I'm Still Here

My muse seems to have left me. My linen lace flirty skirt has attacked me. I've been tagged TWICE! and I just can't seem to put pen to paper . . . er, fingers to keyboard. I've probably lost the small following I had. Come back, pleeeeeease!

First of all, after I made my list and checked it twice I remembered a lot of projects that should be incorporated into that list of priorities. I'm going back to my modified version of Guru Laura's Rule of Threes. More on that to come.

Secondly, the first plunge into the lace of the flirty skirt has derailed me. "Knit the knits, purl the purls" has me all a shook up. Are YOs knits or purls when you get back to them on the next round? When you're doing YOs is there such a thing as a purl YO? In my shaken up stage I took another plunge and enrolled in TKGA's Basics Basics Basics which wasn't to arrive for weeks. It arrived in days--so fast it made my head spin! So now I'm shook up and my head is spinning. Not good when at the threshold of the big holiday season, especially when you're trying to clear out and sell two houses and clear out and remodel the one you're living in. But I can do it because I'm a woman--W-O-M-A-N!

And last but not least, in this entry are seven random and/or weird things about me you probably don't want to know and couldn't care less about. 'The reason for these seven things?' you ask. My guru Laura, The Scarlet Knitter, tagged me. To make it even more interesting one of the other people she tagged, Necessary Chocolate, also tagged me. Thanks ladies! Now do I get to write 14 random/weird things about myself? I can do it, but I'll limit myself to seven right now:

1. I'm left handed until my right hand thinks it can do the job better and then I become right handed. I write right handed, eat left handed; draw right handed, color left handed; wield a knife left handed, cut with scissors right handed; juggle? I use both hands and still can't do that.

2. I love Cape Cod. It makes me happy. It is my Laughing Place.

3. I'm a hobby junky.

4. I'm a collector, a very bad thing when you are a hobby junky. I have doll, rabbit, dollhouse and coin collections. Also yarn, fabric and needlepoint stashes. I mean COLLECTIONS and STASHES! I won't even list the minor ones.

5. I hate heights. I'm talking about higher than the second floor. Flying requires much psyching up on my part. Forget walking across a bridge. Save me from those glass capsule elevators providing a panoramic view as I rise or fall. (Well, it feels like falling!) And don't even think about getting me over to the observation window in a tall building. Just writing about it makes me weak in the knees. Steps with no risers? There'd better not be very many!

6. I can keep a secret . . . forever.

7. I am a loyal, protective and trustworthy friend. After all, I will carry your secrets to the grave.

Second seven to follow. Right now I'm trying to come up with three others to tag. Problem is many of those I'd like to tag don't have blogs. Kind of defeats the whole purpose, doesn't it?

Bona Fide Knitter

Making a List . . . Checking It Twice

I went to a dollhouse miniatures show on Saturday. Dollhouses were my passion three hobbies ago. There is knitting, sewing, doll collecting, quilting then dollhouses. Before that there is needlepoint with a little cross stitch and crewel thrown in and crochet. What can I say? I'm a hobby junkie. And you will notice that I don't refer to any of them in the past tense. Anyway the biggest most prestigious show in the area, Philadelphia Miniaturia, was held last week in Cherry Hill, NJ.

I hadn't attended the show in years. My mother, Margaret, and I used to attend yearly without fail when we were Mari-Mar Miniatures. We were never vendors there, not good enough, but we knew many there from other shows we were part of and we'd spend the day shopping and getting the inside info from friends in the know. We retired from the miniatures game and my mother became unable to attend the shows. She passed away almost two years ago. When I first got there yesterday it was odd not to be able to reach out, grab her arm and say, "Mar, look at this!"

Oddly enough the show was almost too big. There were sooooo many vendors--two ballrooms and a lobby full! Many were new to me, but there were still some friends left from the old days. We talked about the show's beginnings in Philadelphia, actually Willow Grove, a Philly suburb. It was held in a seedy motel, the George Washington Motor Lodge, and was the show not to miss. All the best miniaturists were vendors there. This year's show was the 39th year and the vendors are even more talented. Miniatures have come a long way since using acorns, bottle caps and "found" items to outfit a dollhouse. I watched some of it evolve in the 80s and 90s, then missed a decade. In the new millenium, miniatures and dollhouses are really something to behold!

