duchessofgravity

who doesn't love a good sunset?

with a beautiful day off? well we went for a "scent"ic drive out to the beach. we being the dog. and me. she loves to stick her nose out the window and smell where we are going. we took a few lonely roads. ok, so maybe like 10 little roads. i make turns at random when i'm not in a hurry. and can you blame me? just check out the view! it really was spectacular. i would love to live out this way! we finally arrived at north beach in point reyes national seashore. they have a few beaches where leashed pets are allowed. i snacked on a quick lunch of tomatoes, figs, raisins, and almonds (from the farmer's market again) then we headed down to the water. my baby is 12 and she's never seen the ocean. i must be a terrible mother or something. she was just staring and staring. she couldn't get enough. after repeatedly chasing and running away from the waves for a half an hour she was content to just sit back and relax on a dune. and then she stood and told me it was ti...

fall is pumpkins and squash, indian corn, and crisp air. i can't wait to head out to the pumpkin patch to pick out ours next weekend :) and as a bonus a funny story for you. when i was little mom used to volunteer at my school. she always helped out when they did hearing and vision tests at the beginning of the school year. she recently told me a funny story about one of those years. she was working with a little girl who just wouldn't speak. mom asked her her name. she wouldn't tell her she tried laughing with her and telling her a story but nothing doing. finally mom asked her what her mother called her at home. to which she replied "puuuunkin." and she didn't say another word the whole time ;) ah you have to love the south :)

and i do mean ever drink coffee at 9 pm. no matter how good it would taste with smores pie. i promise you'll regret it at 2 am. i promise. the good news. although shari's took over the baker's square down the street, there is still free pie on wednesdays. we were skeptical, but the food is still good. even though it took half an hour to pick out dinner since we were unfamiliar with the menu. the bad news. there is free pie on wednesdays.

so about a hundred years ago when i was in school i had a handheld computer. it helped me keep track of birthdays, addresses, assignments, and my high score in bejeweled... today it came out of the box in the back of the closet for the first time in i don't know how many years. you see i think i'll be needing to keep track of my bejeweled scores in my new position. no? k, how 'bout this? i think i might need a better calendar than my free hallmark one. in the past it has served me well. until now i was able to write down my schedule and then scribble in schedule changes in those one inch squares. i could happily cross off days until vacation started. i could draw lines through days i couldn't work for some event or another. i could even fit in knitting night notices and the occasional lunch date. alas i think i'll need more space now. there will be actual stuff happening during my days. more stuff than making coffee that is. (i'm kinda panicking here ...

i think my favorite place this year may just be the santa rosa farmer's market. it has been fantastic to pick up the freshest produce week after week*. not only does everything taste great, the colors are fantastic. i just love heirloom tomatoes there are every shape, color, and size imaginable available the best part today was the tomato tasting...i think i ate 2 or 3 whole tomatoes worth. well if you were to glue the hodgepodge of types they had into one fantastic fruit! there are also all kinds of squash beets and radishes, carrots and more and the peppers! purple green red yellow orange sweet hot and everything between and the best part well best after tasting everything (i love samples) is bringing home your favorites 2 kinds of pears, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, black mission figs, apples, nectarines, plums, basil i see fruit salad and pizza in our future! *oh, and its not just the best place for produce, there are also: preserves, honey, bread, pies, olive oil, vinegar, che...

it's official; fall is here

i know it has been a little quiet around here. but i was trying not to spill the beans. i've been teetering on the edge of my coffee house seat here for a while but it is now official. i've made assistant store manager! it's really exciting and a little bit scary. i'm moving stores again which is sad. but it is a move in the right direction. yippee!

a couple of weekends ago we headed out to point reyes national seashore and caught sight of some tule elk. i'd never seen this kind of elk before, there are some ladies off in the distance if you squint you can almost see them lying down... but this guy is on the wrong side of the 8 foot livestock fence and the other side of a cattle guard from the girls hanging out with a bunch of cows... silly guy

if only i could stop reading for 5 minutes i would have time to knit. that is if i could stop stitching for 5 minutes too :)

harvest moon. mike over at friday foto proposed a labor day theme this week and this is what i saw tonight. moonrise over sonoma mountain. school is in full swing. and its getting crisp at night. i don't see labor day as the end of summer but more the unofficial start of fall.

