So, I've Been a Bit MIA These Days

Whine, whine, whine, do you really want to read about my pain issues?

If I'm not posting, it's either due to traveling, or due to pain, or life and its other distractions--I'm sure you know how it is.

I think sometime between Thanksgiving and the winter holidays, I went out with my friends for lunch, yarn and chocolate shopping in Nyack. We finally got around to checking out Knitting Nation, and we all walked away with a purchase we were happy with.  I debated heavily on my purchase, but snapped it up due to the sheer yardage, even if the shade was a bit on the drab/faded out side, what a steal! A sweater's volume of yarn for $25. (The yarn is now with a friend, who is an indie yarn dyer, and I'm excited to see what magic she has worked with this yarn.)

 

Anyway, in January, we visited family in India, with a side trip of about three days to Hong Kong.

Hong Kong was great, and everything I expected it to be, and then some. Disorienting, delicious, crowded, and then some.

And of course, I managed a trip to a LYS while there. I decided that Google maps said the shop was a 15 minute walk from my hotel, and when the Maharajah laid down for his nap, I disappeared. I figured, conservatively, if Google maps said it'd take 15 minutes, for ME, it'd take twice that, and I figured on returning to the hotel within an hour.  TWO hours later, I traipsed back in, and he was still snoozing.  

Hong Kong is great, and in one aspect in particular it reminded me of our last trip to Paris, when we were looking for the small lane that the laundromat was located on--all the little side streets don't appear to be on the map!

Considering my doctor's orders are NOT to walk more than 15-20 minutes at a clip--I was starting to fear I was in crisis when as it neared one hour, I hadn't found the shop.  

I persevered, and found what was a high rise building that was mixed use, and had some retail shops on the ground floor--and the shop was upstairs somewhere. And I finally did find it.

Yoko Labs is what felt like a very tiny space. Maybe 20 ft x 20 ft max. All the yarn (acrylic) were in bundles from the manufacturer, nothing was out to touch, and the place was redolent of moth balls.  There was a full array of Japanese crochet (and knit, I'm sure) books, but hey, I have Kinokuniya close to home, so this was not an advantage---now if there were CHINESE or MACANESE books? I would have snapped one up as a keep sake.

There was a small area with a table and chairs, and every last seat was occupied, so I could not even sit for a few minutes to rest.

There was a small array of clover and some Tulip hooks (not the ones with the soft grip handles) and I decided I was going to reward myself with a hook as a souvenir before making the trek back to the hotel.

 Our trip to India follows a set plan that doesn't deviate much from visit to visit. It's mostly family oriented, time visiting relatives, going shopping, eating home cooked food, going to temple. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.  

I brought along enough yarn to knock out a sweater for the Maharajah's cousin who lives in the US, and was using the pattern for the Cap It Off Topper; however, I don't think I made the calculation for difference in yarn type (see also: previous blog post about making yarn substitutions). I think I did make a slight alteration, or went with the smallest size of the pattern, but I worried the entire time it'd be too big for its recipient.

About two days before our last day, we happened to be out to lunch with relatives, and in the center of Madras, and I saw a sign for Parry's Corner--and I didn't assert myself. I don't want to be demanding, but I really need to get better about being more assertive, as in this instance, it wouldn't have been too much out of the way to go there, so I could check out any yarn, notions, and fabric. Oh well, perhaps something for us to do next time we are out there--something for our 2019 visit.

So the day before our last day, I finally asserted myself, and wanted to go to a shop to get buttons. And rather than take me out with him, my brother-in-law went out of his way to do things the DIFFICULT way. First, he spoke with the neighbor who is a seamstress, about where to buy buttons, as I described, "functional but also fancy--not just drab buttons, but something fancy." And again, rather than take me with him, he drove there, snapped photos of buttons that met my criteria, DROVE BACK HOME, showed me the photos, then DROVE BACK TO THE SHOP to make the purchase.  The buttons on the right are the ones I picked, and the ones on the left are the blingy-er ones he insisted on getting too. I suspect since I said the buttons were for a sweater for their beloved cousin, perhaps that was much more the motivator than if it were just ME wanting the buttons.

I never did what I wanted to do while in India, which is to say, I never finished it while in India, which is what I wanted. To start and finish it there, as a true souvenir of my time there. Oh well.
 

 Anyway, at some other point in time, once I came home from India, I was in the dollar store and encountered these eight skeins, and I picked them up while there. Even if it's just nondescript acrylic, the yardage was a good value. The color was bright and cheery, and I did what I do always now when buying yarn: I bought enough for a sweater.

And I decided that I was going to attempt the Perennial Peasant Blouse by Margaret Hubert, as I had been eyeing it for a while, and the construction is interesting enough.

And I don't trust that I have enough yardage, so I'm working a band in the midriff of the remaining yarn from the teal sweater I finally finished up for the cousin. And here she is, cute as a button, wearing this sweater... or I should say, the sweater is wearing HER!

 (For now) Here endeth the update-th.

