eth weekend

hubby and i spent the past weekend in jim thorpe - we saw our favorite band enter the haggis at the mauch chunk opera house.  we saw them there 2 years ago and the show rocked so we got tickets to see them again.

after dropping the kids off at my folks' house we had lunch at a&w on the turnpike (where i had a phallic looking piece of long john silvers chicken) then checked into our hotel and rested a while until driving into town.

a boat launch entrance was near our parking spot, so we walked down to the river.  never saw it up close and personal, and the lehigh river is beautiful.  upriver is the gorge and people white water raft and kayak downstream.  i would love to try this sometime except with my luck i would drown.  

haggis heads!


blatant knitting shot!


we walked around town and visited our favorite shops.  i got a pink salt candle holder (for salt ion therapy) and more black salt at the wicca shop, some vintage valentines at a toy store and more saint medallions at the irish shop (just when i think i have all the saints, i find a saint for protecting me from yet another thing wrong with me).  walked into a yarn shop and...walked right out.  she sold mostly aran yarn (not a bad thing) but there were a bunch of ladies in the shop and it was hard to look around, so i left without buying a thing.  (my yarn binge from a few weeks ago was also weighing heavy on me).  the town library was having a book sale - they were selling old knitting magazines.


the book sale was in an old home that was so neat - pocket doors, high kitchen cabinets, old wooden floors.  another vintage shop had a beautiful staircase.  there are many beautiful old homes and buildings in town and we love walking around and picking ones we'd love to live in.  home prices are $$$ in old town and we're not wealthy so it's safe to say we won't be moving there anytime soon.  we also walked into this church - we heard organ music - and found they were having a service (wedding, funeral, church - no idea which).  the church also has a neat old fashioned elevator (the sanctuary is a long ways up) and i would have loved to have a ride in it.  at 4:30 the church's chimes rang and they were LOUD!

we ate at molly maguires pub (hubby had fish and chips, i had a salad becos i wasn't very hungry) then took a nap in the car (the day was pretty warm and i think i was dehydrated becos i didn't feel well).

we then made our way to the opera house and waited around with other concert goers.  it's always fun to see other fans - they dress in homemade ETH shirts and costumes.  some have traveled with the band on overseas tours.  we found our seats inside and discovered that we were actually a few rows further back than where we sat last time - the management removed the first couple rows of seats to make a mosh pit.  we bought some snacks and drinks and i knitted on a cowl while we waited for the show to start.

eth from where we were sitting...


up close in the pit...


the guys played two 45 minute sets plus an encore, with music from their new album plus old favorites.  brian (the fiddle/keyboard player) didn't have throat illness this time so he sang lots of songs.  i could watch them perform every day if given the chance, they are so awesome.

the next morning we drove up flagstaff mountain for a view overlooking jim thorpe:



we wiggled our way back to my folks' to get the kids, but not before stopping at sonic.  we had a great weekend and can't wait to go back!

ETH weekend at jim thorpe

hubby and i are back from a nice weekend in jim thorpe.  our favorite band enter the haggis were playing at the mauch chunk opera house.  we got tix months ago and only learned last month that the drummer james was leaving the band to go to school to be an air traffic controller.  so we feel absolutely blessed that we were able to be at his last show.

we decided to stay over at a hotel since the show was late at night, and we didn't want to get home in the middle of the night.  jim thorpe is only an hour and a half from our house, but who wants to get home at 2AM?

we puttered around the area and visited country junction - that killed about 30 minutes.  same crap, same farting gorilla.  got some noodles and candy.  visited a lovely winery and had a wine tasting and took some bottles home.  drove back to jim thorpe and had a very early supper of fish and chips at molly maguire's (it was too hot for fish and chips, but shepherds pie would have been worse and way heavier). walked around town and visited our favorite shops - mauch chunk 5 &10, the emporium of curious goods (got a new set of fortune teller cards, a card for reading palms, cards with the kiddos names on them, sage for burning and black salt to scatter outside the house, and a glass evil eye to hang on the door).  we missed the treasure shop, i always go in there for all things irish, and for saint medals - it was closed by the time we got there.  bought old cute buttons in a shop (really wanted some pickles but the tourists were in the way!)  found a yarn shop, ironically behind the opera house, called hooked on yarn.  very nice shop in an old home and i got 2 skeins of coral jil eaton.

ETH was excellent.  we were 4 rows back and about 10 feet from the stage.  a lot of people were in the pit in the front but we had no trouble seeing the band.  sadly i had a migraine during the show, otherwise i would have been dancing in the aisles too.

band played our old favorites plus songs of their last album.  they did 2 sets which was an awesome treat.  for the encore, the audience serenaded james to "leaving on a jet plane" (how appropriate!) and the rest of the guys changed into black shorts and t-shirts, james' "uniform" (along with a leather jacket.  the guy wears shorts both winter and summer.  hardy canadian boy!)  the encore was bittersweet.  we were so lucky to be there.

hopefully we'll see haggis at celtic fling next year.  can't wait to meet the new drummer, bruce!

and now to the picture portion of this blog.  my apologies on the fuzzy or goofy pics.  snapped them with my iPhone and it's hard to get good shots when people are moving around.  most of these were taken in high def.



the boy sending us off




me and hubby in a cute little park overlooking the town




there's always a yarn shop in town!  the house was really cute inside too - i love old homes.




me knitting in the park by the train station, killing time until the concert




the start of ETH, sitting on a huge lump of coal




ETH's van




the inside of the opera house, looking up on stage from where we're sitting




ETH




a true haggis head.  i wonder how the guy even saw in that mask?  the haggis heads were in rare form last night.  dancing, singing along.  hubby and i are poser haggis heads, i guess...




