Mistress of my own domain

Domain name, that is. I just purchased www.unwinding.us. If I set things up correctly, if you enter that web address, you should be directed to this blog. I'm looking forward to more regular blogging this summer!

Paddlin' on the River

While I'm waiting to upload my photos from my trip to the Southwest, I thought I'd share some local "travel" shots -- these from the Friday night Chill Paddle on the East River. The Long Island City Community Boathouse sponsors free kayak trips on weekends all summer long, and last Friday was the first official paddle of the season.

There's even a tangential knitting connection -- my friend Melissa, from the LIC Knitters group, came along as well!

Unwinding -- my new blog name

I realized that one of the reasons I hadn't posted in such a long while was that I'd been traveling more than I'd been knitting. So, I decided to make some tweaks to my blog and have it focus on two of my passions -- travel AND knitting.

Off we go!

Bad blogger

Wow -- can't believe it's been almost two months since my last entry. Lots to tell, but no time to do it today. In summary -- resigned from Changing Our World in mid-April; took some time off between jobs and did some traveling (D.C., Detroit, Sante Fe, Tucson, and Utah); signed a lease on a new apartment and will move at the end of July; have almost finalized my divorce (a long and painful process); and started my new job at The Conference Board last week.

I've done a bit of knitting over the past two months -- finished and gifted two more baby hats; finished and gifted two scarves; and found buttons (the final step) for the Olive cardigan. Sadly, forgot to photograph the scarves and hats, but will hope to receive photos from the wearers.

My knitting karma was working in Santa Fe -- found a cute little yarn store just off Canyon Road, so had to buy some yarn as a souvenir. Resisted the hemp yarn from the Hemp store near the main plaza, though, as I had no idea how hemp works up.

Cute baby alert!

I happen to think my daffodil hat is pretty cute. But you haven't seen cute until you've seen baby Joie actually wearing the daffodil hat. Don't you agree?

Daffodil hat

What, you thought it was going to be shaped like a daffodil? Sorry...I'm just not that creative. But it is a lovely daffodil-yellow color, so that should count for something.

Details: Rowan All Season Cotton, Color 205, knit flat in garter stitch on size 7 bamboo needles and then seamed. Pattern is from Debbie Bliss. Very, very easy.

This hat is destined for my colleague's 4-month-old daughter, Joie.

Hurray for Holl-lywooood...

OK, not really Hollywood, but close...Burbank, CA. Home of the Bob Hope Airport, which is one of the small airports to which JetBlue flies from NYC. I had a meeting last week in LosAngeles, and rather thoughtfully chose to save my client a LOT of money by flying into Long Beach and out of Burbank, rather than in and out of LAX. Which is even more saintly when you consider that my client's office is located NEXT TO LAX. That's right, next to, as in "right across the street I could walk to the airport from there and catch my flight without ever setting foot in an automobile." Instead, I drove around... a lot.


But the nice thing about driving around, and driving to Burbank's Bob Hope Airport, specifically, was that I found...a yarn store! A lovely little yarn store called Unwind.





















I hadn't brought any knitting with me to L.A. because I had a book I wanted to read on the plane, but seeing the store made me want to knit, so I popped in and picked up a skein of Rowan All Seasons Cotton, along with a pair of Clover bamboo needles (size 7, for those who care about these things). This is what I've done with it so far:

There's a new blogger in town

Hey, faithful readers: check out my friend Monica's new knitting blog!

http://paddleandknit.blogspot.com/

Monica lives in Greenpoint and is one of the volunteer leaders of the Long Island City Community Boathouse, where she takes folks out on kayaking trips on the East River. She's just started coming to the Tuesday night SnB at Communitea, so those of you who are Queens-based have already met -- or will soon meet -- her.

Welcome to the blogosphere, Monica!

Me gusta tejer

Which is Spanish for "I like to knit." Which is what I did quite a lot of on a recent trip. Here's a shot of me in action, along with my friend Francine, a Chicago-based knitter. (Francine and I are currently doing a scarf exchange; can't wait to see what she has in store for me.)

