Reboot

This blog of mine has sputtered and struggled for years now, and I finally know why.

It is the norm these days to deliver ourselves to the masses as a branded product. The public will make judgments about who we are whether we like it or not, so we may as well exert some control over how we are portrayed online. (Folks who don't have anything online? We can make judgments about them, too, based on their lack of online presence). That's all well and good, but honestly? It drives me nuts. Online media, social or otherwise, tends to portray people from one very unique perspective - the perspective those people wish to share, whether they've thought really hard about it or not. But it's the ones who are clearly branding themselves who really bug me. I often think "geez it's a good thing I know this human in person, because I know he/she is a really cool person but online he/she is really just obnoxious!" And that obnoxiousness really comes from just seeing that one very carefully crafted perspective: Friend as Photographer, Foodie, Parent, Mormon, Jesus Freak, Super Active Person With Many Accomplishments... you get the idea. I'm sitting here thinking, come on. Your whole life isn't this great.

I really don't want to be another one of those obnoxious people.

When I started this blog, I knew it wouldn't be focused on any one thing. I'm a generalist, not a specialist. I enjoy too many different things to focus on just one. I also didn't really want to incorporate my professional life into it. For me to have work/life balance, I prefer to keep those things as separate as possible.

My rebooted blog probably won't stray too far from that initial intent, but the difference is: I'm really going to make an effort to present all the perspectives of my life. My work life will probably intrude. Some weeks are pretty mundane, and this blog will reflect that. Hopefully most of it will be interesting. Ultimately, I'm hoping that a more honest, multifaceted effort will be something I can stick with. We'll find out! Until next week...

Escape knitting

There are times - many times - when work life is so frustrating and ties my psyche in such knots that all I can think about is getting home and spending my Saturday morning knitting on the couch. If it's easy knitting, I can have the television on in the background; if it's more difficult, I either ensure I have something on that I've seen before, or, I turn it off altogether.

My Pink Memories sweater, in progress.
A ribbed neckline is added later.

Last weekend, it was raining, it was chilly, and my mind really needed to be focused on something that wasn't my day job. And so I knit. The subject: Isabell Kraemer's Pink Memories sweater, knitted on size 4 needles (when I swatched I swore to myself that no way was I going down to size 3). My memories are knitted with Misty Mountain Farm's Prime Alpaca, which I dyed to a warm brown a few months ago. It's a simple pattern: a top-down, raglan sweater knit in the round. The fun part is that the front is garter stitch, and the back and sleeves are stockinette. When I saw this pattern, the yarn practically begged to be knit into it -- the different textures create interest, but there aren't any complexities in the pattern that would get lost in the yarn's fuzzy halo.

So there I was on the couch, trying to escape into my knitting, but because the pattern is so simple, my mind kept running off to think about the things I wanted to escape. (To explain those things would simply bore you. Just the usual frustrations with a pigheaded, idiot supervisor who undercuts the people who report to her instead of supporting them). Perhaps at this point I should simply have played the 1963 film The Great Escape. Instead I started poking around for something else to knit that would have a little more complexity.

It should come as no surprise that I love a good theme, and the Down Cellar Studio Podcast's Pigskin Party KAL fits the bill. It's a knit-a-long that lasts throughout the NFL football season. Say what you want about football and the NFL (I don't watch NFL football, myself), but this is a great excuse to knit. I participated last year and had so much fun! It was a great opportunity to try new yarns and patterns, and interact with other knitters.

This month's interception (an opportunity to knit a specific type of thing that can be entered for extra prizes) is to knit an ornament of some type. For a lot of people, this is probably a Christmas tree ornament, but it could be any knitted or crocheted item that is small enough to hang from something. Now here's the thing. For years I've thought it would be fun to knit little bird ornaments to hang around the house or on a small Christmas tree for the holidays. What an opportunity to finally begin this project!