Photo Dump: Vienna, Prague & Budapest

Normally, I have a plan to visit a local yarn store in whatever city I visit; however, this trip was not to be. No time. And by the time I did manage to eke out an hour, I went to the trouble of hoofing it about a mile, one way, to past not one, but TWO yarn stores, only to realize they were closed long before I even arrived at their door steps.

Better planning next time. And while I didn't NEED more yarn (who, afterall, truly NEEDS more yarn?), I enjoy bringing back something that I can later relive my trip, when the yarn finally tells me what it wants to be when it grows up.

Protip: For Wool-Walkers in Budapest "fonal" = Wool or Yarn. 

The solitary "craft-related" souvenir: Lace procured while in Budapest

 After visiting Prague Castle, I tucked into the Toy Museum in the castle compound and found these examples of lace work in with their doll displays.

MIA: Misc. & Traveling

Not much to post herein, other than more sweaters and such have been hooked (unsurprising), and I've done more traveling.

While January saw fit to provide me another opportunity to visit India, the end of April I was in Amsterdam, and the beginning of May I was in Belgium.

Oh, and I am registered to take a class at NYS&W in October, so there's THAT for me to anticipate:)

This tight crop of a larger Dutch Masters painting pretty much summed up my experience in Amsterdam. (Subtext: I found the city unenjoyable, mostly due to the chaotic crowds & outright lack of a decent food scene.)

While my overall experience in the city was unenjoyable (check out this video, as every item he lists that he hated about Amsterdam, I hated as well--I only wish we saw this video BEFORE our trip!), the hospitality at our hotel was above and beyond pleasant. 

No trip of mine is complete without finding a painting or sculpture of a pig, and this painting was hanging in the lobby of Hotel Fita. And, for me the saving grace was (after enduring yet another MEH! meal), a trip to a nearby yarn shop.

Here is the haul from Penelope Craft. Some locally sourced yarn, and a crochet book (yes, in Dutch!).  It's a good thing I planned on going to the yarn store for a visit. The Maharajah under-estimated how chilly it would be on this trip, and en route to the shop, we discovered a second hand store, Episode, where he scored two Izod sweaters for a total of $50 USD.

We did manage to take a day trip to Keukenof Gardens, and while I did not take many photos, this photo of a parrot tulip photographed much more remarkable than it was in person. No filter. Nothing special done to it. Snapped it with my cell phone camera. The color saturation was just lovely.

Things improved for me after we took the train to Belgium, where we ate a bucket of mussels at Chez-Leon, had some incredibly good pilsner (Maes), and ate our weight in chocolates (which we got at Galler in Brussels, and Chocolate Line in Bruges).

Here I am outside of one of the many lace shops that adorn the city. Perhaps on my next trip to Paris, we will couple up another visit to either Brussels or Bruges, so I can visit the lace museum, and then fill my belly with Waterzooi, and do some more things we managed NOT to do on this trip.

Here's another photo snapped just with the cell phone camera. No filter. No adjustments. Just snapped "as is." This pile of macarons were in the store front of one of the many sweets shops in the area. This one in particular was located in a shopping gallery near our hotel.

The above photo and photo below is the project I am currently working on. 
I am hooking up a shawl, that, IF I FINISH IT IN TIME, will be given to a friend, who I believe, is getting married at the end of the summer. She had ogled the yarn in my stash, so even if she doesn't wear it to her wedding, I know she'll enjoy it on other occasions.  I normally bristle at other people's patterns, especially ones that are not FULLY charted, given I'm a visual crocheter and much prefer charts to text--as indicated by my love of Japanese crochet books. The pattern is Piquant, and the yarn is Holiday Yarns Flocksock, which I'm hooking up with a D hook--so even though I am hooking up the smaller size of the shawl, it should be sufficient size once it's all blocked out. The picture beneath this one is a close up of the body of the shawl.

This last photo is a shrug of my own design, though I used the body portion of the Bella Shrug for the body of this one, and decided to do my own thing to finish it off for the shawl collar etc part of it. The yarn was Vermont Shetland wool I purchased at Northeast Fiber Arts Center, located in Williston, VT, which was bought during a vacation around Labor Day, 2014. It's a good thing and a bad thing I live so far from this shop! It truly is a remarkably well-stocked and unique shop!

I am now laughing at myself, as I look back at the beginning of this blog post. I thought I didn't have much to say or share, and thought I'd just do a photo dump of five photos, and before I realized it, this very nice blog post evolved. It's kind of like life, sometimes it surprises me. (Sometimes!)

I See London... I See France...

Literally. Yes. I was in Lodon. Yes. I was in France (Paris) last week.

Two crochet take-aways from the trip:

My travel project: Festival Shawl, by Lyn Robinson
Yarn used: some no-name handspun I bought while in Estonia last year.

Hook: Knitters Pride, size D.

Two souvenirs from Paris! :)

Actual dialogue exchange between me and sales clerk:

Me (in faltering French): I want to buy ALL the books!

