lucky guy(s)

Long time between posts here.

Just thought I'd mention my recent cross country flight. I dread the day long journey to California, and last week was no different. To stave off the boredom and flight anxiety I usually have knitting projects on board. I had two sock projects with me last Tuesday, so as soon as I settled into my aisle seat on the first leg of the flight to Chicago I pulled out the preferred sock project. The middle seat was empty and the window seat was occupied by a late 30-ish man. As soon as I started the casting on process he became interested.

So what are you making?

I'm starting a sock for my husband.

How does that work? How does it become a sock?

It eventually becomes a tube and then gets a heel and then a toe.

Bet you'll have it finished before we get to Chicago!

Probably not, don't think I knit that fast.

Well, your husband is a lucky guy.

I knit for the duration of the flight, but surprise, surprise I didn't finish the sock. I did make my way through the cuff.

During the 2 1/2 hour layover at Midway terminal, where they don't offer FREE Wifi, I made progress on the leg of the sock and the stitch pattern started to develop down the leg.

The flight to Sacramento was very full and the empty seat between a woman at the window seat and my aisle seat was soon occupied by a big, tall man. What was he thinking squishing into the little center seat (and possibly impairing my right arm action)? I pulled out my sock project anyway. He looked up from his magazine and asked me:

Are you making a sweater?

No it's a sock.

My mother used to do that in England when I was young.

Hmmm...that's interesting. Yeh, England is still full of knitters!

So what will you do with a sock?

Make another one and then my husband wears them.

Lucky guy!

As I knit along on the sock leg, I became more and more attached to the results of this appealing hand-dyed yarn. I'm thinking how lucky my husband was to be getting these socks that I'm loving so much I might have to hijack them!



I arrived in Sacramento many hours later, settled in at my parents house and took out my alternate sock project, a sock I'd started knitting last month with plans to gift the pair to my brother so he'd be prepared for next winter. I showed him the sock in progress and told him I was knitting it for him.

I couldn't wear that sock!

Why? Is it too fancy?

Well yes it's too fancy! Maybe when I'm buried...I could wear them.



Brothers! He was in a surly, deprived mood. I can't tell you how much of a pain in the %@# these socks were to get started (right? Karen), during my early spring brain freeze. Maybe I'll finish his casket socks and set them aside until that fateful day or maybe I'll just give them to some guy on a plane!

Just a 12 hour span of sock knitting in public.

yarning oversaturation

Yesterday I drove 3 hours to Hartford CT to see what the knitting show, Stitches, was all about. Like the last yarn-filled weekend in Rhinebeck wasn't enough. Just had to find out for myself.

I set out from my house early Saturday morning where the leaves on my trees looked like this.
Every year I'm amazed at how they fill my windows with yellow leaf glow and I take pictures of it.

Connecticut's leaves are still glowing too. I'm happy to be driving through the Fall landscape passing towns with names like Beacon Falls and
Plainville...as I try to describe by name the colors that whisk by.

Around 11 I arrive in the parking garage at the Hartford Convention Center. I'm armed with copies of sweater patterns that I think I might need to knit.

It's a convention center like many, you could be anywhere, and the booths are set up like any tradeshow. After the first aisle although I like what I see in the String Theory booth by the end of that aisle I've forgotten all about their lovely yarns, because there's lots of yarn and lots of people. In the third aisle I think maybe I better get a shot of something. So I hold my camera up over my head and click the button to shoot the busy aisle.



By the time I get to the end of Aisle 300 there's an announcement over the PA system about ....some unauthorized photography. What? I take it personally, close my camera and shove it back into my purse. Though I'm a visual person I've apparently missed the big signage at the entry warning the attendees that there's to be no unauthorized photography, because apparently there's something classified going on here.

I've now lost track of what I'm doing here and temporarily lost the will to buy yarn too. I'm also wondering if I can go home before seeing every booth, but I'm also not ready to sit in the car for another 3 hours. It's beginning to look to me like every yarn store within 70 miles has decided to sign up for a booth and brought all their stock with them.

