Much Ado About Nothing......

My oh my.....over a month and no post? What kind of blogger am I? Obviously a novice! Hey....a busy novice! We were fortunate enough to have two long weekends, back to back, of roadtrips....one to Monterey and one to Mendocino. Monterey was, for lack of better words, awesome. My DH and a good friend of ours planned a golfing weekend and asked me if I wanted to come along. Now mind you I don't golf but I am perfectly capable of entertaining myself, so of course I said yes. There are two yarn stores in the vicinity....that alone was reason enough to go! I had such a good time by myself.....drove down to Big Sur and visited art galleries; shopped around Montery; did the 17 mile drive to Carmel and of course bought yarn! I got lots of supplies for my artwork, particularly pieces for my Shaman series and am itching to finish some new pieces. And we had fabulous meals, and drank lots of wine and got kicked out of the hotel hot tub! Good times.

And Mendocino, a combined anniversary/birthday celebration trip. Mendocino is our very favorite weekend get-away. DH and I go up there at least twice a year when we can manage it. I love the ocean there.....miles and miles of very dramatic coast line. And no matter what time of year or what the weather is like, it is beautiful. The drive there is just as beautiful, through Napa Valley, Alexander Valley and then Anderson Valley. The stretch through the Redwoods along the Navarro River is my favorite part of the drive. When you emerge from the forrest you can smell the ocean and it is instant relaxation mode for me! Got lots of knitting done, I was working on my first attempt of cabled knitting and it was a success. I also got the body of my entrelac vest finished. We had a cottage at one of our favorite places, Sweetwater Inn and Spa, that had its own hot tub. Talk about heaven! It was foggy and misty, perfect hot tub weather. Our first night there, we went up to the grocery store, bought wine, cheese, crackers, grapes and had a feast, sitting in the hot tub. Was a wonderful start to our mini-vacation. And yes, I bought yarn and buttons there, too. I always pop in to the yarn shop there; is a great little shop that has expanded in recent years. I got some lovely Classic Elite Alpaca sock yarn. (yes....yet another skein of sock yarn!).

I've had artwork accepted to two galleries and work in a shop here in town and have been busy with artist receptions....and now the holidays are on us and I have two shows to do and don't want to pull work out of the shop and gallery, so I have much artwork to do! And here I am sitting at the table blogging! And...I just found out I am to be a grandmother.....yay....now I have an excuse for knitting all of those cute baby sweaters! And sock yarn is perfect, and I have lots of it, and so yesterday I got on-line and bought more.......the baby is a boy so I had to buy more blue yarn!!!!!!! As one project gets close to completion, my entrelac vest, several more will be cast on: baby sweater, A-line sweater for me, DH's socks, a pair of socks for my youngest son....the list goes on..... I have so much on my plate it is crazy!!!! When will I get it all done???? I guess I could start right now.......stay tuned and see what I accomplish. Later!!

So......been awhile. Yes...well, no one reads this so what do I care. Why is this so hard to write? Why do I have this writers block?? Its crazy. So girlfriend what are you up to? ......................... I am trying real hard to finish a knitted vest that I started for our Afghans for Afghans campaign...am almost done with it. And I cast on the Tofutsie socks pattern that they posted on their website, Tidal Wave, I think is the name of the pattern, just because I love that yarn and have bought 3 skeins of it....thought I should start something with it. Then..... I have been on a real sock yarn tear... I have more sock yarn than I know what to do with. I just love it. There is something about the fact that socks are considered a "small" project. So I keep thinking that if all I buy is sock yarn I'm really not falling into that "stash builder" spectrum. But... well, there is that yarn...and its, um yarn.....and I really don't have anything like it.......
I'm just sayin"....I have now 4 differnt socks on the needles, two vests, a sweater, and .......what more do you want????? That's normal, right??????...........

A list.......

Things I'd blog about if I had the time or the inclination(I stole this idea from a blogger I read but I can't remember who it was):



1. Telling someone to their face exactly how I feel about them!



2. Lack of time to spin, knit, make art, blog.....take your pick.



3. Dealing with f'n politics within an organization without hurting feelings (see #1 above).


I started this post weeks ago and after today it is so apropos. That all I'm sayin'...........

Dish Rag Tag........I'm it!

