Yes, but do you have any yarn?

Yes, but do you have any yarn?, a photo by she_bakes_cakes on Flickr.

This might be my new Minneapolis hang. The Yarn Garage (yeah, it's a converted garage), brought to you by Steven Be. Stephanie and wandered about slack jawed until settling on gorgeous, but different yarns. stay tuned for project updates.

Juicy

Literally!  Today I started a three day juice cleanse, and I'm alternating between acceptance and freak-out.  The freak-outs are a result of my fear of failure. I'm not concerned that I'll wake up one day surrounded by a half-eaten cheese pizza, but that I'll cave and have a salad. I've ever been a great one for self control, so the thought of not chewing solely because I've decided not to chew scares me.

So this is what I'll be having for the next three days:

I'm doing the Blue Print Cleanse three day Renovation Cleanse, which is great for a newbie juicer like me.  The renovation is their entry level cleanse, which I think means it had heartier juices/more calories than the other cleanses.  It's only a little past one on day one, but I'm liking the juices (conveniently labeled in 1-6, the order in which they are to be consumed) so far.  Right now I'm sipping on a pineapple, apple, mint concoction and it's delicious.

In other, less literal juicy news, I recently finished another hat.

Details:

Pattern: Rikke, by Sarah Young

Yarn: Madeline Tosh DK

Needles: 3.5mm, 4.5mm

Start: March 24

Finish: March 26

I love this pattern, so so much.  It's so simple in it's appearance, design and construction, that it's genius.  All garter stitch and a subtle change in texture brought about by a simple change in needle size.  This is actually the second Rikke hat I've made; the first was for me and I wear it all the time.  It's black and I haven't managed to take a decent picture of it, so no blogging, but this pretty green (Jade is the colorway) shows the stitch detail and texture nicely.

I selected this yarn as part of a thank you gift I received for knitting something for a friend.  The way that it's dyed, the yarn seems almost to glow from the inside, all space-agey and stuff.  It's the first Madeline Tosh (side note: is she related to Peter Tosh, by chance? Because that would be cool) that I've ever worked with and now I get what all the fuss is about. It's incredibly buoyant and springy, making it a great pairing with patters in which stitch definition is a plus.  I was at Purl last week and had to stop myself from pulling one of her glowing tans off the shelf and shoving it into my basket, such was my enthusiasm for this yarn.  But I kept myself to the one skein of Spud & Chloe Sweater that I needed to finish another work in progress.

Last Friday I went to what turned out to be a lame party with some close friends (we enjoyed each other's company, anyway, almost as much as the Nilla Wafer banana pudding dessert that was on offer), and as we were leaving, I pulled this hat out of my bag and started working on it as we walked to the train.  I asked Him if he thought he might have use for the hat, when She jumped in and said she liked it, too.  Fortunatly, they're married, so Megan & David, this hat's for you!

Finally, a third, slightly more salacious and definitely funkier kind of juicy.  I leave you with the 1983 R&B hit "Juicy Fruit" by Mtume.  Sexy lyrics, yes, but it's still Sunday morning cleaning the house music to me.

What you can, when you can

I've come to loathe my morning commute.  It is mercifully short (20 minutes door to door), but people can be shockingly rude in the a.m.  My complaints are of the mundane variety, so I'll not bore you with them; suffice it to say that nothing makes me happier than walking or riding my bike to work. I get to be not on the train and in the fresh air.

Yesterday's weather report called for a high of 50 degrees, so I decided to take advantage of the spring atmosphere and hoof it in to the office.  I kind of planned my outfit poorly, so that I was both cold and sweating as I walked, but the sun was out and my iPod was on shuffle working its magic, so I didn't mind.  Too much.

Today we've been experiencing what the weather forecasters call a "wintry mix." It's been raining and snowing off and on all day.  I've not been too disturbed as I work indoors and have plenty of handknits with which to bundle up.  The weather has, however, made me glad that I took the opportunity yesterday to spend some time in the air and sun while I had the chance.

On the topic of seizing opportunities and making the most of right now (ham fisted segue), about 10 years ago a not great movie starring one of my biggest Hollywood crushes was released.  He is Keanu Reeves, and the movie is Sweet November.  I'd never intended to see the movie, and in fact, I once decided that a guy was "not right for me" because he suggested we see it on our second date (which subsequently never occurred), Yet see it I did, last fall when I was dogsitting for some friends.  As I said, it's not a great movie, but I'll forgive a lot when I find an actor charming. 

ANYWAY, Charlize Theron stars opposite Keanu as a woman with a poorly kept secret (SPOILER: it's lymphoma) who takes men under her wing, one at a time for one month at a time, and teaches them how to be present and embrace life.  Hokey, yes, but she wore some great scarves in that movie.

Had I seen the movie when it was released, I wouldn't have known what to do about these scarves I liked so much, but now I am a knitter and a crocheter and I knew what to do: Ravelry!  Turns out patterns for both knit and crochet versions of the scarf are available (for free).  I opted to make the crochet version, for maximum authenticity, and I'm really glad that I did.

