are 899,999 other customers (who all live in neighborhoods) without power. We had 3 field hockey games, 2 ice hockey games, 1 dress rehersal, 2 dance recitals, and a study group going on this last weekend. On Saturday night, I told Hub that he'd better get his quarters together, we were going to the laundramat and then to the health club for a shower first thing in the morning. We were very lucky. There was no one in the laundramat and we sailed in and got everything washed and dried in an hour and a half. By the time we left, people were lining up their baskets of dirty clothes waiting for the washers to be open. The community center/health club isn't. They wouldn't let me bring Sassy in for a shower because she was underage. Besides, "half the town would be bringing their kids in here for showers if we let yours in." "Hmmm," I said, "I thought that was part of being a community center." Sassy had a sponge bath in the kitchen with water we heated up on the grill. I'm not a pioneer woman. Give me water or give me death. Needless to say, there wasn't much fiber going on at my house this weekend. I did have the lovely experience of reading by candle light (and managed to avoid singing my hair). I finished up The Well of Lost Plots on Friday. What an amazing book. I'm in love with Jasper Fforde. Also started and finished Black Rubber Dress, by Lauren Henderson. I can't wait to read the other adventures of Sam Jones! Mac, over at Go Fish has put together a summer reading list. Thinking this is a good idea, I've cribbed it and have put together a small list of my own. Of course, I still have several books in a bag at my house courtesy of Jillian - so those are really at the top of the list (there's another Sam Jones mystery in there somewhere), but here's my official summer reading list: Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, Christopher Moore Not Wanted on the Voyage, Timothy Findley For Rabbit, With Love and Squalor: An American Read, Anne Richardson House of Sand and Fog, Andre Dubus III What's everyone else reading this summer?

There's so much to tell...

DC last week was fabulous! I was also very HOT!! I'm a wuss, I'll admit. I came from Michigan and nice 60 degree weather and was dropped into high humidity and 90 degree days. I hate walking out of the hotel to hail a cab and having pit stains from the (minimal) effort. And what's with federal buildings? They all said, "The air's on...", if that's what passes for air in those buildings, I'm glad I don't work for the government. Other than the business I was there to attend to, the trip was great. I met a friend on Wednesday for a trip to Knit Happens. It's really a cute little shop. I had heard so much about it from other bloggers that it just seemed too good to be true. I'm always amazed when small shops manage to pack a ton of yarn into a place and not have it feel crowded and junky looking. (I'm amazed, because this is what I attempt at my house and it always looks crowded and junky looking.) Anyway, yes, it's a small shop, but they have great stuff - Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Trendsetter, some pretty cool sock yarn that I forget the name of, and tons more. Who was in the shop when we arrived? None other than Wendy! I approached her and mentioned a mutual friend and we chatted for a few minutes. I didn't introduce myself - which I didn't think about until later, so I'm sure she thought I was some weird blogger stalker. I was looking for a cabled baby sweater pattern and the clerk (I think it was one of the owners) gave me a stack of Miss Bea books to page through. Found just what I was looking for here . If you haven't seen the Miss Bea books - go look, they're wonderful, very well written and the pictures are just so damn cute! On Friday, I had the whole day to myself! As an aside, my boss always apologizes to me for making me travel to these meetings. Um, right...5 nights alone in a hotel room, eating fabulous meals in places where the Hub and kids would never cross the threshold, and a whole day to do whatever I want...I laugh at him every time. Anyway, back to my Friday. Started off at the Textile Museum. It is, by far, my favorite place in the city. The people are so nice and the exhibits are well organized and interesting. There was a group of school children there while I was going through. I could hear these kids wherever I was in the museum (it's a very open design). They were having the best time trying on wrappers from different parts of the world and figuring out how they looked best. Every now and again, the docent would shush them a little, but they were having such a good time. It was a lot of fun listening to them. Took the metro over to the National Museum of Women in the Arts. This place is huge!! Three floors of art by women. I must admit, I was a little disappointed when I first went in. I love paintings as much as the next person (okay, maybe a little less), but how many of the Madonna and Child can one person look at? They do have a great exhibit running right now called Nordic Cool: Hot Women Designers. It features women designers from Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Norway. There were paintings, photos, textiles, furniture - all kinds of things. It was a very nice exhibit - well put together and interesting. After that I was exhausted and wanted to go someplace to sit down and eat. I kept telling myself, "you haven't been to the third floor yet" - that's where parts of the permanent collection are. So, I went back up the stairs and saw this: It's The Springs by Lee Krasner. I know it doesn't look like much on the screen. In person, it's 43 x 66 inches and just fills your field of vision when you stand close to it. What I most love about museums is how close you can get to the paintings and really see what they're made from. This painting is lovely and I've found something new to go visit while I'm in DC. (Please tell me I'm not the only one who returns to visit things I've seen in museums. My other favorite is a Rodin sculpture called She Who Was the Helmet Maker's Beautiful Wife on display in the Hirschhorn. You can go see her for yourself here. There's more, but I've gone on a bit long already. I'll be back with pictures of what I've done in this busy, catch up week.

Lazy Alert

Okay for 2 days now, I've schlepped in my ball of Rowan Calmer and the attached swatch...but I'm too damn lazy to make my way to the scanner and scan the thing. So, I finally pick up the goods and make my way across the office to the computer with the scanner attached and someone's using it. I feel a little funny asking someone to stop working so I can goof off. You're going to have to wait to see it. Trust me, it's gorgeous. The yarn is lovely and I really like working with it. Now I just have to sell my first born to be able to afford a sweater's worth. Have a fabbo lunch with Jillian and kidlets yesterday. Mr. Henry cracks me up! J told me he loves the backpack and when she put him in it, he got the most contented smile on his face I've ever seen. After about 10 minutes of walking around, his little lids were very heavy and he drifted right off to slumberland. My friend Isobel wasn't having a very good day. She did demonstrate a very nice handstand for me and showed me how she dressed up Shaggy in Velma's dress (I love it when little girls giggle). Don't worry J, in a few days, she'll be right as rain. I'm off this afternoon to have my hair highlighted and cut. I feel like I'm letting Gloria Steinem down by admitting it's because I'm going on a business trip next week. I can't have these people (most of whom I see 3 times a year) thinking I walk around like a sheepdog most of the time (which I do - but I can't let them think that!). I knew once I started highlighting that it would be one of those "personal hygiene until I die" things, but it didn't stop me from doing it. I'm also taking a couple pairs of pants to be shortened. Do I leave things until the last minute? Does the Pope wear a funny hat?

