a holiday. or not.

Some of my offices are open on this Columbus Day Monday, so in my head it's a holiday, but the reality is that I might only be able to squeeze out a few hours of being off. That's okay, though, because the kids and I have a beautiful hike planned for later today. Meanwhile, here are a few snaps of things that made me smile in the past few days:

Most adorable yarn label ever, on the yarn I picked up at the Thurs. farmers' market. The writing on the sheep has faded now, but each label tells the name of the sheep the wool came from.

Some of the fabric given to Leah by a very kind customer who has become a friend. She's an elderly woman now, but many years ago, her sister worked at a textile mill somewhere in CT and the sister was able to take home yards and yards of fabric. When the sister passed away, our current customer inherited all her boxes of fabric. Since she hasn't been able to sew it all and loves to chat with a certain young seamstress working at the bakery booth, she's unloading some treasures and Leah is delighted.

Irish step dancing, AWESOME live music, yet another incredible autumn day, a massage for me, and friends galore at the Sunday farmers' market. (BTW, this is about one-sixth of the market. It's a biggie.)

My second Lacy Baktus with Edge in progress, this time in Koigu. I see a few misplaced YOs where I didn't KBL on the return row. They don't show too much with this busy colorway, but I think I'll change the increases to M1s to avoid the oopsies. I'm also going to do a little stitching at the points to pull that last sawtooth all the way across the end. The first Lacy Baktus has been worn by me or Leah every day since cast-off. Love. it.

While writing this post, work came in from two more clients, leaving only one that may or may not be closed today. I'll check that next, but it appears my holiday time is dwindling. Oh well, if I dive back in now (have already been working for a few hours this morning), we should still have enough time for that hike before dark!

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ETA: Just checked on that last client. Not only are they open today, but the doc who makes the most work for me is on. :::headdesk::: (no, not really. happy to have the work, but would've been equally happy to lounge and hike today, y'know?) That was a quick trip from holiday to a hoppin' workday!

finish-itis

I had a raging case of finish-itis this lovely holiday weekend and here's what I have to show for it:

Cuffs on Ingrid cardigan, project now complete and blocked and I think I LOVE it. REALLY love it. Like possibly the best sweater I've ever knit. Photos soon.

Auto-pilot 2x2 rib socks. This was my always-with-me filler knitting for a while. They've been sitting on my desk for something like two weeks, just waiting for me to weave in those 4 yarn ends. Now added to the sock stash. Yup, keeping this pair for myself.

Lacy Baktus with Edge, the 5th(?) I've knit, this one for my sister. This was the always-with-me knitting for a while too, until it got too bulky. A lot can get accomplished in those little bits of waiting time that we all have, if there's an easy project within reach.

And just to prove that it's all Lacy Baktus, all the time, around here, here are two more that my mom just finished. Seriously, most wearable handknit evah. Just enough of a touch to spice up an outfit or add that extra layer of warmth without being too bulky. Mom's living in Florida in the winters, but there are plenty of times to want a little warmth over your shoulders or around your neck, even down south, in the land of overzealous air conditioning. Once you get the pattern in your head or the chart (printed on cardstock) clipped to your work, it's the perfect mobile project. I like to wind the skein of sock yarn into two equal cakes so I'm carrying a smaller package and know exactly when I've reached the halfway point, which is when the increases become decreases.

Next up: Saroyan!

yarny bits

Progress to date on my Minimalist cardigan. Psyched. Looks like the armholes aren't tall enough, but I think they are. Hm. Gonna have to check that again.

Another hat knit by Leah. Kid's on a roll w/ the hat improv. Using up the scrap yarns, keeping people's ears warm. Win-Win.

Yarn cone reincarnated as a Christmas tree rocket, inspired by this video but downsized so we can skip the $150 worth of engines it would've taken to launch a real tree. Test launch happening at this moment in prep for launch at rocket club this weekend. Junk rockets are my favorite kind.

And yesterday, some time with needles of a different type. I got a few quick rows in on Lacy Baktus with Edge (my fourth -- I know! Can't stop! Love these scarves!) while waiting at a blood drive.


I also took a pic of this Lacy Baktus with Scrooge after seeing Hartford Stage's performance of A Christmas Carol. The picture didn't turn out too hot, but the show was great fun. We did a behind the scenes tour afterward to find out more about all the special effects and backstage workings, during which nephew Z got chosen to sit in the Ghost of Christmas Present's huge chair with a wreath of candles on his head as the whole shebang glided across the stage with lights, booming sound, glittery snow, and a low fog cloud. Totally cool.

