AVOCADO FEVER

I've been a bad blogger, but I do have something to show for it!

2010-09-06T20:58:00.003-04:00

I know I have been really bad at blogging, but I've been busy -- really! And I do have something to show for it:

Ali Baba Watermelon! That's Jonah's foot next to it for comparison.

This is delicious! We got 4 big ones this year -- one I picked before it was quite mature -- it was light pink inside with white seeds but still good -- my nieces, nephew and son loved it anyway. One we gave away today, one is still growing, and the other one is this -- so yummy!

I cannot wait to weigh the one still in the garden, it is HUGE!

We have 2 little ones growing too, but I don't think there is enough frost and cold-free time left for them to make it to maturity. If I have the space, I will definitely grow this again next year.

And seriously, the seeds are half the fun -- we were cracking Jonah up today as we practiced spitting them across the yard. We're not very good at this skill...yet.

Garden update

2010-06-30T21:11:00.003-04:00

I went out to take some pics of the garden this morning and didn't even notice Thumper sitting right in front of me, enjoying the view as well.The zucchini plants are getting HUGE - no fruit yet, thought.

Delicious!Corn not looking too bad, but way smaller than that of the "real" farms around here.
Sungold cherry tomato ready to eat!
Garlic just harvested -- I waited a bit too long for some of them, but there are lots more in the ground, not quite ready to be picked.

A little bit of payoff

2010-05-07T21:31:00.005-04:00

We got some very early love from our garden today -- radishes! This little baby practically jumped into my hand, it was so ready for harvesting.

These are Saxa II radishes that I bought from Baker Creek. There are a bunch more out there just about ready -- I'd been doing many successive radish seedings throughout the early spring.

My little garden helper even ate one...except that he spit it out after chewing it for about 20 seconds proclaiming, "It's spicy! It's spicy!"

Speaking of harvesting, apparently it's morel season around here.

Jonah and I found this one on a walk the other day. It was delicious! I'm going to try to find some more tomorrow to share with Dave, now that I survived eating a wild edible.

Other stuff is happening, too. The parnips are getting big, it's about time to thin them out. Can you see the big bushy green thing at the end of the parsnip row? That's the sage I planted last year, it is getting HUGE and starting to flower. I'm not sure if I should let it or not, because it might affect the quality of the leaves...but I think I will because I want to see what it looks like and we don't really use all that much sage around here.Blueberry bushes are blooming.

Potatoes are sprouting!

Asparagus is getting taller.

We planted 4 short rows of Rainbow Inca Sweet Corn today. It's still about a week too early to put in the tomato seedlings, however this one took a major beating in a surprise windstorm a few days ago so I just put it in the ground to see what would happen. It's a Dr. Wychee's.

Pretty stuff

2010-04-18T22:18:00.003-04:00

Daffodils and tulips make good partners.I seem to have succeeded at planting the bulbs in some sort of a straight-ish line along the driveway last Fall!
Garlic getting bigger with peas to the right of them. I don't really like peas but for some reason they are exciting me -- I don't think I've ever had them right off the vine and that is rumored to be a real treat. And they are something green to grow in April!I think some spinach is coming up, too, but I'm not sure if it's actually spinach or just grass. They look similar. And are so small. I've never been able to grow spinach before.

There are so many little asparagus shoots begging me to eat them, but I won't, I won't! Next year!!!
The giant sunflower I grew last year seems to be extremely proficient at multiplying.

It's happening!

2010-04-06T16:35:00.001-04:00

The asparagus are showing their faces! I know I can't cut them until next year to make the plant stronger, but it's tempting...And here come the pea shoots, finally! You can also see how tall the garlic is getting in the background, and if you look carefully you'll spy some daffodils blooming!Strawberry patch is looking good, too.Raspberries are gathering strength to bombard us with their yummy goodness!
And radishes are working their way up, too!

I love this weather!

2010-04-01T16:03:00.003-04:00

A lot of the pansies I planted last spring came back this year. Also blooming in my yard are crocuses! Hyacinths with be next, with daffodils not far behind, and some tulips as well. Spring has definitely sprung, and the forsythia are blooming everywhere on my street!
The garlic is getting taller.
I planted some more tall telephone peas peas, parsnips, cilantro and Saxa II radishes in the garden today, as well as transplanting some Sanguine Ameliore lettuce I had started inside from seed. We'll see how it does. It's too early to move anything else outside and I am finding that I am not really following the garden plan I had laid out in the winter. I can only plant the early crops at the fringes of the garden, since I didn't till it yet and have to do it by hand. I didn't want to plant right in the middle of the untilled garden where the plants will be difficult to till around when the time comes. So things are going in a kind of mish-mosh row. I've got to stop now though because the next row back is for summer squash and watermelons, and that's the best place for them!
I moved my "greenhouse" outside for a bit of sun today.

Garden update and buttery goodness

2010-03-21T20:32:00.004-04:00

We spent this beautiful day outside. I gave the compost bin a big turn, and then spread some of the good stuff from the bottom over the garden. When it's tilled, the compost will mix into the soil and make good things happen.The strawberry patch looks pretty good, and the plants are starting to produce new leaves. We should have fruit in 2 months -- if the creatures don't eat them first!
Dave had the brilliant idea of moving this portable greenhouse into our "screen room." It keeps the seedlings warm and collects lots of light. I was so happy to discover how warm this unheated screen room gets in the sun, it is the ideal place for growing seedlings and it has given me hope for starting my plants from seeds!
You can see some lettuce sprouts here. The basil is coming up, too.
This pine tree is huge and old but it's going to be leaving us. Goodbye, pine needles, hello sunshine!
On another topic, after a day of gardening I made butter out of some of the raw milk I brought back from Uppingil Farm. At least I think it's butter. It tastes like butter! It took a lot of shaking to get there!

The Big Cheese

2010-03-20T21:14:00.003-04:00

Today my friend Kim and I took a cheese making class from Cliff at Upinngil Farm in Gill, MA. Here is a view across the street from the milk house.
We learned about ripening, setting, curds, whey, acidity...lots of technical stuff about all the work that goes into yummy cheese.Here I am, checking out the double-jacketed kettle containing the curds and whey.
Kim salts the Camembert.Cliff apparently thinks that the aging blue cheese is very funny. I took a turn salting the cheese.
Vat o' yum.
Standing over the Camembert forms.
I don't think I'll be trying to make cultured cheeses at home any time soon, but I did bring some yummy raw milk back with me to either drink or make ricotta.

Nobody home

2010-03-16T21:21:00.003-04:00

I don't see any residents in the bat house yet.
But we have our first crocuses! These are at the back of the house, they have been showing up there since we moved in 3 years ago.

Tomorrow I'm going to plant some more spinach and lettuce as well as peas!

Garlic Shoots!

2010-03-12T13:29:00.002-05:00

I raked aside a little bit of the straw mulch covering the garlic plot this morning, just to see if anything was happening...and it is! The shoots are coming up! They're almost an inch high now. I loosened up the mulch a bit to make it easier for them to push up through it, but left them covered to keep them warm -- at the advice of my friend Kim, and expert garlic farmer.

To the Bat Cave!

2010-03-08T14:55:00.005-05:00

Between the two of us, Dave and I managed (barely) to put our new bat house up on this pole in our back yard. Neither of us loved climbing the 6' step-ladder, but we did it. Hopefully there will be some mosquito-eaters moving in soon, although I've read that it might take at least a year to get residents. No comments on the not-so-completely pounded in nail heads sticking out of the top of the house, please...

Here is another pic of the garden where I planted some lettuce and spinach seeds. After softening up nicely for about a week, the ground all froze up again! And after some gorgeous spring-like days, too. What gives?

Swear to be better

2010-03-06T15:02:00.009-05:00

Let's see, it's been over a year and a half since my last post...I feel like I'm at confession. So much has happened since the July 2008 harvest that I just don't have to energy to go over it all, so I'm going to pretend I don't have a 36-month hole in my posts and start up again today.

This is turning into more of a gardening blog than the fiber one it used to be, largely because it is very difficult to knit or spin with a 2 year old and also because I have become addicted to gardening. It's also something that the whole family can participate in one way or another. So what follows is my gardening life...

I am dying for spring to come, and this warm sunny weather is a great sneak peak. Just yesterday I planted a few spinach and lettuce plants -- Bloomsdale Long Standing Spinach andGotte Jaune D'or Lettuce from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and some Viroflay Spinach seeds I had left over from last year from Seeds of Change. Maybe it's a bit early to be planting outside, but I only planted a few to see if they would take. The soil was only workable for about 3", and then it's still frozen, but I think that's more than the seedlings need to start out.

I would have loved to start them indoors but our indoor sunshine spots are non-existent. That doesn't mean I'm not going to try with some other seeds that don't like the cold weather as much as spinach and lettuce. Jonah and I already started some tomato and eggplant seeds in soda bottle greenhouses that I've been moving around to various windows in the house as the sun makes its way through the sky, and we have some sprouts, which is very exciting for both of us. We planted Thai Long Green Eggplant and Dr. Wyche's Yellow Tomato, both from Baker Creek. I think the sprouts are the eggplant, but I'll have to wait to see their true leaves to know for sure.

I'm interested to see what happens in the strawberry patch I dug behind the house last year. I'm not sure if it gets enough sunlight or not, but the plants seemed to do pretty well their first year as far as growing and branching out. Hopefully we'll get some fruit this year.

And of course, the crocuses, tulips and daffodils are starting to peak up out of the ground. Yay!

A little bit of harvest fun

2008-07-17T20:58:00.003-04:00

We grilled veggies for dinner tonight, all from the garden (we just added some purchased broccoli). Even the herbs I used in the marinade were from the garden, including parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme. No lie, my life is a ballad! We ate garden-fresh eggplant, peppers, yellow and green squash, cucumbers, and green beans. And for dessert...
YUM!

Vampires Beware!

2008-07-13T19:59:00.004-04:00

We harvested ALL of the garlic in our garden this week, and we consumed it all in the form of mighty mighty garlic bread. Originally I intended to cure some of it, but the crab grass was intruding mightily on the garlic patch, and all of the nutrients were being stolen away from my little bulbs, so I decided to just yank them all up and enjoy. There weren't that many bulbs and most of them were not that big anyway, but they were delicious!Next year we'll hopefully be rid of the crab grass and I can plant more garlic and do a better job of caring for it. Seriously, though, I had no idea how crazy the crab grass could be!

Besides garlic, what I am loving right now is an unending supply of raspberries. Pictures to come, but we've been eating them as fast as we can pick them so I haven't gotten a chance to take many photos. We had raspberry pancakes this morning, tomorrow I'll make raspberry scones, and I even tried to make raspberry jam last weekend but that didn't go too well.

It's Working!!!

2008-06-22T20:14:00.007-04:00

I always had my doubts that the plants in our garden would grow. Insert seed, cover with dirt and voila, you've got food! -- it seemed like some sort of magic that had to be smoke and mirrors. I wanted to put all of my faith into it and believe, believe that it would work, and deep down I did but I still had my doubts. I didn't want to find out that vegetable magic was a bit like the Christmas Magic of Santa Claus. And it's not! Look at our garden -- it's a wonderful true bit of sorcery!!!Everything is HUGE and blooming or fruiting! Cucumber blossoms,tomato blossoms AND fruit,raspberries (the bees love them!),adorable string bean babies,and eggplant and pepper blossoms, too. The strawberry plants are putting out runners, all the squash varieties are expanding mightily, the corn is getting high (as an elephant's eye), and the tomato vines are becoming unimaginably HUGE -- I need taller stakes and more cages! But I'm especially proud of this one, that I started from seed:Tomato plants have a smell that takes me back to my mom's garden of my youth. I wasn't really too interested in it then -- I mean, what kid likes to eat vegetables? But now I'm glad I have such an experienced gardener to call on for advice.

Here's something else -- today Dave and I built our own compost bin! OK so it's not beautiful, and a pack of cub scouts could probably do a more symmetrical job, but it's functional and made of 100% re-purposed materials (except for the nails). I just hope that it doesn't attract the bears. Because bears are not a make-believe boogey man, I've seen them here on more than one occasion.

I'm a lonely little tomato in a tulip patch

2008-06-04T15:49:00.004-04:00

Our garden is pretty much planted and ready for the season of growing! I am so excited -- every morning, one of my favorite things to do when Jonah takes his first nap is to go out into the garden with a cup of coffee and survey the progress. I'm especially excited to see new seedlings come up and increase in size, like here:
On the box in the left are corn and sunflowers -- about half the corn is from seed, the other half I bought as seedlings from Meadow View Farm in Southwick, MA, about 15 minutes from here. I love that place! It has mad crazy amounts of plants, and is only open May and June. I was so sad when most of my seedlings kind of dwindled off -- my visions of having a "from scratch" garden full of heirloom varieties were going up in smoke. But I learned lessons from this -- like not to leave little seedlings out overnight when the temperatures are low, even if the days are sunny and springlike. And little seedlings need lots of sunlight, something we don't have a ton of in our house -- I'll have to figure out a solution to that for next year. But anyway, I remembered that this is a learning year, and I still wanted us to have some veggies to harvest, so I gave in and bought a ton of seedlings. Happily, Meadow View had lots of heirloom tomato varieties.
Anyway, I digress. In the box on the right are varieties of squash -- about half from seed and the other half from purchased seedlings. We've got butternut (from Town Farm Dairy -- I saved the seeds from their squash last fall and dried them out), zucchini and yellow squash in there.The jungle-like bushes you see are raspberries, which were there when we moved in.