I was determined not to buy anything. I have a workroom full--a miniatures and dolllhouses stash to rival any yarn stash! Looking on the vendors tables I was freshly reminded of just how much I do have. However, around my third hour there, I succumbed. It was the needlework that got me. I know I have many needlepoint kits of the fine scrim--40, 54 and even finer--that I gave up on when my eyes aged, but I didn't have any knotted work or punchneedle. I do now! What the heck! My eyes have been rejuvenated with surgery. I can see again. I'm going for it. I also bought another magnifying headgear thingy as insurance. I should be good to go.

Which brings me to the list I'm making and checking twice . . . I'm packing in new projects for my hybernation this winter as if I don't have enough already packed in! However, it is now time to rein myself in and make a plan. I'm currently working on the lacy skirt without regard to time, temperature, meals, obligations or completing the beach socks. The skirt has grown unwieldly and can no longer be my take-along project so I will go back to completing the beach socks while on-the-go. The list continues as follows: finish lacy skirt and start lacy socks, finish Abundance Afghan then start the Vivian Hoxbro sweater. If my timing is right this should occur right after I've had a class in shadow knitting at the Pottstown Knit Out and Crochet Too in January. That's as far as I'll go with the list today. I'll check it later and again tomorrow.

I have another list to make. I've been tagged! More on that in the next entry as I have real life and the real world intruding on my hobby schedule today. I'm outta here.

Bona Fide Knitter

Stitch Markers--Just What I Needed

Yesterday my knitting guild, Liberty Bell, to which I returned last Monday after many months absence, just in time to sign up, held a beaded stitch marker workshop and luncheon at the Riverton Country Club in NJ. Aching face and newly painful foot did not keep me away. Neither did the torrential rains.

Our little group had a room to ourselves with two round tables set for lunch and a long table down the middle of the room with chairs on each side to accommodate us and containing a smorgasbord of beads in separate packs and on paper plates. There were place settings with packets of tools and supplies for each of us.

We began by claiming a packet of tools and supplies and perusing the bead smorgasbord to select four larger beads and eight smaller ones to compose our first four stitch markers. There were so many to chose from it was a hard decision which got changed many times as the morning progressed.

We learned to twist the wire, add beads and finish off. That is the short version. It was a little more involved, especially the first one. By the third one I was off and running. There were very few mistakes that could not be turned into design features. We stopped for a lovely lunch of chicken Caesar salad topped of with apple pie a la mode. Mmmmm, yummy! Then back to the beading.

Delphia was an excellent teacher. This is the first workshop or class of any kind that I have taken and been pleased with the take home results. I usually learn the process, hate what I've done in class, then go home and construct masterpieces. This time I have very nice stitch markers, one of which I'm using to mark the beginning of the row as I knit like crazy on my lacy skirt. Where's the lace? It's coming. What you see at the bottom is the casing for the elastic and closer to the needles the first purl row where stitched will be picked up for the first row of lace.

I didn't have my camera at the workshop and the pictures I took with my PDA of the guild members refuse to transfer over to Blogger. However, here are some pictures of the stitch markers I made in class. I am trying very hard not to become addicted to making stitch markers.

A bona fide beader? I don't think so!

Bona Fide Knitter

Back from Stitches East

I am coming down from a knitting high and a buying frenzy. Stitches East in Baltimore was a blast in more ways than one: *classes, shopping, dining, pain. Repeat from * three times, ending at shopping on the last day.

I arrived in Baltimore disorganized (left my blouse, hand knit sweater, camera and Stitches name card holder at home) and unprepared (didn't have all my homework swatches finished). Luckily things went uphill from there. I didn't need another white blouse or a heavy sweater (although I wanted to wear something I'd knitted for once). The weather was wonderful, warm and sunny each day. As for the name card holder, I used the el cheapo they give you and was only a little inconvenienced by not having a place for pen, bank card and hotel keycard. About the camera, there were a few times I wished I had one, but the one picture I saw of myself made me hope that I don't appear in any others. Which brings me to the pain. I was having some kind of sinus/neuralgia/who-knows-what episodes each night. It started Wednesday night at home, excruciating pain on the right side of my face. It returned every night I was in Baltimore making for sleepless nights and swollen eyes and face days. What a sight. You can see for yourself. The cute one is my knitting guru, the one who declared me a bona fide knitter, Kathryn.

I found Stitches East to be smaller, less well attended and a little subdued this year. Some old favorites were among the missing, but some newly acquired favorites more than made up for it. That is not to say that I didn't enjoy it just as much, maybe even more, without the throngs of people. On Thursday evening at the Market Preview, after the Kaffe Fassett slide show, I was able to walk right up to him for the book signing. It did help that I already had the book and didn't have to wait in line to acquire it. The book is lovely, colorful eye candy. If you wanted to make the Foolish Virgins sweater years ago and were intimidated by the magnitude of it, there is a scarf--Foolish Virgins at half the angst.