Megan Kreiner's Four Calling Birds

And so, I put down my needles to plan my bird knitting. There's not a whole lot of options, but I did find myself tickled by Megan Kreiner's Four Calling Birds Ornaments. The cardinal in particular looks so spot-on! I even have the right yarn already! The only bummer is that it's only available as part of the 2014 issue of Love of Knitting: Holiday Knits. I could buy a digital copy of the magazine, but having never done this and being uncertain as to what I would actually get, I opted to find the hard copy instead. I found it at vintageknits.com (quite the handy website).

The magazine is scheduled to arrive in my mailbox TODAY. I'm very excited. Perhaps I will go crazy and knit all 16 "fun ideas to deck your halls" as they say on the cover... or perhaps not. The wreath just wouldn't have that lovely evergreen scent. But I will enjoy escaping my demons this weekend as I bury myself in a potential flock of knitted birds.

Warehouses: Where it’s at

A week or so ago, my husband and I managed to float the same Friday off work and traveled to Portland, Maine, for a beer and yarn spree. Tess’ Designer Yarns was the first stop.

I won’t focus too much on the yarn in this post, other than to say that it is just so pleasant to browse these luxurious yarns in the quiet atmosphere of the shop, in contrast with the crowded, rushed feeling of a festival. (No doubt my purchases will be featured in later posts). Tess is located in downtown Portland on the second floor, where I imagine she pays much lower rent than a sidewalk-level shop would cost.

Speaking of costs, parking lots in Portland are five dollars an hour, hotel room prices are comparable to those in Chicago, and while I’m sure there are still hipster eateries, we stumbled into having lunch at an upscale French bistro, Petite Jacqueline. I enjoyed it very much, but it would seem downtown Portland is a different city than the Portland I met back in 2010 — and I know if I had more history with the city, the changes would be even more dramatic.

Before our parking bill grew any larger, we got back in the car and drove west on our quest for delicious beer.

Bissell Brothers was the first brewstop. Located in the Thompson’s Point development, the parking is pricey here too, but this is one of the latest trendy breweries everyone wants to visit. I honestly can’t say I was blown away by the beers - they weren’t my style and I’ll admit I wasn’t entirely caught up in the mood. Other blogs do this brewery more justice than I can.

It was our next stop, Bissell Brothers’ original location, that really struck me, and got me thinking. Located just off I-95 on Industrial Way, three breweries and a distillery occupy a warehouse near the western boundary of the city. On this Friday afternoon, cars filled (free) parking lots and lined both sides of the road. We snagged a parallel spot next to the warehouse (I just love showing off my parallel parking skills) and set out to explore. Austin Street Brewery, Battery Steele Brewing, and Foundation Brewing Company are all in one large building. The long-established Allagash Brewing Company is across the street, and Maine’s first microbrewery, D.L. Geary Brewing Co., is right up the road.

Flight of beer at Allagash.

In this warehouse environment we found friendly people of all ages, friendly dogs, friendly babies, and lots of tasty beer. Each tasting room was open to the warm afternoon, and featured roped-off outdoor seating, with the exception of Battery Steele, which is temporarily closed after selling all their beer. After tasting and purchasing from Foundation and Austin Street, we crossed over to Allagash, where their impressive distribution and market share affords them the ability to offer a free flight to every guest. The atmosphere reminded me of our favorite breweries at home: Great North Aleworks, located in Manchester, NH in a warehouse next to a giant Bingo hall, and our trifecta of the Londonderry and Derry town line in New Hampshire: Rockingham Brewing Company, From the Barrel, and Kelsen Brewing Company. While not in such close quarters as these Portland breweries, the trifecta are located close enough to each other to make it fun to carpool from one to another on a Saturday afternoon — and while they are not all technically located in warehouses, their locations are decidedly industrial.

As small breweries need cheap real estate (and proper drainage, as explained to us by the Foundation barista), and local micro and nano breweries continue to be popular, these industrial back roads are now the trendy spots. I’m sure no one is more surprised by this than the Bingo players in Manchester, who find their sprawling parking lot is suddenly smaller in size.