Fort Popham

I may have gotten a bit overzealous amidst all this concentricity. I am not even caring if that is a word, sshh, let your eyes feast on the lines...{i kid you not, almost every one of these still has its b&w/color counterpart over in my flickr pool, i couldn't leave any of the tender things behind.}



I used to dream of stone houses.



full of corners, laden with the weight of their age. Silent under foot.







But I imagined them full of kitchens with warm ovens, and heaps of wool before I ever knew how essential wool is to me. Later I understood how stone can be stifling and cold at once, but I still swoon over its textures and sweet neutral palette, its spare dusty scent.



Boy battles shirt:



and wins. Which was, I believe, the most action this fort ever saw.

Hermit Island

We went camping on Hermit Island while in Maine, a little island that has been a designated recreation spot for over 60 years, and those who know say it hasn't changed much since. You drive on (no RVs), pitch your tent, and spend your days walking the trails that criss-cross its tiny area from one secluded beach to another. We brought kayaks to explore the bay (no pictures, water sports and my camera don't mix) and sampled about seven different beaches. These photos are from a walk we took around the southern tip.











I like rocks. The end. I will try to get more glimpses of our epic stay on the Atlantic coast trickling in.

Whoopsie-doodle

Sorry for the hiatus, I fell into a pit on the east coast.



Well, mostly it was a lot of water, and sunlight. I may have a few more pictures, I'll have to go and check sometime. But really, we just had a heckuva lot of fun, with nary a picture in sight.

at last!

Remember all those annoying posts I dragged you through that hinted at things I was doing that I wasn't supposed to tell you about? I am excited to report that now (drumroll) I can finally unveil


The Book!

Beyond Toes: Knitting Adventure with Judy's Magic Cast-On (rav link) by the world-famous Judy Becker, she of the cast-on that has revolutionized sock knitting...and now so much more. The actual book does not come off the presses until the end of September, but I am officially allowed to give a little preview of some of its TWENTY THREE patterns. I will note that I had nothing to do with this book other than the photography (I have not even really seen any other part of it, I hear there are great tutorials and everything), all design credit goes to the many brilliant knitters who contributed to the project, too many to name here. Also, something funky happened during my shortcut version of converting CMYK TIFF to jpeg in an RGB system so the colors are a little, erm, bolder than life here, but I am fundamentally too indolent to do anything about it, so a little forbearance is appreciated. I tried to mostly include photos that didn't make it onto the Ravelry pages since variety is the spice of life. Without further ado:


(also, so delightful to remember these photoshoots from months ago and see my friends again!)






I want a girl like this one, she is every bit as serene and wise beyond her years as she looks, and sweet to the marrow of her bones.






of COURSE my son got to mix in there a little bit...






this project, by Judy herself, wound up being the most fun to photograph.




Lo, looking great in my clothes. Darn her.





I was impressed by the variety in this book -- I didn't even get into the shawls here -- which made for an unusually engaging photo project. I had boatloads of fun, I'd do it all again in a heartbeat, perhaps making sure to have warm drinks on hand for freezing models...

All my thanks to Judy, the designers, and the many beautiful people who let me tease, cajole, and beg into modeling for this, it was such an outrageously good time.

the little red sweater

Whew folks, I am on my way home. I won't tell you how long it takes, start to finish, suffice to say that there's plenty of time for me to stop in and talk about my new sweater:



Kerrera! I made a couple modifications, leaving off the hood (I never wear them and I didn't have enough yarn anyway).



and putting buttons all the way down since the flyaway look is super trendy but a bit breezy.



And I made sewn button loops instead of crocheted, and backed the buttons with buttons since the double garter is a bit flimsy.




(plus, I love buttons and doing this meant that I got to use two of my very favorite ones!)

I finished the sweater (sans buttons) the day before I left for Australia, and I have worn it all day, every day since. I am so glad that I made the trip on many levels, not least because it meant I found some wintertime to appreciate this sweater in. It fits perfectly, the style is so easy and elegant, Gudrun is a genius. 'Nuff said. Thanks to my dad for taking pictures on our last day down under!