Most of the Market Preview I was on a mission to buy a Vivian Hoxbro sweater kit. I saw it first at the Mannings' booth, but they didn't have the colorway I wanted with them.

I found it at The Needle Lady. Love it! A touch of purple, worn closed or with lapels, no buttons, lots of knit stitch, my kind of project.

Both vendors were very generous in allowing me to try on the samples. However I am still not sure what size I should make. Both booths said their samples were S/M but the one at The Needle Lady was larger and fit me better. Hmmmm, do I make the S/M (anything with "small" as part of the size makes me nervous) or do I go with the L/XL? Suppose I'm really a M/L. Anyway, another booth had something that caught my eye that will delay the start of the Vivian Hoxbro Rainbow Jacket.

Fine Points from Cleveland, Ohio, was the booth that kept drawing me back and had me pulling out my bank card again and again. I even resorted to cash a couple of times! I bought the pattern and yarn for this skirt. I bought a T shirt on which I based my color selection for the skirt, earrings to match and another day, hand painted shoes!!! They will not be worn with the skirt ensemble however.

Here is a picture of the sample skirt: (Fine Points' picture used with permission)


My colors are these:

And here are my over-the-top shoes:

I've been writing this blog entry for a week (Don't ask!) and Stitches East is becoming just a pleasant memory. Quickly, before it fades away entirely, here is a fast forward recap: Took classes and bought books for reinforcement on finishing techniques, Intarsia and needle felting. Met and talked to old friends and new. Bought everything from sock yarn to a sweater kit. Had wonderful seafood dinners at a restaurant whose name already has escaped me and a couple of pleasant room service meals. Spent more money than ever before--I even bought an iron for goodness sake! But back to the meals: we enjoyed one dinner all the more because of the company. Eugene and Ann Bourgeois of Philosopher's Wool fame were seated beside us and we became a foursome. They are an informed and interesting pair. Dinner became a delight. In addition to being entertaining, The Philosopher, very cunning and quick on the draw, picked up our check and insisted on paying. Ann, whose free online video clip of her two handed Fair Isle technique is worth her weight in gold (or my weight since she doesn't weigh very much), was in total agreement. Ya gotta love 'em!

The painful part of my Stitches East experience was, and still is, excruciating facial pain I am experiencing each night and now sometimes during the day. Yes, I have been to the doctor, but no, not the dentist. X-rays yesterday. Diagnosis soon. In the meantime I am knitting away on the underskirt of my "flirty skirt." Nothing has enthused and sustained me as much as this skirt since the Noro Kureyon I purchased at last year's Stitches East that had me knitting like a madwoman until I finished my first sweater which, by the way, was the one I forgot and left at home this year.

Let my momentum continue!

Bona Fide Knitter

How Bittersweet It Is

I'm knitting again. Not great masterpieces but my comfort knitting, socks. In the three weeks since I last posted an entry here I lost my dear aunt. Ruby passed away on September 11 at 95.66 years of age.

This picture was taken on her 95th birthday on January 14. She had a good life and a peaceful passing. It was hard for me to let her go. I'm still trying to fill the void. I've returned to knitting.

I am doing comfort knitting. I'm knitting socks. Presently I am working on the second of this year's beach socks, so called because the yarn has cotton content and was meant to be knitted on the beach on Cape Cod. I didn't get to the beach this year. I needed to stay closer to home. So the pair of socks have taken an inordinate amount of time to complete. Unfortunately I didn't knit on anything else in the meantime. I'd lost my knitting jones.

It's back, or at least it's coming back. I'm knitting socks on my circular sock machine as well. I've knitted three pairs. I've also knocked the whole thing over onto the computer keyboard, magnetized my ribber needles and turned my electric cone winder into a whirling dervish. But that's a story for another day.

I have a desire to start another pair of socks, one that might qualify as an attempt at lace knitting. They are the Chaussettes de Dentelle (Lacy Socks) in Nancy Bush's Folk Socks done on size 000 needles using Brown Sheep Company's Wildfoote. Folk Socks was the first sock book I purchased and the Lacy Socks was the first pattern I attempted from the book. They were to be a shower gift for a bride-to-be. The couple married, bought their first house and are expecting their first baby. The socks were never completed. They were far beyond my ability when I started them. I think I can do them now that I'm a "bona fide knitter." I think I need the concentration involved.

It's autumn. Time to think Stitches East. It's almost here. I have homework to do for my classes. I need to get that done. I hate homework! I miss Ruby.