With the garden being quite full, I still had a few semi-decent sized plants that I grew from seed that may or may not be hearty enough to make it this season. I didn't want to throw them away, so I started planting them in random places around our yard. Here's the tomato amongst the tulip leaves:
And a pepper plant with the pansies and catmint.Three of the first radishes are ready to be harvested! Dave ate them tonight and said they were way better than store-bought -- the highest compliment to me! I tried them, but don't really like radishes anyway.
I planted a new patch of them about a week ago, and they're starting to sprout too (they're the little green things in front of the mature radishes).
I had direct sown a lot of seeds in the garden, but hardly anything was coming up. So when I decided to plant purchased seedlings, I covered up a lot of the garden with salt marsh hay to keep down the weeds. But I think I was too impatient -- a bunch of cucumber sprouts started poking through the hay, so I cleared the area and stuck stakes next to them so we wouldn't step on them (since they were in the middle of the row!) We are going to have so many cucumbers, because besides the ones that sprouted from seed, my mom gave me a bunch of seedlings that she grew from seed. So we have about 10 cucumber plants!

We put down the hay to keep the weeds away, and to help the soil become more fertile next year, after we till everything into the ground at the end of the season. And it's not just weeds that the hay keeps away, it's grass -- since this used to be part of our lawn, lots and lots of grass keeps trying to grow where we tilled. We could really use this grass in other parts of our lawn, but it insists on growing where we DON'T want it. See it starting to surround the garlic?

This fall we'll cover the entire garden with some sort of mulch after we till everything under. That should help keep some of the grass away.

So to sum it up, from seed we planted butternut squash, zucchini, radishes, garlic, lettuce, basil, corn, cucumbers, sunflowers, basil and a few tomato plants. Okay we initially started with more vegetables than that, but those are the things that seem to have a chance of having one or two plants make it. The raspberry bushes were already in place, so we didn't have to do any planting with those. From purchased seedlings we planted zucchini, yellow squash, corn, pumpkins, strawberries, peppers (yellow, red, green and scotch bonnet), tomatoes (MANY varieties, including yellow and cherry), eggplant, and a whole mess of herbs. And my mom gave us some cucumbers and string beans that she grew from seed.

Can I just say a fews words about my mom here? She is awesome. She totally made this garden possible. She spent many hours either weeding or occupying Jonah so I could weed/plant. She brought me tons of lilies and cosmos, and even planted the cosmos for me, in a semi-border around part of the garden. Not to mention the from seed plants she grew and brought me. I'm so lucky to have her! Thanks, mom, you rock!

Oh, and in case you haven't checked out Jonah's blog lately, here's a picture of him practicing eating (so that he can have all of those yummy vegetables...maybe next year!)

Lots of Growing

2008-04-27T17:40:00.003-04:00

Besides having a growing baby in our home, we're also growing lots more plants! I was so excited to see the flowers we had planted as bulbs in the fall start springing up all around the yard. I think that I didn't really believe that it would work -- this is the first time we've ever had a yard to plant anything in, so I was skeptical that those brownish-yellow bulbs would ever actually yield anything like this!Also, I transplanted a lot of the vegetable and herb seedlings into bigger pots.And this is where Dave and his dad roto-tilled for a garden a few weeks ago. I think I need to mulch. Notice that you can't really tell where our lawn ends and our garden begins? That's because our yard is very very brown. I think we have to invest in some grass seed!Still no knitting or spinning going on here, but the Guru was here with Mr. Guru this weekend, and she was knitting a sock in all of her spare time. It really woke up my knitting bug again!

A different kind of baby

2008-04-05T21:32:00.007-04:00

Spring has sprung, and I'm getting excited to plant my first ever garden! Last fall we put in some tulips, daffodils, crocuses and other bulb flowers, and they are finally starting to sprout up. I've seen crocuses in full bloom around town, but our snow took a looooong time to melt so I'm hoping we didn't miss the blooming season.We also planted some garlic, and I "think" these are the sprouts of those bulbs, although I'm not sure -- the previous owners could have planted some other bulbs in this area too. We're excited to see what comes up in our yard.We tilled a little bit by hand to plant the garlic bulbs, but in the next week or two we are going to rent a tiller and plow up some of the yard for a real garden. I started some seedlings in my "greenhouse" a few weeks ago, and as long as Kingston doesn't feast on them, they'll go into the garden and try to become vegetables. Dave gave me a whole bunch of heirloom and organic seeds for Christmas. We have various types of tomatoes and peppers growing in the greenhouse, along with eggplant, basil, parsley and sage. Hopefully more will sprout soon, and then I also have many different seeds to sow directly into the ground. I'm not getting my hopes up that this year will be a perfect garden, because we are basically just plowing up the lawn of crab grass and tilling it over a few times. I know the soil will have to be fertilized to get it to the right PH level, and maybe we'll need some top soil too, but for this year, we're just going with the basic till and plant method. As one of my new friends in town, who is a for real farmer, says, "Plants want to grow" -- I hope they will!

Happy one month birthday to Jonah!

2008-02-25T16:34:00.006-05:00

Is anyone surprised that I haven't posted for a while? And that now that I am posting, there is really only minimal non-Jonah content? Hey, I'm a new mom, what can I say?I have good news, though -- my right hand is back to normal! No more numbness! That means I can knit again -- when I get a bit of free time, that is. I really want to make an organic cotton blanket for Jonah. I wanted to do it the whole time I was pregnant, but wasn't able to.

Here's a cute pic of Jonah modeling some knitted gifts! Booties from Vicki, and a rattle from Mary.I really haven't been doing much other than tending to the baby's every need. And that kind of suits me just fine right now!

Been a little busy...

2008-02-07T13:39:00.000-05:00

I won't overburden you all with a million pics of Jonah (although I could if you wanted me too -- he's really too cute to not stare at him all the time). I just wanted to post and say everything is going great so far. I added a link to Jonah's blog on the sidebar, so your Jonah fix is just a click away.Also, I wanted to share these pictures of the wonderful handmade gifts my knitting group in South Bend (aka Frog Pond Fiber Arts) sent me. It was such a happy package to receive, and right before Jonah was born. It really meant a lot to me, those ladies put so much effort into these presents. You can be sure you will see photos of Jonah modeling this booty in the weeks and months to come. I'm sorry it took so long to post the picture of these awesome presents, but right after I received the package, "stuff" happened!

Vicki made the blue/grey sweater and hat on the left, along with the blue booties and striped socks. Aubrey made the light blue and multicolored socks. Carol made the teddy bear (the colors remind me of Eric Carle -- who by the way has a museum in MA not too far from here, where we'll take Jonah when he's a bit older) and Jess made the cabled blue sweater on the right. The light blue vest is from Elizabeth, and Mary made the light blue hat and the ball with a rattle in it. The very colorful blanket underneath all the gifts was made by Sandy, it's a stroller quilt. These gifts are all really so cute!

I voted today, did you?

2008-02-05T18:16:00.000-05:00

I had the funniest experience voting for the first time in our new town. I'm used to the old school voting machines with the lever, and as we went into the school gym we saw all these little boxes. I was thinking, "Cool, high tech computers for voting!" So the woman checking us in asked if we've ever voted before, and I said, "Yes, but not with these new machines." She handed me a folder with a piece of paper in it and basically said, "Take this over to any 'privacy booth' and fill in the dot next to the name you want to vote for then put it in that box over there." What??? Total regression to 1800's technology! I guess there is a paper trail, but still...

And by the way, go Obama!

He's here!

2008-01-29T21:13:00.000-05:00

We are so in love with Jonah Gino, born January 25, 2008, at 2:44pm. He weighed in at 6lbs 15oz. We're all doing great, we just got home from the hospital today. More details later!

Induction Scheduled!

2008-01-23T11:03:00.001-05:00

Just a quick update with no pics -- still no Bacon! I went to the dr's yesterday and everything is fine but that little boy is just not moving down where he is supposed to be. Man! Stubborn little baby! So if nothing happens by Sunday, we'll be induced Monday morning and Bacon will be a little Aquarius by Tuesday at the latest. Thanks for all of the comments and well wishes, and please keep on sending us those good thoughts!

2 More Days - sort of

2008-01-16T15:52:00.000-05:00

Bacon is due in 2 days, but of course that doesn't mean he'll actually be here in 2 days. So we're just waiting. In the meantime, David and I went out for a great dinner at Metro Bis last night to celebrate my 34th birthday -- I guess I'll never be a 33 year-old mom! Also, David gave me a great present -- hand cards! I've been wanting a set almost since I started spinning. I can't wait to wash the fleece that has been stinking up our closet and prep it -- carding is so relaxing.

I had a nice "visit" with my niece and nephew at Stew Leonard's earlier this week -- those kids really like the dancing chickens, man. I felt sorry for the employees working near that station, because Sam pressed the button to make them sing over and over and over and over...and then she and Brady danced.

Any day now, and Bacon's face and name will be revealed!!!

Something knitting-related!

2008-01-03T22:02:00.000-05:00

I'm still bummed that my numb hand is preventing me from knitting at this point in my pregnancy, but luckily I have some talented friends to cover me (or to cover Bacon) in this area. I should have posted these pics a loooong time ago, because I received them all (except the socks) at our baby shower in November...but better late than never. The blue blanket was knit by my childhood friend's mom, and the colorful blanket was made by Dave's Ciocia Pat. The adorable and lusciously soft alpaca sweater is from the guru herself, and so are the socks (but those are for me!) And of course Bacon has the knit dinos made by Claudine, which I did get to show you a few months ago.

These pics kind of show my huge belly -- and they are also a before and after of my new haircut. Don't I look so Katie Holmes in the second shot? I'm feeling really well and just kind of waiting right now. I'm due Jan. 18, so that's just 2 weeks away. According to our dr's visit today, there is some progress in the effacement area, but that's about it. I'm very content right now, not in any rush to have the baby but very very excited to know that his arrival is imminent. I'm on maternity leave and am still surprisingly mobile and active, going out and doing errands and such rather than sitting around the house all the time. Although I do my fair share of movie watching and chilling -- nesting, reading, and trying to cook a bunch of meals to freeze so we don't have to eat take out every night after the baby is born. If we were still in NYC, take out would be a most welcome option, but the restaurants out here don't deliver and it gets COLD. We've had snow on the ground since early December -- maybe it will melt next week when the temperatures get into the 50's, but I'm not holding my breath. I like the snow, but then again at this point I'm absolved from any shoveling duties and Dave scrapes the ice off my car every morning before work -- so my take on the weather is a bit skewed by my lack of responsibility for dealing with its side effects.

Still Growing...

2007-12-10T14:21:00.000-05:00

Did you miss me? Well, that's not easy to do these days...look at how HUGE my belly is! Bacon is taking up more and more room these days -- and now you can see him moving around from the outside, big bumps sliding around the top of my stomach. It is so cool!

Please forgive my absence from the blogosphere...I've been crazy busy and really tired, so any time I'm not trying to get everything done I'm napping (or trying to). But lots of fun stuff has been going on, too.

My mom and SIL Kerry (who is PG again -- making another cousin for Bacon, due in July, so the cousins will be so close in age) threw us a fabulous shower a few weeks ago. It was at my parents' house, and we had such a good time hanging out with family and friends. And we got tons of awesome presents -- Bacon will not be hurting for clothing at all! Sorry, I don't have any pics, because they are all on my mom's camera.

We finally completed the nursery and decorated it -- isn't it cute?

And we picked out and chopped down (well, Dave did the chopping, and it was more sawing that chopping, no axes involved) our Christmas tree and decorated our house. It is so fun to have a house at the holidays!

Our friends Amy and Matt had a baby girl named Cate last month, and we went to visit her a few weeks ago. She is so tiny and perfect!

Knitting and spinning have both been put completely on hold until after Bacon is born. I had all these visions of knitting little sweaters and hats and booties for our baby, and a nice organic cotton baby blanket to cuddle him in...but no! One of the more fun PG-related maladies is hand numbness -- my right hand is numb almost all the time! The dr said it's very common, but that doesn't make it very fun. I don't mind, though -- I really am loving being pregnant. And we can't believe there are less than 6 weeks until the due date!

Happy Anniversary to Us!

2007-11-12T13:59:00.001-05:00

Saturday was our 6th (and final) child-free anniversary! We celebrated by heading up to Newport on Friday. We ate at the Brick Alley Tavern (thanks to Jenn and her funny dad for reminding us of this place, really liked it) and then froze our butts off walking around town the next day. Seriously, it was COLD -- mostly because of the wind. But we couldn't even really walk near the beach without getting sand whipped at us, so we just popped in and out of shops and wandered around, drinking hot chocolate. It was a lovely weekend away.

