Really, traditions make the holidays feel like the holidays.

Since changing coasts, my trips back home have established a new set of traditions for me. The Mimbly and I visit our two favorite craft spots every time I visit old Rhody. Yesterday we did so again.

I bought a zipper from Lorraine Mills to create this little make-up bag about which I'd fantasized since making my sister's Christmas present.







The yarn is from Yarn at Lace Wings. I will be using it for...gasp...a crochet project. One of the many craft-related goodies from the Mim (she really needs to get her own blog) was Not Your Mama's Crochet. Needless (I just accidentally spelled that "needles") to say, I am very excited.


But really, that is all incidental to this post, which is about the traditions of our visits home. In the midst of our traditional outings yesterday, the Mim and I went to the salon. After my turn, and while I was waiting for Mimbly to receive her shearing, I knit. And then I was surprised. Every woman I talked to told me about her knitting. The hairdresser with whom I spoke the longest, told me, after I confessed my nerves failed me as I thought about following a crochet pattern, "nawt to worry. Crochet is no hahdah than knitting. Once you get used to it, it even goes fasta."

It felt so good to sit and knit and talk fibers and local stores with the ladies at the salon in North Providence. San Francisco is fun and often interesting, but in a break from the normal tone of this blog, I'm going to say it's freaking hard to be away from home and the crafty mimbly.