a tiny corner of the marketplace

Did I mention that there was yarn at Madrona? Yarn and fiber and spindles and wheels and needles and hooks and amazing things – all in one room.

I didn’t buy any yarn. Really.

I bought books. A German stitch dictionary and a Japanese felting book that makes me want to die the little things in it are so amazingly cute. Felted postage stamps. And little squirrels. And six little penguins in an ice cube tray. And flowers. And… get this one, now… bean sprouts.

I bought some really cool little tiny, tiny crochet hooks that were recommended by Sivia Harding. They are smaller sizes than even my old, old, old set, which means they can be used for even tiny beads with tiny holes. And they’re really short and can be hung on a key ring.

And there may have been a figured walnut nostepinne that came home with me. Maybe.

shopping with Sivia

And I did get to go shopping with Sivia Harding and a bunch of other wonderful people.

And I had a little chat over coffee with Lucy Neatby.

And I took a class from Nancy Bush.

And I traded iPhone apps with The Yarn Harlot.

And I saw so many fun and wonderful people that I can’t even list all of them.

I love Madrona because the entire hotel is taken over by fiberistas of all kinds. So there are knitters in the bar and spinners in the lobby. And people are petting each others’ hand knits while waiting for the elevators. And so I met and chatted with many amazing people.

[waving to the gal who I ate dinner and breakfast with! How was your dying class?]

sensory overload at Shipwreck Beads

On the way home I stopped at Shipwreck Beads.

They bill themselves as the largest bead store in the world, and I believe it. This isn’t even all of the store. There are rows and rows of just crystals. And more rows of semi-precious stone. And more rows of wood. And precious metals. And all of the findings and tools and stuff that you could ever want.

There may have been a few beads that came home with me. You know I hung around with Sivia quite a bit. Just saying. 😀

it's a little damp here

And this is just one more picture that I took on the way home in a rest area right off I-5 that sort of explains a lot about why I love living in the Pacific Northwest.

That is a tree. (duh, Judy. OK. But hang with me for a sec.) The tree has thick, green, springy, gorgeous moss growing all over it. And there, on that branch high above my head, is a whole colony of ferns growing out of the moss. I’ll let that settle just a bit.

Ferns. Growing out of moss. That’s growing on a tree. Next to a freeway.

Yes, it means it’s a bit damp here. But such loveliness and such quiet, deep beauty. Such optimism and perseverance. Such strength.

I just read the list of sock summit teachers and I think I’m going to faint.

kinnearing the Yarn Harlot

You may recall that yesterday I was unsuccessful kinnearing the Yarn Harlot. So today I was bound and determined to take advantage of any opportunity that presented itself.

Walking from the classroom to the Madrona marketplace at lunch, who did I spy? That’s right…

I whipped out the old iPhone, and surreptitiously snapped away.

Mission accomplished.

Nancy Bush explains all

I’ve never been one to rest on my laurels. So I kinneared Nancy Bush, too. Here she is explaining a complicated bit of Estonian knitted braid technique to a rapt audience.

Today I took Nancy’s Baltic Braids and Bobbles class and it was tons of fun. Really interesting techniques, and so pretty.

braids and bobbles

See? (Ignore my wonky knitting. This was a first attempt, after all.)

We made a little sampler to learn the techniques. Mine turned out to be just the right size to wear as a cuff. So I wore it all evening while we gathered to hear to the history of Madrona (this is its 10th year) and listen to Stephanie Pearl-McPhee speak about the importance of knitting and knitting conferences. I think most of us were pretty in tune with that concept.

Tomorrow I’m going shopping. I’ve heard rumors of Japanese stitch dictionary books and… (drum roll please)… quiviut – which I probably can’t afford. But at least I can gaze longingly at it and pet it a bit.

Tomorrow I am going shopping with Sivia Harding. (!!!!!)

I tell you gentle reader, I am just an ordinary mortal. But I feel as though I’ve somehow been transported to the top of Mt. Olympus. Except the Olympian gods and goddesses pre-dated knitting. This is like Mt. Olympus with many wonderful goddesses and lots and lots and lots of yarn.

tied up ?

This morning I journeyed from the lovely San Juan islands to Tacoma where the Madrona Fiber Arts Winter Retreat starts tomorrow.