Funny....I discovered an entry I had written and forgot to post! It made me think about my many friends. I am very blessed in my friendships. A couple of weeks ago when I was at a talk at our LYS about Andean Knitting, I realized that I had made many new friends there. It was reminiscent of "Cheers", remember when the door would open and everyone at the bar would shout "Norm!"? Now when I walk into the yarn shop, I always recognize most of the faces sitting around the table knitting, and many of those faces have become friends. I love that!





I am playing Dish Rag Tag(see http://yarnmiracle.com/ for explanation) this summer.....I just got the "baton" last week, the box crammed with goodies from my team mate in Washington. I think the most fun was the anticipation, waiting for the box to be delivered to me, reading all my teams posts about the race and what they got in the box when it was their turn. I got mine on Wednesday evening but I couldn't start knitting my dish rag right away. I had been commissioned to create a piece, a gourd, for a wedding present. A friend of mine's daughter is getting married this weekend and he wanted to give her one of my pieces. I had to have it done Wednesday night! The same day my Dish Rag Tag box arrived! I got the piece done, it turned out fabulous....he loved it. I hope his daughter likes it too. Anyway, late that night, I made myself a sandwich and took it to bed with me along with my knitting. Even though I knitted a quick swatch and checked my gauge, the dish rag I started was too big! Ripped it out, cast on fewer stitches, and...the same thing. Rippit again, cast on again, and by then it was midnight. I fell asleep, dreamed of a dish rag that kept growing larger and larger......every time I measured it, it was larger than before! I woke up frazzled, because this is a race after all and I was trying to get the dishrag knitted up so I could mail the box on to the next person before the post office closed on Thursday. No such luck....I did have to work at my "real"job after all (how else can I afford yarn and art supplies???!!) During lunch hour, while I was knitting on my dishrag, I realized the reason it was larger than it really needed to be, and the reason I kept ripping it out the night before, was because I was so tired, I had miscalculated the number of stitches I needed to cast on! I was working with multiples of four but was so tired that I couldn't even remember what 4 x 9 equalled!!!!! So, my dishrag is about 11" square. The rules stated it needed to be at least 9" square....at least I won't be disqualified due to size!!!!!!! I got it to the post office Friday morning. It should arrive Tuesday at its next stop. I hope my teammate likes her "goodies". I won't tell you what I included for her so that I don't spoil the surprise for her. GO SKANKS WITH HANKS!!!!

Friends and three.....

I've had many reocurring incidents, thoughts, dreams . The strangest is the "threes". I've been dreaming about my knitting, about the Dish Rag Tag (it's getting close to me!) about travel, about friends. It was very strange having these dreams that were different, but there were always three of something and my subconcious told me the "three" part is what was important; but I still can't figure out why! I was reading a book this week, The Power of the Three. About three friends and I guess that started all of this dreaming of threes. But then all these other facets of my life kept entering into my dreams, but then thats what dreams are all about. But I just can't figure out the significance of the threes. Of course I had to look it up in a dream dictionary. The obvious was the trinity aspect, mother/father/child...that sort of thing. Nope, doesn't fit in. Odd numbers, especially three means you are creative...OK, that fits. But still doesn't solve the mystery. But three and also friends kept cropping up. I had received an invitation for lunch with the women I went to high school with (small school); I spent some time with my knitting friends at our local yarn shop; I was meeting up with my two best friends for a birthday lunch......friends, threes! Bizzare.

Rambling thoughts.....

This blogging thing is harder than I thought it would be......I'm always thinking now about blog entries. Now all of a sudden, everything is subject to being written about. The thing is.....who cares? So you will just have to suffer through my ramblings.

Lots of things have been happening since I posted last......

I went to Lambtown, in Dixon, CA, with a couple of friends, which, while I had a good time, the event itself was a let down. In years past it was huge, covering several blocks of the downtown area. This year, for several reasons, it took place in a park and wasn't anywhere near as big as the other times I had gone. There were only what looked like 2 sheep to shawl teams. We didn't stick around for the other spinning contests so I don't know how those went. I did meet someone from Ravelry, miss "M" of Sincere Sheep. If you haven't signed up to beta test you need to check it out. It is an awesome, on line fiber community. Mostly knitters, lots of spinners and crocheters, too. You can find almost anything there connected with fiber. I can't begin to describe it, go check it out. I will warn you it is an addicting time suck! So, at Lambtown, I did do some stash enhancing...5 skeins of some lovely fingering weight wool, 4 oz of space dyed superwash Merino from the Royal Hare and 4 oz of some beautiful natural dyed merino/silk from the Sincere Sheep. I don't know what I will do with the rovings after I've spun them up....they were just so pretty!