Wait till I get started!!!!

Which Princess Bride Character are You?
this quiz was made by mysti The Princess Bride has got to be one of my favorite movies of all time. Rob Reiner is a genius.

Swatch Yarns

Here is the small collection of swatching yarns I've purchased recently: Let's work clockwise, shall we? The red in the upper left is Rowan Calmer, which is 75% cotton and 25% microfiber. Next is Dale Svale, 50% cotton, 40% viscose, and 10% silk. Then comes Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool, 65% wool, 35% silk (notice I bought the green and not the muted yellow - I really wanted the yellow as well). Lastly is Maggi's Aran Tweed, 100% wool. I'm currently working on a swatch with the Calmer. It's really lovely yarn - lots of bounce and very cushiony. The microfiber addition to cotton was a good idea. This yarn will have some memory, but will drape nicely. I'll show that swatch tomorrow - I'm about halfway through a pattern repeat of the Elann Dancing Vines Tunic. I'm not sure it will work quite right for this sweater (a little too bouncy), but it does show off the pattern stitches well. Also, it's a little pricey ($11.25/ball) for a giant tunic sweater. Here's my other swatch-in-progress This is Jaeger Trinity, 40% silk, 35% cotton, 25% polyamide. The swatch is knit on 3.5 mm needles, which may look a little big, but anything smaller and I think the swatch would be boardy. One weird thing about this yarn is that periodically, I would have a huge stitch. I don't think I was doing anything differently. Just every now and again I noticed a huge stitch, like I wrapped twice and then dropped a wrap. Very strange. I like the hand of the swatch, a little crisp and crunchy, but also drapey enough to make a nice summer sweater. I did a seed stitch boarder and then did an increase on either side of a 10 stitch panel every other row. You can see that the piece has a pouch - too many increases. Next time, I'll allow a couple of rows in between the increases to make a nice gentle slope. I also threw in a pleat (which doesn't quite show up in the photo). I've never made a knitted pleat before - I don't think this was the yarn to try it with. The swatch pleated nicely and the yarn falls beautifully into the folds, but the pleat itself looks like the dog's breakfast. I put 16 stitches on a double pointed needle, placed that behind 16 stitches on my working needle and k2tog for 8 stitches and then ssk for 8 stitches. My problem is with the "join" area. Here's a close up: Apologies for "over-exposing" but I think you can see the area I'm talking about now. See how the stitches on either side of the join pull away from each other. I know it's because of the decrease stitches, but how can I make it look more, well, pleat-like? Next time, I think I'll try it with 15 stitches behind and do a triple decrease in the center - slip 1, k2tog, psso. The Elsebeth Lavold skein will be a similar looking swatch. I'll keep you posted.

Spring Cleaning

I'm still on a bender to get my house cleaned up. I don't know what it is this spring, but I just want everything clean and organized. I've noticed this is a trend in blog-land. Consequently, there's not much going on the fiber front. We've been staying up too late watching way too much hockey (Go Red Wings), but I'm too exhausted to knit. I've been half-heartedly spinning, but not much of that either. Lately, I'm swatch girl. The last couple of times I've been to the yarn shops, all I can pick up is 1 or 2 skeins of something I haven't tried before. Last week, Jillian and I went to the local shop and they finally have the Elsbeth Lavold silky wool. It's so yummy. I wanted to buy several skeins, but contented myself with 1 in the muted yellow. I've got a dream sweater in my head and I think this might be the yarn for it. Next week I'll be in DC. I'm really dying to see Knit Happens. I have a friend in the area (newby knitter) and we're planning on having dinner and shopping. She always knows the newest, best restaurants in the area. Good food and good yarn - I love DC! Now, I just have to get through the prep for our meetings and 2 days of meetings before I can splurge. I have to go in a day early, at the request of my boss. I told him I'd be happy to go...on one condition, that he pays for me to stay an extra day. Of course he agreed (what a good guy). Anyway, I'll be wandering through the Textile Museum and the National Museum of Women in the Arts on Friday. Anything else I shouldn't miss?

I'm happy again

I think Spring has finally arrived in Michigan. We actually slept with the window open last night and woke up to the birds singing this morning (okay, we actually woke up because the cat came running through the house and bounced on our bed on the way to the window to try and get the birds - but it's close right?). We spent last week mucking out the basement. The kids were on Spring Break anyway, so it was a good time. Every couple of years we try and get a dumpster delivered to our house to take the junk away. We've lived in this house for 12 years and have used the basement as a cache for everything we couldn't bear to get rid of. My advice to myself now is - GET RID OF IT!! It doesn't get any better just because it's been sitting in the basement for a couple of years. Hub replaced the windows and I ripped out the carpet in the living room. My plan was to make it look terrible, thereby forcing Hub to do something about it. It worked. We went to Lowe's last night and checked out all the different brands of laminated flooring. It's truly staggering what they can do with wood and plastic these days. Anyone have horror stories about laminate floors? My only fiber time last week was crunch knitting. Hub and Little Big Man go to a fishing tournament every year at this time. Last year, Hub came home with a request for some hand knit socks for the raffle table. "Cool," I figured, "I have a whole year to finish 1 pair of socks." Um, yeah, I didn't start the damn things until April 8 - they left for the tourny on April 15. They turned out nicely and the guy who won them was very pleased. I didn't take a picture because I was sick of looking at them every waking moment. Hub and LBM didn't catch one fish - not one. He always tells me, "Catching a fish isn't the point, just being outside in the water is the point." Riiiight. Here's what I'm happy for today: seeing the sun being back at work not having to knit with 2 strands of Kid 'n Ewe that Hub didn't win the weekend trip this year (it was a stay in Nepal - oh sure, I'll bet there's fiber there, but who wants to be on a plane for 24 hours!)

