sheep in the city

Did that really happen?

The trip to sock summit was amazing...totally crazy...but amazing. First let me say that we were in Oregon for less than 24 hours. I can't believe that I traveled that far and all I saw was the convention center, but that is okay by me. I was there for yarn, not to sightsee! The yarn was amazing, but I have to say, the fun part for me was meeting people that I have only known through their blogs or in the comments of mine through the years. Like Amy!!! Of Good to be Girl and Splityarn Caro!! So fun! I could have just sat and talked with them for hours. (which according to my pocketbook, probably would have been the better plan.)

It's me and Amy, finally meeting after reading each others blogs for 5 years.

It's Caro!!

...and then there was the yarn. Goodness, it was as far as the eye could see, and it was awesome! I had some serious self control going on, but it was so hard not to just let loose and go crazy. Here is a look at my yarn "souvenirs".

It is Crown Mountain Farms "Sock Hop" colorway "Wish You Were Here", Sophie's Toes colorway "Just a Small Gathering of Friends (one of the dyed for glory winners for Sock Summit on Ravelry), Miss Babs colorway "BFF", Yarn Love Marianne Dashwood colorway "Bouquet", Socks that Rock colorways Valkyrie and a Rare Gem.

Now for some of the non-yarn goodies that I picked up!

Sheep mug and needle jar from Jennie the Potter, project bag from Silver Moon Studio, a few project bags from Good to be Girl, Harry Potter sock blockers from Chappy's Ebay store, sheep bobbins and an owl needle sizer from Girl on the Rocks, a little bird notions bag from Queen Bee Creations, a pint glass with the Sock Summit logo, and a Splityarn bag.
I was practically dancing a little jig when I got my hands on this bag. It's LOG people!! (does anyone else remember that Ren and Stimpy song...it's log, it's log, it's big, it's heavy, it's wood! It's log, it's log, it's better than bad, it's good!) I love my little log bag. :)

We spotted the Yarn Harlot, so of course we had to bug her for a picture. Well...because it is just what you do when you see her. Thats all folks. Our flight out of Portland was at 5:30ish...and we headed home. If you are wondering how I got all my goodies home, I came with an empty carry-on suitcase, so it came back filled up. And yes, that is a pink suitcase. :)

San Diego here I come!

Sorry for the blog silence lately. I've been knitting, really I have! I've also been cleaning and organizing my house and loft as well. Pictures later, I promise. I got some new shelves for my yarn that I am super excited about...think PINK!

I'm headed this morning to TNNA out in San Diego. Whoo hoo! If any of you are going to be there...let me know. I'll be checking my blog and email on the road!

Knitting in Arizona

My trip to Arizona was just what I needed. I don't go there to sight-see and run all over the place. I go there because I have no responsibilities and I can relax. My Dad wasn't feeling like doing much either, so he was able to rest, while my mom and I watched movies and knit. It was fabulous. On Friday (how is that already almost a week ago?) I met up with Sarah and we had lunch at Scratch Pastries. It was oh-so-yummy. I mean, check out my dessert! It was almost too pretty to eat! (ummm...but I did!)

After lunch, we headed over to Knit Happens. It was a beautiful store. There was yarn everywhere. There were people knitting in big groups. A woman was passing out homemade chocolate chip cookies. It was a little slice of heaven!

After we left Sarah (who it was so nice to meet by the way!!), we headed back to our little cozy cave of an apartment and knit some more. I worked primarily on my Christmas sweater and my ruffle scarf. Neither of which got completely done, but I made some really nice progress!

Grocery shopping...

The parents and I arrived in Arizona yesterday and on the way home from the airport we decided to get the grocery shopping out of the way. Going to the store is something I will always put off, anyway, by the time we were there, my Dad was tired and decided to just wait in the car for us. No problem. My Mom and I will just pick out a few things and be quick, or at least try to be quick. We were discussing what kind of cheese to buy when all of of a sudden my Mom starts laughing. I look up and my Dad is driving by in one of those electric carts! He got a quick lesson and was approved to drive it. Needless to say, that was one of the most fun trips to the grocery store I've had in a long time. The picture below is typical behavior for my Dad...he'a a total goofball.

Today my Mom and I are meeting up with Sarah to check out a new yarn shop here. I can't wait! I just found out that it's snowing back at home, which makes me all the more glad that I'm in Arizona!

YarnCon loot...

I think that many of you were expecting me to come home with a ton of yarn and piddleloop bags and various other stuff. Well...I didn't go that crazy. What came over me? The yarn above is Sophie's Toes. It is the only yarn that I ended up buying at YarnCon. Isn't it gorgeous though? I had been told to watch out for this booth specifically and I'm sure glad that I did. The color is Deep Rose. I'm thinking it may end up needing to be a shawl of some sort. It was great to meet Emily, who besides dying yarn, is an amazing quilter. (the quilting came first actually...she even dyes her own fabric!) Check out the picture of the Barn Raising blanket that she's making that matches a quilt that she made! It's completely inspiring and makes me want to rethink my own barn raising blanket. Here's another link to her etsy shop.

I also picked up these lovely flower pins made from recycled sweaters. Aren't they fun? The one on the back left is going to permanently live on my orange tweed winter coat.

I got to meet Mickey, a long time reader of this blog, which was a fun surprise. (she participated in knitting 2 squares for my Dad's afghan and also made me the tiny red earrings) What a sweet woman. She gifted me with the lovely drop spindle and fiber you see above. Thanks again Mickey, it was nice to finally meet you!

See. I didn't go too crazy with the piddleloop bags! Before the girls that saw me buy a lot more bags than this tattle on me. Yes, I did buy many more bags than you see here, but they weren't for me. 5 girls sent me with money...so I bought each of them a bag. Then there was my mom, who I bought 2 bags for...but she ended up with 3?! :) Funny how that happens. Last but not least, I bought one of these aprons to wear when I work at the shop. I guess that pretty much sums it up.

What's up and where have I been?

I've had a fun filled and exciting couple of weeks...sorry to have neglected the blog though. It all started with a long weekend in the mountains that turned into a mini family reunion. I just love fall in the Colorado mountains. There just isn't anything prettier than the aspen leaves when they turn colors. It was the height of the change the weekend that we were up there, so we all got to experience it.

This past weekend I was up in Chicago, visiting old friends, and making new ones. I was able to deliver a finished Tulips sweater to my friends John and Julie and at the same time, spend the day on Saturday hanging out at YarnCon. It was a blast to say the least!! One of the highlights to me was meeting Ann Shayne, co-author of the Mason-Dixon books and blog! I have "known" these lovely ladies for years through their hilarious blog and when I found out that they would be in Chicago, I was thrilled. Here I am, pictured with Ann at YarnCon, looking extremely short. :) It was wonderful meeting you Ann...and if there had been more time, I can totally see myself sitting and chatting and knitting with you. Oh, if only Nashville wasn't so far away. By the way, the new book is amazing. I want to knit a bunch of stuff out of it already, specifically the Kiki Mariko rug. I have tons of feltable wool just laying around, waiting to become something fabulous...and this just might be it! I have it on good authority that Colorful Yarns has a whole stack of these books just waiting to go home with people. Go on in and get one!

Moving on. YarnCon. It rocked! I loved hanging out with the Piddleloop Sewing Team. Even more fun was meeting up with a bunch of the Ravelry "Friends of P" group. I can now put faces with the names of all the girls I chat with in that group. So fun. The booth next to ours was empty, so we just set up shop and knit and had a generally great time getting to know each other. I love meeting new people, can you tell? I got to meet Franklin. Enough said. I asked if he was ever going to come to Colorado and he said that he hoped to! There were just too many other cool people and booths to mention and I didn't take nearly enough pictures. (why is it that I always realize that I didn't take enough pictures when I'm home already?) I'll share all the details of my purchases in a later post. Again, sorry for the blog silence. I'm back into the swing of normal life, I think, so I should be able to get back into this regular blog writing thing.

My first Christmas FO!!

I have finished the first in my list of holiday knits...and no it's not the big gift that I'm giving. (which many of you know about) But still...I can check one off the list! Yay! It's such a good feeling to be getting things done! My Mom brought down 3 sweaters (one for her and 2 baby sweaters) that just needed to be sewn up, so she's coming home with at least 3 FO's. We are on a roll!

Yesterday my Mom and I ran over to Jessica Knits, my favorite local Arizona yarn shop, and stayed for a couple hours. We looked through patterns, and books, and sale yarn. Plus they had a trunk show from Lace Style visiting the shop. I picked up an old Rowan magazine that I had been searching for and my Mom got a sweet deal on some chunky Rowan Tweed. I did walk out with one super fun thing...my new necklace! Love it. Gotta get back to my knitting, have a great weekend!

Just a few projects...

I have been making some good progress on the projects that I brought with me to Arizona...and I still have 3.5 days down here to knit. I actually have finished a surprise gift that I haven't talked about yet, and probably won't since the recipient reads this blog! Yay for finished Christmas gifts! My other Christmas knitting is progressing nicely. It looks like I'll be finishing up all the stuff that I want to give at Christmas on time. I think my Mom and I are going to hang and knit at the apartment this morning and then venture out to some knit shops/knitting related shops this afternoon. I still need to hit up IKEA...since for some crazy reason, Denver still doesn't have one. Hope that everyone is recovering from Turkey day. Okay...off to go and knit some more!

Happy Turkey Day!

My parents and I arrived in Arizona on Tuesday afternoon, just as the snow was arriving back home in Denver. Since it was such a heavy travel day, there were lots of people at the airport. I had plenty to keep me occupied though...just a few knitting projects that were all being toted to Arizona in my Piddleloop bags. Yes, my name is Stacey, and I'm addicted to Piddleloop.

My Mom and I have done some serious shopping, which we actually haven't done together in a while. We did some damage at Old Navy and The GAP. I bought something that I love, and hope to get a lot of use out of. It's something that I never would have made for myself...it's a knitted dress! Mine is a little longer than the one pictured...mostly because I'm not 6 feet tall like the model! I picture wearing this over a pair of jeans or with tights and boots. I don't have the boots yet...but maybe that will happen later this week. *wink wink* Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Picture time!

First trip...Russia. Honestly I didn't take that many pictures. It was a bit of a rushed trip and I was busy helping my cousin with the baby, etc. But here are a few of them.

I started the Central Park Hoodie while flying across the Atlantic. I thought that it was very appropriate to be knitting with Peace Fleece yarn while traveling through Russia!

You can see a bunch of my pictures in a slide show here. Make sure that you click on the "i" in the middle of the page to see what I've labeled each picture. Go watch the slide show!

Little Isabelle, all bundled up and ready to go outside in the cold. This little snowsuit even had bunny ears! It was too cute.

Here is a mosaic of some of my favorite images from Russia.

Second trip...Chicago!

Look at my photos as a slide show. Again, these are just a sampling of the photos that I took, and actually one whole day in the city my camera ran out of batteries and I'm still waiting on my friends to send me their pics. Here goes.

I picked up a new bag at Colorful Yarns before I left for the trip, it's a Tepper Jackson. (because I needed a new travel bag! Ha!) There is the beautiful new Koigu. Yummy!

Home again, home again...

I am back from Chicago, and as much fun as I had, it feels great to be back at home. I'm not going on any more trips (that I know of) until Thanksgiving, when my parents and I are heading to Scottsdale, just the three of us. The rest of the siblings are going to their in-laws. Sometimes it's great being single.

So Chicago. What a great place. I have to say, it was one of my favorite cities that I've visited in the last few years. My friend Julie picked up RayLynn and I, we dumped our bags at her house, and took off exploring. We ate lunch at Crust. Yum. Good food and all certified organic. Then we wandered down the street and found a little gem of a store called Paperdoll. Oh my. I was overwhelmed with little goodies to buy, but I held myself back. I did buy a bag there though. It's covered in Donuts and is the cutest thing. Seriously. Frivolous and fun...just what I like!

From there we headed to Loopy Yarns. Once we found it (right in front of our faces!) and found a parking spot...the bigger challenge in Chicago...we headed in. What a charming spot. Friendly people, lovely yarns, and then WHAM! They have Koigu! I am in knitters heaven! Ahhh, Koigu, how I love thee. I walked out with a lighter step, but maybe that was just because my wallet was lightened too?!

All of this happened on Friday, the day that we arrived. I loved that we still had 2 full days to hang out and play! I didn't love getting up at 4:00am Denver time to get to the airport, but it was worth it in the end. My friend Julie is an amazing cook, something that I haven't been able to experience first hand very often since she has always lived far away. Mmmm, mmm, good! She can cook! I came home with a few of her recipes for cheese garlic biscuits, black bean salsa, chicken enchiladas, cinnamon rolls, chicken artichoke lasagna, and many more. Being around her makes me want to cook more. We'll see how that plan takes shape.

Saturday I got to meet up with Jen, of Piddleloop fame. (you know, the wonder-girl who made my goldfish bag) I made what she called a "rockstar" pickup, meaning that I picked up my purchases in person...so I got some extra goodies. So fun! I bought a couple things. Like maybe a few bags for myself and one for my mom...and then maybe a couple little bags that had sheep on them. My iPhoto is still acting weird so I'm not loading any new pictures on my computer...I "borrowed" these photos from Jen's blog, saved to my own server of course. Anywhoo...I'm planning a big Russia/Chicago photo post as soon as my brother helps me with my computer. It was so fun meeting you Jen, and if you haven't visited her shop...what are you waiting for?! She does awesome stuff! Get over there!

**One goal I have for the month of November...post more than 5 times. Including this post, I will have posted a measly 5 times! That is a pathetic showing...at least for me. I want to get back to posting at least every other day. So, I'm going to try!**

Chicago anyone?

I'm headed to the windy city tomorrow morning and I'll be there all weekend! A few knit shops have been recommended to me, Arcadia Knitting and Loopy Yarns. Are there other shops that I should try to make it to? Is there anyone out there that would like to meet up at any of these stores? I'm traveling with my good friend RayLynn, who I taught to knit years ago...and she is now addicted to knitting almost as much as I am. (although she still only works on one project at a time...I'm so proud!) We are staying with good friends who live in Chicago about 10 minutes from downtown. I will be in town all day on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday...then it's back to Denver on Monday afternoon. I'd love to meet some Chicago-area knitters if it's at all possible! Email me if you want to try and get together! sheepinthecity AT gmail DOT com

*the picture above was taken in June of '05 when we had both finished our Clapotis scarves...which we started together on a previous trip to California. RayLynn is the best traveling buddy a girl could have!*

Russia...