The big news (to me, that is) is that we had a BEAR in our yard last week. I never believed my neighbor who told me that bears eat birdseed and would tear down bird feeders...but it's true. I was out in our side yard one evening, carrying a bucket of birdseed to fill up the feeder, when I heard this rustling coming from the woods in the back. Branches were snapping and I was looking in there, trying to see if there was a dog or cat or something...bigger. It was BIGGER! I wasn't quite sure if it was a human or a beast, but I turned and ran back inside and looked out the window. And there was a black bear rambling out of the woods. And yes he went to the bird feeder. And tore it down. And ate the seeds. Then he went to the front yard and took down that bird feeder too. Needless to say we've removed said bird feeders from our yard. Here's a pic but it was kind of dark so you can't really see the bear too well. It was kind of cool to watch this huge animal wandering around our yard, but also a little sad because I don't think he has that bright of a future if he's so calmly walking around populated areas.

Knitting Friends and Babies

2007-11-05T15:26:00.000-05:00

Yesterday Dave and I headed into NYC in some glorious weather, and while Dave wandered the town I spent the day hanging out with Jenn, Claudine, Ruth and blogless Jill. You see, the fabulous Claudine (who is so money and she doesn't even know it) hosted an SnB baby shower for Bacon and me. It had been a very long time since I've been able to spend hours just chilling, knitting and chatting with my friends, and I really appreciated all the effort Claudine went to. She had fun knitting door prizes (I got a ladybug tape measure and a yarn snipping pendant), great snacks and she made me these adorable knitted dinosaurs for Bacon! Ruth gave me a kit of baby care items (which Dave & I were playing with on the train...teeny tiny nail clippers, really soft brush, awwww...) It was such a fun day and I felt really loved. Thanks, guys! I miss my NYC SnB girls so much! Whenever I get to go back to the Tuesday night gatherings, it reminds me of so many reasons why NYC is the best city in the world.

Happy Halloween from the Chicken-Head Cats!

2007-10-31T09:19:00.000-04:00

Chicken Head Mango looks at the flying witch making her way across the sky on a broomstick, while Chicken Head Kingston licks his lips in anticipation of the chicken-flavored candy he'll be collecting tonight.

Booty Check

2007-10-23T15:54:00.000-04:00

After John went wild over my bright orange booty and asked where I got it, I realized it's really good fiber blogger etiquette to ID your stash! Give props to the maker! So without further ado, here are the origins of the softness that now lives in my sheep closet:
Left to right, there is:

Pale blue with rainbow streaked merino top from Stony Mountain Fibers
Crazy colored wool from A Touch of Twist -- the label says "Screamer's", and I'm not sure if that's the color or another name for the company, but either way, it's appropriate!
Merino orange and red sunset brilliance from Spinners Hill
And the lonely skein of yarn on the top is 400 yds of Brook's Farm Solo -- I think this is merino, too, but the label just says "fine wool"

Rhinebeck!

2007-10-22T22:21:00.000-04:00

Mother Nature just keeps on giving, with the beautiful weather still holding today. And what a day she gave us for Rhinebeck! I drove over there on Saturday morning, with the sun hitting the trees in just the right way to create such brilliant shades of orange and yellow that I couldn't believe my eyes. I wandered around for a bit, and then ran into Sweetgirlknits. Together we wandered around fondling things until we it was time to meet up with the rest of the SnB gang. I got to see PassionKnitly's beautiful new tattoo, and then witnessed the beginning of the end for her -- she bought her first fiber and spindle! Oh there is no stopping that girl now, she's gonna spin! I also saw lots of other NYC friends, and not a few fibrous animals. The funniest thing I saw all day was a boy around 10 years old giving a mini lecture on alpacas and publicly re-affirming his humanity. We were gathered around one of the pens, petting the alpacas' lovely heads, and the boy was saying to everyone, "Now, if the alpacas weren't in pens, they wouldn't stand still to let us pet them. But I think that since they are in pens, they are getting comfort from us being here. But I don't know that for sure, because I'm not an alpaca."

I didn't go crazy buying stuff -- I was tempted by a pair of wool hand cards, but I think I'm going to put them on my Christmas list. I really, really need to wash and card that raw fleece I bought in Greencastle last year...but here at Rhinebeck,I mostly stuck to colorful fiber, really really soft fiber -- I think it's all merino. Even the one yarn purchase I made is merino. The soft stuff was really calling to me. I could have done a lot more damage, but after 4 hours my feet and hips were killing me and I just had no will to go on. Bacon was just trying to save me some money, I guess! Now, I just have to remind him that alpaca cria walk the very day they are born, none of this starting with crawling and then working your way up to bipedism...

All the fall beauty does mean one thing besides apple cider, pumpkin picking and leaf peeping -- time to rake leaves! The maple tree in our backyard has shed, BIG TIME. But isn't Dave doing a nice job of cleaning up after it? And doesn't Mango really blend into those colors?

The pumpkin hats, they just keep on coming

2007-10-18T16:37:00.000-04:00

I wanted to share these cute pics from last weekend with you before RHINEBECK completely takes over my blog. And that's only 2 days away so I realized I was running out of time. Our friends Cherisse & Steve came to visit our "country house" from the great big city, along with their cute son Jack (who would not leave his hat on long enough to get a good shot of him in it!). We did lots of fall stuff like go on a hayride, pick out pumpkins and eat apple pie. Now I just need to carve up all of the pumpkins we have been hoarding for the last few months...because jack-o-lanterns are fun, and roasted pumpkin seeds are even better!

Totally off-topic -- does anyone watch Dirty Sexy Money? I DVR'd it to give it a try, and I am hooked. At first I was annoyed with Nate's constant honesty (ok I KNOW his name is Nick, but he'll always be Nate Fisher to me), but now I think it makes things interesting. We'll see.

MUD's Crib

2007-10-11T18:02:00.000-04:00

As promised, here are some inside photos.

First is the living room -- the inaugural lighting of the fireplace is getting closer as the weather FINALLY turns to real fall.

Attached to the living room is a little sun porch. The cats and plants like it for now, but it's not in very good shape and won't be a pleasant place when winter comes. We want to remodel it next year, so that we can hang out in it for all four seasons.

Here's the kitchen.

And the orange room -- the office/guest room. If anyone wants to come visit, this room will be your home away from home. Complete with double bed and internet access, yeah!

Interiors!

2007-10-10T16:20:00.001-04:00

Several people have asked me to post some interior shots of the house. So here you go! The best part is the baby's room, because that just happened in the last 24 hours. My parents got us the crib and glider (and dresser but sadly it hasn't come in yet), and they were all disassembled last night. But when I woke up this morning, it was like Christmas -- Dave had put everything together! It's so cute even in this stark naked state of undress. And the carpet just came 20 minutes ago. Look at the window behind the glider -- we have a huge maple tree, and the leaves are really starting to change this week.

I love our living room, and bedroom too -- the only other rooms that have new furniture. Pics of those to come tomorrow, because they are both a mess right now.

Showing off

2007-10-08T15:01:00.000-04:00

David & I finally got our house in order enough to invite some family members up for a fancy pizza dinner this weekend. My niece Sam and our friend Emily really got into the pumpkin hats I made for them, despite the fact that it was pushing 90 all day and we had to turn on the A/C to keep from melting. What is it with this weather, huh?

The next day, David & I took a drive through Litchfield County to check out the fall-ness. Not too much in the way of leaf-changing, but we did run into a fair where there was a spinning demonstration and bluegrass music! And a petting zoo with calves and baby pigs -- baby pigs! Here's me in front of the covered bridge in Cornwall, CT. Down below, this guy was walking his dogs, who seemed to prefer to swim -- they were having a GREAT time!

This weekend we also picked up some fall decorations in the form of pumpkins and mums, to go with our corn stalks. I think our home is looking nice and seasonal, don't you? Of course, it definitely needs a good power washing, but Bacon can do that in the spring...

So much to say

2007-09-26T14:33:00.000-04:00

It's "only" been a month since my last post...yikes! I don't have any new pics of Bacon (don't worry, it's just a placeholder name until we can decide), but I know he's getting bigger because he has been kicking up a storm in there! We're a little nervous because we were hoping for a very chill baby, like my nephew Brady, who was very laid back in the womb, according to his mom. His adorable yet spirited sister Sam, on the other hand, was a jumping bean before she was born. I love to feel the kicks, though, even if it means less rest once the baby is born and he won't sit still.

That's a new picture of me, I think I'm starting to show! We went to the Big E last night -- so many sheep and llamas! And cows, too. This baby merino sheep was just 2 days old! But I think he was born with springs in his feet -- after walking away from his mom, he started jumping straight up and down into the air -- it was so cool and very Tigger-like.

I've finally picked up the knitting again, mostly hats for the fall. I've got to get several more pumpkin hats done before pickin' season starts in earnest, so I can outfit the kids in my life for their pumpkin patch adventures. The little blue one was a gift for Bacon from Mary at SnB last week. Thanks, Mary, his first hand-knitted gift! Speaking of SnB, I was so so happy to be able to go to a meet-up in NYC. I really missed the SnB ladies (and gentlemen -- there were a lot of guys there that night!), and I can't wait to see them again at Rhinebeck!!! I think my heart might still be in NYC, and I don't know if it's ever going to leave. Well, Bacon will probably have my heart the minute he's born, if he doesn't already, but geographically, it's in the Big Apple.

Last but not least, here's Kingston, guarding the rest of the pumpkin hat stash...

It's a BOY!!!

2007-08-26T17:28:00.000-04:00

Home and family

2007-08-07T19:25:00.000-04:00

So I truly owe you some knitting/spinning news, but I have not had much time to do any of that lately (unless you count the spinning lessons I gave to my 2-1/2 year old neighbor Emily -- well, she kind of just spun the wheel with her hands while shouting, "Look, mommy, I'm making yarn!") Hopefully I'll have more time for all of that once we get settled in our new house in the next few weeks -- yes I have to share more personal news, we are now homeowners! And here is Dave doing some "exterior beautification" (which is about the only thing we can work on right now, as the interior is having its floors stripped and refinished and its walls painted before we move any stuff in).

And, we saw our baby again yesterday afternoon. I asked the doctor why he/she wasn't jumping around in the u/s like last time, and he said, "Michelle, babies get to sleep too..." and then the little baby wiggled a little, like he/she was snuggling. Awww...Dave is convinced he sees a little penis, but I told him that if the Dr. couldn't tell at this point, neither could he. Anyway we should find out if it's a boy or a girl in about 2 weeks, at least if the little one is looking in the right direction at the time! And if it's a girl, she's still getting a blue bedroom -- I like blue, and I'm a girl!

I got my camera back!

2007-07-27T11:30:00.000-04:00

Finally! Here are some pics of my hand-dyed wool (which I dyed about a month ago) -- I used the Easter Egg and sun-bake dying method, loosely following Vicki's instructions.

This first one is kind of a Stone Soup color -- you know, use whatever dye is left in the spray bottles and just cover all the wool and the result will be cool. I'm not sure what the spun up result is going to be -- right now the singles are looking a lot like peas and carrots...

This next one is much more of a colorway -- sort of a seashore at dusk kind of thing. I think this is going to look nice. These are both some wool that Janet gave me back when I hung with the Frog Pond gang.

Lastly, displayed by the lovely but often grumpy Mango, is some yarn that I spun out of some of the hand-dyed wool.

Time to Share a Picture We Are Proud of...

2007-07-13T13:43:00.000-04:00

Yep yep yep, that's our baby! I am 13 weeks pregnant and due on January 18. We are so psyched and I am so happy to FINALLY be able to share the news with everyone! The ultrasound above was taken at about 9 weeks. We went to the dr. today but we didn't get any take home pics, although we did see the little jumping bean moving all around. It was really, really cool.

Happy news! Happy news!

Live Earth

2007-07-08T16:48:00.001-04:00

If you were watching the concert last night -- did anyone besides me wonder why Ann Curry kept punching all of her guests during the interview? She punched Trudy Styler, she punched Anne Thompson and I swore she was going to punch Al Gore, too -- instead she kept grabbing his shoulder. She was way too animated, it was scary -- she was just coming at her victims with her arms flailing and face very very close to them. Ms. Curry is lucky Sting didn't knock her shiny shirt self down with his big bared arms after she punched his wife.

Also, didn't Jon Bon Jovi look a little crabby during his interview with Carson Daly? And Shakira was pretty awful...

And really, Phil Collins looked an awful lot like John Locke...are we sure Genesis doesn't have a new front man?

This is really random stuff but I felt like sharing my thoughts. I'm sure there were more Curry punches and bad performances but I fell asleep before it was over. It's a great cause, but I couldn't help being a bit snarky.

The un-illustrated post

2007-07-05T13:16:00.000-04:00

I've been doing LOTS of stuff lately, and I've wanted to share it here. But my camera is broken! Stupid Cannon -- the lens won't retract. I have to find the warranty and get it fixed, because we haven't even owned it for a year. You all will have to settle for a textual description of my activities.

Over the weekend I dyed a bunch of roving using the Easter egg dying method that Vicki described. It was so fun! Now I'm spinning some of it up to see how it all comes together -- plying is my favorite part. It was kind of a colorful experiment -- there's not much rhyme or reason as to which colors are next to each other, but now that I know it works, next time the color combos can be more intentional. The colors came out nice and bright, even after rinsing, which I believe is due to the fact that I mixed the tablets with vinegar only, no water. And I left the roving out in the sun for 2 days before rinsing it. I can't wait to share pics!

