Stitch In My Side

Leyla

Today I spent a lovely day in Washington DC, at the baby shower that Sarah hosted for Leyla at the Sulgrave Club. She was a consummate hostess, planning everything beautifully and making all of us feel welcome. We were even treated with little pink tea cakes that she had brought all the way from Denver for the occasion. It was fantastic to meet some of the women in Leyla's life, some totally new ones and some whose names I was finally able to put faces to. We lived up to the occasion, and showered her with gifts, all teeny tiny and so sweet to behold. I tried to get over my shyness and take pictures of people, but for the most part my favorites are still the inanimate objects. The whole series can be found here.

For the baby, I knit a couple of alpaca sweaters. They are both Debbie Bliss patterns, but very different styles.

The first is the Beaded Fair Isle sweater from "The Baby Knits Book". I knit this on size 2 and 3 needles with Blue Sky 100% Alpaca.

The pattern as it is written frankly sucks. It is done in several pieces, full of unnecessary seaming, and requires picking up stitches in order to do the fair isle yoke. The pictures in the book are easy to overlook, but upon closer inspection you can see the sleeve and yoke seams, which seems like a shame. I worked the pattern to the underarm seam the way it was written, then knit the arms and calculated how I could finish the sweater as a single piece. My chicken scratch notes are not very useful as they are, but I am planning on rewriting them for future reference. When I do, I'll post them.

The whole sweater:

Front yoke and button detail:

Back yoke detail:

Inner fair isle detail:

The second sweater is the Chevron Jacket from "Number Five". I knit this on number 5 needles with Blue Sky 100% Alpaca. This time I followed the pattern as it was written. My only complaint about this pattern is that the finishing is horrendous! There were about a hundred ends to weave in, which seemd like an awful lot for such a tiny little garment. It was well worth it, though. I LOVE this jacket, love it so much that I would quite happily make one for myself if I wasn't so lazy about having to do the finish work on a big-human sized garment.

The full view:

The artsy detail views:

Autumn goodness

Autumn has finally arrived, bring with it lovely cool weather and gorgeous crisp days. Now that it is actually cool enough to do anything besides lounge in front of a fan we have been trying to take advantage of the season and have gone hiking on various trails around Baltimore. This past weekend Justin and I hiked at Oregon Ridge, which was a treat. We were completely alone the entire time, with only the sound of our conversation and the leaves being kicked around by our footsteps to keep us company. The light was beautiful, and we were able to see the quarry that transforms into a busy swimming lake during the summer months in a peaceful moment, which I imagine is a rare site indeed.

A couple of weeks ago we went hiking in the county with Marc and Lynn, packing a picnic lunch that included a bottle of Muscat that we had brought home from France. We found a spot of beach along the Loch Raven reservoir for our lunch, and proceeded to scare away all of the fish in our immediate area by skipping any acceptable rocks and playing water fetch with the dogs. There are some photos of our expedition here.

Finally, on Monday night we ate homemade comte, aged cheddar and parmesan mac and cheese topped with garlic rosemary panko crumbs- a perfect way to bring in the season. Ah, comfort food.

La France, as seen through the Nikon

Our trip to France was fantastic. We started in Paris, where we had a couple of days to ourselves and exciting things happened.

From Paris we went to Bretagne, where we met up with my dad at Fouche's wonderful home, Villa Mount Holyoke. We ate crepes, drank cidre bouche and visited menhirs and a dolmen in Saint Pierre Quibron.

After a few days we headed down to Beziers with my dad and spent a few days lazing around before Thilde and Steve (Justin's parents) arrived from Colorado. Once they arrived, we ventured a bit farther out, seeing the Canal du Midi, Bouzigues, Carcassonne, Valras, Roquebrun and eating FAR too much fabulous french food. We had never managed to get my dad and Justin's parents together before, so that was a real treat.

Finally, Steve, Thilde, Justin and I headed up to Paris together for a couple of days before going back to our respective homes. Thilde and Steve stayed in their favorite hotel, and Justin and I stayed with my cousin and to our delight the two places were only three blocks from each other.

Trust me, the pictures are far more interesting than this little overview. They can all be seen here. Enjoy!

Home sweet home

Well, I'm back in Baltimore and don't have a lot to report. When I started this blog I was really only thinking about running, then it sort of took on a life of it's own, and now it's just a bit... droopy... like a houseplant that hasn't been watered for the last month or so.

