A Quick Portland Trip

With fall right around the corner, this is always a super busy time in the dye studio. The dye pots are always running, getting ready to send several shops fresh batches of Toil & Trouble yarn.

I did manage to sneak away for a couple of days, making my first visit to the West Coast. I taught Portuguese Knitting at Knit Purl, a shop I'd long admired. Of course I brought home a skein of souvenir yarn. Bumblebirch is hand-dyed in Portland, and I'm sure no one is surprised I picked purple.

I didn't have much time for sight seeing, but I did make it to the Japanese Garden on my last day. Don't let the photos fool you - it was completely packed! I went expecting a quiet couple of hours of relaxation before boarding my flight home, but even on a Monday afternoon there was a huge crowd. It was still beautiful though!

Fiber Revival

This past Saturday was Fiber Revival, a small fiber gathering held at a beautiful farm in Newbury, MA. There's only a handful of vendors, but knitters and spinners bring their chairs and their projects, and spend the day working on their projects outdoors.

There was a beautiful rooster who kept walking up to the crowds and demanding attention. I finally met JessaLu in person, after many years of Instagram stalking, and came home with a Doctor Who toile project bag. In a moment of extreme poor judgment, I bought a Merlin Tree Hitchhiker spinning wheel. This is a terrible idea because I learned to spin precisely 8 minutes before buying it. I blame the wool fumes for clouding my judgment. I chatted with Dave and Kathy, owners of Merlin Tree, who are absolutely lovely, and clearly very slick salespeople. Goal for the rest of this year: get much, much better at spinning. For now, I'll keep torturing some poor merino fiber that deserves much more adept hands.

Weekend Away

We took a break from our super busy schedules to run off to New York to meet family for two days. It did involve some very late nights for schedule readjustment and a fair amout of panic, but we made it. It's always nice to take a break from our routines, but it's equally nice to get back home.

They say you should pick simple projects for travel, so of course I decided to start a fingering weight Fair Isle hat on size 1 needles. To be fair, the Selbu Modern is a beautiful pattern. (If you're interested in making your own, join us at Circle of Stitches next month for a class on this hat)

Socks in NYC

Last week, Nate and I found ourselves in New York for a little fun and a little business. I always have such complicated feelings about New York. I appreciate the vibrancy and variety of the city, but after a few days I find myself craving personal space and a view of the horizon. It was fun, but I am glad to be back in Salem.

It was only fitting that these adorable socks met up with their recipient in NYC since the pattern was from Purl Soho. How cute are these little feet??

I did get to visit Purl Soho in person for the first time. It is a lovely shop, filled to the brim with amazing products. I tried on the City Cape and can't wait to make one. I was a little surprised at the lack of seating/hangout space, which is such a staple of my local yarn shops. But as a New York knitting friend explained, apparently knit shops in the city don't want you to stay - shop and move along!

I came home with this adorable haul. I can't wait to try these little embroidery kits! I could have spent hours looking through all the yarn and picking some to bring home, but I refrained out of respect for my companions.

Does your local yarn shop have a seating area? How do you think it affects your experience of the shop? I can't imagine not being able to sit and knit!

Happy New Year!

Happy new year, dear friends! Since I'm not one for resolutions, I find the first post of the year challenging. But rather than keep agonizing over it, I will just wish all of you a wonderful 2014. 2013 was full of obstacles and plot twists, and I am truly hoping for a less bumpy ride this year.

Our holidays were filled with a lot of food, sleep, happiness, and time away from routine and the internet. We snuck off on a secret trip to Europe to meet up with lots of family, and had a wonderful time.

I consider myself very blessed to have a family full of wonderfully talented creative folks. One of my aunts has been hand-painting ceramics for years, and I had no idea! I found out when we unwrapped this beautiful gift. It was great to spend time with family and get to bring home this handmade treasure, which I'm absolutely in love with.

Now it's back to the routine, and I'm diving back into fiber full force! The dye pots are back up and running, and I have some knitting projects to share soon. Here's to a 2014 full of surprise and opportunity!

Brooksby Farm

For my birthday, I had Nate take me apple-picking. I moved to New England 11 years ago, but somehow completely missed out on this Fall tradition.

Brooksby Farm is a short drive from our home. Not only do they have apple-picking, they also have strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and peaches. I can't wait to go back next year and pick all of those!

They also have a very adorable and delicious farm shop, with fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy products, and fresh baked goods. Of course we tried the apple cider donuts.

