Impromptu
Have you ever found yourself in need of a hair elastic? I'm guessing many of you have. Have you ever found yourself in need of a hair elastic and been far away from either your personal stash or a convenient place to get more? This doesn't happen to me often (I tend to go for the long, loose, and lazy approach to hair styling), but it did on this trip. For you see, I needed to use a handy power tool, and it was windy. Very very windy. And everyone knows long hair and power tools and wind don't mix. [...]
Field Trip, Fisherman’s Museum
I warned you accounts of the trip would not be chronological. Nor would they be terribly, um, edited. I'm going with a more free-form approach. You remember how I mentioned Maine seemed to be a particularly fiber friendly sort of place? My first thought was that this had something to do with the winters (a bit brisk I've been told). Upon second thought, it seems it might also have something to do with the proximity to water. Water and string-like things seem to go together. This was driven home when we visited the Fisherman's Museum at the lighthouse on Pemaquid [...]
Now With Knitting
What's that? You want some knitting in your knitting blog? How unreasonable of you. I did just show you yarn yesterday. But I'm nothing if not accommodating, so let's see what I can do. Look, a sock! Now yes, it is just one sock, but maybe if I show you two pictures of it we can pretend it's a whole pair. Hmm? No. Darn. Well, I'll just have to knit the second then. Yarn is Tanis Fiber Arts (their yellow label, which is a freaking perfect weight for thick socks if you ask me) in the color Olive. Lovely stuff, [...]
Field Trip, Swans Island
So Wednesday morning's stop had unexpected yarny goodness. The afternoon stop though, that had totally expected and planned for yarny goodness. For you see, Wednesday afternoon we went to Swans Island. This was another repeat visit (we went there last year too), and one well worth making if you find yourself in Maine. Swans Island (I swear I'm not leaving out the apostrophe, that's really how it's spelled) makes beautiful blankets. Beautiful, hand-made, heirloom-quality blankets. Blankets I cannot afford, though I do enjoy waving at them when we stop by. Luckily, they also make yarn. Their yarn is all spun [...]
Field Trip, Sweetgrass
Now part of the fun of vacation is field trips. Grown up vacation field trips are much more fun than the third grade kind. You are not required to take a buddy to the bathroom with you, and you do not have to ride a bus. You also get to visit distilleries, which don't tend to feature prominently on the school field trip list. On the Wednesday after Rhinebeck, we headed out to Sweetgrass Farm Winery & Distillery. We'd visited them on our first trip to Maine way back in 2009 (when I was a very bad blogger and didn't [...]
Space Cadet Giveaway
[Edit: The giveaway is over and the winner has been notified, thanks to everyone who entered!] How about we take a little break from the trip stuff and do something a bit more traditional for a day, hmm? Would you like to win some yarn? Specifically, would you like to win a skein of the amazing Space Cadet Creations' Astrid DK in your choice of colors? I rather thought you might! Astrid is what I used to make the Miscreant cuffs in Ne'er-Do-Well Knits. It's delicious. A nice round 4-ply, 100% merino -- sproingy and squishy and hugely versatile. I [...]
Rhinebeck, Commerce Style
Now part of the fun of Rhinebeck is the critters (see the previous post), and part of it is the snacks, and part of it is the completely shameless knitterly abandon with which everyone curates their wardrobes. But I would not be being honest if I didn't admit that part of the fun is the shopping opportunities. I confess I indulged. Though technically I brought home less yarn than last year. What I lacked in yardage I made up for in volume. Yarnwise, I was very restrained. A mere two skeins of Green Mountain Spinnery's Simply Fine followed me home. [...]
Rhinebeck, Critter Style
I'm home. I'm home, and I have a nearly ridiculous list of things I want to tell you about the trip. I fear you'll grow rather sick of it by the time we're done. There was yarn, of course, and blankets. There was unexpected fibery goodness in unlikely spots, completely unplanned knitting (knitting in support of a wildly unlikely project that will, itself, feature largely here over the next few months), planned knitting, surprise knitting (plus bonus kitten), treasure hunting, immolation, and quite a few other things as well. As usual, I make no guarantee of chronological integrity. I will [...]
The Knitting Police
Every now and then, I get a very nice email from a very kind knitter asking if I'd mind terribly if she or he made some little tweak to a pattern. Perhaps knit a sock toe up instead of cuff down or used a different cast on or did the math to make a hat different size. And while I find it very touching that folks take the time to ask, I want to take a moment and say something very important. Stop it. No, I don't mean stop experimenting. I mean stop asking. It's ok, you don't need my [...]
Mailing List
Want to hear when a new pattern comes out or something fun is going on? Sign up below!
Patreon
Want to support the content I create, get nifty bonus material for some of my favorite patterns, or get every new release delivered right to your inbox? Head over to patreon and sign up!
