stitch markers

all of these:



were made into these:

and the wild cards:





my biggest challenge - not sure if it's going to fly...:



the cheese stands alone:

vacation eats

hubby and i like to eat on vacation.  we like to find out of the way, different ethnic restaurants that we don't have in our neck of the woods.  in researching eats in lancaster, we knew we wanted indian.  we thought about thai, but then i wondered if their was an ethiopian restaurant - i always wanted to try it.  lucky us, there was!


for lunch on thursday we ate at shady maple.  they serve a lot of pennsylvania dutch fare, which we're pretty accustomed to eating.  once you swim through the throngs of elderly pirannas other diners, your plate fills pretty quickly.  i really wanted pot pie (slippery style) but couldn't find it, and would have killed for a second portion of stuffing (which was just like grandma's) and baked corn.  unfortunately i'm not a cow with two stomachs, and i don't do the binge/purge, so i only got one plateful of food before i was stuffed.  no seconds for me!

shady maple has stations where they have a rotating selection of dishes made while you wait. you can get seafood, beef, whatever the special is that day.  they had walnut chicken, which i love, but when i got my portion it was basically 2 mcdonalds chicken nuggets (!!!) with a dribble of sauce, none on my rice.  i should have bagged the walnut chicken and got more filling and baked corn!


for supper thursday evening we ate at taj mahal.  a small restaurant behind a strip mall, it boasted a pretty generous menu.

these are the little fried "bits" they served as an appetizer, and we had hot towels to clean our hands - they smelled like roses:




we had samosas for an appetizer.  hubby had saag with crab and i had shammi korma with chicken:



hubby had stuffed naan:



i had roti:



hubby had rasmalai (cheese patties in cream sauce) and i had gajar ka halwa (grated carrots cooked with milk, dried nuts and cardamom) for dessert:



hubby washed his meal down with an indian beer, and i pounded down a pitcher of water.

our meal was delish.  i'd go back in a heartbeat.  i love indian food.

as we were leaving we found this:



an indian spinning wheel!




on friday we went to addisu to try ethiopian food.  i'd heard that you eat with your hands and thought that would be fun.

this restaurant really is a hole in a wall - situated in the side of a strip mall.  it's tiny, with maybe half a dozen tables.  it shares the space with an ethiopian grocery, which consisted of a couple metal shelves holding bags of flour, containers of lentils and spices, and coffee makers.

hubby and i ordered afaagn, a ground beef dish that is a speciality in ethiopian cooking.  hubby ordered his spicy;  mine not so much.  i think they forgot, becos mine was as spicy as hubby's.  it was like eating spicy sloppy joe - very tasty:

the meat is eaten with teff injera, a type of bread sort of like a spongy tortilla.  you tear a bit of the bread and use it to scoop up the food.  it took a bit of work and i wound up using my bread like a pincher.

they served a small portion of lentils with our meal, which i really liked.  while i liked the beef dish, it was too spicy for me and in hindsight, i wished i ordered the combo meal which had half a dozen mini portions of their vegetarian dishes, made with lentils, split peas and other veggies.  oh well - it's a good incentive to go back and try it again!

the menu is pretty small;  no appetizers, no dessert, but they offer coffee.  i don't like coffee, and we were pretty full, so hubby didn't get to try any either.  apparently they serve excellent coffee, which made me wish i liked coffee a little bit.

hubby wanted to go to the lancaster brewing company and pick up a six pack of one of their microbrews.  hubby didn't know which beer to pick, and they don't have free taste testing, so he ordered the sampler to figure out which beer he liked best.



these were the beers on tap (and then some):



i am not a beer person (i can't get over the bitter taste, just the same that i can't drink coffee - i think i'm a supertaster in that respect) but i did taste the strawberry wheat and the milk stout.  if i was forced to drink something, i'd pick the strawberry wheat becos it tasted sweet.  the milk stout made me want to vomit as soon as i swallowed (and i kept that feeling for the next hour until we ate lunch - not fun!)

hubby picked county cream ale, which wasn't offered in a six pack, but he got some in a growler.  it was a nice souvenir to take home, if a bit pricey!


hubby and i had great nosh on our trip.  it's one thing we look forward to when we go away on vacation!  it's fun to discover new foods and restaurants.  

i have my work cut out for me

i got a lot of beads on vacation.  a lot of beads.

while walking around downtown lancaster looking for a british grocery store (which we never found) we found a bead shop.  me and beads, i had to have a looky.  naturally i didn't walk out empty handed...