Also, we had a little 4th of July party with my cousins, and it was so fun to see all the kids playing together! The fireworks display my brother loosely planned was postponed, since it was raining all afternoon. The weather and an incident with a sparkler and a 2-year-old were enough to make us not mind about the night light display cancellation.

David and I found a couple of houses that we like up in Simsbury, CT (aka the Nutmeg State, for all those who asked) and we're going back to take another looked this weekend. We could be homeowners by the end of the summer!

Now if I could only get my camera back in operation, this would all be so much more interesting to look at...

The Guru's Wedding

2007-06-27T17:40:00.000-04:00

This blog has been sorely lacking in knitting/spinning content lately, and there's a good reason for it -- I haven't been doing either of those 2 things at all! We've been so busy traveling around and now getting settled back at work, I haven't had any time to indulge in my favorite hobbies. But that will soon change, I promise -- because I owe the guru some handspun sock yarn as part of her wedding present, and I want to send it to her before she returns from her honeymoon next week. Let's see how far I get with that.

We were in DC this weekend for the aforementioned wedding. It was such a blast. I got to hang out with lots of college friends and lots of the guru's friends I knew from visiting her in various geographical locations (Nepal, DC and Jersey). We had yummy Lebanese food at the wedding, and since the guru is also a veg, the selection was GREAT!

Now we're looking for a house somewhere in the Nutmeg State. I want a big yard so we can have a garden, and Dave wants anything but a raised ranch. I grew up in a raised ranch! Hmmm...

By the way have you read Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle? It was really a delightful book, and I don't use that word lightly (or often...or ever). But that is seriously what it was, all about getting more in touch with where our food comes from and the reality of what we eat. I want this woman to be my friend!

Vacation continues

2007-06-13T13:27:00.001-04:00

Here's where we are now -- one of my favorite places on earth, Hatteras Island, NC. We used to come here as a family every year when we were younger (my parents still come every summer for 3 weeks!), and I was glad to be able to bring Dave here now. One of his friends got married on the Outer Banks, so it was a perfect place for us to end our vacation. We're staying in Buxton at the Cape Hatteras Bed & Breakfast -- seriously the most wonderful, relaxing, perfectly located b & b I've ever stayed at. We were supposed to stay 3 nights, then we extended to 4, and now 5...you get the picture. But they're booked up after Friday so we have to leave then! 500 ft from the beach (which is too windy to lay on today, so you get a blog post!) Here's Dave & I on the soundside last night, waiting for a table at the Sandbar & Grille (used to be located down the road a bit in Hatteras but Hurricane Isabel destroyed it in 2003). And here's a shot of us strolling on the beach.

We also visited my cousins in Charleston, SC and had a great time playing with their young ones -- but neglected to take a single photo of them (oops!) Prior to SC, we stayed in New Orleans for a few nights. Such a beautiful city. But the areas that were hit by Katrina are extremely sad. I'll post some pics of the devestated homes, but not today, it's really depressing. You can look at Dave eating a beignet instead. Just know that the tourist areas (French Quarter, Garden District, etc.) are fine and welcoming visitors, and the city really, really needs it -- there are areas (like the lower 9th ward) where the houses are 90% uninhabited and almost every other yard has a FEMA trailer in it. If you can get yourself down there, do it, support the city. It's really beautiful.

High rolling to high climbing

2007-05-29T21:00:00.000-04:00

Our trip has been varied so far -- we started out in Atlantic City, where I had the best roll of my life in craps (and it wasn't even that good) -- and I managed to win a little money. The secret to winning at craps is to find a table where a little old man, preferably with really thick glasses, has the dice and just bet your heart out -- he'll make the point! Dave had fun too, but ended up in the red so not quite as much fun as me! When we left our cushy AC room in Caeser's, we headed towards Gettysburg, via Pennsylvania Dutch Country. It was so pretty out there, and in the Amish Town of Bird in Hand, we randomly spotted a wonderful spinning and yarn shop called Labadie Looms, which was completely stocked with hand-dyed, hand spun local fibers. I bought some multi-colored locally grown roving to play with, and almost left with some hand cards but managed to resist.

Dave is obsessed with history, and so we had to stop in Gettysburg. We found a monument to Fair Catch Corby, and also stopped at The Gettysburg National Cemetery. It was amazingly peaceful, with tall, wonderful trees (Gingo Biloba, Sassafras, Magnolia, Cypress, Maple, etc., etc.) and birds and just a very respectful place. The battlefield there is huge and within sight of the town, but I was even more moved by the battlefield at Antietam, site of the bloodiest day in US History. It was beautiful -- fields and farms and sheep (yes, sheep!) but spooky for it's pastoral simplicity when you think about what happened there less than 200 years ago. It was so well restored to the time of the battle, it was just too easy to picture the bodies piled in the fields, and the men shooting at each other at close range.

We moved on to Charlottesville, VA, home of TJ's Monticello and UVA -- one of the most beautiful campuses I've ever seen (yes it gives ND a run for its money). Then onto the roughing it part of the trip, when we camped in the Smoky Mountains. We saw a bear sleeping! Not in our campground though...It's amazing to camp out in the middle of a national park, where birds wake you up with the sunrise. So different than the city! The diversity of bird calls is really cool -- you can count the different birds just lying in your tent, listening to their voices -- starting with the owl just before the sun comes up, followed by one after another variety of call.

Next on to New Orleans -- I'm not sure who's more excited about that part of our trip, Dave and I, or Becca and Ryan, who are at this moment excitedly and generously preparing a list for us of what to do, where to eat, drink, etc. in the Big Easy.

Back home again!

2007-05-21T09:09:00.000-04:00

I've been a really negligent blogger, but I wanted to post a quick update. Dave & I arrived safely back in CT last Saturday. We were all set for our big 1 month "Out West" adventure, when I had a little mishap -- on the train to NYC on Tuesday, I sliced open my toe and had to go to the ER and get stitches and part of my nail removed. That is exactly as gross as it sounds. So we postponed the trip a bit, and are leaving today -- changing the theme from "Out West" to "Down South". Atlantic City is our first stop, and I'll try to post some updates as we go.

I miss all the Frog Ponders!

Farewell to friends, part 1

2007-05-01T20:15:00.000-04:00

Tonight 8 Frog Ponders got together at Fiesta Tapatia for a little goodbye dinner. I can't believe I'm leaving South Bend next weekend. I am really going to miss these women. And I was totally and happily surprised by presents! Janet (the spinning wheel goddess) gave me a home-made dying kit. Carol gifted me with Broad Ripple socks, in a color that made her think of me because it reminded her of avocados. I love that avocados make people think of me! I need to spread that association around a little bit more. Sandy (who is rapidly falling into the spinning vortex with the rest of us -- she was playing with my wheel tonight and I bet she'll have one of her own before the summer's over) gave me a most elegant and classy gift -- a sheep that poops brown jelly beans. Yeah!

I also meant to take a pic of the spinning wheel charm that E! brought me back from Israel, but it, along with the orifice hook that Vicki made me, is attached to my spinning wheel now and I'm having a hard time getting good shots of these. Check out Vicki's blog entry for good pics of the orifice hooks, and get one for yourself, too! Mine has my name on it in beads, it's very cool.

Tomorrow night is the last Bella Vita meet-up I'll be able to attend. So it's goodbye part 2. Really sad. I am completely excited about moving back east and being near my family, but I didn't think it would be so hard to say goodbye. Once again, fiber people rock -- they are an international clan, and you can pretty much find a family member anywhere in the world you look. I'm sure I'll find some black sheep of the family in CT, too -- and they'll be great. But not the same as the friends I'm leaving here, or the ones I left in NYC last year. Anyway, I'm already working on convincing Vicki, E! and Jess to come to Rhinebeck with me -- and I bet a few other froggies could be convinced. And I think the Guru may be talked into it, too. That would be a true convergence of my worlds -- the Guru, the Frog Pond and the NYC SnB ladies, all at the same wonderful fleecey place. I think the planet might temporarily tilt out of orbit or something if that happened...

Spring Is Really Here!

2007-04-29T10:33:00.000-04:00

Babies are everywhere!

And David's man crush finally got a job...

How to Wash a Fleece

2007-04-23T17:51:00.000-04:00

Subtitled: A backyard full of sheep can't be far behind...

My spinning instructor Pat showed us how to wash a fleece in class, and then sent each of us home with a 1/2 lb of fleece to wash ourselves. I took some pics of my homework assignment in progress so I could create a little tutorial on washing fleece, for those of you who, like me, just want to keep getting closer and closer to the source. So buy a raw fleece from your local shepherd or at the next fiber festival you go to, take it home, and then do this!

Step one...cut a hole in the box.

Okay, really...step one is to fill 2 basins with water as hot as you can stand. You're going to put your hands into this water for a few seconds -- don't be a martyr, just make sure it's hot to the touch. It's hard to be a fiber fiend with 3rd degree burns. Add a little bit of Dawn dishwashing detergent to one of the basins only (the other one is going to be for rinsing), just enough until the water feels a bit slimy (you don't need frothy bubbles). (NOTE: You can use some fancy fleece washing soap if you want, but Dawn is cheap and cuts through the grease quite well!)
Next, take out just enough fleece to fit comfortably into whatever sized basin you are using. You can't wash the whole 4 - 8 lbs at once, unless you have a REALLY big basin. You want the fleece to be able to fit loosely in the basin, not be jammed in tightly.

Put the fleece into the Dawn-tainted basin, and push it down with some authority. Make sure all the fleece is completely submerged, but DON'T agitate it -- that can result in a singularly un-useful felted fleece! Let it soak for about 20 minutes. Then you'll have some really gross-looking water.Now gently, gently gather the wet fleece up against the back of your basin and tilt the basin so that the sheepy water pours out. You can gently squeeze your fleece to get out some more water, and then submerge it into the rinsing basin full of clean water (no soap). Now here is the reason you filled both basins at once -- the rinsing water should have cooled at the same rate as the washing water, and they will both be approximately the same temperature. Significant differences in temperature can result in fleece felting, so if you let the basins cool at the same time, you're golden when it comes time to rinse.Let the fleece soak in the clean water for just a few minutes, and then again gather it up against the back side of the basin and tilt to let the water pour out the other side -- target is minimal agitation of the fleece. Gently squeeze again, to release more water.

Repeat from step 1, re-filling both basins (one soapy, one clean), trying to make the water in the 2 basins the same temperature as the water you just removed the fleece from. In other words, this water will be a little cooler than what you started with on the first wash.

After the 2nd wash and rinse, lay the fleece out flat on a large towel.Gently (do you notice a trend here?) roll the fleece up in the towel and squeeze the towel. If it's big enough, you can even step on it to get the towel to absorb more excess water.
Lastly, lay the fleece out flat on some sort of breezy table-like structure. I used this mini slatted bamboo table, but your best bet is a sweater rack, so that the air can dry the fleece on all sides. Leave the fleece laying out for 24 hours, then flip it over for another 24 hours so that the other side can dry. You might have to let it dry a bit longer, depending on the fleece.Now you're ready to card and spin! But that post will have to wait until I save up to splurge on some wool cards. Right now I'm just using the ones in my class, and it is so relaxing to card. I even spun about half of this self-washed, hand-carded fleece already. Rolags! I love you!

I didn't include any advice on actually choosing your fleece at a Fiber Fest or farm, and that's because I don't have any expertise to share on this. I'm just learning! At the Greencastle fest, I just stuck my hands into every bag of fleece I came across, and finally settled on one that felt great and was affordable. At the very least, your hands will be silky soft from all the lanolin at the end of the day, even if you don't walk away with a fleece. Make sure that whatever fleece you buy is skirted, which means most of the Vegetable Matter has been picked out.

Starting her off young

2007-04-17T23:22:00.000-04:00

Sam, this is a sheep. A sheep is a wonderful animal that gives spinners like your Aunt Michelle wonderful fibers to twist into yarn that can be knit into fun clothing for little people like you! Sheep should be treated with respect and NOT eaten. Don't eat the sheep! Pet the sheep, love the sheep, shear the sheep (gently and preferably only in the summer) but don't eat the sheep!!!Watch out -- if you do try to eat the sheep, their bodyguards will get you!

Greencastle!!!

2007-04-15T22:40:00.000-04:00

I spent Saturday at The Fiber Event in Greencastle, IN. This was my very first fiber event where I didn't buy ANY yarn! Can you imagine a more deadly sin? But spinning has completely risen to the forefront of my obsession. On the 3-hour drive home, all I could think about was getting back in front of my wheel (she really needs a name, by the way) and letting the fiber slip through my fingers and twist into its new yarn-y incarnation.

I had an awesome day with Jess, who had a pretty wonderful time herself -- she went home with a beautiful Jensen production wheel, named Hazel. She told me I had to either talk her out of it or into buying it, and I told her it would certainly fit nicely into the back of my car. I'm not so good at talking people OUT of buying things, you see. And neither is Jess, by the way. I kept telling her to make sure I didn't buy anything else, and she replied by promptly showing me something else wonderful to buy.

I bought a LOT of multi-colored roving, because I love to see how the colors spin up together. Jess and I picked up our Corriedale x Romney fleece, which came from Lola at Praire Winds Farm and had been processed for us by Wooly Knob Fiber Mill. And I bought a whole fleece! It's from the lovely Alfreda, a Cormo x Border Leicester, almost 5 lbs. after some skirting. I'm going to try to wash and comb it myself...we'll see how far I get with that. But this is the real deal, a sheepy-smelly bag of fleece, freshly sheared off its previous owner.

