Category Archives: travel

Brioche weekend away

Posted on July 17, 2023 | 5 comments

I had a fabulous weekend teaching a two-day brioche workshop at Sitka Center for Art and Ecology on the Oregon Coast. The setting is lovely, nestled among the trees on a slice of land on Cascade Head near Lincoln City.

We started with one color brioche, a scarf in super bulky yarn (Brioche Entrée), just to get a feel for the sl1yo and brk stitches.

Then we moved on to 2-color in the round, setting up for Brioche Pastiche. I’ve revamped the pattern for plain brioche rib or leafy climbing vines, on either a hat or cowl. I like giving options.

I also included the Whale Watch pattern, because it fits so nicely with the coastal theme. But Pastiche is a much gentler introduction to increases and decreases, so that’s what we actually worked on.

The weather was glorious all weekend, so we took our knitting outdoors!

Sitka Center features arts workshops all summer long. The other participants this weekend were creating beautiful things, hand building with clay.

Kristin showed me some of her beautiful work. I want to try this! Check out the catalog of classes for this summer here.

Cathy and I visited the Salmon River estuary after class on Saturday. That looks like a whale’s ribcage, but it’s really a tree.

That speck of a bird way out there may be a cormorant. It was fishing!

Closer to the ocean, Cascade Head to the right

I had time for a walk on the sand after my last class on Sunday. I headed south to the beach at Road’s End (north end of Lincoln City); that’s Road’s End Point in the distance. It was foggy on the beach, with blue skies inland.

My stay at Sitka included the night after my workshop, so I’m writing from this sweet stairway nook on Monday morning. It’s drizzling now, and raindrops are hanging on the maple leaves outside my window. Perfect.

There’s so much art on campus; here are some things I saw while walking around.

And nature makes her own art, too. I love this lichen!

Bisquee wanted to come with me, but I had to say no. I needed to bring clothes.

And I even had time to knit! More about that in another post. How was your weekend?

5 Comments

Posted in classes, Knit, travel

Tagged Brioche knitting, Oregon Coast, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology

Knit with me at the Oregon Coast!

Posted on June 20, 2023 | 2 comments

I’m teaching a 2 day brioche workshop at Sitka Center in Otis, Oregon (near Lincoln City),July 15-16. No previous brioche experience needed; you should already know how to cast on, knit, purl, and work in the round. Lodging isn’t included, but there are many places to stay in the area. We’ll have a relaxing time knitting together!

This is my only brioche workshop this summer, other than the sold out schooner cruise in August and the Vogue Knitting Cruise to Alaska in September. Come knit with me!

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Posted in classes, travel

Tagged brioche classes, Brioche knitting, Sitka Center

Upcoming Brioche Pastiche update

Posted on May 31, 2023 | 1 comment

This is the original Brioche Pastiche (Ravelry link); I designed it to be a quick start introduction to brioche in the round for a 3 hour class back in 2018. It begins with a bit of 2 color brioche rib to learn and get comfortable with the technique. Increases and decreases happen next, to form the leafy pattern.

Last year I added a different crown shaping to the pattern, just for fun.

And now I’m planning to add a cowl to the pattern. This one is pretty short; I’m hedging my bets to make sure that two 100g skeins of worsted weight yarn can make a cowl and hat set. I’m keeping careful track with my handy yarn scale! (Some would call it a kitchen scale, but I know better.)

So I’m re-knitting the hat with the alternate crown, too. I want the pattern to look more cohesive, so I want new pictures for hat and cowl in the same color set, with the same yarn as the original (Malabrigo Worsted). Three color sets and two yarns is too jangly in one pattern.

While I’m at it, I’m making the pattern “choose your own adventure” style. I like offering both hat and cowl in a class, because not everyone wears hats, and not everyone wears cowls, either. Also, in class, a student can choose to complete a project in plain brioche rib, if they’re not ready to tackle increases and decreases. Lots of options! Those options are also good for knitting at home.

That’s a lot of updating! So I’m going to make these all these changes to the pattern, and make it stand alone. It will no longer be part of the Brioche Hat Trick (Ravelry link) collection when the updated pattern is released. If you already purchased Brioche Pastiche (Ravelry link), or the Brioche Hat Trick collection, you’ll get this updated pattern for no additional charge. If you want the updated Brioche Pastiche pattern, buy it now at the current price (pattern or collection), and you’ll get the update without paying the new price.

This pattern will be my teaching pattern on the Vogue Knitting Cruise to Alaska in September. That’s what’s driving this update! We had thought about using Whale Watch Cap and Cowl, but we have some repeat cruisers and wanted to do a different brioche project. We’ll pretend that those leaves are sea kelp, and stay on theme. I’m really looking forward to this cruise; I haven’t been to Alaska since working at a salmon cannery to pay for college.

