Effet Que Tu Me Fais

Paris

Paris will always be my favourite city. It's really where I learned to be independent. I moved over from NY for work a couple of weeks after my 23rd birthday and I didn't know a soul. My French was non-existent to appalling and I was in for a major culture shock. (what do you mean shops don't open on Sunday?) It was scary but what an adventure.

I always try to come back to visit my old stomping grounds. The food is still fabulous.

While the translation, isn't so hot, the service was fast, the waiters fairly polite and the portions were enormous. This is a great place to go if you're fund of fondues. I had the tartiflette, bacon and potatoes under melted reblochon. I was absolutely famished but could not manage more than a third of the serving. I'm not sure if it was because there was a life size sheep goat staring down at me or what. We ate so much cheese, that we were worried about having nightmares featuring hungry mice!

We also ate here.

I used to live in the 5ieme and Pizza Cesar was at the corner of Gobelins and Blvd St Marcel. So, this was a stroll down memory lane for me. We went to the market at Mouffetard and then walked over to Pizza Cesar for lunch. They really do make the most delicious Penne all'arrabiata and the service is still fast and efficient, eventhough the restaurant has become much more up-market. I used to stop by here on the way home from work and get a take-away pizza for my dinner.

There's so much to see and do.

We went to the Musee D'Orsay, to see the Impressionists works.

(I didn't just have tea and embarrass my husband by being more engrossed in my Every Day Cardigan than in the national treasures of France), I really did enjoy the museum. The lighting is fabulous, the Musee used to be old railway station.

I also went to the Catacombes. I've never been there before.

It's kind of like visiting the Statue of Liberty. Lots of steps to walk down into the depth. The tunnels were 1.6 km. The bones and skulls were gruesome. After negotiating my way back up to daylight, I was stopped for a bag check. Do I look like someone that was going to nick a skull for a prank? Once the guard saw my yarn in my back pack, I reckon that he realised that stealing bones held no interest for me whatsoever.

If you are ever in Paris, I would highly recommend a visit to Musée National du Moyen-Age Thermes de Cluny.

This museum houses the 6 gorgeous Lady and the Unicorn tapistries. The tapistries were restored at one point using chemical dyes and unfortunately, this faded at a much faster rate than than the original wools, dyed using plants. So the bottom of all the tapestries are lighter than the top.

This is one of the best museums in Paris, but it has a very special theme. If you are interested in the Middle Ages, you will adore it. The collection isn't enormous, but each item displayed, was high quality and a significant representation of the works from Middle Ages.

We stayed in the center in the Latin Quarter. It's rather nice being woken up by the bells of the Notre Dame.

And ... of course, there's always the yarn shopping. I visited the Bon Marche and left with this

and then went to Phildar in the 14ieme and left with this.

It was really a bit of a yarn glut, but how could a girl resist? The phildar patterns are lovely, and I like many of their yarns, even though I felt too many of them included a very high quantity of acrylic. It's not that I have anything against acrylic, I just prefer to knit with natural fibers. To tell you the truth, like most knitters, I started out knitting with acrylic, Red Heart and Lion Brand. But, once introduced to the finer yarns (Rowan, Jaeger, Anny Blatt, Cascade) , I just turned my nose up at anything that felt too synthetic. Recently, I was dismayed at Rowan introducing acrylic and nylon into some of their yarns. However, since using Calmer and All Seasons Cotton, I've come around to thinking that not all synthetics are bad. I think that I'm going to like this Plaisance, very, very much. More lovely memories from Paris.

GSRP

Arrived when I was away. I manage to prise the box from my neighbour, who was wondering if it was my birthday since it was the 3rd package that I had gotten in the past 10 days. The other packages were my Peace Fleece for my Everyday Cardigan and care package from Stephanie.

Emma, had put in some really lovely things. After a very decandent trip to Paris, I thought that I would bring the yarn to Liberty and have Rowanette Yvonne have first pick, after emailing her a list of the contents. You see, I knew that Yvonne was going to love the Juniper that Emma put in. The yarn was a fabulous mohair blend in the most gorgeous jewel tones. 14 balls was enough to make a splendid top. So Yvonne, went through her stash and contributed this:

Hence, my comments on her generosity. She took 14 balls of the Paton's Juniper, 1 skein of the Cascade Tencel/blend and 1 pair of the flexi-needles, and added
4 balls of purple mohair
3 balls of green Lang mohair
1 large skein (250g) of hand-dyed Silkwoods Yarn (this is a GREAT felting yarn)
2-20g skeins of Touch mohair/wool hand-dyed yarn
2 x 50g Debbie Bliss Merino Wool
100g lace weight Merino (enough to do most of the FiberTrend Shawls)
6 oz of Motomo hand painted cotton/cashmere

Just trying to fit all these treasures onto a chair to be photograph was a major challenge. Many of little balls were trying to escape! So I went to Liberty with all the contents of the GSRP, hoping to return with a smaller bag, and I ended up bring back a lot more than I left the house with. I have to get a bigger bag to post this out on Monday. I'm thinking to move this to a plastic posting bag.

I'm still procrastinating on what I would like to take for myself. I think I'm going to grab this (it's the Motomo Cashmere Cotton that Yvonne put in) and a a pair of the flexi-needles (contributed by Emma).

I'm definitely contributing this, a skein of Colinette Isis in Kingfisher and 8 skeins of Jaeger Pure Cotton in Maderia.

I'm going to have a dig through my stash, as I would like to add a few other things, but I am conscious that the box seems to be getting heavier with every stop and the posting charges might be a bit exhorbitant when it leaves the country. (So, I won't put the Kaffe Fassett books that I had, since it weighs a ton and everyone down the line would probably curse me to high heaven). I'm going to ask the GSRP leader if we can name our box (please, Entrelac?) and if I can add a few pounds so that the cost doesn't become stupid for anyone posting it out of the UK, especially, as me and Yvonne meeting up and doing our bit meant one less posting.

Posted by atu at April 3, 2004 05:00 PM