Clerk (in perfect English): Is this a problem?  :)

The Long Awaited Post-Vacation Photo Dump

Before even MORE time elapses, I'm dumping my latest photos herein. Some are from my trip to Istanbul, Copenhagen, the Baltics and Russia, and some have been taken afterwards. Time is both, standing still, and moving too fast for me. Summer full of medical crap zapping my attention span. So without further ado. Oh yes, this post is ALL OUT OF SEQUENCE. It's not written in a linear fashion as it happened.

During our ALL-TOO-BRIEF visit to Istanbul, I was able to meet up with my friend Rengin, with whom I have been corresponding for years about our mutual love of crochet and creativity. So very blessed to have met her face to face. And so happy that technology is so advanced that we were ever able to meet in virtual reality in the first place!

We each had gifties for each other, and Rengin gave me a stunning scarf she edged in Turkish Lace/Oya, a lovely bar of lavender soap, and her mom forwarded onto me a lovely piece of lacework she made for me. And I, in turn gave several pieces/swatches of Bruges lacework I had tinkered with, I believe a bag, and some other items, and of course a small bar of sandalwood soap I had picked up in my travels to India a while back. GMTA!

On the left is a doily Rengin's mom made for me, and in the background is the scarf Rengin edged in oya for me. Both, truly beautiful items!

Istanbul was our first stop, where we were there for two days and a wake up before heading to Copenhagen for an overnight before our cruise.

I love the perspective of this photo. You get an idea of the sheer loveliness of the mosaics, without seeing the SWARMS of people around me. The place was packed, and the queue was quite long to enter the mosque. And also? Yes. That's the scarf Rengin gave me. I'll cherish it always.

While in Copenhagen (aka "Land of the $4 7-11 coffee, HOLY SHIT THINGS ARE EXPENSIVE THERE!), we ate Thai food nearly every meal (with one exception being the meal we ate at the Danish National Museum--well worth the trip!

We were in Copenhagen for an overnight before our cruise, and for an overnight after our cruise. 

Before our cruise, we visited Rosenburg Castle... here I am with my Knitty City bag :)

 And looky here... crocheted items on display! I believe this was part of the royal sleeping garments...(actually looks more like a combination of cut work and crochet...)

So we managed to visit Rosenburg Castle before our cruise, and managed to see quite a bit more of the city after our cruise. We managed to see the plaza near the City Hall, Danish National Museum, (one of the) statues of Hans Christian Andersen, as well as Tivoli. Sadly, I was not able to make a trek out to see the Little Mermaid, or to scope out a yarn store. Also during our stay in Copenhagen after our cruise, the Gumball 3000 car race was happening in the city.

 Here I am standing next to Hans Christian Andersen.

In an exhibit devoted to native and eskimo and what I guess is First Nation culture, were a few examples of fine detailed crochet work and even hairpin lace:

Souvenir bags for the two good friends with whom I meet nearly every week for our "sit and knit" get togethers. Kinder eggs and tea I picked up in Copenhagen, and Matryoshka patches I picked up in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Interestingly enough, I picked up the Kinder Eggs, some salty licorice, bottled water and a few other items at the Aldi pictured here, and also, WTF was up with that car? I still don't know what it was, other than a possible publicity stunt? I never did get around to Googling it in a timely manner. Perhaps I'll never know the genesis or meaning of WTFISUPWITHTHATCAR?

ETA: 7/17/13
Just Googled "crushed car near Aldi, Copenhagen," and this turned up:

It still doesn't detail what happened... though I haven't dug into the comments section. Perhaps a local person has commented about how this car was crushed etc.

I finished up my "Flying Diamonds" shawl, which I edged in the crochet edging from Doris Chan's "All Shawl." 

I finished Flying Diamonds by day three of our trip, just in time for our first port of call: Tallinn, Estonia.

Alexander Nevesky Cathedral (gorgeous!)

While in port, we shopped (of course) and I managed to buy a hand knit shawl, in what I believe to be a mohair blend yarn, and I also managed to buy about 200 gm of Estonian wool.

Not sure what I want to do with the wool; however, several weeks after our trip, I was in NYC and went to Kinokuniya to pick up this book, and perhaps inspiration will take the form of Estonian lace for the Estonian wool. Who knows. (Oh yes, I also managed to pick up a hairpin lace book, too. I'm on my way to a full dozen of these Japanese crochet books. Just love them. Charts are so much more comprehensible to me.)

Photo Dump

 Overview picture of the Flying Diamonds Shawl I have been working on for the last three days or so. Works up quick. Love the yarn I chose (it's a lovely yarn by Ella Rae).

 Close up of the design itself. Love the stitch definition on this.

 Here are the materials for a freeform/freehand Lorax I've been dreaming about...

Not sure if I've shared this picture before, but since I"m setting my table for New Year's Day with this tablecloth, I figured I might as well share it. It's something lovely I picked up in Croatia on one of my vacations.

Practical Souvenirs

Close up of a cushion cover I picked up
while in Kumarokom, Kerala (India), January 2012.

I think I'm going to dig thru my things and
share pics of crocheted souvenirs I have
picked up from my travels.

Next up: The table covering from Split, Croatia.