*Just to warn you...my iPhoto is acting weird and not letting me export pictures. So this post will be picture less. No fear, I will post many, many pictures soon!*

I've been home for a week now, and I finally feel up to writing about my trip to Russia. I was completely wiped out by the flights home, this was definitely the longest trip as far as flights go that I've ever been on. I was traveling for a total of 30 hours, including layovers and delays. Getting readjusted to the time difference was killer. Enough complaining though...I'm home and back in the swing of things. My sister and her family moved to their new house this past weekend and my parents move to their new house next weekend. It's a little crazy around here and that is why the blog has been on hold. It will be so nice to have everyone in my family settled in to their new homes and we can all get back to a normal schedule, whatever that is. :) Oh, and did I mention that I'm going on a trip to Chicago this weekend with my friend RayLynn? Crazy! This trip has been on the books since mid-summer...I've never been to Chicago before and I'm thrilled to be spending time with RayLynn.

Oh...so you want to hear about my trip, huh? It was a whirlwind to say the least. We arrived in Moscow on Saturday night after the sun went down and the next morning we left to fly to Samara before the sun came up...so I didn't see much of Moscow on the first leg of the trip. We touched down in Samara and immediately were picked up by a driver and translator and driven to the orphanage. We did get a chance to tour some parts of the orphanage, where the babies lived in particular. Overall, it was a lot better than I expected. They had about 10 toddlers and infants. The women working there seemed to be very friendly and even though we couldn't communicate (the translator had gone off to have tea) it seemed like they really cared for the babies. Pretty soon, we were able to leave with the baby...and head back to the city of Samara. Let me just comment on the driving over in Russia for a moment. It is CRAZY! I never would want to drive a car there. I'd much rather have someone who is used to the way things go driving me around. In a lane that looks like a 4 lane road, there would be six lanes of traffic. At a light where it looked like there was room for maybe 3 cars, there would be at least 5. And shoulders on the road? Those are actually just another lane to drive in. Sidewalks? Those are actually the perfect place to park your car?! The craziest part is that they don't require for children to be in a car seat, so when we left the orphanage Terri just held the baby. I looked at her at one point, as were flying down the road, going who knows how fast, and said, doesn't this feel wrong? No car seat and all the crazy drivers. We did make it safely back to the city. It was a little scary though. The first night was a bit of a challenge, trying to get the her to eat, but everything worked out in the end. My cousin Terri is a first time Mom...so she's just figuring things out as she goes. We were in Samara until Tuesday doing paperwork and waiting for her passport. I was definitely ready to head to Moscow...to get back to the city!

We stayed in an apartment in downtown Moscow. Terri took care of all the arrangements, but I guess it was cheaper to rent a short term apartment than to stay at a hotel. So we had a little kitchen and a big bathroom and a washing machine. (which came in very handy for the babies clothes, etc.) It felt like we were right in the heart of the city, I loved it! We were very near Arbot Street, which is geared towards tourists, but it was fun to walk through that area. I picked up many a souvenir there. The weather in Moscow was much cooler than I was expecting. Oops. I really should have brought a warmer coat. It rained alot in the afternoons and once it even snowed! That was kind of cool...we were there for the first snow of the season!

Overall, I had a fun trip. I loved experiencing and being submerged in a new culture. I love that I now have stamps in my passport. But what I love best, is being back home with friends and family...and of course Jesse, my big kitty. No matter how exciting a new place is, there really is no place like home!

It's go time!

The day has arrived, I'm headed to Russia this afternoon. I'll be posting from the road at least once, but I'm not too sure that I'll be able to upload any pictures. Until then, knit on and I'll be back in the states on the 14th!

I've been meaning to post this picture of Jesse for a few weeks now. It has nothing to do with my trip, it's just a funny picture. I got this DVD for him on the recommendation of the Knitty Professor. Her cats love it. Seriously, this is what happens every time that I put it in the DVD player...he sits and stares. So funny. Okay...gotta run to the airport now!

*what you can't see in the picture are all the little mice on the screen. Creepy, but he loves it.*

How do you say yarn in Russian?

Exciting news here folks! I'm going to Russia! What? When? How? I know, it's almost too exciting. I can hardly get the words out. My cousin is adopting a baby and her husband isn't able to go on this last trip, so she asked me to go with her to pick up the baby. I am completely honored that she would even ask me. Can you believe it? In about 10 days I'll be winging across the world. We'll be there for a little over a week. I'm am totally excited, can you tell?! The past few days I've been scrambling to get a Visa and all the other little details figured out. Luckily I already have my passport all in order. About three years ago I decided to get a passport for occasions just like this. You know, unexpected trips that may pop up. I never really expected to use it though. I mean, I love to travel, but currently I can't just drop everything and fly to Paris even though that's what my heart tells me to. Wow. I'm still shocked that I'm going to Russia of all places. For a girl who hasn't been outside the US before, what a way to start! (I have been to the Bahamas and to Mexico...so I should count those I guess)

I have to say, after my last post, you all had some amazing ideas for me. I now need to decide what to take on the trip with me. That is a whole other set of criteria. It can't take up too much room and it can't be too complicated, although it is a looooong flight and I will have some time to concentrate. Hmmm, I'm going to see how far I get on my deadline knitting this weekend and then I'll decide what to take with me. This is me putting off the decision making.

For those of you that have traveled to Moscow before, I'd love to have some suggestions of places that we should visit. It would be too fun to find a yarn shop over there, so if you know of any of those let me know. Now, before you think that I am nuts for thinking that I'll find a yarn shop in Moscow, I stumbled on this website this morning...so I think I have a good chance of finding something. Have a great weekend everyone!

Family fun...

*this hat was knit with Tatamy Tweed in the Carnation Tweed colorway. The pattern is from the book Itty Bitty Hats.

Well, I survived the drive to Missouri to my family reunion...and I've been telling everyone that the most well-behaved "person" on the trip was my brothers dog Oreo. Seriously. That dog is so well trained, he didn't make one noise on the whole drive across Kansas. You would think he had been drugged, but no, he just loves to be in his kennel. The whole trip was a bit of a whirlwind. We drove all day on Friday, arrived in the evening, hung out with family on Saturday and Sunday, then drove home all day on Monday. This side of my family, my Dad's side, is rather large. He has 5 brothers and 1 sister. Adding them all up, I have 29 first cousins. More than half of them came. Of those 29 first cousins...about half of them now have children of their own, 37 kids to be exact. This was definitely a rowdy reunion with kids running around everywhere! Tons of fun.

*this is little Liam, just one of the grubby kids crawling around, getting all kinds of dirty...but having so much fun!*

While we were all gathered together, we took the opportunity to have a baby shower for my cousin who is adopting a little girl from Russia. The hat pictured above was knit for her special little girl, who if all things go well, should be here in a month or two! Another one of the really special times was on Sunday morning when my Dad preached a message and then all the family had a neat share time. Let's just say, many tears were shed. It was very special. I never get tired of hearing my Dad speak.

I did get to knit quite a bit on this trip. Yes, the picture above is my Sienna Cardigan...and that is the collar that I am knitting! That is the last thing that I have to do before setting in the sleeves and seaming up the sides. Am I excited...umm, yes, just a little! I can't wait for this sweater to be off the needles.

I didn't get a chance to visit any of my favorite knit shops in KC, but no trip would be complete without a little sheepy/knitting memento. This one was found in a unlikely place...a shoe store! Check out my new kicks. Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star Low Tops...with sheep on them! (click here for a close-up of the black sheep!) It seems like you can order these shoes directly through the converse website.

*Edited to add...you can also order them here from Zappos! Thanks Christy!

When I arrived home, there was a big box waiting for me, filled with knitterly goodness...I'll tell you all about it tomorrow!

Family Reunion Time!

Oh yes, it's that time of year. Family reunion time! We are headed to Kansas City in this big van...it's going to be my sister, her husband and 2 kids, my brother and his wife and their large dog...oh and me. I'm sure that I'll have lots to talk about next week, if we don't all kill each other on the drive across Kansas! See ya!

Day of fun...and then some!

So, something happened on our way to our day of fun around town on Friday. We decided to visit a yarn shop, Knit Wit, in Olathe. The shop was small, but jam packed with some great yarn. They had great bags too, which as you all know, is a make it or break it deal with me. I like to see good knitting bags when I visit a store! This wasn't the problem though. The problem was, when we decided to go to a 12:15 showing of Pirates of the Carribean. Holy cow! We walked out of the theater at 3:15! The day was mostly gone?! I'm not sure why we didn't look at the playing time on the movie...but oh well. We chucked our plan and went back to RayLynn's place to just hang and knit. So funny. We had spent the whole evening before mapping out our plan of which part of the city to go to first and which stores were worthy of a stop. Sheesh. After the movie, we scrapped the whole thing.

Saturday dawned, and we drove down to Springfield for a wedding and stayed over with family for the night. Sunday, Alice woke me up at the crack of dawn...so RayLynn and I ended up getting a much earlier start back to Kansas City than I expected. On the drive up, I ripped a chunk of my Molly Ringwald out. I decided to lengthen it...so off the needles it flew. It has been raining off and on here the last few days, but we've managed to do a few outdoor activities. Sunday we headed to The Plaza and did some touristy things.

Starting with lunch at Winstead's. This is a diner that my grandparents went to on dates, my Mom went after school with her friends in high school, and I grew up visiting. It's totally nostalgic for me. I get a Limeade, grilled cheese, and a 50/50. (that's half fries and half onion rings for those of you that don't speak diner!) Yum! Then we walked around a bit and took some pictures by one of the most famous fountains in KC. Gotta love the strange looks that people give you when you are knitting in public...it's so funny. Some people will actually ask you what you are doing, where others just stare. More talk about my Kansas City adventures later!

Cheetoh's, Cherry Coke, & Teletubbies

These are the things that made the drive to Missouri bearable to us all. Cheetoh's for Alice. She held that bag in her lap and it was almost as big as she is. Cherry Coke for me. Somedays I'd like to just hook up an IV. Mmmm...I love a good cherry coke from the fountain with lots of ice. The teletubbies were for Liam. We could get at least 45 minutes to an hour of semi quite time out a Teletubbie dvd. Poor little guy. He hates the car on a regular day, let alone when we are in it all day.

On Thursday I made it down to The Studio and picked up the makings for a little swirl hat. I couldn't resist the mint chocolate swirly cuteness. I'm planning on making a couple of these for Kaps for Kendall and I've already started one for Alice out of Nashua Cilantro. You can see in the picture below that I am knitting on it while on a walk with my family. My cousin thought that this was so funny, he had to take a picture of it. You can also see a closeup of my new haircut in that shot. (click here for the closeup) I've got a big day planned today with RayLynn...we're making the rounds of all my favorite places in Kansas City. More on that later!

I came, I saw, I got blisters.

TNNA was awesome. Let me start out by saying that. It was so much fun to see all that yarn in one place...and know that the vendors were all there to sell themselves to us. And the knitting celebrities were everywhere. I got to meet Lexie Barnes, Larisa of Offhand Designs, Norah Gaughan, Stephanie Japel, Nicky Epstein, Erika Knight, Mel Clark, Teva Durham, Annie Modesitt, and Brandon Mably. That'a just the beginning of it though...they were everywhere!

So, the trip started with Tiffany and I leaving Denver in the afternoon on Friday...leaving behind snow and 1 degree weather. Seriously. It was 1 degree out when we took off. Crazy. Needless to say, we were excited to get to California. I managed to cast on for a sock on the plane, but soon enough, turbulance and yucky feelings overwhelmed me and the sock got put away. Once we arrived, checked into our amazing accomodations, (we had a corner room from which we could see the marina and all of downtown...amazing!) and registered at the convention center, Tiffany and I explored the GasLamp district.

Saturday is all a blur to me. I woke up super early, headed downstairs to the Starbucks in the lobby and knit while I ate breakfast and chatted with my Mom via cellphone. Have I mentioned that there was a Starbucks in the lobby? I love that! Since we thought the show started at 9:00am and it actually started at 10:00am, we had some time to burn. Who happened to be sitting next to us...it was Mim! From Mim Knits, and she was wearing her Icarus Shawl. I got to touch and feel it...and now I need to make one, but that will have to wait.

From 10:00am until 6:00pm we were on the move, going from one vendor to the next...searching for the perfect yarn or accessories to order and have at the shop. Have I mentioned how much fun it was? I was in shopping heaven, and it didn't even bother me that I couldn't take any of it home with me. After eating dinner, we went back to the room and just crashed. Sunday was more of the same...a race to see it all and make our flight, not to mention fit everything into our bags!

There were a record number of free books given away this year at the show...Tiffany thought that maybe we'd get 4 or 5 books apiece, but take a look at this:

Because TNNA doesn't allow cameras on the show room floor, I wasn't able to document the event like I would have normally, but believe me, it was amazing! Here's what my sock looked like on the plane ride home...and I'm thinking that it's going to get ripped. Too loose. Can't see the pattern. Not a happy sock. I also just so happened to be sitting next to another fiber celebrity on the flight home, but that's another story.

Why I'd knit more in Boston...

Two words. Public. Transportation. Although Cynthia has her car in Boston, for the most part, we rode the train everywhere we needed to go. That meant at least 20-30 minutes of knitting time, each way, that I wouldn't have normally had. Who wouldn't want to knit on their way somewhere, instead of being the one driving? Okay, so I know that some of you know that my commute to work is only like, 2 minutes, but I'm trying to prove a point here! There seemed to be more "extra" time to knit. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

I had to take a picture of Lucia's daughter, Miss B. at Rhinebeck. Dude, she was knitting with pencils...it doesn't get cooler than that!

Here's my last picture from Rhinebeck...which I totally snagged off of Jeni's blog, but it's the only one that I liked of all three of us together. This trip was so fun...I still can't believe that I went clear across the country in pursuit of fiber, but I'm so glad that I did!

Yarn details

This is what you've all been waiting for! The yarn details!

Socks that Rock...yes, indeed they do! We were within the first 10 people in the Fold booth on Saturday morning so I managed to get by greedy little hands on 4 skeins for myself, 1 skein for my mom, and 2 skeins for a friend that so kindly gave me money to shop for her. (it really is great fun to spend someone else's money!)