Study Group Outlines - Woolen

Here's what I meant to post yesterday: Spinner's Flock Woolen Yarn Study Group Purpose: to spin a "woolen" style yarn with different twists, plies, diameters and to discover correct uses for this type of yarn Preparation of Fiber . Beginning with raw fleece � your choice of fleece � you will need 1 pound . Save a lock of the raw fleece for documentation, if you wish (protect it from future moth damage) Wash the fleece . Document how this was done, what soap was used . Save a lock of the washed fleece for documentation . Weigh the washed fleece to determine loss from washing Prepare the fleece for spinning . Document use of equipment used � cards, pickers and/or drum carder (what kind), pickers (what kind) Spin up woolen yarns . as singles and plied yarns . of varied angles of twist . of varied diameters (wraps per inch) . document for each spun sample o Wheel / spindle used o Wheel � whorl ratio o # of twists per inch o angle of twist o # of wraps per inch o # of yards per pound o # of plies . each spun yarn sample (singles and plied) should be 5 yards each, but allow for another yard or more to document each samples for twists/inch, angle of twist, wraps per inch. Make sample swatches from the handspun . Document for each detailed method of making swatch (knit, crochet, felt, weave, etc) . Size of equipment used (loom, needles, etc) Discuss appropriateness for each sample spun as related to type of wool used. Discuss appropriate end products that can be created from each sample of yarn. So, where am I in the process? My wool is washed and weighed. By the way Emma, you were right - my merino went from being 1 pound to .58 pound - I lost almost half of the weight in grease. There was some vegetal matter (vm), but not a lot and most of it was big enough that I could just pull it right out. I brought my drum carder into the house from my studio last night and fed the Mr. Clean wool through, just to see what would happen. I think I should probably use a different drum cloth with finer teeth, but this will do nicely. The wool fed through and I got a pretty decent bat out of the practice run. I'm being very anal about keeping notes on everything. It doesn't feel like homework, it's been really fun. I'm anxious to get started spinning though. Sassy will be helping me with the carding - that ought to be interesting!

Weekend Project

So last weekend, I got together with some spinning friends to start a study group about (what else) spinning. I have the outline and am planning on posting it just in case anyone wants to play along at home. We haven't had an official meeting yet, but we did decide on some of the guidelines. We are all starting with a pound of unwashed wool (any type). We'll be spinning woolen and we are to keep a record of whatever we do to the wool (washing/carding/type of wheel, etc). I dug around in my stash and came up with some unwashed Merino. Here is what a pound looks like: I must admit, it's pretty disgusting. I was worried about using merino because I've heard so many horror stories about not getting it clean the first go round and having it seize up after the wax and grease re-harden on it. I decided to give it a go anyway. Here's my pile of clean wool: I figured I should start with boiling (or near boiling) water to make sure to get the most grease and wax out on the first wash. So, I boiled water on the stove in my biggest pot and poured it into the stopped up sink**, dribbled in a bunch of dish soap (Ivory), wisked the soap around and gently lowered a colander full of dirty wool into the sink. I let that sit for about 40 minutes - the water was still so hot it hurt my hand to reach in and unstop the sink. Poured in another pot of boiling water and lowered the colander again. Then I rinsed 2 more times (for 15 minutes each) in the hottest water I could get from my tap. It took me 2 days to get those 8 batches done (the batch in the upper left corner was one I did with Mr. Clean to see if that would work - it did, but left a nasty smell on the wool, so I decided against that). I'm waiting for them to dry completely so I can weigh them again to see how much I lost in grease. I'll post the group's outline tomorrow. Come on Amy, you know you wanna... **Just an aside, if you're going to use boiling water for a project, it's not a good idea to pour it into a stopped up sink and let it sit for 40 minutes at a time. The plumber's putty that seals the drain basket melts in boiling water, leaving you with sheepy smelling, dirty water in the cupboard under your sink. Hub suggests you use a bucket to hold the boiling water.

And the wheel, goes round...

This is the first spring that I've officially had Start-itis. Seriously, it really hasn't hit me with this magnitude before. I have 3 different spinning projects going. Here's what's on the Journey Wheel: That roving is called Sapphire and it's from my friend Liz. She has an amazing color combination sense. Her rovings all sell out when she brings them to our guild sales. I was very lucky and she still had some of this available. Go check out her other colors. This is some silk I bought at SOAR last fall at the Treenway Silks booth. Can you read the tag? It's the Spice Market colorway And here's what it looks like on my Schacht: I think I'll be spinning this up and trying some of Lynne Vogel's techniques to get the colors to stay separate. They all look gorgeous together, but I would like to see them individually. I also have something going on my hand spindle, but I think I've shown that before. In any case, I didn't snap a picture of that this morning. It's a short entry today, because I got my eyes dilated at the eye clinic this morning. I'm still wearing my sunglasses indoors and I still look stoned. I went to the clinic because I'm really tired of wearing glasses and would like to just have those funky reading glasses. However, I hate having my eyes messed with. I told the tech walking me through all the diagnostic machines that I was leery about this procedure because I couldn't close my eyes and not watch (I have to avert my eyes when they take blood or give one of my kids a shot!). She laughed. So anyway, has anyone had this done? Is it worth it? How much does it hurt (because I'm such a baby - despite two natural childbirths)? Someone reassure me, dammit!

I may not have been blogging...

but I have been busy. Here's my first offering from the yarn I got from the Great Stash Redistribution project. This is Tivoli Santos, 100% cotton yarn: Doesn't Kit look warm and cozy? She's been sleeping with the blanket for the last couple of weeks. Sassy is very happy. It's a simple stockinette stitch body with a garter stitch border. Thank goodness it's so small - having all those ends hanging off the back of the piece while knitting is definitely not my favorite part of intarsia. I started a pair of gloves from the orange and purple alpaca yarn I bought when Jillian and I took our yarn trip last spring. Discovered that 7" double pointed needles cannot be used for fingers and took a trip to the yarn shop to buy short ones. As it turned out, they didn't have short US 1s, but they did have this lovely yarn It's Interlacements Toasty Toes. This stuff isn't cheap ($32/skein), but Knitter's Review says there's enough for 2 adult-sized pairs of socks. As you can see, I'm making gloves - my first. The colors are so gorgeous, I didn't want to hide them in socks - I wanted to show them off on my hands. Have I mentioned that I love the Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns? That's where I got the pattern for the glove and it's so easy to follow. The orange and purple gloves have been abandoned temporarily. I couldn't deal with 2 intarsia projects at the same time! They'll be done before winter starts again. So, I mentioned that I worked up an alternate ending to Karen Baumer's diagonal scarf. Here are the ends of my scarf: The way the pattern is written, the last triangle continues being knit in the same direction as the previous triangle - I'm anal, it bugged me. (Please note, the left side is the last triangle.) Here's what I did: start the last triangle the same way every other triangle was started. Continue in pattern to the middle of the triangle (I had 80 stitches, so I did the pattern until I had 40 stitches on my working needle). Remember, you're making a stitch and then doing a decrease right afterward for the pattern. Once you get to the mid-point (on the triangle, the mid-point is the right side), you don't want to continue making a big triangle, you want a right angle. So what you need is a double decrease. I made the stitch, did a k2tog and then did a psso (slip a stitch, knit a stich, pass the slipped stitch over the knit stitch). I think it worked out pretty well. There was some confusion when there were about 5 stitches left - I don't know if you can see it, but there's a sort of bulb on the left side of that last triangle. I was so pleased with myself that I got this far, I fudged it and I'm extremely happy with it. Let me know if this doesn't make any sense. It's a lot easier to do it than to try and write it down.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

