Knit-topia

Call it Heavy Metal Noise

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 07:56:00 +0000

I somehow found myself with a ticket to see The Scorpions and Sammy Hagar tonight. I grew up in a town where I could listen to rock/heavy metal or Country music on the radio, so I went the route of the former. My first concert was Motley Crue, and I've seen many concerts since. But I some how never ever saw the Scorps, even though they were one of my favorite bands in high school. So I went to the concert tonight to see them, fingers crossed they would play The Zoo and Holiday. THEY ROCKED!!! Yes they played The Zoo and other songs that any Scorps fan would know (no Holiday but that was reaching) and I sang at the top of my lungs. I don't care that they are maybe(?) 60, they ROCKED! And I got an awesome rocker chick shirt just to remember that I really did go see them. But the thing that took me by surprise was Sammy Hagar. When I was 16 I LOVED Sammy Hagar and my friends chipped in to by me his Three Lock Box ALBUM (which I still have by the way) and I played it all the time. Things happened along the way and Sammy's rocken' world changed and came under some really bad press. But I am here to say that Sammy has been much maligned by the press because that man is AWESOME! I've been to a few concerts in my time where the band I went to see was fine, but another act blew me away. I saw Depeche Mode at Red Rocks (yes, world renowned venue is also the local place to catch a band in Colorado) and was amazed by Book of Love, saw Tori Amos and discovered the Ditty Bops, and tonight I went to see the Scorpions and fell in love all over again with Sammy Hagar. He sang his own songs, Van Halen songs ( with Michael Anthony no less!!!) and even a Led Zeppelin song. Definitely left me higher than high, feelin' just right.

I went hiking

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 08 May 2008 02:08:00 +0000

I went hiking on Saturday, did I have fun? Or maybe I should say, I went hiking Saturday and all I got was this lousy scrape (not a Rockband injury Jeni!). I fell, probably you can see that. Its really not the first time I've done this, I had all the first aid items I needed to clean up and finish the hike, but it is annoying. I've spent the week wincing when I walk because my jeans touch it, people in the city probably don't even notice!

After I fell Linda and I went and had linner ( it was later in the afternoon, not lunch, not dinner) at a Mexican restaurant in Los Altos (Fiesta Vallarta, yum!) and I did some self medicating with margaritas. Nice! After the first one I didn't care that had dirt and blood and some odd mud made of those two things all over my leg.

For all this, the hike actually was good, we saw a couple of grass snakes , a zillion lizards and even some wild turkeys!

I also thought I should maybe have some knitting content, yeesh.

So I finished (in the last month and half or so) yet another Lace Leaf Baby sweater. My co-workers are reproducing like bunnies! I really do need to find a new baby sweater pattern, but this one is cute and at this point well memorized.

Another of my cowekers had asked me to make a sweater for her cat. Yes her CAT! He is a hairless one and she thought he would like it. Cats and sweaters are a bit like cats and water, not good friends. I did not see the event but apparently he walked backward for at least an hour trying to get out of it! She found it really amusing, she took a video with her cell phone but she was laughing so hard it didn't turn out well. If I can get a hold of it I will post it. I made it from some random acrylic I had and used the dog sweater pattern from Knitty. I ended up ribbing the whole thing, the pattern called for just the top. It was really fast, I think I spent two days on the train with it, but its kind of cute.

I am still working on the BBF scarf of Cindy's, nearly done! And I started the Knitwhits hat but that needs some tweaking.

Test socks

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:17:00 +0000

I've been test knitting a sock Pattern for the new Fiber Fiend sock, Shake your Fishtail. It was really fun to do, I liked knitting the first sock, although the guy who sits next to me at work did not understand. He said its a sock, how new can that be? Sigh, non-knitters, what do they know? The pattern was quite easy and its a really pretty sock! She will be selling it this weekend at Stitches West. Yay, can't wait! Her booth is 738, if anyone who is reading this doesn't know that yet.

Can't wait for Stitches, I have a list and everything!

Pudding

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 05:15:00 +0000

I love pudding. Its always been one of my favorite desserts, creamy, cool, chocolaty, well if it is chocolate pudding anyway. I found a new blog, Brownie Points, it was something a co-worker had sent me for the bacon vodka recipe, but I found some inspiration for cooking. I've been slacking a bit lately, some times I need a bit of a push to get back to cooking things I like. She has a post for chocolate pudding that is amazing! I don't think I've ever made pudding from scratch but its really easy! I make a lot of things from scratch, but never pudding. I added 70% Lindt Chocolate for the double chocolate part, mmmmmmmmmm!

I also made a cauliflower salad from Everyday food for dinner,
there were lovely ones in my veggie box this week. Just as tasty as they look, even in my blurry pic.