No salmon roe packing for me this time!

1 Comment

Posted in events, Knit, pattern design, travel

Tagged Alaska, Alaska cruise, Brioche Pastiche, Vogue Knitting Cruise

Weekend in Buffalo NY

Posted on May 23, 2023 | 4 comments

I had the great pleasure of teaching for the Knitting Guild of Greater Buffalo this weekend. We had a day of brioche, and then we explored elongated novelty stitches (some of which are also great for assigned pooling) and designing with favorite shawl shapes. So much fun!

I usually choose my airplane seat by whether there might be a view of Mt. Hood. It only matters during daylight, and it was a very pretty morning. (No view? Aisle seat please.)

Maureen was the perfect hostess/tour guide/organizing whiz. I met her (and Sharon, the other half of the organizing duo) at Madrona years ago. She took my entrelac and Syncopation classes and knew we’d have a good seminar weekend! My one non-knitting wish was to see Niagara Falls. We went over to the Canadian side for a better view.

Niagara Falls, American and Canadian, on the Niagara River

The water is a pretty green from dissolved minerals.

American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls (the smaller one to the right)

Looking across the ring of Horseshoe Falls

I think the Canadian falls are prettier than the American falls, but I’m not trying to create an international incident!

I didn’t think to take class pix until the last class, which was on shawl shapes. It’s a pretty relaxed class, and you have a bunch of mini-shawls when you’re done. Vince says he’s going to string his on a cord and hang them like a garland on his mantel. After blocking and weaving in ends, of course! Blocking is magic for shawls.

When in Buffalo, one must have Buffalo wings!

Thank you to the Greater Buffalo Knitting Guild for having me! I love teaching for guilds. If you want me to come teach for yours, let me know…

Now I’m home trapped under these cats!

4 Comments

Posted in classes, travel

Tagged Buffalo NY, classes, Niagara Falls, shawl shapes

Whale Watch for Landlubbers and more

Posted on March 12, 2023 | Comments Off

I’m teaching an immersive two day brioche workshop at the Sitka Center for Art and Ecology on the Oregon Coast, July 15-16. Fees are just for the workshop; you’ll need to find lodgings nearby if you’re not local.

We’ll start with beginning one color brioche, move into 2 color brioche in the round, and then introduce increases and decreases to make the whale tail and seagull motifs on the Whale Watch cap or cowl. You’ll be a brioche pro by the end of the weekend! Register here.

This is the same hat and cowl that I’m using on the Nautical Knitting Cruise on the schooner Zodiac at the end of July. (The cruise is full, but you can sign up for the wait list if you’re interested.) Either way, you’ll have fabulous brioche skills at the end of your time with me.

I may be teaching Whale Watch brioche on the Vogue Knitting Cruise in September, too. We’ll see if we have repeat cruisers; if there are a lot then I’ll choose a different pattern. I’m looking forward to all of these coastal adventures!

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Posted in classes, events, Knit, travel

Tagged knitting classes, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology, Vogue Knitting Cruise, zodiac schooner

Still catching up, bicoastally

Posted on February 21, 2023 | 3 comments

How much can we pack into February? A LOT. I’ll never get to completely blog VKLive NYC and Red Alder Fiber Arts Retreat in Tacoma, but here are some highlights.

Fun classes with great students, both at VKLive

And at Red Alder. why am I showing both Sheepy Steeky Coasters classes? Because the joy of scissors makes a great photo op!

So happy to meet up with Keith Leonard and Shaina Bilow again after Knit Maine. And new friend Dario Tubiana, too. (Check out the sheep on the door of La Pecora Bianca.)

The Empire State Building makes a great tiara…or unicorn horn. You decide.

I didn’t have a full length mirror in NYC, but I did in Tacoma, so I could do my traditional what did I wear collage. Coffee Breakers Shawl (from Brioche Knit Love), Camellia Wrap, Ebb and Flow cowl.

Ebb and Flow looks good on everyone! New Beginnings statue outside the Federal Courthouse in Tacoma. It was the train station a long time ago.

Hanging out with Alasdair Post-Quinn (double knitting king), Michael Kelson (Spinpossible), and Xandy Peters.

We had fabulous markets on both coasts. What did I buy, since you know I don’t stash yarn?

Super fun yarn and NYC-themed project bag from Maker’s Mercantile. And it comes with a notions box that fits in the pocket, too. Look closely to see all the fiber-related pictures!

