Big hurrah! I’m back in Canada! (Not that I haven’t enjoyed the States, but you know that you’re ready for home when the Canada Custom’s sign at the airport makes you a little bit weepy. Am I the only Canadian who thinks that it’s totally charming the way the customs people say “Welcome home” when they see your Canadian passport? They must have trained ’em, because they all do it, and I find it touching every time.) I landed in Vancouver, and couldn’t have been happier.
First thing, I found some mountains for Margene.
They aren’t the biggest ones, but they are the edge of the Rockies (Which are plenty big) and I think they stack up ok.
Next I found my hotel (The Granville Island Hotel) which had an awesome view of the sea village and the bay. Granville island is interesting (well, for lot’s of reasons) because it has no provincial affiliation. It isn’t in BC or any other province, it’s Federal land, and is simply in “Canada”. My friends Ingrid and Andre took me to dinner and we had the lovliest time. The restaurant overlooked English Bay, the weather was perfect, the company fabulous and the food and wines (from the Okanagan Valley) were beyond compare. Andre and Ingrid – I can’t thank you enough for making me at feel at home.
The next day I made a crash landing at Urban Yarns, where the sock laughed itself silly at the really neat sign the store had knitted…
Neat, eh? I took a picture of the staff too…
they are laughing because I asked them to squat so they weren’t blocking the shot of the Fleece Artist kits behind them. (What? It’s good looking yarn.)
From there it was on to the Capilano Library, put together by Mary at 32 Books, where the room filled just as the librarian was starting to mutter something about “fire code capacity”. Personally, I think she was just freaked out by the knitters.
There were so many bloggers there that I couldn’t hope to name them all. Shout out in the comments ladies, and we’ll click on your links! I did meet Amy/Indigirl and company,
which was a star struck moment for me, since I’m a big fan of her designs.
After, I hooked up with Angela, who fixed me up with some fab dinner companions,
There’s Sherpa-doug, Angela, Me, Lynne (Who owns Knitopia in White Rock. I am in awe of yarn shop owners. I don’t know how they don’t keep it all.) Fran, Mel, Pearl (who knit me a wool-pig that is simply to die for.) and Sivia Harding (who I tried hard not to gush all over. I think I played it pretty cool.)
Pearl was responsible for unlocking a yarn shop later that night to show me the biggest carder I have ever seen.
I lay the sock on it for perspective
see it there? Quaking in it’s DPNs? The tiny little sock just at the bottom of the drums, just behind all the fibre going to it’s doom?
Pearl also showed me and the sock the BALES of wool who have a date with the carder. I felt dizzy. (Probably the wool fumes.)
What is wrong with me that I don’t think this is too much wool? Do I have some sort of defect that lets me look a this enormous mountain of wool and think “There’s a start”.
The best thing, however, that the sock did was go to the Capilano suspension bridge. (We have to thank Angela and Photographer/sherpa Doug for these pictures. I was shaking too badly to do it myself.) The bridge spans 450 feet over a gorge and sways rather alarmingly.
It’s not that scary crossing, until you decide that you might think about letting go of the edge. (Also? I would have liked someone to make sure that everybody didn’t stand on the left side of it. I kept being worried that for reasons I couldn’t imagine, all the people on the bridge would stand on one side and the whole thing would flip over.) Here the sock dangles 230 feet above the gorge…..
The astute among you will note that this means that I stood 230 feet above the gorge and looked over the side. (Thank you. You support means the world to me. I’m five feet tall, and there’s a reason for that. It’s really how far off the ground I’m comfortable being. I don’t have an unreasonable fear of heights, but I do have a very reasonable fear of FALLING VERY FAR ONTO ROCKS.)
Here, the sock daredevils it.
(and I look nervous, note that my left elbow is holding the bridge very tightly. I know it’s difficult to hold onto things with your elbow, but I managed to just about make a fist.)
and here…my piece de resistance.
Me and the sock, doing our thing 230 feet above ground about halfway across a nauseatingly swaying wooden suspension bridge. (There was wind too. Did I mention the wind?) I look odd because every single muscle in my entire body is completely in spasm and I am sort of sweaty and shaky. Note the wide stance, not sure what I thought that would help. I. Am. Not. Holding. The. Bridge.
Teri? This is my entry for the Extreme Knitting Contest.
