The Typha scarf is supposed to be about 2-times this size. I actually saw the modeled sample that was sent to Knitscene at Christa’s (the designer) house when I stayed with her in Vancouver in 2010. She was blocking it on the living room floor. Loved the pattern and vowed to make it.  The one I made for my sister is a mini version. I really wanted to use this unique yarn (Creatively Dyed Yarns Woodbrook in “Flash”). It was only 250 yards though, so there was no more yarn for the pretty crochet border in the original pattern. Probably for the best considering that my crochet skills are sub-par.

I have had a lot of starts and stops in knitting lately. Start something new, and then rip it out. I just couldn’t find something that was simple enough to do while unwinding and enjoying my down time. My creative stores are going to my writing, cooking, and gardening. So, knitting garter and stockinette is just the kind of thing I crave right now. I cast on for a lace shawl this past weekend, and didn’t even make it 2 rows… luckily, I love the look of simplicity.

Kris and I went down to Virginia this weekend to visit my sisters – Mimi moved here at the beginning of the year from California, and I take every opportunity I can to get down to see her and the nieces.  Baby V is now Toddler V at 2.5, and Baby Lulu turns 5 months tomorrow:

Sarah and I are probably the craziest aunties ever. All we want to do is play and kiss these cuties! (We need these t-shirts, eh?)

…and of course, I want to clothe them in knits too…

Since Lulu is 2 years younger than V (and born in the same season), I am concentrating on knits for V now – that means that they will get double the wear. This little stripey pattern is a simple tunic tank for the summer.  I am using Debbie Bliss EcoBaby Fairtrade Cotton that I found at a new yarn shop in my area.

As noted earlier, this mild winter was not as full of knits as previous years, but I did manage to keep up my tradition of Kris’s anniversary sweater. I finished it 4 days after said anniversary (and if you recall – this was a big one – Kris and I celebrated 10 years in January.)

RAVELRY NOTEBOOK PAGE

You will recall that the pattern was completely in Japanese – a language I cannot read, unfortunately – although there were charts and schematics. I used my knitty senses to the nth degree on this one! When I finished it and sewed it all up, I was disappointed to see that I had a tunic… for an orangutan. Long sleeves – past the fingers, and a hemline that went way past the waist. I was upset, butI re-grouped quickly, sought some advice on Twitter, and decided to do a hot water bath and an air dry. What a difference – It fit him perfectly!

I used Patons Wool in Burgundy – a good “work horse” yarn. I like the way the color turned out, and so does Kris. In fact, he said this may be his favorite sweater yet. High praise. Too bad he didn’t get to wear it much – but here’s hoping we get some cold temps and big snowstorms NEXT winter!

A cowl was just the right amount of layer for this weather -I finished my Madelinetosh Brick Road Cowl in late December:

RAVELRY NOTEBOOK PAGE

I wore this many times. I love the colors and the reversible sides. The Tosh Merino Light was a dream to work with… no surprises there. I look forward to adding some more to my stash… the yarn shop near my mom’s house in PA had a nice stock… will have to check it out again on my next trip.

Hats and baby knits were also on the needles this winter…

Spring knits are in my mind now, and I am drawn to all of the light shawl patterns. Maryland gets pretty steamy, so realistically, shawls will have to wait for next fall, but there are so many that I have my eye on – and a lot of yarn in the stash to make them many times over…

Since this blog has been dormant for the entirety of the winter season (as mild as it was), I guess I can say that it was hibernating… and now that the VERNAL EQUINOX is here, she wakes up!

*blink blink*

In short, the last few months have been great. 2011 threw me for a loop with unexpected changes and a long adjustment period; I welcomed 2012 with open arms and a renewed sense of purpose… and things are working out quite well!

What have I been up to all this time? I like infographics, so I’ll use one to show you:

If you follow me on Goodreads or Twitter, then none of these things will come as a surprise – I have been reading and writing like a fiend. Unfortunately, the writing did not translate to blog writing (yeah, I know, doesn’t make sense – but no time like the present, right?) More on that later…

I have been traveling and road tripping.  Eastside coasting right up and down Interstate 95 and beyond: many trips to Pennsylvania – both the far west to Pittsburgh for a anniversary / hockey-filled weekend and Philly in the east to visit my parents and most recently, the Philadelphia Flower Show (also stopped by several PA spots in between: Gettysburg and Hershey), many times to northern Virginia to see my sister and my nieces who moved in  January, and a long weekend fun trip to North Carolina over the President’s Day holiday). Next month, we’re off to Wisconsin, and then I’m planning a super big + super fun road trip for May…

Gardening and hiking are picking up with the unseasonably warm weather, and I plan to share more of what we’re up to there too. …and my cooking? well, I am enjoying it now more than ever before – I love every bit of the process, and now with the beginning of the season, I look forward to many months of fresh produce and creativity in the kitchen. I will share some of what I have cooking with photos and recipes.