A SOWA Sunday

Yesterday Lucinda, Karissa, and I met up in Boston for an afternoon of fabric shopping and shopping at SOWA Open Markets in the South End. It had been a ridiculously long time since I had gone to SOWA, and I really love being on the buyer end of the craft show sometimes. I know a lot of the local handmakers in this area, so I'm always excited to find new people to stalk love. This time I found two new-to-me sellers.

Jon Wye makes "Artist-Driven Graphic Clothing," and when I saw this t-shirt of a robot eating robo-cereal, I couldn't resist getting it for Nate. Those who know Nate know he has a serious fondness for cereal, especially late at night.

I am completely smitten with this turquoise pomegranate vase by New Moon Studio. As a mythology lover, I have a special place in my heart for these lovely fruits. I've seen many artistic interpretations of pomegranates, but I had to have this gorgeous turquoise version.

I also spent some time tending to my veggie garden this weekend, and it looks like I'm going to have a bountiful tomato harvest soon. I can't wait!

I hope you had a wonderful weekend, and that this heatwave is being kind to you. We lost power for a while on Friday, and some pretty uncivilized things were yelled by someone in this house. Ok, it was probably me.

On Squam, part 2

Dear friends, I hope you had lovely weekends. What I expected to be a quiet, restful summer has turned into quite the frenzy, which comes along with unexpectedly becoming a studio manager for a new artist community. So before I forget what peace and quiet feels like, let me tell you about the classes I took at Squam.

I took two classes, both about knitting. It let me pretend that Squam was at least in part about "expanding my work skills" rather than just pure indulgence.

One of my classes was on the basics of Shetland lace, taught by the absolutely adorable Gudrun Johnston. She is amazingly sweet, and I seriously have the biggest crush on her.

I admit I don't know if I am sold on garter stitch lace patterns, but I learned a lot about traditional Shetland shawl construction and it gave me some new ideas about how to develop patterns. I really enjoyed this class, and find myself lamenting the lack of more hours in the day because there is so much I want to experiment with.

My other class was a shawl design class with Stephen West. While I am pretty familiar with shawl design using standard shapes, I was hoping to learn a bit about how to approach more unconventional design. By the way, Stephen is almost a foot and a half taller than me. He was crouching for this photo.

For the first half of the class, he went through how to set up a basic, top-down triangular shawl, which I was already very familiar with. But, to my delight, he asked us what we wanted to do for the second half of the class, so I asked him to talk about unconventional shapes.

He brought out a suitcase packed with several of his own designs, and went over some of the design concepts. We talked about ways to distort some of the more basic shapes, and the idea of knitting in multiple directions to achieve different shapes. I definitely came out of it with a new appreciation for being fearless in design and breaking the rules after understanding them.

And that was Squam, in a very tiny nutshell. I procrastinated on writing this final post because it meant accepting that it really is over and I have to wait a full year before going again.

Have you ever gone to Squam, or any other creative retreats?

On Squam, Part 1

Thank you, everyone, for the sweet and supportive messages you sent me about our cat's passing. I am trying not to dwell, but rather accept and move on, so I decided it's time to write about Squam. I am in that strange post-Squam limbo, where I desperately want to cling to the "Squamness," but at the same time, even though I've only been back a week and a half, it feels like a lifetime ago.

Last fall, I went to my first Squam retreat and absolutely loved it. I loved the environment and the creativity, and knew I had found something special. So I went back this year for the spring retreat. I loved it even more. As much as the fall retreat was amazing, it wasn't quite as "niche" as the spring, with a mixed-media focus. The spring retreat is fiber oriented, with a heavy focus on knitting. This time, I wasn't the only one walking around with a couple of knitting projects in my bag at all times. This time I truly felt surrounded by my people.

Much like last year, I feel like it's impossible to wrap up the experience of Squam in one post. This is because there are two amazing overarching themes to Squam: the setting, and the classes. Squam Lake is beautiful, magical, and completely removed from "regular life." It's amazingly restorative to be in the woods yet surrounded by water, living with strangers who quickly become dear friends. That alone is transformative.

If you told me, in my daily life, that you were going to put me in a cabin with 9 other women I had never met, I would panic. The thought sounds truly terrifying. But at Squam, it's a wonderful thing. My cabin mates were amazing woman, each one so different and bringing something unique to the group. Friends for life.

And then there are the classes. The classes are fantastic and inspiring, and Elizabeth manages to bring in the most amazing teachers. I'll tell you all about the classes I took in the next Squam post.