scorcher

Yesterday was a hot and humid scorcher of a day, but a pleasant one nonetheless. From the relative coolness of the bakery's shade tent beneath a big tree, Scott was jazzed, as usual, by the bakery's many friendly customers.

While Leah served the Nathan Hale Homestead's iced tea and baked goods, and collected the admission price for the Hugh Blumenfeld concert, I chatted with knitterfriends gathered in a shady grove.

Jesse was picked up by friend who took him for a rollicking time of tubing behind their speed boat on the lake. While exploring the bottom of the lake later, he found a pair of prescription glasses that just happened to have been lost by his friend earlier this summer and for which the friend's family was offering a reward, so good vibes all around! When back at the market later, he and the ice cream guy picked up their ongoing rocketry conversation, as the ice cream guy is a fellow rocket enthusiast.

We broke down the bakery booth in record time and were home to refresh and enjoy the jump in Glastonbury Glassworks Etsy store traffic, courtesy of Twist Collective, then Leah and I were off to western MA for a performance by the Sound of New England, an award-winning Sweet Adelines chorus with whom she has gotten involved.

This is only about 2/3 of the group and not a very good pic because of my obstructed view, but it might give a sense of the energy of these shows. They're planning to start a Young Women in Harmony group this fall, but until that takes shape, they have welcomed Leah to take part in their rehearsals. She hasn't been with them for more than a few practices so far, but she and some of the other kids (mostly daughters of members) joined the group on stage for some of the songs last night. Singing + choreographed moves = great fun and big smiles!

Thus ends a run of busy-ness, the likes of which we have never seen before and didn't think we'd survive, with a few extra surprises thrown in for good measure. Not like there's hibernation and infinite chill time to come now, but there will be breathing room and something resembling normalcy, or our version of "normal," at least. ;-)

so close and yet so far

It's tough being the knitting mom of a big guy.

See, Jesse's only 13 years old, but he's over six feet tall. I knit inches longer on the body and sleeves than suggested on the Durrow pattern that I'm vaguely following and it's still not enough. I added something like 3 inches to the sleeve before starting the decreases and saddle shoulder shaping, and it's still ending up only reaching halfway across his shoulder, with a way too wide neckline. :::sigh:::

Others on Ravelry noted similar problems with the neckline being too wide. I now remember reading some of those comments way back when I was considering making this sweater, but forgot about it somewhere along the way. I've come too far on this giant sweater knit on size 4 needles to cheese it up now, so last night I bit the bullet. Disconnected the sleeve and ripped all (front, back, both sleeves) back to armpit level. Will add even more inches to all, then try the shoulders and neck shaping again with Eliz. Zimmermann's seamless saddle shoulder construction.

i love this boy i love this boy he's a pain in the neck sometimes but i love this boy. :-)

amused. or not.

We are easily amused 'round here, as evidenced by the ooh...ahhh response to whatever happens to Scott's glass goodies as they go through the annealing process. Yup, it's all pretty and it's all good, except when we want the buttons and the beads for Leah's Sylvi sweater coat to MATCH. The buttons turned out as we hoped, but the beads for the flower centers were not encased in clear glass and turned a much stronger purple. Common sense would suggest that making more beads, using the same glass rods and encasing in clear, just like the buttons, would net that same soft plummy-purple on an amber base with slight iridescent haze over top, right?

RIGHT?!

Um, no, apparently not.

That'll get you mossy greens. Beautiful, indeed, but not what we were aiming for.
So, it has been decreed that the original beads will remain in place, not perfectly matching the buttons, but pretty nonetheless. And the beadmakerbaker has told his #1 pain-in-the-butt non-paying and highly demanding customer :::waving howdy ho, that's me!::: to take her special orders for a flying leap. :-)

Meanwhile, hey, guess what my sister wore as a wrap for her company's Christmas party this year?

It's the Lady Eleanor stole that I knit for my mom a little over a year ago. WooHoo for knits that get used, and in such a stylin' way!

(I'm working on getting Bren to hand over that dress so I can snip off that chiffon outer layer and nuno felt it into a jacket or something for her. She still cringes at the thought, but I know she'll go for it eventually.)

After about a dozen false starts on knitting projects that just haven't worked out lately, I seem to finally have something workable underway.

This is a big fat cone of tweedy goodness scored at a stash swap last weekend. I'm knitting two strands at a time, aiming for a gansey for Scott. As long as it has his beloved seed stitch and a cable or two, he'll be a happy guy. It's the least I can do, after rejecting so many of his pretty (but wrong) beads!