I told my husband he'd better come home with some of this: if he wanted to continue living in my house. I fully expect a 6-pack in the fridge when I come home tonight. It's the least he can do for me. So, I've been procrastinating (what's new?). I don't know if it's that I'm waiting for Spring or waiting for my sister-in-law to leave, or what exactly I'm waiting for...but I'm waiting. I did manage to finish Kit's blanket. I washed it and layed it out on the table and Sassy's been dancing around it ever since. "You know, Kit's cold. When does she get her blanket?" It was dry last night and I grabbed the camera to take a picture and the batteries are dead. Sassy had Kit sitting up and draped the blanket artfully and everything. It's off to Target today to pick up batteries. I finally started on the gloves I bought yarn for when Jillian and I tripped to Grand Rapids last Spring. Discovered I have to knit them on US 1s and that I don't have any short 1s. I guess a trip to the yarn shop is in order. Spring break is coming up for my kids in about 3 weeks. I convinced Hub that this is the perfect time to attack our basement. He bought a power washer last fall (to clean his boat) and I talked him into power washing the walls and painting with that water-repelling paint. Our basement gets so wet in the Spring, so I'm hopeful that this will take care of some of the problem. Hub thinks this is a good time to replace the teeny-tiny windows that are down there to let more light in - a good plan! We also need to muck out the junk. I don't know why, but the garage and basement seem to collect stuff. We're all semi-packrats...well, you can imagine how much there is in the basement. My plan is to get a dumpster and throw tons of it out; anything that's still useful will go into a garage sale pile; anything that anyone wants to keep needs to be justified (me included). I even recruited my parents to help. My dad is great as long as he has a project - he'll stick around for the whole week if I can keep him busy! I was just over on Pioneer Melissa's blog and apparently she's doing it too! I guess I'm in good company. Anyone want to join an "Organize Along"? After the basement, I need to tackle the living room. It's had 3 different big paint swatches up for the last 5 months. It's time to fish or cut bait.

Diagonal Scarf

Here it is in all its diagonal glory: It was so cold on Friday, that I sent Sassy back into the house to get it for me to wear. I'm happy to report that it's warm and soft - a lovely scarf. We had the most gorgeous day here yesterday. My niece and nephew were with us the whole day and the kids played outside. It was amazing! They had so much room and so many different things to do that no one had a fit and they all got along. The age range is from 12 down to 6 - unbelievable that they were good all day. I took Sassy and my niece to the Spinner's Flock meeting and my niece said "I want you to make me a sweater." When I asked her what color, she pointed to the multi-colored blue roving I had just bought and said, "Outta that nice blue stuff right there." I was spinning it up yesterday (who can resist the call of the new) and she came in every couple of minutes to check on my progress. "I can't wait until I can wear my new sweater!" What a kid.

Okay, I suck

...but I have a really good excuse. My crazy sister-in-law is living with us. She's sleeping in my studio (which is unheated and is located in the back of our pole barn - where we park our cars), so I don't have a lot of time or space to play with my yarns. I drive her to work and back home everyday. Who knew it was so stressful to sit with an adult for 25 minutes one-way and not speak one word!! I like the quiet as much as anyone, but geez, say something. Oh well, Hub promises that it will only be a short while - it's already been a month and I honestly don't know how much more I can take. Enough. Here's something to celebrate: Another eBay haul. I lovelovelove the color of this yarn. I just want to touch it, it's my next swatch project. I finished my diagonal scarf and took a picture of it, but haven't had time to upload. I was flipping through the Knitblog webring and found someone (I think it was Matt from Threadbear) talking about how the end triangle didn't match. It's not knit in the alternating direction - so I messed around with it and came up with a solution. Did this bother anyone else or are Matt and I the only anal retentive ones? I'll post a picture soon. Time to go home - another 25 minutes of silence. Oh joy...

Great weekend

I gotta tell you, if you ever get a chance to take a class with Beth Brown-Reinsel DO IT!!! She's an amazing teacher. So often, I've taken classes with teachers who are great on technique, but short on patience. Beth was gentle and patient with every student in the class. She made sure even the beginning knitters accomplished something toward the goal of knitting a sampler sweater. The class was called Traditional Construction Techniques for Ganseys and this is what we made: This is the front of the little sweater I made. I had originally thought that Sassy's American Girl doll would benefit, but the neck is too small to fit over her head. (There was an alternate neck that Beth gave us, but even with that one, I don't think it would have fit.) Anyway, that's why there's a "K" in the lower corner. She gave us 3 different cables to work and what you see in the front of the sweater is Barbara Walker's Baby Cable - I liked the way that one looked the best. it seems rounder and more "cabley" (if that makes any sense). You can also see the underarm gussets pretty well in this picture. Traditional Ganseys are tight fitting sweaters - they were made for fishermen who didn't want a whole lot of excess material to get caught in their tools of the trade. Since a tight sweater can restrict arm movement the smart knitters of the area came up with gussets. You get full range of motion, without hiking the sweater up and being uncomfortable. How cool is that? This is the back of the sweater and it shows the other 2 cables Beth showed us how to do. The true cable is on the right and the mock cable is on the left. The beautiful thing about all these cables is that you can do each one without ever using a cable needle! I'm forever losing those things, so this makes my cable knitting easier. The sleeves are picked up and knit from the shoulder down (after you knit a small saddle - from the neck out!). We also learned a cool provisional cast on (for the neck) and the Channel Island cast on - you may be able to see the decorative bumps on either of the pictures near the welt on the bottom. It's a very simple cast on and looks beautiful once you start knitting. So, now, I'm trying to figure out where I can fit a self-designed traditional Gansey sweater into my already full knitting schedule. I guess it's a good thing to have too much knitting to do.

