favorite things

knitting, camping, christmas

winter weather, 

piper

these are a few of my favorite things :)

(beautiful photo by carrie bostick hoge, poor upload by me)

and this! Madder anthology 2/simple pleasures

a new knitting book by Carrie Bostick Hoge,

 available for pre-order january 12th. 

all 17 patterns in the collection are on ravelry now, see them here.

i can not wait for this book, the photography, the knits, every design is stunning.

and. 

this is my girl on the cover. 

:) :) :) :) :)

xxx lori

happy new year! 

south : : north

back again! i hope you are well and enjoying the season! it is truly autumn here, after a (too warm) spell, we've finally settled on perfect shawl wearing weather. i've taken a couple adventures, met lovely friends, saw amazing things, would you like to come along? again, no camera, only iphone photos were taken. maybe it has been all the travel of late, but the need to go light came first....

i am on the pacific surfliner train, heading almost six hours south to san diego

sitting + watching + knitting + coffee = BLISS

california agriculture

the reason i am in san diego

my girl {and her love} we now live in the same time zone.

we worked all the day, stopping for beach breaks and an occasional meal (YUM!)

 her commute has changed some. 

these two. they drove me back home. and also, hannah taught matt to knit.

we had my girls baby shower, i made her a sleeping sack and gave her a small book that was her own as a child. 

time to pack for the next adventure. going north {my current work in progress still on the needles}. 

met lovely friends, kathy, karen, gudrun

we shopped {homestead seattle}

glassybaby

salish lodge

we ate delicious meals and drank delicious drinks {photo of my own personal shoulder singer courtesy of gudrun} :)

and froze

and visited tolt yarn & wool!

celebrating tolt's one year anniversary. on saturday morning there was a line down the street, happy knitters waiting for the shop to open. it was an experience unlike any i've had before. the beauty of place, the warmth, kindness of people, welcoming atmosphere...left me near tears

{it was incredible to meet so many beautiful friends from blogging and instagram}

rachel, an instagram friend and 'tolt' ~tia! 

{photo by kathy cadigan}

 lovely anna dianich, owner and proprietress of tolt and veronika of yoth {yarn on the house} in the middle. it seems that living in washington makes one beautiful sweet and extremely kind.

{photo by kathy cadigan}

karen and i with the charming and delightful tif ~ dottie angel

 sweet lisa and her bunny (wearing it's own mini hap shawl) she made

and paula works here too! hi paula! ((((hug)))) we were roomies in shetland :)

thank you miss kathy for all the incredible hospitality {puff cloud x 10}

so glad i did not set off your alarm {#sorrynotsorry}

thank you anna

and now no more traveling for a bit, waiting for my new grandbaby 

to land on earth, any minute now!!

thank you for coming along, and always for leaving such kind words,

xxx lori

alegria ~ heaven

hello! how are you? we are back from our northern california adventure|getaway. in a previous post, part one and two happened, this is part three (favorite part!). we celebrated our wedding anniversary staying at our favorite bed and breakfast, alegria oceanfront inn and cottages.

 big river beach, mendocino

~ alegria inn ~

 we stayed in the driftwood cottage

 indeed the most charming place we've ever stayed on this continent. alegria has several cottages to choose from (that is the hard part, how to choose?) and a few rooms in the main house as well.

the driftwood gives a feeling of coming home, even though we don't have our own loft

bedroom, wood burning stove, private garden and a kitchen with a hand hewn wood table...

some of the ways we celebrated while in mendocino...

went sea glass hunting, found lots of treasure on the beach right out in front of alegria!

 saw the extremely photogenic Point Cabrillo Lighthouse

 wandered around town. across the road (behind me) is the 'love bench'

where couples sit and take in the spectacular ocean view

(no photo because it was always occupied) :)

visited the mendocino yarn shop

 watched the many migrating or wintering birds. {anna's hummingbird}

walked along the trails ~  mendocino headlands

stood among favorite trees, navarro river redwoods (a short drive from mendocino)

ate delicious organic breakfasts at alegria, complete with (stunning) ocean view

 collected treasures

a wonderful coincidence happened! this is one of my favorite knitting books,

'shear spirit' by friends joan tapper and gale zucker. 

gale,  photographer of the book, told me the lovely girl in the brown hat on the cover,

is the innkeeper's daughter (of alegria) 

and gale had stayed here while shooting the mendocino part of the book.

 eric and elaine, owner's of alegria were tickled to know this and said to 

say 'hi!' gale! 

and treasures for one reader of this blog. 

oh my goodness i found a lot of sea glass on this trip. the surf came up and there was even a little stormy weather. perfect sea glass collecting conditions. i found a book at the gallery bookshop that seems very helpful in finding your own treasure. it's filled with sea glass collecting tips. 

i'm giving away 'the official sea glass searcher's guide' and the sea glass shown here,

and a post card of alegria, to show where the treasure was found.

 to either add to your own collection, or start one.

{a small way to say thank you for all your kindness}

giveaway begins now, happy november 1st! and will end tuesday november 4.

leave a comment with an email, if you would like a chance to win

open to the world 

good luck everyone! 

mendocino links in this post:

alegria oceanfront inn and cottages

point cabrillo lighthouse

mendocino yarn shop

gallery bookshop

visit medocino