Waltzing Knitilda

The Wanderer -- Part the Second

I'm debating whether this should be about Knitting Camp or Old Home Week. Hmmm.

While I'm deciding, after a month of waiting for insurance companies and contractors and coop boards to sort out the fire aftermath, work is about to begin on our apartment.  Work meaning painting and redoing the floors. At last. So the weekend was spent packing off all things. The movers came Monday, and finished packing and moved our stuff out and into storage. The contractor tells us we should be back in about 3 weeks. Whew.

I didn't realize our apartment was that big.  It's amazing how big it looks without the usual crap. I tossed out a lot, I mean a lot. But all empty as it is makes me want to toss out even more. Once our stuff comes back.

The most favorite thing I tossed, well, ok it's hard for me to admit this.  I feel like I'm admitting to one of my deepest darkest secrets. 

See, it was skeins of. Of. Cough. Fun COUGH fur.

I bought it years ago, at the beginning of the novelty phase. Because it was, well, a novelty.

I made a handbag for one child that was furry. And used a bunch as a mane for a lion I crocheted for the other child.

Both were hits. Then there were the leftovers. Like a hangover.

I couldn't stand posting the skeins on Knitswap because I was afraid someone like my knitting compatriots who scour that site would discover my deepest darkest secret. That I actually owned fun fur. I didn't want to join the hordes of eBayers also trying to get rid of it. And I couldn't just fling it out the door because well, there was nothing REALLY wrong with it. I mean, nothing had happened to it that would prevent it from being knit up. Not that I would be knitting it up. In my lifetime. Ever.

So there it all sat. In my yarn cabinet in the living room, next to the Lopi that I've yet to use but am sure I will. Some day. Mm hm.

Smoke damage can be a good thing. The yarn got totaled. I feel somewhat guilty that it is now in a landfill somewhere. But I GOT PAID TO THROW IT OUT. How cool is that. I mean, no one gets paid to throw away novelty yarn and keep it from circulating in the yarn bloodstream.  Kinda like those bad wedding presents that you know have been regifted through the last century.

I am certain that those landfilled skeins will still be there centuries from now, in about the same condition.

But I digress.  Paint chips are my life. Oh how to choose. Kitchen/dining? Red. At least 2 walls anyway. White on the others. The floor is black. I think it'll look sharp. Kids? They picked blue and purple for their color scheme. The rest? No clue. Eeek.

Anyway, Chicago. Because I need to be really awake to describe the wonders of knitting camp.

What can I say?  It was like my own personal journey through time, back into the mists of childhood and high school and college. Tracing down the people and places who and that made me. Besides my family of course.

See I left Chicago right after college for that wonderland on the Potomac. My brother moved the following year, and then my parents after that. So even though I adored my friends there as well as the city, I just couldn't really make it back for any decent length of time. I am not counting swinging through O'Hare on business trips.

But with knitting camp in Wisconsin, I finally could pull it off.

As it turned out, the days broke down naturally into one day grade school, one day high school, and one day college.  And I even got my Art Institute fix in.

Overall impressions? The city looks even better than when I was there. Daley Deux has outdone his father.  New York looks shabby in comparison. And I like New York.

But I dunno. There's something that New York has lost over the years that Chicago has retained. Maybe it's a sense of humor. Maybe it's because of the aftermath of 9/11 and post-traumatic stress, as this one friend of mine thinks. Maybe it's that NY real estate is so out of line with what you really get for the cost that a lot of the people who made the city have cashed out and moved, and the ones who've come in actually believe their own pr hype. About themselves.

I used to go to NYC to get my fix of Chicago. But this trip made me realize how far the two cities have drifted in character.  And how much more interesting Chicago is as a city than New York in many ways. Plus I love that the people are generally cheery and funny, and that is just part of the norm. No one here is that funny anymore. Just stressed and cranky. I love that Chicago gets the job done. It's not dense and overcrowded, it's sparkling. The percentage of whiners and yellers is way lower. Of course, it is the summer. Not the winter. I may not be as gushy in the winter. Still. I got so homesick.