There is also a recipe for a no knead bread that I am in the process of making, I haven't made bread in years! It looks easy (well duh, you mix it and leave it for 12 hours, its not much work) and the posts on the blog say its really tasty. I can't wait! Jenny and I were talking about baking bread at Boba knit on Thursday, I thought I would probably make some this weekend after our conversation, and then I found this recipe.

I'll have some knitting tomorrow, I've finished my test sock!

Tagged twice!

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 06:10:00 +0000

Both Lisa AND Margit tagged me with this meme! I am not sure who to tag next though since I've seen it on a lot of other blogs, or the people I would tag are already tagged!

4 Jobs I've Held:
Concessions in an Ice skating rink (best high school job ever, I met all the hot high school hockey players in town!)
Art Gallery
Deli (loved it, more fun than you may think)
Tech support

4 Movies I've Watched Over and Over Again:
Pride and Prejudice
Persuasion
84 Charring Cross Road
Casablanca (I watch a lot of movies repeatedly, this is a teeeny list of them!)

4 Places I've Been:
Birkenhead, England (okay yes I've been to London too, but I bet less people will say this!)
Paris, France (in case you thought of the one in Texas first ;^) )
Stuttgart, Germany
Portland, Oregon

4 Places I've Lived:
San Antonio, Texas (this was brief but I wanted to have something not in Colorado)
Fort Collins, Colorado
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Mountain View, California

Part A: 4 TV Shows I Watch:
Netflix has ruined me, I pretty much just watch TV from there
Battlestar Galatica
Any PBS mini series.
The Wire
The X Files

Part B: 4 Radio Shows I Listen To:
NPR mostly, but not a lot of specific shows.

4 Things I Look Forward To:
Snow
Saturday morning
hiking
sitting on my couch

4 Favorite Foods:
Tacos
Soup
pretzels
lentils

4 Places I'd Rather Be:
Rocky Mountain National Park
Telluride
hiking a mountain
hanging with friends

4 People I email regularly:
Liz
Linda
my sister
knitters. ,mostly of the Boba persuasion.

P.S- My knitting and I have come to an agreement, we have not made up exactly, but we have an understanding. Yay!

Wrestling

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 05:30:00 +0000

I am currently wrestling with the Cedar Creek sock pattern from Blue Moon. Pattern is pretty easy, only 4 rows in the pattern repeat, but hooooo boy me and the yarn are not getting on well. I pondered some time out today on the train, someone is not behaving and its not me.

I'm a tight knitter, I know that. I don't know how I do it because I barely hold the yarn, I don't even wrap it around any fingers, but there you are. I always go up a needle size from what's recommended automatically, that's usually enough. Imagine my surprise when I had to pull out size ZERO needles for this.

ZERO!!! Not even in my vocabulary! I think 2 is the smallest I've used, well I think I used 1's for the ribbing on some mitts. Its the yarn, its medium weight Socks that Rock and the pattern calls for lightweight. I have gone down a size from what the pattern calls for and I'm still not sure.

The real problem here? I LOVE this colorway! I don't want to find something else for it, I want to knit it now. Its Nodding Violets, and its just gorgeous, my lovely photo doesn't come close to showing all subtle colors. And I really like the pattern too, pretty easy and I like how it pretty it is. Sigh. Juls just finished the same socks and I so admired them that I decided to make them as well.

I do have backup yarn for this pattern if I want, it is even the lightweight thats called for. Its also very pretty, but grrrr, I want to use the other one.

P.S. Thank you Cindy! I will try to take more boba pics for you so you can stay in the loop!

Mitts are done!

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 06:17:00 +0000

Yay! Finished the Endpaper Mitts on the train this morning, they are beautiful! I wore them at work today and they did keep my hands warm. here are two pics with Lisa, hers are nearly done too!

We didn't plan this but they look nice together!

We were told to pose like this to show off the colors better.

Endpaper mitts!!

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 04:55:00 +0000

Holy Cow! I was just on the train frantically knitting the ribbing on my last mitt (yes nearly done!) when a woman walked up to me and said "Are those the Endpaper mitts?" ! Wow! I don't think I've ever had someone say that before! I am excited! We chatted about the yarn I used and the pattern in general and then she left. Yay! That was fun. AND I am like minutes away from finishing them.

Knitting!

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 03:56:00 +0000

I know, I haven't posted anything knitted FOR EVER! So here are two things I've been working on.

I did actually finish the last baby sweater and in my hurry to get it to the parents I DID NOT TAKE A PICTURE!! I could cry. yeeesh. So it was this sweater:

In this beautiful green and cream colorway. I like the green a lot more than the pink, its so soft and creamy.

Its a good thing the baby was a girl (no known gender when I purchased the yarn!) because what I thought was a very gender neutral color was super girly! But I loved loved loved the Sock Pixie yarn, nice to work with and pretty colors. I would totally use this yarn again, for socks even!

