Rhinebeck and Webs

Thought you kids too far to make it to Rhinebeck or Webs might like to see what I got. I didn’t get nearly as much this trip as previous times so it won’t be a display of excess but there are some pretty yarns that now live at my house.

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Blue Moon Fiber Arts: Socks That Rock in medium weight in the Raven color Corbie. It’s a blue purple color over dyed with even darker blue. I can see something manly with The Boyfriend’s name on it. A hat perhaps, since even the lightweight is too heavy for socks in my opinion.
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Blue Moon Fiber Arts: Socks That Rock in medium weight in the color Sugarplum. It’s a lovely purple, lavender, sea foam green mix. Definitely has my name on it. I’m seeing fingerless mitts or some such thing.
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Blue Moon Fiber Arts: Socks That Rock in medium weight in the color Jingle Bells. OK, I’ll fess up to it. I already have this color…but but….but it’s in light weight. I just love the pale green and vibrant red contrast. I see baby clothes when I look at this color. I think The Communicator may have knit baby clothes in a similar color which is why it’s been labeled as such in my head.

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Glamour Bunny was my cave purchase. I’ve seen this at all of the New England sheep and wool festivals. A couple of the girls are knitting the softest fingerless mitts I’ve ever felt with this stuff. Not wanting to be a follower but wanting a pair of my own, I was over come and purchased a navy blue and pastel blue blend (theirs are solid so mine are different!). I’ve knit the mitts except for the thumbs already. Sooooo soft!!!!

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After flashing the Decadent Fibers women so that she could see my Hey Teach Sweater made out of their Crème Brulee yarn, I found my way back into the booth and happened upon more Crème Brulee. Can you believe it? I just love their yarn and it knits so nice oh and they dye such pretty colors. Well I was destined to buy another sweater’s worth. I went with the a light charcoal gray color knowing that I’d be more likely to wear that than a flashy purple or red, which is what my eyes are typically drawn to. I’m not sure what sweater this will be, but knit on size 9 needles, it will work up fast. I’m feeling inspired after my Diorama success and want to launch into another sweater straight away but I also sense the snow and holiday season coming. So I’ve put a Christmas countdown on the site to help remind me to work on those Christmas gifts in addition to my usual sock knitting and occasional sweater knitting. It is funny though, the time when I’m most inspired to Christmas knit is January. Definitely not October-November. I think it’s the hype around new fall yarns that pulls my brain toward thoughts of self indulgence rather than charity.

And that’s it for Rhinebeck yarn. I feel slightly embarrassed to say that is all I bought. I was trying so hard not to buy sock yarn and to find the perfect sweater yarn that I passed up on a lot of yarns that were beautiful and deserving.

Rhinebeck and Webs too

In the warehouse I found some great deals. It took all my will power not to buy a sweaters worth of ...
Misty Alpaca Hand Paint Baby Suri Silk in a gary, taupe, green variegated color. Actually there was a lot of self talk about knitting sweaters with DK weight yarns. I already have enough DK alpaca yarn from Peru (my boss used to carry it back in her suitcase when she’d visit the factories). If it had been worsted, I’d be done for. And that’s knowing that it grows and shouldn’t be used for sweaters. Really this is the most beautiful yarn I’ve seen in years.
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Misti Alpaca Chunky in a rust color found it’s way into the basket as well. It spoke to me about becoming a Christmas present so it had to come. As did it’s cousin in soft baby pink. It’s the same yarn I just knit the Meathead and Si Captain hats out of. Chunky alpaca is my kryptonite. It’s true. If you were to look up Knitting Samurai on Wikipedia you’d see it listed there along with sweet elvis crepes and red devon rex cats.
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And lastly there was a sock breakdown as well. Here is the standard series of events when a new sock yarn is encountered…

• Samurai sees yarn she’s never seen before, eye narrow and head tilts



• Samurai touches yarn to confirm skin can tolerate it’s texture



• Samurai assess yarn for nylon content



• Samurai confirms it is not Auracania Sock yarn as Samurai has a jihad* against it



• Samurai's color detector locates most pleasing color



• Samurai purchases yarn

Really it’s that simple.
In this case Wisdom Yarns in color Los Angeles was the novel sock yarn of choice.

*The use of the word Jihad is meant in jest. If any offense is taken to my irreverent use of the word I apologize.

What happens when you take 8 knitters and a cat to Rhinebeck?