Details:

Pattern: Sweet November Scarf/Shawl by April Draven

Yarn: Wollmeise Sockenwolle Twin

Hook: H/5.0mm

Started: January 22

Finished: February 19

Love the pattern, love the yarn.  I bought the Wollmeise from The Loopy Ewe on total impulse and in a panic, because the stuff sells out within 5 minutes of being posted.  I love how acidy bright it is, with incredible depth of color.  The hype surrounding Wollmeise is not for naught.  The colorways are gorgeous and it's easy to work with.  It's so tightly plied that it's almost like working with cotton, so maybe it's funky to knit with like cotton, but to crochet was a breeze.

I wanted to make this big and drapey so that it could easily wrap around one's neck more than once, so I ended up using about 1 1/2 skeins of yarn. Still, it's light enough for damp and chilly spring and fall days, and possibly even summer nights if you live in a temperate climate.

So, Sweet November, might not be an award winning movie (although it was immeasurably better than that crap fest Forrest Gump) there are some nuggets of wisdom in there (like do what you can when you can (SPOILER: because you mighty not have a tomorrow), and it inspired this dope scarf, so yay for that.

Maybe next time I'll share my thoughts about The Lake House (SPOILER: I love it!)

See!  Even they're dubious.

Calmate!

I have a secret that's not so secret if you know me well.  I can stress out about anything.  Before leaving for Mexico, I had a quiet freak out about packing.  Too much? Too little?  More tops?  Fewer skirts?  How many swim suits (for the record, I packed and wore 4).  When I freak like this, it's quiet and internal, my mind races, I move quickly and bump into things. I am, quite literally, spazzing.

I never spazz in Mexico.  I think it's impossible for me to freak out there.  Being in Mexico always feels so comfortable and familiar.  It's not that I've spent an extraordinary amount of time there, but there's a vibe about Mexico that agrees with me, and heading there for vacation is like dream time.



On the flight down we were upgraded to Business class.
I am, therefore, enjoying a V&T.

 The impetus for this trip was a friend's birthday.  Seven of us flew down, for the sand, sun and food.

We were responsible sun worshipers, all of us heavily armored with SPF and some of worshiping from the shade. 

I started with SPF 15 and quickly upgraded to 30 (body) and 55 (face).  The sun was intense.I brought a crochet project with me, thinking I'd have all this downtime at the beach, I'd surely get bored.  Oh, no.  I didn't crochet a single row.  Instead I read Jackie Collins trash (Poor Little Bitch Girl, which I highly recommend)  

and stared at the sea.

Was it all fun? Pretty much.

But there was some expanding of cultural horizons.  I learned a lot, more than I can recount here so let's just say the Mayan's were pretty incredible.

And there were some physical activities.  Snorkeling, anyone?

I've been back for over a week now, and, true to form, have started stressing.  About unimportant weird things, like projects I want to finish, blog entries not written, photos not taken.  It's not totally out of left field;  I've got a lot to do before I move at the end of May, so my mind's started buzzing.  When this happens, I can get compulsive about my knitting and crocheting, so I'm trying to be conscious of this and calm myself.  "Calmate . . .," is what a Spanish speaking friend would tell me, "calmate."  So instead of racing to the finish, I'm working, calmly on this.

It will be done when it's done, and until then, it will just be fun.

Playa

By the time you read this, I will be in Mexico doing something a lot like this:

I love a beach vacation in winter.  Adios y hasta pronto, amigos mios!

A hat for Sarah

When I drew Sarah's name in the my knitting group's gift exchange this year, I was pretty excited because she's someone whose taste I think I know pretty well.  I thought making a gift for her would be easy.  Pride cometh before a fall . . .

A couple of years ago, Sarah turrned me on to a method for extending the utility of my fingerless mitts well into winter: layering them over cheap, knit gloves.  She loved it, I loved it.  But as a member of the Cult of the iPhone, her layered approach to hand wear has been causing her problems vis a vis phone use.  After hearing her comment that she thought she needed a pair of proper mittens, I started scouring Ravelry for mitten patterns.  I eventually decided to crochet a pair, using some Sanguine Gryphon Eidos fingering weight yarn that I bought at Rhinebeck last fall.  Crocheting a fabric sufficiently dense so as to be suitable for mittens was slow work, but fun.

When I finished the first mitten, it was snug on me, but my hands are extraordinarily large, so I thought it would be a good fit for Sarah.  With almost two weeks to go until the gift exchange, I felt very comfortable that I'd finish well ahead of our deadline.  At our next get-together, Sarah announces that she's just made herself a pair of mittens, and in doing so, has realized that she really just doesn't like mittens.

Well, shit.

Because I've known Sarah for about three years, I was able to shift gears without too much angst.  She likes hats, specifically slouchy ones.  Even better, she has a tendency to lose them, so could always benefit from having a spare or two.  I settled on a pattern I'd made twice before because I thought it would suit her style and set to work.