Today I am in Edmonton (Wondering if the West Edmonton Mall is extreme….Anybody want to go with?) I’ll see Edmonton Knitters tonight at Audrey’s Books at 7:30. I’ll bring the sock. I’m going to lie down now.
Sigh. I think I’m in love with the giant carder.
You Go Girl!!!
Whoa. Ok, the bridge is now scaring me! I so wish you could make it out to Arizona. I could show you the Grand Canyon, you know. No bridges crossing it, though.
What I love is not only that they’ve trained ’em to say it, but to make it sound as if they’re saying it to you for the first time, as if they are really, truly glad to welcome you, and only you, back to Canada…
You need to take the sock to the New River Gorge Bridge in West Virginia. 876 feet to the bottom of the gorge. Third weekend of October is Bridge Day, when they let the public walk across the bridge, and let BASE jumpers and bungee jumpers have a time.
It is an awsome site.
Steph, you’re killing me. Killing me, woman! Dangling that poor sock all willy-nilly like that over that footbridge. With those little slippery metal DPNs holding precariously onto each stitch… Killin’ me!
Did you get your certificate for successfully crossing the bridge? I have my certificate….I don’t think I’ve worked harder on anything in my life….except maybe socks.
http://thetravelingknitter.blogspot.com/
eek! Did the sock have a heart attack being dangled off the bridge???
There’s a roller coaster in the West Edmonton Mall, just saying…
So what are you going to do when the tourtourtour is all over? How is Mr. Washie going to keep a sophisticated world-traveler, such as yourself, occupied and satisfied?
Another tourtourtour for the new bookbookbook, mebbe?
Gee, that bridge is giving me the creeps even off the screen!
Last winter, when we did a complicated custody drop-off in Vancouver (phone call to Tel-Aviv; thus spake the ex-husband: “meet me at 4 PM on Friday by the slides. In Stanley Park. Vancouver. Canada. I’ll be flying in, you only have to drive there.” – I count seven border crossings to get everyone involved to those particular slides. It’s a nice park, though.)
After we did the drop off (ex was late) we had a nice night, and the next day we went to Chinatown and found out about the history of racism along the West Coast and then it rained on Daniel and Rose as they crossed the bridge. 27 times. She got her certificate stamped every single time.
Me, I stayed at the hostel and read. I don’t think
I would have enjoyed the sight of my girl doing that. In the rain. Eeeek!
My stomach was lurching about behind my belly button and the soles of my feet were tingling just looking at those photos. I’m a wimp when it comes to heights.
All I can imagine when I look at that bridge is that scene in Indiana Jones (I think it was Temple of Doom) when the bad guys cut the suspension bridge. I think he used his whip to get out of that mess. At least you would have had the sock yarn to save you!
Bah! I am sure you could knit a better bridge.
GAH! I used to LIVE in Edmonton! I went to University there! All I can hope is that one of my best friends, Angela, makes it there in my place. She darned well better! My Mom is hoping to go see you in Winnipeg (4 hour drive for her – not bad!).
PS West Edmonton Mall is extreme in December, and if they’re holding Canadian Idol contests. Seriously. The only thing wrong with it is that it has no yarn shops, although it does have a fabricland. Sorry Stephanie!
Heather, the Grand Canyon has no bridges, but we could take Steph up the road a bit to Lee’s Ferry, where the Navajo Bridge crosses the Colorado at the beginning of the Canyon. It’s concrete and steel, though, so no swaying. Almost 500 feet over the water.
Bungee-jumping socks,who knew?
I would still be locked in a soundless scream, if I had not been laughing so hard at your statement that you were almost able to make a fist with your elbow.
I’ve done it with my knee, but not so much my elbow………….
You looked over the edge? LOL – you sound exactly like me and every single tree top walk I’ve done. That is one big carder, and Lynne knows how to spell my name 🙂
Okay, you want to hear my bridge story? (Fair warning,this is not for the squeemish) My sister-in-law has a brother who is a State Policeman. He was making rounds over the Cut River bridge and saw a tripod sitting there on the bridge, and no one around. He did, however, see the bottoms of a pair of boots when he looked down. He went to check and found a very short upside down body…and a broken camera lying nearby. That always gives me the shivers, I could just imagine grabbing for the camera….