Is it Spring yet??

I have Spring fever really bad! These teases of warm weather make me crazy. I want it to stay over 50 degrees F for a couple of days in a row. At least the snow is melting. The dirt roads back into my house are making my car a mess, but I'd much rather have mud than snow. 17 more days!! And because it's getting warm, here's what I'm working on: It's a diagonal scarf from my Mountain Colors leftovers. I had the pattern, I had the leftovers, but I wanted a skein that would pull the leftovers together. So, I bought a skein a couple of months ago and then lost it in my house. At least that's what I thought. I was out re-organizing my studio over the weekend and came across the skein - put away in the color box. It came into the house with me and I wound it up right away (before I could lose it again). I like the way it's turning out. The fabric is substantial without being boardy and the Mountain Colors is so luscious! I don't seem to be able to commit to long term projects these days. I like these little short things that don't take much time. When will my 3 current sweaters (Applegate Shirt, self-designed cardigan, and Emerald Isle Pullover) be finished? Maybe soon, I'm getting the itch to finish things up and get going on another big project. If I sat down and actually worked on them all, I bet I could get them done over the course of a weekend. Not this weekend, though. I'm taking a gansey class with Beth Brown-Reinsel on Saturday and Sunday. I've wanted to take this class forever, but whenever she and I were in the same place, I was doing other things. I'm really looking forward to it. One more thing...does anyone who reads this live in Australia? I'd like to have a copy of an old show that ran here in the US back in the 80s. My sister and I used to watch Prisoner - Cell Block H on late night TV. I just found out that it came from Australia and would like to get some episodes to give her for ChrisTmas. Anyone down-under willing to trade? Is there something that you've been pining for here in the US that you can't get there? Drop me a comment and maybe we can work something out.

Okay, okay

I'll bow to the pressure to post and move the link to the magic store down a little. Too much temptation eh? I am happy to report progress on some of the yarn I took out of the Slip Stitch box. There was some gorgeous Tivoli Santos (100% cotton) in 4 different colors that coordinated beautifully. Sassy has an American Girl doll (Kit - from the Depression era). Kit frequently complains that the blankets she has are too small for her. When I saw this yarn, I immediately thought of a doll blanket. Here it is I have 2 skeins of the yellow, teal, and red, and 3 skeins of the beige. I figure I'll just knit until I run out of the colors and call it good. Sassy's very happy with it. Had coffee and yarn with Jillian and Henry yesterday. The LYS had called her and told her "The new Bearfoot's in!!!" We were there when the place opened and there was a line! Here's what I got: Apparently, this stuff is worth its weight in gold. They ordered something like 300 skeins, had a waiting list, and were worried that they wouldn't have any to put on the shelves. I'm happy to report that we left some there. It's lovely and soft and I can't wait to have socks from it. Here's what else I got yesterday: It's the second book from the man who wrote Eyre Affair. So the question is, do I need to finish the book I'm reading right now before I start this one? It's a bit like getting new yarn to play with when you're deep in the throes of a big project...

I hate when that happens

I am the original "money burns a hole in my pocket" woman. No really, I can't stand it if I have "extra" money. It's easier for me to be broke than it is to have anything extra. When I'm broke, I just tell myself, "You can't afford it - just look." That money from Elann was making me crazy. Luckily, today I found Peruvian Collection Quechua. It's an alpaca/tencel blend and it's beautiful. Here's the color I got: I think it will be lovely and drapey and very swank to knit with. At first, I thought it was going to be this: But the gauge doesn't quite work out. Gauge for Quechua is 22 st = 4 inches and the gauge for Gatineau is 20 st = 4 inches. Not terribly different and I probably could make it work, but I'd really rather not. So then I found this sweater: The gauge matches, the sweater is slightly too small around. That I can fix easily. The sweater, called Mariner, is knit in mercerized cotton. I'm thinking that alpaca (with no memory) and tencel (with it's drape and sheen) is a good substitute. It will be warmer than a cotton sweater, but I can live with that. I love this planning phase!!

Opa!!!

My son's middle school class takes field trips occassionally to the public library to do research. The teachers like to take the kids to ethnic restaurants on these trips so that they try something different. Parents get to volunteer to take groups of kids to different places. Today, I went to my favorite Greek place, The Parthenon (right out of My Big Fat Greek Wedding). The kids just wanted to watch the waitress light the cheese and sausages on fire - it was a big thrill. Afterwards, we went to Afterwords (I crack myself up). It's a remainder book shop, so everything is cheap. I haven't been in a while and I used to work right up the street, so I was a regular. I scored these: for $5.98 - I've been looking for this for a while. I don't have any idea why I didn't buy it when it first came out. But I'm sure glad I found it - it was the only one on the shelf. for $7.98 I found a fabulous sweater in Irresistible Knits that I must have. It's the Gatineau on page 40. I'll scan it tomorrow. It's a simple sweater with a basket weave pattern and some cables. One of those, just throw it on and go sweaters. Now if I could just find some yarn on the Elann site...

Monday?

So, I'm ready to start my week boss-less. I surf over to Elann this morning...I have $50 to spend - guilt free! Do you think I could find anything? I must have surfed every yarn category, all the needles, and even the tools section! Upshot is, I still have my $50 to spend. Am I nearly this picky when I'm spending real money? It doesn't seem like it. Last Thursday, I had tea with Jillian, Isobel, and Henry (man is that kid growing!!). We had a lovely time. Miss Isobel can turn a mean cartwheel, let me tell you. So anyway, J has pulled me out of my reading depression. I've been whining for the last couple of months that "nothing is interesting me". She gave me a large yarn bag full of books with recommendations on which to start with. I must tell you, go read Eyre Affair - right now. Turn off the computer and just read. I started it on Thursday evening and finished it Sunday morning. I remember as a kid when I'd read, what a revelation it was to read and re-read the same book. It gave me a feeling of power that there were real people acting out the story on a stage in my head. No matter how many times I picked up the book or where I started reading, the actors were ready. This book reminded me of that feeling. The main character, Thursday Next, is a LiteraTec - she investigates crimes against literature. Fictional characters rub shoulders with real characters moving back and forth between the pages of a book and the real world. It's wickedly funny (I laughed out loud when one of the characters was introduced and his name was Braxton Hicks). Two thumbs way up for this book. I'm dying to get a copy of the second in the series. Needless to say, not much knitting got done this weekend. I love it when I have a good book to read!