I can't believe I waited so many years to go back.

Without further ado....Day 1.

Here are my closest friends from grade school. Don't they look great?

It's Linda, Debbie, me, and Nan.

We have known each other since first grade.

I have not seen Linda and Debbie since the mid 1980s. And Nan since the late '80s.

Did it matter? Well, no.  We slipped right back into giggling as if we were in 7th grade again. Swapped stories about whatever happened to...and running into the teacher who had the affair with a classmate and was still trying to pick up women in bars. Running into first loves, some of whom the years have treated well and others who have turned bitter. Really juicy stuff. Showed off pix of offspring. Who are the cutest. Teased Nan about her eyeshadow collection in 8th grade, which was truly impressive as she has older sisters who gave her all their eyeshadows and she used to give us makeup application lessons like where to place blush and stuff.

She pulled out the scrapbook. OWwwww.  All those high school dances, all those awkward moments, all those attempts to look really cool.

And you know? We didn't look half bad back then.  Nope. Not at all.

I have not laughed so hard in years. Nan's adorable daughter was a bonus -- she joined us, and is about the same age we all were when we got into the makeup stuff.  It was amazing how she just fit right in.  A new member of the group. Now my brother wants Linda's brother's email addy, as they were friends too.  We're all emailing and text messaging each other. This is such fun.

OH and Debbie's started knitting. Bwa ha ha. I don't think she uses fun fur.

To be continued...

The Wanderer -- Part the First

Doo wop The Wanderer. That would be me this last week.

Oh. My. God. Did I have a great time. I haven't laughed so hard in years. No lie.

Then, living out of a suitcase that I am, Delta misplaced it on the return trip. THE suitcase. What was killing me was all the laceweight in it from Joslyn's fiber farm, and the roving/sliver I picked up for a song from Meg Swansen's very own stash. The clothing? Yeah that hurt too.

Finally they found it last night. Whew. So I'm back to living out of a suitcase again. Never thought I'd say that with happiness but life does do interesting things sometimes.

But first, thanks to the newly found camera cable, some pix of the FOs from before my trip.

Here's the Fruitcake Knits fir cone shawl finished, made from my Barcelona Knits friend Betty's yarn gift from when she was in town and we did a yarn crawl.

I'm very pleased with how it turned out. I had to block it on my studio partition at right angles for it to fit, but I took the picture so you could see how it really looks.

My studio is not on a Titanic style slant.

Here is a closeup of the edging. These pix are all from before the fire. You can see the subtle gradations in color, and even a little of the yarn's slubby blue features. I love this shawl.

The pattern was a good one, and the yarn blocked out beautifullly. It all started from the center back and spread out from there, so I knit till I thought I had only enough left for the edging and then started the edging.  I guessed right too; if I'd done another repeat I would have run out. The edging took up more yarn than I thought it would, but isn't that always the way with edgings.

Next in the queue is the collective afghan for a friend with health issues.

30 squares.  All Koigu. Now if that isn't healing I don't know what is.

The only restriction on the group's creativity was that every square be in Koigu and 10 inches square.  Everyone picked their own colors and patterns, and I put it together. (I did a square too.)

So so worth it. It's hard to see the detail on some of them, but they are really incredible.  Two of the pieces were in shadow knitting, with one appearing as a heart, and the other as the LOVE graphic you may remember from the Love postage stamp and the movie Love Story.

Some are beaded. One has the King Charles brocade pattern. 

A number have tree, leaf and other life force motifs in raised texture, really more bas relief sculpture than anything else. The quilt block was perfection, a tour de force of looking just about as neat on the reverse as on the front.

All in all an amazing effort.

And it's already being snuggled under.

Part the Second: Chicago, or, what happens when you track down your very best friends and places from your formative years.

FO week

First there was the community afghan. 30 squares made by pals from all over for a dear friend whose health has been, well, challenged recently. Pix of that when she gets it as I don't want to spoil the surprise. All Koigu. All different. All stunning. I put it together and did the edging. Looks like stained glass.