Bravo! I hate that bridge and I’ve live my whole life in Vancouver. I went over it with a death grip on a friend muttering the whole way. He was afraid he wouldn’t get me back over! So Hurrah! for knitting in the middle I’d pass out!
Yowsers! Brave woman! They would have had a real hard time getting ME there!
If those dpns had gone through that carder, would they have come out like Habu Textiles’ stainless steel yarns?
I once told my FIL something about my fear of heights, and he promptly launched into telling me of the footbridge like yours there that used to run across the Potomac River at Great Falls (rocks, waterfalls way below, you get the picture) when he was a kid. His uncle took him to go walk across it. It was very old, not well kept up at all, and the wood had begun to rot. The planks went sideways to the ones in your picture. Dad stepped on one that crumbled under his foot and fell into the river way below him, and the two of them panicked the heck out of there back to the Maryland side and home. And have told the tale now for 65 years with great glee to all the up-and-coming generations. The footbridge got closed down and dismantled immediately after that. (I’m betting his uncle called someone in the Park Service.)
i think that the librarian was probably not scared of all the knitters. in fact, if she is like myself and a number of the librarians with whom i work, she was more concerned that her branch manager would catch her with her own half-finished sock in hand, rapturously enjoying your talk, while not assisting the children playing “runescape” on the internet…! though i can imagine the tremors of fear about fire code in an overcrowded room stuffed not just to capacity with knitters, but with their wool, bringing the flammability quotient extremely high!
By golly I think you’ve got it…they ARE mountains, real mountains and the best mountains (the Rockies)!!
I admire your ability to stand 230′ in the air, on a bridge (it was swaying, right?) and knit. I bow to you. You win the extreme knitting in my book!
Oh, I’ve seen a carder that big before. In an outbuilding behind a residence in downtown SLC. That’s all I’m sayin’.
Glad you made it to the bridge. The sock looks so relaxed although the DPN’s look pretty jittery!
EDMONTON? NOW?!
You won’t come to Chicago, and now you couldn’t wait until my vacation in October to do the Harlot tour in Edmonton?!
*weeping, weeping*
Looks like quite the simul-blog fest in that there library!
Good for you for not only letting go of the siderails, but managing to smile while on that bridge! I’m beginning to think the Sock Protection Services folks might need a quick call though. I mean, the giant carder and being dangled over a suspension bridge on the same trip? Poor wee thing. I hope the groupies took good care of it when it got back to the hotel.
Kudos for knitting on the Capilano Bridge. My hand stayed glue to the rail all the way across and back. Nearly didn’t make it back, but my husband held my other hand to reassure me.
That’s the most terrifying picture I’ve ever seen on a blog! Did you really lean over to take the picture? You are SO brave!
Well you did better than me on that bridge. I made it as far as the end of the treetops and stood paralyzed for a period of time before I meekly retraced my steps and perused the gift shop. I have no regrets whatever that I was unable to cross as I am sure fear itself would have shortened my life by at least a few years.
I agree the RainCity Grill is fantastic, it was 12 years ago and I still remember.
I get sniffly thinking about entering Canada too … but not for the same reason. I got married at the Granville Island Hotel last spring. Hoping to get to see more of Canada some year soon.
Someone asked if the sock had a heart attack when being dangled over the bridge. I think the more appropriate question is, Did it shit the bed?!
I went to Vancouver on my honeymoon. We went to the bridge. As we tried to cross it (very slowly, gripping the rail very firmly) there was a little boy running up and back and up and back making the whole thing swing and shake so much I was ready to toss him over just to save myself.
I hear you. Consider your entry entered! I’ll post soon. And I totally understand about hanging on for dear life with your elbow. I’m afraid of heights, too. That why I used to rockclimb. Go figure.
Hmmm, brave sock and really brave Harlot! Glad you’re glad to be home, but we’ll miss you here in the USofA.
You are the bravest extreme knitter, though a friend of a friend (or wife of a friend of a friend) knit while in scuba (diving) training.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/puckstop/28927139/
She took her yarn underwater… Into goodness knows what. My only consolation is that it looks like Red Heart instead of Rowan.
BTW, Edmington Mall is the largest Mall in North America. For those of us who are a bit geographically challenged, that trump’s USA’s (part of North America) Mall of America in Minnesota. I think it qualifies as extreme… Any mall with a hotel qualifies as extreme in my opinion.