This is my Endpaper Mitt from Eunny Jang, posed in front of Garden of the Gods and Pikes Peak. They are nearly done now, but I will have no way of taking a picture this pretty out here. So this the start of number one and probably later in the week a pic of them completed.

Comfort

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 06:13:00 +0000

Yes, I have not blogged in FOREVER and no, there is no knitting content in this post either.

I was just reading Posie Gets Cozy (Linda keeps me updated on corgi sightings over there. They are about the cutest things EVER. And a gaggle of corgis, well there is nothing like that. Watch "The Queen", at the end you'll see what I mean.) Anyway, she had a post there about food from childhood that's comforting. I read that as something different than comfort food, I think that can change, or is about the same for everyone (mashed potatoes?) . But the food your Mom made that was special just for you or for when you were sick. I read a lot of the 220+ comments and saw a lot of similar things ( tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, who doesn't love that) and a lot of things just special to the posters family. It of course made me think of the things that I ate as a child and loved at the time. So here is my list, much like people posting on that blog some things everyone ate and some things I really don't think so.

Toasted Cheese- toast with cheese melted on it, for breakfast. My sister can remember coming downstairs on a school day and smelling that and being happy. I still eat that for breakfast probably once every couple of weeks.

Fried Egg sandwich - NOT a healthy breakfast really, but sooo good. It is what it sounds like, a fried egg, toasted bread and mayo. I can taste it now, it was so good. Also a school day breakfast. Usually we had cereal so these were special and memorable days. (All I can say is that she came from a family who ate fried toast. Toast fried in bacon drippings, really good but damn that could really kill you. Fried eggs have at least some nutrition!)

On the weekends my Dad (while he was alive anyway) would make breakfast and my Mom would get to stay in bed and read the newspaper drinking coffee. I learned to cook (at least breakfast) from Dad on these days and he made all kinds of things. One of his favorites was fried spam and eggs, I know, I know, Spam, gross, but I really loved it when I was kid.

One of my Dad's favorite lunches/snacks that he would share with me was peanut butter and bologna sandwiches. Again, I know, how could I eat that, but it was good! The peanut butter brought out the sweetness of the bologna. deeelish! Try it, seriously, you'll be hooked.

I also remember my Mom would make a dinner on cold snowy nights that wasn't really dinner but so good. She would make a big bowl of popcorn (real popcorn, not microwave crap) and then slices of apples and slices of cheese. We would sit in front of the fire and watch a movie and it would be all snowy and blowy outside and we would be cozy and eating popcorn!

There are other odd things that I liked, hot dog sandwiches for one, that would be cold hot dogs with mayo on bread. I LOVED hot dogs that way, in a bun, not so much. I know I was weird.

Creamed beef on toast, I think that was a military thing, and not chipped beef, it was hamburger. I tried to make it a few years ago (because I can still taste it and its comfort) but I can't make it as good as Mom.

Bread pudding as only my Auntie Glad could make. Hers was simple, quick and the best I've ever had, no fancy restaurant has ever gotten close to hers.

Those are my childhood foods that were special or comforting then. Probably my ultimate comfort food is tacos, loved them as long as I can remember eating food, and will until I can't remember what I am eating. But thats not the same.

What did you find a comfort?

Here is a pic of me drinking my favorite beer over Christmas, notice my joy!

Being an adult

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 04:30:00 +0000

Here is one thing I love about being an adult and living in California (besides eating banana cream pie for dinner). I came home and in like thirty minutes whipped up this yummy dinner. Salmon and lentils with a mustard vinaigrette and rapini with pine nuts. AND a glass of fantastic Chaine Dor Chardonnay (Local!). And its just a regular Tuesday. Mmmmmmmmmmm!!

knitting pics soon!

Did I just blog?

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 00:37:00 +0000

Holy Crap its been forever. Stuff going on, internet DOWN and sucking so posting was tough. Its somewhat better now so yay! It is free wireless I guess I can't complain if its not working right.

Anyway, I've done some crafting! I completed TWO stockings for my sister, so now I am done with that. YAY! I worked on them all year thinking I'd be done easily by Christmas, I did three because that seems a good number. And what happened? My sister IM's me in November and said the family she picked has four kids. FOUR!!!! CRAP! I had to do some cram embroidery to get that last one done, I can tell you. Lucky I had the kit available so that was good. I think I mentioned before that my sisters work adopts a needy family at Christmas and gives them the gifts on their lists. Plus some extras, like the stockings stuffed. Its for a good cause, so I don't mind the last minute notice, its just a lot to get done in a short time. She claims 6 people (2 parents and 4 kids) are too many to coordinate for the people at work so she says a smaller family next year. Here are the last two that haven't been blogged yet.

