Fiberly One

We discovered the Clackamas Repertory Theatre four years ago, in it’s second season, when we saw the best production we’d seen (even better than off Broadway) of I Love You. You’re Perfect. Now Change. Since then we’ve subscribed and haven’t been disappointed.  Last night was no exception.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is an ambitious undertaking for this small production company in a relatively small venue, but it was done brillantly.  I’m not a theater critic, so I’ll leave that to those who are, like Holly Johnson of the Oregonian.  Suffice it to say we LOVED the production—so much so, we are going back next Friday, when we’ll sit in on the Actor’s Forum after the performance.

The show runs through next weekend.  And at a mere $22 per ticket, it’s an entertainment bargain.  Even if you don’t live in Clackamas County, the Osterman Theater at Clackamas Community College is easy to get to—take I-205 to the Molalla/213 exit—and well worth your time.

Go see A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.  I’m sure you’ll love it!

It was a busy Tigard Knitting Guild meeting for me.  It was my month to arrive early to help with set up.  It was my month to do a small presentation on lace, the theme of the year.  It’s half year so new members can join for half membership fee, so as treasurer I was very popular (6 new members). And at the last minute I was recruited to help with the Twist Collective fashion show.

I was thrilled to finally meet designer, blogger, and mom to Panda and Thea, Marnie MacLean who emceed the show.  She’s posted pictures.  Check it out.

A girl can’t have too many skirts

I’ve worn this skirt several time since finishing it in May. It was one of several pieces I cut from stash fabric to coordinate and it is the same fabric as the tank I made earlier in the month. It’s from the same New Look 6470 pattern. I love it!

I started this second Elderflower skirt (Ruth Sørensen design) in March in stashed Crystal Palace Maizy yarn. I didn’t actually look at how much of this sock weight yarn I had and started knitting away. This pattern is designed to be knit with any weight yarn and doesn’t specify amounts. I didn’t have enough. Fortunately it’s not an old stash yarn and is still being sold. Two orders and two months later, I finally finished it.

Working through the stash, I chose some Fiesta Yarns Meteor, a rayon/cotton ribbon yarn. It was a risk since the pattern called for 720 yards and I had 700. My stash made the body of the skirt and off to the internet to find one more hank. As luck would have it, not only did Webs have the yarn in Jamaican Spice, it was on sale. The pattern is Kira K Designs Sawtooth Skirt. The skirt is stockinette knit in the round (fast!fast!fast!); the lace border is knit separately and sewn on.

Gifts

In May, we headed to Black Butte Ranch to spend the weekend with Dianne and John. We went in to nearby Sisters and the Stitchin Post the local fabric and yarn shop. Dianne, an avid cook, liked the aprons featured. She picked out the fabric and pattern and I offered to make it for her.

In March we celebrate Dianne and Tom’s birthdays. In June/July, it’s John’s and my turn. In anticipation of our trip to Hawai’i later this year, I found a nice tropical fabric that wasn’t too garish and made John a shirt for his birthday.

What better thing to do on my birthday than acknowledge a friend’s day?

Early in the month, Tom and I took a quick trip south to help Amy celebrate her 30th. I’ve finally pulled out the camera.

It was a busy month for our San Jose friends, but we were fortunate that Cam was able to break away and have lunch with us at Armadillo Willy’s in Cupertino. It was well over 20 years since last we met in those Apple days.

It’s not a milestone birthday, so I’ll just spend the day with the man I love and my charming pups. I’ll probably do a little knitting, maybe some sewing, and possibly learn how to edit movies on my new iPhone – or not.

On Monday, I popped down to the Bay Area to spend a little time with Fiberly Friend, Diane. We started with lunch at Caffe 817, a nice little cafe in downtown Oakland.

Next it was to Piedmont Fabrics. Diane had been meaning to visit the shop earlier; I guess that’s why I really flew down. Maybe not. There were some lovely fabrics, including some Liberty cottons. In Lucky magazine, Diane saw a man-tailored shirt in Liberty cotton for $300. Aren’t we lucky that we can sew? We each took some home to make our own shirts for considerably less than $300. Diane suggested we see who gets her fabric made up first. Ha! That will be Diane, I’m sure.

