Category Archives: Travels

My Sister Was Here

My sister was visiting us and this is my excuse for the long silence.

We explored Toronto together, we went on a road trip that took us to Maine through Albany (to drop Sam at her boyfriend’s house on her way back to college) and to Quebec City on the way back to Toronto (my Joe is an expert in finding the longest way between any given two places,,,)

When Miriam arrived and saw my stash, my recently finished projects and the ones I am working on these days, she immediately felt the need to knit something too. She is not an avid knitted like me, she is doing many things, jewelry being her most serious thing these days. She decided she wants a light, small shawl and after I showed her how to start and do the increases for a basic triangle shawl, this is what she managed to finish while she was here:

Miriam Fast Shawl

Miriam's Quick Knit

She already started another scarf from her head, she is the creative spirit in our family, her head is full of great ideas in so many different areas, just amazing! (she is my one and only sister so I am allowed to brag about her, right?)

On our way to Maine we passed through New Hampshire and Joe spotted a sign on the road to The Fiber Studio, he asked if we want him to stop and we said yes,  so he turned around and we found a most delightful yarn shop that offers much more than yarn and patterns:

The Fiber Studio, Henniker, NH

The Fiber Studio, Henniker, NH

I have more photos of this lovely place but I wanted to show you what us sisters found in the shop:

Such a nice mix of things!

Such a nice mix of things!

Miriam found so many different things: yarn (of course) – she went for light cottony things that will fit the Israeli weather (I coudln’t resist the softness of the warm wools even when I lived in Arizona,,,), materials to make some kind of a scarf, I call it free form as I don’t know its official name, it involvs water soluble sheets (the Mokuba brown thing in the photo), all these ribbons and the fancy thread, you need to arrange them on the sheet and then sew it (god forbid, not my cup of tea,,,). She also found a lovely beaded scarf knitted with this colorful yarn that is unique to this shop (the two colorful cakes on both sides of the more muted cotton mix cake in the center) and the beautiful wooden tray for her bead work, oh and also some lovely button we forgot to add to the tray before taking this photo – she had to stop there because of space limitation on airplanes these days,,,,

You want to guess what I bought? Yes, you are right, just some boring yarn:

Are they nice together?

Are they nice together?

I bought the center one a few weeks ago in The Naked Sheep of Toronto (they had a lovely anniversary sale with 25% discount on any yarn for the whole month of August!) and then I saw in my Ravelry favorites that its the yarn for the Daybreak I decided I must have the first time I saw it.  I needed another color and couldn’t choose between these two so I had to buy them both don’t you agree?

Now, do you want to help me choose or should I use all three?

I wanted to show you the sock I very slowly knit these days (I have beautiful photos of it near the ocean in Maine – such a magnificent place!) but this post is already too long and I have to go so I will continue next time.

Cherries and Some Knitting

Almost 2 weeks ago, on our way back from Niagara Falls, we stumbled upon  D.Smith&Son Two Century Farm – a Pick Your Own (PYO) cherries place that was still open, although it was quite late in the evening. We met a lovely girl, Elissa, who very politely told us that actually they are closed but as we are there already we can pick sour cherries there and black cherries, she will show us where, when we finish with the sour ones! While she was talking with us her grandmother appeared very apologetic, she forgot to close the gate, it is all her fault that we are there, but she hopes we will enjoy what we will get if we are already there (very nice family).

We picked quite a few kilograms of these:

Hmmm,,,  Lovely Cherries

Hmmm,,, Lovely Sour Cherries

And some more Kilograms of those:

Yummy Black Cherries

Yummy Black Cherries

I wanted the sour cherries to try and recreate something that is a very sweet childhood memory: Vishniak – a cherry liquor my parents used to make when I was very young. I remember the demijohn standing on top of their closet in the bedroom and some very delicious cherries that came out of it and were given in very small portions and only for special occasions.

After consulting the internet and finding many recipes and advice (some quite contradictory to each other) we set on making our version:

Sam was the Demijohn Washer

Sam was the Demijohn Washer

The cherries were carefully washed:

The cherries are getting ready

The cherries are getting ready

We put them in the demijohn:

Oh Lonely Cherry

Oh Lonely Cherry

Then we added quite a lot of sugar and the strongest Polish Vodka we could find and got this:

What's inside our demijohn?

What's inside our demijohn?

Now we can only swirl the demijohn from time to time and wait and wait and wait,,,,

In a few months I will let you know how it turned out!

And I will have to show you the products of the sweet black cherries some other day as this post is becoming too long and I still have to show you some FOs!

Yes, I finished the Simple V Neck Sweater and two pairs of Noro socks in time to gift them to my sweetheart for his birthday:

Aren't they lovely?

Aren't they lovely?

Those are going to keep his toes nice and warm in the Canadian winter

Those are going to keep his toes nice and warm in the Canadian winter

A better view of the Noro similar socks

A better view of the Noro similar socks

How come those came out so different? I only changed the heel!

How come those came out so different? I only changed the heel!

Assortment of Noro Socks and a tip of a Sweater

Assortment of Noro Socks and a tip of a Sweater

The wonders of Noro yarn, the first pair has almost identical socks the second 2 quite different ones. I only changed the rib from 2×2 to 3×2 and the heel, go tell!

Delight

I love the weather in Toronto.
I think I was brought here just so there will be at least one person in the whole big city, happy with the gray, rainy weather at the end of June!

We  still use our down comforter – what a delight!
Yes, I know I am weird, what can I say, I always like different things than most people.

At least my Mexican Chickens share my delight:

What is all this green stuff all over this place?

So much rain, in June? and what is all this green stuff every where?

We bought these chickens in Nogales, Mexico – the closest Mexican town to Phoenix, Arizona. Unfortunately,  I can’t find any description of this type of pottery on the internet, probably because I don’t know its proper name, I am sorry about that. They are made of some kind of stone and are quite heavy with bright colorful painted decorations. You can find different animals in all different shapes and sizes.

And the knitting continues, it is just that all my current projects are not in a very photogenic stage right now.

Happy Canada Day