Look what I found in my inbox today

Holy crap, ya’ll! I’m going to have a piece in the Louisiana State Museum!

I declare a naked day!

If you need me, I’ll be sitting in the den knitting and watching tv wearing nothing but my skivvies.

Consider this a warning if you ring my doorbell.

Barry @ nm museum of natural history

We went up to Santa Fe today. My parents are staying at a hotel in Albuquerque this time but they like spending time up there too. Mostly because Dad likes his breakfast burrito from Cloud Cliff Bakery and we like to shop at the outlet mall up there. But there’s usually some plaza walking too.

Most of my time in SF is really weird for me because suddenly I’m a tourist in a town where I used to live and loathe tourists. Anyway, we were in the little Mercado where the Blue Corn is (as well as a new bar grille thing on the bottom floor called Sleeping Dog Tavern)- because that Mall one has a decent public bathroom - and I saw a big scarf/shawl thing that looked a lot like the one I made out of Artfibers yarn in the window of a shop with lots of floaty deconstructed flowery gauzy clothes. You know the kind, lots of linen and old looking lace - like Molly Ringwald but with crystals. I used to love dressing that way when I lived up there. It kind of fits. Anyway, I went inside to find out how much that stole was (300 dollars btw) and found all kinds of mixed media knit skinny scarves with dropped stitches and little milagros tied on with ribbon. I could make them in approximately 2-3 hours. Those averaged 100 dollars. There were also some freeform crochet sweaters by Valentina Devine but those cost a small fortune. Regardless of the downtown Santa Fe markups, it was a reminder that I’ve got to get back into creating items for the Etsy shop.

I know it’s common for people here to dislike Santa Fe for a variety of reasons. But I do miss some aspects of living up there. I went to the parts I liked and lived in my own world, usually at night, sneaking down to the Barnes and Noble every once in a while for some megacorporation chain coffee and access to lots of books. Now I live within two miles of that B and N and take day trips to Santa Fe. Life’s funny.

I just (re)started a pair of top down 2 socks on 2 circs this morning using some Greenwood cotton lycra striping yarn I bought in February. This time is going much more smoothy because I’m using the pattern that came with the yarn rather than vagely follow a pattern in a book.

The ride home was really rainy. There were roads that had been completely flooded by water and clay earth in Rio Rancho coming in from Bernalillo. Crazy. On the one hand I wish it weren’t so muggy and I worry about all the problems with water washing out and flooding new houses and streets, on the other this state really, REALLY needs this rain. This might be the end of a six-plus year drought and replenish that ever-drying water table the city’s been wrestling with that bothers a lot of anti-growth people (ironically the most vocal are usually imports themselves). Seriously it’s been like living in the friggin dust bowl here. It’s annoying and I have to go find some mosquito protection for the dog but it’s important and I’m willing to deal with that for the sake of a city I enjoy (for the most part).

woke up (very important)
cleaned house (not as important usually but damned important this week)
drove to Wal Mart (how very American)
rented a Rug Doctor (tres tres American)
steam cleaned carpets
cleaned
steam cleaned carpets again
cleaned
slept (it changed to July fifth somewhere in here)
pulled weeds and trimmed junipers and trees in the front yard
cleaned
steam cleaned carpets
panicked (always very important to get the last adrenaline push for the final cleaning)
cleaned
showered
went to dinner with my parents

The public areas of the house are actually quite impressively clean and stink-free now. Let’s see how long that’ll last.

It’s muggy today. Lots of water in the air. Which is very happy-making for the drought sufferers but not very good for people who depend on an evaporative cooler to keep their house cooled off. Especially when they’ve been steam cleaning carpets. Blergh.

I was just thinking about some odd things I’d like to do someday. They’re not earth-shattering but I thought they were fun.

Someday..
- I want to have pink hair. Not fluorescent pink but kind of a midrange cotton candy to barbie pink
- I want to get a puppy and kitten at the same time so they’ll grow up together
- I want to get the back bedroom set up into a nice studio
- I want to enclose the back porch and make a breakfast / morning room
- I want to have a pool or at least a hottub
- I want to get a hedgehog tattoo
- I want to lose at least 100 pounds
- I want to travel to Europe again
- I want to knit the perfect sweater for myself
- I want to play the piano again
- I want to read all of the 100 greatest books

I’m so excited! I just got my big birthday present. Wanna guess what it is??

A room! A room on what?

Yes! My parents just paid the deposits for Cody and my room on the Seasocks cruise! Squeeee! My Dad’s so funny, he was like “What would you like most in the world for your birthday m’dear? You want to drag Cody on a cruise about knitting? Ok then.” No he wasn’t really like that but sometimes ya gotta wonder what he and Mom think about the kind of freak daughters they’ve created.

I’m very excited about this trip. I will be bringing my folding wheel and maybe we can have a spinning or dyeing class or something. Wouldn’t that be fun?

Thank you Mom and Dad! Love you! See you Thursday!

So now that the Dyeorama hooha is dying down I don’t have much of an excuse to not get work done on my remaining secret project - the one for Albuquerque. Now this has been in the works since April folks and it’s still not perfect but dammit, I want to go public so I think this is the best it’s going to get for now.

Say hello to the Albuquerque Craftistas

Scout and I’ve first talked about this back in April, as I said. Basically, we wanted to create a group for crafters in all its forms and provide a fun place to learn - without competitive bs or feeling like you’re being judged for creating stuff that might not fall into a specific category. One where crafters could kick some crafts and be creative. Hopefully this will grow into something more but I thought it was finally time to get some work going on this project now that dyeorama’s (finally) slowing down.

We had discussed starting a local chapter of the Craft Mafia but had decided that their focus on the more commercial aspect (while being a great thing) wasn’t something that we wanted. We wanted people to get to participate regardless or skill or sales.

The good news is some enterprising chickies on Etsy have started an Albuquerque Chapter of the Craft Mafia which I am totally happy to join. And we’ve decided to be sister organizations since a lot of our memberships would overlap and while our financial goals might be different, we agree that it’s all about the craft.

So, local Albuquerque crafters, hurry yourselves over and join la Craftistas! And if you like to sell stuff, join the Craft Mafia too!

I think our first order of business should be starting joint bowling and roller derby teams! Then we can all get matching tattoos. Yeah, I know, “Slow down there, cowgirl.” It would be fun though wouldn’t it?

For the non-locals there’s a fun new knitting webring that I joined yesterday too. I’m totally a kickass joiner.

I got a lovely basket of snacks, fruit, and flowers from my parents today. It was about thirty minutes after I’d dismantled it and eaten some of the jalapeno gouda (YUM!) and crackers that it occurred to me that maybe I should take a photo. I’m way out of practice with this photo thing.