Presents!
Lookie what I got in the mail today from Steph:
It's an amazing monkey banana knitting organizer! This thing has so many freakin' pockets that I feel the need to go buy more notions. I'm totally delighted to have it, especially for my millions of DPNs. The dark wood needles in the upper left are also a present, a belated birthday gift from my lovely and wonderful sister Lynette. They're gorgeous rosewood.
It was a busy day at work. I'm nearing the end of our term (we're on a funky schedule), so I'm dealing with student crises. The committed students want to talk to me because they want to make sure their work is fabulous. The students on the other end of the spectrum are panicking and trying to figure out how they can pass.
After I got home, I walked the dogs and ran back out again to scoop up Trent and go to Hale's. Last winter we went almost every single week, usually on Wednesday because we both had stupidly exhausting schedules that meant by Wednesday we were out of any food we had purchased over the weekend, and really, really needed a beer besides. This winter we've been less regular there (possibly because the dark cloud of despair has lifted off of me), but it's still one of our top 3 pubs. I had a stout and the macaroni and cheese (excellent!), and Trent had a cask conditioned IPA and the fish sandwich (also very tasty). We like to sit on the bar side - it's much cosier than the restaurant.
On our way home, we stopped at Wide World Books & Maps in Wallingford. The very kind employee let us come in even though she was trying to close, and we quickly scooped up a guide to cycling in Britain and three walking guides. We've booked flights to England for two weeks this summer, and we're in the giddy planning stages.
I got settled in at home in time to catch the 10 pm showing of Project Runway. I'm sad to see Nick go, but I thought his outfits have been lousy for several weeks in a row. His garden party dress was worse than Andrae's (equally stiff and very poorly fitted), and his inspiration dress was just tacky. The part of the show when the judges questioned Santino was squirmingly uncomfortable. I wonder if Kara really said nothing at all, or if it was just edited to look like Santino answered for her?
Spinning Wheel
Elaine asked in the comments about my spinning wheel. My main wheel, the one that spun the New Year's suprise yarn, is a Betty Roberts. Betty is a fabulously eccentric woman who lives in Oroville, WA, and makes gorgeous hardwood wheels with inlaid flowers and butterflies. All the wheels she builds now are multiplier wheels, which means that they gear up like bicycles and you can get fast ratios without a huge wheel. I encountered her wheels at Alpacapalooza a few years ago. I had intended to upgrade from my Louet s10 to a Fricke, which is a perfectly functional, reasonably priced wheel. Then I tried one of Betty's wheels at the booth of Cloud Ranch Alpacas. After a few months of indecision, I emailed Betty and we started planning for my wheel. My wheel is the "economy" model in maple. I got to pick the enamel color for the inlays. When we drove out to Oroville to pick it up, Betty had a wheel made out of apricot wood, and I had to wipe the drool off my chin. Wowza. Anyway, the pictures below are taken when the wheel was young and new (and I lived in an apartment). Cats are included for scale.
It's an amazing monkey banana knitting organizer! This thing has so many freakin' pockets that I feel the need to go buy more notions. I'm totally delighted to have it, especially for my millions of DPNs. The dark wood needles in the upper left are also a present, a belated birthday gift from my lovely and wonderful sister Lynette. They're gorgeous rosewood.
It was a busy day at work. I'm nearing the end of our term (we're on a funky schedule), so I'm dealing with student crises. The committed students want to talk to me because they want to make sure their work is fabulous. The students on the other end of the spectrum are panicking and trying to figure out how they can pass.
After I got home, I walked the dogs and ran back out again to scoop up Trent and go to Hale's. Last winter we went almost every single week, usually on Wednesday because we both had stupidly exhausting schedules that meant by Wednesday we were out of any food we had purchased over the weekend, and really, really needed a beer besides. This winter we've been less regular there (possibly because the dark cloud of despair has lifted off of me), but it's still one of our top 3 pubs. I had a stout and the macaroni and cheese (excellent!), and Trent had a cask conditioned IPA and the fish sandwich (also very tasty). We like to sit on the bar side - it's much cosier than the restaurant.
On our way home, we stopped at Wide World Books & Maps in Wallingford. The very kind employee let us come in even though she was trying to close, and we quickly scooped up a guide to cycling in Britain and three walking guides. We've booked flights to England for two weeks this summer, and we're in the giddy planning stages.
I got settled in at home in time to catch the 10 pm showing of Project Runway. I'm sad to see Nick go, but I thought his outfits have been lousy for several weeks in a row. His garden party dress was worse than Andrae's (equally stiff and very poorly fitted), and his inspiration dress was just tacky. The part of the show when the judges questioned Santino was squirmingly uncomfortable. I wonder if Kara really said nothing at all, or if it was just edited to look like Santino answered for her?
Spinning Wheel
Elaine asked in the comments about my spinning wheel. My main wheel, the one that spun the New Year's suprise yarn, is a Betty Roberts. Betty is a fabulously eccentric woman who lives in Oroville, WA, and makes gorgeous hardwood wheels with inlaid flowers and butterflies. All the wheels she builds now are multiplier wheels, which means that they gear up like bicycles and you can get fast ratios without a huge wheel. I encountered her wheels at Alpacapalooza a few years ago. I had intended to upgrade from my Louet s10 to a Fricke, which is a perfectly functional, reasonably priced wheel. Then I tried one of Betty's wheels at the booth of Cloud Ranch Alpacas. After a few months of indecision, I emailed Betty and we started planning for my wheel. My wheel is the "economy" model in maple. I got to pick the enamel color for the inlays. When we drove out to Oroville to pick it up, Betty had a wheel made out of apricot wood, and I had to wipe the drool off my chin. Wowza. Anyway, the pictures below are taken when the wheel was young and new (and I lived in an apartment). Cats are included for scale.
posted by Melinda at 11:24 PM
1 Comments:
Oh. My. God.
It's almost too pretty to touch, I'm in awe.
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