james on drums, brian on fiddle




a good shot of the band




james setting up for the second set




brian on fiddle




trevor on guitar




mark on bass




james drumming on trevor's guitar during "congress" - my favorite!




james' curtain call.  we were pretty verklempt




my apologies for such a fuzzy shot - humble james




the guys in james' "uniform"




final jam.  that's a really good shot of all the guys




brian and mark (on bass)





craig (on bagpipes) and trevor (on guitar)







james' drum solo




final jam





last curtain call




looking down on "little switzerland".  my pap's family was from lansford, which isn't far from JT, which might be why i'm so compelled to return to this lovely area.


good luck, james "seamus" campbell, on embarking on a new chapter in your life.

monkey goes to celtic fling

hubby and i got tix for the friday night kick off concert for PA RenFaire's celtic fling.  our favorite band enter the haggis was headlining with the young dubliners.  we found ETH a couple years ago when we attended celtic fling and have been mildly obsessed with them ever since.

after a buffet lunch at passage to india, a nap at the hotel and supper at sonic we went to mount hope winery, where RenFaire is held.  beer and wine flowed, there were a few shops open, and the crowds were starting to arrive.  hubby got some honey mead and some swashbuckler gold and fat alt bier.  i, ever the teetotaller, got a fresh lemonade, a pretzel big enough to beat hubby into submission, and some kettle corn. we found seats about halfway from the stage and settled in.  we took turns walking around - mostly kilt merchants and a couple shops.  only part of the grounds - the shops and refreshments around the globe - were open.  i got some cute beads to make into stitch markers.

it's fun to people watch at these things.  guys in kilts, women with their boobs hiked up to their chins (pirate wenches don'tcha know), people dressed up, dressed down, dressed all around.  so much fun.  someone brought their dog (a great dane?) dressed in a kilt.  there were people in the mosh pit my parents' age, and little kids dancing and singing along.  you see all kinds here.  it's great.

at 7 the young dubliners came on.  i had never heard of them but their show was energetic and fun.  hubby and i downloaded some of their tunes during the show and i can't wait to check out their catalog on itunes so i can buy more.  they had to fly back to LA for a weekend show, but not before some of the members came down to chat with fans and do photo ops.

i, ever the knitting geek, took monkey #2 along and worked on it before the show.  i remembered that the the yarn harlot takes pictures of her projects, usually a sock, at the location where she is lecturing/teaching/being her own fabulous self or with another equally fabulous fiber artist.  so i tell hubby my idea and he cheered me on.

this is keith, the lead singer of the young dubs, holding monkey.  what a good sport he was!  i think he thought i was nuts, asking him to hold my sock while i snapped a shot:

the dubs had a special guest, eric rigler.  he plays the uilleann pipes.  his music has been featured in several movie soundtracks such as titanic and most recently, during the "nanny go bra-less" scene on the recent SATC movie.  last night he played a piece from "braveheart".  his music is haunting and beautiful.  anywho, monkey got snapped with eric.  he even looked at it asked if knitted it during the show.  maybe he knows knitting?

after a equipment change haggis came on the stage.  their show was electric and soon i went hoarse from singing and screaming, and my neck ached from bobbing to the beat.  as the moon rose over the stage  they played our favorites plus new songs from their last album.  they could have played all night, i loved listening to them.  hubby and i even got down to the crowd in front of the stage in "the mosh pit" for our favorite songs during the encore.  is it possible to be both exhausted and exhilarated at the same time?  i was.

after the show ended we looked to see if any of the guys came down to greet fans.  they were heading out to a celtic festival in connecticut in the morning.  but i spied brian, the singer/fiddle player, and asked if i could snap his pic with monkey.  he looked at my sock then smiled:

the yarn harlot, also a toronto native like haggis, would have been proud!

we made our way back to the car and made a pitstop at mcdonalds for some late night nosh.  got lost in the countryside driving back to the hotel.  it was midnight and we were whipped.  but happy.

and goodie for us, we get to do it again in september, when haggis plays the mauch chunk opera house in jim thorpe!

they like haggis

yesterday was the babies' 2 week checkup. they are gaining weight and the doc is pleased with them. now we go back in 2 months. while we were there we saw a local tv personality getting his baby's checkup (their baby is a couple days older than the twins) and he saw us and said, "whoa, twins! congratulations!" that was pretty surreal - getting congrats from a news anchor!

we got medium flow nipples for the bottles and the babies are eating much much better. now they don't struggle and fall asleep finishing a bottle. they were still up in the night, but it was becos of dirty dipes. yeah, i'd bitch too if i had a load in my shorts too.

i don't know if it's hormones, tiredness, goofed up back or weather, but i have the headache from HELL. i feel like i'm wearing a hat that is 10 sizes too small. and meds aren't touching it. i tried sleeping it off but that didn't helped, hubby massaged my feet, neck and head and that didn't help, i'm drinking in case it's dehydration and nothing helps. ugh, i haven't had a headache this painful in years. i get migraines on occasion but never to this extent.

yesterday while waiting for hubby and the boy get the nips at kmart, i sat with the twins in the van. we'd been listening to the monkees and peter paul and mary (the boy's choices) and i decided to try my new lullabies. put on the pixies, and monkey ears started to wail! so i put on haggis, and he immediately quieted down. go fig, the kids would rather listen to celtic beer rock than punk lullabies!

i have about 3 dozen ears of corn to shuck, steam and cut off to freeze. i hate shucking corn and putting it up but i like having corn chowder and chicken corn soup in the winter so it's definitely worth the work.