Quiddity

California Vacation

We arrived in Reno, Nevada on Friday afternoon.  The flight went smoothly and we were soon on our way to Truckee, California, about a 40 minute drive.  My BIL has a vacation home on one of the ridges above town, and every year my SIL and her family come out the week of President's Day to ski.  They all squeeze into BIL's little three bedroom, two bath house - this year, there were 14 people ranging in age from adult to age seven filling the place.  Jim and I were quite happy with our quiet condo, thank you very much.  After dropping our bags there, we met everyone in town for a delicious Mexican dinner, and then we went "home" to drop exhausted into bed.

Saturday morning was bright, beautiful, and almost warm.  I was fearful that I wasn't going to get any use from all the things I'd knit!  Here's a view of the condo.

You can see, it had been snowing quite a bit.  Admittedly, much of that pile was from where they had plowed and blown the snow, but still!  After a nice breakfast, it was off to the slopes of Squaw Valley.  

Jim rented his gear, and then took off with his brother.  I bought a ticket for the gondola, which takes you from mountain base (elevation 6200 feet) to High Camp (8200 feet.)  While still not at the very top of the mountain, it's high enough for me.  Lovely views all around.  Here's one showing Lake Tahoe in the distance.

While it had been very warm at the bottom, it was extremely windy and cold at the top.  My hat and mittens were put to immediate use and proved more than up to the challenge of the weather.  I walked around a bit, watching the skiers head further up the mountain, and those who were taking lessons on the easy slope.  There was even a cool place to have a drink (although I didn't.)

It's the Ice Bar!  Cool - in more ways than one.  

I met Jim and Tim (his brother) at the top and we had a nice lunch at a restaurant with fabulous views.  They went back to skiing, and I took a few more photos.  By this time, it was clear that the big weather front predicted for later that evening was beginning to roll in.

The clouds began to gather, the wind blew even harder, and I took the gondola back down, taking pictures on the way, of course.  I love this one showing all the skiers far below.

I found a cozy spot by a fire, pulled out my knitting, and waited for the slopes to close.  After a few happy hour drinks, we headed home to get cleaned up, and then joined everyone at Tim's house for dinner.  By the time we started over, it was snowing heavily, and we were thankful for the rental car's all wheel drive.  

The next morning, it was snowing hard at the condo.

But by the time we drove down to Truckee, a loss of about 300 feet, it was raining.  Undeterred, we headed over to the ski resort, where it was a mix of snow and rain at the bottom.  And because it was so windy, the gondola and the top of the mountain were closed.  The skiers stayed to the middle and bottom, and Jim said that the snow was really good.  It should have been, as they'd had 18" overnight.

This was the scene for the rest of the day, and into Monday, as well.  I spent most of Sunday sitting with various relatives in the Starbucks, waiting for other relatives to come and go.  We took time out for a nice lunch, and by the time we were finished, it was close to closing.  There was some browsing of stores at the Village, but the only thing I bought was a tee shirt.  We all went into town for dinner that evening, except for Patti's youngest, who was overtired, and her husband who had to stay home to take care of her.  We enjoyed watching the tears roll down Tim's face from the HOT chicken wings he ordered.  There should have been more of a warning on the menu, I think!

Monday was worse than Sunday, weatherwise.  While it was alternately sunny and snowing at the condo, it was raining hard down below and on the way to the resort.  And it kept raining hard.  Jim was not sure he'd ski, but his sister and her family had been on the slopes for a while, and said further up it was snowing.  The top was still closed, but Jim and one of Patti's boys, Sam, went out while the rest of us had lunch.  Jim said it was fine higher up, although a bit slushy, but they had to come down into the rain.  They were SOAKED!  But I guess if you fly from the east coast to the west coast to ski, you might as well ski.  Tim had to go back to work, so he missed the wet skiing, and then Patti and her family left when the slopes closed.  That allowed Jim and I to have a quiet evening by ourselves.  We enjoyed a delicious dinner at a restaurant overlooking beautiful downtown Truckee.  Then home to pack and get ready for an early drive to Reno.