We stopped at Stitches & Scones on the way home (braving snow and sleet and rain). What a cute store! That's where I redeemed myself, by buying some lucious Malabrigo. I don't know what I'm going to make with it, but once I touched it I couldn't leave without it. I also picked up some Fleece Artist merino roving -- as if I hadn't bought enough fiber earlier in the day.

In spinning class, our instructor, Pat, showed us how to wash a fleece. She gave us some raw fleece to take home and wash before the next class, where we are going to comb it. I washed mine last night, and took lots of pics of the process. I'm going to post a little tutorial with pictures on how to wash a fleece in the next few days.

White Easter

2007-04-08T22:24:00.000-04:00

We had about 2" of snow blanketing the ground this morning, and I swear if ONE MORE PERSON comments that it's more like Christmas than Easter, I'm gonna blow!!! Although...are those REINDEER in the front yard? We did have a nice time with David's family, cold or not.

Since my PG friend Phillipa received her package (thanks for the nice note, Phil -- I'm glad you liked it!), I can share pics of the basketweave baby blanket I knit her. Props to Kimberly Chapman's Knitting Gallery for the pattern. It was really basic and simple, but knit up with organic green cotton, the blanket looks very nice and was really soft. Perfect for wrapping up a little baby!

In which MUD goes farther into the vortex...

2007-04-05T14:27:00.000-04:00

Now everyone has to die someday (hey, can that really be incontrovertibly proven?), but with the escalating spinning infatuation my day to dye was obviously just around the corner. This is my first attempt, and it won't be my last. I followed the instructions for Kool Aid dyeing on Knitty, and learned a few lessons as I went along. Number one being don't tie off your handspun with hand dyed yarn and then immerse it into a pot of boiling water...you'll get some bleeding. This is most likely destined to be a hat for Sammy or Anika. It's some mixture of 5 packs of pinkish-red flavors. The yarn has a nice slightly variegated look to it (I KNOW green is not a variety of pink. Just try to ignore those parts, please). Do you think the pink will bleed more when I knit and wash it? I boiled it until the water was clear, and then rinsed it forever until the water ran clear, but it still smells kind of fruity...

I think my next plan is to try to dye roving in several colors before I spin it -- it's wicked fun to watch how the colors blend. This multi-colored proposal will involve quite a lot more mess than simply boiling a skein, so I might wait until I can make use of the great outdoors to spatter instead of Kool Aid dyeing the kitchen counters.

Here's a little sock update (Claudine, I'm glad I ripped it back last week no matter how much it hurt at the time...)

This week is a gift!

2007-03-29T23:43:00.000-04:00

Someone ordered up a near-perfect week for me after a couple of fortnights from hell. So many things happened to make me happy -- I really don't know where to begin, so chronologically seems like the right way. Well, we can start here, with Jess -- I met her last summer and we instantly bonded.

Last Saturday was the second Frog Pond Fiber Frolic, hosted by the one and only Chocolate Princess. Picture yourself in a room full of friends with wheels and fiber, and hours of un-interrupted spinning. Then, imagine that people start giving you things. Wonderful things you never even asked for, like an expandable hand-made fiber/yarn/etc. bag from Vicki, or massive amounts of free fiber from Liz, or a wonderful cake from E and Jess! These women are the most wonderful spirits in Michiana (and beyond!!!) They all welcomed me into their group, submerged me in the fiber world and I resurfaced as a spinner, really truly spinning wool into yarn! And they never asked for anything in return, just wanted me to be happy. I love them and am going to be so sad when I leave for the east coast in May. Man, am I digressing from the fiber-post at hand, but I can't say enough about these ladies.

So back to the frolic re-cap...Charlotte was there with bags full of Shetland Icelandic cross fiber from her own flock for sale, and I bought a pound of white wool. I was also lucky enough to win Charlotte's door prize of home-grown honey, home-made bath scrub and more fiber! Janet, the spinning wheel guru, solved a tension problem on my wheel with a literal turn of her wrist. My drive band kept on spinning without driving the wheel -- and that's its job, to drive the wheel! I was so frustrated. Janet told me to turn a knob that I had previously thought was just for decoration...and this magic knob raised the flyer and spindle and adjusted the tension and relieved my main wheel problem. By the way, Janet knows a LOT about wheels, and she has a lot of them too, and she's selling some...so if you want to buy a wheel, let me know and I can give you Janet's info. She's the procurer of Charlotte's walking wheel, which I previously posted about.

Beyond the Frolic, the weather has been gorgeous! So much so that Dave & I had to get out of town on Sunday and drive up to Saugatuck, where we wandered the streets wearing nothing but a skirt and a honeymoon cami -- well, that was me, Dave was otherwise attired. The day was so beautiful!

Monday afternoon I headed to NYC for work, and this time I got to go to see my girls at NYC SnB! I stayed with the gracious hostess Claudine, and we did a lot of knitting (and frogging -- well, I did the frogging, Claudine did the convincing...I think I really did need to rip back that sock that had a few too many decreases after the heel flap...although I had the opposite conviction at the time). #1 needles are really really small...I had to buy impersonal metal dpn's because I kept snapping my hand-loving wooden set with my brute strength while knitting. These socks are coming out really nicely now, though, and should fit Dave's feet. Thanks to the guru for the yarn and to Claudine for putting my stitches back on the needle (and for letting me cuddle with Murray).

Fiber Frolic!

2007-03-23T18:38:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow is the Frog Pond Fiber Frolic, and I'm very excited! I'm going to pick up some lamb roving from Charlotte, and I'll get to spend time with my fibrous friends/fiends. More important than the roving, I hope to leave with some spinning tips. I'm doing a lot better with that craft but I have so far to go. It is veeeery addicting, though...

I spent some time in DC last weekend with the guru, and she took me to a wonderful place called the Springwater Fiber Workshop. They had all sorts of roving, bobbins, classes, yarn, needles...everything! And it supports local fiber artists -- I'm all about local. I bought this blue roving, I'm not sure what it is beyond "some sort of wool" and the cashier wasn't sure either. But it's pretty with its greenish hints, and I'm almost done spinning it.

I also "set the twist" on some of my yarn in my bathtub with a homemade contraption. This consists of a pants hanger, a shower head and a lunch bag full of small cast iron skillets. It's as unwieldly as it sounds. But it works! Look!

Prairie Winds Farm

2007-03-12T21:46:00.000-04:00

What a weekend to be without my camera! David better come back from Europe with some excellent photos...

On Saturday, Jess and I went to local farming guru Charlotte's Praire Winds Farm, just south of town. This is a sustainable farm and nature retreat -- Charlotte has sleigh rides in the winter, prairie walks, spinning events, etc. She also does historical spinning re-enactments. It was an AMAZING experience I wish I had gone there earlier. And I wish I had my camera!!!

We drove up the long dirt driveway, passing by a flock of sheep and a herd of horses and ponies, up to the house where we were greated by happy farm dogs. We were invited in and immediately served a delicious slice of pumpkin pie, followed by a little tour of Charlotte's spinning wheels. Dominating the living room (which had a series of enormous glass windows overlooking a beautiful prairie) was a larger than life walking wheel Charlotte had just bought. The wheel must have been at least 3 feet in diameter, and I got to try it out. You pretty much walk back and forth with the fleece in your hands, the spinning and winding happening as you move towards and away from the wheel. I'm not sure about all the engineering dynamics of this -- like how does the wheel spin if Jess isn't standing there giving it a whirl for me? But I'm sure Charlotte will have it figured out in time for her demonstration this week.

After the wheel fun, we went for a tour of the farm. It was extremely necessary to tuck our pant legs into our high rubber boots, as there was much deep mud and animal "discharge" to wade through. Many times during the tour we were warned: "Be very careful, you definitely do NOT want to fall down here!" We visited the sheep first (which Jess & I had to "herd" towards Charlotte so she could get a pre-sheared picture of one for someone who had bought a fleece from her), a turkey (really bumpy head), horses, ponies, a windmill-powered well, a pregnant goat (I felt her bulging (smelly) belly), and chickens. Oh and peacocks. Bunnies, too. Charlotte and her daughter showed me how to collect eggs from the chicken house (and they were delicious for breakfast the next morning!) And Jess and I bought a whole fleece -- it's still on the sheep though, I think they are being sheared this week.

So this post would have been a WHOLE lot more interesting if I had my camera. But you can use your imagination and just know that I had one of the best days ever!

I'm a Spinster!

2007-03-09T11:57:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the long time between posts. David took the camera on his "class trip" to Europe, so I can't take any pics! And I do have things to take pics of! I've been spinning so much, it's so relaxing and fun. I think I'm getting better. I'm going to try to scan some skeins of yarn on my scanner later, but I'm not sure how that's going to work out. I'm ready to buy a whole fleece -- I can't wait until the next fiber fest!
I didn't want to leave you with NO pics, so here's one of some of my Italian ancestors -- this must have been taken in the late 1920's. I know the girl standing on the right is my grandfather's first cousin Italia, and she looks to be about 14 in that pic. His cousin Leah is also in the pic, but I can't pick her out. See, this sheepy thing is in my blood!

In Memory of Gino Tosolini, 1916 - 2007

2007-03-01T16:53:00.000-05:00

A lot has been going on in my life lately, but figuring most prominently is the loss of my grandfather this past Monday, Feb. 26. It is really sad to lose him, but fortunately he had a long and full life, and he died peacefully in his sleep, at home in his favorite chair. My grandmother was an incredibly giving wife, and took good care of Grandpa until the very end. I wasn't able to be at his service yesterday, so I just wanted to remember him here.

Grandpa Gino was always a kind of larger than life figure. He immigrated here from Italy in the 1930's, and always seemed indestructible to me. I mean, when he was a boy he was shot in the eye with a bow and arrow (inside an Italian hospital, no less), he's been in numerous car and tractor accidents, and he always seemed to come out of them a little bruised but otherwise in good condition. His father (whom I never met) was a cowboy! I always remember him tinkering around with machines, trying to keep things running. He used to lay out breadcrumbs on the hill behind his house for the birds when we were younger -- I remember saving the ends of bread loaves and slightly old bread in a bag in the fridge for grandpa all the time. He called everyone Luigi or Salami. He always gave us kids a butterscotch hard candy when he drove us someplace. He loved fishing -- he even had a little boat that we would go out on sometimes. He would get up at the crack of dawn to fish while they were biting. He used to take 5 mile walks every morning at 3am -- he was an EARLY riser. My grandmother didn't drive, so my grandfather drove her everywhere, patiently waiting in the car, reading National Geographic, while she did the grocery shopping or whatever errand she was on. He never complained about waiting around -- I think he kind of liked the time to read.

He slowed down a lot lately -- my most recent memories of him were when David & I lived in the apartment on their first floor for a month, and he would call me upstairs almost every day to re-program his TV remote.

I went to visit our cousin Mario in Grandpa's hometown in Italy a few years ago, and I scanned a lot of old photos there, some of which I'm sharing here. Rest in peace, grandpa -- I love you and will miss you!

First yarn!

2007-02-22T14:11:00.000-05:00

It's not pretty...but it's my own. However I completely used the niddy noddy incorrectly -- I could tell from people's faces at Bella Vita last night when I showed off my new creation. But I'll learn. And I really think I'm getting better at the spinning part. By the way, ignore the various colors in there -- everything besides the navy blue are bits that were already on the bobbins when I got the wheel from New Zealand, and I just plied everything together without regard for color or nature of the fiber. It looks pretty, though!

When I started knitting, I was kind of overwhelmed at all there was to learn, or rather at all I perceived that there was to learn. But it's really just knitting and purling, with a little bit of a twist now and then. I didn't believe that at the time though. It took 4 or 5 tries and a large winter storm to get knitting to "take". But with spinning, I do not find myself looking ahead to all the other things there are to know...I'm just enjoying the process of sitting in front of the wheel and spinning fiber into yarn. It's just so nice. And I don't really care if I'm not doing it right yet...I'll get there.

That all being said, I can't wait until Tuesday night's Frog Pond meeting, so I can get some tips from experts like E!, Jess, Vicki and Elizabeth. And from anyone else who wants to throw me some advice! These ladies have all been mega supportive of my spinning efforts. And they are all somewhat addicted to beautiful, complex lace projects. I hope that's not contagious!

The Cabin!

2007-02-19T13:42:00.000-05:00

This weekend was spent on a fabulous get-away filled with knitting, good friends and Little House on the Prairie. David & I went up to Lake Ann, MI, to a cabin that my friends B & D go to every year. We had tons of snow and a fireplace...very conducive to knitting. I finished the Avocado Fever Socks (thanks to Yarnmonster for the great dye job!) and started knitting a baby blanket as a gift. I'm using beautifully soft organic green cotton that I bought at MDS&W -- but I might rip it out. I've been doing a simple basket weave pattern (idea came from Kimberly Chapman's Knitting Gallery), and it's quite nice and soft, but I seem to remember Claudine knitting (or talking about knitting) a baby blanket all in one color that had the letters of the alphabet on it, made by just knitting/purling. I can't find the pattern anywhere -- Claudine, can you help? I think that's what this yarn really wants to be.