Details: From left to right, the colors are: 2 skeins of Rhodonite, Harlotty, and Lucy. Yes, I meant to buy two skeins of the same color...these are destined to be either knee-highs or a lacy shawl of some sort. I'm always happy to hear suggestions, so suggest away!
Website: Blue Moon Fiber Arts

Spirit Trail Fiberworks: This colorway spoke my name and it just had to come home with me. I wish that you could feel this yarn...it is so soft!
Details: 100% Superwash Merino, 200 yds, 21-26 sts/4" on a US 3-6
Website: Spirit Trail Fiberworks

Pucker Brush Farm: This was a total impulse buy and I have to say it is one of my favorite purchases. I bought this when I was trailing behind Cynthia and Jeni, taking my sweet time. This happened a lot over the course of the day, and then they would call my cell phone and ask where I was...and we'd find each other! This system seemed to work for us.
Details: I don't have many details on the yarn except that it's Merino and Mohair and approximately 230 yards. I bought both of the skeins that they had. I'm thinking that I may make mittens or Pop-up Paws out of this yarn.
Website: Pucker Brush Farm

Shelridge Farms: Another one of my favorite yarn vendors. They had so many samples to look at and touch and feel...even try on! I bought 2 hat patterns, the Carousel Cap and Riblets and 7 skeins of the Soft Touch Ultra. Why are there only 5 skeins in the picture? Because my mom snagged the 2 skeins of pink!

Details: Shelridge Soft Touch Ultra, 100% wool fingering weight yarn. The skeins are approx. 190 yards (I'm guessing a little on this!)From left to right the colors are: Green Apple, Lemon Lime, Pumpkin, Apricot, and Coral. The three orangey skeins are going to be made into a 3 color ribbed hat, going from dark at the brim to light at the top. The green skeins are destined for the Carousel Cap which has a pattern that swirls around your head and has beads at the brim. I still need to find the perfect beads to go with this one.
Website: Shelridge Farms

Skaska Designs: I came all the way to New York to buy yarn from Colorado! I think that this is rather funny...but I just had to have some and I really don't remember seeing this yarn at Estes last summer.

Details: 100% Fine Wool, 1200 yards (wow!), for $15.00 (double wow!) Colors FO3602 and FO3601
Website: Skaska Designs Limited

Here's the yarn that I picked up on the way to Rhinebeck at Webs:

2 bags of Elsebeth Lavold Silky Tweed in Color 06 to make a garment of some kind. I'm thinking sweater, I'm thinking cables, and I'm thinking that I love this yarn! If you want to see a close up of the colr and all the little pink flecks then by all means, click for a close up!

After seeing and trying on a store sample of the Falling Leaves shawl I decided that this was a great "souvenir" project. We all know what those are, right? It's Fall, there are lots of leaves in Massachuests, this was yarn that is exclusive to Webs...these are the things that go through my head when I'm trying to justify a purchase. So, I picked out some yarn for one of my very own. You can't beat the price, it's 3.99/skein...and for the large version you only need 7 skeins...so that's a shawl/wrap for only $28.00! I like that kind of deal.

Details: Bought from Webs, Valley Yarns Stockbridge, 50% Alpaca/50% Merino, 7 skeins in the color Kiwi

Posting all these details has worn me out! I'll have to talk about the Boston portion of the trip later...and I have some pictures of the project that I've been knitting on exclusively for the last week. It's almost done!

Here's the scoop!

I now totally understand why they call it a "red-eye" flight. Jeni and I flew on a red-eye to Boston on Thursday night. We arrived bright and early at 5:30 am EST, and dropped our luggage that we didn't need at Cynthia's place and headed out to grab breakfast and get on the road to New York.

We had to stop at WEBS on our way...because we just had to! It was everything that I thought it should be...and more. This place is huge! You literally have a shopping cart (like at the grocery store) at your disposal as you walk through the place. I actually didn't do too bad while we were there. I bought enough Elsebeth Lavold Silky Tweed (color 06) to make myself a sweater, 1 skein of Noro Kureyon for my Lizard Ridge, and some of their Vally Yarn Shelbridge to make a Falling Leaf shawl. From there we headed to our hotel about half an hour away from Rhinebeck. We tried to go to sleep early so that we'd all be rested the next morning...but we were all too excited. Of course, we got up way too early, but again with the excitement. The day of Rhinebeck was finally here!

The festival itself was huge. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but this place was gorgeous. There were beautiful Fall leaves and colors everywhere. The weather was perfect, and then there was the part about being surrounded as far as the eye could see by fibery goodness. I think we were all in heaven...yarn heaven that is! We had arrived a little...ok, alot early...so we browsed around, scoping things out, and taking cute sheep pictures. They really are so cute, it almost makes me want to be a farmer, almost. Who am I kidding? I'll settle for cute pictures.

I met tons of fun bloggers at the blogger meet-up. It was total chaos though. A lot of the people were running around trying to find bloggers that they had on their bingo card. Some were trying to have quick converstions with people that they've only known online. I was trying not to get lost in the shuffle and at the same time meet some of the people that I had in mind to meet.

Like Sarah! I finally got to meet Sarah...she's the girl who was a huge blessing to me and especially my parents while they were down at the MD Anderson Cancer Clinic in August. She is just as sweet as my Mom described to me. Since I only got to talk to her for about 5 minutes...we're going to be planning a trip for her to come and visit me in Colorado! Fun! That wasn't the only person I met though, I met Ann and Cara, Carrie, Beth, and Adrian and too many others to mention them all and...I did get to meet Stephanie. I just happened to have my mittens (that she made, remember!) with me for a photo op. Dang camera malfunction. I asked if I could take a picture of the two of us, with the mittens, and of course she obliged. Twice, the camera didn't take the picture. Of all the times to not work! Ahh! So, I had to be happy with catching a shot of her later. It works...I still got to thank her for the mittens in person.

And a shot of the back of the wedding shawl. (thanks Cynthia!)

I hardly took any photos at the festival, I think due to being overwhelmed by it all. I had yummy food, tons of laughs, and made some memories that will last a lifetime. I'm so glad that I went. Here's a shot of the yarn haul...more details to come in the next post, along with my thoughts on Boston. I'm convinced that I would get more knitting done if I lived there. I'll explain that too!

Click to see a slide show of the trip to Rhinebeck!!

I'm out of here!!

Rhinebeck...oh and Cynthia...here I come! I'm not sure that I'll be blogging from the road or not. I've thought about having my mom or sister guest blog...but then I'd have to explain everything, yada yada. So, you may hear from me, and you may not. If not...then I'll have lots to talk about when I get home next Tuesday! Have a great weekend, I know I will!!

Indiana recap!

The purpose of my trip to Indy was to see two of my good friends get married. Plus, my Dad was officiating the ceremony which is always fun! I flew into Indy on Friday (with a layover in Kansas City where RayLynn got on the same flight as me! So fun!) We got all checked in to our hotel and then headed to the rehearsal. Of course, with every wedding there seems to be a lot of down time, and we as knitters know just the thing to fill up the time! Here are my Mom and RayLynn knitting away at the church. None of us were actually in the wedding, but since we just had the one car...we were kind of stuck. But, again, the knitting came in handy!

We actually managed to make it to two knit shops on the day of the wedding on Saturday. One before the wedding, and one after the ceremony but before the reception. We're sneaky like that! The first shop that we stopped into was awesome, it's called Mass. Ave. Knit Shop. It was a huge store that had tons of great yarn and samples galore! I love it when stores have samples...and obviously it worked on all three of us because we all bought yarn to make a purse that they had on display! I could kick myself for not taking a picture of the finished bag...oh well. I'm almost done knitting mine though! With this project, I decided to stray a little from my usual color scheme. I knew that I would shock all the girls that I usually knit with because these are so not my colors, and they are so the colors that somebody else I know loves! A couple people in fact!

The yarn that I'm using is Malabrigo Aquarella which I had never seen before. It's so fast and fun to knit with! It's a sling bag that has long straps that cross over your body. You start at the tip of one strap, increasing along the way, then you knit the body for the bag, and finishing with the second strap. I had most of what you see knit in the above picture done Sunday morning. (It kind of looks like a big knitted sting ray right now) The pattern is one that the shop designed and gave out with the purchase of the yarn. I'm sure that you could call the shop and ask about the pattern, they are calling it the Malabrigo bag. It's knit on size 15 needles...so it's flying! I have a knit group to go to tonight, and I think that I should finish it. Sometimes it's just good to have an instant gratification project. I also picked up a shawl pin to wear with my Charlotte...it's perfect! It's made by the talented folks at Moving Mud. This is kind of a crappy picture, but it's mostly a pale pink color, with a little splash of a deep burgandy wine color. Perfect!

After the wedding ceremony was over, and RayLynn and I had taken the first of many goofy pictures, we headed to the reception. Since there was a yarn shop practically on the way to the reception, we had to stop! This one was called Stiches & Scones. It definitly lived up to the cuteness of it's name. I highly recommend stopping into this shop if you are in the Indianapolis area. Check out the wall of Koigu! Holy moley!

Can you believe that I walked out without a single skein?! Could I be reaching maximum capacity in my Koigu stash? Maybe it was because I was so focused on finding the perfect shawl pin. I came pretty close I think. I will be looking closer at the packaging tonight, to see exactly who it's made by. I know that it is made by Urban Tribal Wear, but I can't find these on their website. I'll look at the package it came in again and let you all know. It's really cool...it's made of polymer clay and the pin is twisted metal and beads. I also picked up a skein of ArtYarns Hand-paint Stripes yarn.

Many of you have come to expect me to bring home a new knitting bag when I go on a trip. Well, I didn't want to disappoint you...but I didn't really find anything that was unique. But, check out the bag that Mass Ave Knits gives out when you purchase yarn from them! This is what they put it all in! How cool is that? So, I guess I did get a bag while I was away!

One of the highlights of the trip for me though was getting to see my friend Stephany. She and her husband currently live in India, so I don't get to see her very often. She was the "Matron of Honor" and came all the way from India just for this wedding. Our last night in town, the three of us stayed up late talking and laughing and just being goofy in general. This picture is a perfect example of how silly girls can be together! Overall, this trip was a roaring sucess and just what I needed. I didn't realize just how much I was missing my friends until I had the chance to catch up with them.

Hopefully in the next couple of days I should have a finished Indy Malabrigo bag to show you!

I'm back!!!

I'm home from Indy...and it was a blast! I haven't had time to post about the trip yet, but I plan on writing all about it tomorrow. There was knitting, laughing, crying, eating, shopping, and much more...stay tuned to hear all about it!

Yippee! I'm going to Rhinebeck!

I can hardly stand the excitement...I'm heading to Boston in October with Jeni to visit Cynthia and it just so happens to be on the same weekend as Rhinebeck. How convenient is that?! We are so there! (and there may be another friend coming, if we can convince her to go!! Come on already! Get a plane ticket!) Have you read about Rhinebeck Bingo? I've already signed up! Can you tell how excited I am? Seriously though...let me know if you're going to be there, I'd love to meet you! Of course I'll be watching Cara's blog for updates on the big blogger meet-up! So...is it October yet?!

Baby, it's HOT oustside!

We've spent the last two afternoons at the pool, and can I just say that knitting and swimming don't really mix. My Mom almost had an accident that involved the pool and Koigu. It could have been tragic, but I yelled and got her attention just in time. Crisis averted. We did get up and around yesterday morning to run a few errands and hit the yarn shop down in Mesa called The Fiber Factory. Believe it or not... but I left the shop empty handed. What can I say, they had no Malabrigo yarn.

While we were in Mesa, I had to take Genia to the funky little coffee shop, Coffee Talk. I had been there with Amy when I was here in January and it's such a cool place. We all sat around drinking iced coffees and knitting on our Koigu-Clapotis'. Yes, you heard me, we are all knitting a Clapotis out of Koigu. This is Genia's first, my second, and my mom's THIRD! She is well and truly addicted to this pattern. She has one using Interlacements Texas (like mine), one out of SWTC Bamboo, and now one out of Koigu! Here's a shot of all three. I'd like to point out to everyone that mine is the biggest...not that it's a competition or anything!

So, about yesterday's post...of course I haven't given up the Koigu. There will be no mass distribution of my Koigu stash. I know that some of you were secretly hoping to get their hands on it, but I'm going to have to disappoint you. Sorry. I'm clearly just infatuated with this new yarn. I've had 2 skeins of it in my stash for months...but I had no idea that is was so fun to knit with. Here's a better shot of the colors I bought the other day, aren't they so springy/tulipy. I just love them all together!

It's so easy to be GREEN!

As I was knitting yesterday, I realized how much green I've been knitting with...and then it struck me! Hello Stacey! Green is this month's Project Spectrum color! I have my Mary Jane in chartruese green (finished but still not felted), my Koigu clapotis in various shades of green and other bright colors, and then a new project that I just couldn't resist after seeing Jessica knitting one at the shop. It's the stripey tote from One Skein using all that lovely Malabrgio yarn that I bought the other day. The whole base is knit with the darker green color. You guys...I can't stop knitting it. I only had Jessica wind one skein so that I wouldn't get too distracted by this project. But malabrigo is like knitting with butter (laced with crack). I think it's the softest yarn that I've ever knit with. I may never want to knit with anything else. Seriously. Koigu, who needs it if they can knit with Malabrigo? I think I may be addicted. I'm tempted to go get more as soon as they open on Wednesday. I may need an intervention.

In flight entertainment...

...was provided by the makers of Koigu, the designer of Clapotis and the authors of Mason-Dixon knitting.

First, let me just say, have you read Mason-Dixon knitting yet? If you haven't, please do yourself a favor and run out and get it! I love this book!! It reads just like their blog, which I love, plus there are tons of really cool patterns inside! Bonus! On to the second thing that I am so excited about, have you seen Cara's or Ann's square craziness? I think I'm in love! Ann's is filled with such tweedy richness...and Cara is just brillant with color. I'm keeping my eye on those two because I can't wait to see what the end result is going to look like!!

Now back to the trip...ahhh...things are so relaxed here. We all have very little agenda which makes for a nice time, not to mention more knitting time! I have already knit more hours since I've been here than I have in the previous two weeks at home. It sure feels nice to make progress on a project! I gave my mom her felted Mary Janes and she loved them!! Here they are unfelted:

Yarn: Tahki Baby in Pumpkin
Needles: Addi Turbos- size US 17's!!!
Pattern: Cozy Toe Slippers from the book Funky Knits.
Knit: In one day last week!! This project just flew off the needles! I started around 6:30pm and had them both done a few hours later! I love instant gratification projects!!

