The end of an era

My flight to CA today marks the end of our BOS<->OAK run, it was the easiest cross country travel route you could imagine. Rarely a delay, always a direct flight, what could be better? Soon we'll be looking for the perks in the BOS<->FRA and routes FRA<->SCE (try to find that one!).

A fun haiku to mark the end of this adventure:

JET (BLUE) me to OAK
non-stop, personal T.V.
Red-eye back to BOS

And today's soundtrack? A throwback to the Eighties. Whenever I hear this song, it makes me think of the Goonies, and the Cyndi Lauper concert C & I snuck into our a few years ago in Berkeley. fun fun. enjoy*

What do you do....

when life steals your tires {AND WHEELS}?

no, not your wheels, your parents' wheels.




well, first thing's first, you think you're going crazy because you can't find the car. you knew where you parked it


but




that was after yoga, and sometimes yoga can make a person's brain go to mush.

so

maybe you parked it somewhere else...








but no, and after an hour you're still biding your time, waiting for the right parent to call... because,




you don't know the license plate number. who memorizes a license plate if they're just borrowing the car? oops.





finally, with license scrawled on paper, you call the tow lot. yes,

it's there...





but




you have to go to the police station to pick up the "release form". it's 11:00 on a Friday night, why not pay your pals, the cops, a visit?

last time i was in a police state? um, kindergarten field trip?





me, with release form in hand, "may i ask why the car was towed?"

cop, reading the police report {and chuckling} "your tires and wheels were stolen, AND your car's so light they had it up on milk crates!"




me : awesome.




so, what do you do at 12:30 AM on a Friday night? order some possum yarn.

Wednesday Soundtrack

But first ~ a finished sweater!

This was the great Christmas 2009 Roadtrip sweater. Then, it languished in the knitting basket, waiting for me to decide upon buttons and such.

I agreed with the comments, something natural was the way to go ~ I was thinking either dark wood or leather, but I have so many great buttons that I didn't really want to go out and buy some more... so the sweater sat in a clump while I mulled the options in my collection. Then, finally ~ I opened the one jar that's full of a mixture of unsorted buttons, and I found these perfect little guys. I'm not sure exactly what the material is {it's not wood or leather}, but it is that perfect dark brown color I was looking for, and my search was finally over. I like this sweater, but there are a few things I'm not too sure about::
-The yarn seems awfully stretchy, and I can't tell if the whole thing's going to start to droop over time
-In person, the ribbed button band looked ok, but once I saw it on these pictures, it looks a little too wide, and a little but funky near the neck... I may have to work on this, but I'm feeling way to lazy to go back and decrease the width. What do you think?
-I'm having such a hard time sizing sweaters. With the owl sweater, I wanted something snug, but not tight. I love the way it feels on me, but maybe it looks too small?... now with this sweater, I wanted to make sure the sweater didn't look too tight, so I purposefully knit it to match my measurements, but because of the aforementioned stretchiness, I think a bit of negative ease might have been a good thing.
-... and maybe I'm just over thinking the sweaters too much.


Enough of that, here's Pomplamoose! Um, they're awesome... what more can be said? They were interviewed on NPR last Sunday and I realized that they've never made it to the front of my Wedesnday Soundtrack list. It's time, enjoy*

black {grey} white

Knitting! Knee socks!
I started these at the very end of August, so I guess it's only appropriate that they stayed on the needles all winter and are finished just in time for spring. C'est la vie. I'll be sure to slip them on the moment there's a chill in the air.

I couldn't be happier with how they turned out. They're knit from the toe up, making it easy to increase up the calf without much guesswork. The pattern is Firestarter. I picked it because I loved the gusset increases and heel. This might be my new go-to method for toe up heels ~ it provides for a heel with much more wiggle room than the basic short-row heel, which can sometimes be a bear to get on.

Other than following the pattern for the heel section, I took liberties with most of the pattern:: I lengthened the cable repeats, spreading them over more rows than the original pattern because I wanted a longer cable repeat rather than a short and squat one. I also didn't do any of the ribbing where suggested on the heal and up the leg. And finally, I lengthened the leg ~ the pattern is not for knee socks. Once at the top of the leg, I knit and extra-long 1x1 rib {knitting the knit stitches through the back of the loop to keep the ribbing stretchy ~ a little tip I learned from the EZ videos!}
I was worried about them staying up, and I don't know how it happened, but these puppies are perfect ~ they are snug without being tight, and there's no chance that they're going to end up around my ankles like Olive Oil {yes, even though I love the olive oil style, mom}.

Continuing with the black and white motif, my schedule continues to keep me in front of the computer most days, so I'm back to night foliage, but I really can't complain::The magnolia's in Boston are in full bloom!

And finally, a bit of grey, for the aficionado in our house:: pants {jcrew}, shoes {aldo}, location {my favorite bathroom}

Have a great day*

For SF

After I read this post, I had to hear the song... on repeat, as usual when I hear something this good. So a day early, your weekly dose of music::

Thursday? I've done some spring cleaning and will finally show you those finished knits I've been hording!

Ahhh, did you notice? Spring's here! Unfortunately I've been spending 24, no, more like, 25-7 in front of the computer. It's so much screen-time that even posting some pictures seemed like a chore, sorry about that.

Anywho, back to spring {and knitting}. While the cats bathed in the sun, C and I took advantage of the nice weather last weekend to go on a little trek through the woods.

No adventure's complete without a few water obstacles. Some required a running start::
Others a bit of balance::
... take note of a couple of well-worn, hiking-appropriate knits {paired with footwear not meant for swamps!}.


And the next day? it rained.




AND, you don't think that's all the knitting do you? I finally have some long-overdue finished projects coming up. Stay tuned; I'll be back.