This sign hung on my door in place of the more typical do not disturb type sign.

While it’s true that I brought some yarn with me. And, in fact, I just may have acquired some yarn between the time I left home and the time I arrived here. But… what exactly do they expect to happen in this room? Inquiring minds want to know.

Tomorrow I am taking a class from Nancy Bush: Baltic Braids and Babbles. It sounds really fun. And Nancy Bush is sort of one of my knitting heroes so I’m totally geeked out that I’m going to get to meet her. Hopefully I won’t embarrass myself too much,

I have seen the Yarn Harlot, but I was too busy swapping iPhone apps with her and with Blue Moon’s Depraved Dyer to kinnear her. I will keep trying.

afternoon view

I really thought that the week was going to calm down a little bit.

That was before #1 Son’s computer started having what we in the vaguely techie business like to call issues. When in need, #1 Son always calls Mom’s Tech Support. This particular incident ended up requiring a complete wipe of the hard drive and reinstall of XP, and there were driver issues and… I won’t bore you with the details. But it took time.

And then there was the little incident where the nice officer on the lovely motorcycle stopped me as I was on my way home from dropping the fur kids off at the Cat B&B. He informed me that I’d just been doing 30 in a school zone. I’m usually very, very careful about that. In my defense, it was a high school that sits way back from the main street. It was the middle of the morning and no children were anywhere to be seen. And I admit to a bit of distraction as I tried to figure out how to cram 3 days of activities into about 8 hours.

I banged my head against my fortunately knit cozy clad steering wheel while the nice officer wrote out a ticket.

And then I ended up sort of needing a second root canal. The good news is that now the pain is all gone. But it took time. Actually, more time than usual.

I have a very tiny mouth. (No comments from you out there in the peanut gallery.) But it turns out that I have deep roots and a lot of nerve. So it takes a bit of doing to make sure I don’t feel anything while the whole root canal procedure is being performed. And that takes time. But with that finally accomplished, Dr. P was happily reaming out my tooth, and I was happily ignoring the whole thing as I lay there with what feels like a balloon pressed against my mouth and drool running down my chin, when the light went out.

You know. That light that the dentist shines in your face so that the inside of your mouth is lit up? That light. It went out. The. Light. Went. Out.

After a stunned silence, a mad flurry of activity ensued as everyone in the office tried to change the light bulb. (I just know there’s a really good joke in there.) It turns out that those light thingies are quite complicated mechanisms and you have to practically take the whole thing apart just to change this itsy bitsy light bulb. And the person in the office who used to change all of the light bulbs because she just loooooved doing it so much had retired the month before. And nobody was really sure of the best approach.

It was suggested that I be moved to the next room. But the room wasn’t ready and it was announced that in that room the brain wouldn’t boot up. I have no idea what that meant. But I really had no desire to be in a room where the brain wouldn’t boot while my mouth was under construction.

As the mad flurry whirled around, Dr. P (love this man) calmly continued with his business, mostly by feel and with the help of a little hand held fiber optic spot light. I lay in the chair, drool dripping from my chin and laughing at the absurdity. Because, really, what else could I do?

Eventually Dr. P reached the point in the whole operation where more light became necessary. What are you doing? he asked the light bulb changers.

It’s difficult to do and you have to use this spreader and it’s hard to get it in the right place. was the reply, in a tone that said you obviously have no idea how to do this or you would understand.

Dr. P stood up. Give me the screwdriver. And he started in trying to take the thing apart.

I have been taking things apart and putting them back together since I could hold a screwdriver, and I desperately wanted to get up and get in on the fun. But, all things considered, I decided it was safer to stay where I was and watch from the sidelines. Eventually the old bulb was removed, the new bulb was inserted and the light fixture was returned to a fairly usable state. Dr. P finished up his business, my tooth was reconstructed in a temporary sort of way, drool was wiped off my chin and I was off back to the races.

I ran home, threw a few more driver disks at #1 Son, threw a load of laundry in the washer, and headed out the door to Westside Wednesday Sip ‘N’ Stitch because I really felt that, all things considered, I deserved at least a short bit of knitting with my peeps. I had decided that I would just plead guilty to the traffic ticket (remember the ticket? – that was before the root canal) and make it go away. So, carefully following instructions, I signed the ticket, wrote out a check, tucked both inside an envelope addressed to the correct location. And just as I stuffed it into the slot in the mail box and it left my grasp never to be recovered, I realized that I’d sort of forgotten to put a stamp on it.