You say you managed not to gush when you met Sivia Harding well I’m sure I gushed when I met you last Sat at the Cap. library. It’s like you’re a celebrity or something.
Hey Harlot — It was gemly meeting you in Vancouver. I’m glad the rest of your visit here went well, and am especially glad that you got to see the behemoth carder. When I first saw it, I had an irrational fear of walking beside it. I LOVE me some Birkeland Bros — heading there tonight for the Knit-n-Pearl night. I’m certain there will be much talk of the Harlot Visit.
Oh intrepid knitter! I am in awe of your public display of bravery. I used to tell people I was afraid of heights, but then I corrected myself: it’s not heights I fear, it’s falling. There is actually a difference. I went to the Grand Canyon and was fine peering over the edge, but the moment I started to hike down into the canyon and there was no guard rail on the stairs, i panicked and turned around. You are a marvel. The sock? Well, there are no words.
I LOVE THAT BRIDGE! Even though I hate heights, and the first time I was on it, some little snot of a school child bounced on the end, so it rippled alllll up and down the length of the bridge, making everything very…interesting. Ah, Vancouver. My favorite close-by-yet-in-another-country city.
I had serious post-Harlot letdown Friday through yesterday. Thankfully, my sock and I got through the blues, mostly because it is very red, and cheerful making, and I can’t wait until I finish a pair for ME.
Ah, the joys and the wonder of knit bloggers. The intarweb is the best invention EVER!
Never have I seen such courage…
Extreme knitting…the reality show…My money is on you.
🙂
You are too brave! I’ve crossed that bridge once under the delusion of being strong and super (which I am not) and now I never have to cross over again because I can be all, Oh I’ve done that, yea it was fun but I need bigger adventures and sound all cool. I do have to be careful though, if my best friend is around, she tells everyone about the screaming, the knees knocking together and the FEAR! You, however, are brave!
I demand a picture of the divine wool pig!!!!! (please?)
That librarian was crazy. I’m a moderately large guy, obviously a crazy American from the moment I open my mouth to ask where the knitters are, charging into the library a half hour late because I spent way too much time in line at the border, and she actually tried to convince me there was no room left in there. Geeze. Like a room full of yarn could be a fire hazard or something.
Oh? Really? Never mind that, then.
I’m well glad I drove up to see you after Work ate my chance at seeing you Thursday in Seattle. Thanks again.
Margene is a person? I thought Margene was a cardboard sign.
Vancouver is my most favourite city – love the pics. And, I hope you enjoyed the wine from the Okanagan. Since I live in the Sunny Okanagan, I love our wine choices.
My elbow feels for your elbow. It would be holding on for dear life too!
I am impressed. With you and the sock’s bravery.
You are my hero. That, my friends, is extreme knitting.
I’d take Capilano bridge over W.Edm. Mall *any* day. But good for you for doing both!!
That bridge is just way too scary – you are much braver than I! 🙂
I got queasy just looking at the pictures of you and the sock on the bridge.
You’re fear of falling is perfectly legitimate.
Shudder.
Now that sock there is one brave….um, thing?
I’m wondering, though, could the sock get an entry in “extreme knitting” for quivering in front of that big ole carder?? I mean, we all know what COULD happen to the poor thing in there…
There is an amusement park here in VA that has a replica of the Eiffel Tower that you can go up- once I was up I had a death-grip on the girder nearest the center that noone could break! Yea, you for being so brave!
Now see here. Enough impugning wool as a fire hazard. Wool is fabulously safe with fire — it smolders, is extremely difficult to make burn. The librarian was much more frightened of getting in trouble with the fire marshal and having her room shut down. Ask me — we had to run a Harry Potter party in a library room fresh from being busted for overoccupation.
But the fire marshal would have given the wool his blessing. It’s them cellulose fibers you have to worry about. Another good reason not to knit cotton.
oh, I love Birkeland bros! I went there once on a holiday to Vancouver. It was so nice. I bought a drop spindle and some corriedale and tried spinning for the first time. I met Pearl too. If I go back sometime and see her again, even though she doesn’t know me, I’ll probably gush “Oh I was reading on the interweb, you met the Yarn Harlot! You’re famous! Both of you!”
Also I used to live in Edmonton. Whyte Ave trumps the mall, I think. But maybe the mall just Has To Be Seen.
oh yeah… I love coming home to Canada too. The customs officials’ welcome, along with coming home to a country I really do love and miss while I’m gone (no matter how great the trip was), makes me all mushy.
