A visit from the Bourgeois… -es

Ann & Eugene Bourgeois are coming in this evening for a workshop, and Rob and I are looking forward to having a nice dinner with them at Taste of Thai, a wonderful local restaurant. The Bourgeois… -es are always a delight to have around, and I, for one, and really grateful to have the time to actually relax with them a bit. Frequently, they’ve been in Lansing when Rob and I have been so utterly swamped that even during the times when we were supposed to be relaxing, we really weren’t.

Of course, tonight is also my typical Wednesday night in that the ThreadBear newsletter will also need to go out, but someone (them, I suspect) was smart enough to suggest dinner before their workshop. We’ll be off to dinner, come back, they’ll teach while we get our work done, and at the end of the evening, we’re not scrambling—hungry—to figure out who is still open. And which, of those is actually going to be good food for everyone? Much smarter. Sounds like Ann to me. I like her.

I like Eugene, too. He’s a genuinely nice guy who also happens to be very bright, funny, and conversationally astute. He alone can keep the table entertained for hours. Hmmph. Maybe having dinner beforehand wasn’t the best choice. It does, however, make the most sense for them. I feel fortunate to have guests here; it’s just that I’m greedy enough to want to get my work done and spend more time talking with all of the fun and interesting who come through Lansing.

Coat progress
I’m six rows or less from the top of sleeve one, and I can actually see the finish line. I want to install one sleeve immediately to make sure that it fits, so you may get to see that as early as tomorrow.

Sock progress
Nowhere. I’ve not picked it up since the last pic here.

Morgan progress
Ditto.

Other knitting
I did swatch with Classic Elite Cotton Bam Boo a couple of weeks ago, and I’d been carrying the swatch around on my addi Click needles in my bag since. Today, I showed three staff members to Magic Loop. I had no idea they didn’t know prior, or I’d have show them then. Anyway, the swatch and different needles are now on the Cotton Bam Boo shelf for anyone interested in trying out the yarn or Magic Loop technique.

Other projects
I got a call from my mom this afternoon, and I’m to show her photos of my new living room furniture arrangement and pick out three new projects for her. The photos are taken (oh, I’ll show you, too, if you promise not to make fun of my lived-in—by dog and bear—living room), and the projects include:

• her second time around on Fetching from Knitty. Her first go-round was using Needful Extra Stampato, but she had help on her thumbs. She was here for me to do the first, but she shipped the second one to me to do. This time, I intend to walk her through the process here,
• the Shape-It Scarf from Sally Melville’s The Knit Stitch, and
• a cabled scarf.

These shouldn’t be too challenging for her, but usually, she’s here in Lansing visiting when she starts new projects. Since ThreadBear’s a fifteen hour drive from her home in LaGrange, Georgia, we thought this way might be more cost effective.

Inspiration

I’ll have to motor through today, but I’m frantic to get a post up. We’ve got company in from Atlanta/Baltimore in our old friend Crystal B (Sister Paul, to those who know her well), and it’s been a busy week to boot.

There’s tons going on at the shop as we continue to bring in summer fibers and work on bringing in fall stock. We’ve pushed out our next Yarn Tasting since several of the yarns that we wanted in either weren’t in the States yet or needed models knit and weren’t yet in the store. Every yarn has to have at least one model for the event to make sense, and if the yarn’s still on a boat, then nothing’s on the needles yet. EEK! So that’s pushed back.

Yarn’s still pouring in, though, and we’re very excited to be working with Alchemy again. We’d tried a bit out when we were still in Indiana, but A) we didn’t have models, and B) we never reordered, so that went the way of the dodo. We had a long, wonderful conversation (if an hour or so of giggling and being generally evil with Austin and Gina constitutes a conversation), picked out tons of patterns, got offers from them to supply us with some fantastic models, and we’re back in the game. They’ve got beautiful product, and I’m really happy with what’s come in so far.

So much so, in fact, that you’re soaking in it. Yup. The swatch from my last post is Alchemy-based. What is it? Oh, silly reader. You know better than that. I’ll get there eventually. But not today.

Today, I want to talk about inspiration. As corny as it sounds, my family has been much of my inspiration lately.

Ailing Connor resting her weary head on Tate’s back.

Well, yeah, they’re my inspiration, too, but I’m not talking about them. I’m talking about Rob. When we’re together and talking and generally relaxed, I see things that just make me want to design something. Sometimes it’s an architectural thing.

Stained glass dome inside Houlihan’s Restaurant. Lansing, Michigan.

Every time we eat at Houlihan’s not far from the shop, my eye is drawn to this dome. How it’s going to show up in a knitted piece, I have no idea, but it’s in my head, and it won’t go away.

Decorator pillow from a recent visit to Pier 1.

Sometimes it’s a combination of colors or shapes that catches my eye. This decorator pillow didn’t leave Pier 1 with me, but it’s with me constantly. I can’t get the multiple tones of each color our of my head, and the sections of colors over multiple blocks is making my teeth itch. I want to translate this into fabric… badly. My own fabric, I mean. Knitted fabric!

How will it happen? Hell if I know. When will it happen? Ha! That’s funnier than the first question. The point is that it’s in the cooker. It’s rolling around, banging into the sides of the pot with steam roiling around it. Eventually, it’s going to hit something and stick. Hopefully, it won’t be cauliflower. I’m not a big fan of bland design, and cauliflower doesn’t particularly excite me.

What does excite me, though, is happening. Change. I don’t know how, but my life appears to be changing. I’d like to say I’m at the helm of this boat, but I think I might not be. But I can feel the engines. And they’re rumbling pretty hard.

And on a final note, this is me. First of all, the rest of the picture was horribly overexposed as many of my images lately have been. Why? I’m using my phone to take pictures. They suck, in my less than humble opinion, but that’s what I’ve got at the moment. We keep the good camera at the shop, but I’m looking strongly at having a nice, new camera soon. Why? Well, because I’m a raccoon, and I like new and sparkly things. But more realistically, I see wonderful things all over the place very, very frequently, and I sincerely want to share them with you. And if my camera sucks, you might not see the beauty that I do. And we simply can’t have that.

P. S. What I’m working on: updates to the website. Here’s yet another teaser:

Screenshot of new ThreadBear main page under construction.