Mary's Excellent Adventure - Part 1

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Because of the ambiguous nature of my line of work, lately, for any extracurricular activity in my life, I tend to waffle until the very last minute, not making definite plans, not knowing if work is going to interfere with life. And this time was no different -- I made no hard and fast plans to attend this weekend's Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival. I did, however, have the foresight to reserve a hotel room, just in case.

Earlier in the week, as it became more apparent that work would not, in fact, be interfering, I made tentative plans with a fellow Richmond knitter to drive up together. Understandably, however, she later found out that she couldn't get away from family responsibilities for an entire weekend.

I'm a big girl, and did not fret. Instead, I decided right then and there to try a little experiment. A little adventure, as it were, and see how I'd like going to Mecca all by myself. I'm actually really looking forward to coming and going as I please. After all, it's how I spend much of my single life. Why does this need to be any different?

Yesterday, despite the fact that Cuzzin Liz was in town, I opted to avoid the downtown crowds, and went to a plant sale instead. Today I puttered around the house all day, doing laundry, cleaning this and that, and packing, and didn't leave until 5:30 or so. It is now about 10 pm and I'm safely and comfortably nestled in my Columbia, MD hotel room, typing this blog post, only slightly worse for wear after battling the Beltway traffic.

I did make one pit-stop along the way:



That's the Knitter's Cottage in Fredericksburg, VA. It's just two miles off of I-95, and therefore only a slight, but worthwhile detour.

It's in a wonderful old house, with lilacs fragrantly blooming on either side of the porch steps. The inside is sunny and bright and makes you feel welcome as soon as you walk in the door. Shop owner Nancy greeted me warmly and gave me a little tour of the place, and then allowed me to browse on my own. Since I had arrived at the dinner hour, I had the place to myself. I ended up leaving emtpy-handed, but knowing that I'd happily make that detour again, next time I'm toodling up the interstate.

And now I must lay me down to sleep, to wake up early for wool and sheep!

Tomorrow, Part II of my excellent adventure!

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Tappahannock Tuesday

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I've said this before, and I'll say it again, knitting and knit-blogging have enriched my life. Yesterday was a perfect example.

But before I jump into details of yesterday, I'd like to review a little history, if you'll bear with me, to reinforce the point made in that first sentence.

Soon after I learned how to knit I started this knitting blog to keep track of my progress. As with most knit-bloggers, I'm also inspired by reading other knitting blogs. This past January I stumbled upon the blog of a local knitter (hi Jane!) who had started a knitting group that conveniently met on my side of town. A month or two later, I started actively attending that group and have made many new knitting friends. (Hi TNKers!) Jane also turned me on to a few other Virginia knit-bloggers, one of whom is Queen Bess. I started reading and enjoying Bess' blog regularly, and we began exchanging emails and found out we had lots in common, including that we'd both attended the same high school, (although not at the same time). One discussion led to another, and in April, Bess came to Richmond to give me my very first drop spindle lesson.

Fast-forward to June when Bess blogged about wishing for a digital camera. A lightbulb turned on in my head, as I'd been wondering for awhile what I'd do with my old digi-cam once I upgraded to one with a functional zoom. Jump to October when I finally get around to actually purchasing the new camera. The old camera then became immediately available for adoption, and the hand-off occurred at the Fall Fiber Festival. But I also promised to give Bess an in-person digi-cam tutorial, which we scheduled for yesterday, when I met her at her place of work, (where resides her faster computer).

Thus ends my personal history lesson, and begins the tale of yesterday's fun.

It amazes me that I've lived in Virginia for most of my life, and there are still towns I've never heard of and places I've never been. I'd definitely heard of Tappahannock, but had never been there, and never realized what I'd been missing, until yesterday.

From my house, the little town of Tappahannock is exactly an hour's drive. Just get on 360-East and keep going:


stopping just before you cross the bridge over the Rappahannock river:


Once you get outside the Richmond area, past the Mechanicsville sprawl, it's really a lovely, peaceful drive. At 10:30am, after the morning rush has waned, there were stretches of road where I was the only car in either direction. What I love about living in Richmond is that, within fifteen minutes of the state capital's metro area, you stumble upon scenes like this:

I found out later that one of Bess' relatives (her cousin's husband's brother's wife's uncle?) grew up on Prestley Farm. Bess -- feel free to indicate the correct connection in the comments!

