Japanese and Rose Gardens in Portland

D had been to Portland before and told me about the Japanese Garden. So number one on our list of things for me to see on this trip.

We took lots of pictures, so you have been warned.

One of the complaints I heard about this garden was "there are no flowers" and "it is not colorful". It was so rich with greens that D and I both fell in love. There are so many shades that my camera could not keep up.

One of the rock gardens. D could have sat here all day. You know I think he would have been one of the few people that appreciated a desktop zen garden.

The other rock garden. They change the patterns depending on the seasons. Last time D was there it was a checkerboard pattern signaling harvest season.

A view of Portland from the garden. I think that Mt Hood is in there somewhere covered by the clouds. Still beautiful to me.

See what I mean about shades of green?

Did I ever tell you that D was my Tae kwon do instructor? That is him showing off his "crane" kick. Yeah I love that guy he can make me smile.

Yeah we really liked the garden.

Then we walked across to the International Rose Test Garden. Color everywhere. And people everywhere too.

See why I love him?

I could not resist this one.

We even came across the aftermath of a wedding. I love weddings!

D made me pose for this one too. I was laughing so hard I am amazed the picture came out.

Afterwards we had Mexican food and beer! So it really was an international day for us. Oh we also found a Peet's coffee and had some tea.

We liked the Japanese Garden better but then we like green a lot.

Work in Progress Wednesday

So some brilliant person on Ravelry came up with work in progress Wednesday (WIP). I will try to show off what I am working on.

I made Mustardy Cheese Pretzel Bread, or was it Cheesy Mustard Pretzel Bread? Either way it was yum. The dough did not seal very well with cheese mixed in so I got 'mountain' shaped bread.

Does not matter how it looks, it tasted great. I think D may have finished it today so I guess it is no longer a WIP.

Remember this sock? I knit on it while I was on my way to Oregon. Such a great color. As much as I loved knitting on this, I was fighting the feeling that it was wrong. Don't get me wrong I am sure I would have loved the socks but...I think it wants to be something else.

I found this pattern last week on Ravelry. (I must be on there a lot.) It did not matter what I was looking at this pattern kept popping up. I enjoyed the simple lines. Then I saw the name, Multnomah. I was constantly mispronouncing this word in Portland. It was the street where I stepped on to a city bus for the first time ever. It was my linking point between the MAX light rail and bus route 8.

I really wanted to knit the pattern using yarn that I actually bought in Portland. I petted, I pondered, I imagined, I talked to the pattern asking it which yarn to choose.

It told me that the sock was wrong for my blue alpaca yarn. That yarn rode Multnomah St. with me. It was riding in the car when we crossed back into Multnomah county. That yarn was just as much Oregon to me as the yarns I bought there. The pattern whispered that it would be OK they would work together.

And so far we are all sharing the love.

Portland!

Blogger got me again. I had my Portland post all done when I went to post it, Blogger booted me out and somehow auto save was turned off too. So here I go again.

We stayed in a B&B in the historic Irvington neighborhood. It was beautiful and unique, yet all the differences worked together. As we walked through I took pictures that caught the feel of the neighborhood.

Mossy Steps

Apparently in super nice neighborhoods you don't allow people working on your house to use your toilet. I must admit that a port-a-potty is not what I think of when I think of 'Honey Bucket'.

There were several trees in the area that had this trunk bulge. I wonder what caused it?

Some houses had ivy for their front lawns. Now I want an ivy yard too.

We went to a local infamous book store, Powell's Books. They sell new and used books right next to each other. The original store takes up a city block. The funny thing is that from the outside it looks like nothing special. When D walked by it he did not even go in, the first time. He humored me and was shocked how it looked inside. It was totally like the TARDIS inside. (Dr Who reference)

The rooms were referenced by colors. The restrooms were in the Purple room. In case you ever need to know. Knitting books and cookbooks are in the orange room. Mysteries in the gold room. I found some early Robert B Parker, Spenser books, and a romance novel.

The technical branch of the bookstore was down the street and I found something that had suspected for a while.

Oops, I read that as Algebra lies!

We used the MAX light rail to get around the town. Is it wrong that I really wanted to go to the library? But we did not.

D let me try his 'Sassy Sue' beer at dinner. Yes it was good.

Is it just me or is D staring longingly at the mustard?

It cracked me up that we came across this scrap of paper on the walk back to the B&B. Do you think the student finally remembered who they were supposed to do their report on?