So, besides sitting around and knitting (a lot) this weekend, we spent hours watching Little House on the Prairie. Our new friend Suz, who is a prolific knitter and makes really great felted bags that she sells on her Etsy shop -- check it out! -- well, Suz also is the proud owner of every single LHOTP episode on DVD. We were way into Season 6, when Laura meets Manly. If they did a re-make today, who do you think would play Pa? We have some ideas for the cast, but my favorite is Clay Aiken as Willie Oleson.

On the way home, David and I stopped in Glen Haven to check out Lake Michigan -- frozen around the edges, snowy on the dunes...and very beautiful.

Spinderella cut it up one time...

2007-02-14T23:47:00.000-05:00

I've been so busy, but now I finally feel like I've got my life back -- at least for a while. I did have some time to play with my new wheel and fiber tonight, and you're getting treated to the first ever action shot of me spinning! It's rough going, but I feel like I'm figuring it out little by little, a bit more each time I use it. I was spinning the mixed navy blue wool that Vicki gave me last week. I know this is something I can eventually do well, I just have to keep at it -- and it's really not a chore, it's very relaxing, and I can see how much I'll love it once I get to point where I don't have to stop and start so much.

Also, even though I have previously proclaimed to hate socks, I decided to give them another go...and I'm liking it! I'm just doing a very very standard sock pattern, and turning the heel with the help of the Yarn Harlot's advice in her new book, Knitting Rules! (it has an EXCELLENT description of socks on page 136 -- kind of changed my sock-knitting life, as a matter of fact. Another good move on the guru's part -- she gave me the book!) But one of the most wonderful things about this particular pair of socks that I'm knitting, besides that they are being done with a new appreciation and understanding, is that I am using yarn hand dyed by my good friend the Yarnmonster, in her Avocado Fever colorway (is it uncool to link your own blog in your post? Ha!)!

Last thing -- and this is a pure rave -- I went to Columbus, OH last weekend (home of Susi's OSU Buckeyes, may they rest in peace for 2007) to see my friend Laura in the opera The Merry Widow. She played Valencienne, and was AWESOME, as expected. Beyond the opera, the highlight of our trip was dinner at Dragonfly with A Second Breakfast and her roommate, and our friends Emily & Brian. Dragonfly is a vegan restaurant, but I think you wouldn't know that if no one told you. The food was...was...orgasmic? No, no, that's not a strong enough word for the pleasure I felt when the first bite of braised trumpets SNAPPED in my mouth -- and no mushroom has ever done that to me before. The texture...taste...smell...oh my God, it was sensation heaven! The restaurant is very local, very natural, very unbelievable, and all the carnies with me left full and swore they'd be back. If you're ever in the general area of Columbus, like say in the same hemisphere, go here!!!

Fibrous Ecstasy!

2007-02-07T22:23:00.000-05:00

Look, just LOOK, what the wonderful Frog Ponders Jess, E and Vicki gave me tonight! They presented me with a little spinning shower! I was so surprised, and touched, and happy...they are THE BEST! The perfectly rustic basket was from hand spinners Jess and E, and was stuffed full of fibery magic, including some beautiful blue Fleece Artist roving that Jess brought back from Nova Scotia, its mother land. (Mango tried to eat this, and as a result it's hiding on a high shelf in the closet, for it's own protection, until I can gain some proficiency with the wheel). Also inside were a niddy noddy and some spinning books. And Vic ki made up a beginner's spinning package of the fibers of various beasts, a magazine, another niddy noddy and some really cute hand-made labels for when I get good enough to skein my own yarn. These ladies really know how to make a girl feel special. I really almost cried when they gave me these gifts. Now all I need is a spinning get-together to get me rolling!

Tonight's meet-up at Bella Vita was so much fun. The group has gotten really large, and I met some new friends, including Strung Out. Knitting really is the universal language...oh, sorry, I meant LOVE of knitting...

Lamma Lamma Ding Dong

2007-02-01T05:09:00.000-05:00

Work had been CRAZY this week in Hong Kong, and my head is spinning from working through 2 time zones, here and NYC. So today I decided to head out for a little sunshine...because I just checked the weather forecast for my homecoming this weekend, and saw a high temperature of 8. A HIGH of 8. WTF???

I hopped on the ferry to Yung Shue Wan, on Lamma Island. This place is so different that the hustle and bustle of the city. There are absolutely no cars on the island, just some tiny little lorries used for transport only that look more like lego trucks than anything else. I strolled up and down tiny streets, through a tamed jungle, down to a beach (with a scarily close power plant in the background). Before heading back I stopped for Chinese food and a big bottle of Tsing Tao by the sea.

There was a tiny little cafe (and I use that term in the loosest possible way -- think plastic chairs and tables on a little slap of concrete with a plastic tarp overhead) by the path, where a little old man was doling out tofu gelatin -- kind of like hot yogurt soup with honey. I was skeptical, but went for it anyway and it was so good! This place is supposed to be semi-famous for the gelatin dessert, and is run by a little old lady called the tofu grandma.

Is it just me, or do these banana bunches look awfully phallic?

I did try to go to a knitting store in Admiralty last night with one of my HKG friends. She wants to learn how to crochet. But by the time we finished our Thai feast with mango and sticky rice, the shop was closed. So we had to go get beer instead!

PS No, there were no lhamas on Lamma...damn!

Shedir Troubles

2007-01-28T19:27:00.000-05:00

So, the hat is looking beautiful, I'm starting the decreases, and I'm getting excited about finally being able to send it to my friend, even though it's already a month after Christmas. It's getting cold in NYC finally, so she can really use it. What's the problem, you ask? Well, see that tiny little bit of yarn on the left-hand side of the pic? That's all I have left for about 20 rows. It's not enough. Not by any stretch of the yarn-magination. So I have 2 options. One costs money, the other costs sanity. I can buy another ball of koigu. Or, I can rip this back and eliminate one of the repeats of the pattern, since it will be long enough anyway. Frugal mud wants option #2, but mud who is easily frustrated by ripping back multiple cabling rows and fearful she will not be able to figure out where to stop ripping wants option #1. I have a week to decide, since I'm on a work trip in Hong Kong now and didn't bring this with be so I wouldn't fret about it. What do you guys think?

In other wonderful news, my wheel arrived just before I left. Isn't it cute? I'm kind of amazed that I got it all assembled by myself (thanks to some help from the Ashford web site), and even got David to play with it a little. But I desperately need Jess's help to get me spinning. I tried and can't really get it started. I'm sad I'm missing the Frog Pond Fiber Frolic on Saturday, it would be a perfect coming out party for my new little wheel! I was excited to find out that Yarnmonster Jess has the same wheel, it makes me really think I made the right choice, because she's pretty good at all things fibrous and would buy a bad wheel!

What have I gotten myself into?

2007-01-19T12:29:00.000-05:00

As most of you know, I've been on a mission to learn how to spin since early last year. I've had a few bouts of practice with Vicki and Jess, but I finally signed up for a class at the local art museum this month -- and it got cancelled due to lack of interest! And I've been browsing ebay for months, trying to find a reasonably priced wheel, but every time I found one I would get outbid at the last minute. So many impediments!!! Last night, however, I logged onto that addictive bidding site and saw an Ashford Traveler with 3 minutes left in the auction. I didn't even have time to think. I just bid...and won! I bought a wheel! OMG, I was freaking out b/c it's kind of a big purchase, and it's been my abstract aspiration for so long that for it to become suddenly real, with less than 3 minutes of transition time, was a bit overwhelming. But exciting! In less than 2 weeks, this baby should be here! Frog Ponders, I'm counting on your expertise to get me spinning!

(David's prediction: In less than 3 months our apartment will be filled with garbage bags of animal by-products. That sounds so much less romantic than roving. But he's a muggle -- he doesn't know.)

Oh, and I meant to mention this in my post yesterday -- the yarn that the guru used to knit me the Monkey socks was from Shelridge Farms, and she bought it at the MDS&W. I love these funky monkey socks!

All Is Good in the World

2007-01-18T11:13:00.000-05:00

I got some pretty awesome Christmas/B-day presents from some pretty awesome people. Somehow, David knew I was coveting this Cherry Creek Farm Icelandic Wool -- actually I saw it on someone else's blog in December, but I cannot remember who posted it, I'm sorry! I'm thinking it will become a nice hat and scarf or ... yikes! ... gloves! But the thought of all those DPN's scares me.

The guru sent me these fabulous Monkey socks, which I am wearing right now, and also the Yarn Harlot's latest book.

Jess (who I finally saw again last night at the Bella Vita knitting meet-up) gave me a subscription to a spinning magazine. Now I just need to get a wheel -- our spinning class was cancelled because Jess and I were the only ones who signed up, so I have to learn with a little help from my friends. And to that end, my parents and parents-in-law gave me a little bit o'birthday cash to help me on the road to the wheel.

I'm working on Shedir and having a bit of trouble at the point where the repeats start. I know Schrodinger completed it, I'm going to have to ask her to tag in and help!

Sheep Smelling Heaven!

2007-01-08T12:15:00.000-05:00

I have been traveling for the past month, for the holidays (to see David's family first, then out east to see my family). I'm still not back in the midwest, but I didn't want to postpone posting any longer because A. I didn't want to become a has-been blogger and B. The amount of stuff I have to post about is already getting unwieldy! Belive me when I tell you that I have been getting up to lots of sheepy shenanigans.

First up, I went to Back Alley Fiber Arts, in Caro, MI. This is the new yarn shop in David's hometown. When I walked in the door, I was greeted by one of the 7 women who started the shop as a place to get together and knit when the old yarn shop, Ruby's, closed down a few months ago. The shopkeeper asked me what I liked, and when I told her I was into the natural stuff, she pointed me to a basket of locally grown and spun yarn. The prices were amazing!!! I bought a bunch of it, and the brown sheep wool became a hat for my dad (thanks to Fig & Plum for the Cashmere Ribbed Hat pattern). I also stopped at Zeilenger Wool Co. in Frankenmuth and picked up some dreamily soft alpaca that became a baby hat for my new cousin Chiara, who lives in a small town in the Dolomites in Italy. Kingston is really enjoying the brown hat...

In another yarn shop I picked up some light blue Koigu and used it for the first time -- oh yeah, it's true, it DOES knit like a dream! With this, I'm making the Shedir cap from Knitty, as a belated Christmas present for a friend. Hmmm...didn't someone else just make both of these same things? Thanks, Schrodinger, you're a good leader, even if you didn't know I was following you.

Wait wait, adventues in yarn continue! I mentioned the Farmhouse Yarns sale I was going to this weekend, right? Well, it was fantastic. Just imagine a mini-Rhinebeck in someone's (very large) driveway, in the middle of the woods, with sheep baa-ing in the background. Carol, the owner, buys fiber from many small farms and has it spun into her own lines (like Lum py Bumpy, Silk Spun Cotton, Fat Sheep) which she sells to yarn shops. But every once in a while, she needs to do an inventory reduction so she hauls everything out into her driveway in hundreds of bins, most organized by type and color of yarn, and invites crazy yarn addicts like myself to come fondle and buy it at majorly reduced prices. She even had some roving for sale, and her flock of sheep literally overlooked the entire event. I just bought a few skeins -- light blue for a jumper for Sam, green (color Avocado!) and electric blue for something for Brady, orange for pumpkin hats and the brown for a hat for someone, not sure who. I almost purchased some undyed Lumpy Bumpy, because when I plunged my hands into the bin the yarn was so buttery soft I wanted to roll around in it naked. But alas, the bin wasn't big enough for that and I wasn't alone with the bin, so I decided to keep my clothes on and pass on the yarn. Truth be told that particular lot of undyed yarn was too sheep-smelly, even for me.

Rest assured, I have not been ignoring Rogue entirely during my yarn-buying frenzies of late. Here's a shot of the sleeves in progress (I'm trying to do both at once). But small hats are so much more portable and instantly gratifying. Didn't I used to be a monogamous knitter?

Be Back Soon!

2007-01-05T16:51:00.000-05:00

Wow, it's almost been a month since my last post. How very very bad...blogger block! I'll be back soon, having plenty to write about because I'm going HERE tomorrow!

She doesn't usually have a retail store but there's a big sale event. YAY!

Hoodie has a hood!

2006-12-14T12:36:00.000-05:00

I FINALLY finished the hood! Things I'm happy with about it include:

The cables really do meet up and look continuous
I used the 3-needle bind-off for the seaming and that worked nicely
It seems to look good from the front and sides

Things I'm NOT happy about are:

The grafting of the center stitches was a little iffy
The hood over all seems a bit large

Anyway, as I told Jess, who has been an immense font of knowledge on all things related to sleeves, Rogue is not going to be a work of art. I think this pattern was a little beyond my knitting abilities, which makes it a great project for me to learn from. She'll look beautiful unless you stare at her seams, and I know I really need to work on the seaming things. I'm at peace with the flaws, though. And I'm really glad I have such good friends to help me through the rough patches, like the NYC Jess and the Granger Jess. And of course, my guru.

Now I need to tackle the sleeves, not in the round since they are set in. Yikes!