The biggest project – the one that has picked me up and helped me wake up with a smile on my face – is actually a return to something that I have always loved. I am writing a novel. I started preliminary work in January, and really dug into research in February. The process is teaching me a lot about personal discipline and commitment – it is hard work! I joined a local writer’s group, and last week I shared an excerpt in front of the whole group. I was nervous, but it turned out really great. This whole process of writing and researching is the kind of stuff that really makes me tick (always a librarian, I guess!) and while I have loads of work to do, I am so excited about this project. (Teaser: it is a historical piece inspired by real events in the early 1900s).

…and the knitting will just have to wait for the next post… while the writing and research have been my #1 in the attention department, I have managed to knit several things too! Stay tuned.

Oh, and by the way – Thanks for reading my blog! 

(and if you would like to leave a comment, it is easy: click on the title above “Coming Out of Hiberation” in this case, and the comment form will be at the bottom of the post) This new blog format has prompted several questions about commenting.

Books and reading are my favorite conversation topics. With yarn and knitting as a very close second. Perhaps because reading has been a passion of mine since childhood, while knitting just came on scene in the past decade… I get a lot of requests for book recommendations, and this is one of my favorite things to do. I usually point people to my Good Reads account because I write pretty detailed reviews there and use their star-rating system (though I wish had .5 stars! or even .25 or .75 stars!).

In these days before 2012, I look back at all the books I’ve read this year (and the one that remains on my nightstand – still time to finish before the new year!)

Notes:  ** Best of 2011 – my recommended favorites for the year.  All links point to my GoodReads reviews.  You can see all the book covers here.

Non-Fiction

The Wordy Shipmates
Kingdom Coming
The Murder of the Century
Fire
The Rights of the Reader **
In the Garden of Beasts
Unfamiliar Fishes
World Without Fish
The Ragged Edge of the World **
Man Ray in Paris
Earth Then and Now
Spilling Ink
Hope for Animals and Their World
The Tree
Lost City of Z
Architecture of Happiness
Emperor of All Maladies **
Medium Raw

Fiction

The Submission **
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
When She Woke
The Lake
Ready Player One **
Robopocalypse
When God Was a Rabbit
I am the Messenger
Centuries of June
Vampire of Ropraz
A Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
The Lover’s Dictionary
Dead Reckoning
Across the Universe
One Day
Matched

Graphic Novels / Sequential Art (Fiction and NF)

Nat Turner
Empire State: A Love Story (or Not)
Dawn Land
The Influencing Machine **
Petrograd **
Anya’s Ghost
The Homeland Directive
American Vampire
People’s History of the American Empire
Embroideries
Aya
AD: New Orleans after the Deluge **
Life with Mr. Dangerous
Postcards: True Stories that Never Happened
Dark Entries
To Timbuktu
A Study in Scarlet
Hound of the Baskervilles
Waltz with Bashir
Stitches
American Born Chinese
Night Fisher

Cookbooks

The Hundred Best Vegan Baking Recipes
The Vegan Slow Cooker
Vegan Soul Kitchen

Miscellany (How-tos, Reference)

Scaling Down: Living Large in a Small Space
Nonfiction Readers’ Advisory
The Compassionate Diet
100 Countries 5000 Ideas
Crazy Sexy Diet

First some background: You may recall that my last two trips to New York City have included stops at Kinokuniya Book Store, the well-stocked Japanese language book store in Manhattan. I don’t know a lick of Japanese, but I do know that their crafting books are phenomenal, and I figured that one day I would have the knitting confidence to take on. the challenge of “winging it” through one of the patterns. Japanese knitting pattern writing is different than American or European styles, but even without a word of English, it is possible to decipher the charts and the schematics and construct the garment.  This is what I am trying to do…

The Japanese gansey pattern from the Let’s Knit Series – Men’s Knits. I talked myself in to the challenge when I saw that it is essentially a box construction: drop shoulders, no shaping in the body.  The stitch pattern is fully charted… simple enough, right?  Luckily, I have a good friend who knows some Japanese and is also a knitter.  She sent over some tips for knitting, and I was able to get a rough idea about gauge and sizing based on swatches.

