Author Archives: Queen Bee Knits

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About Queen Bee Knits

Living in Maine, knitting, baking and loving my family. Please be kind!

My Maine LYS

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In Maine, the yarn scene is so much richer than in Central Florida. There are all sorts of fiber farms, most of which spin their own fibers. Many of whom sell at local yarn shops. My LYS when I’m here is the Yardgoods Center in Waterville.

The Yardgoods Center has been in business for more than sixty years. Before Joyce and her brother owned it, their father was the proprietor. Half of the store is wall-to-wall fabrics, a sewer’s paradise. The other half (and where I spend my time) is yarn (and a little bit of stamping.)

Yardgoods Center offers classes almost every day that it’s open … and more than one class on some days. They are open six days a week – Sunday is their day of rest. They have a huge selection of yarns and should be able to please just about anybody. From the relatively inexpensive yarns to the very expensive … beads, notions, needles. It’s pretty amazing! They have a big wall of sock yarns, novelty yarns, and always several bins of sale yarns that are at least twenty percent off. If you take a class, you enjoy a ten percent discount on anything that you buy (a good time to plan your next project!)

I’ve attended a class on Wednesday nights for several years. I have also attended once on Tuesday night (when I thought it was Wednesday – no wonder I didn’t know a soul!) and just took a class on Friday afternoon. The teachers and students are friendly and you can get help with any project … or the teacher will suggest one for you.

The only “weakness” that I can find is that their technology is not always up to date. Blog is currently stalled since February. When you click on the classes link, no classes are listed. Facebook is seldom updated … at least from the yarn side. Maybe they can hire me to do that for them!?

If you’re ever in Waterville, I highly recommend the Yardgoods Center.

Yardgoods Center, Downtown Concourse, Waterville, Maine

Monday through Saturday 9:30am to 6:00pm

Like them on Facebook

Knitting with Friends

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Camp Smedley – From the Water

We have our first house guests (maybe I should call them “camp guests” since this house is really a “camp”).

Our friend Bob comes up with kids each summer and the kids keep on growing. They’re fun to watch around the lake each year and it’s interesting to witness the excitement that they get when they’re “let loose” at the lake.

Coffee discussion this morning centered around what it is that one of the kids likes about fishing. Talk amongst yourselves….

We decided that Bob was probably “right” in his observation that the joy of fishing is in not knowing what you’ll get. The adventure of the hunt. Walking through the grass and finding a snake or up on the railroad tracks and finding a long-dead porcupine or dipping a hook into the lake over past the boathouse and waiting for the thrill of the first underwater tug. The joy of the unknown? Would that that joy continued into an adventurous spirit in adults rather than fear!

Meanwhile, I’ve had lunch and attended a knitting class with a new knitting friend. My post about the Ravelympics was picked up by a reporter for an Olympics News-related website and I was asked to respond. (Little old me?!)

On my needles … my tunic sweater is growing again after its too-large frogging. 🙂 I really love knitting with my Signature needles. The cord is so flexible. Much more so than the other needles that I have. I’ve finished my first Maine Lobstah sock and must admit it’s a tight fit … not sure if I’ve knitted it more tightly or if the yarn is a bit heavier than typical sock yarn but they’ll be fun. Sock number 2 is cast on and a new WIP. I’ve decided to pull out a few of the older projects and yarn that has been in my stash for a (long) while. I’ve cast on the Gaia Shoulder Hug shawl by Anne Carroll Gilmour. It’s a simple lace design knit in Noro Kureyon Sock (or Silk Garden Sock) and the lace/eyelet rows are knit as the colors transition. The color way that I chose is difficult to knit with as the color transitions are so slight. But, I’ll finish it this time … if for no other reason than to do it. And, last, I’ve pulled out my mohair lace yarn to cast on the lace scarf that I had attempted years ago. I’ve done a successful cast on as required in the pattern and I’m ready to try the pattern again.

Bought a bit more yarn the other day, too! (I don’t know what to say, I can’t seem to help it! Must be just like I wrote above … the wonder in the discovery!)  Ron Miskin had another surprise purchase (with an excellent discount) on The Buffalo Wool Company‘s Facebook page. And, I’ve had an order from that wonderful grandma who won the socks give-away. A little hat and mittens for her grand-daughter for the holidays! More goodness to come! Blessings are all around me!

Gone knitting!

USOC Attorneys Attempt to End the “Ravelympics”

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I just found out from a Facebook and knitting friend that Ravelry is under fire by the USOC.