I arrived at Bess' shiny-new library building by late morning, and we spent a nice hour or so in her office for the brief camera tutorial, (she really didn't need it -- she's a smart cookie and had figured it all out already), and then she showed me the fantastic progess she's made on what she calls her "KipFee" sweater. She even showed me how she knits it continental-style, carrying both colors over her left index finger and just picks the desired yarn for a particular stitch. I had every intention of taking pictures and perhaps even a little movie of her knitting style, but we were having too much fun chatting and I never stopped to turn on my camera. Then she showed me the fantastic contents of her library's knitting video and book collection, (it's good to be Queen, apparently!), and I was amazed that there are knitting designs from the 1980's that are still quite beautiful. I would not have believed it, had I not seen the books myself! (Bess - I hope you'll highlight those books on your blog someday -- I think they deserve their time in the spotlight!)

After our fun in the library, we had a delicious lunch at a neat former hardware store across the river in Warsaw:


On our way, we stopped for gas and I had to chuckle at the sign in the gas station's window:


After lunch, Bess gave me the grand tour of Tappahannock, where she showed me things like:

wonderful old homes
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gorgeous river views
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beautiful stained glass window at an old movie theater
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The Essex Inn - wonderful B&B near the rivah
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17th (?) century Baptist Meeting House that's now a dry cleaners
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old Customs House
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After the grand tour given by the world's greatest tour guide, (no one can tell a good story like Bess can), we stopped on impulse at a neat little gift shop which held such girly treasures as:

peacock feather purse
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peacock tea service
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peacock feather mask
(can you tell I like peacocks?)

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snazzy spider hat
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beautiful necklace
(it wasn't too hard to talk her into buying it!)

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All in all, a lovely day in a lovely town with a lovely person. I now understand more fully Bess' penchant for waxing eloquant about her small town. Tappahannock would make a wonderful weekend trip, perhaps staying at a B&B, taking a boat trip up-river to a winery, and antique-ing at the half-dozen or more antique shops in the area.

Thanks, Queen Bess, for a great day!

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Vacation Loot

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I promise that this is my last post about my vacation, (unless I change my mind - it's my doggone blog, after all!). But I thought I'd share some of what came home with me after last week.

Shells

Shells collected from the beach at the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse
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Close-up of barnacle encrustations on inside of blue shell
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Bags

I admit it. I'm a bag 'ho. But the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. Hello, my name is Mary and I'm a bag-aholic. (Hi, Mary!!) Besides the purchase I shared previously, here are two more bags that came home with me after last week:

Back: Vera Bradley tote in Bermuda Blue (!!) -- birthday gift from my SIL Jenny
Front: another Endless Possibilities woven bag, perhaps a gift for ???

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In my defense, one of those bags was purchased for me by someone else, and the other was purchased by me for someone else. I'm thrilled about that Vera bag, though -- it's now my new knitting bag. Now that I own one, I can't believe how many others I've seen around town. Mine is the prettiest, though! ;-)


Love Notes

When we ate dinner at Colington Cafe last week, my six-year-old nephew, (my 'lil buddy), requested that I sit next to him (be still, my heart!). Our linen tablecloth was covered with paper (perhaps in preparation for five kids?), and the wait staff handed out crayons to each kid, and so 'lil buddy and I had a running love-fest conversation in crayon all evening,

(I'm "Aunt Kitty", if case you hadn't guessed)

Can you blame me for tearing out this section of our tablecloth and taking it home with me?
It now resides permanently on my refrigerator door.
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Before you gag on the cute overload, let me just tell you that for a good part of the week 'lil buddy was thoroughly entertained by bopping my knuckles with Lincoln Logs, which is surprisingly painful. How fickle are the hearts of six-year-olds! But he gave me the greatest bear hug as we were leaving to drive home on Saturday, so he's my buddy again. For maybe another year. He's #12 of my dozen nieces and nephews, and so I've learned a thing or two about kids, and I know that once they hit the age of seven or so, Aunt Kitty gets knocked off her pedestal of Auntly greatness, and she becomes just another boring adult. So I'll take my hugs while I can get them!