Stitches East 2010

Saw: Countless knitterly friends, including one I've known since I was about 16. :::hi Roz!:::

Made (by Leah): baby hat for Caps for Good.

Walked: from East Hartford boat launch, over the river, round and round the convention center, then back again.

Wore: My newly finished Lacy Baktus with Edge. Pattern from Cheryknits, posted with her permission. If you make her version, she'd love to see a picture of it. Since my first Baktus has been worn just about every day since I finished it, I knew I'd also like another one. This time, I used two skeins of Koigu. It was smaller than the first one, so I gave it a good blocking. This really shows off the lacy edge and made it every bit as big as the first one. Love it, love it, love it, and got lots of compliments on it from other knitters too. I'm tempted to knit a third, but...


Bought: Two skeins of Miss Babs' Windsor Shadows sock yarn in Blackwatch colorway, with the idea of doing something about my mismatched self. The plan is to knit a Semele scarf and Ringwood gloves. Both patterns are printed out, so with that, I'm off to cast on!

p.s. Duck!

I have some knitting time coming up; I feel sure of it. And the Ingrid cardigan requires too much concentration for some situations, and the lacy Baktus is nearing the end. So rummage, rummage, rummage. Now, there's not much in my knitting bag, so you can imagine my surprise to find this little ditty in there:

It's Saroyan, a lovely free pattern in that Baktus-ish shape that I am finding so very wearable this winter. Perfect, I thought, and just enough underway to have all the kinks worked through and be ready to rock it out.

Wasn't it nice of me to, at some point in the past, set this up for exactly this kind of situation? It's like in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, when their future selves left a note for them in the past, telling them where to look for the car keys and to Duck!

Whew.

Be excellent to each other and knit on! :::strikes air guitar riff pose!:::

early morning baktus thievery

I spy a daughter and her knitting at breakfast.
But what's that cozy accessory she's wearing?

There is clearly a need for more than one
lacy baktus with edge 'round here.

something for everyone

Yesterday was atlatl day. If you've been reading here for a while, you may remember from past blog posts that this is a favorite event of Jesse's, so, for the umpteenth Saturday in a row, the boy and I were up and out the door early for a trek to something he was excited about. Little did we know that I'd enjoy the day every bit as much as he did.

I had a great walk along some trails of the state park and found a perfect little cabin.

I ran into a few delightful knitters over the course of the day, including this vendor; a woman who used to own a yarn store; and a couple of white-haired women who were on a bus tour where somebody else was knitting socks during the rides and there I was, also knitting socks while waiting for something, and they thought that was just about the best idea ever and they were both inspired to go home and dig out their long-stashed knitting supplies and get back to it.

I finished the lacy baktus scarf and, with it being October in Connecticut, put it to use right away for a walk along the boardwalk with Knitajourney and Stuff You Should Know podcasts in my ears. I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about this scarf all along, but it turns out that I just might love it. As a matter of fact, I just might be planning to cast on for another one. The size and shape make it that good.

I joined in on a wild edibles talk and group walk that included tasty snacks and a cool group of interesting and interested folks.

Life is good. :-)

nyc xmas

A few pics with a yarny bent, snapped around NYC on Saturday:

Esprit windows dressed with yarn ball-decorated tree, mannequins in knitted clothes and accessories, packages tied with yarn bows, and a backdrop of criss-crossed strands of yarn.

A wool-encased family waiting in the ice skating line at Rockefeller Center. Thank goodness for the wooly warmth.

One of the Macy's windows depicting the Yes, Virginia story. Can't tell from my cell phone pic, but the librarian has knitting needles sticking out of her hair bun.

I also knit about 14" of another (my 4th!) lacy baktus scarf while listening to an audiobook on the train there and back. So much funstuff to see and do!

a hop over the border

The four of us piled in the car on Friday and drove to Montreal for a long weekend, just because. There were stunning sights to see, like the Notre Dame Basilica,

along with a history museum, Old Montreal, a science museum that ranks among the best we've ever been to (and we've been to a lot of science museums), super cool bicycles modified to look like motorcycles, and an archaeological museum that was equally eerie and amazing.