Lastly, a big thanks to Amy at Live, Learn, Knit for passing the Kreativ Blogger award our way. I'm supposed to then pass it on to some bloggers whose work I enjoy, so here's to:

Laurie at Issues With Knitting
Ruth at Knitting On Impulse
Karrie at Delaney's Duds
Lorraine at Of Faith and Fiber
Maria at Passing Down Crazy
Pat at Pat's Knitting and Quilting
and Faith at The Needle and The Damage Done

hangin' with the Redcoats

Since we've been loving Old Sturbridge Village's Redcoats and Rebels weekend for years now, you've seen plenty of pics of it before, but here are some highlights from yesterday's event.

Reenactor using a lucet to make a square cord. I've known about lucets, but never tried it and never seen one in action, so this was a fun thing to come upon.

My favorite independent reenactor, proudly wearing the dress she sewed specifically for this event. She started with this Simplicity pattern as a guideline, but modified the heck out of this thing because she had way less fabric, time, and experience than it called for. The pattern talks of boning, lining, bias tape -- all sorts of things Leah had no intention of fussing with, so she just skipped those parts of the instructions and made modifications where necessary. When it became clear that there wouldn't be enough time to finish her crocheted lace collar, she subbed in a fabric one. Cotton fabric and buttons from our stash, "petticoats" from my wedding dress storage box. :-) There's lots of room for improvement, of course, but she is ecstatic with the results and her mind is spinning with more sewing ideas. Given how many times she was stopped along the way at Sturbridge yesterday by people asking if they could take her picture (and given how many people in costume were there, the fact that she was picked out of the crowd so often is truly astounding), she certainly had a lot of encouragement as a result of her efforts!

Reenactors enjoying some shade near the blacksmith's shop while troops and spectators gather in the distance for the big battle.

Jesse with some tired reenactors after the battle, chatting it up about the weapons collections. This guy made his big gun from a kit and, like all enthusiasts, was happy to discuss its finer points as long as there was an interested audience. Jesse spent the early part of the way with the historic miniature gaming group from Boston. He discovered this group at Redcoats and Rebels last year and has since become involved with a group locally, some of whom are also members of the Boston group, so he enjoyed being welcomed back this year as an experienced historic gamer who could help other new folks learn the game.

A new experience for us this year was the comfortable feeling of being a part of it, not just visitors. We know some of the reenactors through the Nathan Hale Homestead and the fiber community, knew the gaming guys from last year and the local group, are recognized by some of the OSV staff because we've been going there forever, and just generally bumped into people we knew all over the place and found ourselves in pleasant conversation with other people everywhere we went. No doubt about it: this is one of our favorite events of the year.

Then we came home and I worked on my secret project, which hit a huge roadblock. I can't bring myself to look at it yet, but will re-evaluate later today and determine course of action. Let's just say that everybody 'round here wisely gave me lots of space by bedtime last night.

flounces

As has been the case for so many days this winter, yesterday's weather conditions caused plans to be scrapped, so the kids and I shifted to Plan B, which included a romp around NYC. We visited a science center that had a traveling exhibit we specifically wanted to see, then met up with one of my old friends for a visit with his family (baby snuggles!) and then out to lunch at an Indian buffet. While wandering around his neighborhood afterward and taking in the sights, sounds, and scents of businesses of many ethnicities, Leah ducked into an Indian sari/fabric store.

Ooh, the silks, the beadwork, the colors, the light-as-air cottons, the textures!

After a few more hours of cruising around the city, back onto the train for the start of our trip home. I did some more knitting on the Lacy Baktus du jour while the Goob oohed and ahhed over the lovely blue satin evening gown of our trainmate-in-drag. He was a totally pleasant guy who was entirely decked out for a big evening in the Big Apple, including pearl earrings, a fur jacket, and vintage evening purse.

When it was his turn to get off the train, the elbow length blue satin gloves he pulled on completed the entire ensemble. Leah admired his dress. I admired his chutzpah.

Here's a gown Leah's presently working on, made of velvet rec'd in a swap with our Rav-friend Michelle.

It's far from being finished. As a matter of fact, she's unhappy with enough aspects of it that she hesitated to let me post this pic, but I think it's beautiful, and I think she's beautiful, and, well, there you go. Seamstress, age 12. Verklempt mom who definitely needs more sleep and less work, age 44. :-)

otherwise

I blog through Picasa, which I like very much, except that it limits me to four pictures per post, so there were four neckwarmers in yesterday's post and one leftover to share today.

This is a pattern of tiny cables, knit by Leah in deep forest green alpaca along with a strand of laceweight variegated tencel that gives just enough of an accent to keep the color from being flat. Feels fantastic around the neck and alpaca is toasty warm.