Also from NYC, Jūl’s new toolkit. Choose your shape: round, square, or triangle.

You can make the shape into a shawl pin with the stick pin, or a shawl cuff with the leather band. You can use the stick pin by itself. The other two leather pieces are to close a cardigan front. And the buttons have a round ball at the end of the shank, and a leather back to pop over the ball. You can move your buttons from one piece of knitwear to the next. So far I’ve only used the cuff, but I’ve used it a lot.

From Tacoma: a silly cats in hats project bag, also from Maker’s Mercantile. Did I need it? Yes. It will help corral supplies for a class.

Oh look, yarn! I bought this peacock green to teal gradient from Schmutzerella to knit one more Ebb and Flow. I love how smoothly the colors melt into each other. I can have both the taller neck and the longer triangle with this much yardage. It’s not stash if I have a plan to cast on soon! Right now I’m trying to decide if I want the blue on top or bottom. The piece gets wider towards the bottom, so the stripe down there will be narrower, but more visible. What do you think?

Always nice to see Mt. Rainier from my hotel room window.

So very different from my hotel room view the week before!

Currently on the needles: I’m finishing an Embellishment Cowl sample. I used it in class last week at VKL, and now I need it to display at For Yarn’s Sake as a sample for my class on May 7. It’s almost done. I need to have it bound off and steam blocked by Thursday morning, just in time for my trunk show. Wish me luck!

3 Comments

Posted in classes, events, Knit, Product review, travel, yarn

Tagged Jul Designs, Red Alder Fiber Arts, Schmutzerella Yarns, VKLive, VKLive NYC

Planning ahead to September

Posted on February 4, 2023 | 3 comments

I worked summers at a cannery on Kodiak Island, Alaska to pay for college, way back when. I worked in the egg house, sorting and packing salmon roe to send to Japan.

That’s me, with a handful of salmon roe. I’ve always wanted to re-visit Alaska, without the fish eggs.

Guess who’s going to Alaska? This cruise with Vogue Knitting is going to be spectacular. I’m not sure what I’m teaching yet, but I think brioche and Whale Watch Cap and Cowl would be perfectly appropriate.

We shall see! Come knit with me!

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Posted in classes, Knit, travel

Tagged alaska knitting cruise, Vogue Knitting Cruise

Ahoy, knitters!

Posted on January 10, 2023 | 9 comments

I’ve just signed on to teach aboard the Zodiac, a schooner that sails out of Bellingham, Washington. This is in conjunction with Northwest Yarns of Bellingham. The 3 day cruise is July 31-August 2. It’s a nautical knitting cruise! And you get to learn to help sail the ship, too.

(photo from the Zodiac website, used with permission, copyright Taylor Hodges)

The trip includes 4 knitting classes. Two of them will be brioche! We’ll use my Whale Watch Cap and Cowl pattern to introduce brioche and then learn increases and decreases.

Our other two classes will explore fancy stitches and herringbone braids (and simple stranded colorwork).

Are you game? Register here!

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Posted in classes, events, travel

Tagged nautical knitting cruise, northwest yarns, zodiac schooner

Best laid plans, volcano edition

Posted on December 14, 2022 | 4 comments

The news that Mauna Loa was erupting when we already had plans to be on Hawaii kicked my planning instinct into high gear. Kīlauea has been erupting since September 2021 (it stopped in 2018, and started up again), so we hoped to see Kīlauea and a distant glow from Mauna Loa if we drove from Kona over to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and stayed overnight.

I booked an AirBnB in Volcano (the town) for Saturday night so we could drive over on Saturday, bask in the glow Saturday night, and come home on Sunday.

We scoped out the overlook on the Crater Rim Trail so we’d know where we were going to go after dark, planning a viewpoint that would include both Kīlauea and Mauna Loa. Halema’uma’u (the crater inside Kīlauea) was smoking that afternoon

and looked beautiful at sunset from Volcano House. (Although suspiciously less steamy?)

I spoke with a park ranger, and she pointed out Mauna Loa’s steam in the distance, but said that things had quieted down quite a bit. (Steam from Kīlauea’s Wahinekapu steam vents in left foreground.)

We went down Crater Rim Trail to the overlook after dinner, and this is what we saw. Yep, nothing. No lava glow from either Kīlauea or Mauna Loa. Too dark to see steam (the moon wasn’t up yet). I guess Madame Pele (Pelehonuamea, the volcano goddess) has her own timetable, which didn’t coincide with ours! But I have to say that the sky was stunning, with more stars than I’ve ever seen at once.

We rose before dawn to see the sunrise (in the rain) over Halema’uma’u from the Kīlauea Overlook. (We picked a different overlook, because there was no need to try to get Mauna Loa in the same view.)