Kris choose this deep red wool in the stash and I cast on for the sleeve. I decided to start with the sleeve to measure the gauge and make my calculations from there. I am past the elbow now and have started the gansey chart for the sleeve.  I am trying the length and width on Kris’s arm and so far it seems to be working well.  Maybe “cutting my teeth” on this pattern will allow me the confidence to try some of the other beautiful patterns in the books?

For this particular project – geared to photographers and travelers – there is a weekly theme. A few weeks ago, I contributed some photos of DOORS for that week’s theme.  Today’s theme is SKYLINE.  The theme is usually pretty open to interpretation, so you can go the traditional route of cityscapes and twinkly lights or something more natural.  That’s what makes it fun! Here are some of my contributions this week from various travels over the years:

Chicago 2007

San Diego 2009

Juneau, Alaska 2010

Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite 2011

Hashtags are powerful little tools.  They can be quite useful metadata tools, but can be easily manipulated – like so many things on the web – by commercial interests and spambots.  If you do participate in social media circles, however, hashtags are a great way to meet new people with similar interests.  Using #FriFotos are an example again: I share a photograph from this year’s trip to Yosemite National Park.  When I tag it, everyone can see that.  PersonX just got back from Yosemite and has a photo to share that is very similar.  Shared interest and common bond.  Added bonus when I see that PersonX is also into the same kind of music as I am.  New acquaintance and new thread in the web of life – all because of a hashtag.  From there, it can just keep on going.

Another hashtag that I particularly enjoy and participate in each week is the #FridayReads group on Twitter.  While they have been mired in a bit of controversy lately, the fact remains that it is a community of readers who like to talk about books.  Each week, I report which book I am reading and attach the #FridayReads hashtag.  The moderator (@TheBookMaven) calculates how many people participate just for fun, and when you click on the hashtag, you can see what everyone else is reading.  Maybe that book that you have been meaning to pick up? something long forgotten? or an author that you like that has a new piece out?

While the concept sounds so elementary, social media really just comes back to community building and engagement. How do you meet new people? how do you interact? The hashtag for #Socktoberfest on Twitter was really fun this year with several updates and interactions.

As the tweet above suggests, I have been reading up a storm lately… I’m planning a little Reading Year in Review post soon. Stay tuned!

Terra Cardigan :: reverse stockinette with pockets

Pattern: Rebecca 34 magazine – #13 pattern
Yarn: The Fibre Company Terra in “Nettle” colorway
Needles: Size US 8

As I stated on my Ravlery notebook, all Rebecca patterns need some “hand holding” and this one was no different. The problem with this one was the armholes and the sleeve length. The armholes were very deep in the pattern as written, and I ended up doing some extra seaming to fix this in the end. Also, the sleeves were pretty long to begin with, and got even longer after blocking.  This was my 5th Rebecca pattern, so I always go in knowing that I have to rely on common sense and “knitter’s intuition”.

Since I finished this one the week before Thanksgiving, I have worn it nearly everyday.  It is perfect to pull on as I head to the mail box or out on a dog walk.  I have worked with Terra before (I wrote up that pattern for the Sherbrooke Cowl using it back in 2008) and it is a very nice yarn.  It did stretch a lot in blocking, which worked out because I wanted a longer cardigan.  However, if you are going for a more form-fitting garment, it is worth noting that when you use this yarn.

I met up with my friend Isel and we had the best time talking to the farmers and vendors, feeling the yarns, and planning some knits. All the farms represented were Maryland farms, so it was a great way to support these local businesses. We both had a good laugh over the two alpacas with pop culture names: Bad Romance and Hot Toddy. Their owner was telling us that they are just over a year old.  They were communicating with each other with these little hums and grunts.

There are two types of alpacas: the Suri with their silky locks and the Huacaya with the fluffy pillowy hair.  Both are native to the Andrean regions of South America. They are a domesticated camelid, but smaller than the llamas and camels you see – some only about 3-4 feet tall.  Their wild ancestors, the vicunas, still roam in the Andes.  The alpaca was domesticated long ago, with their fiber prized for its silkiness, and hypoallergenic qualities.

