With Black Friday Approaching...

We're all spending money. We're lying if we say we're not. We might be cutting back, crafting, not buying something unless we really feel we need to, but we're still buying. With that in mind...

Remember, the money you do spend speaks volumes, especially in these troubled times. If you like a store or restaurant, go there. Do you like a specific mom'n'pop website, spend there. I've been wanting to write about this for awhile but something hit home last week.

Jenny invited Regina & I to dinner before SnB. She wanted to try Tart. She's driven by it about a thousand times and read the reviews and just hadn't made it in. I've passed by it about a thousand times and read the reviews and just hadn't made it in. Thanks to Jenny, we all made it in.

There was no one there.

It was us.

When we were finishing, another group of ladies walked in.

That was it.

I'm not telling you how to spend your money. I'm not telling you just to buy handmade or only support local artisans. (Though, really, feel free to buy me a log, or three.) I'm just asking you to think about where you shop or buy dinner. With the way things are going, these places aren't going to be there when we all come out of this economic mess we're in. And no one is immune.

And, that's all I have to say about that.

But here are some cute puppies. (Thanks Catherine!)

The Urban Craft Center - The Return

So Regina & I spent our Sunday at the Urban Craft Center. Anyone who reads this blog or hers knows that we go there. But, unless you've been there lately, you haven't been.

Holy.
Crap.

I'm moving in. Seriously. I'm buying an Aerobed and just moving in. Mom can take care of the dogs.

The space is gorgeous and the shop they opened...they have fabric that Michael Levine doesn't have. Yeah, that's right, I said it. And I bought a yard of it too. The shop & space are pretty much the stuff of every crafter's if-I-won-the-lottery conversation. Its fabulous. They have like every crafting book. I haven't seen anything like this in any of my knitting/crafting travels. They have supplies and gifts and stuff you need to buy me. And, their prices are exactly at suggested retail, unlike other places I've been to that have tried to charge more.

Now, I'll be perfectly blunt and say that I'm waiting for the next wave of classes (mostly because I've already taken the ones in the current group that tripped my trigger....do the soap class, its fabulous.) Although if they were to do some of the holiday Martha Stewart project classes we talked about at Felt Club (hint, hint do a simple stuffy class before Christmas...I need to make at least one!), I'd be in for that. But, otherwise, I'm waiting for the quilting class in January that's been tossed in front of me like a carrot on a stick.

So, until the website is fully functional, get on their mailing list (they only send out newsletters so you won't be bombarded with stuff and they're super protective of their people so they don't sell you out) or better yet, go visit. They even validate.

The Urban Craft Center
2433 Main Street
Santa Monica, CA 90405

(In the Edgemar building)

And the countdown begins

That's right kids, we're just one month shy of Christmas. So, the crafters out there are either smiling smugly or panicking right now. I'm oddly in between. Between my own projects and the elves I've employed, the only panic that set in for a moment this morning was the fact that I almost forgot a short person in my life. Its not Christmas crushing as I picked out the gift my mom is getting her (that and she's not yet two so she wouldn't remember or hold it against me) but still, I forgot. Not good.

Moving on...


Here is my first complete gift, safely posted here on the interwebs as the recipient feels the internets is a waste of time and if she were to log on it would suck her into the great Matrix and never let her out. (I exaggerate, only mildly.)

Yup, my first pair of completed socks. Now, this isn't the first pair I've attempted or the first pair on needles, but the first pair done. Woo!

These are from the worst book ever named but the best for fabulous basic men's patterns. Seriously. The pattern is called Plain Old Rag Socks (link here for the Ravelers out there.) For anyone afraid of socks because a) they don't want to knit with needles the size of toothpicks, b) they don't want to work with yarn the width of dental floss, and c) don't want to spend 2 weeks on a project that will be destroyed by the recipient, these are the socks for you. They're on size 7 needles using a worsted weight yarn. The first one took me a bit to figure out the heel turn and all of that but the second one took me the flight home from Minneapolis to L.A. and that was after my flight from London....we're not talking about full brain power.

I only ran into one snag. You see those fabulous green toes? Super cute right? Well, yeah. The pattern might just underestimate how much yarn you need. Unless you want to stash bust using a different yarn for the heel and toe, do not try to use one skein of gorgeous hand-dyed yarn that you dyed yourself and were super proud to use on this project only to see you're 10 rows short. yeah. Not good. You're going to need 1.2 skeins of yarn.

Woo!