Here’s a link to the letter written by law clerk, Brett Hirsch.

http://www.ravelry.com/discuss/for-the-love-of-ravelry/2189293

Seems that the use of the “ympics” part of the word “Olympics” MAY be an impingement of the USOC’s exclusive right to use the word Olympics. An obvious blend of Ravelry and Olympics attempting to “falsely suggest a connection to the Olympic Movement” Are you kidding me? This is ludicrous and surely these attorneys have better ways to spend their time than trying to intimidate a bunch of knitting/crocheting crafters and artisans who are, in actual fact, having a little competition of their own in HONOR of the Olympics.

Is not imitation the highest form of compliment?

So, knitters, beware! Do not ever dare knit the Olympic rings into your hats or afghans. They, too, belong to the USOC. The word “Olympics” is not allowed in your pattern titles or posts. The USOC attorneys have nothing better to do than to pick on us as we attempt to stretch ourselves and have a little bit of fun as a community during the Olympics.  (By the way, as we were knitting we were also WATCHING the Olympics.)

While, at times, a bit tongue in cheek, it is certainly not meant to be disrespectful of the athletes. They are all winners by virtue of their participation in the Olympic games.

Gone knitting … with a bitter taste in my mouth.

Frustration Strikes!

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Yes, it did strike today … and on more than one level. Kind of like the s#%t that hit the fan a couple of days/posts ago. Many little annoyances … placed carefully in one day so that I’ll appreciate the easier days, perhaps?

I had gotten pretty close to done with the back of my Dropps tunic. Only to realize today that I was making the XXL size rather than the XL. I’m simply not an XXL. So … without further ado, I had to frog it. Had to. There was no way to finagle it to be right without a battle. I’ve pulled my beautiful green Signature needles out again and have cast on the proper number of stitches for the XL tunic and will get back to where I need to be!

I did finish the fingerless mitts that have been languishing in my project bag for ages. I think they were started way back before Christmas when I was making oodles of fingerless mitts for an order. These were made with Lana Bamboo by Cascade and they’re really pretty – will go well with denim as they’re a lovely mottled blue color way. I am pleased with the pattern even though I didn’t care for the needles that I used (at least for the second one). Nor did I mark the pattern well when I knitted up the first mitt so that I made a couple of matching errors on mitt number two. No matter, I frogged a few rows and started again so they were “right” and they matched each other.

The “throne” at our Maine house has been malfunctioning this summer. It’s been “out of service” for several days. Today I was told it was finished and ready to be used again. Discovered that it’s not really and will have to wait until Thursday … in the meantime, I guess I’m grateful for the upstairs bathroom!

Company arrives Thursday and we still haven’t gotten a new vacuum – well, we did but it didn’t suck. Literally. It’s been returned but the house needs vacuuming NOW! 🙂 Maybe we can get a new vacuum with suction included tomorrow. I don’t think our blankets will be back from the dry cleaner in time for their beds. Sure hope the weekend is warmer than it’s been so they don’t miss them. Antique wool blankets are wonderful but they do have to be cleaned once every decade or so. LOL!

Please don’t notice the dirty/old stove! Thanks!

I did make a successful breakfast food – pull-apart cinnamon bread. It looks pretty good and I hope it tastes equally good. I was in the way in the kitchen but dinner was also on the table at a decent hour. With construction and dogs and all that has been happening in this house over the last few days, it’s a miracle that I can get anything accomplished.

If I could see in the dark, I’d be going for a bit of a walk tonight to walk off the frustration. For now, I’m not knitting. I’m just done. Maybe it’s time for bed.

 

Fathers’ ? Father’s? … A day for Celebrating and Remembering Dads!

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Everybody has a father.

My father had a father …

He looks like he was the penultimate lawyer (and I think he was an excellent patent attorney). He was gone before I was born so I never knew my father’s father. He must have had a more relaxed side, too … here he is resting while my grandmother does the dishes on a camping trip in Rye (NY?). I think we’d have called him “Grandfather”!

My mother had a father …

This is Grandpa Jack making up a bouquet of pussy willows. I didn’t know him either. He was gone before I was born. Mom was only 14 when he died and her younger sister was four. Oh, the stories about Grandpa Jack! He was a milk man and at one time drove a horse-drawn milk truck. He must have been an entertaining guy … here he is wearing a woman’s bathing suit! (Nice legs, Grandpa!)

