Sockonundrum

Dangit!  The purple and green turned out to be too similar in tone (or is it value?) when knit in the Lizard Sock leg pattern.  The chain pattern was totally lost.  So I went to the LYS since I know they have a small selection of Claudia's HandPaints yarn, hoping they would have something contrasting yet complimentary to use.  Actually I wanted 2 skeins of yarn to work with both the purple & green, so I would still have enough for pairs of socks.  ARGH!  I hate the LYS here!  They look like they have a lot, but when you dig in you realize how little selection they have.  Not much that would work at all :(  I finally whipped out my droid and opened Ravelry to scan through the completed projects to see what color combinations worked well.  I ended up with a soft silvery white to pair with the purple - I think it'll be purple lizard on silver background, unless I want to go for the moonlit lizard on a dark purple base.  Hmmm...I like the sound of that.  Or maybe do one of each for a negative effect?  The green was harder to match, knowing how variable the colors of it are.  I finally chose Ink, a dark dark warm color not quite black.  The green will obviously be the lizard.  I'm going to do the purple and silver ones first, and see how I feel when the project is done.

Sizing Note for all you with Lizard Socks in your queue:  The sizing for Europe vs. US doesn't match.  I wear a 40-41 Eur (9.5-10 US).  I decided to go with european sizing since the pattern is German.  I chose the Med. size but when I knit a swatch it wouldn't fit over my heel.  So maybe the US sizing is right (I would have knit a Large if going by US).  But it's worth the time to swatch for this one, since these socks have no stretch to them. 

Sock opinion needed!

I'm ready for yet another pair of socks.  They are going to be 2 color, variegated purple and variegated lime green from Claudia's Handpaint - the photo doesn't do it justice, the colors look really great together.  I have 3 patterns I'm trying to decide between, and need YOUR opinion!  Two of them are fairisle, something I'm happy knitting but have avoided in socks.  I was always concerned about the stretchiness of them, but there are so many stranded sock patterns it must be ok.  The third, Bolts, is fairisle only on top of the foot where the pattern is.  The yarn is carried inside the sock across the pattern area to the beginning of each round and twisted in, just like knitting a circular swatch flat.  If I do the bolts pattern I think I may flip the colors for the 2 socks.  The other 2 patterns will be purple background and green colorwork. Here are the 3 pics, and the Ravelry links with the name:

Meeresrauschen


















Bolts Socks

Lizard Socks












So what do you think?  Bolts was my original intention, but I favorited the other two also, and think they could be really cool.  Plus being fairisle they may not wear out and need darning quite as quickly.  But I really like all 3.  So, please let me know what you think, ask other people nearby which they like.  Also any opinions or tips about fairisle socks are welcome!

My first official trip

In preparation for my travels I splurged on several packing aids for carry-ons -- clothes envelopes, a universal charging amt for all my electronic gadgetry, a bag tether to hold my 2 bags together as one.  I also watched some videos on efficient business trip packing and was excited to try out what I learned.  I was very impressed how well everything fit in my bag, so well in fact that I was able to squish my pillow in too.  I'm so thankful to my chiropractor for recommending the contoured neck pillow to ease my neck/shoulder strain, but equally frustrated because now I can't bear to sleep on anything else.  So not only am I the twat at the airport with a laptop and 2 smartphones, but I'm also the tweed carrying a bed pillow too.  Still, I was really excited how easily everything fit in my bag.  Until I unpacked and really started thinking about the next few days.

Turns out I forgot to pack a few items.  Like shorts, pants, or any casual bottoms except for the capris I was wearing and running shorts.  I also forgot my pajimmyjams (PJs) and handknit wool bed socks.  This simply will not do.  I'm going to designate a pair of bedsocks for travel, and never take them out of my suitcase.  Luckily I found an awesome Lululemon yoga shop and got some new pants.  I had to get the regular length, since the talls were WAY too long for me.  I also got a beautiful purple tank top that I can wear without a bra.  Wow, I was so excited I rushed out of the dressing room to show the girl helping me.