My mom liked them so much, she immediately cast on for a pair out of Brown Sheep Burly Spun so that she could see for herself how easy they are to knit! I cast on for a pair for myself out of Burly Spun as well...but mine are out of the color Limeade! The big felting session is going to take place today or tomorrow, and hopefully Illanna can come and felt her 6 pairs with us! It will be a felting party!!

As I mentioned before, we've already visited Jessica Knits. What I didn't mention is that all the yarn that we purchased is very telling about what kind of colors we are drawn to. Get ready, this is so funny to me. (by the way, Jessica Knits has Touch Me yarn on sale for $12 a ball!)

Mom:

5 skeins of "Touch Me" for a Vintage Velvet scarf, 2 skeins of Cherry Tree Hill in this gorgeous colorway!, and 1 skein of Blue Sky Cotton to make something from One Skein.

Genia:

5 skeins of "Touch Me" for a Vintage Velvet scarf, 1 skein of Cherry Tree Hill in a green colorway, and 1 skein of Blue Sky Cotton to make something from One Skein. Great minds think alike, huh?!

Me:

5 skeins of Malabrigo yarn to make the Stripey tote from One Skein and some childrens books (on sale no less!) that have knitting in them...and then on my second trip to Jessica Knits, I picked a little Koigu.

I need to go get ready to head to the pool...ta ta for now!

**If you were wondering who that third pair of feet belongs to...that's my friend Genia who came down here with us!**

And the winner is...

...Illanna, who just happens to live in Arizona and works at my favorite shop down here, Jessica Knits! How often do you get to hand deliver a blog prize in person?! It was so fun seeing her reaction! She was the second person to guess...and she got it exactly right! Down to the exact pattern and everything. She has knit at least 6 pair of these shoes herself, and I actually first saw these "clogs" on her blog. I decided to give her some of the same Tahki Baby that I made my Mom's Mary Janes out of since she hadn't tried that yet. (she's used Manos doubled, Blue Sky Bulky, Rowan Big Wool, Doubled Brown Sheep Bulky, and Brown Sheep Burly Spun!) Thanks for inspiring me to knit these Illanna! I can't wait to see what they look like all felted up!!

**I'll have pictures of my Mom with the Mary Janes and all of the pattern info in the next entry!!**

How much is too much?

As I was packing last night and this morning for my trip to Arizona, I was reminded that I am a very unrealistic packer. Both with clothing and with yarn. Does it look like I'm taking too much yarn with me? I can't decide what to cut out though. It's a problem, seriously.

Here's what I'm taking:

1. Felted Clogs: Because they are almost finished
2. Jamaica yarn: I can't wait even one more day to cast on! I'm bringing it on the plane with me! I'll be doing a little tubular cast on while in flight. (is it just me or does that sound a little bit wrong?)
3. Mystery Project 1 and 2 because as someone pointed out, it's the perfect time to work on them.
4. Rogue: Maybe I'll figure out my sizing/gauge problems (I was way too tight the first time!) Only 1 skein is going with me though.
5. Koigu Clapotis: For obvious reasons...must...have...the Koigu...at...all...times!
6. Bloggers afghan: I'm finely making some good progress, so I can't let the momentum stop!
7. Shop sample of My So Called Scarf...out of malabrigo...it's scrumptious!
8. Baby Bolero from One Skein: That baby is going to be here soon!!! I swapped out my yucky tan color that I bought first for this yummy orange one! Look at how it matches the clothes my sister bought! Soooo, cute!
9. Noro Shrug: This one is obvious. I knit with too many people who have already finished there versions ahead of me...it just needs to be done!

I told you I have a problem.

Buena Vista- part 2

I had to post the pictures that Michelle took of the 2 views we had at the Liar's Lodge where our knitting retreat was. (thanks Michelle...all my pictures from outside turned out a little too light or too dark, and yours were just right!)

View from the front:

View from the back:

It was so beautiful and relaxing. I highly recommend that everyone go on a knitting retreat at some point...it's just so cool to be surrounded by other creative people! Especially ones who are as obsessed as you are! We arrived Friday night, unpacked the car, settled in and had an amazing meal. (one of many over the weekend) Marilyn, of Black Water Abbey Yarns taught us a class on two color knitting using her Jean Purse kit. Some of us chose to put together our own colors, myself included, and it was interesting to watch how they all came together.

Mine, of course, is the pinkest one in the picture, on the left hand side:) I just loved the oranges and browns and the little bit of pink thrown in. I loved the colors so much in fact, I bought 3 skeins to make one of Marilyn's Mitered Square Tote Bags! (I'm using Chestnut, Rust, Sunset, and Pink Heather...it's going to be gorgeous!) We took a break from "class" and headed into town to the little local yarn shop, Serendipity.They just happened to be celebrating their 1st anniversary...and having a sale! Bonus! I managed to pick up a few things.

I picked up some Trekking XXL sock yarn, because I just can't get enough of this stuff, and a needlecase for my DPN's. The needlecase is from Ashland Sky and they specialize in "Knit Stick Sacks". I also received an early birthday gift from my mom, in the form of my dream bag! I have been coveting her Offhand Design bag for a while, and I've looked and looked at all the color options on their website...never quite deciding which color to choose. Well, now I have one of my very own! I love this bag.

You might be thinking, "Where's the pink? Where's the orange?" I decided to branch out a little and I love the chartruese green with the turquoise. It looks so retro...like it could have been the material that a little old lady upholstered her couch with in the 1960's. One of my favorite features is the way that it opens up. It has one of those metal "jaws" that stays open on it's own. So cool. These bags are a little pricey, but they are very well made and will last forever. It has tons of pockets inside...and I guess I could go on and on about it, but I won't! If you want to look at the other designs they make, check out Offhand Designs. The style of my bag is called the Zelda Tote.

Over the course of the weekend I was given two gifts, one from Judy, the hostess of this retreat. We all got to pick a wrapped package out of a bag...and look what I chose!! Yep! That's "Socks That Rock" in the Spring Fling colorway! My mom kept laughing at my face because I was so shocked...in a good way! Thanks again Judy!

And, as if that wasn't enough, Nachaele gifted me with some one of a kind Serendipity yarn as a thank you for inviting her on the retreat! Awww! Thanks Nachaele! The weekend continued on with lots of good food, lots of knitting, and for me, a lot of late nights and early mornings! I woke up at 6:00am each day! I immediately went downstairs to the great room and picked up my knitting. Before long we were all sitting around, drinking coffee and knitting in our pj's. What a great way to start the day! Sunday morning we had a quick class on cabling without a cable needle. I have to say, I think that I've finally got it. I've had people show me before, but this time the light went on and I understand it. Overall, the weekend was a great success, none of us wanted to leave...or maybe none of us wanted to face packing the car! Ha!

p.s...I finished my Charlotte!! I'm hoping to block it this weekend! Yippee!!

Buena Vista- part 1

This is what happens when you have 4 knitters riding in the same car to a weekend knitting retreat. We all knew that we would be working on class projects, but that didn't stop us from hauling yarn and other random stuff with us. I have to admit, I had the most "stuff" with me! (go figure) Check out the car...we couldn't have shoved anything else in there! We all laughed when we realized that we would be visiting the local yarn shop while in Buena Vista...and we'd have to get all of our purchases home somehow!

Then there were the snacks. I asked all the girls I knew that were going to bring some kind of snack food with them...and boy did they!! Check out the bounty that was the snack table!! (FYI...click the highlighted words!) There will be more tomorrow on the first day of class, a trip to the local yarn shop, and much more!

You had to know...

...that I almost always buy some sort of bag while I'm on a trip. It's just kind of a fun tradition at this point. Well, while I was in Boston I kept my eyes peeled for just the right bag. I saw a canvas bag at The Woolpack that had a sheep on it, and it was cute, but I didn't want another canvas bag. So I kept looking. I saw some cute ones at A Good Yarn, but I was more interested in yarn at that point. On the drive back to Marlborough, I saw that my mom had bought a bag and I knew that I had forgotten. I think I was in a Koigu induced stupor. So the search continued, but I wasn't holding out much hope since we weren't going to visit anymore yarn shops. Then on our final day, we decided to drive through Concord to get back into town and the airport. I'm so glad that we did! We stopped off at the Orchard House, home of the Alcott family, and the place that Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women!

We went on the tour of the house and I learned alot about the family that I didn't know before. It was interesting to hear little insights about the sisters and how Louisa incorporated them into her books. While we were browsing in the gift shop I spotted my bag! It's really tiny, but it's perfect for sock knitting. Mr. Alcott tought all of his daughters from the home, and one of the things he would do for their exercise was bend his body into the shapes of the alphabet. It fits my new sock yarn perfectly. (click to see inside the bag!)

Thanks for all the welcome home wishes. It's good to be home! I'm going to start on my Bloggers Afghan this weekend. I'm trying to decide just how to go about figuring out which yarn should go where. I'm going to lay out all the yarn on the floor and play!! Hopefully by Monday I will have made some progress and have photos of all the yarn that people have sent! This is probably one of the most fun and exciting projects I've worked on, mostly because I've met so many new people through it!! If you are still going to send yarn, there's still time, this is going to be an ongoing project and will proabably take a while to finish! Just email me and I'll give you the details and my snail mail addy.

The Lowdown on Boston

My trip to Boston was a blast! The wedding (you know, the reason for going out there) Saturday was beatuiful and the weather could not have been more perfect. The other days we were out in Boston were filled with going to historical sights, meeting knit-bloggers, and of course visiting some local shops!

On Friday, my mom and dad and I drove to Littleton, MA to meet up with Ruth at a great local shop called The Woolpack. I highly recommend this shop. They have a great selection of yarn and the atmosphere is cozy and very friendly. I found some great used books in their sale section. If I lived anywhere near Boston, I would make this yarn store one of my regular stops. My Dad settled in at the gathering table they had and made friends with Ruth's littlest one...by the end they were fast friends.

I loved meeting both Ruth and Lucia. They were kind enough to take me to two of their local yarn shops. Their kids were out of school and so we were a big group going from store to store...but it was so fun. The second store we went to, A World in Stitches, was great for the kids, it was big enough that they played hide-and-seek and could really hide! So funny. They had a big sale room with great stuff. My mom and I both were able to find some good stuff there. My mom bought yarn for at least 2 baby sweaters, and we found yarn for a poncho for my sister to wear while she's nursing. (If you know any poncho patterns that would work well for this, email me. I'd love some suggestions. We are using a worsted weight yarn, and she wants it pretty solid instead of holey like most patterns. Thanks!) My favorite purchase of the day was a pair of Serendipity needles that had little fimo hershey kisses on the end! So cute! You want to take a look...ok, click away! Friday night was the rehersal dinner at the historical Wayside Inn, and the wedding was the next day at the little Martha-Mary Chapel next door to the Inn. It was just beautiful!

Sunday, we spent some time sight-seeing in Boston, but it was cold and rainy so we didn't do as much as we had planned. Then it was time to meet up with my favorite Bostonian, Wendy! She is one of the sweetest knit-bloggers around! I had met her one other time when she made a trip out to Colorado last year, and I knew as soon as I found out that I was coming to Boston that I'd need to get in touch with her. She was very patient with me and my family as we tried to navigate our way through the unfamiliar city. We hit Circles first, where I picked up a pattern by Karabella for a really beautiful lace shawl. You tell me...doesn't this model remind you of a certain surgical intern from my favorite medical show?! Seriously...seriously!!

Next up was A Good Yarn. I had heard many good things about this shop...it's the shop that Alison, Dani, and Johanna all work at. Johanna was working on Sunday and she helped me pick out lots of yarn...what a great store!! (click to see a picture of the knitbloggers at A Good Yarn!) I found lots of goodies, including some great Koigu!!

Every other store I've been to lately either has the same colors that I already own or are almost completely depleated. So yeah, I got some Koigu! (this is as some of you may know, is my favorite travel yarn. I love to pick up a skein of it when I'm out of town. So far, this has worked on almost all of my trips!) I picked up some Misty Alpaca Lace weight yarn to make the above Karabella Shawl, some ArtYarns Handpaint Stripe to make some stripey mittens, and some Koigu...just for fun!! My Dad was getting into the yarn shop thing, he dubbed himself "The Yarn Chauffeur"! My Dad is the greatest!! At The Woolpack on Friday he was being kind of sneaky and when we got to the car he showed me a surprise that he had found for me. It was a license plate for my car that says "License to Knit" on it! I love that he thinks of little things like that! Awww, I love my Dad!

Finally, what you all have been waiting for...the loot! Here it is (sorry for the poor lighting...I really need to do something about that at my house!) Lots of books and patterns, and lots of yarn!!

I bought a lot of Alpaca on this trip...it's just so hard to resist because it's so dang soft! Here's a closeup of the bowl of Alpaca yarn. It's 4 skeins of Frog Tree Alpaca Sport weight yarn in color #28, to make a "Cape Cod Shell Scarf". (my mom and grandma are going to make one too. We didn't even notice the name of it until much later, and it's so appropriate that we bought it in Massachusetts!) 5 skeins of Misty Alpaca Lace weight in red to make the shawl I've already mentioned, and a skein of Trekking XXL that I just couldn't resist! In the next bowl is some pink handpainted wool (can't remember the info), the ArtYarns stripes in pink/brown and my orange Koigu! Love it! I have a couple other things to show off, but that will have to wait for another day. This post is long enough! I had a blast with my family, and meeting new knit-bloggers. Overall, this trip was a roaring success!!

I'm headed home!!

I'll have a full update tomorrow...I'm getting ready to board my plane in Boston. This has been a great trip and I've had a blast with my family. I met up with some wonderful knitters and managed to buy *just a little bit of yarn*. Ha! More details in the morning, so check back!!!

Headin' to Bean Town

I'm heading out to Boston in the morning for my cousin's wedding...ummm, yeah, bright and early baby. It seems like just yesterday I was in OKC for my other cousin's wedding and this trip was months and months away. And now it's here!! Of course I'm going to fit a little yarn shopping and knitting in. Ruth and Wendy have both volunteered to go shopping with me on different days. I really had to twist their arms to get them to go yarn shopping...yeah right!! Just so that this post isn't completely boring and void of knitting content, I leave you with this...a picture of me and Alice, where I swear she is learning to knit. Look at the concentration on her face! So cute. I may be blogging from the road...it just depends on the internet hook up at the hotel. Otherwise...I'll be back on Monday. Gotta go finish packing now.

