Minneapolis Institute of Art

All I have to say is, Wow.  The twin cities has an awesome museum that has some great works, and it's free! I made a $20 donation, but I could have just walked right in.  You can see Monet, Picasso, pretty much any famous modern artist FOR FREE.  They even had some Hudson River School paintings (which I was not expecting, being in the Midwest and all.)

There were pieces of furniture that I would totally have in my home.  Like this rocking chair, from the 1920's, and this hutch.

The only minus that I had was that a lot of the art was framed with glass.  I don't like that - I get that you don't want people to touch the painting or whatever, but there really is no reason to do it.  It's like seeing a landscape through a window.  Especially when the glass is dirty with dust! Ugh.

The cafe in the museum was great, pretty reasonable for museum food... $9 for a salad and cup of soup! Compared to some museums I've been in that's giving the food away.

I think I ended up taking as many photos in the gift shop as in the actual museum.  They had a lot of cute things, pretty (but expensive) dresses and a square teapot and decor that I was tempted to make myself when I got home.  There was an entire wall of stationary, which I had to practice a ridiculous amount of willpower to avoid buying from.  They also had an ocean-themed table, which I did buy from.

Overall, the place was definitely worth the trip! Especially on a rainy, dreary day like yesterday.

Doodling

Like lots of people, I have a dream of working full-time as an independent knit designer.  I also have dreams of being a SAHM and owning a homestead, but for now these two things aren't really that feasible - mostly because I have student loans to pay, and also because I just don't think I'm at the point of my life where I can pursue them.  I can have a homestead when I'm retired, and live far off in the country in my off-the-grid permaculture complex; and I'm not going to run around trying to have kids, and even if I did, I love my job too much to leave it right now!

Anyway, my point is that knitwear design, on the other hand, is a dream that I'm nervous about.  I don't think I could ever be a full time designer because I get so much inspiration while doing other things.  I think it might be a left-brain, right-brain thing.  While I'm sitting in training, one side of my brain is focusing on statistics and applying business ideas to EHS.  When this happens, the other side of my brain fires up and says "ME! ME! Look at this cool idea I just thought up! Hey! What if you took that yarn that's in your stash and did this..."

It started last week, drawing ideas for a little dust bunny doll.

Then I thought hey, I'm not really using that top margin of that one page. What if I knit a wooly bear caterpillar? And it could have tassles on it! I remember that idea I had for a bunny, what if I made a little set that had other animals dressed as ballerinas?

Okay, we've drawn, I'm actually going to take notes... oh my gosh, wouldn't it be cute if I knit a little chick, like for spring time?  So I drew it over and over until I figured out the proportions, type of wings, eye placement, etc. (There's also a picture of me and Dan as chibis here, some bad drawings of the people that were presenting, and an idea for a garland.)

Then I just gave up and ended up just doodling.

What I like about times like this is that on this page, there are plans for 15 different projects.  And a sixteenth one that I couldn't quite figure out (the pony doodle.) That's more stuff than I can knit in a year!

Of course, this only happens maybe once a quarter, and not all of the ideas are worth doing.  I'm looking at you, football-shaped dog with pompoms in the top right corner. Some of the ideas might have already been done. Who knows if there isn't a lego-shaped pillow out there?  Still, I keep pages like this stashed away and when I feel like I want to knit something new, I look back in the archives.  I'm thinking of making all of them digital, as kind of an insurance policy.

Props if you recognize the ballet instructor from here or here.