While I'm still sorry I didn't get to drive around taking pictures because of the weather, and made the mistake of not going to the yarn shop when I knew it was really open, overall it was a nice trip.  We spent fun time with Jim's family, Jim enjoyed skiing, and although I didn't get much knitting done, it was all very relaxing.  

I did, however, come home with an assignment.  My seven-year old niece, Caroline, fell in love with my flip top mittens, and made me promise to make her a pair.  Pink and purple stripes, of course.  And I'd better get to work on them soon, because I don't think patience is one of her best virtues!  Good thing it's going to be a rainy weekend.

Last Drawing Class

Back from vacation, and right into drawing mode.  We arrived at the airport on Tuesday night, and then it was up early this morning to go to my last class.  I do have some photos from our trip, but the weather was not good for photography.  I had hoped to be able to drive around taking pictures while everyone else skied, but that wasn't possible, as it was constantly either raining, sleeting, or snowing.  There was a lot of waiting around time as a result, but despite that, not much knitting happened, either.  Biggest bummer of all was that Monday, the one day I actually had free time for shopping, the local yarn shop was closed!  Drat.  On the plus side, Jim did a lot of skiing (he didn't mind the rain,) we got to spend time with his brother, sister, and their kids, and there was snow at the higher elevations, like at the condo, as well as the top of the ski mountain.  Lots and lots of snow.  Yay!  I'll go through my photos tonight, and get some snow shots up tomorrow.  In the meantime, here's what I did in my last drawing class.

The instructor had several bags full of leaves.  We each chose one or more, and then traced it onto our watercolor paper.  He showed us how to use the watercolor paints, and then how to create effects with masking fluid, wax pencil, toothpicks, salt, and sandpaper.  

These leaves combine the last four techniques.

The lessons I learned from these leaves are:  

• Less is more.  When the paint was wet, the colors were more translucent.  I used too much paint and too many blended colors.   
• The paint will spread into any wet area, so be careful where you apply the water.  I can sand out some of the smudges, but I'd rather they not be there in the first place.   

 

The second part of the lesson involved tracing a leaf and then applying liquid mask to form the veins before painting.  After it all dried, the mask was peeled off to reveal the white paper underneath.

 

I'm happier with the paint application here.  And I have to say, I really enjoyed the whole watercolor process.  I found it quite satisfying to push the color around the page.  This is a technique I'm definitely going to pursue in the future.  It wasn't nearly as hard as I'd been led to believe, and is more forgiving, too.  

I hope you've enjoyed my drawing lessons.  I'm going to keep up with it on my own for a while, and will look at taking more later this year.  I now return you to the regularly scheduled (mostly) knitting (and sometimes spinning) blog.  

Drawing Day

Here I am again with more drawing.  This is my next to last lesson, and despite not getting the kind of instruction I expected, I think there may be progress.  

The subject

And my finished drawing

I'm very fond of the broom.  I also like the effect I achieved with the baseball and apple.  The blanket folds almost drove me around the bend until I just let go and swooped the eraser and charcoal across the paper.  Maybe that's the secret - don't try too hard.  Hah!  Next week is intro to watercolor.  I'm ready!

The TV is full of tornado warnings, while outside, the sun is brightly shining. A very, very bad sign.  This time of year, when it rains in the morning and then gets warm and sunny in the afternoon, tornados often follow.  There are predictions of 80mph winds and big hail for later this evening.  Think I'll go take a walk while it's still nice, and then come back and start getting ready for Friday's flight to California.  There's a mountain of wash to be done.  I sure hope the power stays on!

 

All Done!

The baby things are finished and delivered to the new grandma.  She'll take them to the shower on Saturday.  I wish I could be there to see the reaction when the package is opened.  Hopefully, there will be lots of pictures.