I spot the Tutto Isager booth ---these people know how to display yarn and knitted samples and the urge to buy something wooley comes back to me. I do that, but apparently I wasn't at the right end of the line (what line?) to make my purchase. At least they didn't announce that on the PA system.

One kind lady manning a large booth from another state, a patient state, took the time to show me all the needle felting options. Handles that secure multiple dangerous needles for poking wool---maybe this is what I'm not supposed to take pictures of. Anyway, I buy the one she says she likes the best, the cheapest one.

The Habu booth is filled with baskets of little skeins of intriguing fibers. I buy pineapple twine, it looks like, in two colors and plan to bring it home to add to my collection of unused skeins of wonderous Habu fibers. Oh yes and there was that skein of Possum Lace I bought from the discontinued yarn booth because... I don't know why. Was that a good thing to do for the possum community or not?

In one vendor's booth I was encouraged to knit with triangular knitting needles, but preferred his flat needles. Though he is good at making weird shaped knitting needles in his workshop, his wife has suggested he learn to knit. Good idea.

I'm real tired and I don't remember what aisle I'm shopping in or not shopping in. It's a blur of yarn store cubbies. I've yet to pull out my sweater pattern reference. After all, my current sweater knitting isn't going all that well. I've started 2 different sweaters and a scarf all from the blue yarn I purchased to make one sweater. Sweaters involve things like fitting and knitting to gauge, things I'm not interested in. It takes a long time to do make all those parts and then you also have to be willing to wear the sweater once you've knit it. But that's not Stitches East fault, they probably have a class to deal with this problem, I just didn't READ their information.

I see every last booth or think I do in spite of my hunger and thirst, make one last purchase of Moving Mud glass buttons (for what? a sweater?) and head for my car. Four harrowing hours later I'm home having driven through the pouring rain to safely conclude my weekend knitting or "yarning" adventure. (In my household, "yarning" refers to any activity related to knitting or dyeing yarn or looking at yarn online or receiving it in the mail, now also including taking off for the day or part of the day to do any of the above).

Perhaps no more Stitches for me. It just made me think a yarn crawl of the yarn stores and any independent yarn artists studios within 70 miles of the Convention Center would be a more interesting thing to do. That way you get to stop in towns like Plainville or Beacon Falls, maybe, and be inspired by their leaves, have lunch at a local restaurant, meet a yarn store owner and buy yarn from their brick and mortar establishment and/or meet a creative yarn-dyer in her studio and appreciate the work that goes into that skein of hand-dyed yarn.

Or maybe I've just hit my yarning capacity for the month and I need to turn my attention to scrubbing my stove.

button hunt

I used to collect buttons until I found out there were rules involved. Several years ago after buying a big batch of mother of pearl buttons at an antique show I wanted to know more about the buttons and joined a button collectors club. I lasted about a year and a half--nice group of women but the rules involved in sharing your interest were beyond my capabilities and so was the price range these women were dealing with at this stage in their collecting careers.

Saturday I went to Southbury CT to shop the vendor showroom at the Northeast Regional Button Association's Annual show. I had been to this show when I was a practicing collector, 8 years ago. Then it was overwhelming to walk into a meeting room filled with buttons, everyone talking about buttons, boxes full of 9" x 12" cards full of buttons and tables filled with boxes! I was totally absorbed in the hunt and unwittingly aggravated the tendonitis in my shoulder by looking at all those cards of buttons, every last one of them. The circumstances mystified my orthopedic surgeon who obviously wasn't a collector.

Yesterday when I finally found the Crowne Plaza at exit 16, not exit 11, not exit 14 or 15 I was greeted by one of my former button collecting mentors at the door. Once inside the familiar room it was much less stressful to be looking for buttons for resale. I said I wasn't a collector for 2 hours or so, then I saw a button that awakened my acquisitorial spirit: an ugly worn wooden button shaped like a squished stump. What else? A log button! (See the ugly one on the lower right of the picture!)