I think I understand now how you lost that one sandal at that other hotel…..
Like you, I’m short, and, also like you, I don’t have a fear of heights, but I do have a feel of falling! Glad to hear I’m not alone in this.
Thanks again for making the trip to Vancouver! It was a great experience and definately worth the trip over from Vancouver Island.
I’ve never been to the bridge but I can second the comments about not being afraid of heights just of falling from them. Congrats on being a more extreme knitter than I am.
i totally love that customs dudes say ‘welcome home’ coming back into canada.
Great meeting you at the library! You have great natural comedic timing, and I don’t believe for a minute that you can only be funny about knitting.
You were so gracious to thank me for my patience waiting in line – that’s what I learned from knitting. Right, eh?
Sandy from Tsawwassen
Stephanie – thank you! For years I have felt like I really SHOULD visit the Capilano bridge – if for nothing else than to confront my fear of heights. But now that you have done it, I can live vicariously through you and the pressure is off!
the first wool piggie went to urban yarns.
the second wool piggie stayed home.
the third wool piggie had veggie-fare at rain city grill.
the fourth wool piggie had none.
and the fifth wool piggie cried wee-wee-wee all the way across the Capilano suspension bridge!
excellent adventure you’re having dudette.
Ye gads! I would not have gone on that bridge. Kudos for bravery, Harlot! Also, being short has no direct relation to the fear of falling: I’m six feet tall and I have nightmares about it…
Wide stance makes perfect sense. May not be holding the bridge up, but is definitely stabilizing your miniscule body mass so YOU don’t fall off a swaying bridge. Body mechanics at work to ensure the continuation of the species!
Ah! You are making me jealous! My DH and I just got back from a wonderful vacation to the Southern Gulf Islands (BC), Vancouver and Seattle about 10 days ago. I love it out there! And while I didn’t make it to the Capilano suspension bridge, I managed to knit in Paradise, WA (atop Mt. Rainer), and all over the Strait of Georgia while on the ferries.
For a brief moment, I thought the sock was trying to end it all. You’re scaring me.
You’re five feet and a centimetre tall. I have the photos to prove it. *I’m* five feet tall…
Oh crap. It just occurred to me that I may have shrunk.
I think *I’ll* go lie down now…
The fiance and I are honeymooning in Canada, with an evening in Vancouver, and I thought about visiting that bridge, ’cause it looks really neat. Then I realized, it looks really SCARY. And not in a good way, in a vertigo/vomit-inspiring way. There is no way in hell I could walk across that bridge. There must be other sights in Vancouver to see…
I went over that bridge in my grade 5 school trip, we traveled down the Canyon highway to the cost. I really wanted to meet you but I was 6 1/2 hours away in the other direction. I tried to send my brother in law but NO! I am glad you trip to Vancouver was safe.
*sigh* I missed you on Saturday. I had made plans to be there at the library but family stuff came up. My sock was so looking forward to having a picture taken with your sock.
It looks like you’ve hit all my favourite fibre places here. 🙂
Damn. IT! That is a nauseating bridge. But at least now we know how you manage to knit all those “not swatches”…you have an extra dexterous elbow. Biotch!
;0)
You are my hero. I have a healthy fear of plummeting to my death as well, and I stand in awe of you for knitting on a swaying bridge above a gorge with sharp pointed rocks below you.
Indiana Jones has nothing on that.
Heh! That carder could only be one place…Birkeland Bros. Pearl is a sweetie.
Okay, you definitely won the extreme knitting. I’m one of those with an’unreasonable fear of heights’; just thinking about it makes me dizzy. The things we, I mean YOU, do for the blog.
I can’t even look at those pictures of the bridge. You are so my knitting hero for facing up to the challenge of knitting in the middle of that bridge. The experience would have left me scarred for life.
Too funny. I got all lightheaded and weird feeling just looking at the sock dangling over the side of the bridge. Jeep commercials do it, too, the ones where the Jeep is perched atop a mountain peak and the cameraman is in a helicopter swooping ’round and ’round and closer and ’round and then I have to look away and stop my head from swimming before something unseemly happens.
In my book, that’s a hands-down winner for extreme knitting. Did you have your shoes on? Can’t see your feet — my toes would be gripping the bridge floor, for sure!