This one goes nicely with the two others, kind of related or a series or something.

This one is not quite in the same color family,
but it does have Santa so I guess that works. And there is a two year old,
so I think it will work out okay.I have also FINALLY finished the last baby sweater I will ever make! YAY! okay maybe not EVER but for a long time, I am very very tired of baby sweaters. I am gonna start on the end paper mitts FOR ME!! I also started on a new embroidery project. also for me, woohoo! Did I have pics when I did the upload today? Of course not, so that will be the next blog.

Also, my lovely new shoes will get taken out on Friday for my works holiday party. Yay!

Love

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sat, 10 Nov 2007 10:05:00 +0000

At almost first sight.

I think I may be wearing these with everything, even jammies, for awhile. Yay!

Pirates

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 03:10:00 +0000

No, no its not talk like a pirate day again. My nephews want to be pirates for Halloween so I have been sewing this weekend and my apartment is a wreck!

This is not a great view but you get the idea that there is stuff all over the place! But I've made some progress that's good, but it means no knitting for a bit until this little project is done.

Besides sewing I did get out yesterday, went to Zao noodle bar and had yummy Vietnamese noodles and Thai iced tea. So good, I love that place and yet I forget some times that its there.

After lunch Tina, Linda and I went to look at glass pumpkins in Palo
Alto. I found one! See how cute it is? A bit pricey for a glass pumpkin but its ART and cute.

I was looking at my favorite on-line bookstore, Powell's, for ideas for my book group (feel free to give me suggestions!) and I noticed this:

Powells.com Top 50

Top selling books at Powells.com at 7 p.m. for Sunday, October 7

#1
Letters to a Young Teacher Signed 1st Edition
by Jonathan Kozol
Special

Publisher Comments
In these affectionate letters to Francesca, a first grade teacher at an inner-city school in Boston, Jonathan Kozol vividly describes his repeated visits to her classroom while, under Francesca's likably irreverent questioning, he also reveals his own... (read more)

New, Hardcover
Your price: $19.95
Add to Shopping Cart

#2
New Pathways for Sock Knitters: Book One
by Cat Bordhi and Michael Hopkins
Crafts

Publisher Comments
What's in the book? Eight new forms of sock architecture, each introduced with a baby sock, then adult designs in multiple sizes, and a Master Pattern inviting you to create your own designs with any yarn, at any gauge, for any size foot within (or... (read more)

New, Trade Paper
Your price: $28.95
Add to Shopping Cart

Holy cow! A knitting book is number 2 on their best seller list today! How great is that!

F.O.'s

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 06:11:00 +0000

Yes I am finally posting some knitting content! woohoo! So while on my trip i did finish some projects and started a new one!

Right before my trip I finished the Lace Leaves baby cardigan. Very cute and really loved the SockPixie yarn, I will totally use it again!

I finished my own Anemoi mittens, they are so cute and I love to make them! They were great to work on in the car, its such a long trip but with color work and Harry Potter the time flew by!

So with those projects done I started a shawl/wrap for me. This is Cozy from Knitty, its lacy and yet fun to do, not super hard.

Okay yes this is not an FO really but its like 50% done. Thats close!

When I got back from my trip I picked up my crochet again and actually FINISHED it! Whoohoo! Its in a box on the way to my sister now.

I enjoyed it so much that I just purchased the Amigurumi! Super Happy Crochet Cute book! Can't wait to see how these come out!

This blog was temporarily interrupted by my vacation!

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 05:08:00 +0000

And well Ravelry. Yup, I got my invite while I was on vacation! So a lot of my time has been sucked up by getting things going there. Pretty cool site so far! I will try to spend more time on my blog, clearly I have been neglecting it.

I went to Telluride, Colorado for my annual vacation and it was, as always, wonderful and beautiful. It was a smaller group than normal but it was a lot of fun. Linda went with me this year, she need a holiday and she had a lot of fun. You can see all the pics she took at her blog: www.yogaturtle.com/knitatnite .

These are some pics from my favorite hike here, Jud Weibe, shows how amazing this little town is! I do this hike every year and I can't wait to do it. I've been living in California too long now though as the altitude has more of an effect on me so I have to do this on the second day in town at least.

This is one of the hikes we did as well, to Tomboy mine, abandoned now but was huge in its day. This is one hell of a hike, but really only due to the altitude. The trail is just a jeep road, but since the mine is at around 11,500 feet the altitude makes the last half mile or so pretty difficult. And this day there was a pretty ugly storm going on around the mountains, though not exactly where we were. A lot of lightening, which is not a good thing when you are hiking, so we nearly turned around and went back. But we didn't and it ended up clearing while we were at the top. We were there for about 45 minutes and the storm started blowing back in so we left, and just in time, we got to the bottom of the trail when the clouds just opened up! I've only done that hike one other time, its not easy but ifs well worth it. We met lots of friendly jeep people, many who offered us rides down! Couldn't figure out why we would be walking! ha!

