she shoots sheep shots

oh baby what a week

2012-01-28T00:54:00.000-05:00

If you're the kind of person who procastinates by perusing Friends' Activity on Ravelry (um, not I can be found doing that, like daily, or anything) , you might also be the person who makes up little stories based on what's faved & queued. And if you are that person, and you're my Friend, you might be thinking "what's up with the spike in queuing baby knits?!"

An Aviatrix Hat for a neighbor last week. I LOVE this pattern. It's a 3 hour knit.

Baby sweaters&baby booties &little hats & blankets ? Me with the 18 and 21 yr old sons? What's the deal?

Meet Zoe Valentina, born last Saturday 1-21-12, my....wait for it...granddaughter ! To answer the questions possibly crossing your mind: yes, she is amazing. yes, I am very young to be a granny. The older one. With us. Nope, they get up, not us. Have I knit a mountain of adorable tiny things for her? um..wellll....

Not exactly. I finished this hat. The adorable coordinating booties came out sized for a 1 year old. While they (the parents, not the too-big-booties) were in labor, I knit a newborn size booty but not yet its mate. There are 2 partially finished blankets, and plans for much much more. I don't know what happened-partly too many other knitting commitments, partly not as much knitting time as usual, partly superstition.

Fortunately her great grandma, my mom, came through with beautiful knits: sweaters and hats and this fabulous and already much used cocoon. It is going to become my go-to baby gift knit, it's just so useful and sweet.

Pretty sure this is the pattern she used, and though I was with her when she bought the yarn, I can't remember anything except we were at Kitschy Stiches and it's superwash. The matching hat is too big....but she'll get there.

Late night with uncle and slightly sulking American Bulldog.

looking into 2012

2012-01-12T12:22:00.000-05:00

Have I ever mentioned that I like to look back over the past year to see if any themes emerged, and set an intention for the new one?

2011's was Embrace the Unexpected. On New Year's eve 12 months ago, I thought I was downing a tumbler or two of organic cranberry juice but it turned out to be evenly mixed with tequila. whooooeeee! The year followed, rolling out in unexpected and often delightful ways, though sometimes with a slightly painful hangover.
(Awkward segue warning) F'rinstance I didn't plan to get into a blogging groove and then suddenly drop it. I'm jumping back in with a Wednesday Wip. On Thursday. Because, guess what? I finished That Reindeer Hat. And in Tangerine Tango, the color of the year, no less.*

About the Fornicating Reindeer pattern: first, it's a chart. BYOP(attern).** I went with a generic 96 stitch hat, 2x2 ribbing over the ears , squared off top, so there'd be some slouch. I improvised a checked bottom section and diagonals on the crown. The rest was the chart. It's been ages since I knit colorwork. I totally enjoyed it. Note to self: move Sleight of Hands mittens and Muckle Mitts up the queue.

Second thing is Reindeer can't Fornicate ***. On the bright side, your reindeer can be randy, screwing, mating, making whoopy, f*cking ... whatever the verb, you'll want to block the hat so the graphics look nice, and not puckery off the needles.

It turns out Leo wanted a closer fitting hat, and put it on his head like this. I offered to redo the top and make it shorter.

But he said he's happy as is.

This is one of those zen moments of being a knitter and a parent. He'd just said 'I really like how the yarn going across looks". Of course I wanted to grab it and say " you can't wear it with stranding peeking out like that." But I replied "yay glad you like it".

I mean, here is a loved one appreciating a handknit, and it's got reindeer doing it, is anyone going to notice how it's folded up?

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* Isn't this aggressive selling us a color of the year ridiculous? Google the color and Pantone's flacking it all over the intertubes. What a weird consumer world we live in. (still, it's a shade of orange and I do like orange)

**If you too want to knit a version of this hat, I belatedly found a very nice (and undoubtedly warm) pattern to go with the chart. It's reversible , so you can flash the reindeer or keep them close to your brain while revealing a SFW handknit. I can only imagine its usefulness in a dating situation.

