Antiques Roadshow - We're rich! We're rich!

NOT !

I scored some AR tickets by entering their tickets raffle by email a few months ago. The tickets give you the exact time you are supposed to be there - in our case: 8:00 am. You can take up to 2 items per person to be appraised. So yesterday evening we packed up: 1 painting (surely worth at least $1K!), a set of 4 prints (maybe more?!?), 1 katana (I had that thing forever, must be at least another $1K!), and 1 mantle clock (must be at least $500!).

We arrived with time to spare at the San Jose Convention Center, and schlepped our treasures to the hall entry. A HUGE hall! They had it divided by appointment times. So we stood in the 8:00 am line, and were surprised how fast it moved.

Line for the Generalists tables

Luckily, we had the first appointment time of the day and there weren't any people hanging around from previous times. At the end of this line (where you see the sponsor logos projected on the wall) you are directed to one of the "generalists" tables. There you get a ticket according to what category your item falls in: in our case, we got 4: 1 for Asian Arts, 1 for Clocks, 1 for Paintings, and 1 for Prints. We decided to split up, because we were still expecting long lines at the appraiser tables.

The appraiser tables (no photos allowed in this area) are arranged in the form of a circle, and the lines for each table are radiating outward (more or less). The bulk of the lines is kept behind the dividers arranged behind the appraiser tables, with only a few people at a time waiting in front of the tables. Again, the lines were moving surprisingly fast. I had fully prepared to stand in line for an hour or two. In the middle of the circle was the TV setup.

My first appraiser (katana) was a bit grumpy and impatient (maybe because she had to get up early, too?), but the second one actually showed a bit of curiosity about my clock. Alas, no treasures here. Sigh!

My better half found out that our valuable painting was done by a commercial artist, hmpf - again, no treasure! The 4 prints which I received as a gift from my brother many years ago, are worth a few hundred dollars, but again: no treasures! Well ... As I heard an appraiser say on TV one time: "Well, it might be a treasure in a few generations' time!"

Thanks to our early appointment time we were in and out in less than an hour. Here are our souvenirs:

The tickets and the appraiser category tickets, plus 2 handouts.

Maybe they will be worth something in a few hundred years!

When we got home, our cats were happy to be let out in the yard again:

The boss cat rolling around on the grass - in anticipation of a lazy day.

So we're not richer, but wiser - it was certainly interesting to see how these roadshows are organized. You know, when you watch the show on TV, thinking: "Why did these people bother to bring in this junk?" Yup. That's us!!! :-D

Till next time!

Lessons from the Indiski shawl

The Indiski shawl proves to be a great learning experience (ahem)!

Lesson 1: It REALLY is best not to have any distractions when working on lace pieces (and this is a fairly easy one!)

Lesson 2: When picking up the stitches from the outside border to work the inside border pick up only one loop, not both, of the edge stitches, otherwise the shawl is no longer reversible! Since the decrease stitches in the borders are all worked as K2tog they all lean in the same direction. So by reversing one border when you graft them together, the shawl becomes totally symmetrical!

Lesson 3: Others who have worked this shawl thought that there is a mistake in the body pattern - the instructions say you have to pick up 165 stitches. But looking at the first charted row you realize that there must be 166 stitches to start with, because in the first row you have to knit 2 together at the end, resulting in 165 stitches.

This is actually more of a case of omission in the written instructions. They should have mentioned that when picking up the 165 border stitches for the body you ALSO "pick up" the first border stitch from the other border which gives you the missing stitch. I only knew about this, because I took Galina's class in Warm Shawl Construction, and - luckily - I had made a note of this.

Oh, and when you work the last-body-stitch + border-stitch DO keep the yarn in the back - or keep it in front after turning, so the join looks consistent.

I'm glad I'm finding all this out before working my first gossamer shawl!

Yesterday I received a package from Fleegle containing the fabulous Phoenix yarn (52/2 60% merino 20% silk 20% cashmere) she custom-ordered for a few knitters (and herself I assume) from China! It will be the thinnest yarn I've ever worked with - once I actually dare to use it!

Our washer has been fixed (for many $$$) - once something like this quits working you really appreciate household appliances, and that you don't live in the 19th century!

Haapsalu Sall book

Hi there,

This morning I had to sign for a package from Estonia! In it was the long awaited Haapsalu Sall book everyone on the KBTH list has been drooling over. I ordered mine almost exactly 2 weeks ago - so the wait was not as long as I feared. (I ordered it from Hobipunkt.ee - Ms. Helen Idarand was very responsive with answers to email.)