We stayed downtown for this trip and saw the city entirely on foot, which gave us an opportunity to discover cool graffiti'd spaces, cobblestone streets, interesting architecture, street performers, city parks, Chinatown, and gargoyles.

Along the way, we learned a little French. We relaxed in the pool and hot tub. We tasted Tim Horton's coffee, crepes, Montreal style bagels, and poutine (didn't think we'd care for it; we were wrong).

We had a picnic dinner in upstate NY on our way to Montreal and stopped for a knitting pic on the way back.

Yup, another Lacy Baktus with Edge. The two we have were worn constantly this weekend, as they have been ever since they came off the needles, so it made sense to me to cast on another one as my travel project. Halfway done now and infused with happy Montreal memories.

I Spy (a bunch of loons)

I Spy another knitter on a DVD we were watching recently. This one was no surprise, although it's the first time we've watched the show. Any guesses who it is? I'm thinking lots of you will be able to recognize this knitter's hands.

Remember how a couple of weeks ago I showed Leah's mess of a room? Well, last Tuesday morning I mentioned to Scott that the calendar was blissfully clear for the next few days, so we were discussing building shelves and cubbies in her closet, but then we got to talking about how what the room really needed was an overhaul to go from a little girl's room to a young lady's room/studio so the space could really work for her. And of course, in our crazy old house, this does not simply involve a paint job and new quilt. No, of course not. Tuesday afternoon, she packed her stuff. Wednesday and Friday, we gutted it. Saturday the framing for the new closet went up. The electricians were here on Sunday to confirm that Scott did the wiring correctly (their expertise rec'd in exchange for wood-fired pizza shells :-). As of yesterday, the sheetrock is up, the first coat of mud has been applied, and a color/design scheme is coming into focus.

When not hauling debris out or sheetrock in, and when not wiping construction dust off of every item and surface in our house, Leah made herself a ribwarmer. She came up with this idea on her own. She used a chunky crochet hook and 2 strands of worsted weight yarn to double crochet a trianglefor the back, then she crocheted two rectangles down the front, then connected the front to the back by crocheting around the side, decreasing the number of stitches per row as she traveled upward. Simple construction, done on the fly, a totally wearable warm vest!

I've been knitting a bit here and a bit there, including on the patio at Panera's, while waiting for my mammogram, before the Memorial Day parade, near our backyard campfire, etc. I'm following the Lacy Baktus pattern with lace edge mod by CheryKnits. I can't get the pattern in my head, but I made a small printout of the 8-row chart that I need and pinned it to my work, as I like to do, so it's a perfect take-along project.

I gave a ton of stuff away yesterday and am feeling excellent about it. More on its way out today, including a bunch to a new homeschooling family whose mom I know from wayyyyy back in my La Leche League days. Meanwhile, incoming yesterday was a beautiful skein of yarn, handspun by our friend Jen, from roving dyed by our friend Kris, in exchange for use of our bike rack on Jen's trip to the Cape last weekend. Woo Hoo for pretty handspun! Reservations made this morning for Spa Knit and Spin 2011. Farmers' market season starts tomorrow, so lots of excitement (and incredible aromas) in the air around here!

Life. Do it up!

I was away for only 36 hours this weekend, but it felt like a week's worth of vacation and festivities and, really, like I'll be riding that wave for a good long while. You know that kind of weekend? Yeah. Excellent.

Started off on Saturday morning in Cambridge, MA, to run my first 5K with Pa, Ben, and Jed (and others) from the Do Life movement. Didja hear that, Peeps? A 5K! Me?! Now, all you real runners, don't fall off your chair laughing. I know 5K is a warm-up for some of you, but for me, it's big. I mean, I've been walking that distance or even double that distance for many days in the past year, but running? No. Never did. Never expected to. But when the body has energy and the joints don't complain, it seems a natural progression and -- dare I admit this? -- I'm *liking* it.

I started loosely following the Couch to 5K program a few weeks ago. I say loosely because it's supposed to be a 9-week program and they warn you not to jump ahead, even if you feel like you can, but I did it in 3 weeks because I'm an idiot rebel like that. It was steamy on Saturday morning, though, so I (and the other couple of women I hooked up with) did a fair bit of walking during that 5K. Still, it's all movement and it's all good.