you may well remember that many many moons ago in a far off land called orlando i started... the blanket. no? let me refresh your memory... i knit a garter stitch wash cloth to teach a friend's child to knit... i decided hey that would make a neat blanket. and i knit a bunch of strips in garter. and i hated how it looked seamed up. so i frogged it. and i knit it up in stripes on the knitting machine my mom found for me at a junk sale. in it's most recent incarnation it looked like this and that is how it stayed for over a year. every now and then i would wind in a few ends but there are a lot of ends there. and i didn't want to weave in ends. that is such a waste of time. especially when i'd rather be knitting! well. i guess if you get me bored enough. and you finish all my projects. i can be convinced that old projects need to come to a close! so 24 episodes of dexter later. it is seamed. the ends are woven in. yes i had nightmares after seeing that much gore. but tha...

some yarn just doesn't want to be what you want it to be. the pattern isn't right. knitting them just doesn't make you happy. you try a different pattern and that just doesn't help. heck sometimes. you just don't even want the yarn to be yarn after a while. you just want the yarn. and the project . to just go away. so say goodbye. these are headed to the frog pond. anybody want some slightly used but perfectly acceptable sock yarn? i'm just over it. let me know.

lots of sugar in my cappuccino please. or maybe iced. it has been a hot day... i guess as long as it is caffeinated it shouldn't really matter right? i think i deserve it! cause these babies are done! the venezia socks. or cappuccino as i call them. i used the pattern charts and just knit these up. for my second attempt at stranded color work i think they turned out great! if i had it to do over again i would probably have used a different pattern for the sole. the stripe is a little too bold for the swishiness of the instep and leg pattern. but hey. you learn. the specifics: pattern: chart from the venezia sweater by Eunny Jang yarn: sock it to me 4 ply in coffee bean and latte needles: knitpicks harmony circs size 1. socks knit as 2 magic loops simultaneously (these needles are actually growing on me) details: magic cast on 16 stitches in coffee bean, increase at edges on every row to 26 then every other row to 36 stitches. move one stitch from sole of sock(35) to inste...

so there is a sweater in the works... i just don't know what it is yet. i've been doing research. i just haven't come to a decision. you see shirley gifted me with some of her stash yarn a while back. ok so it was almost a year ago. and i thought i would make her a sweater. crazy i know. why knit a knitter a sweater? well she weighs all of 95 pounds soaking wet so it will be a fast knit. and she did gift me the yarn. and i don't really need the yarn seeing as i can knit at least 6 sweaters from the stash right now. so shirley is getting a sweater. i'm leaning in a couple of different directions. i want to knit an interweave sweater cause well i have the subscription so why not right? so here are the candidates: 1) nantucket jacket 2) wheat-ear cable yoke 3) tangled yoke cardigan 3) climbing vines pullover 4) diminishing rib cardigan and i also figure the recipient might want a say in said sweater... so i'll keep you posted. but in the meantime. what do you th...

we needed a little color here to brighten things up. the grass is all dead. and the heat is incredible (well for here it's hot). i can't wait for fall. soon i can already tell it is changing. maybe some fog tonight. now wouldn't that be nice!

yes i know this is a knitting blog too. i promise knitting content will arrive shortly. i've just got to narrow down the short list of sweater patterns :) oh, and photograph some socks. cause you know there are socks!

i just couldn't kick the flower bug. the veggies are doing well but the patio needed a little color. say hello to the newest addition to the family :) i love geraniums!

we were wandering the city with dave's folks last week and i saw the neatest building. i just love the details they used to put into the simplest things we

when in wine county you know are surrounded by wine and vineyards and it just follows...you're completely surrounded by grapes

the in-laws are coming. dave's mom and her guy are here to visit from philly. you know what that means right... touring, running around, touring, running around some more, and eating out way too much. i can do this. it's only a week...

when it is time to go home all there is time to do is to clean up house and head out with a last minute milkshake from the chatterbox of course wave goodbye to the eagles and the phillies and sit an hour and a half on the runway with 20 other planes for no apparent reason

with only a few days to relax. a trip to the beach turns into a blur of "i just want to sit here" mixed with "but we have to do this too" so several days worth of photos divided into day parts. cause really it is all running together :) think sandra bullock from that movie premonition where the days are out of order...but nobody's gonna die. sunrise: over the ocean. after waking up early not feeling well from a late night out with the family. i took one for the team ad finished the wine...don't do that. not good. i ran the 2 blocks to the boardwalk and over the dunes to the water to get these couple of shots. seagulls and beachcombers are your only company when it's this early! i've never seen so many mussel shells when it wasn't after dinner. midday: on the boardwalk. after the beach you go to the boardwalk to grab lunch at mack and mancos. apparently the best pizza ever. i'm not convinced. but heck i don't really get the wa...