Then... finished a crocheted skirt. Yup. Crocheted. I was inspired by the one in SnB Happy Hooker, but changed the edging. The solid part is half double crochet, and the edging is deep, so there's serious peekaboo but not the trashy kind.  Pix up when I find the cable connector for the camera. 

It's a brown wool cotton, fingering weight, and it was what I grabbed to work on during this whole ordeal because it really was mindless for most of it.  And repetitive and soothing.

I'm happy with how it fits and looks.  Yesterday I hit a local fabric store and found some linen to line it with. Actually what I did was make an underskirt, a mini skirt really. The fabric was a little too hefty to put a drawstring through at the top waist part without having it bunch in a bad way around the waist. So I sewed a tube together and pleated it at the waist. No sewing machine, so it's all done by hand with the needles and extra buttons supplied in the hotel mending kit.  It works fine, and gives a nice smooth silhouette under the crocheted skirt in addition to preventing that Lady Di I-see-your-legs-cuz-you're-not-wearing-a-slip look.

Today's agenda: pack and laundry.

Monday:  Off to Chicago.  Monday night:  reunion with my 3 best friends from grammar school. We've known each other since first grade.  I haven't seen them in years.  Years. Years.  The most recent we figured had to have been about 15 years ago, since it was before her soon to be 15 yo daughter was born.  The others? Could be 25 years.  Yow. But we've always had the kind of friendship that we can just pick up the phone or write and it's as if we talked the day before.  I can't wait.

Tuesday:  Art Institute, then meeting my best friend from high school. I haven't seen her in, well, probably 17 years or so. Ditto on the picking up the phone bit. Wednesday: More old friends, but from college.  Thursday: off to Wisconsin for knitting camp.

I can't wait for all of it.

Independence

Happy 4th to all the Yanks, as some would say.

We're still in the hotel.  It's hot and muggy, and the streets of Manhattan are about as empty as they can get for Manhattan.

I love it here in the summer.

The cats are now playing with each other. Doing the cat chase thing. They've switched food bowls. Not sure what that means but they seem to be happy with it.

The mistress of the house? Not as much. They're keeping her up in the middle of the night. Then feigning innocence.

Hotel living is weird. Nice weird though. I really like the UWS neighborhood we're in. And there are sales on.

And Knitty City is steps away.

Knitting Camp is next week. I leave Monday for Chicago to visit old buds from high school and college first.  Then Wisconsin.

I. Am. Counting. Down. The. Minutes.

I should feel guilty ditching my family.

But I don't.

I should feel guilty that I don't feel guilty.

But I don't.

I miss Chicago in the summer. I miss my old friends. I adore my new friends. But I still miss my old friends.

First event?  Reunion Monday night with my 3 best friends from GRAMMAR SCHOOL.  We've known each other since first grade. And haven't seen each other in the flesh in decades. 

You get the picture.

Day at a time

Just wanted to thank you for all the support. 

It's funny what happens. Striking images pop up at odd times now. Like standing in front of our apartment watching the billowing smoke clouds obscuring the window, and asking for some sign that things would be ok.

Then seeing the orange chrysanthemums in the window box as the smoke would ebb before starting up again.

That was a good sign.

From our foreign correspondent

This just in.  From our friend Katherine who is watching our cats, Beauty and Sophie, whilst we are homeless.  Her cat is Whiskers.

First, a little background. Katherine is the mother of my oldest daughter's best friend. Beauty is about 6, and is Sophie's mother. Sophie is about 3. Both are fixed females. Tabby and grey with a white apron.  Whiskers is about 1, maybe less. Male. Also fixed. Known to do things like place his master's dirty sock in her handbag to remind her when she opens it at work that it is time to do laundry.

They have been introduced to each other slowly, over the last few days. (If it had been up to DD1's best friend's father they would have been put together and expected to act like dogs. In other words, sniff butts and play right away. Luckily, he took warning and wisdom prevailed.)

From the front lines, she writes:

Battle for Supreme Domination of the Universe (or at least the 4th floor)

Beauty seems clearly to be the alpha kitty in the mix, and Whiskers is having a hard time with that.