**Can you believe the outcome on Project Runway??!! Holy Crap!!! Seriously...SERIOUSLY?**

I did a bad, bad thing...

...but I have to say it was for a good cause. Not that my actions are justified by that but what can I say?! I guess I have no willpower. When you combine 3 skeins of GGH Touch Me Yarn, proceeds going to the Knit For Her Cure cancer research fund, and the fact that it was bubblegum pink AND in a little pink bag, what was I to do? The whole kit was $32. That's the price of 2 skeins of Touch Me normally. Even I can do the math on that one...that equals 3 for the price of 2. My friends and I joked before we bagan this whole thing that we would likely break the stashalong if we came across Touch Me and it was on sale. This was kind of a sale?! Right? Or maybe it was just a "souvenir" of Arizona? Hmmm...I'm trying to just be honest here. I need to check with Kim, the leader of the Stash-along to see if I'm kicked out of the group. I'm pretty sure that I will be. I'm not sure what happens now. But, if I was going to break my 3 month fast...at least I did it up good with a yarn like touch me. I'm going to cast on this weekend:) It's soooo soft:)

Amy and me.

I was able to hook up with Amy while I was down in Arizona last Saturday. She took me to a great little coffee shop in Mesa called Coffee Talk. I totally forgot to take a picture of the funky teapot and teacup chandelier that they had hanging in their shop...it was so cool. It was something that I saw and then thought, "I could totally make one of those". Anywhoo, here we are:

Amy is holding the bag that I made her. The fabric was just perfect...it was orange and pink and had monkey's all over it!! This had to be a quick post, I'm swamped at work...hopefully tonight I won't just crash, I'll actually take some pictures of the knitting that I've done! This is a knitting blog, right??

Quick post before flight time.

Here's my latest bag purchase:

**Click on the above picture to see a really cool feature about this bag!!!**
I am loving this bag...it was very affordable at $25. Look what will fit into this bag just perfectly?! (click on the pink words to see) Yep, that's my Fair Isle Jazz. I am headed home today, so I'll be posting more about my trip tomorrow. I'll also have some knitting project updates!

Yarn? We don't need no stinkin' yarn!

I have visited 3 yarn stores in the last 3 days...and I haven't bought ANY yarn!! Ladies of the stashalong, you'd be so proud of me! There were even sales at two of them! I'm kind of liking the feeling I have walking out with nothing...it makes me think that there were many times in the last few years where I would buy yarn just for the sake of buying yarn. But...to be completely honest I have been buying things for another stash that I have...my fabric stash! I have been looking for a certain quilt pattern called 'Yellow Brick Road' for a few years now. The shop I went to yesterday had it as well as the Kaffe Fasset fabric. I haven't seen the Kaffe Fasset fabrics at my local quilt store, so of course I had to pick some up!!!

These are "fat quarters". I only needed 12 of them to make a lap quilt, so that's what I purchased. (I may need to go back and get some more though to make a bag for myself!! Here are a few close-up pictures of the fabric. It's going to be all pink, orange, and green fabulous!! I can't wait to get home and start putting it together!

Kim, I hope buying needles is okay with the stashalong...because I desperately needed some Addi's to get gauge on my Fair Isle Jazz (of course I had the wrong size here with me!) and I found some metal teeny tiny DPN's! Now I can be just like you! Ha! If only I could finish a pair of socks as fast as you do I'd be set!! I have more to talk about...but I'm going to save that for a later post. As a teaser...I have decided to copy a friend of mine in a great project that she's doing! It's going to be tons of fun!!! Hope everyone's having a great weekend, I know that I am and I'm getting a lot of knitting done! Off to start a movie, knit some more, or maybe just take a nap.

Baby, it's warm outside!

Hello from Arizona! I made it down here all in one piece on my first flight with Southwest. Yesterday was just their second day to be flying out of Denver! Before I left town though I got a haircut. I've been letting it grow out (why? I'm not sure?!) and it just hasn't been cooperating lately. It wasn't really doing what I wanted it to and my solution was just to pull it back all the time. I made it through all the ugly painful short layers growing out stage so the stylist actually had something to work with. You can't really see the back, but there are more layers back there and it's slightly longer in front than back. Ta da! Here it is.

She was much more patient drying and difusing my curly hair. Can you believe how she got my curls to tame down?! I looked a little bit like goldilocks or Shirley Temple. Ha! Here's a funny shot of my mom and I that I took while I was trying to take a self-portrait. Enough about my hair...I need to get back to knitting!

**I'm able to receive email here, but I'm not set up to send mail out yet. I'll just answer any questions in the comments!!**

Oklahoma: Part 2

Here's the promised tale of the rest of my trip to Oklahoma. We arrived on Friday evening just in time to go to the rehearsal dinner. It was fun to see all my cousins again...I can't believe that they are old enough to get married!! (It was my cousin Danny who got married, and he's only 21...so it's debatable if he's really old enough?!) Saturday morning we got up and the three girls all went to 2 yarn shops in Oklahoma City (thanks to my handy new guide). The first stop was at "A Gourmet Yarn Co."

They opened up in August and had a nice selection of yarn. I didn't find anything that I couldn't live without, but I did pick up the new Knit Simple magazine. From there we went to a little shop that was a combination knitting and stitching store called 'The Linen Sisters'. At this point we decided that we had enough time to drive up to Guthrie and visit S.W.A.K. (Sealed With A Kiss). Boy am I glad that we did! What an amazingly cool store, check out the inside!!

The way they displayed the yarn was so creative. They used tons of old antique dressers and kitchen cupboards. My favorite display was the huge tub of Cotton Classic:

And I do mean TUB!! Isn't that the coolest?! I picked up a book at 50% off that I've wanted for ages...it's called the Sweater Book. The weather was kind of crummy so we didn't get to walk around Guthrie, but if I make it back to OKC I'm definitely going back! The wedding was Saturday night (congratulations Danny and Ashley!!) and we headed back to Denver early Sunday morning. We stopped one more time in Salina for lunch on the way home at the neatest little Italian place just a couple doors down from the yarn shop. I highly recommend the spaghetti and meatballs if you have to drive through Salina anytime soon.

It was nice to get out of the car and relax a bit at the restaurant. We had a few laughs when my mom showed us her "progress" on her Charlotte, and my grandma replied, "well...that's real impressive." Ha! I continued working on my Charlotte until it got too dark and then I started on a little "secret" project for Alice. I was knitting by the light of the visor mirror. Has anyone else ever done that?

Whatever did I get?

I must be very predictable, or you guys know me really well!! Leah of White Lamb was the first person who guessed correctly when she said I always buy a bag when I travel. I'm not sure why I do this, but it has become a tradition and I do love a good bag. Here it is folks in all it's pink glory. May I introduce you to my new Namaste bag. It's the "Everyday" bag in their new collection. I had never seen one of these before Friday when we made a stop for lunch in Salina, Kansas and I "convinced" my dad to stop over at the local yarn shop there.

Here's the stats:
•16" L x 10" H x 8" W
•inside center zippered divider, with a total of 4 pockets on the inside and 2 on the outside of the bag.
•it came in chocolate brown, hot pink, light pink, robin's egg turquoise, and a camel brown

I had mentioned the book that my friend RayLynn got me for Christmas a few posts ago, and it surely came in handy on this trip. While we were lunching in Salina I noticed that they had a yarn shop listed...who knew?! So we headed over for a quick look while my dad gased up the car. The shop is called 'Yarns: Sold and Told' and has been open since August. It's a great big open store in downtown Salina. (it's very easy to get to off I-135. Take the Crawford exit and go north on Santa Fe) The ladies who own the shop were very friendly and helpful. My mom and I managed to find a few things while we were there. (surprise, surprise) All of the things that I got were items that I hadn't seen before! A shirt that says, "Got Yarn?" in my favorite combo, brownand pink. Little pink point protectors, and some Bryspun circular needles. Not too bad for a quick stop, huh? The shop had a huge inventory of every kind of needle out there. They had a pair of HUGE needles hanging from the ceiling as a display. It was a very creative touch. Then there was Fern. She greets people as you come in the door, too cute! Here's a shot of my mom and I with our new bags. (you didn't think that I would be the only one to come home with one, did you?)

From there we headed down to Oklahoma City and we managed to go to three more yarn shops on Saturday...but more on that later. I worked on Charlotte and made some good progress until I messed up something and I can't figure it out. So, I started and almost finished a little gift for Alice. I'll have some photos tomorrow, along with the rest of my Oklahoma adventure.

On the road again!

Well, I'm on my way home this morning and I can't wait to show everyone pictures from my trip. I managed to forget my cord to download pictures with at home, so there aren't any yet...you'll just have to wait! You'll never guess what I got at one of the three knit shops we visited?! Actually, if you can guess, in exacting detail (or close to it)...I'll send you a little prize. So, here's my hint...it's new on the market (or at least I've never seen it?!), I always buy one of theses when I'm out of town, it's in my favorite color, and it's knitting related! Okay, talk to ya later!!

Email woes & yarn pick-me-up's!

**Email woes**I had planned on getting caught up on my email while I was down here this week, but when we arrived I was informed that I couldn't send out third party emails. There went that plan. So, any of you who have left comments, I'll get back to you this weekend.

**Yarn pick-me-up**Sunday the girls headed down to Jessica Knits for a little knit shopping. Of course I needed a little yarn to remember the trip by! So I bought a skein of yarn that I had never seen before called Malabrigo Yarn. It's the softest stuff that I've ever felt. It's times like these that I wish you could reach into my computer and feel it yourself! The color is Cognac and it's approximately 215 yards of worsted weight kettle dyed pure merino wool.

I only bought one skein thinking that I would knit myself a new hat for this winter, which I will probably still do, but it looks so pretty all twisted in a little ball that I may need to swing back by tomorrow and get some more. (so that I can have one skein to just sit around and look pretty!) I love the stuff! They have such rich beautiful colors. The rest of my purchases are shown in the picture as well. I picked up some addi-Natura needles to knit my Bamboo Clapotis out of and a container of knit themed gift tags (thanks mom!) from Knitterella. The other two things lurking in the picture are my comfort foods of choice...and constant companions on vacation, Cherry Coke and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. Mmmmm...chocolate and peanut butter. I didn't realize before this trip that my grandma and I both share a love of Reeses Peanut Butter Cups.

On the knitting front, I've been making some good progress on my Harry Potter scarf. I think I just may get it done before the movie! My mom and Grandma have both been working on their respective Clapotis. They are both knitting it out of SWT Co. Bamboo.

My Grandama is actually almost done with hers. She's at the point where you are dropping two stitches, one on each end. I think she can see the light at the end of the tunnel. My mom is not far behind her, but she's had a few other projects that she's been working on, Rogue, a knitted babe, and a HiP scarf to name a few. I wonder where I get my multiple project syndrome from?! I'll be heading back to Denver on Thursday, flying home instead of driving. (thank goodness, it was fun...once, not twice) This week has been great, but it's going to feel good to be home.

Extreme Knitting?

On the second day of our road trip we made a stop to go see the Acoma Pueblo, also known as Sky City. It holds the record as the oldest continuously inhabited pueblo in the United States. And guess who knitted on top of a 357-foot sandstone mesa? That's me...and my Harry Potter scarf, that's who!!

It really was a beautiful place. There are still 14 families who live on top of the mesa year round with no electricity or running water. They live a simple life, but sometimes that sounds good to me. I think I could live anywhere as long as I had my family and something to knit on!

They have 6 natural cisterns that gather water. They are dependent on the rainfall to fill them up and what little rain they get each year does the trick. Here are some more shots of the 70 acre village.

This is the church that was built in 1629.

This is one of the many traditional bread ovens on the pueblo. How would you like this view from your kitchen?!

Lastly, we have a picture of the ladies on the trip. Three generations are represented here. Happy Monday!

Arizona bound!

We're on the road again here at Sheep in the City. I'm in route to Arizona with my mom and my grandparents, blogging from a hotel in Santa Fe. My Dad flew down yesterday, he very lovingly gave up his seat in the car so that I could go with them. Wasn't that nice?! I told him that I would be happy to fly so that he could have the time to talk to my grandpa in the car, but he said, "no no, you go, you'll have more fun." Yeah right. But I'm just glad that I got to go. We actually would have been further down the road except that we had two things holding us up. The first one was a parking lot on the highway between Monument and Larkspur. We sat there for an hour and a half. Then, in New Mexico, there were super strong winds and we saw at least 3 accidents before we got to our hotel. This morning my grandpa called over to our room and told us that the highway we had been on was closed for 4 hours last night due to another more severe accident. Thank goodness we made it to our hotel safely! We should arrive in Scotsdale this afternoon. More blogging from there!!

This is my Grandma in her cute "travelling" hat!!!

Branson and back again...

Many of you may know that I was raised in a little town called Branson, Missouri. Well, this past weekend, I had the opportunity to return and visit with a huge group of people that were gathered to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the ministry that my Dad started, Doulos Ministries. It was a great time of hanging out, telling stories, laughing, eating, and oh yeah, a little bit of knitting!

The people that I was most looking forward to seeing were the girls that I met while I was working at Shelterwood, a residential facilty for at risk teenagers, in Branson. I lived there from August of 2000 to August of 2001. It was one of the hardest, and yet most rewarding years of my life. The girls pictured below are a few of the women that I worked along side there:

I visited my favorite chinese restaurant, Hong King Buffet, with a group of girlfriends. That's Jill, Amy, Stephany, Julie, and RayLynn. As usual, my eyes are bigger than my stomach, and even though I didn't order the buffet, I still ate too much. But it was well worth it. Here in Denver every once in a while I get a craving for Hong Kong Buffets General chicken and crab cheese wontons. Mmmm...crab cheese wontons. Of course I had to take the opportunity to have some while I was in town!!

My friend Stephany finally was ready to learn to knit while I was in town. We headed to the local WalMart (horror of horrors, Branson has no yarn store!!) and grabbed some needles and yarn for her to learn with. It was fun to pass along something that I enjoy so much to my friend. Thanks Steph for being patient and for laughing through the learning process:)

It took a trip all the way to Missouri to be able to see my friend RayLynn who lives about 30 miles from my house. Sadly we've both been really busy the last few months. So of course I had to get in some good RayLynn hanging-out time on this trip. When you get so busy with life, it's easy to overlook how important spending quality time with your close friends is.