But you don't have to wait, here's what is inside the boxes.

Each color group went into its own box, but I wrapped them together.  I also added some tags to the clothing.

• The yarn for all was Rowan Handknit Cotton.The green is #309 Celery, and the blue #324 Bermuda.  Normally, I really dislike knitting with cotton, but after all these little items, I've decided that this yarn isn't so bad.  It certainly is soft, seems to hold its shape well, and didn't hurt my hands.  A definitely win.
• The patterns - One Piece Baby Kimono, Baby Bib 'O Love, and Baby Genius Burp Cloth from Mason-Dixon Knitting.  Hat and booties from Itty Bitty Nursery.  All fast, easy, and absolutely cute. 

My cousin's daughter is also pregnant, so there will be more baby knitting.  But in the meantime, there's more stuff for me.  

I loved the colors of my Noro Striped Scarf so much (#207 - maybe the best Noro color ever) that I made matching mittens and a hat.

 

Maybe not to everyone's taste, but I tend to let the Noro colors fall where they may.  The first mitten used almost a full ball, so I started the second with a new one, and didn't bother trying to match the colors.  Very funky!  And also, not just mittens.

Tah-Dah, they flip!  And thanks to good friends Olivia and Regan, they flip correctly. (I'm a bit spatially challenged, and they helped me figure out which end of the band to sew to the inside.  Duh!)  

For the hat, I wanted something slouchy, and found the perfect pattern at Knitch.  Almost.  It was written for bulky yarn, so I found my courage, worked out the math, and ended up with this.

 

It doesn't look like much on the porch, but I LOVE how it looks on me.  The forecast for Squaw Valley, CA is snow, and now I'm ready!

Now I need to figure out what projects are coming west with me.  Socks, of course.  And maybe a baby surprise sweater.  I'm going for three days (with a travel day on either end.)  Do you think I need to take more?  Wanna bet I will?  

I'll be back soon, hopefully with lots of snowy photos to show off.  And maybe even a picture of me snug and warm in my hand knits.  Throwing a snowball!  But first, you'll get to see my latest drawing effort - tomorrow.

Still Life

Another Wednesday, another drawing.  This time, however, there was a lot less anxiety.  I think it was because the subject made more sense to me - mostly all based on circles.  Here's what we had to work with.

And here's my final drawing.

Things I like:

• The carrot - I'm especially fond of the foofy top.
• The apple, pear, pomegranate, and both onions. 

Things I would like to improve:

• The basket 
• The grapes 
• The grape leaves (what do you mean you can't see them?  hee hee) 
• The beans, although I'm happier about them than the rest on this part of the list 
• The cabbage

 Overall, I'm content with this - certainly more so than with last week's boot and flower.  And my confidence level is higher, too.  There are two more lessons before the class ends, and I'm looking forward to the last one because we will learn to use watercolors.  That's something I've been interested in, but never tried.  We will be drawing a leaf, always a favorite subject for me.  

Our Spring-like weather of the last few days resulted in more than warm temperatures.  About thirty minutes ago, the tornado siren at the nearby college started going off.  I switched on the TV to see what was happening, and it was quickly apparent there was no real danger.  If there was, the only place to hide is in the damp and scary basement.  I would not hesitate to run down there, if need be, but thankfully it wasn't necessary this evening.  Atlanta is a great place to live, without many natural dangers to fear, but we do get our share of tornado warnings (and tornados) in the Spring and Fall, as well as the occasional winter ice storm.  And I feel safe in this big brick house.  After all, it's been standing here for almost 100 years.  (Is that considered whistling past the graveyard?)

There should be photos of all the baby knitting I've been doing by the first of the week.  The baby shower is next Friday, so it's quickly getting to the point where it all needs to be finished and wrapped.  Then it's off to California.  Looks like there will be lots of snow, which means a wonderful chance to take photos of something that doesn't occur here very often.  And it appears there is a new yarn shop very close to where we are staying, so that's something else to explore.  All the bases are covered, and I'm looking forward to getting away for a while.  In the meantime, back to the booties! 

