Another Successful KDO, Another Successful Heel Turn.

Day 2 of Knitter’s Day Out:

7:30 am:  Left the house an hour before my first class, fearing that I’d get stuck on I-81S again.  Thankfully, there was absolutely no traffic at that hour, which consequently made me 45 minutes early to campus.  Made my way to the classroom and thought I’d knit on the Norfolk Ramblers a bit, but instead, chatted with other early birds until class began.  Shadow Knitting was a lot of fun, and easier than I thought.  It might be a little tricky for me to create my own illusion patterns, but at least I’m more familiar with the technique now.

11:30 am:  Lunch!  Gotta hand it to the KDO Organizers, they treat their students REAL WELL.  The food was excellent!

12:00 pm:  Strolled the Market again.  Went back to some of the vendors from last night to chat with them and take some pictures:

Sweitzers Countryside Yarn Shop:

Beautiful display - rustic and homey, it just draws you in.

Sweitzers had their yarn in Mason jars... I love it!

Fluffy U Fiber Farm:

These artisans spin yarn from the fleece of animals on their farm. No artificial ingredients!

Don't believe me? All of Fluffy U's yarn was labeled like this. Personally, I love knowing exactly what kind of wool is in my yarn.

Dancing Leaf Farm:

DLF has the most gorgeously dyed yarn. Wish I had a LOT more to spend at the Market today...

Dancing Leaf also had these needle felted scarf kits... wow!

Alpacas of York:

This is Sheri from AoY, carding some alpaca fleece. At least I think this is carding. I never saw it done like this before!

Alpaca of York roving. Makes me want to attempt the spindle again.

I also had a picture of Gerry from Dyed Bright Here, but for some reason I’m having trouble downloading it.  We chatted as she spun some beautiful pink and gray roving that her daughter dyed.

1:00 pm:  2nd class, Crochet for Knitters.  It was so nice to be in a room full of smart, talented knitters who, like me, knew NOTHING about crochet.  Some of these crochet stitches were confounding at first, but I got a lot of practice during class, and I think I can single, double, and triple crochet with the best of ’em now.  Not planning on giving up the knitting needles for a hook, but VERY glad I took this class!

4:00 pm:  One last stop at one of Central PA’s most revered yarn vendors to buy some sundries, then… home.

All in all, a very successful KDO.  Many, many thanks to the organizers for all their hard work and dedication to this conference – I truly hope they know how much they are appreciated.

And now… back to the Norfolk Ramblers:

Since I refuse to allow this crazy heel turn to defeat me, I decided to do some research. Turns out that this pattern is describing a Welsh Heel, which creates a pocket that’s more square than the commonly-knit round heel.  The YOs in this case don’t create holes in the work, which is what I had assumed would happen because… that’s what YOs do.  Create holes.  Decorative ones, for lacey things, as I’m sure you know.  Maybe when I first tried this heel turn, I misread the instructions or something, because my 2nd attempt was much better:

See the cool "seams"?

So yay!  Moving on to the heel gusset… oh, and my Tilli Tomas Symphony Lace is on its way!

Flood vs. KDO.

So I’m sure you’ve heard by now that my hometown is having quite a day.  The remnants of Tropical Depression Lee hit PA hard – rivers and creeks are overflowing their banks as I type, and evacuations have been ordered.  I’m fortunate that I’m living in a part of Harrisburg that won’t have to evacuate, although my basement is in danger of flooding if my sump pump fails.  It’s happened before. It’s not pretty.  My heartfelt sympathies to anyone who’s dealing with floodwater in their homes today.

The Sunken Gardens in Riverfront Park, Harrisburg, are living up to its name.

As I listen to the news, and await some friends-turned-refugees who are spending the night, I’m wondering about the Knitter’s Day Out conference, scheduled for this weekend… located just outside of flooded Wormleysburg.  I haven’t missed this conference since I started knitting, and I know I won’t be the only devastated yarnie if it gets cancelled.  Happily, the website says it’s still on… but, y’know, that could change.  Sigh… nothing to do but wait.  I hate waiting.  So… time to figure out those crazy YOs on the Norfolk Ramblers…

Any updates on KDO or the flood, please feel free to post it here, and I’ll Tweet and/or Facebook it.

(is Facebook a verb yet?)

 

* picture by Scott Detrow

OK, I Get It Now.

No, not the heel turn with YOs on my Norfolk Ramblers socks… I’m still figuring that out.  And no, not whether I’m going to knit the Lace Jacket holding Symphony Lace single or double… actually, I haven’t picked up my needles since earlier this week. Why, you ask?

Facebook.

Stop laughing.  There’s a good reason why I’m the last person on Earth to join the madness.  It’s very simple, really:  I’m a Java developer/Web designer, and after spending 8 hours a day staring at a computer screen, the last thing I want(ed) to do was go home and… stare at a computer screen.  Also, I really valued my anonymity, since it’s such a rare attribute in a world of reality shows and social networks.  I figured if someone really wanted to find me, they would.  I mean, I’ve found plenty of people using Google and Wikipedia alone.  Takes time, but it’s not impossible.

My downfall started with Twitter.  Believe it or not, it was kind of a revelation, with all the info that was zooming at me.  It was exciting, and fun, and look!  A link!  Taking me to… yikes… Facebook.  Someone’s wall… which I couldn’t see, because I didn’t have an account.  This happened so many times that finally, and with much humility, I caved and signed up.

Two days later, I’m making plans to spend a weekend in NJ to visit some high school friends that I haven’t seen or heard from in years.  A happy reunion, courtesy of that which was ridiculous and frivolous to me only a week ago.

Alright, alright… I get it now.