I showed my artwork at the first annual Art Gala at Cartlidge & Brown winery yesterday. Fun event......I helped the winery with getting the word out to artists to show. For a first time event it went very well. We had about 30 to 35 artist showing. Was a beautiful day, there was music, food and wine, what more could you want? I also sold a couple of pieces, bonus!!!!! Great day all around.

I've been having a conversation with a friend that keeps cropping up with others. It is the whole argument about creating art in the first place. The argument is complicated. Are we artists or or salesmen? I belong to a few artist groups and it is interesting to me to watch the whole issue unfold. I consider myself an artist. My work is not created just to sell. I create my pieces for myself. My art is my therapy, it is my play time. It is something in me that needs to come out. When I go for long periods of time not doing my art, I get weird. I need the outlet to center myself. When I show my art I don't expect to always sell something. It is always a rush for me to hear how my work affects others, how they see it. And when I sell something, thats a big rush! That's a bonus. Granted, I am lucky in that I don't have to live off of the proceeds. I would really starve! I do have a real, full time job, that has nothing to do with art. With all that I do now with my art, showing and learning and creating.....that is paying my dues. I'm creating a following, I hope, a name for myself, so that if and when I retire, I will be able to supliment my income with my art. But I meet so many people that focus entirely on selling their work. So they get lost in the commercial aspect and in my mind are no longer "creating" ART. They are just spewing product. And then they complain that they are not selling anything. If you are at an art show it becomes evident very quickly the difference between art and product. Yes, it is always good to sell, but is that your initial reason for creating your art?????? I suspect this argument will never end.

That's enough for now, this is jumbled and disconnected, just like my thoughts right now......lets see how long it takes me to write my next entry!

Stitch 'n Pitch

Last night I went to my first Stitch 'n Pitch at PacBell/ATT/whatever Park in San Francisco. I heard about it last year a week too late so I was determined this year. As an extra bonus, Barry Bonds is within 3 homeruns to break the all time record, and yesterday was also his birthday. I figured he was playing at home, a special day....he had to make it memorable. No such luck. He was up at bat at least 6 times and only got one base hit. At least they pitched to him instead of intentionally walking him. Score was 4 to 0 until the 9th (!) inning when the Giants tied it up. Thats when the game got good. It was so much fun to be with a group of 15 like minded women! We talked and laughed and knitted the game away. We got goodie bags, too, filled with #19 wooden needles, #1 plastic needles (Pony?) a double ended, long crochet hook, a little "Giants Fan" needlework sampler, coupons, patterns etc. and a listing of all the yarn and needlework stores in the Bay Area. But what a long night......went on for 14 innings. Didn't get home until after 1am because we took the ferry over. Needless to say I am beat after a long days work. And the day is not over my friend.....I am off to the pub for a darts match. Wish me luck!

PS: This blogging "thing" is interesting. Now I find myself, all day long thinking "should I write about that? Is it even interesting? Does anybody care?!

Sticking my toe in the water....

Well.....I tried this once before as a group effort, under a different guise. Didn't last too long for various reasons. So now I'm flying solo. I've joined too many online groups, discussions, knit-alongs, etc. where blogging is de-riguer, so here I am people!

I will try to post as often as humanly possible given my life.....at the very least once a week. As we move along you will see why I said that! This will be mainly about my fiber and artistic pursuits, however don't be surprised if a rant or two shows up....where else am I going to vent?

So what am I up to these days????? Several projects on the needles...3 pairs of socks in various stages, a vest that is a "challenge" project, a scarf, a sweater that has been in limbo for several years now (more on that later). Was just looking through "Knitting Nature" for another "big" project to start, since I just finished my Poppy Sweater (see the Poppy Along on line). Am thinking about the Diamond Tunic. Store bought yarn.....hand spun....hmmmmm??? Oh, I also signed up for "Dish Rag Tag". That starts on August 1st, so a dishrag will be cast on soon. Today I am going to pick up a Baby Wolf loom that belongs to our fiber group, to store indefinitly.......of course that has me thinking about weaving again. And then there is the big Art Gala I am working on. Must create more pieces (gourd art) for that show.......sigh. Ah yes, then there is this blog.......