***Thanks Kay for catching the ignorant use of the word. I had no idea it had legal connotations. I was sorely tempted to thank you for being my friend who knows a thing or two about fornication but that just seems tacky. Um, kinda like the hat.....

Check here for more WIP WEDNESDAY

that reindeer hat

2011-12-15T01:06:00.000-05:00

Is it still wip it Wednesday somewhere? Mid Pacific? I'm posting this one anyway. Last month I was flapping my mouth offering to make handknits for family members . Poking around on Ravely, as one does, I came across a hat , and was sitting there chortling when I saw that it had over 1000 versions. That drew my son's attention. He looked. He said he needed one.

Not want. Need. In orange and white.

And so, I am knitting the Fornicating Reindeer Hat. (That a Ravelry link. Here's a particularly nice one on a blog. )It is mind boggling that there are 1028 different versions of this hat prancing around the world. Go look. I know, it's a little tacky but it's also funny. He may have been 5 years old and waiting for a sweater with penguins (who were not fornicating) the last time he was this excited about something I was knitting. Plus, I am enjoying the colorwork.

The yarn? it's from Plymouth , superwash merino. Because I know my customers. .••••••••••••••

Need a new wip yourself? I just saw this hat pattern, Empire. Cute. Fast. Not boring.

goods & curiousities

2011-12-12T19:12:00.000-05:00

Around here, darkness is landing with a cold thud mid-afternoon. Even if you don't celebrate the major holiday happenings in all their green and red and santa clausness, it's pretty easy to be charmed by twinkly Essex CT. (Did I mention pubs?)

along Main Street Essex

Even for someone like me, a reluctant shopper. So, this week's photo heavy Monday: a visit to the Goods & Curiousities Store at The Griswold Inn.

It's full of cool stuff. These things for example? They look like little sculpted/carved paperweights (what do we need to weigh down, anyway?) but they're made of graphite. You draw with them.

That's sister Lulu on the right, by day she's the Director of Retail operations at The Gris.* And on the left, Ann Weaver of Weaverknits, indie designer and knitter, on day 3 of an intense east coast book tour. Which might be why she looks slightly crazed. She's really not. You can see my Craft Activism presence to the left.

Ann & I had a showroom upstairs from the shop for the day.She brought knit kits,and handknits, I brought photos and cards. We both had books, samples ,and a lot to say.

I know you want a closer look at these pieces from the shop.

Made from vintage newspapers.

Nice way to pass a December Sunday. Plus, I got some knitting on a gift done. If you wish you hadn't missed us, Ann's knit kits (with indie yarns and patterns) and both our books remain at the shop, in a corner with some other woolly items, like fleece lined slipper boots from recycled wool clothes, and hats.

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* Consider that full disclosure, nepotism and all. But I wouldn't bother to blog about the joint if I truly didn't think it was special, and worth a look. I'm not that kind of blog.

another wednesday, another wip

2011-12-07T21:49:00.001-05:00

Does it seem like I keep on showing new projects, but you never see anything finished? This month I have an excuse: gift knitting. So this week for wip it Wednesday, a loop scarf, in green, as requested by my niece. (I don't think she reads here but just in case: Ariana? Look away!)

I'm making the pattern up, inspired by scarves I've seen knit in changing stitches and weights so that when they're wrapped around your neck, it looks like you have two scarves on, with lots of texture. Kind of like this one. But mine's bulkier, and handknit.

Here's a less cluttered view. I started with a skein of Peruvia Quick . I knit it up in Mistake Rib, an old favorite, over 23 stitches on size US13 needles. It yielded about 30" of nice cushy warmth. Quick, just like it says on the label.

I continued with a skein of Peruvia, a worsted weight single in the same color, over the same 23 stitches. But now in an open Lattice stitch (um, maybe its Reversing Lattice? Or maybe I have been calling it by the wrong name? I can't find it online to link to. It's easy though. ), on size 10 1/2 US needles.

Better view of the lacy work section, which is still cushy and squooshy but much less dense than the first section. The plan is to knit 30" of this and then close the loop. Whatd'you think? Will it work? I'm counting on it having lots of .....presence ..when it's done.

