Amy Artisan

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Category: Road Warrior (page 8 of 8)

Home again, home again…jiggety jig!

Woo hoo! I’m back in Chicago for, *gasp*, 10 whole days! Because of the July 4th holiday & a previously planned vacation day next week I will be working remotely from home next week & won’t head back to Chattanooga until July 9th.

I don’t have big plans for the weekends but am looking forward to enjoying some simple things that I can’t do while on the road…making my favorite Frappe as my morning coffee…grocery shopping & cooking…doing some paper crafting – including some belated Project Spectrum work…spend time with Miss Butterfly & Miss Doodlebug – their family is in town for the whole week & I can’t wait to catch up with them.

More to come in the next week. Have a safe & fun holiday weekend!

Hanging Out with the Folks…

Instead of heading to the airport to fly back to Chicago on Friday I picked up a rental car (a slick new Azera which the family has dubbed Hank) merged south onto I-75, set the cruise control & headed down to the ‘Ville to hang out with Mom & Dad. It was a fun weekend – filled with playin’ in the dirt, grillin, chillin’ & knittin’.

Playin’ in the dirt…

Saturday was a gardening day for Amy Artisan & Dad Artisan. I definitely inherited my green thumb from him and since I didn’t do my deck plantings or flowerbed this summer since I’m traveling it was fun to ‘play in the dirt’ for a bit & help get everything planted at home.

The first thing we did was plant the zinnias in the front flowerbed. (Zinnias are an Artisan Family favorite flower.) As Dad lifted up the turtle statue to move it out of the flowerbed he discovered a Mama Skink had nested & was watching over 6-8 eggs. So, the turtle statue will stay where it is & Mama Skink now has a lovely flowered & mulched home for her babies.

Skinks Home

We also planted up several color pots for the front entry to the house as well as the back deck. I think my favorite planting was the red & white coleus in the red pot – look closely & you’ll see a familiar “As Seen on TV” item – that’s right, the coleus are in the “Pasta Pot” from several years ago. The pot had outlived it’s usefulness in the kitchen & was such a pretty color that we thought it would be fun to plant into it – the red coleus leaves are a perfect match for it. Next year I vote for basil in the pasta pot – how fun would it be to grow “pasta herbs” in the pasta pot?

Pasta Pot Coleus

The other color pots indeed contain a lot of different colors: zinnias, coleus, petunias and more!

Flower Pot Color

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Grillin’…

Dad & I cleaned up the grill & made use of it for dinner on Saturday & Sunday. Saturday got the grill going for the season with turkey mignon, Vidailia onion slices and yellow squash slices. Sunday was yummy marinated steak. The meals were rounded off with super sweet canteloupe and Mom’s homemade strawberry pie. Having Mom’s home cooking is always great but I appreciated it even more this weekend since I’m eating out ALL the time while on the road.

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Chillin’…

A couple of fun movies that we watched over the weekend: Nanny McPhee & Glory Road. Both were fun flicks & good entertainment!

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Knittin’…

On Saturday afternoon Dad & I went to Hobby Lobby & spent the vast majority of time in the yarn section. There were several ‘new to me’ baby yarns that look like they would be so soft & cuddly for baby blankets – I have to make 2 baby boy blankets this summer so I think I will try some of these yarns instead of reaching for my “standard” Bernat Cotton Tots.

While browsing through the yarn at Hobby Lobby on Saturday I found a good selection of my favorite Sugar’n Cream for dishcloths – including several colors that I haven’t seen in store before. So, even though I had some SnC yarn in the suitcase for hotel knitting I picked up 5 balls of summertime colors. Saturday evening I got started on 1 “Grandma’s favorite” & kept on going all Sunday afternoon & evening. I’ll be finishing up the 5th dishcloth later this evening. Since suitcase space is a premium 4 dishcloths stayed in Georgia for my mom & sister to enjoy.

Summer Flavor Dishcloths
(L to R: Cherry Swirl, Swimming Pool, Key Lime Pie, Creamsicle)
These colors just seem to capture the vibrant fun of summertime!

Also…a bit of hotel knitting…Last week was fairly busy in the evenings here in Chattnooga – the annual Riverbend Festival was in full swing so our project team checked out the events on a couple evenings. I still managed to get 2 small knit projects completed: a simple dishcloth & a scarf.
Hotel Knitting

Project Spectrum: Blue Hydrangeas

As I was taking pictures of our flower plantings last night & Dad was watering the plants he asked if I needed any more blue pictures for this month and suggested that I take some pictures of the hydrangeas along the side of the house. So this Project Spectrum digital collage is from Amy Artisan & Dad Artisan.

Blue Hydrangeas

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All in all it was a great weekend – it was a treat to hang out with my Dad on Father’s Day!

Back home for a bit…

…46 hours to be exact – that’s the elapsed time between when the cab dropped me off on Friday evening & when the cab will pick me up on Sunday evening to head back to the airport.

When I got home on Friday I was pleasantly surprised to see that my Knitters Tea Swap package was waiting at my front door (instead of held with the rest of my mail). I quickly opened up the box & was thrilled with the goodies.