We spied Piedmont Yarn & Apparel as we were looking for fabrics, so did a quick stop there. They had some usual and unusual yarns, including locally dyed yarns, one of which came home with me. It’s fingering weight superwash merino.

Our next stop was for a cookie break at Sweet Adeline Bakeshop. Good oatmeal cookie, but I still like mine better.

Our time was running short, but as fate would have it, I got an email that my flight was running 25 minutes late, so we had time for one more stop.

Now one could got to Berkeley and spend the day looking at everything in Lacis. Instead we spent a half hour and I come home with two cool little notions for my knitting tools bag—a small maginifying glass, since I don’t always have cheaters with me, and a neat little yarn cutter.

The day went by too quickly and to the airport we went. Fortunately OAK isn’t too busy in the early evening, and we able to prevail on the security guy to take our picture.

Good day spent with a good friend.

Before the summer Interweave Knits arrived a couple of weeks ago, I had already picked out a “must-knit” pattern–Annie Modesitt’s Luminarie skirt. KnitPicks CotLin yarn was ordered for another skirt project, but this one seemed infinitely more interesting to knit–and it was.  I love enterlac and lace, and I love skirts, so the pattern had my name all over it. All in all it was a pretty quick knit, since I “knit backwards” instead of purling.
 
 
 

April was the month for starting more thing than I finished. I spent several days deciding on patterns and fabric, laying out fabric and cutting patterns – the part of the sewing process I really dislike, so I do as much at one time as I can stand. The idea was to take one piece of stash fabric and see how much I could make from other stash fabrics that would coordinate.

The first of that effort was this cowl tank from New Look 6470. The fabric is a Fabric Mart purchase from who-knows-when. There was enough for a skirt and, from other fabrics, I cut a different top and a pair of pants.

The realization that Mother’s Day was just a few weeks away prompted me to pull out the beaded fabric I’d bought for my mom on a trip to Mexico. I consulted with my Fiberly Friends, on what kind of pattern to use and decided on McCall’s 5668. It took some days to prepare, since it had to be cut one pattern piece at a time to make sure the beads were placed off seam. Then I had to cut off beads on the sleeve and lower back and sew down any loose beads. I also decided to line the jacket and had to make lining pieces. Here’s there result.

On an episode Knit and Crochet Today, they featured the cutest baby booties that I knew I’d make and the birth of Carolyn’s grandson, The Little Prince, was just the excuse I needed as a diversion from the larger projects on knitting needles.

February was a bust for finishing projects because I just wasn’t in any one place long enough to focus on anything. But March was a different story: in addition to the birthday gifts and jacket, I was also able to start and finish three things in just the last week.

One
I received my copy of Mother-Daughter Knits by Sally Melville and Caddy Melville-Ledbetter and loved several patterns, but settled on the easiest to start. Begun on Thursday and completed on Friday: the Reversible Tank—knit in KnitPicks five balls of Shine Worsted yarn, .

Two
It’s spring, but it’s still cool in the mornings so I need to wear a hat on our mostly-daily walks. I wanted a neutral hat, and found Foliage on knitty.com. Two hours later it was completed in time for the morning trek to Starbucks, out of one ball of Series M Cuzco Peruvian Highland Wool – a very old stash yarn.

Three
And finally (for the month), there’s the Drop Stitch Lace Tank from Fitted Knits: 25 Projects for the Fashionable Knitter by Stephanie Japel. A three-day project that knit up quickly from even older stash yarn – Sunbeam Cotton Classic, I picked up in London on our second trip which was sometime in the early nineties. I will make a comment about this pattern and book: the pattern was extremely easy, but the book/pattern editing was pretty bad. Be sure to check out the many corrections from the book at Grampyre Knits site before you start anything from this book.