It's Friday and next week the boss is gone...

How happy am I? Of course, I don't want to think ahead to the following week when he comes back brimming with ideas...I'll be Scarlett O'Hara and think about it tomorrow. I finished a cowl/scarf for my Sassy: She was over the moon about it, but couldn't just smile and make a nice picture. What a goof. I have my free money at Elann. Do I need anything? Nope. But there's lots of stuff that I want. I just need to decide what I want most.

Fall Fleece Fair

I really was restrained. Usually in February, I come home with a whole fleece. My friend Nancy didn't shear her sheep yet this year (it was too cold). So, I guess I don't have a fleece to play with until the September sale...or I could go when Nan shears the sheep and get it right off the hoof! That might be fun. So anyway, here's what I bought for Sassy. She roamed around and came back to me with this: Her very serious attempts at drop spindling are really charming. I can't wait until she gets a spindle full and we can make a skein out of it. I'll have to hide it away so she won't throw it out. She tends to be a perfectionist and even though she's a saver, I'm sure she'll pitch it the first chance she gets. Here's what I bought for myself: It's a wool/mohair blend. I don't really like to spin mohair, but the colors pulled me in and I found myself watching this roving from across the room. I had decided that I wasn't going to buy it - using the rationale that I could get it "next time." Someone in the waiting to pay line was talking about roving she was buying. "It's from Moonstruck - you know, Rose. Well, she's opening a shop in the near future and won't be dying roving anymore." I quietly stepped out of line and went back to the table where this lovely stuff was sitting. - and snatched up a ball. Rose has the best color sense I've seen in a long time. She's one of those people who can put colors together in roving that I wouldn't put together in the same room and it works. It's really going to be a loss when she stops dying and blending roving. Lastly, this is my Turkish spindle: It's bird's eye maple. Can I admit that I'm a little afraid to try it out? I know, I should suck it up and give it a spin, but I'm so used to spinning on my little Hatchtown (and loving it) that I don't want to try anything new right now. My god, I'm turning into my old Nana - I'll be spinning on it tonight.

Woohoo!!

The Slip Stitch box is here!! The Slip Stitch box is here!! I tore into that puppy and look what was scattered on my table: Then I took a bunch of stuff out and filled it back up again: Hub just stood and smiled at me pulling stuff out of that box. He said, "I'm going to leave you alone with that now." What fun. Michelle G. in Indiana - it's heading your way so keep eyes open!

Is it really Tuesday?

Yesterday was President's Day here. What kind of holiday is President's Day? The kids had no school, so I threw myself on the sword and stayed home with them. We had fun - no really. There were 2 fabulous TV marathons on Law and Order on TNT and The West Wing on Bravo. I spent much of the day switching between the 2 stations, and spinning. We made jewelry with the ton of beads I have. I promised them they didn't have to get dressed if they didn't want to and they didn't. Sassy said, "Don't you tell me to get dressed. You said I could wear jammies all day!" On Saturday, I spent the day with my spinning friends at our annual Winter Fleece Fair. Imagine a middle school cafeteria with all the tables filled with pounds of wool - natural, colored, multi-colored. It's sensory overload. I did end up coming home with a Turkish spindle, a 1.5 yard niddy-noddy, 8 oz of amazing orange/yellow swirl roving, and a 2 oz ball of blue/yellow/green/white that Sassy couldn't live without. She's learning to drop spindle. I gave her the one I made at SOAR and bought her some light green roving a couple of weeks ago. It's very lumpy bumpy, but she keeps asking, "Why doesn't it look like yours? Why isn't mine smooth?" I have to dig out my very first handspun and give it to her. She doesn't quite believe that I was ever bad at spinning. I love the faith my 8-year-old has in me. This is a Turkish spindle: It's not mine (only because I was too lazy to take a picture of it this morning), but it gives you an idea of what one looks like. I'll try it out this week. I'm more partial to high-whorl spindles, but the Turkish spindle is great because you can push the shaft out from the 2 cross pieces and then pull out the cross pieces and you have a center pull ball. How cool is that? I tried to restrain myself from buying and buying on Saturday because I really have more roving than I think I can handle right now. I saw some lovely roving from England and picked up several balls. Then remembered that I had a sampler pack at home that hasn't even been opened. I went home and dug through the fiber stash - found the bag (which has 7 different kinds of roving in it - in 2 oz balls). When I finished the gorgeous blue wool/tencel blend that I had, I pulled open the sampler bag. I started with the Black Welsh. It's coarse, but feels springy and wonderful. I think it would make a great coat - or rug, something that won't be worn close to the skin. I'll keep you posted on my progress. I have a goal to spin up a bunch of fiber by the time the Fall Fleece Fair rolls around. Maybe I'll sell the yarn or make something and sell that. One more progress report, I finished seaming the Emerald Isle pullover and tired it on. It's a little form-fitting, but not unattractively so. I'm about 1/2 way done with the bottom band and have to do the neckline. Do I need a "finish by" date? Probably - I'll keep you posted on that too.

Enough is enough

I don't consider myself a "political" person. My philosophy of life can be pretty much summed up by "live and let live." I'm not bugging you, you're not bugging me - let's just leave it at that. Hub (who as you know by now is a fascist Republican) and I had a little conversation the other night regarding this marriage bruhaha. You can probably guess that I don't give a rat's ass who you sleep with - it's none of my business and when push comes to shove, Hub doesn't care much either. Hub, "What's the big deal? Why can't they just live together and act like they're married." Me, "The big deal is, we get benefits and perks because we toe the heterosexual line. They can live together, raise children together, and own property together, but they have no legal recourse if something goes wrong. Hub, "What?" Me, "Say a lesbian has a child - she's the biological mother of this child. Her partner has no ties, but has been in the house since conception and has raised this child as her own. Many states won't allow gay/lesbian parents to adopt - even when one is the biological parent. What happens if the woman who gave birth dies and her parents were never crazy about that lesbian thing. They swoop in and because they are related to the child, can take that child away from her only remaining parent." Hub, "Oh..." Me, "What about a stay-at-home gay dad? He's given up the rat race for a while to take care of the kids. He doesn't have health insurance. You know what happens to a single income family when one or the other parent gets very sick or becomes unable to work for any reason?" Hub, "Hmm, I guess I never really thought about it." Me, "You need to." And so do you. I don't care if you're black, white, asian, agnostic, atheist, born-again, Jewish - it doesn't matter. We are all human beings and should be treated equally and with dignity and respect - no matter what our lifestyle choices are. Click, read, and give - it's important.