Then I headed to NYC, where I trekked around and had an amazing lunch of raw gourmet foods (I ordered appetizers so I could try a variety -- tostada, hand roll, pizza, ravioli) at Quintessence and raw dessert from One Lucky Duck. I ate that mint chip sundae on a bench outside and took the tiramisu and lemon square with me for another time. Boy, it's too bad that a raw foods lifestyle is so boring and restrictive and deprivational, eh?

;-) Saw some live music, enjoyed wandering the city solo, and met up late at night with a friend who was letting me crash at his place (lest y'all get the wrong idea: platonic! guest room!).

Up the next morning for another 5K! This one was in Central Park, again with the Do Life guys (and many others). If you check out Ben Does Life, you might see my smiling mug in 3 of his recently posted pics. This time, I again met up with two women with whom to run -- all of us at about the same pace and endurance. I took 1-minute walking breaks a few times, but this one felt like I really ran it. And I was able to hold conversations while running with them. And it was fun. So. Much. Fun. I left plenty of time for chatting with people before and after, met some fabulous and interesting folks, and really got the biggest buzz from the whole thing.

Back to friend's house, we had planned to take his motorcycle to the beach, but decided the traffic would be horrendous, so instead strolled the High Line and Hudson River Park on what had to be one of the most spectacular weather days of the year.

I googlemapped my weekend this morning and came up with about 23 miles of walking/running, total. No joke. Yet another Lacy Baktus along with podcasts to keep me occupied on the train ride back to CT to fall into bed, so tired but yet so energized.

oh. now I remember.

Remember how I killed the blog as a means of simplifying? Well, I forgot that blogging actually IS simplifying for me. I got slapped upside the head with a reminder of this over the past couple of days, as Jesse and I went on a trip and enough people have since written to me to ask how that trip went that I might as well just blog it, rather than send individual emails in response.

First, let's back up a week. Jesse and I hit the road for the Maryland Delaware Rocket Association's 3-day rocket-launching event, Red Glare. Translation for the yarnies: This is Rhinebeck for rocket scientists.

There were rocket drag races, vendors, experimental rockets, chemicals, charity fundraising, camaraderie, and plenty of sunshine on the most enormous wide open, flat expanses of soybean fields I've ever seen. I took this pic, with my newest lacy baktus in the corner, to send to the Knitwits podcast because I've recently become a fan and they mentioned getting a kick out of knowing what people are doing while they listen to the show.

Next, we headed to DC for a few days. Since it was just the two of us (Scott home to work, Leah still happily doing that silly school thang), Jesse got to choose the itinerary. The best part was that these places were of such high quality that I was every bit as enthusiastic about them as he was. After hitting up the Air and Space Museum and the Spy Museum, we stopped for a self-portrait in front of the Capitol.


The junk behind us is leftovers from the engineering and science expo held there the day before. We were hoping to make it to that, but a dead car battery stole a few hours out from under us, so we shifted to Plan B for that day. Still, I was pretty happy with this pic. Do you have any idea how hard it is to take a pic of two people (one of whom has minimal tolerance for the mom's self-portrait efforts, preferably not looking like they're in pain or camera pointing directly up nostrils) AND a building in the background without actually being able to see what's in the shot?

Another day, another couple of amazing museums, this time the Smithsonian's Museums of American History and Natural History. I had to laugh out loud when we arrived at the latter and there was a big banner announcing that the Crocheted Coral Reef was currently on display.

Seriously, a CROCHETED exhibit in the Smithsonian? How could I not blog this?! My little iPhone pic doesn't even begin to do it justice, but browse this Flickr pool for better ones, especially this pic to get an idea of the scale. It's huge, it's colorful, it's a textural bonanza. There were LOTS of people gathered around, admiring it. Totally unexpected and totally cool.

Our last little jaunt was over to the National Air and Space Museum at Dulles Airport (related to but separate from the one in DC). This pic shows a fraction of one of the two ginormous hangars full of flying contraptions of all shapes and sizes.


One of the rocket dudes mentioned this as a must-see a few days earlier, so we squeezed it in on our last day and I am so glad we did. It was entirely fascinating for both of us and we could've both enjoyed a few more hours there. It just blows my mind how much interesting stuff is out there for the learning.

Okay, so now be prepared for a flurry of catch-up posts, especially since so much yarny goodness continues to happen all around us.

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ha ha ha. And then Blogger imploded and politely stated that it could not complete my request (um, to post to my blog) at this time. I'm going to make it post my words and pics from a diff. direction, but ha ha ha, Blogger, you're too funny and the timing is impeccable.