Felt Club/Nickel Diner

Really these two deserve their own posts but I enjoyed them back to back so you can too!

First rule of Felt Club is that you talk about Felt Club.

Well, it seems that everyone important was talking about Felt Club before the event. I didn't feel the need to toss my two cents in before. But, now that its over, I'm happy to chatter.

Since most of the outlying areas of L.A. seem to be burning, creating this creepy orange-grey look to the sky, there was no one on the road. We left the house late, circled for parking4 times, bought bagels and then headed over to Felt Club. My thinking was that I didn't want to stand outside for an hour for a swag bag so I might as well just get there on time and saunter in. Yeah. Right. I got there at about 10:30 am (opening was 11am). Right when we jumped in line I saw a blue car that I was about to point out to Todd that looked like Regina's. Turned out, it was Regina's! She had the same plan I did...get there at 11am. Yeah, traffic from the side of the city she was coming from was just as light and she got there hella early as well. And we all ended up with a swag bags. Woo!

Ok, onto the show...

Thankfully it was at the Shrine this year. And I say thankfully because the last Felt Club event I attended was in a venue so small that the Fire Department was dispatched. (Hey! Felt Club! Over here! How about Santa Monica Civic next year? Just an idea.)

By getting there early, we actually saw all the vendors and their merchandise. As the day wore on, we literally made our purchases and ran as it was getting more and more crowded. I mean really crowded, push-through-people crowded, hey-I'd-like-to-look-at-that crowded. Anyone who questions the power of craft right now, need look no further than Felt Club. Crazy crowded. But, I would do it again, in a heartbeat. Yup the vendors were that strong.

Here are my favorites...

Ex Libris: Seriously brilliant. He takes old books and turns them into journals. He even keeps the pages and tosses them in with the blank pages. And, the dude was nice. Regina snagged my absolute favorite...a book about lawns. That's ok. I grabbed Dehydration Made Simple. I was happy to see that although a few of us were just buying one or two, there were people buying ten to twelve at a time. I hope he sold out of his entire stock yesterday.

My Imaginary Boyfriend: She has these log pillows and even kits to make the log pillows. And, seriously, the cutest robots EVER. Freakin' brilliant. I saw one little girl holding her robot like a doll after her mom bought it for her. That little girl couldn't have looked any happier with her robot. It was awesome. If I ever do get my own house, you are all buying me log pillows. I want a stack of them. I'm not kidding. And really, that's the only reason I didn't buy the kits myself. I couldn't stand the thought of them just sitting sadly waiting for a place to be put.

Biggs & Featherbelle: So I got bath salts & soap & Todd got lip balm. Todd's working in Albuquerque today so I can't ask him to comment on the lip balm, but Oh. Mi. Gawd. I love the bath salts. I have the Muscle Soak. Not only does it smell yummy but it is amazingly relaxing. I know, I know, baths are relaxing in general. But this stuff is way better than what you're buying in the stores. Once I run out I either have to mail order, go to some yoga place in Hollywood or call Twin Cities Green to make sure that they really are carrying everything from Re-gifts and send Todd over to dreaded Uptown to pick up some more. Hmmmmm....

I Melt with You: Sadly, only their candles are up on their site. (Not that there's anything wrong with their candles, they just have so much more.) I picked up the yummiest smelling body balm ever, Mint Mango Tea. I don't know what it was about this scent but everyone in our group agreed that it was the best ever. They also had a clean laundry scent that made for the best candle ever. And, like all of the othe vendors I mention above (even if I don't say it in the individual write-up), they were just so nice and excited to talk about their product. And, for me, that's what makes shopping and gift buying fun.

With our purchases and swag bags in tow we headed over to Nickel Diner. Horray! I finally made it! I'll be honest, I'm not sure what I liked more...the food or the vibe. We'll start with food and you can decide later.

The menu is fabulous. There were at least six things I wanted to order, and that's really saying something. Three of the sandwiches looked good, the French toast was tempting...hey, I'm making myself hungry again. Anyways, I settled by trading half of my sandwich so I could try two different things. Oddly, I loved both. Usually, I'm all smug that I ordered better. Yeah, wasn't so sure. And the french fries are worth the tightness of my waistband today. And the desserts.... So, she left the desert tray right in our field of vision. Not cool. We kept staring at it. Wondering what was on the side we couldn't see. Finally, she saw our drool and brought it over and introduced us. We were all in love. Homemade pop tarts, ding dongs, red velvet cake, chocolate cake, the list goes on and on. Everything we ordered was great.