Our B&B had a resident cat, Winston. I will be honest that is one of the reasons I picked that B&B. Having someone to pet did make me miss my boys less. D and I always joke that hotels should have rental cats for me.

We had a great stay at The Georgian House. Willie (the owner) was super nice and even cooked around D's aversion to eggs as a breakfast food.

Into the wild blue yonder

We got to vacation in Oregon! D and I both fell in love with the areas we saw. We started and ended in Portland with a side trip to the coast in Newport.

I found a good antidote to air travel. Yarn! The following picture shows what is called the great wall of sock yarn. It is located at Twisted in Portland, Oregon. I was too shy to take more than one picture. Ironically all the sock yarn I bought came from the other end of the wall. My yarny oasis does exist!

You have already seen my new backpack. Lovely isn't it?

Even better it has it's own yarn compartment. Can't see it?

How about now? I think they designed that compartment for shoes, but you know it works better for me as a future sock compartment. We ran into some people we know and they laughed at my yarn compartment. Can you imagine laughing at a yarn compartment?

D headed out to Portland the week prior to me so he took the felted ipod sleeve I made. So I stitched up the sides of my sweater cable swatch and felted it a bit to make a new one for me. I may even like it better than the old felted case.

This was one of the socks I knit on while flying. I finished the other sock to round out a new pair for me while somewhere over Ohio near as I could tell. I even kitchnered the toe closed on the plane and no one even asked what I was doing. I wore them with pride in Oregon, especially since they were dyed in Oregon. They are of course drying now since they were relegated to the laundry when we got home. Pictures will follow at another time.

While I was admiring the great wall of sock yarn I texted D, to ask him what color he wanted his next socks to be. The answer was chestnut. ? Who asks for chestnut as a color? Oddly enough I had just looked at the above yarn called....wait for it.......Chestnutty. How odd is that? I am hoping he will love these socks as much as I love mine.

I will post my yarn purchases later, I think I got some good stuff. I was told that I got a nice selection of Oregon yarns, thanks that is what I was going for. Yarn memories.

Maybe we should stop threating people

There is a big issue within the knitting community mostly within the US. It pops up every 6 months or so. Whether or not knitters can bring their knitting on airplanes. After September 11, knitting needles were on the banned items list for quite a while.

That rule was relaxed and knitters every where in the US let out a sigh of relief. Then there were instances of disagreement and some people lost their needles. So now the general feeling seems to be: TSA allows knitting needles on airplanes but the individual security agent you're checking in with may overrule the general guidelines. If the agent feels your needles are a threat you lose them.

So that sets off a firestorm. Some people think if it is allowed, it is allowed period! So now every time people fly they print out TSA regulations to show the agent if they have issues. I have not heard of any one winning that particular argument. Actually I have not really heard of people losing that argument either.

There are ongoing debates on wood vs metal needles, smaller dpns vs circular needles, how you carry the needles (mixed in with writing implements), if you have a project on the needles, anything way that you can think of.

I have heard people say things like: they better not take away my needles, I will be a very unhappy parson if they do. You should never try to take away something from someone with pointy sticks.

Aren't we being counter-productive here? We want the TSA to allow us to keep ourselves entertained for several hours by letting them think needles are not harmful but the next sentence out of our mouths we threaten them with the very things we said are not dangerous. Hello anyone else see the double standard here?

If I were a TSA agent am I more or less likely to let you keep your needle if you threaten to poke my eye out with it?

And ultimately don't we all want to get there safely first and entertained second? Or is that just me?

Life attacks!

Yarnkettle is away from her blog. Do not worry she will be returning to the blog shortly.

You may talk amongst yourselves, I will give you a topic: Are hand knit wool socks the best or uber good? Discuss.

Something I had been meaning to do

I did something yesterday that I've been meaning to do. Any guesses?

No, I'm not visiting a prison.

Does this help?

How about now?

I went to watch the planes at the airport. It started off quite slow, about 15 to 20 minutes with no activity. I knit on my sock and finished all but the closing of the toe. I was a bad knitter because I left the house with out my knitting accessories. So I did not have the scissors or needle. Luckily the traffic at the airport picked up enough to amuse me.

I enjoyed watching for a bit but it is not something that I need to do every weekend. It was interesting to see how the traffic ebbed and flowed both in the parking area and the airplanes.

I also picked up a new backpack, that is fully kitty endorsed. Jack loves bags whenever we go on a trip you can find him in the bag when you go to pack it.