On the needles right now: the scarf for Francine, and an evening purse for a friend. Just finished three scarves over the past two weeks, two of which were paid commissions. I'm thinking about a sweater as my next big project; we'll see if I get motivated enough to actually get started!

Ladies & Gentlemen, Elvis in in the house...

Well, maybe not Elvis, but his spirit is alive and well in Memphis. I was down there last week on a business trip and had a chance to visit Beale Street, home of the blues and some of the best BBQ you will ever eat. And, as you will see, some really amazing neon signs.

Sock yarn, get your sock yarn here!

I thought I was going to really get into sock knitting. All my friends knit socks, and my grandmother would tell me stories about being in kindergarten in Germany and learning to knit socks as a 5-year-old. So, I bought some sock yarn. But I've just never gotten around to learning to knit socks. So, it's up for trade. Lindydiva from the Knitty board has first pick, but then the rest is available to others. I have two skeins of each.

Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting

That's the name of a new exhibit opening this week at the Museum of Art & Design here in NYC. The show runs from January 25th until June 17th, 2007. Field trip, anyone?

Here's just one of the items to be exhibited -- a tiny pair of gloves knitted out of silk, using wire in lieu of knitting needles. Impressive! (Though my hands are cramping, just looking at them.)

Good genes!

The past month and a half were big for birthdays in my family, so I drove down to Philadelphia several times to celebrate. It was a blast to spend so much time with my nieces and nephew, who are 10, 4 and almost 2. As you can see, they are quite adorable!

This is Emily, my goddaughter, who will be two in March...

...Thomas, who turned four in December and has a great sense of both humor and fashion...

... Sara, who was just 10 last week and who is flanked by my brother Stephen and sister-in-law Lanina (Sara is a knitter, so that's the knitting connection in today's post) ...

... and, finally, my mother, who is ultimately responsible for the gene-pool cuteness factor passed along to her children and grandchildren. Thanks, Mom!

Global Warming

Melissa, my fellow LIC knitter and the talented knitwear designer behind Neoknits, has had enough of unseasonably warm weather that makes it impossible for us to wear our handknitted garments. So, she's launched Knitters Against Global Warming, and is encouraging knitters worldwide to take action to help reverse the alarming climate changes we've all experienced recently.

Having just seen "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore's film about global warming, I'm totally on board with this campaign. Join us, please!

And a belated thank you...

...to my good friend Deborah and her adorable daughter, Nina, for hosting me for Thanksgiving weekend. Deb is a new reader of this blog, and wanted to know why there were no photos posted from my Thanksgiving trip to Portland. Well...perhaps because I forgot to bring my camera with me and so didn't take any photos? Luckily, Deb sent me a shot from Thanksgiving dinner.

Nina's favorite activity during my visit was playing "tea party" -- never have I drunk so many imaginary cups of tea in so brief a time period. I'll give her another year or two and then get her started on knitting and purling!

Save the Children

I posted back in the Fall about the "Caps to the Capitol" drive that Save the Children was undertaking, to raise awareness of infant mortality rates in developing countries and to encourage knitters and crocheters to make hats for newborns. Here are the two hats I made:




I should have added something to provide perspective on size -- these are TINY. A colleague asked me if they were mug cozies. :-) The tan hat is crocheted from a superbulky wool, and the aqua hat is knit from DK weight cotton. I mailed them off to Save the Children on Wednesday, along with a note to President Bush asking him to provide funding for maternal and child health programs in developing countries. The hats themselves will be sent to Africa and India, I believe.

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to meee.....

I'm a new year's eve baby, and this year decided to throw myself a party to celebrate the end of a fairly awful year and to ring in the new year with good friends and a hopeful attitude.