The vibe was cool and I don't mean in an eastside hipster sort of way, which was going on as well. I mean the owner works the door and greets her clients like friends....completely old skool. In my opinion, that intimacy has been lost in restaurants today. It was incredible to see it back. She knew her regulars, greeted them immediately, seated the new kids, made sure everyone had what they needed, cleared a table because the busboy was busy...it was a very cool ballet to watch.

I don't spend as much time as I used to in Downtown but I can tell you that I'll be back to Nickel Diner. There are too many things on that menu I need to try and maybe one day I'll be greeted at the door.

Alright, to Tuesday....

Now that we've all voted to change the world and make it a better place, we can now return to blog posting about mostly nothing at all...like trips we've taken!

Tuesday, October 21, 2008 - We head off to London on the 9:15 train. Our cab driver to the airport described London as a mistress. She's beautiful, and expensive, very interesting, but not somewhere you can afford or handle forever. I agree. I adore London but can only afford her in small doses. One thing the cab driver didn't mention was that affairs often cause high drama. And, without getting into too many sad details, on our train into London, we had a two hour delay due to some drama. But in true British fashion, they were efficient, quick, and got us on our way as quickly as they could.

Once in London, we took the tube towards St. James Park. On our way to the park and to my favorite attraction in Britain, we walked by the Royal Mews. Not the sort to walk by horses, we did the self-guided tour.

In all honesty, I don't know if I'd recommend this. I say that because of one thing:

These are the only horses we saw.

When you say mews, I think of a place where horses live. So, Todd and I were just a little sad when these were all the horses we were going to meet. We did see and hear about the amazing carriages that carry and have been gifted to royalty over the generations. We learned that many of the people who care for the horses actually live in the Mews with their families. And, when you look up above where the horses live, you can see the apartments with flowers on the window sills. Seeing a glimpse into royal life and those who care for the entirety of that life was cool.

We also met this guy, who is an obvious resident.

Pressing on, we gawked at Buckingham...

That annoying black bar in the picture is part of the gate that goes around the palace. To take pictures you have to go through the bars. (I would have edited it out but picnik isn't behaving. )

Its mildly amusing to see hundreds of tourists leaning through bars to take pictures. Of course, it might have been more amusing to them to see one tourist taking this picture....

From Buckingham, we walked through St. James park.

See the London Eye in the background? It didn't move the entire time we were there.

From St. James, we embarked into the Cabinet War Rooms. I adore the Cabinet War Rooms. Why? Well, thank you so much for asking...

I really didn't enjoy history. Memorizing dates and royal lines and all of that stuff isn't fun. And, I'm not good at it. Staring at note cards, being quizzed by mom really didn't help my appreciation for those who came before me.

But, humanities...putting all the pieces of a culture together, art, music, politics, literature, fashion, etc... that's what I love. That's when history comes alive. And that's what the Cabinet War Rooms do. After the end of the war, everyone just left. And the map room, it is exactly as it was all those years ago, down to the sugar some dude was hoarding since there was rationing. To me, that's history.

Now, of course, some of the museum had to be recreated, like the bedrooms and such whatnot. But to see how the war was dealt with, below ground, to see how staff lived and worked...that's just amazing.

As we came out of the War Rooms....
It sort of sums up London for me: light, dark, still, moving, old, new, simple and complicated.

That was deep...anywho...

From St. James, we walked down Pall Mall so I could meet my London co-workers and see the London office.

From there we walked to Fortnum & Mason, also known as the Queen's grocer. The food is spectacular and, during my last visit, I saw the Edge in a fabulous green top hat and tails escorting an appropriately aged, dressed, and quite attractive woman to some sort of an event there.

We walked Bond Street to SoHo where we ventured to All the Fun of the Fair. This marked my first knit shop in London. The shop is tiny but incredibly bright and easy to navigate. They have not only yarn and notions but all sorts of hand knit treats like cupcakes and tea cosies and bunnies and bears for sale. I really enjoyed my time there. Now, my only rule of yarn buying on this trip was to buy only what I cannot get here at home. For some reason shopkeepers were amused & delighted by his request. After being introduced to all of the yarn that fit my description, I bought two large skeins of organic undyed wool and two normal sized skeins of bamboo sock yarn.

We walked around Carnaby Street down Regent Street and around Piccadilly Circus and then took the tube back to Kings Cross. The 19:15 Cambridge Express train brought us back to Cambridge for a late dinner, email and bridal mayhem.

