Monday, December 16, 2013

Christmas, and the woes of the whiny knitter

All the gifts are wrapped, the tree is decorated, the menu is planned…  All I have to do over the next week and a half is cook, bake and enjoy my friends and family.

This past weekend TJ and I were up in Napa at our favorite Inn, The Inn on First, with our favorite Innkeepers Jamie and Jim.  It was a bit of an extended birthday celebration for me, and a great pause before the Holiday frenzy.  We have a very set routine when we go up to wine country, we always start with pizza at Ca Momi, and a leisurely stroll around the fantastic Oxbow Public Market, where this year we did a little bit of Christmas shopping.  That first evening we had dinner at Bottega, where we have dined an embarrassingly many times - Chef Chiarello is often in the restaurant, and I grinned at him this time like a star struck fan (yep I am…).  The following day we took Atti on a long winding drive around the valley, which included driving up the Silverado Trail to Calistoga, a pleasant lunch and walk through St Helena, a stop at Dean an Delucca (whee!), a visit to an open house (beware the Notos will look at property anywhere!), and a stop off at a great little estate shop and art gallery where we met Tom Scheibal and saw his wonderful and luminous paintings.

When I first laid eyes on his work I thought it was encaustic, and I could not get over how smooth it was.  I should step back, I wouldn't have been as engaged if his work hadn't struck such a chord with me.  He is originally from the Pacific Northwest, his work is lyrical, dreamlike, quiet, and melancholy but not sad.  I was drawn to his work right away, I wanted to touch the surface of the canvases, I remember walking through the Oregon forests and feeling the same sense of serenity that I found in his paintings.  His work is not encaustic, it is a resin method that is his own, and it is truly lovely.  Please enjoy his work.  http://thomaspscheibal.blogspot.com  I don't want to copy it directly without his permission, but I encourage you to visit his blog.

In knitting notes, I am stalled, I can't find the Noro colorway for the sweater I had planned to knit over the winter, and now I can't even find the magazine in my pile of knitting patterns!   Oh the woe's of the whiny knitter!

Lastly I gave myself a wee little birthday gift…  Carla Sonheim's Year of the Fairy Tale class.  I am so excited!  Creativity for a whole year!  I have already dragged out my copies of The Brother's Grimm, Has Christen Andersen, Anne Sexton's Transformations, and Angela Carter's Burning Your Boats - ok so I am hoping that the topic of fairy tale has some wiggle room!

I wish all of you a very festive season, to those of my friends who celebrated the Festival of Lights earlier this year I wish you a very happy 2014!  To those who celebrate Christmas, have a safe and merry holiday.  I wish you all a wonderful season and lots of love.  See you in 2014!






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