Sometimes, Knitting is Funny

But before we get to that, I want to encourage everyone in the metro Atlanta area to immediately go see Jesus Christ Superstar at the Alliance Theater.  I went this weekend, and have to say it was the best theater experience I've ever had.  A newly arranged gospel version, it takes the original and creates a production that nails you to your seat, raises your spirit, and leaves you breathless.  The staging is original, the music amazing, and the actors incredible.  Even if you think you don't like musicals, or gospel, or even the story line - GO!  You will not regret it.  

Now, funny knitting.  Well, the knitting itself isn't funny, but the situation is.  On Saturday, a surprise arrived for me in the mail from my aunt in Arizona.  She saw how cold it had been here, and quickly knit a beautiful scarf for me.  Jim and I were getting ready to take a walk, and I wrapped it around my neck and face and had him snap a photo.

What's funny here (other than me, in general,) is that it was currently 68 degrees outside!  I did not need either the scarf or the sweater.  Fortunately, we are soon off to Squaw Valley, where highs are in the 30's, so both items will be well appreciated.  The scarf is knit from Cyprus Mohair, a blend of 15% mohair and 85% acrylic.  It's soft, soft, soft.  And very warm.  Thanks, Karyl, I love it!

Today was very Spring-like, with a high of 72, and tomorrow will be just as warm. It's not that unusual to have a week of very warm weather in February, and it will most likely turn cold again.  But it most likely means we've turned the corner on the worst of Winter.  I hope that's true, because when I went riding last Thursday morning, it was 29 degrees.  Brrrrr!  Because we started about an hour later than usual, I was hoping the temperature would rise a bit more than that by the time I got there. With that in mind, I neglected to bring a scarf, and the instructor dug something out for me to put around my face so I wouldn't get frost bite.  I wish I had a photo of me wearing the bright red wrap that usually goes around a horse's leg!  Don't laugh - it kept me nice and warm.  But no danger of frostbite this week, thank goodness.

There's good progress with all the baby knitting.  Both sweaters and hats are finished, and I've started the socks.  There was a little glitch when the first one came out a bit too long, but I've gone down a needle size and will adjust the length so it should work out this time.  I've decided not to knit the burp cloths, and instead will attempt little teddy bears.  It remains to be seen how that will go.

Hope you are enjoying a bit of thaw this week.  Before we know it, everything will be blooming again!

If It's Wednesday

There must be drawing.  With three more lessons to go, I'm having a good time with the classes, but....  Yes, a "but" has cropped up.  The man teaching the class is, from the work he's shown us, a good artist, but I'm afraid he's not really cut out to be a teacher.  The problem is that he gives almost no direct instructions about how to approach drawing the subjects.  He starts each class by doing an extremely fast rendition of the item, and then tells us "it's easy, now start."  He will come by and give help if asked, but only in the form of taking the charcoal and drawing over what is on the page.  I feel there should be more specific information in the way of learning about line and perspective and basic drawing techniques.  Last week, I asked him after class about how to give more detail to my flowers, and he began to draw.  I noticed him using varying amounts of pressure with the charcoal, and asked him about it.  "Yes," he said, "that's important.  I suppose I should mention that in class."  Uh, yeah!  And you know, he didn't.  Anyway, I'm doing the best I can, and will most likely take more drawing classes, but it's beginning to shake my confidence.

Here's what I did today.  The subject:

Almost completed.

You can see that the perspective is a bit off in the shoelace area, and the boot top is too tall.  I did a bit of erasing and redrawing with this being the final result.

A little better, but on the whole, the drawing is flat.  I may try again, using the photo to guide me.  I'd like to figure out how to bring in more detail, as well as appropriate depth.