 – 2 beautiful balls of Louisa Harding Kimona Angora that contain so many of my favorite colors – A box of Dutch Stroopwafel cookies – I’ll have to do the traditional “way to eat” & warm one over a cup of hot tea. – 3 boxes of Revolution Tea: Decaf Honeybush Caramel; Sweet Ginger Peach & White Pear. This is one of my favorite brands of tea so it was a perfect selection. I had seen the Pear online but hadn’t had a chance to pick up a box yet.

Thanks to Nancy in Arizona for a lovely box!

Travel Pocket

Now that Carrie has received her Knitting Vacation Swap box I can post the picture & details about the knit project I made for her. A travel pocket (or envelope clutch) – to hold a journal, pen, postcards, stamps, maps, travel brochures and any other paper while on the journey.

Yarn: Dalegarn Baby Ull in Pink (4504), Red (3718) & Orange (3507) all held together

Pattern: My own design. I knit half of a “Grandma’s Favorite” dishcloth for the flap before switching to a stockinette rectangle. After steam blocking, the side seams were zig-zagged on the sewing machine & then overstitched in yarn. The button is a vintage one from Mom’s button tin.

Also included in the swap package a set of custom “Vacation Swap” stitch markers from Katie’s Pink Sheep shop. I’ve enjoyed all the cute sheep that Katie has made & when I emailed her about a custom order for this swap she said “no problem” & went to work. Unfortunately the sheep were intercepted somewhere in the mail. Katie quickly made a replacement set of sheep & mailed them to my parent’s house so they could be included in the package. Thanks Katie for helping me out!

Dishcloth 414

– aka another Ballband…So named for the hotel room I was in this week where 90% of the knitting was done – notice the lovely ottoman pose

Sugar’n Cream yarn – Violet Veil Ombre & Hot Purple

Not in Kansas Anymore…

(Or Dateline Chattanooga #2)

To say that the last couple of days have been a whirlwind of travel would be a bit of an understatement.

Flying back from Chattanooga last Wed. was not without ‘excitement’ - spring weather in Chicago meant that our flight was delayed 3+ hours. And the Chattanooga airport does not have much to distract you with if you are delayed. Towards the end we were able to use a broomstick to change the channel on one of the gate TVs & watch a bit of Alias before we finally got on the plane. While the delay was not fun, the flight to Chicago was a beautiful view – the clouds below us were so full of texture & details and the sunset above the clouds was a gorgeous mix of pinks, reds, oranges & almost purple – I wish I had taken a picture.

After a whirlwind of errands & book club on Thursday I was on an early flight to Kansas City on Friday morning. My parents drove up from Atlanta & we met up at the airport. We used to live in Overland Park, KS in the 80s so this was a bit of a “going home” weekend for us. We were in town to celebrate the wedding of a dear family friend (a sweet girl who I used to babysit a long time ago). Friday’s lunch was an excellent meal of famous KC BBQ.

Friday evening was the wedding celebration. The ceremony was a beautiful, contemporary, elegant event filled with joy & the reception was a fun party!

Megan & Larry

Congratulations Megan & Larry!!

The rest of the weekend was spent with the family of the bride (some of our dearest friends ever), other friends from when we used to live there and a fair bit of driving around & seeing how everything has changed since we moved away.

I got home last night just in time to finish packing my “work” suitcase & catch about 4 hours of sleep before flying to Atlanta this morning, picking up a rental car & heading into the office. To say I’m tired would be an understatement – I don’t know if I’ll be awake for the Alias finale tonight, but I’ll definitely watch it with my Dad when I’m home this weekend.Â

One other highlight of the weekend was knitting related – I gave my Mom her birthday present (some of the secret knitting that has been alluded to in past posts) – a Morehouse Merino lace shawl in one of the Monet colorways. I realized last night that I don’t have any pictures to share. Never fear, I’m spending the weekend with the family down in GA so next week I can share pictures of my latest project with you all.

And with that…good night!

Dateline Chattanooga

Coming to you courtesy of the wireless connection here at the hotel…

The weekend was a hubub of activity in preparation for being on the road. This week I’m in Chattanooga, I’ll be back in Chicago for one day, then off to Kansas City for the weekend for a wedding, then back down South for 2 weeks. whew! I’m tired just thinking about it.

First thing Saturday morning I went out to the backyard & cut all my remaining tulips so that I could enjoy them inside for the weekend. All of these blooms were closed when I picked them – it was fun to see them open throughout the weekend. Â

My quarterly crop club was already scheduled to meet at my house on Saturday morning so we had a fun time working on our albums.

While running errands on Saturday I picked up several crafty items that will be used in the coming weeks. First up, Mason-Dixon Knitting and some Sugar’n Cream cotton to make the Ballband Dishcloth(s). While at Homegoods (you never know what you’ll find) I happened upon Alterknits at a great price as well as a Stitch-It Kit from Sublime Stitching that was also at a nice price. On the reading front I picked up Yarn Harlot: The Secret Life of a Knitter and had to make sure I wasn’t laughing out loud while reading on the puddle jumper flight last night – most likely I’ll be finished with the book before the turning out the lights tonight.

Even though I’m only down here for 3 evenings (really only 2 because it was 11 by the time I checked in last night) I have a couple of small projects in the suitcase. One quick project is a green square for the Papa’s Quilt project being coordinated by Jamie. If you have a moment, go check out this latest “knitters in action” opportunity.

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