Do You Believe in Miracles?

Last week, Kathy asked if anyone was planning on going to see the new movie Miracle about the gold medal winning 1980 US Hockey Team. At the time, I thought, "We're a hockey family - of course we're going to go!" Hub and I took the kids on Saturday night. We also introduced them to the illicit joys of buying movie candy at Target and sneaking it into the theater. Before we got out of the car, I said, "Leave it in your pocket until the theater gets totally dark." They dimmed the lights for the previews and immediately Sassy breaks out with, "Can I get my candy out now? It's dark!!" But I digress. I remember lying on the floor of my parents' living room watching that game. It was so long ago and yet feels like yesterday. I sat weeping in the theater while Little Big-Man laughed at me (and passed me a napkin to wipe my face). Time passes way to quickly - and I'm digressing again. I said to Hub as we were driving home, "You know, that Kurt Russell...I've been in love with him since Hub did not remember that movie. I said, "Okay, I really loved the bad boy in So, in Miracle, he plays a hockey coach from Minnesota (who dresses badly) but I loved him anyway. I think he got the Minnesotan accent right (anyone from Minnesota agree?). I was a little disappointed that his wife never showed up with a hot dish, though. Anyway, I pay homage to the acting career of Kurt Russell. Go see the movie, it is a Disney classic and it will make you feel good.

What made me spew latte on my monitor

You are Merino Wool. You are very easygoing and sweet. People like to
keep you close because you are so softhearted.
You love to be comfortable and warm from your
head to your toes.

What kind of yarn are you?
brought to you by Quizilla I'm cackling madly here in my office - it's the easygoing and sweet part. Ha!

WTF?

Didja get your new Lion Brand yarns catalog? I'm not against Lion Brand, in fact, I've used their yarns more than once. And I've been happy with the results (although WoolEase does pill something fierce). This is a photo from their article in the new catalog titled "Student Exhibit at FIT" That sweater on the left is about the fugliest thing I've ever seen. Is it art? Is it a sweater? WTF is it exactly?

I'm back

I need a new book to tell me Women should ignore media's �perfect mom� image? The [current] assessment of motherhood has been shaped by out-of-date mores, the authors noted. It is not about whether women should have children or whether mothers should work or stay at home; it is about how no matter what they do or how hard they try, women will never achieve the promised nirvana of idealized mothering, they said. Is anyone else puzzled by seemingly "scientific" data published in a book for big $$$ that is just common sense? My life is all about letting some areas go (keeping my house spotless, never having dirty laundry) so that I can pursue other areas that bring me fulfillment (watching Little Big-Man play hockey, listening to Sassy's develop her reading skills, spinning, knitting, etc.). I get really tired of academia telling me how I should and shouldn't behave/think/feel. Go check out the review if you're at all interested. I'm sorry I've been away so long. I've become one of those bloggers that bug me (someone who doesn't post in forever and doesn't explain why). I caught the cold from hell last week. I was in bed for 2 days with a fever that hovered around 101 F. Not terribly high, just bad enough to make me want to lay in bed and wish for a quick and painless death. It was so bad, I didn't even care how terrible daytime TV is! I curled up on my heated mattress pad with a big glass of water and alternated between sleep and the DIY network. I've slowly returned to knitting and spinning and I'm currently working on the bottom band for the Emerald Isle Pullover. Maybe I'd like to wear this before the end of winter??? I also started spinning that lucious blue wool/tencel blend. As predicted - it's gorgeous. I'll be pulling a skein off my plying spindle soon and I'll snap a picture of it then. It feels so good to feel good again.

Comment Day

So, what's the etiquette of comment commenting? Is there etiquette? I don't know, but since you all asked some good questions, I'll be like All Things Considered on Thursday and "read from your comments." Tracy asked "How will you be traveling around Antarctica?" We'll be flying to Argentina and then boarding a small cruise ship. Small means that there will be 49 passengers total on the ship. The tour guide I spoke with was on this trip last year. She said, "These are not luxury accommodations. These ships were originally used for expeditions. They're comfortable though - you'll be well taken care of." I honestly have to say that I never once thought about going to Antarctica, but when Nancy asked if I wanted to go, I jumped at the chance. I keep telling Hub, "I'd rather be well travelled than have a huge house." Both Emma and Lera commented on my bale of aran yarn. Emma wanted to know what I'll make from it. I don't have a clue. I do have a pattern for this It's the Red Rocks Pullover from Black Water Abbey. I can't decide if that's what this yarn will be or not. I think maybe it needs to age a little and then I'll decide. Emma also recommended the extra short double point needles for doing fingers on gloves. I was at the Elann website yesterday (just looking) and saw that they're out of the short Bryspun needles. Oh well, I'll have to go back soon and see if they've restocked. Amelia and Carolyn recommended a couple of books to combat my boredom. I've put Kitchen Confidential, Girl with a Pearl Earring, and The God of Small Things on my Amazon.com wishlist. Jillian recommended a couple of mystery series to me as well - yup, on the list. I finished The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. What a fun book! I must admit that I was disappointed that Mma Ramotswe decided to marry the mechanic. It's not that I'm against marriage, I just love to find strong women characters who live alone and enjoy it. Mirror, Mirror by Gregory Maguire is on my bedside table now. I absolutely loved Wicked and this one is shaping up to be a good read. Janice asked if I had a spinning wheel in addition to my drop spindles. Janice, I'm a little embarrased to admit that I have 2. I've been spinning on a single treadle Schact for a couple of years. At Spin-Off, I bought a Journey Wheel. They're both wonderful and I'd recommend them to anyone. Well worth the money I had to spend. Big thanks to all of you you made me feel good by commenting on my recent accomplishments. I picked Sassy up from the hockey rink last night and when I told her to put on her hat and mittens, she pulled the pink wonders out of her pockets. I said, "Oh, you're wearing your new mittens." "A course - you made 'em for me," she replied.

At least I made good use of my time...

