dessau and shetland

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

  photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

i am a little late in sharing this cowl, a sample i made for carrie bostick hoge back in december. dessau cowl is a fair isle cowl in quince & co.'s lark (peacock & belize). i love this pattern (and wool), it was so much fun to knit, and infinitely wearable.

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

 i don't know if i was more excited to have the opportunity to knit this for carrie, or that my daughter would be one of her models for this collection. yes! this is my girl! i know i shared before, but now my girl is wearing what i knit in the photos, extra extra exciting!  hannah rose met up with carrie in brooklyn, where hannah lives, for the photo shoot.

 photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

she played with darling immie!

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

and posed in gorgeous knits (she did not want to take off), this stunning sweater was made by my oh so talented sweet friend nicole

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

photo courtesy of carrie bostick hoge

we are so so grateful for all the incredibly beautiful photos of our girl. a good experience all the way round. 

for more on the dessau cowl, raverly notes here. for all of madder made patterns, go here.

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i've been reading reading reading, all about the shetland islands. for a trip i'll be taking there in a few short months! dear knitters, or anyone interested in travel, history, wildlife, birds and of course wool! it has come to my attention that a spot has opened up on this grand adventure to the shetland islands with gudrun and mary jane! there is room for one on the trip for summer and room for four on a second trip that has been added to include wool week in october. to tempt you further, here are photos from a movie i've been watching filmed entirely on location in shetland. called 'the edge of the world'. if you think you might be interested in coming along (yay!) please contact gudrun here.

joining with dear ginny

HOW KNITTING SAVED THE DAY

yesterday, my darling grandson had a commercial to film, his mama was working so i had the honor of taking him. soon after camera's started rolling, one of the producers shouted 'stop!' he then ran up to travis, said excuse me, and pulled off the baseball cap trav was wearing (that they had provided). he said 'this string is driving me crazy'. and he began trying to pull off stray pieces of thread from the cap. immediately realizing the folly of his action he hollered again 'i need scissors!' that prompted all four commercial makers to turn on their scissor radars and begin searching.

can you guess where this is going? i had been sitting and watching and knitting. and being really really quiet (as i'd been directed). i thought to myself, i have scissors. speak up lori! 'excuse me. i have scissors'. oh! they exclaim! grandma has scissors. rushing over (time is money!) i snip snip snip the offending threads and production continues. i suppose i could have named this post grandma saves the day too, hee hee ;)
happy spring weekend everyone!

KNIT. HIKE. BIKE. SHOP. BIRD. PHOTO. REPEAT.

greetings! 

hello! i hope you are well! lately around here...

~  i've been using my phone a lot for photos. i found an attachment for iphone, that might be good substitute sometimes for a camera. it's a 4-in-1 lens system, including a fish eye, wide angle, 10x macro and 15x macro. have you used anything like this? would you recommend it? here is the link olloclip.

~ spring has arrived to california's central coast, the weather has been extremely lovely. i've been hiking and bike riding, and beach walking and gardening. first roses bloomed this week.

 ~ my grandson is in santa barbara magazine! he and his friends (travis is the blonde on the left) and the skateboard park they frequent. favorite designer heidi merrick is on the cover and featured inside, oh this dress and this one. yay heidi and travis!

~  sparrows and house finches are dining at the 'window cafe' (our blue bird feeder) all day long! i'm pretty sure i saw an indigo bunting, hoping to see it again!  these are such tiny colorful birds, the finches a deep rosy red. sometimes 3 or 4 sit on a nearby fence waiting their turn.

~  chuck and i collaborated on an article, it came out last sunday in the los angeles times. we both had 2 photos, one of mine has yarn :) this was a first collaboration for us so very exciting, more to come... :)

~ i made a shawl, a gift for a dear friend, for her upcoming trip to greece and turkey. it's the shetland lace triangle in jade sapphire lace weight cashmere. it took just about 450 yards. the skeins are 400 yards apiece, so i've just enough left of the second to make a very sweet pattern. and the pom pom yarn is now knit up, that was a patience tester. i think it's going to be a pillow, maybe...oh! and i've been collecting wool for the last few months for a long term project. it's all here now and i can start!

~ and little by little making preparations for scotland and the shetland islands. flights and accommodations are booked. we ordered a new bag, it's called the 'black hole' ,a wheeled duffel that has more room than anything i've ever owned. chuck calls it the 'black hole for cramming in yarn'. yep.   :)

and from cape town, more africa here (this is the last article), thank you lara and tamlin!
have a good week dear friends!

low tide

there was rain! it fell all through the day and night, it came with wind and fell in sheets. power was lost at my work on friday, forcing an early closure. thank you for your messages of concern, we are not near any of the mudslides (scary). here at the coast we received about five inches and the back country almost ten! hopefully there will be more march and april showers! today the sun came out (kind of) and the waves came up. chuck surfed and i tidepooled. the rest of the weekend was spent unraveling a sweater i made almost two years ago, and have not worn. now i have a new pile of wool! have a great week ahead, xxxxxxxx lori