Pattern: Wurm, by Katushika

Yarn: Noro Taiyo & Jade Sapphire Mongolian Cashmere 6-ply

Needles: US7 & 8/4.5mm & 5.0mm

Started: January 30

Finished: February 4

I love this yarn so much.  I picked up the skein and as soon as I saw it in the store and carried it around with me like a greedy little hoarder until I decided to buy it.  The colors are so lovely and  I thought the variegation would lend themselves to the welted hat.  The silk content reduced the stretch off the yarn, which resulted in welting that is less pronounced that in the other Wurms I've made.  This bothered me at first, but I think that was more a matter of result versus expectations.  After I sat with the hat for a bit, I decided I was happy with this variation. 

This pattern has you work an extra long brim and then fold it in half, picking up stitched from the cast on edge and then continuing to knit up the hat.  I decided it would be nice to work the inner part of the brim using some super soft cashmere.  Mmmm soft.

Sarah's head is about my size, so I knew that if it fit me, it would fit her.

Bingo!  It's even a tad big, but I think it's OK.  Anyway, it's cute and cozy and Sarah likes it.  When I was running on Saturday morning I ran in to her heading off to run errands and lo!  She was wearing the hat.  Color me happy.

Portlandia

My hometown's all over the news these days.  There's the IFC TV show, Portlandia (if you don't have cable, you can catch some clips on youtube; it's hilarious), a new NBC sitcom that's set there, called Perfect Couples (which has become a guilty pleasure; check it out on cable on demand) and then last week, NPR aired a story the gist of which was this: Portland's unemployment rate is usually 1% higher than the national average and salaries are 20% lower than in Seattle, but (young) people keep moving there anyway because it's so awesome.  And there are biracial guys who work at food carts and play in metal bands.  Again: it's awesome.

I was home for a week earlier this month for a sad occasion, so I was kind of off and blue much of the time, but I did find it warming to be back in Portland again.  The city has changed a lot since I moved away in 1989 (!!), but some things have remained comfortingly the same, like Oaks Park, the amusement park and roller rink where I used to skate to Van Halen, Billy Squire, AC/DC and Ratt.  The park itself was rather rinky dink, as evidenced by the photo, but the skating was always good.

One afternoon in need of a diversion I drove my rented Toyota Yaris over to Burnisde Street in search of a shop owner who is a friend of a friend, just to say hi.  While looking for the FoaF, something in a window of a store called Haunt caught my eye:

Hand knits!  Like I said, I had some time to kill, so I went in and poked my nose around a bit.  The woman working was talking to a friend/customer and since the boutique is small, I couldn't help but overhear their conversation.  The customer was asking about a book that the shop owner had written, if she was going to do another, yadda yadda, and it clicked!  The shop owner was Laura Irwin, the author of Boutique Knits.  After the customer left, I overcame my aversion to intruding on one's privacy and asked her if she was, in fact, Laura Irwin.  She was quite surprised and so friendly.  She said something  to the effect that not many people know of her book, to which I replied "EVERYONE, I know who knits knows it," then admitted that this is probably a small percentage of the general population, however.  Then we chatted about crafting and the smallness of the knitting world. 

I maxed out on dorkiness when I asked if I could take a picture of her (since I'd missed out on my chance when I saw Ysolda Teague walking across the Brooklyn Bridge a few summers ago).  She graciously agreed.  

Cute, right?  The dress Laura's wearing is in keeping with the vibe of the store: modern, feminine with a touch of industrialism.  Because I was focusing on knits, I didn't take pics of the pretty tops, earrings, capelets and shrugs they carry.  Wouldn't have done them justice, anyway, as I'm not a stylist.  But Haunt stocks really lovely items and if you're in the Portland area, I highly recommend stopping in, and if you're not, Laura and her partners also maintain an Etsy shop called Haunt Studio.  Convenient, no?

Another thing that made me happy when I was in Portland was getting the chance to see this dollface:

One of the early members of the Fort Greene/Clinton Hill Knit and Crochet Group, she moved back west a little over two years ago.  She's thriving out there, which is wonderful.  Making and selling a lot of art (on Etsy at her store Little Canoe), being outdoorsey, living the good life, which in Portland, includes eating good food.  In addition to my favorite pie place, Random Order Coffeehouse & Bakery, she turned me on to this spot here:

The Potato Champion is one of Portland's many, many amazing food carts.  This one is located in a "pod" (cluster of food carts) across from the Burgerville on 12th and Hawthorne.  I had a hard time deciding between the Belgian style fries, poutine, chili cheese fries and PB&J fries, but I opted for the exotic sounding poutine.  It's a crazy delicious concoction of French Canadian origin that combines french fries, cheese curds and gravy. Yummy peasant food - right up my alley.  The poutine was hard to believe delicious, and as I sat in one of the pod's picnic tables enjoying my snack, I felt really happy and lucky, and also a little nostalgic for my childhood in hippie, progressive, green, coffee-drinking, beer brewing, laid-back Portland.