These are finished: I did take a picture of Sassy actually wearing these, however it was snapped after she dropped the camera. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth, so she doesn't look very happy in them. (I love that you can immediately delete any picture you hate with these things!) I must admit, I didn't much like making these mittens. They're knit with Koigu (thanks again Jillian) on US #1s. I really like the density of the fabric on ones. I think they're perfect for keeping little hands warm. What I didn't like was knitting around on 19 stitches for the thumb. Either I need to get shorter DPNs or make bigger mittens. Next up is a pair of gloves for me. (I may go insane knitting all those fingers.) I also used the old drop spindle yesterday. Here's why: I was going through some stash to pick out what I wanted to include in the Great Stash Redistribution Project (I should be getting the Slip Stitch box soon). I came across this gorgeous wool and tencel blend that I bought in Boston (I think, but I have no idea when). I want to spin it now!! Puritan that I am, I have to finish spinning the maroon roving that I started back in November. I swear this stuff breeds in the bag. There isn't that much left, but I filled the drop spindle last night and it didn't look like it made a dent in the fiber mass. I do have some lovely skeins of this - once I'm finished, I'll post a picture. Still tempted Amy? I'm going to work today, come hell or ice and snow. I had to give myself a time out yesterday when I found myself thinking, "maybe John List wasn't crazy after all."

I am officially in hell

We got that freezing drizzle last night, so everything I can see is covered in a sheet of ice. (It's extremely pretty, yes - but what a pain in the ass!) School is called off, so the kids are home. Hub is self employed, so it's not a problem for him to stay with the kids. Here's the hell part, I can't get down my driveway. I'm stuck in the house with no caffeine (Hub drank the last of the Coke last night and we're out of coffee). Now, it's snowing...

I completed something!!

Sassy is happy. Turns out, she wanted to know exactly when the stocking was done so she could try it on. I kept telling her, "It's not a sock. It's a stocking!" "I know that mommy! I just want to see if it fits!" Here she is trying it on to see if it fits: Then I took both hers and Little Big-Man's stockings down to the washing machine. I think they could use a little more felting than this, but I was tired of standing by the machine. For some reason, hers looks a little fuzzier than his and his felted a little more firmly than hers. I'm not sure why this is. It could be the dyes, it could be my gauge. Who knows. I'm pretty pleased with them. When Hub looked at them, he said, "The foot looks funny. The leg part is too long and the foot part is too short." I told him to stuff it. Here's one thing I forgot to mention yesterday... Yup, that's more Koigu. Would I leave town without finding a place to buy yarn? There's a very cute shop in Holland, Michigan, called Friends of Wool. Small space, but she has the most gorgeous yarns you'd want. She had Philsopher's Wool kits, Interlacements, Mountain Colors, Manos, just about anything you'd need - okay want. Took a good look at her Charlotte's Web shawl. She told me to get going, "It's not as difficult as it looks." Plus, her pre-teen grandson was in there helping people. He never got far from the cash register - ringing people up is his favorite thing to do apparently; and he was pretty good at it. So the green yarn is for me and the other is for Hub. He actually me to knit him a pair of socks. This asking took place about 6 months ago and I've waited this long to see if he's really serious. The last 2 pairs of socks were given away and the 2 sweaters I've knit for him languish in the closet. I'm willing to give him another chance - Republican or not.

Isn't a spear a kind of pickle?

Little Big-Man had a hockey tournament this weekend. I usually go to his home games because it's kind of fun to watch him skate and see how much he's improved in the 3 years (or so) that he's played. I don't usually go to the away games because it's a little painful to travel for over an hour each way to watch his team get shellacked. Anyway, we traveled on Friday over 3 hours away for a weekend long tournament. His team got beaten (not terribly, but they lost) on Friday evening. They were in the process of winning the first game on Saturday when the referee blows his whistle and points at my kid. Then he makes a hand signal that I don't recognize. (Let me just interject here that I've been watching hockey for a very long time, but never really learned all the rules.) My kid skates over to the penalty box and the referee waves him out of the rink. Now I'm pissed. There's less than 2 minutes left in the game, but let the kid sit with his team at least. Then I hear what the call is, "spearing." I think to myself, "He couldn't have speared the kid, he was hooking him!" (Spearing is when you take the blade of your stick and hit another player with it - usually near the ankle or knee in an attempt to take him down. It is very serious and can hurt someone pretty badly. Hooking is when you use your stick like a - well, like a hook - usually on the arm or body. Sometimes you pull them down, sometimes you just distract them enought to get past them.) Anyway the referee said he "chased the other player down the ice and speared him. That kid went down immediately." Not true, I was watching and the kid never hit the ice. But, the call was made, a 5 minute major with a 1 game suspension. Little Big-Man had to sit out the second game on Saturday. He took it all pretty well and his team shellacked the other team in a 5 to 0 victory. They let him sit in the penalty box with his helmet on, so at least he was with his teammates. I was feeling kind of bad because during the second half of the game, his head was bent down and he was sitting in there looking dejected. Then Hub told me, "Yeah, he was a little bored, so he was playing with someone's GameBoy." So much for object lessons. Here's what I learned this weekend, I really do knit faster and tighter watching my kid play. I had to rip out part of Sassy's stocking, because I was paying more attention to the hockey game than to the knitting. Here's an updated photo: Sassy checks my progress and says, "Well, let me know when it's done." Should be sometime this week. I also (finally) finished one mitten. Since it's been so cold here, maybe I should finish the second one before spring. Too much to do!

Please Mr. Postman

I went to the post office today to sign for this: What could it be?? Yes, I know you guessed, you're very smart.

I'm bored

It occurred to me today as I worked my way around my blogroll, that lots of you are bored as well. Bored and cranky - those seem to be the words of the day. Even Little Big-Man's teacher is sending cranky e-mails out. It's the usual middle school stuff, "Are you making sure your children are doing their homework? I'm tired of them coming in on Mondays and bragging about how much time they spent on video games over the weekend. Yet, they aren't turning in their homework assignments." I think everyone has a big case of cabin fever. Of course, the sub-zero temperatures aren't making anyone happy either. In an effort to combat this boredom, today I bought . I think it was AJ who suggested it. As you may remember, I'm coming up short with book suggestions. Nothing is keeping my interest these days. I am in dire straits, because this morning I walked out of the house without my knitting bag. It's huge and yellow - what made me overlook it? Anyway, I have Sassy's ballet class to sit through - so I had to get something. I also shelled out for the new issue of one of my favorite magazines, Piecework. I've loved this mag since they started publishing it. You just never know what they're going to feature next. In other news, I found out last night that my Hub is a closet fascist Republican. I was making fun of Dubya giving his State of the Union speech and Hub got downright defensive and, I hesitate only sli