Over the course of the weekend, there were many late night gatherings. This picture is from one of those nights. That's my friend Julie sitting on my lap in a recliner. (do not try this at home folks) We almost tipped the whole chair over...which of course lead to much hysterical laughing and then tons of picture taking. Overall, I didn't get as much knitting done as I thought that I would. Thirteen hour car trips seem like the perfect time to knit, but believe it or not, and I may get kicked out of the knitters circle for this, but I kinda got bored with it. Is that blasphemy? Did I just say that I got bored with my knitting? What is wrong with me? It was fun seeing old friends, but it sure is nice to know that I'm home, and I'm not going anywhere anytime soon.

I received my needle exchange package today...so I'll be taking pictures soon!! And I should have some sock photos too:)

Have sock, will travel.

This picture is for you Stephanie!

Hello all, I made it home, in one piece. The family road trip went off without a hitch, and was actually pretty fun. I knit on my sockapal2za sock on the way down to Albuquerque, and I have to say...long road trips are made much better when you can sit in the back seat and watch this:

The movie that I'm watching was Beauty Shop, with Queen Latifah. Funny movie, great for watching in the car! The rehearsal dinner was that evening we arrived, and it was great seeing some of my cousins that I hadn't seen in years. My cousin Sherman was the one getting married, and I was so excited for him. He's in his early 40's and never been married, it was just sweet watching the two of them together. Awww.

Saturday the girls went out exploring. And what did we manage to find?! A yarn store of course!!

**insert picture of yarn store here**sorry folks, more technical difficulty...I'll have more pictures later**

Village Wool was everything a yarn store should be. I had taken 2 steps into the store, my mom was right behind me, but still outside, when I turned to her and said, "I'm in heaven!". You never know the kind of stores that you will find when you travel to other cities. Will they live up to your favorite local shop? Will they have a good selection of yarn? Will there be enough room to walk around? Let me tell you...there was! All of the above. I was even able to find some yarn that I hadn't seen before...so I had to pick some up. It was a swedish sock yarn called Marks & Kattens Clown. I'm lovin' the color combo. I also bought a pattern called the Shadow Shawl (yep. it's shadow knitting baby!) that I'm going to knit up with the Silky Wool that Cynthia gave me, and 3 skeins of Koigu from the Koigu stash. Can you say yummy?! Speaking of yummy, don't let me forget to show you the Yummy Yarns plastic "yarn" that I picked up at String a few weeks ago. It's way cool. Back to the NM loot...last but not least my mom bought me some Serendipity needles that are bamboo, size 11, and they look like they have Jawbreakers on the ends.
**insert picture of goodies here**

My mom laughingly told me that she had been checking my blog each day to see if I had posted yet, and I wanted to say, "Ma...you were with me on the trip, what do you want to read about it for?" But I didn't, I think it's fun that she wants to read my blog. Tomorrows an extra early day, I leave at 7:00am for a reunion in the town where I grew up, Branson Missouri. It's another long trip in the car, this time with people that I work with. I'll be back on Sunday night, and I hopefully will be able to blog from the road. One piece of fun news to look forward to? I received my Sockapal2za socks in the mail!! I love them! Thank you Bonnie!! (who apparently has no blog?! Bonnie...email me so that I can send you a proper thank you!!!) They are going with me on the trip, so I'll be sure to take some action shots on the road:) I already can't wait to get home from this trip and just be home. I miss my cat. I miss my routines. And I miss my TiVo. After this trip, I'm done traveling for a while.

From the road...

Well, I'm off to New Mexico with my sister, Alice, and my parents...woo hoo...8 hours in the car!! I can't remember the last time we went on a road trip. I'm sending this from McDonald's in Trinadad, Colorado. I'll have lots of photos and fun stories...I'm sure, on Monday!!!

Relaxation is sweet... (part 2)

Our little knitcation (thank you Cathi for coining that little phrase) continued on, and one of the highlights was having my friend Marilyn there. Why, you ask? A little thing called Black Water Abbey!

She brought some of the samples that she has knit up for shows and a bunch of the purse kits, it was great!! Nothing like having your own private trunk show...we even got to try on the samples. Here's Cynthia trying on a gansey, she may be making one in the future since she couldn't keep this one:)

Of course, we had lots of silly moments, because that's what happens when you get a whole bunch of girls together. Like when we wanted to go to WalMart at 3:00am to see if we could buy yarn at all hours of the day...but then they were only open until 11:00. We went anyway though, in our pj's!! Ha! It was hilarious!

The ever photogenic Cathi, who has never met a camera she wouldn't pose for! (that may sound harsh, but the girl is a huge ham when the cameras are pulled out!)
Then there is Wanda, who flees each time the cameras are pulled out. But, ha ha, I chased her down...literally, to get this picture! We were being so loud, or I should say that I was being so loud, I'm surprised they didn't send someone back to check on us!

Amy, me (in my penguin pants!), Cynthia, and Michelle were supposed to be posing with gross faces because so many of the Halloween/Fall colored fun furs are hideously ugly but no one did, except me. So I'm the freaky one in the picture...again. What we expected to find, we did. Lots and lots of fun fur. Lots and lots of novelty yarn. The only thing that kept the night from being a total bust was the fact that WalMart carries Interweave Knits. Who knew? They totally win points for that!

Sadly the group picture that the little old man who stands at the exit door took didn't come out. But, on Sunday morning my mom took a picture of all the "younger" girls out by the duck pond.

What a fun weekend! I had to pick and choose which pictures to post because I took so many! Some progress was made on both my Rogue and my sockapal2za socks. I'm going to take pictures of those soon, but right now they are both pretty unimpressive. Tomorrow I'm going to post some pretty pictures of a new yarn shop here in town that I visited on Tuesday. Gotta love having a new yarn shop just down the street from my house and work!!

Relaxation is sweet.. (part 1)

How sweet, you ask? Check it out for yourself!

These were made by Amy who I now believe can make anything...go check out the Huppa that she knit for her brothers wedding (scroll down to the June 28th entry), it's amazing! She knits, she bakes, she does it all! Thanks Amy!

My second weekend in Vail was perfect, it couldn't have been better...well, unless maybe it was a bit longer. Some of my knitting buddies came up to knit for the weekend in Vail with my mom and I, and boy oh boy did we have fun! It all started with that secret project that I was sewing up last week. They were indeed little goodie bags for all the girls.

Click on the picture to see the color-coordinated goodies inside:) There was lotion, pens, sticky notes, gum, and of course candy! Plus, my mom and I bought plain votives and candles and wrapped yarn around the votives to spruce them up. We had so much fun putting them together.
I found the pattern while I was looking for the perfect backtack project over at Thimble. She has some really great tutorials set up. I made a total of 10 zippered bags, any more would have driven me crazy...but I now have a whole new respect for all the indie crafters out there who are into production sewing. Seriously.
Here's a shot of the whole finished line up:

My mom and I were preparing for everyone to come up on Friday morning when she pulled out her collection of wine glass markers and inspiration struck. She had these beads that looked kinda like yarn balls! We had to use them:

Click for a close-up!

As far as knitting goes, it happened night and day around this place. We, of course stayed up late on Friday night...and you would expect a bunch of people on a weekend retreat to sleep in...but we didn't. Cathi brought her Espresso machine and made all of us yummy coffee drinks. Mine with more candy than coffee, just the way I like it! The knitting got started around 6:30-7:00am on Saturday morning. It just made me laugh to see a room full of women knitting away that early. Some of us moved on to making stitchmarkers later that morning, and then it was off to the local knit shop in Minturn called The Yarn Studio. I've talked about this shop before, and it's always one that we go to at least once during a visit to the mountains. This display of ArtYarns Super Merino caught my eye right away:

They make such pretty colorways, I could hardly resist, but resist I did, so no new yarn for me. I did walk away from the store inspired though. Look at this knitted ice cream cozy! What will they think of next?
Stay tuned for the second half of our weekend adventure. Get a peek at the Black Water Abbey trunk show that we had, our midnight treks to WalMart for yarn, and much more!!

Vacation crafting

I've been busy the last couple days working on a few sewing projects while I'm on vacation. It's amazing how many things that you can get done while you are relaxed and away from your everyday schedule. Here's a sneak peek at one project I finished. I can't say what they are yet:)

Before I came up to Vail, I was having a fun afternoon on Friday with two local enablers and I picked up this book and fabric to make a purse out of. I love this book!

I plan on making both the vinyl purse and the vinyl zippered bag. Of course I'll have photos of the process, I can't wait to start sewing this one up.

Next up in the craft lineup are the stitch-markers that I have to mail out to my marker mania partners. I have been a huge slacker...must get these in the mail tomorrow!! Here they are:

There's a lot of crafting going on over here at Sheep in the City! I keep meaning to take some progress shots of my Rogue, but so far it's pretty boring. Now that I have finished up some of these other projects though, rogue will get my full attention!!! I love vacation, don't you?!

Felted clogs and hardwood don't mix...

Umm, so I'm wearing my felted clogs the other night, being goofy running around and laughing with my family. I was headed to show my dad something when I slipped in those silly shoes! I fell backwards toward the steps and hit my shoulder blades then fell all the way to the floor and wacked my head on the hardwood. I caught my breath and was half laughing half crying when everyone ran over to see if I was ok. This bruise, pictured below, on my arm was the only one that showed up, but I had a whopper of a headache that night. My grandpa over the last few days keeps reminding me to be careful and that I really scared him...he's so sweet. The moral of the story is, don't run on hardwood while wearing felted clogs. It can only end in disaster!

Can't have too many, right?

I am a bag person. I freely admit this. My mom is a bag person, I get it from her. So, when Michelle was joking that she couldn't wait to see what bag I got when I was on my trip, I didn't really think anything of it. I just laughed it off like, I don't always get a bag when I'm out of town?! Well, she was right, I was wrong, I guess I do...and here's the latest! I had to go all the way to Arizona to get a bag that is made by some ladies here in Denver! That is funny to me.

I have been wanting one of these KnitOne bags for a while now. They reviewed it on the knitty website and said that they could fit 12 skeins of Koigu in the bag...so of course I had to try it out:) Guess how many skeins I fit in my bag?

Click on the picture to see the Koigu out of the bag. That's 18 skeins baby!! I didn't buy these all in Arizona, don't worry. They were part of my Koigu stockpile.

Here's a shot of the inside:

It came with a little zippered notions case too. I love this bag, it's such a fun shape, and amazingly enough, it holds a ton of stuff!!! I have been using it non-stop since I bought it and I get tons of comments about what a cute little bag it is:)

So tonight, the MHC Knitters are at it again...we are headed to Cynthia's house tonight to knit, but first we are meeting up for First Friday, where a bunch of local art galleries stay open late and serve wine and finger foods. It should be fun, have a great weekend everyone!

Arizona Adventure: part two

The story left off with me purchasing yarn at Jessica Knits, and Amy dropping me back with my parents. Both my parents and I were pretty tired at that point, so we headed back to our hotel...which happens to be one of the nicest places I've ever stayed. My Dad went up to take a nap, so my mom and I decided to knit in the lobby. The lobby? Most people wouldn't knit in the lobby of their hotel...well you would if it looked like this:

This is the fountain that cascaded down into the "lounge" of the hotel, which is pictured below. Are you starting to see what I mean? Umm, yeah...it was a nice lobby.

Here's a shot of me knitting in the lobby, waiting to see if any of the Arizona S 'n B group show up. I'm knitting on the Crumpets dress...it's still not done, but it only has inches left of stockinette to do. I'm convinced that it can still be done! (by Saturday at noon) As I'm knitting the miles of boring stockinette, I have that little voice in my head saying, "I think I can, I think I can, I know I can, I know I can". I'm waiting for it to start saying, "I knew you could, I knew you could." Back to the Arizona story.

Alas, none of them did (maybe next time!) so I was forced to go eat dinner at a fancy Italian restaurant. Oh darn:) The next day was pretty relaxed, my dad played golf, I slept in, we ordered too much room service. Then we headed out to shop some more. We found towels, and bedding, and all sorts of goodies. That little rental car was filled to the gills!! We stopped for lunch at this restaurant:

Mmmm...yummy....food from California. Click on the picture to find out where we were eating lunch if you don't recognize the cup. It's slowly making it's way east. Maybe someday it will make it's way to Colorado. I can dream can't I?! We headed over to the apartment to unload the car and put the latest purchases away. Then it was countdown until we headed back to Denver. It was a whirlwind trip, but so much fun! I can't wait to go back and be able to enjoy the furniture that we bought and just sit and relax. I'm going to try and meet up with a few more Arizona knitters the next time I go down there...so if you live in Arizona and want to knit, email me!! We'll set it up.

These are the promised stamp pictures, along with some "Flamingo" Opal yarn that I picked up Wednesday back in Denver...more sock yarn:) I couldn't resist the title and the colorway.

You want a closeup...okay, click away!

Here's the name of the stamp store Amy and I visited on Saturday:

Stampotique
9822 N. 7th Street, Ste. 7
Phoenix, AZ 85020
602-862-0237

That's all folks...we flew out late on Sunday night...and I do mean late, due to monsoon season and the freakish weather they were having. I'll post a picture of the latest bag acquisition...you had to know that I'd get one while I was gone, right Michelle?! She predicted that I'd get a bag of some sort...and I didn't want to let her down!! Thanks everyone for all the kind welcome home emails!!

Arizona Adventure: part one

I survived my trip to Scottsdale and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it down there, despite the heat. You get used to the hot weather, and I just had to wear different clothes than I would at home, here in Colorado. I went down there to help my parents furnish an apartment that they have rented for the next year to vacation in (read, my dad and his golfing buddies can golf all winter). Hopefully I'll be visiting on a regular basis this next year!!

As soon I landed in Phoenix, we headed to IKEA to start the shopping. I loved it...and had a great time looking at the showroom. My parents enjoyed it, but they weren't as impressed as I was. They thought that it was a little too "young" for them. So, I found lots of cool things at IKEA...none of which I could buy because...ummm, they wouldn't fit on the plane:) They had some really cool displays though, and I took a picture of this one. It's a bunch of plastic collanders...but it reminds me of a chandelier by Dale Chihuly. IKEA was like eye candy to me though, I loved it! On to the next furniture store though. The next place we stopped, my parents actually found all the big furniture at, it was much more up their alley, and didn't require them to assemble anything:) I had to take a picture of my Dad in this chair (which I'm happy to say, we didn't buy!!) because it reminded me of that Lily Tomlin character Edith Ann.

