Peaceful Knitter

Vacations are great, but nothing beats that moment when your head hits the pillows on your own bed, not some strange hotel mattress or an unfamiliar futon, but your own sweet nest of pillows, sheets, and blankets.

Of course, I slept like ass last night, but at least I did it in the comfort of my own bed!

The past two weeks were filled with great moments, one highlight being meeting my nephew for the first time.

Little Jackson is such a wonderful baby, and a welcome addition to our family.  He hardly ever cries, lets his parents sleep for up to 4-5 hours at a stretch, and loves to cuddle with his auntie.  All good things in my book!  Plus he loved to squeeze my fingers when I held him, and I am a sucker for little baby hands.

We also spent some time in Oregon at the coast near Florence, acted as matron of honor, stayed at a ritzy downtown hotel in Portland, and ate Voodoo Doughnuts.  That’s a bacon maple bar in my hands; moments later it disappeared….imagine crispy bacon, pancakes, and maple syrup together in one bit and you’ll understand why it didn’t last long.

Also, this was about 7:30 am the morning of my friend’s wedding; we made a pit stop before heading over to her house for hair & makeup.  It was a great start to the day.  Later we looked like this:

It was wonderful to see our families, reconnect with old friends, and visit the great Western frontier.  Home is great too, and I am looking forward to getting into a summer routine of gardening, drinking excess amounts of iced tea, and maybe even knitting a little…

*Sweetie took all of the photos, except for the shot of us together which was taken courtesy of Brandon, our friendly table-mate at the wedding reception.

I’m headed out of town on another adventure for a couple of weeks.  This requires a lot of planning, from reservations and car rentals to making sure I pack anything I might need over the course of a two-week vacation.  While running through my mental list of To-Do’s, I only just came across Vacation Knitting.

As knitters we all know what an important packing/activity/travel subject Vacation Knitting can be.  We want that perfectly portable project that can go from airplane to car ride to movie watching with ease.  For me, this usually means something on circular needles that I can memorize.

It would come as no surprise, then, that I have some socks on the needles for just this reason!  I started these last week at Squam, having chosen the yarn from my stash for its name, Pebble Beach.  The colors seemed very lakey and appropriate, so off to camp it came.  And I’ve made good progress since.  Now I think these will be going out West with me.

Pattern: Show Off Stranded Socks (Ravelry link)

Yarn: BMFA Socks that Rock in Pebble Beach

Needles: 2-ish I believe

Mods: None so far.  I’ve made this pattern once before and recall there were a few options for the heel.  Last time I chose to carry the stitch pattern down the back of the heel.  Who knows what might happen this time!

What you don’t see in the picture is how the beige color is creating a huge flash on what I have decided will be the back of the sock.  The other colors are so beautiful together, I don’t understand why there is such a large amount of beige in the skein.  I know I could have adjusted the stitch count or alternated skeins to help combat the pooling, but I just didn’t feel like it.  Lazy knitter busted!  At least I’m back knitting, so I’ll take it how I can get it.

I also cast on the latest BMFA Rockin’ Sock Club pattern.  I love the colorway, but am not too sure about how it works with the pattern.

I’ve only done the ribbing with one element of the pattern, and it seems a bit lost.  What do you think?  If you’d like to see some great photos of this sock finished, check out Courtney’s foot here.

So, I’m heading out to Oregon and Idaho to meet my new nephew and to see my best friend from college get married.  It promises to be a wonderful time full of old friends, family, and a fair amount of travel knitting.  Look for plenty of photos at the end of the month.  Till then, knit what you love and have fun doing it!

Words are not quite managing to describe the experience I had last week at Squam Art Workshop in New Hampshire.  There were amazing artists, beautiful scenery, and fun people to meet all around.  The lake, trees, and chipmunks delighted me every day, while the people provided constant inspiration and support.  Treating myself to a grown up artsy-crafty summer camp experience was the best thing I’ve done in a long time.  And if you weren’t tempted already, know that there’s another session coming up in the fall…

I focused mainly on knitting classes with Annie Modesitt which were incredible.  I learned how to make an invisible left decrease, bobbles,yarn dreadlocks, and so much more.  Mostly I enjoyed her sense of humor, clear explanations, and general attitude about knitting.

Even though my heart belongs to knitting, I think my favorite class was with painter Marisa Haedike of Creative Thursday.  She creates the most interesting and adorable creatures in her work, both on canvas and in fabric.  Her class taught us how to take a character sketch and turn it into a Creative Character.

Thankfully I had spent the past couple of months getting to know my sewing machine because there happened to be one almost exactly like it in class.  So I was able to focus on my critter and not how to work the machine.  This was a very playful, creative exercise, one I can see myself repeating over and over.

Here’s my finished Love Bunny with her friend Beaver, a classmate’s design:

A special thank you to my lovely and generous cabin-mates who helped make my experience even better.  A couple of them even have some amazing work you can go look at here.  It was a true pleasure meeting all of you!