I know I’ve blogged about the mittens already. These are nothing special to those of you who are cranking out complicated mittens, like Brooklyn Tweed’s latest, or all the gorgeous ones from Folk Mittens. But these are my first attempt at real, complete mittens.

These should keep my boy’s hands warm this winter! They are a quick knit, and now that I’m over the intimidation factor of knitting for a new body part, I’m ready to try something more complicated. But I refuse to let this WIP remain a WIP much longer. I’m keen to get this one done to move on to greener pastures.

Tomorrow, I’ll dig out WIP #2 and dust it off to show you. Stay tuned.

After months or perhaps even years of ruthless self-discipline, I have finally broken my vow of having only one project on the go at any one time. I now have four WIPs. Four! I’ll begin the countdown with my most recent impulse cast-on.

I was in Ithaca last Friday, browsing through Homespun Boutique (on East State St.; no website) on an impulse. I thought about buying some yarn for Brooklyn Tweed’s latest gorgeous pattern from the current issue of Vogue Knitting (previously gushed about here), but I didn’t see what I’d had in mind. Then I saw the Noro. I remembered that gorgeous scarf Brooklyn Tweed had knit awhile back, and thought it would be just the thing. So I bought some.

My current Impulse WIP is a mixture of Noro Kureyon (for the gentle color variations) and Berocco Peruvia in a rich reddish brown. The colors are simply stunning, and I love the way the Noro gently changes from one row to the next.

mmmm, indeed!

I have to say, though, that I’m not feeling the love for Noro. I’ve read all sorts of rave reviews, but even though I love the colors, the yarn itself is, well, a little scratchy. And the color changes aren’t always as subtle as I’d like them to be. Early on, a few odd orange blobs appeared, several rows before the colors began developing into orange shades.

Oh well. It’s going to be gorgeous anyway. I may have to wear this one only with turtlenecks to avoid face chafing, but if that’s the price I have to pay for such beauty…

I love small-town parades. There is something quite delicious about taking your lawn chairs out on the front lawn five minutes before the parade begins and watching your fellow townspeople parade by. Today was the parade for the annual Italian American Festival.

We had old cars, like this red Edsel…

pipe bands (nothing says Italian like a Scottish pipe band (the Penn York HIghlanders out of Athens, PA))…

a Cheez-It…

a leopard…

and a tiger and a cow…

It’s no Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, but it’s fun and local, and even better, it was right outside our front door. So, we could sit comfortably, with snacks and chairs that we didn’t have to drag for miles, secure in the knowledge that when it was all over, we could just walk a few steps to be home. No fighting through crowds to get to the subway station, no waiting for trains to take us home. This is good!

We’ve had such a busy summer so far, but finally things are calming down. We’ve had two sets of visitors from the UK, a trip to a Fiat car show in Pennsylvania, and a family reunion in NYC. Plus swimming lessons and piano lessons and all the other commotion that goes along with having four kids. But things are calming down, and we’re getting a rare moment of peace and tranquility in the house.

You know it’s peaceful in our house when the cats stretch out in the middle of the walkway. Ahh….. (She doesn’t even mind the hideous carpet that I-hope-with-every-fiber-of-my-being will be gone this fall.)

With peace and tranquility comes knitting. At last, actual knitting content! I took a stroll down to my favorite LYS on Monday and bought this, entirely because of Brooklyn Tweed’s gorgeous mittens on the cover:

Talk about “smitten with mittens”—I’m smitten with Brooklyn Tweed, because I love everything he designs. All of the patterns at the top of my Ravelry queue are his. He is so talented, and I look forward to every new thing he produces.

Anyway, I’m not quite ready to tackle those delicious mittens just yet, seeing as how I’ve never knit mittens before. I’ve been knitting for probably 35 years. I’ve made Aran sweaters galore. I’ve made scarves and baby booties and vests and pullovers and all sorts, but never have I made a pair of mittens.

So, I decided to start simply. I’m knitting the Basic Mittens out of Folk Mittens, which arrived in my mailbox courtesy of the recent Interweave Press scratch-n-dent sale. (By the way, I ordered four books in this sale, and they all looked perfect to me, and were discounted 50%. What scratches? What dents?)

And here we are, well on our way to our first pair of mittens…

…and I sense a bit of an obsession coming on. At the risk of offending what seems to be the majority of the knitting community, I’ve never understood the mania for knitting socks. Socks get covered up, stuffed into stinky shoes, and worn out. But mittens! Mittens are on display! They move about with every hand gesture. They cheer up a cold and snowy day. Ah, yes, I think that mittens are going to be my new take-anywhere small projects from now on!

In the spirit of that special transatlantic relationship, we have our own way of celebrating the Fourth. Have a happy one!

Good golly, life has gotten so busy these last few weeks that I haven’t blogged in ages. Visits from friends from the UK. End of the school year for three kids (with multiple award ceremonies, graduations, performances, etc.). Work work work (it never stops, does it?). Gardening (while the warm weather lasts–this is a land of long winters, after all…). Very little knitting, though there has been some needle felting (pics of pumpkins soon to come). I’m alive, I’m here, I’m just not a good blogger at the moment. More soon!

Happy anniversary, husband!

It’s been a glorious day outside, and I (foolishly?) spent the whole day indoors…shopping.