No lava glow, but it was beautiful anyway. It looks like both Kīlauea and Mauna Loa are now taking a break. I think Pele is laughing at us! (If you’d like to see more glow from a previous visit in 2015, see this post.)

Of course I took a picture of my knitting with the volcano. I didn’t actually knit…it was rainy, windy, and cold. This is the little sample I’d be using the next day to review increases and decreases for the Brioche Buddies cast on party.

The nice thing about getting up before dawn is that there was nobody on the Chain of Craters Road, and we were the only people looking at the Hōlei Sea Arch before 8 a.m.

The arch in 2013 and 2022. It’s 90 feet tall, and was formed 550 years ago. You can see by the angle that they’ve moved the viewing overlook; heavy surf in July made the cliff less stable. The heavy surf also took some chunks out of the arch leg; at some point it will fall into the sea.

It was a beautiful, quiet, windy morning.

I’m glad we took this road trip, even if we didn’t get to see hot lava!

Sometimes you just have to chill out and go with the flow…

4 Comments

Posted in travel

Tagged hawaii, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, volcano knitting, volcanoes

Knit Maine 2022

Posted on October 1, 2022 | 13 comments

After the Vogue Knitting Cruise and a few days in New York, DH headed for Portland, Oregon and I headed for Portland, Maine. Knit Maine (from Peacetree Fiber Adventures) was held at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle, a 3 hour drive from Portland. It was like going to camp! North Coast Maine is a magical place.

It’s probably good that I didn’t know beforehand that I’d be taking my suitcases (2!) down these stairs to my room.

And back up again at the end of our stay. And that I’d be up and down them repeatedly every day. I got my 10,000 steps every day, and a stairmaster workout, to boot!

With Louis, Shaina, and Christine Walker (Knit Maine organizer!)

Happy to be settling in!

Outside the dining hall at Haystack — Gathering area outside the dining hall

Morning Yoga at Knit Maine — Morning yoga

My classes? In the wood studio. I taught Petite Brioche and Whale Watch/Brioche Increases & Decreases, as well as 3 other classes.

My Planned and Assigned Pooling students loved the Cabana Boy colorway from Yarn Snob.

Fancy knit stitches — YO? YO! Fun and fancy stitches to dress up your stockinette.

thrumbelina thrummed slipper — Thrumbelina thrummed slippers

Jacquie didn’t love making the thrummed butterflies, and I mentioned that some people use the roving as a carry-along strip. Worth a try! As long as you get the result you want, you’re doing it right.

The days were packed with classes, but we also had time to shop in the market that was set up in the clay studio. Casey Ryder from Port Fiber had some beautiful yarns from Cashmere People, Spin Cycle and Harrisville Designs (and more?).

Madder Root had beautiful bags. I couldn’t resist this one. You know I love the night sky!

Louis Boria — Louis choosing colors from North Light Fibers

and Sven from North Light Fibers brought beautiful yarn, including Water Street, a DK weight 40/60 cashmere/merino blend that is making me dream of cushy brioche accessories. There was more, the offerings changed from day to day. I’m sure I didn’t see everything.

The weather was perfect, and there was time to explore the campus.

At Picnic Rock with Shaina, Kristin, and Cal

Rock stack at Picnic Rock — Stacked stones at Picnic Rock

Path through the woods at Haystack — Trail…

Louis Boria, me, Shaina Bilow, Kristin Drysdale, Casey Ryder, Christine Walker (Peacetree Fiber Adventures), and Cal Patch. Knit Maine featured classes in knitting, drop spindling, embroidery, sewing, needle felting…a nice mix of fiber arts.

Christine is such an excellent organizer. She had Knit Maine tote bags ready for each participant, with supplies for their classes. Also in the bags? These mugs, and a center pull ball winder from Katrinkles. ETA: T-shirts, and a copy of Taproot magazine. (I had partially unpacked, and things got separated!) A skein of yarn from Moss Fibers, specially dyed as The Maine Event colorway, was the parting gift. I’m looking forward to making something special with it.

The fun didn’t stop when we left Haystack; we still had to get back to Portland.

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You can get a lot done on a 3 hour bus ride

That’s a wrap on my epic east coast adventure! I’m so happy I had the opportunity to teach in such a variety of settings. What a great way to start autumn knitting. Now I’m gearing up for virtual and in-person teaching. Looking forward to a fiber-filled fall!

13 Comments

Posted in classes, events, Knit, travel, yarn

Tagged Haystack School of Crafts, Knit Maine, maine, peacetree fiber adventures