Many more wips linked here for wip Wednesday.

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Speaking of presents and handmade: do you love this piece? I saw it at Goods & Curiousities Shop at The Griswold Inn in Essex CT. I'll be there this weekend for a special event showcasing handmade, Sunday December 11th, 11-4, in a showroom with knitwear designer Ann Weaver of WeaverKnits. I'll be chatting about Craft Activism at 11 and 3, and we'll both have all kinds of goodies to show & tell and sell. Stop by! More info on the Craft Activism blog.

you win some..etc

2011-12-04T17:46:00.001-05:00

Ok, I am exhausted just reading the 136 descriptions of what you all are handmaking this season from my coffee giveaway comments. Exhausted! I random generated a winner, and she's been notified. Thanks for entering.

at the Fremont Fair in Seattle

No one mentioned that they have an art car they need to complete as a holiday gift. I adore art cars, don't you? It'd take me a lot of coffee to get through this kind of brilliant crafting.

Joan & I originally had art cars and the art car community in Craft Activism, but we had to drop it due to space limitations and logistics. I'm still crazy about them, though.

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And because this is the perfect place to kvetch, may I take a moment to acknowledge mercury in retrograde and its (predictable) effects in my personal orbit? As of noon today, the machines that have ceased working recently include: our clothes washer, the coffeemaker, the electronic throttle adjustment system in my car and the hard drive on my laptop. While I take the attitude that they're all, after all, just things not people, still.....ugh.

this is the sweater that never ends...

2011-11-30T22:49:00.001-05:00

* 4 days left to enter my coffee giveaway.

That's 4 bags of coffee and a mug, what are you waiting for???!! *

At this rate I will permanently have this sweater for Wip It Wednesday. Even if I finish the 3 gajillion other wips around this joint. This one'll just keep turning up.

You last heard about me finishing off the sleeves so I'd have a nice new Cadence sweater to wear while booksigning and working on a photo shoot in wintery, snowy Minnesota. Done the first night there. I slipped it on. It fit ! Like a glove.

Cascade Eco Wool.: a desert island yarn if I ever I had one.

Problem #1 : I do not want a wooly sweater that fits like a second skin. Not hardly. I was aiming for an inch or so of positive ease. A live-in-this sweater with room to layer. I'd measured and swatched and got gauge and how could this have happened? (also how could I have not tried on a topdown raglan? ). Consider that I spent most of my trip with the wonderful knitters from The Yarnery, a group that surely has the wherewithall to stop me from this kind of crazy. They offered aggressive blocking. oh, never mind....I tore it out back up to the armpits.

And acquired some new needles, the square sided ones.why not?

Problem # 2: I was surprised to find that though I'd gotten gauge on US 9 needles, I had somehow managed to knit the whole sweater on size 8's.

And so, once again, in progress.

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Here's a future wip : My nephew said he'd like "one of those hats with very long earflaps attached. So long that they have pockets for hands."

My nephew is about 6 feet tall, so I guess we're talking truly long earflaps. Maybe this would work, with pockets. More WIP WEDNESDAY posts linked here.

she shoots sheep shots, yet again

2011-11-28T16:16:00.001-05:00

* Coffee giveaway still in full swing--go enter. Java! *

Today's Photo Heavy Monday is from Beaver Brook Farm in Old Lyme, CT. I had a sheep & lamb visiting jones on Friday. What ? That doesn't happen to you ?

The back lighting through the ears slays me.

Sun worshippers? Or posing?

We were a day early for Open Farm Days, which features lots of shearing & kettle corn.
Fortunately, the shearing was already underway. Unfortunately, no kettle corn.
OTOH with no one else visiting, we got to meet the first lamb of the season up close & personal.
They also have a cheese shop, and butcher counter.
Handspun mitts & hat. Love.
Thrummy.

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If you click on the link up top , you'll see you can go visit Beaver Brook Farm almost every day. It is the best antidote I can think of to the barrage of commercial, overwrought holiday stuff going on. Also, really excellent cheese.