To Oz!

Hello friends and compatriots, my best wishes from across the equator and the international date line! I am all kinds of upside-down, but as long as I don't try to think about what day it is where and what time, I do all right. Australia is wonderful, this was our sunset last night:



But I'm getting ahead of myself. Before New South Wales there came a lot of traveling. A few days' worth, in fact, from summer to the tropics (for a brief layover in Rarotonga, then on to Auckland, NZ (and winter) for a day and a night. Thence to Sydney for another night, where we had our crash course (almost literally) in driving on the wrong side of the road. After all that, being firmly ensconced in the Upper Hunter Valley in a little shire called Scone (the horse capital of Australia) is relatively relaxing. Yesterday I did what I came to do in the way of work, so now I'm free to enjoy myself for a few days before making that trip in reverse. But you all don't care about this nonsense, here are some pictures! (I don't have many, work and all, but hopefully now I"ll be able to take more.)


The airstrip in Raro. Crap picture, but I just thought the whole thing so incongruous I had to snap one off.


The Cloud, in Auckland. Taken from the hotel room. This structure has something to do with the upcoming Rugby World Cup, hosted this year by New Zealand. And by night:


Yeah, it's blurry. I'm no brain surgeon.


Breakfast menu in Auckland. Taken only to prove how incredibly expensive EVERYTHING is down here, NZ especially. Yes, I had that $16 bowl of porridge, and it was darn tasty. We had company for our meal as well:




(Look! Knitting! It's my Kerrera, finally off the needles!)


Maritime Museum pics.


(the yacht that won the first America's Cup for NZ)


A socked-in Sydney, from the hotel. We spent all our time outside trying dearly not to die, so there are no other pics as yet.


The man who brought us down, an equine vet who pretty much embodies my childhood idea of James Herriot. Only taller.




My dad.






The Research Centre where we had the teambuilding, and dad did his marketing powerpoint thing, after a bevy of technological SNAFUs. But it always works out in the end, eh?

Today we got to play, which for dad meant golf *snicker* while I went horseback riding. I got to see kangaroos and a cockatoo and some green and red parrots, and he got to see kookaburras and ibises and budgies! An all around success. In the next few days I'll be knitting, punctuated by some sightseeing before we head off to Sydney, the opera, and back home. See you all soon!

of forests and amphibians

For heaven's sake, people, I am the slowest! But (almost) only on the blogosphere, mind you, I manage to keep all those balls tripping merrily through the air in real life. What with patterns and photos and impromptu business trips to Australia and family and work and stuff, things just seems to get a bit snarled up and go nowhere. Does it infringe on your credulity a bit to appeal to your sympathies? Not bloody likely, eh? Poor me, too much of a good thing! But honestly, with all of my great good fortune aside, all I really want to be doing right now is to buckle down to the even more serious business of summertime.

Because, friends, when Summer peeks her insouciant head into the Pacific Northwest, nowhere is it lovelier. And all the natives come out to play (even the ones with very heavy deadlines swinging ominously over them).



Memaloose Lake, with friends. Now why, you may ask, after all that gushing about ripe summertimes, do those people look for all the world as though they are dressed for winter? How astute the blog public is indeed, and the answer lies in the majesty of our mountains and the unpredictability of their weather systems. We swelter in the valleys while the snowmelt continues its journey to our gardens. But it made for such a clear and invigorating hike up to the lake, with still-blooming trilliums and other beauties, nascent huckleberries, and dramatic and swirling mists. And true to the magic of such places, the sun did come out and we were transformed.







And the excuse for my son's attire? The hunt!



I wish I could take pictures for you of the air and the singular way it makes you feel, all the scents of growing things and the story of the temperature changes in each little ion. Refreshing just doesn't cut it. And the trees! And all things green! I will let the pictures do the talking from here.











A perfect day, I hope to have many more like it, and soon. Well, in a couple of weeks perhaps, after I've sampled that antipodal wintertime. Now that will be a shift.