Knitting-related Loot

Sock Wizard software; size H crochet hook; yarn & WIP

The yarn is Ellyn Cooper's Yarn Sonnets "Potluck" (she has no website) purchased at Knitting Addiction in Southern Shores. It's a collection of six-foot lengths of various yarns (and quilt fabric strips!) tied together to make a (surprisingly expensive) 150-yard skein. I figure you're really paying for the labor to put this yarn together, as I can imagine it's quite time-consuming, especially for the one-woman show that is Ellyn Cooper. Knitting Addiction had a whole table of her gorgeous, hand-dyed yarns, and I wish I'd taken a picture, because they were just lovely - I kept being pulled back to them. What does it say about me that I ended up buying the most novelty-ish, blingy, expensive yarn she offers? Tacky white trash to the core, I guess.

close-up of the WIP -- lengthwise scarf on US 15 circulars (cast-on ~150 stitches)

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It took a village to get this scarf started -- the very gracious Mary Jane and Anne, owner and employee of Unraveled, came to knit with us at TNK Tuesday night and helped me figure out how many stitches to cast-on to get the length & width I wanted with that limited yardage. (In case you were wondering, it takes a 15-foot tail to cast-on ~150 stitches of this yarn on US 15 needles). I'm still worried that I'll run out of yarn before it's as wide as I want, but I think I can probably compensate with yarn from my stash. One thing about this yarn - it's is SO easy to drop stitches, and I think I've already dropped three or four, at least, so far. But I'm not worried about the holes or ladders - the yarn and the "fabric" it makes is so messy-fringy, I'll just weave in a piece of yarn and tie up the holes, leaving a little tail hangin' and it'll just look like the rest of the scarf.

So, anyway, even though this yarn is pricey and is the epitome of novelty frou-frou, I'm still pretty proud that I visited both yarn stores down there twice, (that's four yarn store visits, people!), and only purchased one skein of yarn.

Gratuitous, touristy gift shop items

socks and shirt for my parents from Big Al's diner

WRV hat for my nephew's 17th birthday

Barrel Fever by David Sedaris
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I picked that up at Manteo Booksellers because he's coming to Richmond in October and I had heard he was funny and wanted to see if his books were any good. I've only read part of the first essay so far but so far my review is - eh. Hoping the next ones are better.


A Humbling Gesture

Vernon Wingenroth painting
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My sister's mother-in-law wanted me to have this painting by her late husband because, according to my sister, she noticed me admiring some of his artwork after his funeral a month-and-a-half ago. I'm quite humbled by the gesture, and am still trying to formulate the words for my thank you note to her. I haven't yet decided where to put this, as it is in a fairly big frame. It may end up on the mantle. This particular painting is of unusual subject matter, as he has mainly done beach and ocean scenes. I feel blessed to own something he painted.

And thus ends this series on my beach vacation. Whew! Enough already!

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Reconstruction

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Before I reveal the real subject of this post, I will lure you in with a beautiful Outer Banks sunset, (or is this a sunrise? I can't remember...) :

[Update: that's a sunset. How do I know? I managed to capture the earth shadow!]

I'm such a cheater, though -- this picture wasn't even taken this year -- it's from last year's vacation. But, it's so pretty, I feel compelled to share it. We did stay at the same house both times, so the view is essentially the same.


The real subject of this post is a sort of before-and-after, through-the-years pictorial. You see, as I've mentioned before, I'm quite fascinated with old, abandoned buildings. And there has been an old, dilapidated building on the drive to and from the Outer Banks for as long as I can remember. So, starting in 2004, I've been stopping along Rt. 158 in Jarvisburg, Currituck County, NC, and taking a few pictures.

2004

2005

2006

Things are really shaping up for this sweet old building.

And what is this place, you ask?


It's the Historic Jarvisburg Colored School -- the oldest African American school in North Carolina, established shortly after the end of the Civil War.

It does my heart good to see it being restored.

I can't wait to see how it looks next year!


***Edited on 4/13/07 to add the following pictures***:

February, 2007

Vacation 2006 - Part 3: Cape Hatteras Light

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***Breaking News*** : Frumpy, out-of-shape, middle-aged woman trudges up 252 steps to top of 12-story structure and her heart does not explode. Alert the media.

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Last Thursday we decided to make a half-day trip and drive south to Hatteras island and the town of Buxton, where the lighthouse is located.


But first we drove over to where the lighthouse originally stood for 129 years before it was moved a mile inland in 1999:


Each of those stone blocks is inscribed with the name of one of the original lighthouse keepers.

Dedication to the lightkeepers
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Another view of Hatteras light, America's tallest

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Lightkeepers cottages
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Inscription as one enters the lighthouse

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Our group begins the long deathmarch climb to the top

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Don't look down!
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View of lightkeepers cottages from the top
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view from balcony of lantern room, which houses the First-Order Fresnel lens
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looking up into lantern room from inside
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view of lighthouse shadow from the top
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As many times as I've been to the Outer Banks, this was my first time climbing the Hatteras lighthouse, and I do believe it's something everyone should do at least once in their life. I'd do it again, although I think they need to space the landings more frequently. One landing every thirty-two steps is too far apart for this couch potato. You think they'll redesign it for me? ;-)

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