I thought you might like to see how some of the other students did, so I took a photo of part of the studio.

I like how everyone has a different take on it.  One of the students is someone I knew well back when our kids were in elementary school.  I thought she did the best job today.

It's a learning process, and I'm going to stick with it, but with a different instructor next time.

On the other hand, my knitting projects have been going well.  I finished the first baby sweater the other day, and the second one this evening.  The rest of the projects are small, and should go just as quickly.  Also on the needles is another scarf.  This one is a special project as it's the newest pattern from my friend Trish.  It's not ready for publication yet, so I can't show it off, but go over to her blog to check out her other patterns.  I'll be sure to post when this one is ready.  I can say that it's easy, fun, and quite beautiful. 

It's been really cold here the last couple of days.  This morning, it was 15 with a wind chill of 1.  Not as cold as many of you have had, but this is Georgia and we aren't used to it!  But by the weekend, it will warm up and I'll be able to enjoy wearing my new sweater instead of a heavy coat.  However, I did enjoy the warmth of the Noro Striped Scarf this morning!

Hope it warms up soon where you are.  I'm definitely ready for Spring.

Fourth Annual Bloggers (Silent) Poetry Reading

Be Glad Your Nose is on Your Face
by Jack Prelutsky
Be glad your nose is on your face, not pasted on some other place, for if it were where it is not, you might dislike your nose a lot. Imagine if your precious nose were sandwiched in between your toes, that clearly would not be a treat, for you'd be forced to smell your feet. Your nose would be a source of dread were it attached atop your head, it soon would drive you to despair, forever tickled by your hair. Within your ear, your nose would be an absolute catastrophe, for when you were obliged to sneeze, your brain would rattle from the breeze. Your nose, instead, through thick and thin, remains between your eyes and chin, not pasted on some other place-- be glad your nose is on your face!

The Internets (and most of my friends) Made Me Do It

Knitters are such a friendly crowd.  They love showing off their projects and pointing you toward their favorite yarns and patterns.  "See how soft this is," they say.  "Oooh, look at the pretty colors."  "This would look so nice on you!"  No holding back or selfishness.  Nice. People.  Which is why, after much head shaking and pushing away of yarn, I finally fell down the rabbit hole that is the Noro Striped Scarf.  I swear, almost every one of my friends has made at least one, and each prettier than the last.  Come to think of it, I've yet to see an ugly one.  So, here's mine.

This is such a fast and addictive knit.  That k1, p1 rhythm becomes so soothing, it's hard to put the needles down.  I used Noro Kuryeon #195, which is composed of very dark browns and blues, as well as black.  The contrast was #207, with a palate of subdued to bright colors of many hues.  I love how the darks set off the brights.  It's a delightful scarf.  Being unable to resist the pretty colors of #207, two more skeins found their way home, destined to become mittens and a hat.  The matchy-matchy mood is upon me lately.

A few days before starting the scarf, I also finally finished my Sophia Cardigan.

• Sophia Cardigan from Simply Shetland.  I LOVE this cardigan.  First of all, it fits.  With no modifications.  Amazing!!  It's comfortable, warm, and stylish, and I plan on wearing it constantly.
• Rowan Pure Wool DK, color #022.   I didn't capture the color too well, but the second photo is pretty close. 
• I couldn't find any buttons I liked, so I made my own using little plastic rings and a crochet hook. 

 

They gave me just the look I was going for - understated and vintage.  Whee!

My plan was to immediately begin another sweater.  I'm not part of that 12 sweaters in 2009 crowd, but would like to make at least one more before it gets too hot to work on something that big and warm.  However, I've been sidetracked by baby knitting.  My friend's daughter is having twin boys in March, and there is a shower on the 21st of this month.  Planned are two little sweaters, two hats, two sets of booties, (at least) two bibs and (at least) two burp cloths.  Time permitting, I'd also like to knit some little bears or bunnies. We'll see how far I get.  Time to start!