OK, one problem I have seriously been baffled by...I was weaving in a bunch of ends when I noticed a single stitch marker hiding at the very apex of the v-neck. I thought it was just an extra that had fallen off my needle when I was grafting/binding off. I went to pick it up and put it away. OMG, it was stuck to the sweater. I pulled. Nope, not coming off. Then I noticed -- It was ATTACHED to a single live stitch. Right there in the middle of the neckline. WTF??? I now remember doing this and wondering why I was doing it. I know I did it for a reason, trust the pattern, etc., but I couldn't find the place in the pattern that told me to do this ridiculous thing -- put one single stitch on a holder and leave it there until you're almost done with the whole sweater and about to rejoice and then you realize you have a live stitch in the middle of the neck and no way to make it "un-live" (what's the word for an un-live stitch?). No friggin' way I was going to frog this baby. I did what any short-cut loving imperfectionist (don't read this, Claudine) knitter would do and I use a short length of yarn to weave the live stitch into its rightful place among the other properly behaving stitches. Pray the ends don't come out, okay?

Last bit of news, I hung out with some knitting and spinning friends on Tuesday night and met an amazing spinner/dyer named Elizabeth (aka the Chocolate Princess). OMG, her stuff is so beautiful. The colors of her sock yarn were just lovely and I wanted to scoop them all up and roll around in them. Unfortunately I hate knitting socks. It's not really fair that there is so much wonderfuly colored sock-yarn out there that gets me all hot and bothered every time I see it and then lets me down when I realize what it is, i.e., not suitable for my knitting needs (I usually like yarn a little bit thicker than the sock variety). But, you sock knitters will love it. She dyes roving, too. And started an etsy store -- check it out!

Rogue Update

2006-12-11T19:17:00.000-05:00

As promised, here are some progress shots. The body is all done and the hood is more than halfway there. I am so in love with how the Celtic cabling is looking, I can't believe how nice it is! The hood is pretty easy -- you have to pay attention at the ends, where the cabling is, but in the middle you can just purl or knit along happily.

After this I have 2 sleeves to do. The pattern says to knit them flat and "set in sleeves" -- but I'm wondering if I can't do them in the round? So much easier than seaming -- especially since I've seen how bad my seaming is on the shoulders. I'd just have to treat each row as a RS row and reverse the WS instructions where the cabling is, right? Anyone have any warnings about why I shouldn't do this...? Please speak now to save my sanity -- I'd say you have until the weekend, when I should have the hood finished and be ready to start the sleeves. Thanks!

Sam is the Jester

2006-12-10T19:17:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the lack of entries lately. I've been busy -- family, baking cookies, shopping, holiday stuff in general...among other things. I was very happy to finally spend some time with my family in CT last weekend. Sam was as cute as ever -- here she is sporting the jester hat I made her. It's really cute, but if I make one again, I plan to tweak it a bit so that the "peaks" are not all on the very top, coming out of the top center -- I think the hat would work better if the top were rounded a bit, and the peaks coming out of the top sides more. Does that make sense? Anyway, I made this with a bunch of leftover yarn bits, and it was fun, quick and easy and fit her surprisingly well. As an added bonus for the adorable wearer, the chartreuse base of the hat is made of Morehouse merino...yum!

During my visit, Sam made some cookies, which were good even though she ate a bunch of the dough and I don't really know where her hands have been...actually I do know where her hands have been, but I tried not to think of that while enjoying the cookies.

Brady is just as cute as Sam, but at this point in his life he really doesn't do much except look cute and smile. I'm sure he'll forgive the lack of attention, I'll make up for it when he has better control of his arms and legs and can make them do funny things like his sister.

Rouge update tomorrow, I promise -- almost halfway done with the hood, which is taking a lot longer than I expected!

Don't Feed Them after Midnight...

2006-11-30T15:22:00.000-05:00

...and never, EVER, get them wet. That applies to suri alpacas as well as Gremlins. I just blocked this hat and OH MY GOD does it smell like a rutting beast! I'm praying, PRAYING, that the smell dissipates after it dries because I've spent a good amount of time working on this "Braid and Bobble Hat" (from Fiber Trends), and frankly, it has been a pain in my ass. While I'm quite pleased with the appearance of the cables and braids, I couldn't remember the repeats so I had to keep looking at the pattern, flipping it back and forth to remind myself the difference between Cr3R, Cr3L and C5B. I should have just written the abbreviations on a post-it so I didn't have to keep flipping the pattern over, but I got too lazy to take the time to save some time. This is going to be a present for someone who doesn't read this blog, so hopefully she'll never know the olfactory experience that is this hat (until she wears it in the rain...)

My Rogue hoodie is coming along very nicely and even more importantly, it fits! It's kind of a perfect fit and I was going for some ease, but I haven't blocked it yet and I'm pretty confident that it will stretch a little bit at that point. The cables look great but I found out that I'm really terrible at seaming -- I had to seam the shoulders and it really looks amateurish. I won't show you because I don't think I want to re-do them at this point so I'm just going to live with it -- anyway, what am I if not a amateur apprentice to the knitting gurus?

I think I'm going to get hooked on spinning pretty quickly. I spent several hours at Jessica's house on Sunday, spinning away on her Lendrum. It was my first wheel experience, and I really loved it. And I love Jess, who owns all the equipment one would need to march a flock of sheep in one door and a thousand skeins of yarn out the other -- including some innocent-sounding combs that have teeth big enough to scare a tiger. And she had a bag of fleece that was truly fresh from the sheep -- and smelled like it, too -- worse than the wet suri hat, but still strangely alluring. My spinning classes start in January!

Mooooooooo!

2006-11-20T14:16:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was lucky enough to be invited on a tour of an organic dairy farm. David and I donned out boots and old clothes and trekked through humongous pies of cow pies to get to a field of about 10 or 12 happily grazing cows. They were overjoyed (as much as cows can show overjoyment) to see the farmer, who took a few minutes to "move the cows" -- that is, enlarge their grazing field on one end by moving a wire out in a few places. This allows the cows access to new grazing land and gives the old pasture a chance to re-grow its grasses. He only moved them a few feet out, but this happens almost every day so the fields all get their chance to rest.

This weekend was also the last home game at ND stadium for 2006, and our last chance to "sit" in the student section. I'm kind of sad that this had to end, football season iss probably the best partabout coming back to ND. But our team kicked butt and we're onto the Trojans next week, fighting for some slight, miniscule, sub-atomic-sized chance at a National Title, or more accurately for the right to get our asses soundly whipped by Ohio State.

Help Dave's Man Crush

2006-11-16T15:29:00.000-05:00

If you love Dave, please go to this web site and vote for Brady Quinn to win the Heisman (thanks to Gillaby for the link!)

Brady for Heisman!

Gratuitous Baby Bragging

2006-11-14T22:56:00.000-05:00

Here are my cute niece, nephew and brother -- not necessarily in that order, but pretty close! Brady is sporting the Jester Hat from Knitting on the Net. I made him the One-Hour Baby Booties from SnB Nation, but I have to say, they were way too small. So was the pair I made for KGB. So maybe they are really meant for new new new newborns...but KGB is only 2 weeks old. In any case, the jester hats came out really cute.

KGB

2006-11-13T14:27:00.000-05:00

I went to visit Eoin, Becca & Ryan in Chicago on Sunday and to meet the newest member of their family, KGB. Isn't his hat cute? Thanks to Knitting on the Net again -- except this time I didn't knot the "tendrils" so they kind of look like atennae -- which I felt was appropriate for a child in that family. By the way, this is a photo of the whole family -- see if you can find KGB.

Once Upon an Alpaca

2006-11-11T14:15:00.001-05:00

David & I had so much fun this morning at Once Upon a Farm Alpacas, who were having an open house on the outskirts of town this morning. There was a pen full of moms and crias, and two of the babies were inseparable. They were twisting they legs and necks around each other, running around. So cute! I bought some more suri for a hat for me, and had a really nice chat with one of the proprietors, Randy Beck. Someday, we'll have our own little herd of misfit alpacas.

As promised, here is a Rogue update shot -- I'm really worried about the size but I do NOT have the heart to frog this until I get to the end. I just have to keep on going. Maybe it will be a gift if it doesn't fit me right. We'll see.

Go IRISH -- 2 hours to kick-off! We have to head out to a local bar to watch the game, since it's only being broadcast on a satellite sports channel. And David forbid me from bringing my knitting to the bar, which I thought was pretty rude. But I can forgive him because he gave me a really cool 5th Anniversary gift, which is traditionally wood. David bought me some trees fromThe National Arbor Day Foundation, which will be replanted in our National Forests. So cool! What a great gift, check it out here.

Brady's Booty

2006-11-10T12:29:00.000-05:00

No, I'm not talking about David's man-crush, Brady Quinn -- I'm talking about my adorable nephew, who is going to get some booty(s) in the mail soon! Kerry if you see this post before you get the package, stop reading now! The booties are from SnB (I actually crocheted the straps, what is this world coming to?) and the hat is a pattern I found online from Knitting on the Net. Like the turtle buttons?

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while. I lost my USB cable for the camera and to me, posting without pics is like eating french fries without ketchup. It satisfies your hunger for food but is only a primitive shadow of what fine dining can be.

Rogue is getting BIG and therefore not so portable as she once was. I promise a pic soon. I finally tried her on and she fit, but I'm worried she's a little snug. I'm praying that's due to the fact that the front was still on the needles and that with a little bit of blocking, we'll be happy together.

Speaking of happy together, Happy Anniversary to Me & David! 5 years, holy crap!

Happy Birthday, Guru!

2006-11-02T09:37:00.000-05:00

I predict a happy and exciting 32nd year, what with getting hitched and all!

Also, happy birthday to Jess's daughter!

*Picture found on Sheep in the City.

Boo!

2006-10-31T10:02:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween!

Please check this out, it makes me laugh and cry -- The Life and Death of a Pumpkin. It's so sick and wrong and I can't stop watching it.

Yarn outing!

2006-10-30T17:37:00.000-05:00

I had a great time going to Sheep's Clothing in Valparaiso this weekend with Elizabeth, her MIL, Jess and Vicki. The store was overwhelming -- so much yarn, books, needles, notions and good fiber fiends. Check out Jess's blog for some pics b/c I was too busy feeling everything to take any.

I bought this nice multi-colored manos that will eventually become a baby gift, and also something that will soon (I hope) become a little birthday gift for someone who reads this blog.

Take a look at Rogue -- now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout! I'm about to start the arms. I love the way the cables came out! I just hope it fits -- I don't have the patience to take it off the needles to try it on. That's dumb, I know, but I came this far...

Last but definitely not least, congratulations to Mikey -- I'm so proud of you! He made detective!

Rogue, interrupted

2006-10-27T18:06:00.000-04:00

I'm usually a pretty monogamous knitter, but the Buttercream suri that I bought from the Amish Alpaca farmers kept calling my name, and I knew that I couldn't wait until Rogue was completed before playing with this buttery goodness. I wanted to make a hat with it, but then I found the Nakis ka pattern on Knitty and it seemed perfect. It knit up super fast and super soft, and I still have enough yarn left to do a hat -- it didn't even take 1/2 a skein! The only thing I had to fix was the bind off -- MAKE SURE YOU DO A LOOSE BIND OFF for this one! Otherwise it won't stretch. But there was a lesson in un-doing a bind-off there for me. Also, I will use slightly bigger cable needles next time -- the middle with the cables is a lot tighter than the edges with the seed stitch. But this will even out with wear, and it looks and feels niiiiiice!

The Merry Widow

2006-10-25T08:38:00.000-04:00

This is my favorite soprano and good friend Laura Portune. She's one hot mama with a voice that can shatter glass, and I mean that in a good way. Go see her in The Merry Widow if you're going to be in or around Columbus in February! While there, you can check in on A Second Breakfast and Ruthless and his bride, who also make their merry homes there.

Two steps forward, one step back

2006-10-24T13:15:00.000-04:00

I'm happy with the progress I'm making on the Rogue Hoodie. But I still slip up. Last night I spent about an hour tinking back when I forgot to do a repeat of the cable pattern and just kept on moving up the chart. Grrrr. But it's all good now. Can you see the kangaroo pocket?

Rhinebeck was this weekend -- all the posts about it make it look like the weather was beautiful and everyone had a great time. Wish I was there -- but definitely next year!

Avocado Fever - THE SOURCE

2006-10-22T22:47:00.000-04:00

After that Paul Hornung's "pants fell down" post, my hit counter skyrocketed by 2K in two days...and a large number of these hits were coming from deadspin.com (think of it as gawker for sports) -- they had AVOCADO FEVER as one of the confirmed "sources" of this rumor. I love it! Check it out here. I am SO sad I didn't have my camera because we were RIGHT THERE in full view of those baby blue boxers. Here's a link to the "event" on NBC.com (I found this link on NDScene). I can't find actual pics anywhere on the web, but I saw an excellent replay of it on WNDU Saturday morning before the game. Bug them to post the video.

You'll all be happy to know that Mr. Hornung's pants remained firmly around his waist when he was honored on the field during the UCLA game Saturday. Here's a shot of the team rushing over to the student section after Quinn and the Shark's amazing last-minute TD to win the game for the Irish! Best worst game I've ever been to...

Heisman winner caught with pants down...