I happily hunted my way around the room in search of more log specimens, tucking manila envelopes full of buttons for resale into my bag for a few hours and then had to concede that I was buttoned-out, just couldn't look at another one. Packed it in and headed south on Connecticut's leafy route 25, I was still absorbed in button euphoria. Well, not exactly euphoria, maybe two steps below euphoria. I would have been euphoric if I found these buttons along the roadside and paid nothing for them, but...

Log specimens examined---

glass in the desert

I saw an amazing installation in the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix last week. My friends in Phoenix had shared their night photos of this wonderful display of Dale Chihuly's work earlier this year and I hoped it would still be up when I was in Arizona. It was and I'm so glad I got to see it. I took 200+ photos before sunset, but without a tripod I was less successful when the sun went down.









I loved this show! I loved the Desert Botanical Garden, the hard-scaping, the plantings---all of it! I have more photos but I found the links at the Desert Botanical Garden and Dale Chihuly's even more informative, take a look!

naturally...mostly

Was going to keep my blog updated as I traveled from the West Coast through the Southwest (on Southwest) but it was less and less about making things than it was about family and not making things.

I did make progress on these socks while in Sacramento:

When I was in Albuquerque I did get a quick visit to Village Wools before going to the airport which delighted my Mom and my sister-in-law. It's a great store, lucky Albuquerque! Found some BrownSheep yarn that isn't carried on the East Coast or at least I hadn't run across it--NatureSpun in fingering weight and Jarbo Garn in a single fingering weight---in a natural colors which I intend to dye and maybe felt.

In Phoenix I misplaced my list of knitting stores but ran across Tempe Yarn and Fiber---they were a fun group. I mentioned Ravelry and they suggested I take a look at their Fred Made me do it group. There I added to my natural color collection to dye---with a few skeins of BrownSheep's Top of the Lamb single in sportweight. I'm smitten by singles in any weight.


What this all boils down to is this---when I returned home to Long Island Spring had sprung more fully and there were new cygnets in the Lake. I caught the mother swan paddling away from our bulkhead and only snagged a few unsteady shots.

Their taupe color reminded me of my natural yarn collection. Of course the natural yarn will eventually be dyed unlike the cygnets. Which reminds me of one more thing: I was shown a book on my trip called Why Paint Cats. I was amazed at the images inside. Amazed and creeped out! It's full of images of "painted" cats. People spent inordinate amount of time air-brushing and painting cats like this one, that I just swiped from website engaged in discussion about painting cats. :
I'm thinkin' how I would even go about painting my black dogs...they barely get baths, so I don't think this is gonna happen and oh, the ethics seem to be a question too!

on board...round one

When I finally land in Sacramento I am always delighted to find the public sculpture in the Southwest terminal---by Brian Groggin (look at his website! what cool work!!). I love these columns of suitcases! They just crack me up. I wish I had made them.



This crossing was surely a sign of our economic times. The whole Southwest flight from Long Island to the West Coast Southwest flight felt like a local subway route. Though the first leg from Long Island to Chicago was roomy, quiet and deceptively short enough. Then a quick board at Midway to the interminable flight to take me to the West Coast. This time the plane was loaded, every seat taken, more in character with most Southwest flights I take. Prior to boarding there was some confusion about the destination among the passengers in line, we all had the same flight number and 4 different destinations. San Diego, Sacramento, Seattle and Spokane. Geez! I wasn't prepared for another stop. Guess I didn't read the itinerary correctly---I have to compliment Southwest on how good a job it does of obscuring those details. It was disappointing after 4+ hours on board the crowded plane that the destination was indeed San Diego. When it was my turn to deplane, after another take-off and landing, I felt sorry, momentarily, for those continuing on and grateful that Spokane wasn't my destination, this trip.

The memory of the flight fades quickly, luckily, because I have 4 more Southwest flights to take.