I had a father …

He was a really great provider and a dedicated gardener. He was a handsome guy! I remember loving to be out in the woods with my dad. Puttering – picking up sticks or trimming bushes. He’d cut a branch of a birch tree that smelled like root beer. Or a big green leaf that smelled like skunk. He almost always had a cigarette in his hand. He would bring us to church (“I see the steeple” would win a penny) and sit in the car and wait to pick us up, reading his Sunday paper and smoking cigarettes. He had a running battle with the squirrels in the back yard who would rather eat bird seed he put out for the birds than the corn he’d put down for them. Mostly the squirrels won but Dad seemed to enjoy the exercise! He loved Maine and was quite a good photographer. He always came in from (snow-) blowing the driveway covered head to foot in snow and stamping his feet. He always rubbed Nouki’s belly at the top of the stairs as he went up to “change” after work. He cried when he had to finally put Sam to sleep. It was the first of two times I ever remember seeing him cry – the second was at his mother’s funeral. He would buy my the pink pistachio nuts that stained our fingers if I went with him to the store. Sometimes on Saturday, I got to go with him to work – and we ate lunch out of the machines at the automat in his building. It was a treat to spend time alone with him because it didn’t happen often. Dad drove American-made cars, mostly convertibles. I remember a Sunday drive with the top down when Jeff was a baby and a cloth diaper (burp cloth) flew out of the car … we all laughed and drove on. He liked coconut ice cream cones at Ho Jo’s and eating fried seafood at Burt’s. He always wore a suit to work with a white shirt and tie. He called me, “monk” (short for monkey). Oh, how I’d love to hear his voice today. Memories are comforting and there are many. I was lucky to be his little girl.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad. I still miss you all these 27 years later.

Gone knitting.

 

We’re Growing! It’s a … ?

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In late December I will become an aunt again. My younger brother (my nearly-Irish-twin brother, sixteen months my junior brother) and his wife are having a baby! Their first.

The last time one of my brothers’ had a new baby, it was my youngest brother who has not quite hit the big 5-0 yet … and his youngest is into the double digits!

My brother and sister-in-law have waited a long time for this baby (relative to their chronological ages) and it’s going to be a great occasion when he/she is born.

So what does that mean for our family?

Joy! Growth. Gratitude. A reminder of what is really important!

While we have had our relationship ups and downs, we’re all “older” enough that we realize how lucky we are to have each other. We all have friends who have lost family members. We have all lost our parents. We cherish every minute together and we make time to be together. As you may remember, we’ve added a new brother and sister and their respective families into the fold in early 2009 and we’re still reveling in that new addition. We’ve added two great-nephews, too. And now, again, we’re growing!

Family means the world to me. In a perfect world (at least in MY perfect world), we’d all live within a short walk of each other. But the world is far from perfect and we’re spread all over the map (U.S. map, anyway!) California, Louisiana, Arizona, Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, Ohio, Florida … none particularly close to the other but today we’re closer than ever. Because I’ve not been working for someone else, I’ve been privileged to travel to each of my brothers’ homes and to my children’s’ homes, too, in the last year. Last summer all the brothers and their wives and some of the kids and one of my kids and their dogs all took part in the Messalonskee “Camp Smedley” R&R week. 13 people, 8 dogs. And we hardly ever left the campus!

This new baby will join aunts, uncles, cousins, fur-family, grandparents … a couple of generations of family who love him or her already. Just because his/her parents love each other and because we all love them. That’s what family is about, isn’t it? Loving each other as we are and holding each other up when we’re down. Leaning on each other. Accepting, sharing, laughing, making time to be together.

Gone knitting!

 

s@%t!

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Well, we’re up to our eyeballs in it!

A summer home on the lake is lived in for a few months a year. We were here last summer for five months – a rare gift of time in a very special place. This year, we’ll be here two months. Between the times that we’re here, many little critters call it home. And those critters leave feces. Yuck! So, when people move back into the house, cleaning has to happen … especially in the kitchen but I’m a bit of a clean freak and I like to clean all over because we have dogs and I don’t want them eating yucky stuff. I had a miniature panic attack/meltdown when I finally decided to clean the bottom cabinets in the kitchen. Thank goodness N. took pity on me and finished the worst part for me. Ugh.

Mouse-infested before ... clean now!

And then there’s the age of the house which contributes to its awkward angle on land. The house is about 100 years old and it’s been sinking on its “fishing camp” (negligible) foundation for 99 of those years. So, you walk into the house, up over a rock, down into the bedroom. Up over a rock, down into the bathroom. Don’t drop anything in the living room that might roll … or you’d best be ready to chase it toward the lake!

View over the septic tank

The result of the sinking house is that the septic tank doesn’t work properly and despite having had it pumped three times in the last 12 months, we had some lovely water in the shower. And now we’re having a new “platform” added to the bathroom (we will have a true throne) so that we can “fix” the problem. (Long-term fix is lifting the entire house up about 24 inches and putting a more sturdy foundation under it … at a frighteningly high price tag and with a huge permitting question as the “new” set-back is over 100 feet from the lake front.)

Throne in progress! And you thought I was kidding?!

So, there you have it – we’re happily (most of the time) dealing with s@*t …

Gone knitting!

Finishing and Starting Over Again

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The other day it was miserably cold and rainy and we were beginning to have a bit of cabin fever. Late in the afternoon, however, the weather changed and we had a lovely double rainbow on the other side of the lake. Clear. Colorful. Perfect in every way! And then the rain came back with a vengence.