We spent a week of hiking, hanging out and eating great Mexican food and then the film festival started! This is the reason I started going to Telluride in the first place, but its evolved into my ideal vacation, hiking and movies with plenty of time to knit., I can't think of a better use of my time. I was very kind to Linda and did not make her see as many movies as usually do, plus, we couldn't get into one of them. This is a list of what we saw:

Thursday:

The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) Free Movie in the Park before the festival. They do this to make us start trying to guess who will be there since the schedule is not released before hand.

Friday:

I'm Not There (2007)

My Enemy's Enemy (2007)

Saturday:

Millions Like Us (1943)

Persepolis (2007)

Help! (1965) Free Movie in the Park!

Jellyfish (2007)

Sunday:

People on Sunday (1930)

Blind Mountain (2007)

Margot at the Wedding (2007)

Monday:

Bricklane (2007)

The Counterfeiters (2007) Three times the charm on this one, we were turned away twice before!

4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (2007)

My favorites in no order were I'm not there, Persepolis, Bricklane and The Counterfeiters. I enjoyed People on Sunday, Millions like Us, 4 Months, 3Weeks and 2 Days, and Blind Mountain for showing me cultures and places I haven't been to and never can for some of them. Blind Mountain left an impact due to the story and I find myself remembering it or drawing comparisons to it in my everyday life. But it was not a favorite, just impactful. Over all a great film fest, I saw some terrific films, as I do every year, but this one seemed a smidge better than some in the past.

This is a shot of fellow line dwellers.

Parting shot of Telluride.

So with all this hiking and movie watching how much knitting did I get done? Lots! Tomorrow I'll post all my finished projects. Yay!

Monkey Joy

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 04:40:00 +0000

Yep they are done! And I am happy! They turned out so well, so cute, I can now understand why people like making socks so much. They were a lot of fun, instant gratification since they are not very big. My first pair of adult socks! Yay!

Now I have time for a new project I started the Anemoi mittens but have a last minute baby sweater to make. I found some pretty superwash yarn from SockPixie.com, great color ways there! I am making the Lace Leaf Baby cardi that I made a few months ago, I really like making it. The color I am doing now is Raspberry cheesecake and I think the other color, Asparagus (pretty!) will be a baby sweater as well. I had such a hard time picking the right colors and I can't say they are exactly baby-ish., but they are really really nice. I could even make socks with this sock yarn!

I went for an awesome hike today on windy hill. It acted a lot like winter up there, it was really foggy at the top, so foggy it was like rain , we got soaked! I wish I had my camera with me, it was beautiful and amazing. The bottom of the hill was sunny and warm, it was like night and day. Lovely.

Stitch n Pitch

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 02:59:00 +0000

Last night was Stitch-n-Pitch at PacBell park. Through some random and other wise events it was not quite what I had expected, but I had a lot of fun. I maybe dragged my feet a bit on the whole ticket buying thing so Linda and I bought tickets in the same general area, but not actually part of the whole deal. No treat bags but we could still hang out with everyone.

Boy was I off! Due to a remarkable power outage Linda's site was very affected so she had to work late. Really late. So at 5:45 (hour and a half before the start!) I asked some people at work if they wanted to go, and happily it was not hard to find some last minute ticket takers. Its probably good that they weren't the actual S-n-P seats, I still don't think the guys understood the concept AT ALL. Knitting? At the baseball game? One thought maybe we did it a lot AND that it was our boba group knitting, not some nationally organized event.

These are my co-workers, they though I was odd knitting, look at the lap top!

It was fun, Barry did not hit a home run, so the race is still on for the home run record. I did wish that the mitten was I was knitting was done, it was pretty damn cold. And windy, so my pattern was tough to follow. .....

Ahh summer in San Francisco!

Too Many Crafts

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 05:10:00 +0000

So recently I have been having issues with my wrists. I know, its like a trend at Boba-Knit, everyone seems to be having some kind of problem. I think mine has something to do with the amount of embroidery I've done lately, those stocking kits get addictive! I have a new keyboard at work that really really helps and I've been told (by Linda) to not do any embroidery for a month. Sigh. I put it down for a week and they were fine so I did a bit of work and they hurt just as much as before I rested. So now I need to go a bit longer. I did read up on carpal tunnel but one thing they said was it usually hits the predominant wrist first and its not, my left one is hurting more than my right. Knitting is not hurting me however, so I'm nearly done with the Monkeys! Yay! My sister will love them so I am pleased. I have pics, of course!