For what it’s worth, US Customs officials have always welcomed me home. And I did find it utterly charming.
The wide stance makes perfect sense–I’m not sure I could have let go of the rail, myself.
Stephanie, sorry I missed your talk due to preps for the first birthday party for my precious one-and-only granddaughter. (I apologise but she rates even over the lovely Yarn Harlot!) Stuff happens eh? But I’m seriously annoyed at Pearl who shoulda called me when you went to see the carder. I only live 3 blocks away! And where was Cara, the MIA Birkeland? Glad the old monster carder didn’t eat the sock.
Margene, hon’, those aren’t the Rockies. They’re the Coast Mountains and there’s even one of ’em north-aways that’s actually taller than any old Rocky. 🙂
We came. We saw. Unfortunately we had to leave before we could *really* get to meet you. Loved your talk. Thanks for allowing Monkey to be photographed with the SOCK.
Many years ago I DID experience Capilano bridge doing an extreme tilt. I was about midway on my way back (pushing a stroller, can you believe it!) when an entire busload of Japanese tourists got on the bridge. You know the jokes about the Japanese tourists sticking together? NO JOKE! Well, as I approached them, the ENTIRE busload *politely* moved to one side of the bridge. The bridge tilted dramatically and I nearly cried (I was scared enough BEFORE that!). A little ol’ Japanese tourist lady, who was at the back of the group and closest to “land”, went running and screaming back to safety. I deeply wished that I was close enough to do the same. The bridge didn’t flip, but it sure enough felt like it might!
http://www.wovenflame.blogspot.com/
Saturday was the first time I ever saw so many knitters in one place. I’ve met groups of quilters before and I have to say that knitters are a much more diverse group. My husband was sorry he didn’t come in after he sat in the library and listened to all the guffawing coming through the closed door. I told him there were other men in there, but something about large groups of women scares him (not to mention large groups of women armed with pointed sticks).
Okay, being 5 feet tall doesn’t mean that you can’t have fun. But than I am an inch taller. But you can blame everything on the wind. And there is nothing wrong with you with thinking that there is no such thing as too much wool!
Tears are welling up thinking about the border crossing into Canada, though mine won’t be until Christmas, I can’t wait! It will always be home in my heart no matter how long I live in the US.
I have to agree with you on the mountain of wool…not intimidating at all!
Glad to see the sock is “hanging in” there 🙂
I can’t remember if they welcomed me when I drove back across the border from Montreal last year, but US Customs at the airport also says welcome home. After taking the train from Amsterdam to Paris and flying to Philadelphia alone (my friends had a different return day), then lugging my bags through 5 floors of airport to get to customs, it almost made me cry.
Traveling is great, it makes you really appreciate being at home.
So… when do you take the sock sky diving?
That thing about Granville Island is the nuttiest thing I’ve ever heard!
Welcome home!!
Thanks for coming to see us! Yes, Vancouver does seem to be full of us blogger types. The paper said the other day that more BCers blog than anywhere else in Canada. I’m not sure why…
You didn’t mention Granville Island’s Silk Tree shop. I’m assuming you either missed it entirely or spent the requisite half a month’s rent. It’s okay, we all do it. Wool and silk does that to the brain.
Muneni (the shy grey sock) wants me to thank you too. He had a great time with The Sock.
I love the bridge shots!
I crossed that bridge when I was 16 and was on a trip to Canada with my high school band. I have to admit, I hung on for dear life the whole way across and back. I was terrified.
The sock, I am sure got an adrenaline rush from its experience.
No need to answer here, found the Harlot recently and have been reading from the beginning backward. Just discovered that I missed April, May 2005, so I was able to enjoy a sort-of-migrainey day with reading. The migraine and twitching right eyelid are due to the teen daughter. Some points of similarity between you and me in no particular order: we have the exact same birkis; the daughters – the older of whom started out nerve-wrackingly difficult and got steadily better, and the younger who was the greatest, greatest kid in every way but has spent the latter one-third of her life working on creating my twitching eyelid (don’t if this is prognistic for you as you have 3, not 2); the unusual (wrong word, should be “not standard issue”) life partner – mine is from a different country,a painter and gallery director – he sells things that can be worked up in an hour or two and sell for vast amounts of money, while I work for days, weeks on a knitted object that probably wouldn’t sell for even the cost of the yarn, not that I’m selling anything; the attachment to Apple products (other ways in which we find ourselves constantly in the #2 position – Mac not Windows, Red Sox not Yankees, Democrats not *%#*^ Republicans, Ford not Chevy, Pepsi not Coke). Points of difference – I’m older, fatter, and don’t have your level of energy with which, your friend Ken pointed out, you get an awful lot done. I think about writing something but have yet to do that. I’m content to be pokey and didn’t even know until recently that there are people (?women) who still enthusiastically spin fiber by hand. How in the name of God did women of yesteryear do all the children, house,, husband stuff and make EVERYTHING by hand as well??????