Yeah. It was just that kind of week.

But today is ever so much better. The pic is of the view out my back door yesterday afternoon. I am at Cat Bordhi’s annual visionary retreat, where I am surrounded by amazing people in this gorgeous setting and my creative juices are flowing. And I may even get some work done on the book. But blogging, I’m afraid, may be sporadic for the next few days. I could tell you all about the retreat and who’s here and all, but then I’d have to kill you or something because it’s all a deep, dark secret and very mysterious and blah, blah, blah. (It’s actually a lot of hard work.) But I will try to blog more from Madrona, where I will attempt to Kennear all kinds of famous people — maybe even the Yarn Harlot!

toes. still.

I know that, from this picture, it looks like I haven’t made any progress on the latest socks.

Not. True.

They look very much the same as the last picture because I’ve frogged them back 3 times — twice just to the end of the toe increases, and once all the way. I just couldn’t get happy with the results of the stitch pattern. First I didn’t like the way I’d done the double-decreases. Frogged to start of stitch pattern.

I tried a different double-decrease, and I didn’t like how it ended up looking like very narrow Jay Walker chevrons and didn’t play very well with the way I placed the toe increases. Frogged all the way.

I tried a more standard feather-and-fan pattern, using KFB increases instead of YO because I didn’t think the colorway would play well with lace. I used KFB increases on the toes, too, to keep the whole theme going. The pattern did not look good with the colorway. Frogged to start of stitch pattern.

I’m sort of back where I started now. I’m using the double decrease from the second attempt, along with KFB increases. I don’t think it resembles the Jay Walker pattern too much now. And I like the way it’s working with the colorway.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Also in the mean time has been this little root canal thingy. And new tires for #1 Son. And freezing fog along with another tiny smattering of snow. (text message from #1 Son: Snow. So. Over. It.) And, well… life.

But I’m feeling that next two weeks are going to be good! For one thing, at the end of today I will be officially on vacation! Next week I’m heading up to Friday Harbor for Cat Bordhi’s annual visionary retreat, where, it is to be hoped, I will get something done on the book and get to rub elbows with some amazing people in a gorgeous setting. And right after that is the Madrona Fiber Arts Festival, where I’m taking a class from Nancy Bush and rubbing elbows with more amazing knitterly and fiberly types until Saturday. What more could I ask?

So, if you are at Madrona, be on the lookout for me. I usually carry a blue knit bag dotted with buttons from Ravelry and PDX Knit Bloggers and Persistent Illusion and other stuff. Other than the one class I will be foot loose and fancy free, as the saying goes. Step up and say hello!

Chapeau Marnier

Chapeau Marnier is finished and will be shortly in the mail to its intended recipient. What a fun, fast knit this was! Again, I really wish that I could adequately photograph this yarn. The sparkle in it is so pretty, without being over the top. It’s just then perfect amount of bling. But I don’t think a camera will ever capture it. You have to see it in person.

The particulars:

• Yarn: Stitchjones Glam Sock (63% superwash merino, 20% silk, 14% nylon, 2% silver), 420 yds per 3.5 oz/100 g skein, in colorway Silver — I used a fraction of the total and have tons left.
• Pattern: Chapeau Marnier by Marnie MacLean from the Summer 2007 issue of Knitty.
• Needles: a US#6 from my Denise set to cast on, and then knit on a pair of US#2 Addi Turbo circs.
• Ribbon: 1-1/2 yds of double-sided satin ribbon.
• Modification: none. Really.

jabberwocky

And, since 3 or 4 unfinished pairs of socks are, apparently, not enough… I cast on another pair.

This was actually prompted by having to darn my Rooster Feather socks yet again. I’m afraid they are not long for this world, but I really like the feather-and-fan pattern I used on them. So I reverse engineered and started a new pair.

The yarn is Blue Moon Socks That Rock in Jabberwocky. So I’m afraid these are fated to be called Jubjub Birds or some such atrocity.

And can I just end by saying that yesterday I heard three words that I’ve been waiting to hear for a very, very, very long time: Former President Bush. 😀