More dessicated than droopy, truth be told.

Part of that is because while there is a lot happening, it's hard to write about it: career, family, finances and the like are all taboo and while there is enough in my head that I don't sleep much these days I don't really feel like this is the forum for any of it. So onto safer topics:

I spent a couple of weeks in Australia visiting my family and it was a really wonderful trip, much more so than I was expecting. It's not that I didn't want to go, it's just that the timing sucked and having to face the reality of a terminal illness in someone whom I love is not something that I relished. I feel like I have these moments of insight and strength and truth sometimes in my quiet moments, but I find that they rarely translate into what I share and do in the moments that count. I'm just kind of a wimp when it comes down to it. Anyway. The highlight was getting to really catch up with everyone, and feeling like I reconnected with my cousins and their families. It's hard to be away from the kids in particular, as the time between visits seems even more vast when they are growing up.

On the way home I had a day with my nephew, his wife and their new baby in Los Angeles. It was fun to see where they lived and to putter around in southern California, although a single day there was enough to exacerbate any body issues that I have. People are s-k-i-n-n-y there, and it's hard not to feel every ounce when sourrounded by wraiths. In my mini PrivacyWatch update, I think I saw David Duchovney walking down the street with a really shitty look on his face, but it's been a long time since I've seen his face, so I could just have imagined that.

From LA I headed up to the northwest for Justin's family reunioun, where I met all of the extended family. It was a lovely time, although in that state of jet-lag I was far from being the life of the party. My pictures of the trip are here, but unless you were at the reunion they won't be fascinating. However, if you want to see gorgeous photos just click here to see some things that Justin's cousin has shot. He is a fabulous photographer and a lovely guy. I want him to take pictures wherever I go, so that everything (and everyone) will look that good.

Knitting updates to come soon, I have not worked on Bonnie since leaving, but have finished the cable sweater for Sophia and hope to get back to Bonnie in the next few days.

Photos

A couple of weekends ago Justin and I took our new neighbors, Marc and Lynn to Second Chance, a salvage store in Baltimore. I love this place, and can easily spend hours in there sifting through glass doorknobs or finding an old dentist's chair. It is really incredible, and such a treat to find things that have already lived a life or two somewhere else. It's also a business that subscribes to the same ethics that I value, as they provide job training and re-rentry training for people who would otherwise be shunned by many employers. If you would like to see the photos from our little jaunt click here.

After that, we went to catch the tail end of the Kinetic Sculpture Race at the American Visionary Art Museum. Because I hadn't read the timeline closely enough, we didn't get to see the crafts do a water entry. However, we saw the crafts arriving at the end and just that was great fun. Then we went up the road to Little Havana and sat on the deck drinking mojitos, so that made up for anything that we missed in the race. For photos of the crafts and the giant mosiac egg at the museum click here.

Then on Sunday Justin and I went to Annapolis and did the Chesapeake Bay Bridge walk, with the hope of being on the bridge when the boats from the Volvo Ocean Race came by. That didn't work out quite as planned, but we had a great time anyway. The photos from that little adventure are here.

A stroll through the park

This morning Claudia, Simone, Ana and I went for a walk around the reservoir at Druid Hill Park.
It turned out not to be so much a walk, as me pushing Ana in the stroller as fast as I could, to try and keep up with Claudia and Simone on their rollerblades. Claudia assured us that she was very slow and unsteady on her feet, but within a minute or so she got the hang of it and was off. Luckily we were on a loop, because the stopping didn't come back to her as easily as the forward momentum had! Simone is a bit more proficient, and at times she almost made it look easy.

The weather was a bit off, especially after the incredible week that we've been having. It didn't rain on us, but except for a brief flash of sun, it was overcast and windy. I still managed to take a few photos, though.

Here's little Ana, smiling away in her stroller:

A pup we met named Pooker T. Washington:

An unidentified bird, for all you ornithologists out there (I think it may be an Oriole, but I'm not sure):

A leaf blowing against the fence:

Finally, the brief flash of sunlight on the water:

Springtime walkabout

On Saturday afternoon Justin and I went wandering around the neighborhood and ended up in Sherwood Gardens, admiring the tulip beds. Following are a few photos:

When we came home from our walk, we grilled the prawns that we had bought at the Waverly Farmer's Market that morning, and had a lovely dinner by candlelight in the garden.

All in all, a great day.