She's eating well- not only her wet food, but his, too! And he does nothing about it - just slinks away, p.o.'d. (I separated them and closed doors during breakfast today).

But the last straw for him was his morning cuddle. I don't let him in the bedroom at night, so in the morning it's a BIG thing for him to come for some snuggles in bed. He's done this since we got him.

Well, this morning, Beauty decided she wanted some cuddles, too - and jumped right up after him.

The look of betrayal on his face! Especially when Beauty GOT cuddles!

The hissing has all but stopped, though, and they just pass each other warily in the hall. They've actually sniffed each other from time to time.

Sophie is staying out of it altogether. She's found her hiding places and is sticking with them.

Thank you Katherine for this report.

In other news, the hotel room is air-conditioned. This is good. My project is going along slowly. This is bad. School is out. This is bad good.

We don't know when the place will be fixed up enough for us to get in. It'll likely be at least a few weeks till we get windows. This is bad.

I'm going to Meg Swansen's Knitting Camp in a few weeks.

This. Is. Very. Good.

Heh.

Ick

In a hotel. With the kids. On the Upper West Side. Great eats around here. Knitty City not far.  School near, but the kids are done on Wednesday anyway.

Apartment? Ewww.  Adjuster was in today, the cleaning crew starts tomorrow. Some things just won't make it. Like a lot of the stuffed animals. The living room couch and chair are history. I was going to say toast.  The rest we'll see what happens.  But these are pros they say, and they assure us the stink will be gone.  I think the store below though is still off-gassing.

So we're out for at least a week. Which is better than I thought it would be. But it may be longer than that too.  It just all depends.

In the meantime, I am so grateful to the FDNY.  Every day I think of it and think what an incredible job they did.

I'm exhausted though.  This is just all very weird.

I started going through some of my stash today. The roving that was near the wheel was also near some of the worst smoke coming into the apartment. It's black. It started out as a beautiful pinky merino hand dye from Fleece Artist. No more.  I'm dreading what else I'll have to toss.  I'm hoping I won't have to ditch some jo sharp I'd kitted up for a Rogue.  And there's this sweater I started last year for DH that's 2/3 done.  I may just finish it and then clean the whole entire thing after it's sewn up.

In the meantime.  I have to finish a piece for an opening this week.  At PCOG Gallery. Thursday night. Group show with 30 artists.  We are transforming a found object found in Harlem, while still keeping it functional.  I got a large lampshade frame.  It's transformed. I'm using felted wool sweaters. Copper wire.  And inspired by Havana. That's all I'm going to say about it.

The show should be very good. And what a relief to be working on this now.

Fire

I was going to post all kinds of cutesy little updates. Like my FO shawl from Fruitcake knits.

Instead, I'm posting about a fire. Yesterday. In our building. Directly below our apartment.

We're all safe.

The apartment is trashed.  Uninhabitable.

It happened in an instant.  The buzzer. My "Who is it?"  They "Fire in the building !" 

By the time I got to the front room it was filling up with smoke. The kids were running out.  They got on their closest shoes, which were too small. No time to buckle them. They were hysterical about the cats being left behind.  Everything was smoky. We got out.

We got out to watch billowing clouds of dense green gray smoke obscuring our window. Pouring up in great puffy shapes. The same sickening green that I remembered from when I was a kid looking at the sky when there was a tornado watch. Watched the firemen break out our windows, and even more smoke come rushing out.  It was a 2 alarm fire.  15 firetrucks.

What could have been is unbelievably frightening. The hardware store had 30 containers of kerosene stored in the basement that no one knew about.  It didn't happen at night, when we would never have woken up with the amount of smoke that suddenly poured in.

The cats are ok. Hiding. Wheezing. Traumatized. But alive.  The kids are watching Cars with their dad. A good distraction.

It'll probably be months till we can live there again. All the windows are broken, soot covering everything, broken glass everywhere, and a hole in our living room ceiling. Blackened baseboards and moldings. Have no idea if there's structural damage under our floor. Insurance adjuster comes Monday.