Congratulations on the success of your book – I will search it out and buy it. My LYS (“Knit Wit” – seems to be a popular name for yarn stores – here in little Rockport, Massachusetts, right across from the train depot) doesn’t carry many books, but I’ll check it out. The proprietor is Finnish, constantly with knitting in her hands and a great source of yarn and know-how. A final word – the death of Peter Jennings is shocking and seemed so sudden. I know he was a proud Canadian.
Oh, Stephanie, we had a great time, too. In fact, so blissed out have I been that I only just noticed that you’ve identified the North Shore mountains (the first photo) as “the edge of the Rockies”. Not “correct”, I’m afraid. That’s the Coast Mountain range, and there are at least 3 more ranges as one heads east before finally encountering the Rockies.
It’s time for me to start a new project and thanks to you I’m thinking it’s got to be something lacy. Or booties. Maybe lacy booties?
Oh, Stephanie, we had a great time, too. In fact, so blissed out have I been that I only just noticed that you’ve identified the North Shore mountains (the first photo) as “the edge of the Rockies”. Not “correct”, I’m afraid. That’s the Coast Mountain range, and there are at least 3 more ranges as one heads east before finally encountering the Rockies.
It’s time for me to start a new project and thanks to you I’m thinking it’s got to be something lacy. Or booties. Maybe lacy booties?
Did I miss the “bidet” story? Or does that come after the bridge?
Oops. Sweetie, those are the Coast Mountains: http://www.peakbagger.com/range.aspx?rid=121 – the Rockies are on the border with Alberta. BUT, I lived in Vancouver for several years, and Coast Mountains are beautiful to look at, too. I’m so jealous of all those people, living and knitting in Vancouver, sigh.
There’s always an uber-annoying kid on that stupid bridge, hopping up and down, making more careful people want to throw him over, lol.
In order for me to venture out on to that bridge, yarn would have had to have been strewn across the entire length of it. Good yarn.
Hi Stephanie,
I am glad that you and the sock liked the Carding Machine at Birkeland Bros. Wool Ltd. I am Cara Birkeland – 3rd Generation in the store. I now know what Pearl does on her time off!!!!
Happy Knitting!!
Cara Birkeland
Hi Stephanie,
I am glad that you and the sock liked the Carding Machine at Birkeland Bros. Wool Ltd. The Carding Machine is approximately 100 years old and still runs. I am now the 4th generation of Birkeland’s who are working on this machine.
I now know what Pearl does on her time off!!!!
Happy Knitting!!
Cara Birkeland
Hi Stephanie,
I am glad that you and the sock liked the Carding Machine at Birkeland Bros. Wool Ltd. The Carding Machine is approximately 100 years old and still runs. I am now the 4th generation of Birkeland’s who are working on this machine.
I now know what Pearl does on her time off!!!!
Happy Knitting!!
Cara Birkeland
I think that bridge may trump ALL of our extreme knitting entries! Wow! *knees shaking all the way from Oregon*
Eesh. Scary bridge. As I always say, “I’m not afraid of heights. I’m afraid of falling from them.”
Hey! You don’t have to fall far onto rocks for it to be scary. Crashed mountain biking (for the first time, what WAS I thinking) at Sun Peaks yesterday (great place but no yarn shops!. Smashed onto some really huge rocks face first. Those full face helmets work great by the way. Was a little upset at first that the crash had impaired my knitting ability temporairily, but fortunately, as long as I don’t have to knit over my head, I’m still good.
It was great to meet you last weekend, Stephanie! You obviously had all of us in the palm of your hand, it’s hard to believe you were ever nervous about speaking. I hope the rest of your book tour goes well, without any more pathologically rude people butting in front of you in lines in airports.