just up the road

Wasn't it nice of the people who run Stitches events to schedule Stitches East about 10 minutes from my house? Leah and I didn't sign up for any classes, but we figured we'd go and check out the marketplace, at least. My mom joined in for the day too, keeping an eye out for a new project for herself.

We attended a demo and fashion show, ran into many folks we know, got a kick out of seeing Scott's stitch markers for sale in the Dye Dreams booth, and did some knitting on the very silly big sock that may eventually make its way into the Guinness Book of World Records.

Leah received about a zillion compliments on her Swallowtail shawl. She bought a few Zippy pins and a skein of yarn for another lace shawl. She was in search of an especially beautiful drop spindle, but didn't find one, so she'll browse on Etsy.

My mom loved this Dream In Color experimental yarn with the finest silver thread spun into it, so she bought enough to make a good-sized shawl and some beads to add a little weight and sparkle.

As for me? Well, before we went, I browsed the stash and rediscovered so much good yarn just bursting with possibility. I also emptied my knitting bag of the five current works-in-progress. And then I didn't buy a thing. Not a single thing! Plenty of temptations at Stitches, but really, an abundance of great options already at home and I am content with that.

Excellent guacamole and appetizers to round out the day, then home for some work and a call to my Gram, who is coming to visit soon. Yippee!!

out there

This young knitter is psyched to get herself and her passion for fiber arts out there. She knit this hat for her oh-so-loved Great Grandma's (Gigi) 88th b'day a while back and shipped it off to Pennsylvania.



This is the Madison Hat, the same pattern that she made for herself last winter. She happened to have her own version of this hat with her when we were in Greece this spring and it was mighty windy up on Acropolis Hill, so she loaned her hat to Gigi to keep her toasty. Since this hat is made of mohair-merino and alpaca yarns, it's soft, fuzzy, and very warm. The last time we visited GiGi, she mentioned that she would like Leah to knit her a hat like that someday. And so she did. Exactly like that, since we had plenty of both yarns.

Leah is also getting her knitting out there by becoming an entrepreneur. The owner of a boutique in Pittsburgh has commissioned her to knit gauntlets/fingerless gloves. She knows it goes against copyright protection to sell knitwear made from someone else's pattern, so she made her first pair with an online pattern and gifted them to a friend, and she is now choosing cables and stitches from stitch dictionaries as she designs her own fingerless gloves. She's on her fourth of five commissioned pairs and having an awful lot of fun with the design possibilities. She even came up with a name for her little knitting empire, Cotton Hollow Creative, named after one of our favorite swimming holes. I just have to smile at all of this because I know somebody who earned a tidy sum, starting at around the same age, by selling crocheted clowns, taking orders of up to 30 at a time!

On her urging, we have started up a new group called the String Thing as a way to connect with other homeschooling fiber artists and those who might like to be. Through this group, we've already made some new friends, hooked up with known fiber junkie friends, heard about some cool events, and discovered some older friends with similar interests. Perfect.

She'll be demo'ing spinning and knitting at Burgis Brook Alpaca Farm at their open house this Saturday as part of National Alpaca Farm Days. I'm looking forward to the knitting time while we're there too and am hoping that the blanket-in-progress will be finished by then so I can start the project that's next in line, assuming the yarn arrives in time. The more mechanically-minded members of this family will be on a romp full of steam-powered contraptions and primitive technology that day, so when we hook back up in the evening, there will undoubtedly be a lot of enthusiastic chatter! We're all looking forward to an inspiring day out there among our peeps.

And at long last, this young knitter's Ravelry invitation arrived this week. I wasn't home when she got the invitation, but apparently she has already set up her account as cottonhollow. She hasn't added any projects or details yet, but she most certainly will, as soon as she can get the momperson to help her. Now I can quit razzing her about surfing the Ravelry goodies under my account and she can add her favorites to her own notebook, which is good because once you've been bit by the bug, there are a fantastic lot of project temptations out there.

score!

We spent Super Bowl Sunday, as has been the case for three out of the last four years, hanging with a couple hundred knitters/weavers/crocheters/spinners at Webs for their pre-game bash.

Such a fun and festive time, meeting old friends and new (in clusters like this throughout the store, down every aisle, in every nook and cranny!), enjoying the snacks, petting the pretty yarns, and working on our projects. Jesse came along because, even though he probably wouldn't admit it, he has a darn good time at these events too. My budding weaver found the loom room fascinating and had a good time chatting about yo-yos and fiber arts among the other folks enjoying the snacks. Lots of people liked his Deathflake mittens and he did proclaim it quite convenient to have a sister who knits such great stuff for him.

Leah has reached the armholes on her cabled sweater and is thrilled to be zipping along on those shorter rows. She expects to finish one front panel today and there's a bunch of snow in the forecast tomorrow, so she's setting aside a couple of Netflix DVDs and doing a happy Snoopy dance about the possibility of finishing the second front panel tomorrow.

Leslie Wind's cable needle necklace is included in this pic because it's been put to use on every single set of crossed stitches you see here and has become one of Leah's favorite and most important knitting accessories. She's also loving those Knitpicks Harmony interchangeable needles -- so pretty and so pointy for easier cabling!

She's been working pretty hard on this sweater and says that, when it's done, she's going to take a good long break from knitting. I'm curious to see how long that lasts. :-)

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I Spy 2 movie was Fahrenheit 451. I thought that would be an easy one (figuring everybody but me had already seen that movie), but nobody guessed it!