But they didn't wreck my wheel. And I ran out with my laptop. Most of my wool is in plastic storage bins or bags, though not all of it. And we were here not in France.

We were so lucky.  So. Lucky.

I can't wait to stop smelling like smoky charcoal.  And trembling.

Mom I'll Never Weave You

This is what my youngest said to me yesterday.  "I'll never weave you."

Weave? Weave? 

Naturally, I wondered.  Did she mean turn me into a potholder?  She assured me no.

How about use me as weft -- over and under -- all the way across this?

No.

This would be my new --gasp-- loom.

Do I know how to weave?

Ah no. Not a clue. Except for potholders and small items.

But this was a gift.  A real gift.  It came from someone who wasn't using it, and wanted it to go to a good home. A home where it would be cherished, as it had come from a cherished person.

It is just beautiful. About 70 years old, a LeClerc, solid maple.

I don't even know what all the parts are called.

And it's now taken apart in pieces in my studio, ready to be reassembled once I reorganize in there. 

See, this is really a stashbuster for me. Weaving is faster than knitting, so I can use up more stash. And if I use up more stash I'll have more space. Right? 

The other reason this appealed to me was that I'm told my great-grandmother was a very renowned weaver in northern Spain.  So it feels like a circle. Or maybe that would be a square. Some sort of poetic completion in any case.

My kid did crack up.  She immediately began thinking of how logistically she was going to do it. Ouch.

The funny thing is I feel a little disloyal, introducing this into my knitting and fiber lair.  I didn't have any such feelings when I took up spinning. 

It feels like sibling rivalry for the yarn between the knitting and weaving.  OK not so much.  I still haven't read the weaving book or put the loom together. 

Too much knitting to do.

Baby elephant... elefante bebe

So I finished a book proposal this week.  Whew.  I've been working on it the last couple of years. Yes you read that right. Years. 

I feel like I've given birth to a baby elephant.  The gestation period was about the same.

It's a knitting book. With a lot of research. And patterns.

It's going out this week. I don't want to jinx it so I won't say more about it.

But what a huge relief.

Al fin, termine' mi propuesta para un libro. Sobre tejer/hacer calceta.  Otra vez con este monio de no tener una manera fija de decir tejer con dos agujas.

No importa. Siento como si di luz a un elefante.  Tomo' casi lo mismo tiempo preparando este. 

Hice muchas investigaciones. Hay patrones. Pero no quiero decir mas porque no quiero invitar el mal ojo a este proyecto.  Estoy muy contenta, contentisima, que termine ya. Un peso se me ha quitado.

And in other news.... here's what happened to the Easter egg dyeing experiment.

Y en otras noticias, aqui estan los resultados del experimento de ten~ir con tinta de huevos de Pascuas.

There they are.

Both clumps.  It's been kind of dark around here the last few days so I had to take this with a flash. 

Aqui estan las dos.  Ha sido bastante oscuro y nublado afuera, asi' que disculpame por tener que tomar estas fotos con "flash."  Lucen mejor en luz natural.

They're better looking in natural light.

I'm pleased.

The green part of the spectrum though really didn't take.

A mi' me gusta como salio, aun que los verdes no quedaron bien.  Alguien me dijo que debia poner sal en el agua para fijar los colores.  Al principio pense que nada mas que necesitaba vinagre, pero ahora creo que ella tuvia razon.  La proxima vez voy a poner sal en el agua final.

Someone told me I should have put salt in the bath to rinse, which I didn't do.  I'll try that the next time.  She said it fixes the color.  I thought only the vinegar was necessary but I think she was right.

Here's the clump that had more reds in it.

Aqui se ve el que tiene mas de rojo.

And here's the one that had more yellow and blues and supposed to be greens.

I was really surprised that the yellow actually showed up.  I'm so used to the Koolaid lemonade being so pale that I didn't expect to see the yellow on this brownish wool.

Y aqui se ve el otro con amarillo, azul y donde iba el verde que no quedo fijo.

