129 Plethora of Patterns

At Pearl Fiber Arts with Bonne Marie Burns
Listen here.

Latte: Karen is working on Vivian by Ysolda Teague. She is shaping the sleeve in seed stitch in a way that makes the increases invisible. Very impressive!

Abby has done a lot of knitting on Color Affection, and is almost finished with Brickless. She has no socks on the needles - ack!

Karen's Vivian Sleeve

Brewing: Abby feels like Dr. Gemma of the Cogknitive Podcast, who sounds like she wants to knit everything right now, and that’s how Abby feels, especially about shawls! Abby is looking forward to starting a pair of socks using the Fish Lips Kiss Heel (which is fun to say!) using the self striping sock yarn she purchased at OFFF. Abby’s also looking forward to knitting Bonne Marie Burns’s Alby from ChikKnits. It’s a great holiday knitting project that only takes 245 yards of yarn!

Take a Bite: If you had one or more hours added to your day to do whatever you want, but you need to add something new, in other words, you can’t say “more knitting time” or “more spinning time”. What would you do with that found time? Karen would like to learn a few languages and how to smoke meat. Abby would like to design knitwear and learn to play the saxophone. Her inspiration was Lene Lovich. How about you? What new thing would you do with more time?

Lene Lovich, saxophone inspiration

Coffee Cart: Abby went to Pearl Fiber Arts with the smart, talented and charming Bonne Marie Burns (Chicknits). Pearl is a great place to go for locally indie dyed yarns. Rachel of Wanton Fibers was having a trunk show and a skein of Prodigal Lace (50/50 Baby Camel and Silk) caused Abby to have what Fairy Godmother Mary refers to as a “retail accident”. Abby plans to make Stephen West’s Tripartite from this luxurious yarn. In passing, Abby mentioned that Chicknits and Ysolda Teague sweaters are some that she trusts implicitly. Karen also feels this way about A. Karen Alfke’s patterns.

Abby also talks about Community Warehouse, a fantastic Portland organization. She is going to participate in this year’s Chair (and table) Affaire. 

Sofa: Abby recommends (again) the documentary about New York Times fashion photographer Bill Cunningham. On the recommendation of Linda Holmes of the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast, she began watching The Good Wife, which, so far, so good (no pun intended). Abby also is reading Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan and is loving it.