This picture cracks me up everytime that I see it!

Fast forward to Saturday morning, when Amy picked me up bright and early for a day of knitting/crafting adventures! First we headed to a Craftster group that she belongs to that was meeting up and going to see a fiber related exibit at the ASU Art Museum. It was a show of Mark Newport's work. I love visiting Art Museums when I travel...and to have this one displaying knitted stuff...knitted superhero costumes no less, was awesome! Some of you may remember seeing his stuff in an old issue of Interweave, I think. What a creative guy!

Amy and I were both inspired by his embroidered comic books. She just picked up a needle punch tool at a thrift shop for a couple bucks, and I have had a set for about a year...so don't be surprised if you see us doing some crazy embroidery around here. Go check out Amy's blog to see a funny picture of me, another crafty lady, and a book that is just about the funniest thing I've ever seen!!
Amy presented me with a Scottsdale Survival kit that included:

•Sunscreen...recommended 100spf, but 30 would do
•Eye Moisturizer...in case any desert sand gets in your eyes
•Aloe...for when I get burnt by the blazing Arizona sun
•Pepto Bismal...for all the spicy SouthWestern/Mexican food
•and last, some Hand Sanitizer, for all "questionable" surface contacts
What a cute idea!! Thanks Amy!!

From the museum we headed to the stamp store, where I reconnected with my inner stamper from days of old. I used to love stamping. Seeing some of the amazing things that they had on display was again...inspiring! I did buy a "few" stamps, but darn it all if I didn't leave them at my house, so there will be no picture today. There was a sheep stamp (had to have it), a monkey stamp, a Frida stamp, and an alphabet set. It's time for me to pull out all my old stamps, like another blogger I know. We headed to lunch at Flo's, Amy's favorite chinese restaurant, that I have to agree is pretty amazing. I liked it so much I wanted to take my parents back there for lunch on Sunday, but they didn't open until 4:00, so we were out of luck.

So, when did we hit the knit shop, you ask? Well, we saved the best for last of course! We headed over to what I think may be the cutest knit shop I've been in recently, Jessica Knits. The shop was well lit, had multiple seating areas, fun displays, and just about every yarn you could want.

(Sorry for the fuzzy picture...it's what happens when other people use my camera) They have a great selection of Koigu, Rowan, Lorna's Laces, and everything in between. They even had some stuff that I had never seen before, and I feel like sometimes that I've seen it all. I could have just looked and touched and played with yarn all day but I needed to get back to help my parents, and Amy had to go home and get dolled up for a night on the town. So, it was decision time! I needed to restrain myself, put back the multiple colorways of Koigu that I had in my big silver galvanized bucket (yes, they give you huge buckets to fill with yarn while you are shopping...very smart, that Jessica) and make a decision. So here's what I decided on:

Pretty, pretty Koigu in a color that I had never seen before, I bought three skeins. It's color 713. I think I'm in love. Can you love an inanimate object? Have I finally lost my mind, due to too much knitting and fondling yarn? Maybe. But, I had socks on the brain, so I got myself some sock yarn. I've never used Lang Yarns sock yarn before, so that will be fun to try out. I picked up 2 skeins in color number 0158. A Fushia/purple and light/dark gray colorway. There are more adventure stories to come, but I need to post this already...so stay tuned for more about my trip to Arizona. Pictures of the place we stayed, the most beautiful hotel I've ever stayed in and what I got when I went back to the knit shop for a second time! Of course I had to take my mom back to the store:)

I'm home!

I got home late on Sunday night, my flight was delayed due to weather in Phoenix. It's monsoon season down there...this I did not know! I've been lazy about writing and posting photos of the trip, but I have many to share and much to tell you about! I'll be putting together a little vacation run down in the days to come. I may have to split it up so that I don't overwhelm you with photos, but I'll leave you with this:

Oh yes, I have been to IKEA. It was just as cool as everyone told me. My only regret was that my luggage needed to be a little bigger, and the airlines should allow people to carry on furniture. Seriously.

Knit-bloggers Unite!

In less than a week, I will be meeting this crazy crafter!

Or, maybe you might recognize these:

That's right, I'm heading to Amyville, um, I mean Scottsdale! Why, you ask? Isn't it like Eleventy-billion degrees down there? Ummm, yes, but my parents needed my help and bought me the ticket so I'm going!! It's a little mini-vacation, I'm always ready for that!! I'll be in the Scottsdale area from Friday to Sunday...and don't you just know that I'm hopefully going to be visiting this place...

...for the first time!! I wish you were with me Cathi!! Amy's taking me to all the cool, funky shops on Saturday...so watch out! It's going to be a shopping extravaganza!

I'd like my buttonhole on the rocks please!

As soon as we found out that my Aunt and Uncle and grandparents were all going to spend the weekend with us in Vail over Memorial Day, my mom wanted us girls to all knit a project together. Buttonhole bag to the rescue! This is a great project that is quick and easy for all different skill levels! The first step was choosing yarn. My grandma and sister and I went to our LYS and found some Brown Sheep Bulky (I of course didn't have to get any because I have a large stash of leftovers and a ton from my trip to Brown Sheep last year!). I brought my tub-o-brown sheep up to Vail just in case anyone wanted a different color...my mom proceeded to dump the whole thing on my sisters head, and that's what we were doing in this picture! Silly mom.

We all got started Saturday evening, and continued knitting throughout the day (it was beautiful weather!) outside on the back patio where we could see the golf course and the little mountain stream that flows through the yard. It was so relaxing. Here's my mom,contemplating color choices for the side of the bag. She chose an all pink color scheme (that's my kind of girl), but really took her time choosing the order that the colors would be in...I love the way her bag turned out! (shhh, don't tell, it's my favorite!)

Of course, Alice even managed to get in on the action. My sisters Chibi and measuring tape have become her constant companions while we were knitting. That girl is so cute!! She's standing in the buttonhole bag that I made a few months ago.

This is here for pure "awwwww" factor. She sat on my lap for probably 5 minutes with her hands on mine while I was knitting. She was concentrating so hard as I told her (in a sing songy voice of course) each step that I was doing. So even Alice knit a part of a buttonhole bag!

The fun thing about knitting this project all together was that everyone's bag turned out so different! Everyone chose pretty distinct and different colors, which makes all the difference in the way they turn out. We were knitting all day on Sunday and most of the day on Monday (with only one quick trip to the yarn shop!)...seriously, if the guys hadn't been playing golf, we could have had one of them take a picture of us all sitting around, talking, knitting, occasionally watching a movie, but knitting all the while. I had that line from Finding Nemo in my head that Dory keeps chanting..."just keep swimming, swimming, swimming, just keep swimming.", but I changed the line to "just keep knitting, knitting, knitting, just keep knitting." It became my mantra.
I made some modifications on my bag so that it would be larger, since I had already made the regular sized Buttonhole. So, I felt like I wasn't knitting as fast as the other girls (because I tend to make these things a competition!), and that my bag was taking forever to knit up...but I kept at it! I was done with mine in the wee hours on Tuesday morning. I woke up and came upstairs to tell my dad that my pointer finger on my right hand was hot and sore. To which he told me that was a sign of too much knitting! I of course think that there can never be too much knitting! The soreness was due to pushing the needle through with my finger, and having so many stitches on my needle that it got a little tight and I had to use my finger more than usual. I think it's like a badge of honor, my knitting wound, I'm building up tolerance...someday I'll have thicker skin and a little marathon knitting session won't even faze these fingers! Right before my aunt and uncle left, (RayLynn was already gone) we took a picture all together with our bags:)

Parting shot: All the bags, unfelted, on the rocks! Enjoy!

Who were these lovely bags knit by, you ask? Well, let me tell ya! (clockwise from the top left)
1-Whitney, my sister, who I'm so proud of! She finished this project in just a few days! Way to go Whit!
2-Me...my monster brown and pink buttonhole...it's like the buttonhole that ate Manhatten...it's huge! I love it!
3-Grandma Sue, she decided to add those couple rows of Limeade, and it really made her bag pop! I'm proud of her too...she sure was glad to get this bag done because my Grandpa thought all of us girls were crazy for knitting so much!
4-RayLynn, who made her pretty purple bag for her mom...and was the first one done! That's because she concentrates and doesn't talk as much as me:)!
5-My mom's Pretty in Pink bag...I love it!
6-and last, my Aunt Roxanne's brown and red bag.
Everyone's bag has such personality, what a fun time we had...and great memories! Thanks ladies!!

*the felting pictures are coming...in the days to come...they are in the washing machine as I type!*

Here are the modifications that I made:
I cast on 3 like the pattern says, but I increased the bottom to 11 or 13 stitches (should have written it down!) and then I lengthened the bottom. I ended up picking up 80 stitches around the edge, increasing until I had 100 stitches on each side, and then following the pattern for the rest of the bag. When I made my handles, I had 17 stitches on each side of the buttonhole and 12 in the handle. 46 stitches on each side...for a total of 92 stitches around the bag in the final few rows. Let me know if this doesn't make sense.

Back to life, back to reality

My time up in the montains was so nice...I think I didn't really want to come back. I had such great plans to knit, read, and then knit some more. But...how could I get anything done when these two cuties are around?!

I knit a little...but didn't get anything finished...oh well. My mom and I managed to get into Minturn and visit the cute little knit shop there. It's called The Yarn Studio and it is just about the cutest place, it's situated in the bend of a little mountain road right next to a stream. You couldn't get much more picturesque! I highly recommend it to anyone traveling in or through the Rocky Mountains.

They have a great selection of quality yarns...Koigu, Noro, Rowan, you name it they have it. One thing that I am highly coveting right now are the Offhand Design bags that they had. If I could figure out a way to justify $150 to $180 for a bag I would be all over it! They are made with vintage looking tapestry/velvet material. I love them...here's a shot of the needle cases. Maybe I should start that Cafe Press shop so that I can indulge myself in all the knitterly pricey things that I want. I do love knitterly things. I think that this bag is even out of the question for my birthday that's coming up...it's over that invisible line that I have between what I will spend on something and what is too much. Ok, enough about things that aren't going to happen.

I managed to leave the shop with nothing...just couldn't justify it...damn it! So where did I buy yarn then? Well, no mocking...but some of the girls that were with me wanted to learn to knit at 9:00pm one night. So off to the local Super Wal-Mart! I just got a little bit. Ha! The girls are now all happily knitting away on dishcloths...gotta love that $1.27 Peaches and Cream! I am on the decrease rounds of my Clapotis/Bonopotis, the end end is finally in sight. I love that you get to drop two stitches per round, that rocks! Seriously though, my Clap is a beast! It's so big and wooly. It is getting heavy to lug around and hot to work on as the weather warms up. I'm going to be glad to be done with it, and move on to something lighter and more summery.

Alright, my friends and sister are waiting on me to leave and they're bugging me to get off the computer...so bye! Here's a parting shot of the cutest niece ever!

Have Clapotis, will travel- Part 3- the big finale!

Day 4: Sunday was a relativly unscheduled day. We wanted to make it to Laguna Beach and that was about it. My mom had wanted to get a macaroon that she had the last time she was here, they are reported to be as big as your fist, now that's a big macaroon! Anyway, on our way there, my dad acted like he was kind of "turned around", not lost mind you, and where did we end up?

The Alamitos Yarn Company! The last time my dad was in L.A. he had stopped in here to pick up a gift for my mom, and he wanted us to see the shop. I'm amazed that they were even open on a Sunday, that's almost unheard of here in Denver. But open they were, so we made a quick run around, found a couple things and we were off. Thanks Dad...again, you are the greatest! Our next destination was Huntington Beach where my dad had a lunch appointment, so we girls were left to our own devices. We ambled down the pier, and ended up at a Mexican restaurant where we sat in the bar area to eat appetizers and knit. Mojito's anyone?

This was probably the most relaxing day of the trip yet because we just kind of drove where we wanted and stopped whenever we felt like it. I'm really bummed that I totally forgot to take a picture of us knitting on the beach...that was one of my main goals, oh well. I can't believe that I forgot! After we left the restaurant we headed to Newport Beach...I kept thinking about different landmarks that I had seen on The OC (yes, I'm not ashamed to admit that I watch that show), but I didn't really recognize anything. We then drove over to Balboa Island and walked around some of the cutest shops. It's definitely touristy, but we still managed to find a couple fun things. My dad found these shoes on the sidewalk: Yes, they are knitted shoes by Steve Madden

If want to see a closeup, click here. They were on sale for $10.00, so he bought each of us a pair...doesn't every knitter need knitted shoes? I think so. Probably one of the funnier moments of the day was when we were standing outside a little shop called The Barkery. These two little dogs were coming out the door! When I asked what there names were she said that one of them was named taco-bella! So cute in their little pink outfits! My favorite little shop that we discovered was called, Melange. The owner, Holly Wojahn, was a fascinating lady. She is a painter and she sells her art out of her shop, but also has a lot of fun French imports because she has an apartment in Paris and spends a lot of her time living over there! Wow, what a life! That is a dream of mine to be able to suppport myself with the art that I create and live in Paris. Someday. It's going to happen someday. After we left Balboa Island we headed back to the city to have dinner with the bride and grooms parents, and then to the hotel to pack. What an amazing trip.

Day 5: The flight home, which could have been fairly routine, was much more enjoyable because my dad upgraded the three of us to first class! Yeah, it's much better up there. They had served me hot nuts (not in a bag, but in an actual little ceramic cup!) and a soda before we even took off! My mom and I were together so we made much progress on our Clapotis. By trips end, here is what mine looked like, no dropped stitches yet:

And here is my Mom's and RayLynn's progress. (click names to view) The idea of all knitting the same project really ended up being a good idea. We were all able to help each other out if we needed to, and plus it was just fun to be knitting the same thing, a bonding experience...I highly recommend it to any of you traveling with other knitters in the future.

Here we are, posing for one last picture at DIA looking a little travel weary. But it's good to be back in Denver...it had snowed while we were away and the air as soon as you walked off of the plane was so cold. My little red sweatshirt (insert Adam Sandler singing "Red hooded sweatshirt" here) that I was wearing just wasn't cutting it as a winter coat. Goodbye California sunshine, hello Denver cold and snow. Oh well, I'll keep the cold and snow and affordable rent and they can keep their ocean view and tiny apartments. (which is where I would have to live if I lived in CA!)

Now for the loot, I really didn't do too bad, I definitly saw more than I bought and that's a good thing. I really feel like I showed alot of restraint.

