Tuesday, March 31, 2009

SALE!

Oh, neglected blog. More posts to come, soon - completed but unposted projects include the climbing vines pullover and a fully-lined Elizabeth (which sadly, I can't find now). Some works in progress include: a modified Elaine's Blouse, Shalom Cardigan, and the impossibly intricate, gorgeous, but pain in the butt Eva Raglan Pull. Side note and a quick FYI to all people who love discount yarns: there's a sale going on at Knots and Bolts until midnight tonight - you can get your project staples like Cascade 220 for a little over $5 - woohoo! Not as cheap as Knitpicks, but I find Cascade pills less, at least for me. It's time to stock up - in times of recession, every little bit helps. Cheers!

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Busy As a Bee

For some reason, it's been feeling like Holiday Season - a lot of running around, many project started and stopped, minus the good food! Part of the ADHD has to do with my recent foray into social networking - while I do dabble in the smaller, more specialized networking sites like linkedin or ravelry, I avoided myspace and facebook like the plague... that is, until about a month ago, when someone twice my age invited to me to join. Ick. It was a slide into the inevitable. The lure of Facebook is understandable - within a matter of a week, I had reconnected with people that I haven't spoken to since grade school. It was a very strange thing. I am still ambivalent about it, but the lure is understandable - perhaps it's because people are naturally curious beings? Lately the posts that people have been writing about relate to their current jobless state. With so few friends in finance, I hadn't seen much of the effects of the current economy, but now it is starting to become apparent in the non-profit sector as well. To add to the depression, I recently went to Coney Island, which was closed because developers wanted to build condos on what they viewed as prime real estate at the time. The beaches are devoid of people in the winter, which is to be expected, but the colorful tackiness of Coney Island was all fenced off, and/or torn down and destroyed to make room for McCondos. On a brighter note, I have a number of projects that are in various states of completion - more follow up pics to come soon!

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

The Yarn Tree

I never liked going to yarn stores in NYC much - they tend to be overcrowded, and the regulars who dominate the knitting tables are a little intimidating. Perhaps that's why I've been drawn to stores not centrally located, and therefore harder to access; my yarn store of choice this past year has been Brooklyn General, but I didn't get to go as often as I would have liked, given my job in the Bronx - by the time I get there, it's usually closed, and then I have to transfer three trains to go home empty handed (sniff)! This weekend I went to the Yarn Tree for the first time with a couple of friends and I think I've found my match! Although the yarn selection isn't as big, the hours are geared towards the working folk - 4 to 9 pm on most days - how lovely! The woman at the store was very friendly, and the one person knitting in the back of the room did not have a crazed look in her eyes. Plus, there was a dog in the store, sleeping on a little ledge in front of the store. All good signs. The store is located in a remote part of Williamsburg, and tricky to get to - the J, M, or Z will get you there the quickest, although I think it's possible to take the L as well if you want to walk. The upside of walking is looking at all of the random graffiti on the walls of buildings. It's more like art than graffiti though, I think...... so after being taken in by the neighborhood and the shelves full of woolly goodness, I ended up buying 665 yards of fingering weight alpaca. I was very excited to make a sweater out of this, but now I am starting to think that this is still not enough. Now I have to go back before they run out of that dye lot, and I know I'll end up falling in love with something else and end up buying more yarn. Ugh! The vicious cycle of buying and stashing begins...