These are pictures of the first sock but I have been diligent this week and I am actually this far on the second one! These being my first pair I am very excited about how quick I learned the pattern so the second one was lickity split! I think I like making socks and I can see why people enjoy them so much. But I need to find more people to give them to since I hate to wear them.

A close up of the embroidery that is killing my wrists. How cute is that! I have two done now and am sorta working on a third. But its in time out for a whole month.

Ramblings

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 17:39:00 +0000

I am having a quiet day, or at least morning. I ended up staying out till the wee hours of the morning at a house warming party. I didn't stay out drinking, just chatting with some fun people, but hooo I am not good at staying up that late anymore. The biggest problem is that no matter when I go to bed I wake up around 8:30 at the latest, it makes for a rough morning when there are only a couple of hours between those two events. So this morning I've been reading everyones blogs, getting caught up. I was reading Tina's blog this morning, which is rated PG by the way, so I thought I'd see how I rate, much like her there is a lot of swearing in my world, I susupect its due to the knitting. I was rated the same! Whew! I do know that Linda will not come out quite so lucky!

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

dead (4x)
crap (2x)

Hahahahaha! Dead is a bad word?

I also did a personality test, the benevolent part is pretty right on but the director part is only partially true. The confusing part of the whole thing is they say I am 28% masculine and 30% feminine. That's 58%, whats the other 42???? Alien? Dog?

Benevolent Director

I was reading Cindy's blog and now that whole mystery shawl thing is looking more and more appealing. I had read about it when she first posted but put it out of my mind. I think its too late now, but maybe next time!!

I have officially finished one sock and it is awesome! I love the colors in this sock and I think my sister will really like it.

The rest of the day is cleaning, Costco with Tina ( I know, its insane to go on a saturday) and then Ethiopian food! yummmmmmm

Kwik-E-Mart

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 05:28:00 +0000

What did I do tonight? I went to Linda's for a delicious dinner (mahi mahi, spinach, potatoes and cucumber radish slaw, yum!) and then Tina met us at my house for some chatting. Dave, Tinas SO, called and told us that the 7-11 RIGHT BY MY HOUSE was turned into a Kwik-E-Mart for the Simpsons movie! Awesome! I read about it this morning, so cool! So did Tina, so we all just ran down there to take pictures, drink Squishees and buy some KrustyO's!!! Fun pictures follow.

~~GRR!! between my connection and Blogger I can't get any images to upload! Maybe tomorrow.~~ Okay I got some of them to uplod, today my connection is fine though.

Knitters

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 17:22:00 +0000

We had a party last night to say good bye to one of our Boba knitters. Kristi is moving to Boulder next week, we will all miss her. But Boulder is a great town and I think she will love it there. Maybe I'm biased since I'm from Colorado and lived near there for 10 years, but I don't think so. We had a pot luck, everyone brought something and tried to make it relate to knitting some how.

Spinnity (Mary) was gracious enough to share her house with all of us, the night before she was leaving for a trip! How great is that?

Everyone was so creative in the food they brought, I have some pictures of it, but I didn't get a picture of Jeni's pizza. She made it in the shape of a vest, a fair isle vest! With olives, basil and sun dried tomatoes for the pattern. So cute! There was a back up vest as well, plain stockinette, but still yummy! Of course there are pictures. Abigail's knitting ball eggs and the cute alpaca bread rolls.

There was a sheep pinata, filled with Kristi's favorite candies and some squishy sheep. Hannah whacked the crap out of it in one swing, scaring small children and pissing off the slightly older ones who had hoped for another whack. She was supposed to distract and get the pinata going so she could run in and change.

Change to what? A sheep stripper of course! Cookie came up with the idea there should be a sheep stripper for this shin dig, so I made a costume and Hannah was forced to wear it. She stuffed the squishy sheep down the costume and ran around and then ripped it open so all the sheep flew out. I laughed too much to take many photos, but I do have the after shots.

We all had dinner and sat around and knitted and feted Kristi and Andy with gifts, including plane tickets so they can come back and see us.

We all had dinner and sat around and knitted and feted Kristi and Andy with gifts, including plane tickets so they can come back and see us.

A very fun party indeed, too bad it was for a going away.

Wine

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Sat, 23 Jun 2007 03:35:00 +0000

I know I have been slow posting so this will be a doosy! Two weekends of wine tasting in the Santa Cruz mountains for Vinters Festival! Did I drink a lot? OH YES! Did I buy some wine? mmm, I think so. Linda had the genius idea to rent a giant ass vehicle- 8 wine drinking knitters (okay only
6 knit) and wine! Brilliant!
We dubbed it the White Wino as we wandered through the mountains.

We started the first weekend at Woodside. Very pretty, nice port, I don't think I've ever bought the wine though. But its nice and a good place to start the day.