Isel dabbles in spinning, so she brought home some roving and some lovely green yarn.  I happened upon some burnt orange yarn that was hard to pass up.  It’ll be perfect for a cardigan…

Making plans for winter sweaters is the highlight of my knitting year. With a million pattern choices (and a growing number of great ones everyday) it takes times to find the ones that you really want.  You match them up with yarns in the stash, or take a trip down to the LYS.  While I reserve the right to add or subtract, I am fairly certain that both of these sweaters are going to be on the needles in the coming weeks.  The Super Soul Cardigan by Mary Jane Mucklestone has been in my queue for a good while – I loved the geometric stranding and the pockets on this cozy cardigan.  Once I cast on, I will be using Berroco Vintage DK in navy for the main color, straw for the contrast, and I may pop it up with one more color – a wine red.  Mmm. Can’t wait. I’ve been dreaming of more colorwork (it never really stops…) and this will fit the bill nicely.

Kris’s anniversary sweater (this will be the 8th year and 8th sweater!) is always a cause for excitement. This Brownstone is my first BrooklynTweed pattern. I have some yummy grey Bartlett Yarn 2-ply in the stash that would work nicely… but I will admit that the Shelter that the pattern calls for is calling me too. Maybe I will just do two? I plan on some light modifications. I see this as a nice sweater to add to the growing repertoire! (See Kris’s other anniversary sweater here on Ravelry).

Winter is coming! (yes, a Game of Thrones reference, and stating the obvious seasonal shift), but I couldn’t be more happy – I do love this season most of all.

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book is a gem. Something that any reader will hold close to their heart. The essays are translated from the original French work by the educator Daniel Pennac. The book is full of amazing quotes. Some of my favorites:

“Time to read is always time stolen. Stolen from what? From the tyranny of living.”

“By making time to read, like making time to love, we expand our time for living.”

I particularly loved Part 3 – “The Gift of Reading” – where he describes a classroom of high school students – the stereotypes of “the loner”, “the prep”, “the goth”, etc. and how when the teacher [him] decides to read aloud to them for the entire class. It is his experiment to get them hooked. He chooses Süskind’s Perfume with its lively descriptions, and the teens, all of them, instantly become hooked.

The last few essays are also great, where he discusses the “Rights of the Reader” (the book is named after this series of essays). He outlines 10 Rights that each reader inherently possesses. He goes on to write short essays about all of them:

1 – The right not to read.

2 – The right to skip.

3 – The right not to finish a book.

4 – The right to read it again.

5 – The right to read anything.

6 – The right to mistake a book for real life.

7 – The right to read anywhere.

8 – The right to dip in.

9 – The right to read aloud.

10 – The right to be quiet.

A perfect book for a literature class – or a continuing education course. I highly recommend it.

View more of my reviews on GoodReads

++

There is a sense of liberty and empowerment when a teacher writes a list like this.  As an avid reader, I have exercised my *right* to each of these 10 things, and I imagine that you have too.

The right NOT to read?  Well, I guess that could be the few books that I sat out on for my old book club.  Things that just didn’t float my boat, so I opted out. The right to skip? I exercise this one ALL the time.  Of course, once a text comes to me in book form, I have to believe that dozens of eyes have read the same thing I am reading – so why does it often feel like everyone forgot their red editorial marker?  So yeah, I totally skip.  The right to NOT finish a book? I usually give books a 50 page limit.  If it has come highly recommended by a trusted friend, maybe 100 pages… I just abandoned a book the other day.  Got through Part I with relative ease, and then what? Part II was a mess.  Close cover. No more. I have plenty of other things to keep my engaged.  The right to read it again?  I will admit that I don’t exercise this one that much.  I rarely read a book twice (children’s books read aloud to my nieces don’t count!) but I understand why people do it.  I have often contemplated reading a beloved series again (most recently Harry Potter and The Hunger Games), but I haven’t done it yet.

The right to read anything?  I have a long history of reading cereal boxes and shampoo bottles and ingredient lists and technical instructions just because … just this morning I read the how-to instructions on my new can opener.  The right to mistake a book for real life?  I often think that if a fictional character was REAL, we would be great friends.  Or I get that feeling that an author might be speaking to me directly, so I think that counts!  The right to read anywhere?  ha – yeah, I told you I read shampoo bottles, so you can figure out WHERE I was while doing that.  The right to dip in?  Tied to the right to skip… dip in and read one essay, and yep, that’s all the fix I need.  The right to read aloud?  When something has to be shared, you have to read it aloud. I sometimes whisper the words to myself though, as I am reading along. Or reading aloud for emphasis and memorization.  The right to be quiet?  Sometimes you read something so moving that you simply have nothing to say.  That’s okay too.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on these – please share your experiences!