3.22.2007

My trip to Nashville, Norfolk, and beyond

So last weekend I went down to Nashville to check out the Revolution of Craft which was the first craft festival of the Nashville Craft Mafia. I was really impressed by many of the vendors. Since it is a new festival, there were many first time vendors, but their work didn’t show it. I ended up buying a bag by Tattooed Jess, some melon lip balm from Tranquil Home, a bunch of buttons, and a shrine from Nieves. I also loved the work of maryink, but I decided to place a special order through her etsy store since she didn’t have the design I wanted in the color I wanted at the booth.

On Sunday, Nieves and I grabbed lunch at Fido and after some quick shopping headed over to the Frist for the Mexican printmaking show. The show was great, but there were way too many lithographs for my taste. After the museum we made dinner and these awesome almond rolls. We spent the rest of the evening watching TV in our sugartose states.

Monday I flew to Norfolk and I managed to knit these hand warmers out of Blue Sky organic cotton. They are samples for the project I am doing for the organic and sustainable knitting class I am teaching at Wild Oats this month. They are just garter stitch rectangles that are sewn together with a hole for the thumb. I figure these are a little more gratifying for a new knitter than a garter stitch scarf, plus they are a great way to practice seaming.
Tuesday the temperature in Norfolk dropped and I nearly froze to death on my walk to work. I have been watching the weather and it had been so warm here that I decided to forgo packing my scarves, hats, gloves, and coat. The only things I brought are my jacket and legwarmers. Additionally, I only brought one pair of work pants and a bunch of skirts to wear to work while I am here. Luckily, I did bring the one thing I never leave home without- yarn. Last night I knitted up theCalorimetry from the winter Knitty. I had to adjust the pattern because my gauge was off and since I didn’t bring a bunch of needles I had to make the pattern work with the tools I had. I am really happy with the result and though my legs were still cold, my ears stayed nice and warm. I made some matching fingerless gloves a few days later, but the weather warmed up. I forgot to photograph the calorimetry so to avoid another day delay on this entry I am posting without.

On the plane to Norfolk, I finished knitting the daisy dish towel from KnitScene. The pattern is free on their site. I finished the embroidery on the towel last weekend. Then, with the leftover yarn I knitted the ballband dishcloth from Mason Dixon Knitting. These are for a housewarming package that Philip and I are planning for his brother who just moved to Oregon. Depending on how much time I have next month I might make 1-2 more of these matching sets since I am really happy with the way they came out. I used three skeins of Cascade Luna and I still have enough left over to make a dish scrubbie.
My next project was a crochet tam with a bill. I started this with a pattern since I am really trying to learn to crochet properly, but ended up going freestyle when I found some mistakes in the pattern. It still isn’t perfect, but I have a better idea of what to do in the future.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I dig your handwarmers! I recently made a similar pair using the pattern from Weekend Knitting, though they incorporate some spiffy short-rows so there's more room for the hand and it's snugger around the wrist. How did you seam yours? I did a three-needle bindoff, which the pattern suggested, but I found it a bit bulky.

busy hands said...

oh wow, that shrine is super cool!!!

Anonymous said...

I like your handwarmers too. Really cute, and I love how simple they sound!

Your hat looks so great on you! That isn't normally my favorite style of hat, but you really pull it off and it totally works. Love it! :D

Robyn Wade said...

Thanks for the comments. If I was making the handwarmers for myself I would have definitely incorporated some shaping, but since these are a project for my first week knitting students who can't even purl they need to be as simple as possible.