I liked being reminded (thanks Mother Nature!) that every day is a new opportunity to start over again. Sometimes we get to start over more than once. Life is full of choices – the question is whether we make an effort to start over … or not.

When I got home after four days on the road and on the run, I was exhausted and a little bit cranky (hard to believe, I know!) When I found out that my daughter went to bed at ten, I didn’t feel quite so badly that I went to bed at nine thirty. I started over several times in those couple of cranky, tired, sensitive days.

I’ve been able to start and finish several knitting projects, too. Started a pair of socks with my Maine Fiber Frolic “Maine Lobstah” sock yarn. Loving the way it is knitting up – bright and so lobstery! FInished the cute little sweater for the baby-to-be also in bright rainbow colors – perfect to start a new winter season in! Finished the “Lakeside Log Cabin” baby blanket with a crocheted edge to give it a really stable, finished-looking edge. Started and (almost) finished a couple of loads of laundry today and have been enjoying the sunny day and an opportunity to sit on the front porch (aka my Northern Atelier) in the sun and cool breeze.

I like the idea of starting a new day every day. Giving myself a new opportunity to pursue my dreams. I still dream of owning a yarn shop. A place that is warm and welcoming and has two little dogs to greet customers. Where I can teach knitting and be surrounded by the fiber that I love so much. I’d love to learn to spin and teach spinning and maybe even weaving. One day maybe pottery too (.. what a mess pottery would make in a yarn shop!) But certainly it will be a place where my personality is infused in every corner – happy, warm, honest, sincere, always learning, full of love. I also dream of traveling in my RV – doesn’t have to be huge or fancy. Just warm and safe.

So, off I go to finish some projects and to start some new ones. Every day I am learning more about myself and just how little I really need to be content in my own skin. I keep simplifying and it’s all good!

Gone knitting!

The Roadtrip Reason

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My son, my “baby”, graduated on Saturday from University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music. That makes three college graduates! Yay!

The graduate and his Broadway-bound big sister!

P.S. We didn’t know what the red sash around his neck was for either … turns out he liked the way it looked and “borrowed” it from his friend! That’s my boy! 🙂

Road Trip! The Kindness of Strangers

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My grand-dog, Mabel, always happy to ride in the car!

This weekend, I put a lot of miles on my daughter’s car, took some long subway rides, knitted in public and watched my son (my youngest child) graduate from college.

I wanted to blog really badly when I arrived in New York at my daughter’s apartment. But didn’t bring my laptop and was sure NOT going to attempt a blog entry on my phone. So, now that it’s not as fresh, I want to mention that I was struck by how many people on the uptown A train (express from Howard Beach to 190th Street) were kind to each other!

When I lived in New York and was pregnant with my first child, I remember long train rides, standing. I was the size of a subway car for goodness sake … and nobody seemed to notice my balloon legs and Omar-the-tentmaker “dress”? But I am happy to report that kindness (and manners) are alive and well in 2012. A gentleman in a suit got up and gave his seat to a woman with a tiny baby on her chest (in a baby carrier – get your head out of the gutter!) Another man gave his seat for the woman’s little girl. An older lady nearly fell into the lap of a woman seated. Rather than copping an attitude, the lady helped her sit and said it was “no problem”. It was sweet to see! I’d likely have written more if my mind was still fresh but alas, it’s not!

Thursday plane, train and subway from Maine to my daughter’s apartment in Washington Heights (Manhattan). Friday a ten-hour drive from New York to Cincinnati. Saturday brunch, graduation and dinner. I also managed some knitting in public both on my son’s porch and at Starbucks! Sunday the return ten-hour drive from Cincinnati to New York – with a lovely traffic jam only five miles from my daughter’s apartment that delayed our Tony watching for over an hour! And today, subway, train and plane back to Maine! Lots of travel for a momentous occasion … my last child’s graduation from college! That means three have successfully completed four years of college and they all are employed! I am one proud mom!

I made a lovely new knitting friend at my gate this afternoon. I believe it’s safe to say that I have never met a knitter I don’t like! She’s from New York State and was heading to Maine on business. On her needles a shawl (pattern had no photo … brave soul!) and in her suitcase, a pair of socks in progress. A woman after my own heart! Her 401k is being earmarked for yarn while her husband’s will pay for retirement. Hey, a girl on a fixed income has got to have a stash of yarn to knit with! I say, that is mighty good planning! We had a great chat and agreed that when traveling we both plan and pack our knitting first!

As nice as it is to travel, I will be happy to sleep in my own bed tonight. Listening to my little Lola snore. I am grateful for friends who open their houses to this Queen Bee and for precious time spent with my children. Tonight I’m too tired to even download photos. So, suffice it to say, I’m not knitting … but I’m going … to bed! 🙂