On to my next knit project
I’ve started Elderflower skirt by Ruth Sørensen out of Crystal Palace Maizy that I found at Purlessence in Sunnyvale two years ago. I made the skirt last year our of another stash fingering yarn, but made it too large in the waist. This time, I took the time to take the knitting off the needles and measure. So foward ho!

With so much traveling, February was a bust for getting anything completed. I’ve done much better this month. Of course, I had incentives, since it’s birthday month for Tom and Dianne.

Three – no, make that Four shirts for Tom
I was hoping to have more shirts for Tom because I had lots of free time in Puyallup and my sewing machine, but I didn’t bring all the pieces to the cut out shirts, so only one got finished. But there was still time, so I did get two additional shirts done to give to Tom on the day.
  

As we have done the past three years, we celebrated the two March birthdays Sunday night, so it seemed occasion for one more shirt.

For Dianne
First there was the cute gift. I saw the pattern in the Jan/Feb 2009 Crochet Today! and thought of Dianne, who always serves tea after dinner.

Two years ago, we traveled to the Big Island of Hawai’i with Dianne and John. We had a great time and decided it’s time to go back. We look forward to the trip in October, and in anticipation of that I made Dianne a new swimsuit top. But since I forgot to take a picture, you’ll have to use your imagination. Here’s the top that I made for Dianne before the trip in 2007 and the fabric for the this year’s version.
 

And for me
In my stash was some white Calmer that I ordered for who-knows-what. I had used some for the I Do shrug a couple of years ago. The Air jacket in the Rowan Calmer Collection called to me so and in December Lamb’s Ear Farm had a sale on Rowan yarn, so I ordered the “white” yarn – without looking a the color number. You can probably guess that it wasn’t the same “white.” While my yarn was truly white (”bleach”), what I ordered turned out to be off white (”drift”). And my yarn, I found out, was discontinued. After much searching online, I found it at a shop in the UK, but they only had 3 of the 6 balls I would need; the balance I found at Alaska Knits. And still I came up short – just. So one more ball was ordered and I finally finished the darn thing. Had I had all the yarn, it would have been a surprisingly quick knit. I think that may be a property of the yarn; the I Do shrug was the same.

My last post was all words. This will be a few words with pictures, to continue on February.

What I bought

Generally on trips, Tom and I stimulate the local economy, but I’ve been restrained mostly because, as you may know, my collection of both fabric and yarn that goes way beyond SABLE, and there just isn’t room for more stuff till I get some sewing and knitting under my belt.

At Madrona, it was the last day and I hadn’t made a single purchase, but a $5 certificate was burning a hole in my pocket and Just Our Yarn yarn isn’t readily available locally. Just before we packed up the car to head south, this was my choice. Almaza lace weight yarn in a colorway of plums, greens, and blues, with a little brown thrown in.

In San Jose, Tom picked up a couple of bottles of single malts – one from BevMo and one from Trader Joe’s. We visited Purlesence in Sunnyvale, but I wasn’t inspired, so walked away empty handed. Again, it was the last day, and we were meeting Margie and Ted Easter for lunch in Campbell, so we stopped by Green Planet Yarn, where it was a hard decision, but I chose this Mirasol Baby Alpaca yarn, as my trip souvenir.

It was a big market at the Sewing Expo in Puyallup. Since I was resolved not to buy fabric I passed up Vogue Fabrics, among others, several times, but I did come home with two books
 

Four DVDs

One pattern (which is much cooler than the pictures would suggest)

And some vintage buttons from Nifty Thrifty Dry Goods

Sewing related, but not sewing…I also purchased my copy of the local ASG chapter’s cookbook. I worked on the project and it includes Tom’s “Meatless” sauce and my tried and true recipes for ginger cookies and southern biscuits. You can buy a copy too. Contact Barbara to get information on ordering.

Who we saw
  
Maria, Bill and Chris

    
Dinner at the Cronins – Thomas and grandmother Connie, just Thomas, Ann, Joe, and Dave

    
Spending time with the Walkers – Thom and Jane, and Mego and Nalla