When we're not slogging through technological/automotive/insurance/financial/political and other grown-up-like cruddy issues and life-suckers in the past week, there has otherwise been a continued bunch of funstuff. For instance, we've discovered the ultra-cool ukelele club in town and are participating in the monthly gatherings for playing uke (Leah's been doing the freebie beginner sessions and her continuing ed uke class will start soon), which are then opened up to the public for the last hour for a big singalong.

There are maybe 30-40 uke players in the club, who are joined by harmonica players and guys on electric bass and sax. A local dermatologist is the leading ukelele enthusiast and he is an awesome combination of great teacher, uke cheerleader, singer, musician, leader of the band, and comedian. We started going to this because Leah loves to sing, but it's actually a crazy lot of fun for anybody and now I wouldn't want to miss it either. Lots of seniors come for the singalong, but plenty of families with kids too. There are leis and Hawaiian shirts galore, ukes available to borrow, and they get you playing about five songs within the first hour of instruction. The thing I like best is that I've seen everybody from a 6-year-old girl to a maybe-90-year-old guy with a walker strumming along, wearing leis, and grinning from ear to ear, having good, old fashioned, low tech fun together. The world needs more of that, don't you think?

During the singing and playing, I get a good bit of knitting done at the uke parties. I'm about 2/3 of the way through the second Edelweiss mitten. I'm running low on red yarn, so they might become fingerless gloves instead, which is just fine with Leah.

There's also been paintball, Airsoft, the Pequot Museum, ice skating, and historic miniature gaming, all with pals, and lots of reading about a remote-controlled underwater vehicle that Scott and Jesse are planning to build. Yup, still plenty of good times to enjoy in this week of challenges.

As has become an annual tradition as soon as those first chilly autumn days arrive, the season's soapmaking is underway. I don't put any effort into selling my soap anymore, but I still have a good number of orders that come through from past years and I'm happy to oblige because I do so enjoy making soap and keeping a good stash around here for little gifts. Luckily, one of my munchkins is also an enthusiastic soapmaker who joins in every time. So nice to have his help for the >100 bars we made last night and to wake up to all the fantastic fragrances this morning.

a boy and his toys

Lixie, who has been mentioned here before, asked Scott if he could do a likeness of a person in glass. He's a cartoonist from way back and has made some lampwork heads from his imagination in the past, so he was game for the challenge. Lixie forwarded a link to one of her blog posts that cracks me up every time, comparing how her husband, Pooch, resembles a baby hedgehog! (Go ahead and click over there for a giggle. I'll wait.)

It then took a couple of tries, but a disembodied glass Pooch-like stitch marker is currently winging its way to London.

Doesn't get much more custom (or silly) than that, does it? ;-)



When he's not playing with fire and glass, Scott's lately playing with fire and food. Since the oven was still hot yesterday morning, after the pizza party of the night before, he stoked up the fire again and made a big batch of bagels (about 6 dozen, flavors including cinnamon raisin, garlic, onion) yesterday morning.

And since the oven was still warm yesterday afternoon, he popped a ham in there before he and the kids headed to the indoor water park (free admission!) again for the rainy afternoon. There are no words to describe the delectable results. Holy moly, you guys -- smoky, slightly crispy edges, falling off the bone. The ham; not the kids.

Meanwhile, we're all still raving about the egg sandwiches from the other morning. Fresh sourdough bread, toasted. Fresh local eggs rec'd as a gift from our firewood delivery guy, who sure does like Scott's cookies. Homemade honey mustard. Locally grown lettuce, crisp and cold and green. Tomatoes from one of the farmers at last week's markets. :::drool:::

I just refilled my coffee mug and noticed he's out there with a roaring fire again this morning. I wonder what he's mixing up in the bakery...

Fibery post to follow. There's just too much fun going on around here to fit it all in one post.

festivities and friends

The past few days have included:

- a tour of the 2nd floor collection at the Springfield Armory

- Christmas by Candlelight celebration at Old Sturbridge Village

- a secret project unlike anything I've ever tried before, using Honduran rosewood

- a festive afternoon with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra



- a date with my husband (gasp!), hanging with old friends, drinking good beer and seeing live music, including one guy on stage that I've been seeing for, oh, 25 years now. (Hi, Pril!)

- bead sales, soap sales, and possibly felt sales when we weren't even trying

- two starts to another baby hat in an attempt to get gauge, so far without success. Third try is planned for tonight, after I get home from working on another secret project, this time with cocobolo

- attempting to take passport renewal photos for my kids without having them look like mug shots

- lacemaking lessons and ornaments in progress

- and a teeny tiny imp who is living here for 2 weeks and getting a phenomenal amount of attention until he arrives at his permanent home with Z-man (see Santa pic above) on Christmas morning. Shhhh...this little bugger (3 lbs.) is a big secret to keep from Zach!