Quede' asombrada que el amarillo si' quedo.  Tengo tanta experiencia con el sabor limonada del Koolaid, que es muy flojo, que pense' que esta iba a quedar lo mismo.  Y ademas con esta lana del color de tierra pense' que no iba a ver el amarillo.

Asi' que la proxima vez, con sal.

DH is in France this week packing up our stuff. So weird.  Appropriately we're having typically Breton weather here.  Damp. Cool. Grey.

But everything else? Green. So that's where the color went.

Mi esposo esta' en Francia esta semana empaquetando nuestras cosas.  Tan extran~o es pensar que esta etapa termino'. 

El tiempo aqui? Como de Bretan~a.  Humedo. Fresco. Y gris.

El resto de la ciudad? Verde.  Ya encontre' adonde fue ese color.

Blog of the week and the reading

Woooo hooooo.  I'm Blog of the Week over at Black Purl ezine.  Heee.  I really like this zine.  Lots and lots of interesting articles.  Well written, all that.

Here.

What fun.

And last week we had another KnitLit reading over at Knitty City.  It was really really fun. 

An appreciative crowd turned up, and Christine Lavin was a riot. 

She sang her What Was I Thinking song, with the Dick Cheney ending.  On the right she's reading her story about learning to knit at 50 and how she has knitting circles before her concerts and her James Taylor infused sweater.

They were all a riot.  Cathy Cooper, Jenny, Kay, and Naomi. 

Naomi has these knit condom amulets that are very cool.  For the over-50 set. To increase AIDS/HIV awareness. What a great idea. Here she is explaining her NYC apartment and composting and red worm installation. I think she unintentionally almost traumatized one of the listeners, who revealed her worm phobia after the readings were done. That's me on the right, wondering if I could be like her when I get a bit older.

Jenny's graduating from her MFA in fiction program this month.  Go Jenny.  I love her knitting infidelity story in KL3, as well as her KL2 story. She's on the right, and Kay's on the left.

Kay said she was exhausted, but she looked and sounded great.  And such bouncy hair. Impersonating Ann meeting herself for the first time. Despite Kay's repeated assertions that she and Ann are freaky internet twins, she didn't do Ann's soft Tennessee drawl. It was a riot.

Cathy looked wonderful and read her Pound of Love story that never fails to touch me. There she is with Lisa Daehlin-- resident opera singer-knit designer -- looking over.

And of course Linda Roghaar exuded warmth and a new beautifully blue sweater.  It was great to see them and hear them all again.  Here she is kvelling on Naomi.

Linda is starting up a short story knitlit series, which I think is a great idea.  Where you have short stories read to you while you knit, then you talk about it.  Like a reading club but without homework she says.  Makes me want to do it too over here. 

I wasn't nervous like I was the last time about reading the short story, "You Owe Me" that is in KL3.  I did the Inspector Clouseau cheap trick again and once again it brought laughs, proving that when all else fails you can sound like Peter Sellers and get a laugh.

These pix are courtesy of Gail Siegel from Knitty City.  And Gail has the world's best knitting store resident pet.  The absolute cutest friendliest dog.  She says he's a cockadachsadoodle.  I say they should make more of them.

So a big thanks to Pearl, Gail and Phyllis over at KC.

Hockey smiles

My oldest, the one who double-checked to be sure she wasn't like Carmen, now has a hockey player smile.

Not quite like Bobby Hull but still.

She careened off a scooter. Landed face first. Make that teeth first. Luckily it was in a wood-floored gym.

She was very brave at the ER. I pretended. OK she was probably pretending too.

The good news was that no teeth were lost and no bones were broken. The bad is that she now has 3-4 chipped front teeth.  And they're not where they used to be.

She has gone from crying when she looked at herself in the mirror to trying out grimacing and growling like one of Maurice Sendak's monsters.  She hasn't scared her little sister yet though.

I'm still recovering.  The cones of sale cashmere from Colourmart UK are a vital part of my recovery.