Ruby at TGI Friday, March 2006

Bona Fide Knitter

Going Into Autumn

Now that for all intents and purposes summer is over, my thoughts are turning to fall knitting. I've already jump started my gym regimen and I'm working on my eating habits. (Kitchen renovation is not diet friendly.) So it's time to get my hobbies in order as well.

Walking the treadmill for an hour gives me lots of podcast listening time and I've found another to add to my list of favorites: Sticks & String Podcast "by an Australian bloke who knits" named David Reidy. I love this bloke! I've not yet listened to the requisite six podcasts before forming an opinion, but I've listened to the promo and three podcasts and I can tell. This guy is good! And he speaks the language without 'air fillers' (uhms, errrs, aaahs), has nice music choices and no fits of giggles. He provides information on what he's knitting, why and for whom. There are book reviews and even "patten" reviews. ("Patten" is Aussie for "pattern" as we say it in the States) And speaking of the Aussie accent, I love it. It's very easy on the ears and so is David Reidy's voice. Shades of Crocodile Dundee. There has been an enjoyable essay in each of the episodes I have listened to so far on such topics as why we give away what we knit and why we meet to knit. Give this bloke a try. I've already succumbed and subscribed.

Okay, I can't avoid mentioning my knitting any longer, or should I say 'my not knitting.' I'm about to make a list and check it twice. Then I'm going to eliminate the naughty and concentrate on the nice. Santa Claus is coming to town. By that I mean I'm making a list of the items I am going to work on next. The list will not include any of the exasperating UFOs. It will consist of only the items I plan to complete this year, maybe by Christmas. I will follow the advice of David Reidy and not let deadlines take the fun out of knitting. I will just enjoy the process. Sooooo, I am allowing myself plenty of time to complete a gift project by starting it now and the other items on my list will be knit when they're knit, and in some semblance of order. Part of the enjoyment of the process is the visualization of the completed item. I have visualization down pat. I need more actuality. Completing AFOs (Actually Finished Objects) is my plan going into autumn. The list? Coming soon.

Bona Fide Knitter

Summer's Over!

I can hardly believe we are at the weekend heralding the last weekend of summer. I know, I know, there is still some summer left, but for all intents and purposes, it's over. Where did it go? Where did I go? How did I enjoy it? What did I knit?

Summer started for me with at trip to My Laughing Place (Everybody's got one. More on mine another day.) where I dropped off spouse and LWDs and continued on to Portland, ME, for the Sasha Festival, a doll collector conference. It was a wonderful long weekend full of fun with like- minded people with the same interests.

I returned to Cape Cod and lazed around until time to return home. I never got to the beach that trip. I just barely got the screened porch hosed down for future reading and napping. We dust-covered it and returned home to a blistering heatwave that rocked the city in July. I was further rocked by the rapidly declining health of my elderly aunt, Ruby, who is 95.

It was just by the skin of my teeth and urging by my family that I went off to Frederick, MD, for a long weekend for the Circular Sock Machine Conference. I returned home after that to the start of my kitchen renovation which continues. It's been delayed by my changes and additions and an attempt to get a vacation in. I had a couple of nights and a day of shopping at a B & B in Rehoboth Beach, DE, the outlet Mecca. Then, after a couple of postponements,we went back to Cape Cod.

While back in MA I went to a doll 'show' and sale where I met with my doll guru and we had a wonderful day shopping and eating at an Asian buffet. After that wonderful Sunday (Could it have been only last week?), the next day I received disturbing news of my aunt and returned home ending my vacation in less than a week. And here I am. Home for the holiday weekend, making sure what is best (as best I can) is done for Ruby and catching up on my blog.

The danger of being home with no pressing errands to run, no kitchen counter granite samples to track down, is Internet shopping. All those books I'd been considering at Amazon might make their way to a cart today. I came this close to ordering bar stools from Overstock.com for a breakfast bar that I don't even have yet and might not get! It must be time to start knitting again.

Knit? Did somebody say 'KNIT'? I have been knitting somewhat halfheartedly on the omnipresent waiting room sock, which was to have been my beach knitting, for weeks and weeks now and am just about at the toe of the first sock. Knitting has really taken a backseat this summer. Too much heat, humidity and real life. I have done good by my Legare sock machine though. I've made a few pairs of socks and finally put the summer anklets up in my recently launched Etsy shop. Yes, they were to be summer anklets and they were made in time for summer, but just didn't get listed until now.

I do get around to doing most of the things I set out to do, like this blog entry I've been trying to get around to. Well, this was it.

Bona Fide Knitter