They get drunk on the yarn fumes for starters.
Friday morning we left bright and early. Arguably I was a bouncing ball of energy, too excited to sleep and ready to go an hour ahead of time. I know, I’m always late so your amazed. Meow Meow Head packed light and was able to fit all of her stuff in just one car which was good, it left the rest of us plenty of room in the other. Having visions of the trip back from Pennsylvania with Lulu last fall, I opted to ride in the non-cat car. When we arrived we were all pleased with the house. It was beautiful and spacious and modern enough for me to be comfortable.
Two trips to the train station later, we had all of our party and were ready for a nice dinner in Rhinecliff. Then we were off to bed and up early to head to the fair grounds. Having been last year, Meow Meow Head and I were adamant that we be out of the house by 8:30. This naturally meant that I was up at 6 “trying” not to wake people up while I got ready so we could get going. The day was a blur of smiles and yarn. I will just leave you with some of the highlight words…

• Socks That Rock yarn
  
• Artichock Freda-French-and Fried
  
• Katie’s Sylvie Jacket
  
• Dips
  
• Si Captian Baseball Hat and Meathead Hat
  
• Flashing The Decedent Fiber Lady with my Hey Teach Sweater
  
• Joan going back for Pam
  
• Cheeses
  
• Kissing Llamas
  
• Knitted Bob Costume
  
• NY Style Pizza
  

Day two was rainy but that didn’t stop us. I think we all bought some Crème Brule from Decedent Fibers. And on Day three with our Rhinebeck hangovers, we headed home via Webbs. What a crazy group of ladies!!!!

Diorama Done and Rhinebeck Tomorrow!

Haha! I've completed the Diorama before leaving for Rhinebeck! Ok so I look a little like Linus in it. He's gained a bit of weight recently and looks like a stuffed sausage in a Linus suite. Yeah so that's about how I look with this buttoned up. But it's cute and I'll wear it anyway!

Rhinebeck is coming!

Do you realize that Rhinebeck is in like 7 days!!!!????? I’ve been knitting on the Diorama, thinking I had plenty of time to finish it. I knit the back and right front and about the time I started the left front it hit me that if I’m going to finish this thing in time for next weekend I really need to be done knitting it by Sunday so that I have Monday to block it, Tuesday to dry and Wednesday to sew it up. Thursday I’ll be packing and then Friday morning we’re off. Normally I’d be fine to finish the last 10” of the front by Sunday but this is a cat show weekend. Mum and I are off to Canada with 10+ hours of driving in our future. I hope I can squeeze in some knitting during that time, but it’s all late afternoon-evening driving which is more difficult for older eyes.

Evolution of Samurai and Boyfriend

We went to a wedding this weekend of a college friend/roommate. This caused The Boyfriend and I to marvel at how much our old college buddy had changed. We’ve known him since our freshman year in college, 10 years this fall. Of course people change over a time period like that. In the few visits over the years since college I had not picked up on the cues while my other half had. He had been watching the progression from rebellious beatnik poet to someone more interested in the party and following the expectations of society. The overwhelming display of personal tastes that is the nature of a wedding drastically highlighted this change for me. It made me sad but it also made me wonder about myself.

In a few days The Boyfriend and I will have been together for 11 years. It’s hard to imagine a time when we weren’t together. Nearly half of our lifetimes have been spent in unity. 13 years ago I started sophomore year at a new High School and met a boy who would change my life. Looking back at ourselves we realized that we too must have changed over such a long period of time. We concluded that there have been three major shifts for us both;

1. We are far more liberal, I was more liberal from the start which means that I’m still more liberal but the conservative boy debating in high school civics classes about war and the economy would not recognize the man I’m married to today. And the girl who was once quoted in the local newspaper campaigning to bring home our troops would be shocked at my opinions on the current war and economy.
2. We both value the environmental and animals far more than our younger selves. I think most people would agree that they are more aware of the environment now as the entire society has shifted to concerns on global warming and reducing waste but becoming vegetarians was not something either of us planned.
3. Neither of us has much use for pop culture. The Boyfriend spends minimal time watching sports, which used to be his consuming passion. And without cable I do not find myself missing mainstream TV. I am far more content to listen to an audio book and knit, from the child who was tortured by her father’s need to sit and read every evening rather than watch TV.
   

There are other smaller things like Mac, Linus and Isitt, he would never have had a cat without me and I would never have imagined that cat showing would be something I’d enjoy. And our current choices of occupations, are definitely not what we set out to do. But in the end I think what matters most is that we have evolved together. He doesn’t mind my knitting and I love discussing philosophy with him in between books. And I write all this to you as I download N’Sync onto my Ipod because it’s been awhile since I’ve listened to them. Yeah, probably since high school. So not everything changes.