three sets of stitch markers. the blue daisies are my favorites...or is it the dice? the blue swirlies?




i adore the flying pig. pretty much sums up when most of my UFOs will be completed... :)




i couldn't pick a favorite, so i picked a bunch of flowered glass beads...and yet another marker set...




these defied a catagory...blue glass swirl, milifiori bead, glass tile pirate. challenge?




stone peace sign, bone skull.




full of favorites!  those lampwork jack o lanterns are adorable!  lampwork flower beads were so pretty.  everyone needs luck with their knitting, right?  "eye" bead and "fireworks" bead, i couldn't leave behind.  and how freakin' cute are those cupcake beads?!!

the girl in the shop asked what i was going to do with the beads, and when i told her i was going to make stitch markers with them, she didn't seem surprised. maybe others visit her shop for the same reason!


then i visited the bead lady at celtic fling. found gobs more beads:



skulls and more skulls. me and my skulls.  i love that green one - it's my "alien" skull.  how i love skulls!!




found the owl first (yep, me and my owls...). then i found the fox. i thought i could make an animal set, but found the mermaid and the buddha. so cute.




more glass beads - love the "firecracker beads". and shamrock beads for celtic fling, natch!




i'm in dire need of some "stink eyes" for my knitting...




the gold hand is a fave...




i'm not sure how the glass cherries will hold up as a marker, but i'm gonna try!  another lampwork flower bead.  the red bead is a wooden one that didn't fit in anywhere.  then i found the red toadstool.  i love toadstools as much as skulls and owls.  odd one, i am.



wow. guess i'm gonna need more t-pins and jump rings!




mama's got a lot of stitch markers to make!!

sock meets haggis...and scythian...and icewagon flu...

the yarn harlot often takes pictures of her sock-in-progress with other knitters.  sometimes she takes them with famous people.  last year i took a cue from her and took a picture of my monkey WIP with various members of celtic bands and documented its adventures here.

i was excited to do the same this year.  trouble was, i had two pairs of socks OTN, and i didn't know which one to take along.  sunday swing (my rav linky) was pretty but i didn't have the brains to knit on it at the moment (the pattern had evaporated from my memory) and while i was working on hermione's everyday sock (my rav linky), it wasn't as showy.  hermione won out, becos it was easier to knit, and really, the colorwave of the zauberball was tartan-ish in my opinion.

this year's performers at the friday night concert were enter the haggis with scythian and icewagon flu opening for them.  we'd heard scythian play a few years ago, but never heard of the FLU.  the gates opened early, with the FLU kicking off the show.  after they finished their set, i went over to their sale table and sock got its picture taken with the lead singer (his name is escaping me at the mo'):

while i was off getting grub scythian started their set.  they were great (albeit really loud with a lot of distorted feedback - strange considering it was an outdoor setting - and i couldn't understand their words really well).  i joined the throngs of other festival goers who wanted their autographs and pictures taken.  they guys were really good sports getting their picture with sock and zauberball.  i'm sure they're not used to getting requests like that every day, but they had fun with it:

our favorite band got on stage around 8:30 and really rocked it.  my pictures suck (took them with hubby's iPhone - naturally i left mine at the hotel! - and left the good camera at home) but at least the sock ones turned out okay!

victim new drummer bruce with sock and zauberball:

he couldn't get over that i was knitting a sock.  when we finished, he reminded me to knit the second one!

then mark the bassist obliged (he looks a little unsure in this pic!):

trevor the guitarist/singer had fun with the picture.  i even asked him how his new baby boy is!

we waited a while for fiddle player/keyboardist/singer brian's picture becos the couple ahead of us just wouldn't STFU with him.  i asked if i could take his picture with my sock, and reminded him that i was the crazy sock/yarn lady who asked him to do the same thing last year at fling.  he looked at my sock and the DPN holder and commented that it was "cool...yet scary".  he found an equally as wacky pose with sock and zauberball and i got this:

dear bob, i love him.  :) :) :)  just think, i have brian DNA on my sock now!  brian also signed the bottom of hubby's beer stein.

no clue where craig the bagpipe player was.  he's the only one sock didn't get its picture with!  oh well, there's next year...

one thing that i love about ETH is how they hang around to talk with their fans.  on facebook, they (i'm presuming brian) thanked everyone for seeing them at fling and making them feel like rockstars.  dude, you ARE rockstars!  how freaking cool that you take the time to talk with your fans and indulge their whims.  

hubby and i had a ball at celtic fling.  we enjoy rocking out with our favorite band.  we can't wait to see them again - hopefully sooner than celtic fling next year!