March 12, 2008

Florida Vaca

So Florida was great. As usual. Every year my mom and I go (here's 2007, here's 2006). Every year I try to remember to take lots of pictures. Every year I forget. I emptied my camera last night and seriously I have twice as many that look like this:
Dexter hates the snow
Dexter hating the snow

Than of anything Florida related. It’s frustrating. But perhaps next year… I did take a few pictures, though so let’s work with those.

We started the trip by doing a little souvenir shopping:
My mom and grandma at Uncommon Threads
Us at Uncommon Threads
Did you expect anything else?

The shop is called Uncommon Threads and it’s owned by a friend of my grandma. It’s good when your friends own yarn stores! In the car on the way my mom and I were wondering… It’s really hot here. All the time. So what do people in Florida knit?

Answer? Everything:
Uncommon Threads Yarn Store

Seriously this store was amazing. So much variety in such a little space. It was wall to wall to wall yarn with a good amount of beads thrown in. I could have spent days in there. Here’s a blurry picture of just one area of sock yarn:
Sock Yarn at Uncommon Threads
Crazy variety going on there. And I was thinking it would be a store of cotton and novelty yarn! Silly me.

We bought lots of fun things Yarn Haul

but the most exciting for me is this:
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran
4 skeins of Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran

See for almost 2 years now I’ve had this sitting in my stash taunting me:
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran
I bought it at a going out of business sale and have enough for a sweater… I’ve swatched so many times with so many different ideas but this dark purpley yarn doesn’t show patterns very well. And I’d be bored just knitting a plain old sweater. Then thanks to my recent obsession with stranded knitting I got it into my head that I wanted to knit this with it:


Hela

Beautiful, right? Problem being that I didn’t want to pick out colors online. And nowhere around here sells this yarn. I know I could have used something else but I just wasn’t feeling that. So when I saw it in this store I was super, super excited. We laid out all of the colors and thanks to the wonder that is Ravelry I was able to quickly pull up the pattern in the store so we could all discuss color options. In the end I decided on a simple, 2 color route:
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran
I think the creamy white against the deep plum will be spectacular.

Anyways here's the rest of the haul:

Roving
Indie dyed roving that is only sold at this yarn store and at another one in Georgia.

Jitterbug
Jitterbug in Parrot

Maize
Maize in Miami Nice

The pile is actually missing some sock yarn that my mom immediately started knitting with. She swore she wasn’t going to buy any more sock yarn and managed to come home with 3 skeins. Uh huh. True confessions later on revealed that she has enough to make something like 11 pairs of socks. I don’t think that’s unreasonable at all (someone back me up on this).

The other highlight of the trip was doing this:
Making Gnocchi

We made gnocchi! I’ve never done that before and it was much easier than I thought it would be:
Making Gnocchi
We were worried about making them too tough and overcompensated by not using enough flour. So they were a bit on the soft side. Even so they were amazing compared to the lumps of lead that you can buy at the store.
Gnocchi
Like little potato clouds. Mmmmmmm.

Other than that the trip was pretty typical. We walked every morning, napped every afternoon, and soaked in as much of the sun as possible:
How's the weather?
florida

We were lucky and managed to completely miss the snowstorm that blasted Ohio while we were gone (Michelle has some good pictures of it here). The airport was closed for a good chunk of the weekend and there were signs of that all over coming home:
luggage lined up at the airport
Bags piled up at the airport. I wonder where there owners were…

Monday it was back to reality and dealing with bus stops that look like this:
Bus Stop Snowed In
And crazy work deadlines that are going to make the next month very… interesting.

It was so nice to get away, though!

13 comments:

  1. That sweater is really cute! It's... hela cute! Sorry, but I had too.

    I'm so glad you enjoyed your trip, it's gorgeous here, isn't it? And we do knit everything, I have a whole bag of knitted accessories that I very rarely wear. Whenever someone I know goes to visit "the north" I bring out my bag and let them pick what they'll need! I like to think that it's a nice break from having to buy something for a short trip.

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  2. Welcome home! You came back just in time for mud season and pothole season!

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  3. Anonymous9:52 PM

    Poor Dexter! He needs boots and a coat to withstand those Ohio blizzards! Maybe he needed a trip to FL too!

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  4. Anonymous10:03 PM

    Well, we tried to shoo the snow away before you got back.. but we failed. Glad you're back, glad you had a nice time. That Uncommon Threads sounds familiar... if its the same store... and I had known... I woulda hooked you up with Gnat (Natalie) at Bark n Knit (http://barknknit.blogspot.com/2008/03/wedding-wednesday-and-stash.html) She's getting married in December. She was just there on the 5th shopping for her wedding shawl yarn.

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  5. That's my favorite local yarn store!!! Hookedonstring is right. Next time your in town let me know and we could meet up!! That's awesome!!

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  6. 11 pairs? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! That's not a confession. That's a shopping trip.

    Looks like you had a fab trip! And that color combo is going to make for one gorgeous Hela!

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  7. Hela is going to be great in those colors!!! I'm sooo jelous that you missed all this fabulous weather! You and your mom planned very well for your escape!! Looks like you had a great time!!

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  8. Poor Dexter! You're right - he really does hate it doesn't he?

    Looks like you had a great time. Pity my own mom doesn't like any of the things that I do.

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  9. You really did miss a big one! It was all over national news!

    Glad you had a wonderful trip and nice yarn loot! Luv how you put in in the snow for yarn p0rn! ;op

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  10. Your grandma is too darn cute! And that sweater is going to be amazing--I made a Drive-Thru out of Jo Sharp and just love that yarn...

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  11. Sounds like a wonderful trip. And I think your sweater is going to be incredible.

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  12. Sounds like a fun trip! I'm jealous of that sunny poolside photo, and that yarn store looks HUGE.

    Hela in two colors is going to be really pretty.

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  13. love the pic of dexter hating the snow ;) glad you had a nice trip!

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