•Big green Frida knitting bag that my dad bought for me at Wildfiber
•Discontinued Noro Kureyon from La Knitterie Parisian in color number 39, dye lot C...it's yummy stuff! Pinks, greens, a little orange, brown, and turquoise. Fun, fun!
•2 skeins of Koigu, one solid pink skein and one bright varigated skein, click for a closeup.
•1 ball of sugar and cream yarn in a pink and orange color
•Eiffel tower zippered bag to put my knitting notions in because I always need more little zippered bags! Right, mom?
•My blue knitted shoes
•fun purple and green stitchmarkers and a Paris snow globe
Lots of fun stuff...but an even better trip with lots of good memories! Thanks mom and dad and RayLynn for making this trip so much fun!!

Have Clapotis, will travel- Part 2

Day 3: The day was finally here...the wedding day, you ask? Nope...the day that I get to meet some L.A. knit bloggers! My mom and RayLynn had planned on going with me, but at the last minute they decided to stay at the hotel because they didn't want to spend any more time in the car after the 5 hours of the day before. La was one of the girls that I was meeting up with and amazingly enough, she lived within 10 minutes of the hotel. So, my parents dropped me off (I have to say my mom had one of those mom moments, where she wasn't sure about me getting into a car with a total stranger that I had met on the internet, ha!) and away we went. It was an adventure getting there, and I got a lovely commentary on the buildings we passed along the way. But my favorite moment was when the traffice slowed down and a motorcycle cop drove by...and was it a terrible accident? Nope. The cops were scooping hay off the highway because a huge truck had dumped a bunch of it off the truck. It was priceless seeing those cops in there little Chips uniforms with huge shovels. Again, only in L.A.
So, our first stop was La Knitterie Parisian, which some of you might know as the home of Knit One, Purl Two. The shop is owned by Edith Eig (the host of said show), and bot do they have a ton of yarn!! Great stuff that you don't see at every other knit shop. I managed to stop myself from buying a really cute WoolyBully bag...they are so cute though! I tidge on the expensive side though. I did get some discontinued Noro Kuereyon.

Here we all are at Jerry's Famous Diner... Lauren, La, and Jen put together this little shindig. From left to right, Lauren, La, Jen, me, Lori, Allison, MJ, and Kris. Looks fun, huh? It was!

It was great to meet some of the people behind the blogs that I read. At one point we started talking about the projects we were working on, and Lori busted out her Rebecca and Phildar magazines. It was like a feeding frenzy, we all jumped all over those magazines immediately. It's not everyday that you get to see them in person...drool much?

I just had to take this picture...this is Lauren and Lori standing next to each other. Lauren is 4 foot something (sorry, I can't remember) and I think that Lori is like 6'3" or so. Wow. :-)

I got back from lunch just in the nick of time to change for the wedding, which was such a beautiful service and I'm so glad that I was able to go out there for it. This shot is one of my favorites...this is the groom Brian and I. Awww. What a cool guy.

The reception was one of the biggest that I have ever been to. There were 50 tables and probably around 400 guests! The cool thing was that alot of my friends were able to make it.

It was really fun seeing and catching up with old friends and meeting Brian's wife Dana. Bonus that they had a chocolate fountain. Have you ever seen one...oh my goodness...it is amazing, imagine liquid chocolate that you can put on Rice Crispie squares, pineapple, pretzels, strawberries, or marshmallows. Mmmm...it was a good thing.

I know what you are thinking, "where was the Clapotis in all of this?" In my purse, ready at any moment to be pulled out and worked on...but it just didn't happen that much today. I made up for it the next day though! I'm getting too tired to post anymore tonight, it's 11:15 PM and I need to go to bed...I'm getting old. Ugh. So tomorrow I'll conclude the stories of my travels...for now it's bedtime.

Have Clapotis, will travel

A few months ago I was invited to the wedding of a dear friend of mine, Brian, who happens to live in L.A. That's where the planning began. I knew that RayLynn would be going, and then my parents decided to go, so it turned into a little mini-family vacation! Fun, huh?! Absolutely! After the decision was made to go, I started joining lists and emailing knit-bloggers in California like crazy. I needed the low-down on the cool places to go, to see the stars you ask? Nope. Although I did see some. The cool places to knit of course! Thank you so much to all of you who took time out of your schedules to let me know which stores to go to! I made it to 4 of them, and boy was it fun.

On with the story though. I got it in my head that it would be great fun to all three (my dad still is the only one in my family that doesn't knit...so he got left out!) knit the same project. That's where the Clapotis came in.

I had been planning to knit it anyway, so why not make it a knitalong-party of 3. We all cast on during the flight out, note the handy pattern holder...yes, the tray locks work very nicely, although I'm sure that we looked a little bit odd. I chose to knit my Clapotis with Interlacements Texas and my mom chose the same. RayLynn bought a cotton/silk mix from Artful Yarns called Fable. The color number is 93, and it's named little red riding hood. The flight was a little bumpy at first, but then smoothed out and we were able to knit, or I should say they were able to knit and I was able to help them work the kinks out. So by the time we got to L.A. I had the tiniest little piece of knitting done, here's the picture of what I started calling the Mama, the Papa, and the baby:

My Dad navigated our way through the massive highway system they have there, to the hotel we were staying at, but by the time we got there all we wanted to do was rest. So I decided to forgo the session of Knit Therapy that I had been invited to by Mary Heather at Knit Cafe. (I'm still bummed that I didn't make it to that part of town) What did we do instead? Drove to a newly redeveloped part of Brea and had a late lunch/early dinner at a great restaurant called Taps, then headed bacl to the hotel where lo and behold...it was happy hour in the bar at the hotel...free drinks to guests...ummm, ok! So the girls knitted and had a few drinks while my dad rested.

Then it was pretty much time to call it a night...here's a shot of my parents, aren't they so cute?! They've been married 32 years this year, and I love just hanging out with them!

Day 2: Our mission was to drive to Santa Monica, visit Wildfiber, have a nice lunch on the ocean, and then get back in time for the rehearsal dinner. Sounds easy, right...we just needed to go about 36 or so miles. It ended up taking us about two hours to get there, seriously as lovely as the beach is, I couldn't handle that kindof traffic all the time. We made it to Wildfiber and horror of all horrors, I didn't take a single picture while I was there! The traffic combined with lots of great yarn...Socks that Rock, Manos, GGH, a wall of koigu, both KPPPM and Kersti to name a few, threw me off my game. I wasn't thinking about my blog or the people reading it...did I mention that I got to touch and feel the much talked about 'Socks that Rock'! If you want to see some shots of the interior, go check out Laurens. These pictures were the reason we decided to go to Santa Monica, be prepared to drool, just warning ya'! After making our purchases, we headed to the car, and look what was on each of our seats from my dad...go on, click to see! Aww, isn't he the sweetest? We each got a dozen in our favorite color! My dad is awesome! The ladies at the shop recommended that we eat at Pedals, a restaurant at the hotel Shutters On the Beach. It was a swanky place for sure, and this is where I had both my celebrity sightings. On the way out the door after we had eaten, walking in was Eugene Levy. I actually didn't see him at first because I was scouting out a place to take pictures, but then my mom says, "wasn't that someone famous?" Indeed it was. Here's RayLynn and I outside Pedals:

After lunch, we had to wait in the lobby for the valet to pull up the car, and since there was a big fireplace we waited by it. Who was sitting not even 5 feet away, talking on her cell phone? Mischa Barton. I didn't want to seem stalker-ish, so I didn't interrupt her while she was on the phone to ask for a picture, oh well! I was just glad that I got to see a couple celebrities while I was in town. (this is when I had to call Cathi because I knew that she would get excited about celebrity sightings, and she would know the name of the guy we had seen...and she did. It was Eugene Levy. Thanks Cathi, I'm always picking you for any trivia game!) We had passed one other knit shop on the way to the restaurant, so of course we made a quick stop there. It was called Yarns Unlimited. It was a small pretty cramped shop, and the walls were towering with yarn, but I managed to find a couple things (read bright pink Koigu) in the few minutes that we were there.

I hate to break it to some of you, but the poncho is alive and well in California. This was one of the shop samples that I'm modeling...it was one of many on display there. Yikes.
I don't even have the words to discribe to you the pain of the ride back home. Picture this, it's almost rush hour...on a friday...what does that equal? Let's just say that it took us a little over 3 hours to get back to the rehersal. Thank goodness for knitting, RayLynn and I sat in the back seat, happily knitting along on our Clapotis, which by now my mom has named the Crapotis because she hates the awkwardness of purling into the front and back. Silly mom, crapotis...that's funny stuff. So the plus side of L.A. traffic is you have time to knit if you're not the one who has to drive.

Probably the funniest thing that happened all day occured while we were on the freeway. At one point we were driving very slowly and noticed that something was littering the side of the highway. We kept trying to figure out what it was, was it paper, was it little bags of something...nope. It was bikini tops and bottoms. For miles. My dad kept telling us to grab one, but eww, and we weren't driving that slow!! Only in L.A. would the streets be littered with bikini's...what a city! We then headed to the rehearsal dinner, which we made it to just in time.

to be continued...stay tuned for more Clapotis action shots, and talk of L.A. knit bloggers, yes there are pictures of some of the people you and I only read about! Click here if you want to see what I picked up in Santa Monica. (note that there will be a grand finale, look at all the loot from California shot in the days to come) Thanks everyone for all the welcome home emails!

Sweet surprises!

So I arrived back in Denver yesterday, all in one piece, in the late afternoon. As much as I love travelling...it was so nice to be home, lounging around with Jesse last night, catching up on my TiVo, finishing up my socks!!! And I slept so good last night, ahhh, I love my little house! So, my plan had been to blog from the road...but as you can see, that didn't work! There just weren't enough hours in the day to do all of the things that I wanted to do. But, I did do a few things...I took over 100 photos (I promise not to bore you with all of them;-), met 6 L.A. knit bloggers and 1 visiting from the east, shopped at 3 completely different yarn shops, bought a "little" bit of yarn (some in a gorgeous discontinued color from Noro), experienced the horror of L.A. traffic first hand, laughed a lot, and had a great time with RayLynn and my parents!! Stay tuned for updates. I will be writing about my trip each day this week. I can't wait to share all the silly things that I saw and experienced with you!!

Here's how the trip began...could my luggage BE any more pink?! I love it!

When I arrived home from LA to snow here in Denver, what was waiting for me? Hold the phone....my secret pal strikes again. She rocks, I just can't say that enough, seriously! Not only did she email me last week, before I left town, with a $20.00 gift cerificate to iTunes (ummm, yeah, I've already spent a portion of it, and I'm hoarding the rest of it for a rainy day)...she sent me another package that arrived while I was gone?! It was filled with yummy goodness, of both the yarn and sweets variety. So, she obviously gets me. I don't need to gush much more, I'll let you see for yourself!

She sent two little post-it notes, one that says "Luv 2 Blog" on it...I'll be honest and say that I've had two other friends give me this post-it set, and each time I get so excited. I'm such a dork! They are sooo cute though! The other is an orange and pink flower. Then there was a refrigerator pad of paper that has a girl on the phone on it, it's hilarious. And then, there's the chocolate and Koigu. I had one bite of the chocolate, which came in a mysterious red box, and I' thought I'd died and gone to heaven. It's not just chocolate, it's peanut butter and chocolate!! Thank you secret pal...you are doing a great job...and you get me. Thanks!!

As if I didn't feel spoiled enough, I got a package from the "Southern Division" of Mason-Dixon Knitting. Ann, you amaze me. This was so sweet, and completely not necessary! Thank you, thank you! Now I just need to find a springy/summery top to knit with my 10 balls of linen drape! **notice the cute little note from her** So, anyone have any pattern suggestions?

Knitting across Kansas

My dad ended up renting a mini-van for us to drive to the funeral, since my Uncle and cousin Ryan were riding with us and none of our cars would hold 6 people. Plus, my dad always finds good deals, he rented the van for $8.00, no clue how he swung that, but it happens on a regular basis, him getting sweet deals on random stuff. Anyway...my mom and I planted ourselves in the back seat and took over every available space back there with our knitting! I primarily worked on my Wavy scarf...which should be about 10 inches longer than it is because I've had to rip it back so many times (about 4 times)! Dang, I hate ripping out! What a waste of time!

I did work a little bit on a "new" project from the stash. It's a tank for my friend RayLynn's birthday. It's called Ginger. It has a high neck in the front, and a v-neck in the back...sexy, sexy! We are going to L.A. in March for a wedding, a few days before her birthday...so, the plan is for her to be able to wear it then! I need to get moving on it. I bought the yarn about 6 months ago at a sale here in town. It's Rowan Summer Tweed in Angel (color 526). I think she's going to love it! She already knows about it because I asked her if she would rather be surprised, or have something fit right. She chose fitting right over being surprised. What sucks about it is, the size that I was planning on making WAS the right size, and it WAS the color I remembered her liking, oh well! At least I know it's going to fit her though. Here's Ginger:

*FYI- Anyone who lives in L.A. and wants to get together to knit when I come out, or make a yarn crawl, or knows anything else that I shouldn't miss...let me know!*

Back to the trip...I also worked on some sadly neglected clogs for my roomate Genia. They have been on the needles for far too long! I am now, thanks to car knitting time, more than half way done with them! I went through a faze last year where I was making everybody clogs...I made 11 pairs. I'm thinking that the reason that these have been sitting in the knitting basket by the couch for so long is that I was just burnt out. But I'm getting back into the swing of knitting clogs. I really love to give this as a gift to people. It takes three skeins of wool total. (I always use Lambs Pride Bulky) You need 2 in the sole color and 1 in the color that you want the top of your clog. The clog in the picture is made with one strand of WW wool and 2 strands of a novelty yarn that will shrink a little.

The pattern is by Fiber Trends, and is one that you really have to pay attention to, and follow very carefully. It's not hard, but it's very specific in the amount of stitches you need to have at all times. I always make a photo copy of the pattern so that I can highlight the numbers for the size that I'm making, otherwise I would get totally lost. My mom helped me out by highlighting the pattern for me! Thanks Mom! This picture gives you an idea of how many numbers there are the pattern page. A highlighter is your friend when making felted clogs!
Here's a shot of my mom knitting in the back seat. She was the true knitter in the car, and deserves a prize (if I was giving prizes) because when the sun went down and I put my stuff away and took a nap...she busted out my flashlight and knitted on into the night! My mom rocks!