I usually look forward to these flights for the opportunity to knit for uninterrupted periods of time and because it distracts me from the tedious passenger job. As soon as we were airborne I had my needles out and clicking away on a pair of socks. I thought they would be the perfect, portable project for this trip. I had only completed the toe and a few rows of the foot before leaving home and was sure this would be a breeze, so I included more yarn for second pair of socks.



But I can't tell you how boring this knitting is!!! I will though. Ugh. I knit for hours on those #1 needles, like knitting with angel hair pasta with only two rows of pattern to remember and it felt like I made little progress. Knowing knitters and unwitting civilians asked what I was knitting or who was the lucky recipient of my knitting efforts? The answer: if I can bring myself to complete even one sock, it will be for my husband and his pumpkin colored shoe(s).

Dennis asked me if the socks would be finished when we met up in Phoenix. I assured him he wouldn't be needing wool socks in Phoenix this time of year, so it didn't matter if they're finished then.

Knitting, when it's not for yourself, is an act of love.

fiber field trip

I got on the train and went into NYC yesterday for a fiber field trip with my knitting in tow. (I didn't think about taking my camera so when it struck me that I wanted to take pictures I did have my phone.) The SUN was so BRIGHT, because it's finally Spring, that I could barely see the image on the tiny led screen---lucky that they are even pictures of something. Manhattan has it's tulips going.


It was a much larger shot of the center islands on Park Avenue filled with tulips and the multi-story buildings in the background, but the image is too large to extract from the phone and I don't understand image editor...the rest are at least viewable.



...so train to Manhattan, subway downtown, oops!, subway uptown to 86 St, walked south, oops!, walked north. I get so distracted I spend a lot of time backtracking to most of my destinations. Ah! The Guggenheim appeared so I was going in the right direction.



And finally the Cooper Hewitt at 91st.



and the entrance billboard for the show....



I have been anticipating this exhibit and was happy to finally be on it's doorstep. There are impressive felted pieces in this show----the yurt-ish conservatory installation...the sunlight space was luscious.




So much work, so much wool--silk?---netting draping from the ceiling....I saw the video of the artist working on this piece on Martha Stewart's website. I could only think how much I wanted the artist's set-up---big tent outdoors, big tables, garden hoses spouting with hot water and assistants. Sigh.

Other than the conservatory, the exhibit is intimate, darkish rooms. There were samples of industrial-created felt, and hand-created wet felting, but not so many pieces of knitted-to-felt. I was distracted by a couple that were looking and babbling in a foreign language as the woman pulled out her camera to snap a few pictures, prompting the guard to her side. They apologized and then went into the conservatory, continuing to take pictures throughout the rooms. I took my phone out and took the conservatory pictures (whoohoo and usually I'm such a girl scout!), poor as they are---I was not to be outdone. I will have to peruse the catalogue to remind me what I saw, like the Urchin Poufs---knit with rope size "yarn", Slices of large logs of spiraling felt colors, Textile stones, ---it was all good stuff! I wish I had been the only one in the exhibit and was able to touch and examine everything! The catalog pages will have to do.

I spent a fair amount of time in the Cooper Hewitt Museum shop wishing I could make a gift registry of all the things I loved and needed.(Get out much?) It's the kind of environment I like to shop in and be shopped for in.

Back on the subway at 86th, to 33rd. South on foot to Habu on W 29th, my old neighborhood. (I do much better south of Times Square.) 29th, 8th fl. No problem.



Looked at the sample book, looked at the small sale baskets amassed on the floor with tiny hanks of interesting fibers...chose two tiny hanks, both silk. Done. Outta there. Though I did try to palm off the dollar coins from the metrocard machine and the young Japanese speaking woman was not to be fooled by my funny money. (I was forced to buy pastry in Penn Station to get rid of the coins.)

So much for my fiber field trip! The weather was lovely and the city was teeming with people on their way home. I knit on my wooly experiment all the way to Stony Brook. When I got home I realized that I needed to rip it all out. Sigh.

...sleet nor hail or is that sleet or hail...

Audition for USPS delivery position...