So ends Tuesday.

I don't know about you but I'm tired. Just writing about it was exausting. Looking back, I don't know how I did all that walking.

I voted

We interrupt the wedding recap for the following announcement...

I voted.

I don't know about your voting experience, but mine was quite different this year. Not only was there a line at 7am (a first at my polling place), but everyone brought their dogs, kids and nannies along. And, I'm not just talking about bringing the baby along, 'cause, well, you can't leave the baby at home. I mean, people brought all of their dogs, all of their kids (from 0 to 16 years old) and a few even brought along the nannies. This wasn't just voting, it was an occasion, a learning experience. People had cameras and were taking pictures of each other.

I've been voting at this location for years (I adore my voting garage) and its never been like this. Typically I'm the only person there with a camera and usually people are giving me dirty looks even though I'm taking a picture of the garage from across the street.

I admit, I'm one of the lucky ones. I only had to wait about 15 minutes and parking was easy.

But yeah, this election was different.

Back to life

As I've been properly chastised by my favorite pharmacist for not taking any time off after my trip to the UK, I figure that means, I'm home and back in the swing of things.

Well, mostly.

Looks like I'll have to hit the hard stuff (herbal tea) in order to convince my body that sleeping 6 - 8 hours in a row is a good idea.

So yeah, here I am. The laundry has been done; the dogs have been walked; and the pictures are uploaded. I guess all that means is now I'm ready to start the England recap. I know, try to contain your excitement. It might be a bit much considering election day is tomorrow.

Nonetheless, let us begin at the beginning....

Saturday, October 18, 2008, I needed to get from Los Angeles to Heathrow carrying the following:

1. Wedding Dress

2. Work Laptop

3. Camera

4. Medications

5. Bridesmaid Dress

6. Purse

7. Jewelry

8. Knitting

9. Reading Material

10. Velvet wrap for above Bridesmaid dress

As you can imagine, this would, er, exceed the usual carry-on allowance. But shout "I'm carrying a wedding dress to England and its not mine!" gets you all sorts of sympathy and help from airline crews. All of that gear flying in both coach (from L.A. to Minneapolis) and first class (from Minneapolis to Heathrow) was accepted and stowed by the crews. I was shocked by how nice everyone was to me.

Sunday, October 19, 2008 - I'd be happy to tell you all about flying overseas in first class. But, when I've done that during conversation, I get the overwhelming sense they want to hit me when I describe the fully reclining chairs, the warm towels and such. So, we'll skip all that and get to England....We made it to London where the future bride was kind enough to meet us. Back at Barton House (seriously, that's how you address letters to their house), we were met by the welcoming committee.

After proper introductions, we we walked a bit, ate a bit, and the bride did her song & dance to try to keep us up as late as possible to aid in our time adjustment. She always does this for me, which is sweet, but by 8pm I was more than ready to snooze. If I was up at 4am the next day, so be it, but I needed sleep.

Monday, October 20, 2008 - As amazing as it was to fly 4,000 miles in first class, I will warn you of one thing that crosses coach/business/first class lines...drink lots and lots and lots and lots of water when you fly, especially if you're flying for a long time, like 8 or more hours. Really. Trust me on this. You want to drink HUGE amounts of water. I slept too much and did not drink lots and lots and lots of water and yeah, I had a bit of a rough start on Monday. But, I will tell you that Motilium 10 is the best stuff ever.

After my recovery from dehydration (ironic that you can't keep water down when you're dehydrated) and a croissant, we jumped onto a tour of Cambridge. If you're looking for a low impact way to see the city, this is a good way to go. You don't have to worry about your guide being good or crappy or funny or whatever...they hand you some headphones, you plug in, choose a language and off you go. Considering my rocky start and my guilt from keeping Todd from seeing the city, this worked quite well. And, we saw stuff that we wouldn't have on foot like the American WWII Memorial, and some of the colleges that are on the outskirts of town. (Did you know it takes 6 years to get a veterinary degree at Cambridge? Its the longest undergraduate degree program at the university.) I was also able to point out which school the bride went to (Churchill) as I wouldn't have been able to otherwise as it was on the opposite side of town from where we were staying.

We only hopped off the tour once, per Todd's request, to examine more closely one of the local attractions:

Yup, Staples. Though, sadly, the easy button did not have an accent. We were disappointed. Defeated, we jumped onto the next bus to enjoy the rest of the tour. Dinner followed by email brought Monday to a close.