I like to serve their Pleasant Son because we are what we eat.

If you don't happen to live around here, try googling "farms to visit" and your location.

coffee giveaway, notated

2011-11-26T21:12:00.001-05:00

Coffee. Love everything about it*. A big honking hot mug to start the day, every day. Iced on a summer afternoon. Coffee ice cream? Yes. Decaf with a shot of liqueur for dessert. I like the kick from caffeine, the smell of beans roasting, the ritual of the coffee break in a group setting.** And professionally speaking? We location photographers are notorious, and deeply opinionated, coffee snobs.***

3 of my many wips: a sweater re-do, a baby blanket, one of 2 Fussy Cuts in progress

You know what goes great with coffee? Projects underway. I spent a lot of time in crafters' studios last year working on Craft Activism . Everyone had some kind of mug within reach. You know how it is, you look at what you need to get done, go brew yourself a pot of coffee, take a sip, feel all centered and gathered and refocussed, and dig in. Making stuff and coffee. They just go well together.

Which explains why I'm doing this uncharacteristically commercial**** giveaway (keep reading! details coming!). In September I taught photography at a crafting event sponsored by Starbucks. There were coffee urns all over the place, full of fresh brewed java, and coffee stations in the hallways, and coffee beans in our goodie bags, coffee fumes in the air, and even a coffee tasting with coffee chefs ***** in the hallway. It smelled divine. It tasted fabulous. I may have overindulged just a bit ******And at some point, possibly just after discovering I really like Italian Roast, I entered a raffle.

I completely forgot about it, until the email saying I won. Mmmm. Coffee shipped to my door, with accessories. Since I have good manners, I sent a note of thanks, which led to a conversation about my deep, deep appreciation of coffee, which led to the totally cool folks at Starbucks offering me a giveway for the blog. Just in time for that need for extra fuel this crafting gifting season, right?

GIVEAWAY: 4 bags of Starbucks coffee and a mug, shipped right to your home

HOW TO ENTER: leave me a comment saying what you're making this holiday season. Or maybe you're buying handmade, or commissioning a handcrafted gift, or brewing beer or steeping fruitcakes.....just let me know about you and handmade this season in a comment and include your email address. I'll do a random number for the winner.

DEADLINE: 12 noon est Dec 4th.The Starbucks folks will ship it to you.

Good luck !

________________________________________________

and now for the notations

* In truth, I don't like coffee stains. Sadly, I am really really good at collecting them.

** I met Dave when looking for someone to take a coffee break with while studying in the library at the U of MN.

*** Location photographers are always traveling, and we need to kill time, or get shelter, or use the internet, or a bathroom while on the road. Coffee shops, good for all of the above. The snobbery? Well, when I was first working with Joan Tapper, we were traveling through Arizona to meet the Navajo Churro sheep ranchers. She accused all photographers of coffee snobbery. I vigorously denied it, and less than 5 minutes later made us go several blocks out of our way to find a cup of coffee I deemed "good enough". You know what I love about Joan? She doesn't gloat.

**** Can I just say? I like to support local coffee shops when I can but man, when I can find a Starbucks in the middle of nowhere, or a small place serving their coffee, I am beyond happy. (Also, they always have decent bathrooms, music and good egg salad sandwiches.)

***** I am not sure they were chefs, but they were dressed like chefs and knew a lot about coffee. I don't think I was hallucinating. But you never know.

****** The top of my head lifted off. Just a little.

whirlwind weekend

2011-11-21T00:24:00.001-05:00

Determined to stick with my format, I'm popping by to report that my last 4 days in Minneapolis have been flawless. If you don't count weather.

Malika, the makeup artist/stylist extraordinaire working her magic

I came to Minneapolis for a photo shoot, which took up 3 of 5 days, it was one of those projects that didn't really feel like work, even though we were cranking the whole time. Love these clients. And my friend TwinSet Ellen made her photo assisting debut.