You see, I’ve been planning a big shopping trip for months. After having lived for years in the Boston area, where I could get anything I needed almost any time, it’s been quite an adjustment living here in the Finger Lakes. Stores don’t stay open until 9pm, and sometimes aren’t open on Sundays. They ahve very limited selections, and most of the stores I’m used to having around the corner are now more than an hour’s drive away.

So, in desperate need of clothes and makeup, I headed to a giant mall outside Rochester. Wouldn’t it just figure that after more than a week of cold rainy weather, this would be a glorious sunny day? But this was my window of opportunity–both kids were out of the house until 5pm, so if I wanted to shop in peaceful silence (as opposed to shopping with the continual groans of a 3- and 6-year-old, I had to go today. I wore myself out shopping and came home with two pairs of jeans and one cotton sweater. How disappointing! Maybe I should just bite the bullet and schedule a few shopping trips to Boston or to NYC a year. I’m not a fashion snob–far from it–but it just seems like all the clothes around here are really dowdy or suitable only for teenagers. That’s just not what I need at a time of life when I’m desperately trying to avoid middle-aged-dowdiness–and have no desire whatsoever to look like a teenager…

Oh well. Maybe I’ll just have to knit a new wardrobe. (I can hear you laughing already–I know there hasn’t been much progress on the knitting front for ages!)

Jocelyn has a meme on her site and rather than tag others to do the meme, she asked for volunteers. So here goes!

The rules of the game get posted at the beginning. Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

1. What was I doing 10 years ago?
I was living in Austin, Texas, totally miserable with my job, and secretly applying for jobs anywhere north of the Mason-Dixon line. (I was seeking cooler weather and liberal-minded folks.)

2. What are 5 things on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):
Get the boys up, dressed, fed, and ready for school; figure out how to get to the mall near Rochester; drive to the mall; buy gorgeous clothes that make me look younger, thinner, and fabulous; check the garden for progress; relax.

3. Snacks I enjoy:Good cheese, fresh-baked bread (whenever I can get it!), french fries, strawberries

4. Things I would do if I were a billionaire:
Pay off debt. Fully fund all the kids’ college accounts. Have my mom’s bills all sent to me. Pay cash for my sister’s chemotherapy so she can tell the insurance companies to f*ck off. Set up a scholarship at my alma mater for history students, who always have to scramble for every penny. Fund the local Teen Center so they won’t have to close in October if they can’t find other funding.

5. Places I have lived:
North Texas; Washington, DC; Graz, Austria; High Wycombe, UK; North Carolina; suburban Boston; Finger Lakes, NY

6. Jobs I have had:
Fettler, fast-food restaurant worker (2 days!), maid, kindergarten assistant, baker’s assistant, office assistant, teaching assistant, marketing assistant, editorial assistant, editor at various levels, and now digital content developer

I just can’t bring myself to impose on anyone’s work load, so I’ll leave this meme here rather than tag anyone.

Have a happy and safe weekend!

Global warming? Not here in this corner of the Finger Lakes. It’s still a bone-chilling damp 50 degrees outside. Half of me is delighted, because of course I can still wear my sweaters, but the gardener in me is frustrated by the coolness. How will I ever get tomatoes with weather like this? How will my beans grow? How will Aidan’s pumpkin plant grow?

Well, if the pumpkin plant doesn’t make it, here’s an alternative that arrived in the mail today. A needle-felted pumpkin kit from Patternworks!

This kit should be enough to make two medium pumpkins or a bunch of little ones. I love these colors! This should be a fun thing to do on these long chilly evenings. (But it still doesn’t make up for the lack of springtime around here…)

What a delightful Mother’s Day this has been! I spent the morning hours perusing over the Sunday New York Times (which is finally coming regularly to our part of rural New York State, after I had to threaten the poor customer service clerk with canceling my subscription unless they could manage to actually deliver this paper for at least two Sundays in a row). I also spent a lovely hour or two in the garden, planting my peony, digging the southwest flower bed, and helping my 6-year-old plant the pumpkin plant that he’d started in kindergarten.

Then it was a fiber afternoon!

Several fiber farms in this corner of the Finger Lakes had open houses (open farms?) this weekend. We visited two of them: Sheepish Grin Farm in Lodi, and Bear Farm in Burdett. What fun!

First, the newborn lambs at Sheepish Grin. I got to hold this baby lamb, who was only born yesterday! Her mum wasn’t very happy about it, but her people didn’t seem to mind.

We met the other sheep and the guard llama, and had a very pleasant tour of this lovely small farm by a very precocious young sheep farmer (all of about 10 years old).

Next we traveled to Bear Farm. Carole and Mark Hatch made us very welcome at their faarm, showing us their new lambs too.

Not only did they have adorable baby lambs for us to ooh and ahh over, but they also had yarn. Lots of yarn. Lovely colors, and such reasonable prices. I couldn’t resist a little stash-building exercise while my kids were running up and down the hill (and up and down and up once more).

What will this become? Stay tuned, and I’ll let you know..

Not only did they have lovely yarns, but they also sell their own honey. My husband bought some (since he’s not a fiber-fiend, though he will indulge me), and I have to say, I haven’t had such lovely, sweet, clean and clear honey ever! It was wonderful. However, Carole explained that this may be the last year they produce honey. They lost their entire bee colony last year to colony collapse disorder, and they had to replenish the colony this year. She said, though, that it’s too expensive to continue doing so, so if the colony doesn’t make it, that might be the end of their honey production. Get some while you can.