I had a mission to fulfill this morning and if I had opened the shades at 6:30 this morning I probably wouldn't have baked "gift" scones for delivery today. But I didn't open the shades and I did bake scones and there was a snowstorm brewing. I managed delivery----

Happy New Year!

Flock and Fiber

So I was in Oregon on the weekend of the 28th for a family wedding (Yay! Jamie and Seth!).

I spent part of Saturday at the Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival in Canby, south of Portland. I arrived as it opened and took one picture of the quiet green---



it looks like no one was there...but it quickly filled as I spent my time inside the two halls wandering around the booths. I got my first skeins of Blue Moon Fiber's Socks that Rock early, as I was afraid if I waited it would look like the Fold's booth down the aisle from me at Rhinebeck---deluged with people and no way to see anything. I was so just thrilled to be a civilian and get to shop with interesting entrepeneurs and vendors. I did to get spend time in the Dicentra Hand Dyes booth admiring her great color sense and dyeing skill---only could decide on one lovely skein of Fall-y colored yarn and realized she's on etsy, so I can visit anytime! I quickly ran out of time to spend there and didn't get to try any spinning wheels out...another time and place.




It was a great day weatherwise --- really enjoyed the variety of regional vendors and talking to the sheep and mingling with the fiberholics. Hope I can go back next year and spend more time...we'll see.

Outta Town

I'm out in California celebrating my mom's 80th birthday and looking forward to Fathers' Day tomorrow. Though I filled my suitcase with yarn projects (enough for 9 days away from home), I don't seem to have made any progress on them. But we have re-organized my dad's office to accomodate his watercolor work. At least someone will be making something soon.

I took a break on Friday and went to Berkeley to visit my longtime friend Sheila. I rely on her to guide me to the most interesting spots in the Bay Area. Breakfast is my favorite meal so starting at Cafe Fanny, Alice Waters' tiny cafe always makes me happy. Mmmm! Cafe au lait and a cinnamon twist from Acme Baking next door and a sculptural epi loaf for pictures.






Next stop, across the Bay in Sausalito. I have been wanting to stop in at the Heath factory for several years and finally we made it there. (I grew up eating off Heathware dishes and when my parents lived in Sausalito I could easily visit the factory seconds pile.) The company was purchased a few years ago and now has a new generation of fans. The factory store is manned by helpful Heath enablers. Thoroughly enjoyed that stop.




A quick bite in the shopping center in Strawberry, I don't know what they call the shopping center now but it's an upscale enclave of lovely stores and tasty restaurants. As we were eating our petite lunch, Bonnie Raitt walked past wearing a black straw cowboy hat unsuccessfully disguising her theatrical red hair. (Didn't even think of pulling out the camera!)

We doubled back to Berkeley and Fourth Street.



Had enough time before I had to get back on the road to take a ritual turn through the Gardener, cross the street to charming Castle in the Air (stationary/pen/ephemera heaven), to sketCh for tasty ice cream and granita treats (mmmm), into Builders Booksource to examine their copies of 500 Chairs and finishing off with a tour of Paper Source. There is so much more to look at on Fourth Street but one must have priorities!




What a great day Sheila! Thanks.

Pictureless on Long Island

I had such a great week of fiber activities to blog about last week…but didn’t take any pictures. What was I thinking? I had the camera with me but neglected to use it. Not on the fiberarts field trip to Manhattan with my very pregnant friend Deborah---Sullivan Street tour of Purl Patchwork and Purl Soho yarns, Global Table, or on to lunch at Le pain Quotidian, or up to City Quilter for a very interesting talk by Donna Wilder, Free Spirit fabrics founder. Great! No pictures! People talking about making things all day long. No pictures!



Went to a meeting of the Spinning Study Group of Long Island in Smithtown, in an historic barn--- 50 or so people, all ages, arrived to set up their spinning apparatus, roving, yarn and projects! Everyone was so willing to share information about their wheels and fibers---I’m joining that bunch! Can’t wait for the next meeting---but once again, no camera.



April will be better. I won't forget to feed the blog!