2006-10-20T22:41:00.000-04:00

I had all these great intentions of posting with photos of the leaves in Brown County, where David & I went earlier this week, and of the excellent progress I've made on my Rogue Hoodie, but I just got too busy doing nothing to blog. And then this happened...and I HAD to share...we went to the ND pep rally tonight with my parents, and 1956 Heisman Trophy winner Paul Hornung was speaking, and HIS PANTS FELL DOWN AS HE SPOKE in front of 11,000 people! Oh my God. I wish I had my camera with me. I mean, the guy was standing there in his baby blue boxers and everyone was cracking up as he pulled his pants back up from where they had fallen, which was all the way down around his ankles. Public speaking nightmare! Ahh!

Anyway, more knitting-related news to come next time. I just couldn't stop laughing about what I saw tonight.

Amish Suri!

2006-10-16T21:24:00.000-04:00

David & I took a trip out to Nappanee this weekend to see the open house at the J-Bar-J Alpaca Ranch. Their flyer was interesting because there was no web site/email info -- we found out that because the ranchers are Amish, the internet is off limits to them. The herd was small (only 8 animals) but I got some nice yarn spun from their own alpacas, and it's 100% suri! Soooo soft. Here's a pic of a suri, I actually think it is one of the animals that this yarn came from (either Shandon or Butter Creme, the yarn is a blend from the two alpacas).

I'm back on track with the Rogue. That's the kangaroo pocket in front -- I was afraid to attempt this at first, because the instructions intimidated me. But then I read them again and it's really pretty simple. I'm past the point where I had to frog it the last time, and it seems to be coming along pretty nicely. I should make some nice progress on it during our trip down to Bloomington, IN tomorrow. It's supposed to be a cute area and is just a little get away during our week off.

Isn't it a bit early...

2006-10-12T15:53:00.000-04:00

To wake up in the morning and find this outside???

The 10th Circle of Hell

2006-10-11T23:48:00.000-04:00

Here's a progress shot of my Rogue Hoodie. Does it look a little strange? That's because I circularly knitted myself into a MOBIUS LOOP!!! Unbeknownst to me until I had progressed through several inches + hem + a bunch of the kangaroo pocket, of course. The only bright side is that now I can fix (aka start over on) that dropped stitch in the cable panel.

I just needed to bitch. I'm so so mad.

Fall Is TOTALLY Here

2006-10-09T17:10:00.000-04:00

First up, a progress shot on the Rogue Hoodie -- I'm doing okay, better than I thought I would be. I actually progressed about 2x as far as you can see from this pic, but 1/2 of that is the hem which I just knit to the WIP, so you can't see it any more (thanks for the lesson on that in the Hourglass Sweater, Jess!). I did mess up one of the cables slightly by dropping a stitch and then finagling it back up to the needle, and I'm not so sure it was properly finagled, but the thought of ripping made me realize that I can live with this mistake, and it's not very noticeable. I'm sure it will be the first of many errors. There is a bit of trickery at work in the pattern in the form of the Trinity Stitch. It involes a combo of K/P into the same stitch 3 times. I found a video on the DIY Network to help me figure out how to do this, but OMG! This Janet Szabo woman, the demonstrator, knits and purls into the same stitch about 20 times!!!! I have no idea what she is doing. And then Vickie Howell says, "It's super easy!" Even David was cracking up as I watched the video over and over and screamed obscenities at the computer screen. Super easy my ass! I think I figured it out anyway, I have the right # of stitches, and if I find out later that I did it wrong, I'm not going back!!!!

The weather this weekend was picture perfect for a football game. Lots of our friends were in town, including the guru's parents and fiance, A Second Breakfast & her roommate and family, Becca, Eoin, Ryan & their family...the list goes on! We won the game and had lots of quality bonding time with everyone.

Sunday was time to get into fall gear, so we headed up to Fennville, MI to visit the corn maze at Crane Orchards and to drink some crisp apple cider. I think this is the last of the beautiful weekends for a while, so we milked it.

Last but not least the eggs -- I scrambled them up for breakfast and there is such a difference in color and taste. I don't ever want to eat store-bought eggs again!

Jane Fonda's Dog

2006-10-06T16:08:00.000-04:00

David & I went to see Ms. Fonda speak at Notre Dame last night. The subject was "The Feminization of Poverty". I'm not so sure how enlightening her talk was on the intended subject, but she was really interesting to listen to. She said she brings her dog everywhere so that she doesn't miss her grandkids.

In other news, I found somewhere to get eggs from pasture-fed hens. I'm cracking some open today and making chocolate chip cookies with them. Here's a pic of 2 types of eggs next to each other -- the one on the right is one from the pasture hens, the other was produced from an unknown hen diet. The pasture-fed one is WAY darker, you can see it even better in person but the pic shows it too. Maybe tomorrow we will do a scrambled or over-easy taste test!

One side will make you grow taller...

2006-10-02T09:42:00.000-04:00

Well, my stature remains unchanged but my eyes have been opened to the omnipresent mushroom kingdom. I met my new friend Davanh at her parents' house, and we hunted the little fungi in the woods for close to 2 hours yesterday. The weather was perfect, having rained the day before (albeit while we were enjoying the ND v. Purdue game, but we stayed until the end this time and ND won so that's okay) and being delightfully warm and sunny for an early October day. But I mean it, seriously, mushrooms are EVERYWHERE. We saw puffballs, entolomas, honey mushrooms and many more. I liked the taste of the entolomas the best, but the puffballs smelled so heavenly and mushroomy. From the moment Davanh picked the first one off of the tree trunk, my olfactory senses were in overdrive. Davanh also game me some of the 15 pound chicken mushroom she and her dad had found the day before. Yes, I said 15 pounds. This thing was HUGE, it almost took over their house. I didn't get poisoned, either, although I admit I was curious to see whether or not I would wake up dead this morning...haha, just kidding. And here I am anyway!

So thanks, Davanh, for the keys to the kingdom. I look forward to the spring, when the hunting is supposed to be particularly fine thanks to the presence of the morel!

I cast on the for the rogue hoodie last night, but casting on is about all I did. I'm using the darker color yarn in the pic, it's some wool from Mountain Shepherdess that I bought from MDSW.

Finished!

2006-09-28T23:10:00.000-04:00

They're finished! And they look pretty good on Dave (sexy legs, baby!) I even ripped back some of the first sock to make the foot a bit longer so it fit better. That was not easy -- the pitch-dark grey/black shade really messes with your eyes. I have to confess, I just don't love making socks. I know the Yarnmonster loves socks. Jenn seems to love socks. The Yarn Harlot loves socks. Even the guru loves socks. Everyone raves about their portability, their speed of knitting and the variety of possibilities there are in socks. But I'm sorry, I'm not hooked yet. I don't totally get the heel thing. And they don't stay up, no matter how small I make them. They just stretch out and slide down. I guess putting in an elastic would help, but I'm not up for more sewing. Maybe when I knit my next pair with the Yarnmonster's Avocado Fever flavor, I'll love them more. But for now, I'm moving on to the Rogue Hoodie (or so I keep saying) and those fall pumpkin hats!

Fall is here and I love the internet!

2006-09-26T10:43:00.000-04:00

I have been such a lackadaisical blogger, and for that I am sorry. I can't expect one pic of my niece and an amusing link to hold you all over for long, right? I am still stuck on this 2nd sock, but as you can see, it's almost finished! And then onto the Rogue Hoodie (along with some quick pumpkin hats for the kids in my life).

This lovely picture you see is my artistic attempt to show my knitting progress along with the bounty of fall. The Farmer's Market was hoppin' this weekend, and I got some butternut & spaghetti squash, along with eggplant and some ears from the last harvest of corn for the year. There were gigantic pumpkins, sunflower heads filled with seeds, and apples, apples, apples!

I'm almost finished reading a wonderfully written book called "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan. I love his writing and his comments resonate with me. Basically he talks about the different food chains in America -- industrial, organic (both industrial-organic and small-farm organic) and hunter/gatherer. It's really made me think even more about our food and where it comes from, I mean beyond my vegetarianism. I'm doing all this research into where to find raw milk and eggs from pasture-fed hens. And I decided that I wanted to go mushroom hunting, but didn't know how. So -- and this is where the "I Love the Internet" part comes in -- last week I posted a plea for help on a mushroom-hunting message board and someone just invited me on a hunt in South Bend this weekend. I'm so happy, just because it worked out so nicely, and it's all about bringing people together, isn't it? And tonight I'm going to meet my friend Jessica, who I met through blogland.

Thankfully ND beat MSU this weekend while we watched in hurricane conditions. OK, we left in the 3rd quarter when we were losing badly and the winds started howling, we're wimps. But you would have left too if you were sitting on the very top level, soaking wet.

That's Brady up there, who either slept or breast-fed for most of my last visit.

Check this out if you're bored...Gizoogle!

2006-09-21T22:58:00.000-04:00

Go HERE and put in your blog's name...thanks Emily!

We...Got...Socked...

2006-09-17T18:03:00.000-04:00

Now focus on the socks, not the newspaper story -- yes, yes, Notre Dame got beat, killed, whooped, spanked, destoyed by our rivals this weekend, and it was the most depressing football game I've ever been to in my life -- but come on, we're talking about knitting here, right? And we here in the The Bend would kind of like to forget about the game for a while. So about the socks -- I'm almost done with the leg of the 2nd one. I've noticed a few mistakes, and gone back and fixed some, but then I noticed more...like a purl where there should be a knit, and vv...let me tell you, black is a BITCH to tink and fix, you can't see your mistakes while you're "fixing" them and that leads to more mistakes where there were previously none. I decided that these are really not major errors and David won't notice and/or care, so I trudge onwards.

Very very exciting news -- Heather's book is out! Once I read that fact on her blog, I rushed to the store to buy Not Your Mama's Knitting. I am so proud of her, she did an incredible job penning an entertaining guide to knitting and its many possibilities. And I got a mention in the acknowledgements, which really means a lot to me -- plus Avocado Fever also got a nod in the blogging section -- yee haw! Thanks, Heather -- you are truly a wonderful chick and I wish you great great things in your knitting future -- especially a book tour that would take you to the midwest...

So back to the weekend...despite our humiliating defeat, it was a pretty good couple of days. The guru was in town with her special friend, and even though we didn't knit at all I always love seeing her. The visit was too short, in my opinion.

2 - 0!

2006-09-11T17:15:00.000-04:00

That's our record so far, after a much more comfortable game against Penn State on Saturday. I say comfortable because ND was much more in control of this game than the previous GA Tech contest...not because I was more comfortable. Standing for the entire game (4 hours!) created a lot less exhaustion 10 years ago, and we were pooped when we got home, but I'll be damned if I was going to be the only one sitting down in the student section!

Luckily we powered up before the game at sensational tailgaters hosted by A Second Breakfast & her family and my JA friend Brian & his family. I had veggie burgers at the latter and Polish brewski's at the former...a lovely combination.

And I finished one of Dave's socks! I need to make the second one now, and I've already cast on. I think the foot needs to be a little bit longer, and I'll add a bit more grey at the toe...who says they have to be exactly the same?

Babies with knitted things on them

2006-09-07T15:30:00.000-04:00

A mostly picture post -- and actually it's only Sam & Annika with knitted things. But Brady and Alek needed some press, too...I made Alek a hat too (colors for both headpieces chosen by Annika at the Michigan Fiber Fest last month), but couldn't get him to pose wearing it. I guess September is too early for wool.

Go Irish! First home game this weekend, plenty o' pics of that to come...

2-Year Tank for a 1-Year Old and Book Tag!

2006-09-06T10:53:00.000-04:00

Rebecca's parents sent me this pic of her in her "One Year Old Two Year Tank", created by my very lovely good friend and author Heather. Now if only Sam's parents would send me such a pic...

Shrodinger tagged me for a book poll, and I'm late in answering, but here goes!

R1. One book that changed your life:

I'll have to agree with the Englishwoman in NY -- I'm not sure any book has actually changed my life. But I remember reading some of Emerson's works sophomore year in high school, especially the one about the transparent eyeball (I think it was called simply "Nature"), and that kind of rocked my world view.
2. One book that you've read more than once:
I too don't usually read books more than once, but "Catcher in the Rye" is one that I have been through a few times.
3. One book you'd want on a deserted island:
Either the bible or a really big thick dictionary -- just because these are both big books and have lots of things to think about in them.
4. One book that made you laugh:
"The Hotel New Hampshire" by John Irving
5. One book that made you cry:
I got really upset when the bad guys were trying to separate Lyra and her daemon (Pantalaimon) in Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy.

6. One book that you wish had been written:
"Not Your Mama's Knitting" by Heather Dixon
7. One book you wish had never been written:
Who can answer this one -- to each their own, and what I hate some else might love. But I think Alex Garland could have done a lot better after writing the thoroughly engrossing "The Beach" than to follow up with "The Tesseract"
8. One book you're currently reading:
"Garlic and Sapphires" by Ruth Reichl
9. One book you've been meaning to read:
"A People's History of the United States" -- I started to but couldn't finish it.

This makes me sad...

2006-09-05T13:15:00.000-04:00

The Croc Hunter died! And it was such a freak thing, he was snorkelling and startled a big sting ray. I'm sad because I feel like he got a lot of people interested in wildlife and promoted conservation. I feel like this is a big loss. And I feel so sad for his family.