On the flight up there was a 2 year old kid a row ahead of me who screamed nonstop from the moment she sat down until they opened the doors again.  Not cried, but that attention-seeking shriek that rattles the eardrums.  I kept expecting her to fall asleep from the sheer physical effort of yelling that long.  You could feel the tension throughout the cabin, and her mother didn't do anything to shush her.  I made up a story where the girl was on a game show and had to hit a certain unobtainably high frequency and volume in order to win the grand prize, and the continued screams were all attempts at winning.  It suddenly made the ordeal funny an somewhat sad, as she kept trying to hit that note but never succeeded.  At least it took away the frustration I felt towards her and her mother.

One last thing - what the hell is wrong with New Jersey roads?  When you pass signs that read "Left Turn Keep Right", what the hell is an out-of-stater supposed to do?  When all you want is to make a U turn and go back the way you came, why would you possibly think you should be in the rightmost lane instead of the left lane, and how in the name of Christ are you supposed ot get over 3 lanes of traffic at rush hour to make a right hand U turn at a light because YOU CAN'T TURN LEFT AT ANY STOPLIGHT??  There should be warnings about that plastered to the rental cars.  And the poor Garmin telling me it was recalculating was like that scene from Austin Powers:  Evacuation compl...comp...com...evacuation com..com...com...

Thirsty dog

It's been hot enough lately that I've avoided taking the dogs on pedestrian adventures.  That's what we say now - they've learned every other euphemism for walk we can think of.  They were really insistent yesterday about wanting to go out in the middle of the day.  I knew it was broiling, and both of them are black.  I wore my runner's Fuel Belt (water bottle belt), hoping if I gave them water during the walk they wouldn't fall over from heat exhaustion.  Windy refused to drink anything, I know she was scouting for open water to swim in to cool off.  I cupped my hand and squirted water into it to see if Kayla would lap it up (she always refuses to drink from travel bowls).  It worked ok, although was somewhat slimy for me.  After a minute like this I put the bottle to the side of her mouth and squeezed, fully expecting her to back away.  She kept up the lapping motion and no water came out of her mouth.  Cool!  My dog can drink from a squirt bottle.  Next water break I just held the bottle to her mouth and squeezed.  She drank 6 oz. of water straight.  The final time I held the bottle to her face and she turned her head so I could squeeze it into the spot she likes.  Hooray!  Now I just have to remember which bottles are hers, and which are mine during outings.

Not quite baby chicks

My SIL recently got a herd of baby chickens and has been blogging about her chicken escapades.  While I don't have a whole bunch of peepers growing at home, I do have some recent egg laying and baby hatching activity at the house.

It's pretty neat to be able to see things like her weaving the egg sac so close.  And once all the babies hatched, it followed a very slow moving flock dynamic.

The thing is, there are SO MANY insects invading, we're letting all the spiders be to help combat the problem.  Well, until I looked and found that every single spider of this species hatched her egg sac on the same day. Sorry, a few spiders per room I can handle.  But thousands of baby spiderlings all over?  Nope, not gonna happen.

Maine Meal

One thing I love about traveling is finding unusual places to eat with foods out of the ordinary.  So we're up in Portland, Maine for work.  I've had lobster, and clam cakes.  Maine blueberries and blueberry soda.  Sampled several microbreweries (yay beer flights!).  Had a great lunch sandwich of smoked turkey, brie, smoked bacon, and granny smith apple slices all toasted together with a microbrewery fresh root beer.  But I never expected to have one of the best meals of my life here.  Someone recommended a funky out-of-the-way restaurant called The Pepper Club.  The menu was a slate with the day's entrees written in colored chalk.  They brought a cute baseball-sized loaf of molasses-oatmeal bread to the table and told us they were having an anniversary 4-course special that essentially was "pick 4 courses off the menu" for 2 bucks more than an entree alone.  I started with baked brie with apricots and almonds (shared with my friend).  Then a wonderfully diverse salad with the kind of dressing you want to drink by the bottle.
But it was the entree - fresh seared scallops in thai coconut curry with jasmine rice and vegetables - that took my breath away. The vegetables were absolutely perfect - fresh and juicy with just the right amount of tooth, firm yet tender.  The sauce was well balanced, enough heat without overpowering the flavors.  But the scallops, oh my.  They were beyond description.  I can still recall the sublime taste and texture.  The dish was so good it wasn't possible to talk while eating, as it might distract from the enjoyment of the food.  I'm really at a loss for words thinking about this dish, it's truly stunning.
The meal ended with their signature chocolate pepper cake, a dark chocolate cake that had a quick hint of pepper on the first taste and a lingering heat in your throat as you ate.  Dark dark chocolate ganache was swirled over the plate and the cake was dusted with a spicy cocoa powder. 