She is a woman of many talents--these are the props she procured when we rejected apples, bananas, oranges, pinecones, snowballs and coffee mugs as possible objets on a tabletop in a set up.

I got to hang out at The Yarnery for a booksigning and some knitting on Thursday night, visited with in-laws and old friends, had some local beer, finished a sweater, unraveled most of a sweater. I can't talk about that now. Literally. I discovered whiskey in tea with honey and lemon is good, as well as good for laryngitis....

tip more than wip

2011-11-16T21:00:00.001-05:00

It's more about travel in process today, Connecticut to Minnesota. A state so chill it's already below freezing. Wool weather !

view of some spectacular clouds, BigGuy by window not willing to skootch so I could get a better hispta for you
I almost finished the 2nd sleeve of my Cadence enroute , wedged as I was in the middle seat between some BigGuys on both flights (bad luck in tight seats).- so, if you happen to be stopping by the Craft Activism booksigning at The Yarnery in st paul tomorrow evening 6-8, you might see its debut.(I'd add links but posting fr the phone is limiting , sorry)
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:W 51st St,Minneapolis,United States

rhinebeck: better late than....

2011-11-14T15:49:00.001-05:00

Photo Heavy Monday would be Photo Heavier today if the new cheapo card reader hadn't immediately broken and corrupted a 2 gig card full images from Rhinebeck. Luckily I had a few on another card from the NY Sheep & Wool Fest last month.

This year's hats on my friends from New Haven- LOVE the fat sequins.

Nanney Kennedy's Seacolors yarns from her Meadowcroft Farm.

None of the setting's beauty but all of the fun I had with Ann & Kay of Mason Dixon Knitting.

Sister Lulu and I found this amazing B&B at the last minute, right on the Hudson in Tivoli.

(from the Lulucam) It was less a fawncy B&B, more a visit to an eccentric auntie who last left the premises in 1942. In a word, fabulous. Although unconventional: I had a direct view of the Hudson- and a jar of home canned pickles as a bookend.

I spent a great deal of my time at the Craft Activism table in the author's area.

with great company like Craft Activism contributors Kirsten Karpur

and Ann Weaver, helping me show the Fussy Cuts blanket while I continue to flap my hands

Happily I was right next to Anna Hrachovec who shares my hand skillz. I LOVE her MochiMochi work.

Gnomes vs Snowmen!

I finally met Laura Nelkin (in her Iota capelet) ! She is so tiny- she seemed so much larger on Twitter, where we've become friends. This photo also demonstrates that restraint in color and a natural palette is a better choice than...what was I thinking? An explosion of color in my attire. Note to self: please knit some solid headbands. Please.
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thanks to my sister, Linda Hali Zucker , for documenting the action in these photos in the authors area or this would be a Photo Slim post!

whatever weekend: a lot like random

2011-11-12T17:42:00.001-05:00

1) We (Joan and I and our wonderful collection of contributors and subjects) are thrilled that Craft Activism made Amazon's Best Books 2011 list. Seriously woo hoooooo! I am waiting for a sash to arrive, you know , like Miss America wears, saying "Top Ten Best in Crafts" so I can wear it at future book events. I do so hope it's hand stitched.

photo by Kristin Nicholas. Yarnbombed sunflowers!

2) If you're thinking, well, I wouldn't mind having a copy of the book, you are reading this at the right minute. Hop over to Kristin's blog where she is doing a giveaway, ending today (Nov 13th). More about my meeting her here.

3) I'm trying to finish up that Cadence sweater before I leave for a few days working in Minnesota this week. My first order of business there is a booksigning at The Yarnery, the legendary shop in St. Paul. I'll be joined by Mary Lou Egan, the mitten designing Craft Activism cover girl. If you're in the area stop by, say hi and talk craft activism with me Thursday this week, Nov 18, 6-8 pm

4) I'm overwhelmed with indecision about what to knit with a sweater's worth of Malabrigo Rios in my fave color Pearl Ten. I think I want a cardi bur I could be talked into a pullover. As long as the variations in the yarn don't look too horizontally blotchy. Suggestions?