After that we headed to Chain Dor, a destination we had for this weekend. They have the best chardonnay, and are so generous, they open their house to total strangers and feed us all just so we can taste their wine! Truly an experience every year. Linda and I split a case there, you can't buy their wine in a store so we stock up. They also allow the tasters to sample the latest bottling of the Cabernet, they set out some of the newly bottled wine in their wine cellar and we all traipsed down there. Very young but sooo good! And look how happy Linda, Cindy and Margit are!

Then off to Cooper-Garrod and Savanah Chanell, very near each other so easy to hit in a short amount of time. Cooper-Garrod was out of their Viogne! Tragic really, I like that wine. But I got a bottle of Cab, they are good at that too. Savanah Chanelle also has nice wine and there is always something I like there. This time they had a special on the Rose, buy 6 bottles at $12 each. Not bad! Linda, Gary and I went in on that deal.

At this point things start to get a bit hazy. There had been lots of wine, plenty of singing in the car (there is a video of that out there. It's nice.) and now we decided to go to one of the spots hosting multiple wineries. Because clearly we need more. The cool thing the vintners fest does is allow smaller wineries with out tasting rooms the chance to pour by having restaurants and such host them. We picked the place with 6 wineries because, well, mostly because they had champagne. And oddly enough, a yarn store across the street. Imagine that! So once we drank some wine (it was the end of the day so not all the wine was available) we went shopping. And low and behold they were serving wine! And we had wine glasses! All very handy AND we bought yarn to boot. We did stop at this point and go out to dinner since we also really needed some food.

Total for the day= 11 bottles (not a case! woohoo!)

Day two:

The next weekend started a lot the same, though we ended up with a different car and it was a bit more cramped. The fun thing was that my friend Liz was out visiting from Denver so I made her go. Yay! It was very fun again, most of the same people went, again, more singing and having a great time on our way to the wineries on the back side of the mountains.

First stop, Bonny Doone. They have fun wine, lots of different ones to select, there is always something that catches my eye. They had an amazing deal on their Bouteille Call wine, a bit like port, so we all bought a case. EACH! They wanted to get rid of it so it was $16 for one bottle or $25 for a case. Who could pass that up? No one as it turns out. But the trouble was that we did not have the white wino this week, so it was tough to get it all in the car. And that was the first stop! Jean and I split a case here (I just remembered that!)

Then the highlight of this weekend, Mchenry. The first weekend was Chan Dor, this one was McHenry. Small vineyard, tiny barn tasting room, amazing Pinot. All they do is Pinot so our tasting was different vintages, such fun to see how it progressed and what was going on that year. And the person pouring? Henry McHenry! If you look off to the left of Lind you can see him there by the barrels of wine. We did not get out of there cheaply, but we all got some great wine. Linda and I split a case here and Jean bought one for me as a trade off for half the bouteille call. If you recall an earlier post I just loved this wine so this is good to have around. At this point we have been to two wineries and the car is stuffed!

Next stop was David Bruce, they have good Pinot and my favorite petite syrah. I showed restrain and didn't get anything , I think we were getting wined out a bit at this point. This is a pic of Linda and Liz squished in the back back seat, they look happy for some reason.

Final stop was Byington, they had some tasting outside this year and then some inside. They have a great rose wine but the one I have is the very last one we tried. And only Linda, Jean and I had it as everyone was done. They had a library tasting of their pinot, holy cow was it good.

Fun day for everyone, lots of wines tasted and purchased. And then off to dinner again, have to have something absorb all that wine!

Total for this day = 13 (I think.) So I ended up with two cases of wine for the two weekends. Pretty good, that should last me for a good chunk of the year!

Back now

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 03:03:00 +0000

Yup, I am blogging, I am sure the handful of people who read this are shocked and amazed! Work has been a bit crazy and since I sit in front of a computer for 8 hours (or more) I get home and the last thing I want to do is use my computer. Or even read blogs. I find myself catching up on all the great things everyone is doing on Saturdays, then I'm tired of sitting in front of the computer! Vicious cycle I know. I have lots of crafty things I've finished so I'll blog those soon, I don't have a busy week this week so it shouldn't be a problem. Plus knitting retreat AND wine!

I am reading a great book right now, The Element of Lavishness: Letters of Sylvia Townsend Warner and William Maxwell 1938-1978 It's much as you would think from the title, letters written by these two over a very long time period. It's lovely really, its starts off slowly but then as they become friends they talk about all kinds of things. And as they both are writers its rich and descriptive language. Delicious! I feel a bit sorry for generations to come, there will be no other books about people corresponding, who writes actual letters any longer? And emails? I don't usually save them myself unless there is something I need for some reason. Really sad if you think about it. One of my favorite movies is "84 Charing Cross Road", a book as well,and just like this one its total strangers writing each other over years and years. Remarkable. I was reading on the train the other day and found a passage that made me think, and for me it points out something missing in our society today.

