In Which I Make Books & Knit & Simone Gets Married!

Here ya go! A week in six pictures......

I was teaching last week. I had a most wonderful Limp Vellum Bookbinding class - 7 students, 3 day class, make great book. I talk about the Red Sox a bunch, and harangue the students. It's great fun! I got a little bit feisty:

(photo by R. Craig Fansler)

This is an example of the sewing technique we were doing - the Herringbone Stitch. We were creating models of a 14th century binding. The sections of the book are sewn around alum-tawed skin, which is held taut on these sewing frames. Yeah, I know - pushpins are not the most 14th-century technique, but, hey, ya gotta go with what works. One of my students posted more pictures of books in action on his blog.

Then off to Vermont I went! For the most lovely (albeit rainy) wedding festivities of Miss Simone and Scott - here is the lovely Simone modelling her contract knitting:

One of the photographers had exclaimed "If you get a chance to touch this thing, DO IT."
The ceremony, the food, the setting, the company, ESPECIALLY the wedding party - all lovely! Miss B also had a handknit garment:

A lovely little capelet (NOT a shrug!), which ended up blocking out all sorts of wonderful.

The car-ride to Vermont? Lots of time for knitting! Experiment Number 194595495: What's the big deal with Blue Moon Fibers "Socks that Rock" yarn? Like, why does everyone LURVE it so? I decided to find out for myself:
Lest you think that I am not thorough in my experiments, I present to you TWO of these dandies:
This is the "Loch Ness" colorway - one of about 3 colorways remaining by the time I got to the booth selling this stuff at Rhinebeck. I gotta tell ya, it's pretty freakin' nice stuff. It's rather sproingy, and I like the striping. It is super NOT splitty, It seems that it will weather and wear well. I think I can undertand now, and I will even go so far as to recommend this yarn to y'all. I'll revisit it, methinks.

I'm going to throw out this teaser:
I'll be back with pictures of my new friend tomorrow ;)

Viva La Rhinebeck!

Well, what can I say? It was all that and more. After a rainy journey out Friday afternoon, the weather (thankfully!) cleared up for the Rhinebeck Wooly festivities. I was a bit overwhelmed at the actual fair and ended up not taking many pictures while there - but everyone else did. Cruise around online if you need to see fair pics. Instead, I'd like to share this lovely view with you:

This was the most lovely setting - well, about 40 minutes north of Rhinebeck proper - and it truly is so beautiful and peaceful to take in. We stayed with my cousin, who has the fortune of waking up to this beauty every day. This section of the Hudson River Valley used to play a prominent role in the whale shipping industry, and the region is rich in history and folklore (the main bridge across the river up there is the Rip Van Winkle; it is said that the mountains form his sleeping profile). It's all just so lovely.

But you're really here for the fair, aren't you? Headed down first thing on Saturday with wool and cheese on the mind. This being my first year spinning, I had a new plan of attack . I was very focussed on finding fibers I have not tried spinning yet - after all, this was the ideal opportunity to get a little of this and a little of that. Oh, and in many cases, I could MEET the animals the fibers came from! I also had 2 other specific projects in mind* , and managed to leave with......well, a decent haul. As I was saying while there "I am here to get a year's worth of fiber" and then next year I can go back and do it all again.
I would love to tell you all about these things, but I took very very very bad notes. Here is a mini-inventory, and things that I am sure of: the orange-green-brown bundle at the very top was hand-delivered to me by Amy, the bright pink/red in front of that and to the left is a silk cap (very stringy/sticky), the red to the right of that is alpaca, the 3 in the middle are alpaca (as well as the lavendar), the yarn to the right is Socks that Rock (primarily because....what's the big deal? why does everyone love this? I need to see for myself if it is ALL THAT), and I can't remember what is on the bottom.














Don't these all look so soft and dreamy? There are some wool bundles in there - after all, the roving is the gift that keeps on giving. It's TWICE the entertainment for your buck! Not only do I get to spin it up, but then there is knitting as well. What a bahgain.

Aside from the softness of, well, EVERYTHING, I also managed to meet a gazillion people and make it over to blogger meetup. I'm not going to do links here, but it was great to talk to (I apologize for leaving anyone out!) Lyssa, Boogie, HelloYarn, YarnaGoGo (all the way from CA!), BrainyLady and Veronik, Jess and Casey, AnnieKnits, and about 56290385609 more great knitters. It was really interesting to see patterns that I recognize walk by, on a REAL person, as well as yarn. I was sporting my Branching Out scarf.........too hot for anything bulkier.

On Sunday we went to visit Reggie at Howard Hall Farms - he and Nora have been working on restoring this house the REAL way for a few years now, and the fun has just begun! Reggie gave us a tour of the place, and the chance to see what has been done so far, what needs to be done, and some history on the building while we nibbled on cider donuts. Here's an example of a lovely Japanese joint redistributing a lot of the load on the top floor, and a bit of the detail (and the thickness of the stone walls!) that they are working to preserve:














Along with checking out this amazing restoration, they kindly provided me with an entire FLEECE from one of their sheep! I'm debating how to go about the processing. So now my car smells like a barn.

Oh, and we got cheese OF COURSE.

I'll leave you all with this picture of Amy enjoying her new favorite color:
*more on this to come.

Home for the weekend

You may recognize the rock formations above as the Flatirons, in Boulder, Colorado. Because I am very, very old and grew up in a simpler, less population-dense time, this is part of the view that I woke up to every morning (although, being a couple miles away, we used to have a truly magnificent panorama of foothills—but the view out my old bedroom window has filled in with now-mature trees).

It’s really spoilt me for life. I’m very hard to please where scenery is concerned. New England is full of the picturesque, to be sure, if you like dairy farms and H.H. Richardson and that sort of thing, but for majesty and magnificence and commanding presence and emotional force... Well, you have to go west. Even a three-day-weekend dose of natural beauty is a powerful thing.

Above is my little fambly, on a “hike” at Chautauqua. My sister’s son will be three next month, so he doesn’t go all day, but he’s really kind of a trouper! We visited my sister’s native-plant nursery, Harlequin’s Gardens (which is located in northeast Boulder next to, by coincidence I assume, the clown school), where I got some sedums for my strawberry planter and a good hardy rosemary called Arp. (We packed them in a little insulated lunchbox, which gave airport security a laugh.) I had two Breadworks’ bread-pudding muffins, picked up some fantastic Silk Road (Drum Mountain White Cloud and Hairy Crab) teas, and went for a long walk past my old junior high every day. It was lovely to see everyone, and I remembered, as I always do when I head west, how I like life to be.

Thrift: Above is the forerunner to the Crockpot, the Nesco slow cooker, a hand-me-down from the very generous and knowledgeable Dave Sakowski of Magpie. This one was probably made in the early 30s, and as you can see, is a lovely blush color. There has been a struggle over it in my house; Joe feels it is simply too big for an objet of mere decoration, and I have agreed to use it in the garden, a la You Grow Girl, but... not yet! Pink enamel is a thing of beauty, and if it’s going to be a planter, it needs the right plant.

Knit: Finally, I expect to finish my Petit Chou bra tomorrow, when I hit the thrifts for an old bra to cannibalize hardware from. And then we will have the promised errata!