Rhinebeck Recap and Mailbox Loot

Last Wednesday evening, I caught the red eye to Newark. I love travelling alone but now that I have a family, I rarely ever get the opportunity anymore and just being "alone" at the airport, knitting and minding my own business was exhilarating!

 

After I picked up my rental car and picked Amber up in BK, we headed to the exclusive Wool & Folk event in Kingston, NY. 

 It was the debut of this new pre-Rhinebeck fiber/music festival. 
We purchased limited advance tickets but I am unsure of whether or not it was actually sold out in the end.  The event was held in a big pavilion along the Hudson.  There were only a handful of vendors and only 2 completely overwhelmed food trucks but there was a great bar offering lots of local beverages and plenty of fine folk music in the background.

The weather was steamy but it was manageable under the pavilion and once the sun set and a breeze came in off of the river, it was delightful.

I finally had an opportunity to meet Aimee from Paris who is the founder la Bien Aimee and has been a great inspiration to me as a fellow Asian American and successful female entrepreneur.  She was super sweet and kind and simply radiating pure fiber love! ^_^

 

The swag bag and apple cider donut I received were super wonderful.  I bought some groovy yarn too but the actual highlight of attending this event was noticing that one of my favorite celebrity chefs, Ming Tsai, was at the event and that his partner is a knitter!  I've been a fan of his Simply Ming cooking show for ages.  I always thought he would be a cool dude to hang with and now I know just how swell he really is!

 

Although it isn't brand new, I wore my Feel the Bern sweater for the sake of comfort since it's sleeveless.  Also, it may just be in my mind, but I swear that (most) people are nicer to me when I wear this progressive liberal bumpersticker-sweater.

 

Amber and I were so happy to be reunited and trying out a new event!

But we were equally happy to return to our favorite spa hotel and drunkenly dance around a pumpkin filled fountain after a delicious meal at our favorite farm to table restaurant.

 

I highly recommend the pork chop and kale salad at Terrapin!

 

The weather on Friday was even hotter than Thursday.

This is the view of the woods behind our hotel from the back balcony dining area.  It was still under construction when the hotel was first built when I first attended Rhinebeck 3 years ago.

We paid for the earliest admission slot at the Indie Untangled event in Saugerties, NY.  We received a lovely swag bag and I purchased a ton of goodies.

I was most interested in getting to the Three Irish Girls booth while there was still anything left and I managed to buy the kit to knit the Summer Vibes sweater below.

 

We spent the rest of the afternoon checking out some shops and a nice restaurant in Saugerties and finished off yet another glorious day back at our hotel, surrounded by the pleasant company of other knitters and yummy cocktails.

 

I was admittedly still a bit hungover while passing through the gates of the Dutchess County Fairgrounds but all it took was the sight of a few furry friends to give me a new lease of life.

 

Amber's buddy, Susan, generously gifted me a drop spindle and some roving and taught me how to use it and although I was really, REALLY, bad at it, she convinced me to enter the drop spindle spinning contest.  I finished 9th out of 9 entrants; no surprise but lots of fun!

 

The rain that everyone had been dreading all day, didn't come until the very end of the day.  It was perfect timing to wrap things up and have a quiet night enjoying all of the spa amenities and fine refreshments at our hotel.

We only spent a few hours at the fairgrounds on Sunday before heading back to NYC but at least I can say I finished my socks!

 

It was an amazing weekend, the quintessential highlight of my year!  I am already so excited for next year.  Our favorite room at our favorite hotel is booked and all I have to do now is sit back, count the days and plan my new Rhinebeck sweater(s).

Anyway, a few things arrived before and after my trip that I haven't had a chance to write about but really wanted to share.

  

I received the Ritual Dyes Fall Equinox 2021 offering.

Everything about it speaks to me.  That sounds corny but it is true.

I also splurged on a few of the leftovers from Kindred Red's last shop update.  No clue WTF I will do with this yarn but it will not go unnoticed!

Lopi Destination Pullover and Jauntie Beanies

As soon as I received my subscription in the mail for Lopi, MDK's Field Guide No. 17, I knew I wanted to knit the Destination Pullover along with matching Jauntie Beanie's for Xena and I.  I was hoping it might somehow get cold enough to bust them out over my weekend in Upstate NY and I was especially hoping to show them off IRL to MJ Mucklestone (who was promoting her books and patterns at a few of the events I attended) but it was just WAAAYYY too damn hot for Lopi anything!

 

So here they are, after the fact but no less pleasing and even more comfy to wear, especially on a foggy, grey AM in SF.

 

I knit size 3 of the pattern and I used size 8 and 9 needles (one size smaller than recommended) to get gauge.

The yarn colors used in the sample of the pullover shown in the field guide were unavailable so I ordered Lettlopi (Lite Lopi) in Acorn, Golden and Lagoon Green from Webs.  So with the wholesale discount, even after taxes, it cost under 50 bucks to knit a sweater and 2 hats and even have 1 ball left of Acorn left.  From a symbolic motif standpoint, I wanted Acorn to represent mountains, Golden to represent trees/land and Lagoon Green to represent the sky.  I drew and colored in a quick little diagram so I could stay on track.

 

The pattern was relatively easy to follow.  The colorwork in the pockets is worked flat which was new to me and purling 2 different strands felt quite unusual.  I hold one color in each hand and have never been able to find the correct tension to hold both in the same.

 

Luckily I had multiple sets of the same size needles so I could work the both sides of the front/back/sleeve shaping simultaneously.  The pattern recommends DPNs on the sleeves but I used magic loop. I also followed the size 4 instructions for the sleeves.  I used a size 8, 16" cable on the neck and picked up 88 stitches (instead of 72 or 76).

 

The hats were excellent scrap busters.  Each hat took only a few hours to complete.  I knit the child large size for Xena and the adult large size for myself.

There are 5 other mix and match motifs that I can play around with for future sweaters.

  

While I love the natural and rustic ruggedness of the Lopi Icelandic wool, I would really like to try another one of these sweaters in a softer yarn.  

Tomorrow I will write up a recap of Rhinebeck and also share some of the wonderful mail I've received recently but just haven't had the time to write about yet.  My trip was so much fun, I'm still recovering!