My dear, dear friend Dara came up from Philadelphia for the weekend to celebrate with me, and we had a great time. Saturday night was a wonderful meal at Tournesol in Long Island City, then watching the "Little Miss Sunshine" DVD -- we laughed ourselves silly! On Sunday, Dara took me to Communitea for a birthday breakfast, then we did a pre-party apartment cleaning and straightening up. At lunchtime, it was off to Central Park for a long walk, fueled by chocolate chip cookies from Dean & DeLuca. And on the way home, we stopped at Daffy's where I found a fun, slinky sequined dress for ...gasp!...$19.99!!!!

Here are Dara and I, in my kitchen, in all our party fabulousness:

Angela brought the birthday cake (yum!), along with her cousin Catherine, visiting from Nova Scotia.

And, of course, there were knitters! Jolie and Gwen, from the LICKnit group.

And Jill and Ruth, from the Tuesday night Stitch-n-Bitch at The Point in the West Village, along with Colette, Scrabble player extraordinaire and fellow LIC knitter.

It was a fun, fun evening, capped off at midnight with a spectacular view of the Central Park fireworks. (At that point, I was a trifle overserved and so did not take any photos of the fireworks, but take my word for it -- they were amazing!)

Happy new year!

Say it with flowers...

I was in Las Vegas twice in November on business, and stayed at the Bellagio on my first visit. The Bellagio has an impressive art collection, including a number of pieces by my favorite glass artisit, Dale Chihuly. The main lobby ceiling is completely covered by fantastical glass flowers; here's a view, and a close-up:









Last week, I was also lucky enough to be given some beautiful roses by a friend -- the photos don't do justice to the deep red color and the perfection of the blooms.








Knitting? Oh, right...yes, I have been knitting as well, not just looking at flowers. I just haven't been photographing my knitting (bad blogger, I know). I knit two hats last week -- one for a friend who is moving to Idaho and will need a nice warm wool hat, and one for a friend of a friend who is undergoing chemo. Plus a lacy scarf, which I knit from start to finish while hanging out with a knitterly friend last night, and a few more sweater ornaments as gifts to friends at home in Philadelphia earlier in the week.

'Tis the Season...

I am slowly but surely getting into the holiday spirit this year. After a meeting last week, I walked over to Rockefeller Center to have a look at the Christmas tree. It's spectacular, as always!

Saks 5th Avenue, just across the street, has a beautiful lighted snowflake display, and I stood for a few minute to watch the show.

And the trumpeting angels, also at Rock Center, were just lovely.

In holiday knitting, I've made up a few little sweater ornaments.

I have been knitting...

...really, I swear I have! I just haven't been posting. I know, I know...I'm a bad blogger. It's just that it's been so frustrating to try and try and try to post photos, only to have Blogger fail on me. Maybe the new version will be better.

Here's what's been on the needles:

1. Olive's cardigan -- knitting completed, seams all sewn, one ribbon sewn in for the button band, the 2nd one almost finished. Just need to buy smaller snaps; the ones I bought are too large.
2. Caps for the Capitol -- one infant cap finished and sewn up, just need to mail it off to Save the Children. I used the same aqua-colored cotton yarn I've been using for all my baby knitting lately.
3. Christmas tree ornaments -- little red cotton sweaters, 2-3 inches in size, to hang on the tree. I've been experimenting with different stitch patterns, and yesterday sewed little star-shaped sequins to them for decoration. Five done, don't know how many I'll aim for. These are destined for Art-O-Mat, for sale.
4. Scarves -- finished three for Art-O-Mat, in a variety of glitzy yarns from my stash. I showed one in a blue ladder yarn to three friends, all of whom requested one for themselves. So, one of these three is finished; one is halfway done; and one is on the list of things to do.
5. Chemo cap -- a friend of a friend has cancer and has lost all her hair from the chemo, so I offered to knit her a hat. Offer accepted, yarn agreed over the weekend -- a snuggly alpaca-silk from Debbie Bliss in a beautiful cream color. It was destined for a cushion cover for my mother-in-law, so I'll have to find something else for that, or buy more (sorry, Catriona!); it's the softest yarn I have, though, so the chemo cap seemed the most appropriate use.

See, I haven't been slacking!