For those of you still waiting for their copy, here are some pictures to tide you over:

Explanation of stitches

My pictures have a blue tint to them, but the book is very elegant looking in beige/off-white tones. Some patterns that caught my eye:

And a few borders: I know what I'll be doing for the next hour(s)!

Take care.

Indiski milestone reached!

Hello,

I just finished both outside borders of the Indiski shawl. Those short rows DO become a bit boring after repeat number x. And I still had to pay attention, because several times I forgot to mark my row and knit pattern rows in the return rows, only to look at the knitted part later and realizing that it didn't look quite right. But it's all good now.

2 outer borders of the Indiski shawl

The inner border should go faster, because there are fewer, but longer rows. I so want this shawl done! My first Orenburg shawl!! WooHoo!!!

Washer trouble, Animation BBQ, Project Update

Our only a year-and-a-half old washer had been acting up for quite a while, and the weekend before last it decided to quit altogether. The earliest customer "service" appointment is two weeks away ... what to do? What to do? (I hate laundromats!) So I remembered that as part of my Y2K preparations (I know, I know!) I bought a cute little Super Wash Pressure Washing Machine ... see:

This is the deluxe model ... it has a drain pipe!!!

I had used it once after I bought it just to try it out, and remembered that it worked very well. So I dragged it out of its (almost) forgotten storage place in the shed and started washing a few loads. It still works fine! I might just keep it around for really small, quickie washs. It's certainly faster than handwashing, even though you still have to spend quite a bit of time rinsing.

My husband decided to do the more manly thing - he threw a bunch of clothes in the bathtub, jumped in and then hand ... er ... footwashed them.

Btw, one of the features advertised for the little Super Wash is that it is suitable for washing delicates and handknits - has anyone ever washed their handknits in one of these? How did it turn out?

Last Sunday (Jul 12th) we went to Crissy Field, because the animation school my husband attends hosted their annual BBQ there. The day started out like this:

A typical San Francisco summer morning

... but once the cloud cover burned off it became really nice and warm. (That by itself is a miracle for San Francisco.)


The audience was treated to live enactments of the "12 Principles of Animation". Here is one:

"Straight Ahead Action" and "Pose by Pose"

Projects:

Olga's Indiski Shawl: 5 repeats of the second outside border done. I really have to pay attention, because the rows are so short! Sometimes I forget to move my chart marker, sometimes I try to do a pattern row on the return row - luckily I'm a firm believer in lifelines!

Caffe Latte Scarf: It's coming along slowly - it's my morning knit while drinking my coffee, so I only knit a few rows (or none) per day - now about 2 feet long.

Since I just had an itch to finish *something* I did this little dishcloth Friday and Saturday evening:

Dishcloth 1 - Diagonals

Take care!

Filoli, Mystery Object, Indiski Shawl

Hello,

Last weekend we visited the Filoli House and its gardens. I had never heard of it before - one of my husband's co-workers recommended it. It was built in 1915 for the mine owner Bourn, who also owned the Spring Valley Water Company. Then it was sold to the Roth family (owner of Matson Navigation Company - you've probably seen the big "Matson" shipping containers on the road). In 1975 the house and garden was donated to the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

The place is worth seeing, but a little too dark and dank for my taste. The gardens reminded me more of a plant nursery, rather than a true garden. But it makes for a nice outing. Here are some pictures of the Filoli "back yard":

Rose Garden

One of the roses in bloom - love the color!

Yellow lilies

I believe these are called "Flaming Torch"

A view from the so-called "Wedding area"

Also in the "Wedding area" - almost black pansies (they are a very dark purple)

A bench where you can sit in the herb garden

In the kitchen we saw this object:

Mystery Object

I maintain it's a primitive toaster, my husband says no. Do you know what this is?

When we left the place, there was this halo around the sun. Until now I've only seen halos around the moon, never the sun:

Sun Halo

And lastly, I've made some slow progress on the Indiski Shawl:

Indiski Shawl - 6 repeats of the first outside border done

Because the rows are so short for this border, I really have to force myself to mark each one as done on my chart. So far I had to rip back two times, because I had knitted a row twice. This represents a little more than half of the first outside border.

Oh, and we saw a sneak preview of Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs - I recommend seeing it, it's better than the second one.

Till next time.

Hello,

I finally had enough of swatching for the Indiski Shawl. Using the 2/28 cashmere, I just couldn't get the pattern to look right - the stitches kept looking sloppy, despite trying out every needle size from 3.0 mm down to 1.5 mm. After a while I realized I need to use a thicker yarn - did a few swatches there, and finally decided on a lovely green light fingering weight alpaca yarn from my stash. This is what it looks like after the 1st outside border repeat, using 2.75 mm needles. I like it.

Indiski Shawl - 1st outside border repeat, 2.75 mm needles