train rides & yarn shops
Each Wednesday, I take stock of the projects I’m working on.
Train rides are great for knitting. And long leisurely train rides with beautiful sunrises, through snowy winter wonderlands, curled up inside a warm train (with no wifi), can get you almost all the way through the raglan increases on your lace weight sweater.
Portland has been amazing and does it have a ton of yarn shops! I mean, I knew there were a lot (mainly the reason I came to Portland) – but there are a whole fuck ton, and all of them have their own personalities – which is lovely.
There are stunning window displays, and super friendly shop dogs, and walls of cones of yarn, and cardboard sheep, and amazing needle felting, and local dyers galore, and, and, and…
Luckily, most shops are heavy on the fingering & sock weight yarn, but have pretty small selections of lace weight (which is thoroughly a blessing in disguise).
knitting by a pool in January
Each Wednesday, I take stock of the projects I’m working on.
KNITTTTTTTTTIIIINNNNNNGGGGGG!!!!
(by a pool).
(in January).
(and then picnicking).
(outside).
(without freezing).
(California has it’s perks).
(it’s also got some great yarn & fabric shops).
(which is not a perk – it’s a necessity).
Of course, there are also botanical gardens
& parks
& walks
& museums
& charming shops
& stunning street art
& cute restaurants
& meeting up with amazing people.
But I’m suffering from photo overload again this week.
So in the mean time, knitting.
photos, stories, sharing, and swatching
Each Wednesday, I take stock of the projects I’m working on.
I’m pretty sure I spent more time sorting through photos for this post and trying to whittle my selection down under half a dozen – then I’ll spend writing it.
I’ve taken hundreds of photos in the past week and a half. Some of them are ending up here, some on Instagram – but mostly they’re organizing themselves into stories & collections.
But the problem is, they’re not organizing themselves into chronological stories – the kind of stories that can be told while they’re happening. The photos I’m finding myself taking are organizing themselves into pattern-like stories – patterns in street art, and plant forms, in architecture and color, and funny street signs.
These are the kind of stories that can only be told after the fact – when you can get perspective, and see all the dots, before connecting them.
All that said, I do want to start using little stolen bits of time (waiting for coffee, or for food to come) to start sorting and sharing – before I get to the end of this trip, and find myself faces with an overwhelming number of thoughts and photos.
(Oh! And I also started swatching for a new sweater – looking forward and starting to plan for two 18 hour long train rides, from Oakland to Portland and back).