MDSW Roundup

I had such a good time at Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival (MDSW).  I stopped for amazingly good donuts on the way up.  I also stopped by a MAC store (no, not the Apple store, although they are side by side at that particular mall) and picked up a new ridiculous shade of bright blue/purple eyeshadow.  They still don't have a good green, but did find an emerald green cream eye pencil that will do nicely.  My rainbow is nearly complete! 

As I drove up my brother's street I saw several people having fun painting a pull-behind trailer.  I wondered about it, then realized it was parked in my brother's driveway!  I did a quick U-turn, grabbed the donuts, and walked up to join in.  A few hours of paint and turpentine fumes later, check out the awesomeness they will be hauling across the country. 

We cleaned the paint off ourselves as best as we could (fingernail beds are apparently a permanent paint location) and had tasty sushi for dinner.  I've never been so full from sushi before that I thought I might burst.  Well, there were bento box goodies and ice cream too.  Mmm...mango, red bean, ginger, green tea, mochi...why do Americans only believe in chocolate and more chocolate?  Thankfully the filling dinner saved the donuts so we were able to slice them up into little wedges and enjoy them with our otherwise healthy breakfast of eggs, turkey bacon, turkey sausage, and oatmeal-applesauce pancakes.  Sure, they roll out the healthy goodness, and my contributions are donuts and mimosas.

It was a fun drive up to MDSW, until the last couple miles that added nearly an hour onto our travel time.  Gads they needed a cop at the intersection!  Once we got near enough we all piled out of the van and started walking to the festival rather than sit in traffic anymore (Thanks Daven!).  Ever had a dandelion fight?  It's really fun, although hard to attack someone if you have to run up to catch them.  Here we are at the climax of our battle - I wish the camera captured the cloud of dandelion fluff we're standing in.  I also learned a dandelion in the ear is shriek-worthy no matter who the victim is. 

I haven't been to MDSW in 8 years or so.  It was great, but less overwhelming than it felt back in those days.  I think I've learned so much in the intervening years I don't need to see/touch/do everything (oops, I mistyped 'everyone' at first).  I did learn a few things that are handy. 
1. Kilts are great as they totally replace a shoulder bag or purse and leave your hands completely free.  I wasn't sure about it at first (my brother handed out kilts left and right when we were all leaving that morning) but by the end of the day I was glad to have it.  Seriously, I had my wallet, camera, phone, notepad, pen, and snack in my pockets and then clipped all my purchases into the convenient belt clip.  There were quite a lot of kilt wearers there that day, which brought questions from some confused folks who thought we were in a dance troupe or something.
2. Golding Ring Spindles really do spin longer than any other, and are totally gorgeous.  But after using them I lost my decade-old desire to have one.  All the extra spin time is meaningless since you have to stop once you near the ground.  And the shafts are kind of tacky feeling.  It might have been because of the heat melting the wood wax, but they had a feel reminiscent of the Mongolian Grill wooden platters you put your bowl on.  It's kind of like losing a crush.

Oh, you'd rather see the haul of stuff I bought?  Special thanks to my husband for demanding that I buy whatever I wanted.  Here's the pretty yarns:

Top: Mountain Colors sock yarn.
Left to Right: Zauberball laceweight, 2 balls of Mini Mochi for alternate colorway striping, 2 skeins of Claudia's Handpaint for striped socks, maybe the Jaywalker Pattern.
I didn't photograph the blue faced leicester wools, since a camera can't capture the feel of them.  I also got a supremely awesome pendant I'll post later.

We stayed to the end of the festival and by that point were trudging along after a day of dizzingly hot weather.  I knew how hot it was when I realized I'd drank 3 quart-sized lemonades and a bottle of water and never had to pee.  Here's part of our band heading out.

I'm so glad I got to go with such a fun group of people.  Maybe we can all meet at Estes one year...