He was telling her about not liking the president, who had just been elected, so he was angry and disappointed about pretty much everything. "On the way to the station I had to make the car swerve so as not to run over a dead cat lying on the pavement, and thought I ought to go back and then thought of the train, and then, after a mile, turned the car around and did go back. The road to the station is littered with animals-now and then a fox, often a skunk or a woodchuck or a chicken or a squirrel- but seldom with cats. It was still there when I stopped, and I had to wait while four more cars passed over it, before I could move it to the side of the road where the person who was probably at that moment calling it would perhaps find it. Left in the road it would soon become two dimensional and unrecognizable. It was disemboweled, and soft and I think not very long dead. And it felt, in my hands, much calmer and at peace than I did."

When was the last time you saw anyone do (or even did yourself) something like that for a person that you don't even know? He moved an already very dead cat to the side of the road to help give the owner the answer to what happened to their pet. A person he didn't even know. And he was very cranky starting his day, and late for his train. And yet he went back to move the cat. What has happened in the last 50 years that has made us less compassionate for others? I see it every single day, everyone thinks that their needs far out weigh everyone else's; talking on cell phones anywhere, road rage. Sigh.

Not that I want to start picking up dead cats, not something I would love, but still, makes me think, or re-think how I move in the world.

Speaking of lovely things (I said the book was, right?) Look!!

Holy crap! The Clap is done! Its much prettier than I thought, all my angst over the blotchiness and all, its nice! I'm not sure I'd use that yarn again though, it is so blobbly, especially the purple, you can even see it in this picture. But the dropped stitches make it less noticeable. And others have used this yarn successfully for the clapotis, so maybe if I used it again it would work better. maybe.

You may also notice I have a new comforter on my bed, better for pics I think. ha! I needed a non-green one I decided, all my others are green. I thought ivory would be very summery AND as I have no black cats any longer, its suddenly a luxury to be able to have something that color. Pretty!

I swear I will post more pics this week! Promise!

Veg

noreply@blogger.com (JillyB) — Thu, 10 May 2007 03:53:00 +0000

Every other Wednesday I get a box of veggies delivered to my house from Farm Fresh to you. I know that this does not sound all that exciting, but it really kind of is. I have no idea what will be in it other than two kinds of fruit and usually 4 types of veg. That's it! I have no idea, I can only guess in general based on what should be ripe now but even that is not always a good measure. So its a bit like Christmas for me and I look forward to Wednesdays. Or at least some of them. This is what I got today. First is my box.. ooooo whats in it? Like my faux grass? A swatch of my Mom's carpet that my brother in law sent me. His sense of humor is something else. But its kind of fun having that hideous carpet, why do the ugly things last forever? That carpet is over 30 years old and yet look, fresh as a daisy!

Just glancing in maybe strawberries in the bag but hard to tell and maybe lettuce and then some stuff I've never seen before. That is one cool thing, there is often some veg that I haven't had or one I don't eat often, its great! I really like most veggies ( read later on for more on that) but I do tend to eat some more than others. I've really enjoyed the chard that has been in a couple of boxes and I never buy that! Every now and then there is something I don't like, there are three big ones - mushrooms, peas and bell peppers. I know, the things everyone else on the planet eats, I hate. Give me a plate of beets and Brussels sprouts I will be happy as a clam, but mushrooms? ewww.

Sort of clockwise from top are Strawberries, Rapini (the unknown), Cilantro, lettuce, Snap Peas and in the middle three mango's. Well, there are only two now, I ate one. And it was outstanding! Their fruit is amazing, I am always delighted with it, though in March I was getting tired of apples, but its winter then and the citrus had a hard year so what else really was there? The strawberries are really good too, I tested them out just to be on the safe side.

Remember what I said were my three least favorite veggies? Yup, there are peas in this picture! Linda and Tina are both out of town (I usually foist my mushrooms on one of them) so if anyone wants the snap peas they can have them. Clearly that pretty much means knitting group people. Or I could bring them for the retreat, maybe someone will eat them there.

Okay, I read the recipes and Rapini is also know as Broccoli Rabe, that I have heard of. What kind of veggie has an alias? That seems not right, but I will eat it none the less. Or maybe especially.

I hope mango is good for horrendous coughs, I am sounding like someones grandpa these days. The guy who sits next to me at work keeps saying bless you every time I cough in hopes that I STOP. I interviewed someone today and he said his friends all had a bad chest cough too, I guess its making the rounds. At least it will stop soon I hope. Seriously, I sound like an old man getting up in the morning. Not pretty! Who ever is sharing room at the retreat should be excited by that notion! ha!