It's a very good thing for humanity that I never became a doctor.  I nearly fainted twice while they were fixing up her teeth.  Luckily the chair was nearby, as the last thing the doc needed to deal with as he was working on a weepy scared little girl was her mother fainting stone cold out.

Ah. A lifetime of dental work. But her smile will be gorgeous. Better than cashmere.

Unity Canvas prep

I'm beat. I just went through all 300 artworks with Pat, one of the other artists, to sort out what's going in the show.  There's only enough space for half of them max, and probably less.

The big relief was that everything was in really good shape.  When we took the show down in 2002 we stored everything flat, with wax or parchment paper between the pieces, in boxes.  Then closed up the boxes, but not sealing them shut.  It worked.

What was the most exhausting I think was seeing all the images again and handling them.  They have so much energy in them, and a lot of it is dark and grief-stricken.  I had to keep washing my hands and drinking water.  But it was a thrill.  And a real thrill to see how strong the works are visually even now, away from the vortex of the immediate reaction to 9/11.  You just can't tell how some things will survive the test of time, even 5 years later.  And these are really good.  Really. Good.

I'm trying to keep the integrity of the original panels, and preserve the visual "passages" of the original installation. That means carving away at sections, and leaving out some pieces that don't build a visual narrative as strongly as other pieces.  Some works came out because they were too similar to others in there, some works came out because the Port Authority said nothing violent and no nudity.  I'm keeping in mind the audience, which is not necessarily art lovers, and will most definitely include family survivors and first responders.  So works that were less slick but had a lot of heart won out over ones that were the opposite.  Works that were blurry and dark or too small to see from a distance were at a disadvantage.  Balance is important -- some works are angry and vengeful, some call for peace and understanding.  And I tried to preserve the original geographic diversity of the group. 

But there were definitely pieces that I wanted to put in and just couldn't.

Whew. I'm beat.  I think this will work but I'll know better next week when it's all up.  I know there'll be some last-minute surprises.

Got out the press releases. Got out the postcards. But still catching bits that didn't get out. Oh and the original website is back up -- www.unitycanvas.com.  Now to write up a statement explaining this in large enough type that people can read it from a distance.

Sheep as billboards

In today's New York Times.

You can't make this stuff up.

Reading Reading Reading

Anyone going to be in NYC this Thursday night?  And need an excuse to go to a yarn store?  Why of course.

Come one, come all to Knitty City, at 79th and Broadway from 6-8 pm.  Thursday, April 27.  And you'll be treated to a Knit Lit event.  A whole bunch of the NYC area authors/contributors will be there reading their great stories and essays. 

Linda Roghaar, she of the famed co-founder and -editor of the Knit Lit series will be there.  Christine Lavin, singer-songwriter extraordinaire, will be there.  And will even PERFORM. (But you have to get there early to catch her as she's got to head out for another gig.) If you click on the link, you must must must listen to "What Was I Thinking?"  Kay Gardiner, the Mason-Dixon one, will be there impersonating Ann Shayne describing how she first met Kay.  (I love their new book, but that's for later.) And then we've got Rena Trefman Cobrinik, Claudia Conner, Cathy Cooper, Naomi Dagen Bloom, and Jenny Feldon.  All great stories. Love each and every one of them. 

Oh yeah. And me too. 

Should be a blast.  These things always are.

Chal empezado... Shawl started

So I decided to go with the Fruitcake Knits fir cone triangular shawl pattern.  The new shawl that is out of the yummy yarn that Elisabet brought me from Barcelona (from Argentina to Barcelona)

Decidi' a usar el patron de Fruitcake Knits para el nuevo chal.  El nuevo chal de la lana que me dio' Elisabet cuando ella vino a NYC.

   Ya empeze'.  Un encanto esta lana.  Y el patron es bastante facil, aun no parece que es.  Buenisima para una novata de encaje/calados.  Estoy haciendolo frente del televisor.

I've started already.  I love this yarn. Really soft, interesting nubbies, great green color.  The pattern is pretty easy too.  It would be good for a lace novice.  This is my TV knitting these days.

Here's how the yarn looks close-up in natural light. It's a little hard to tell but there are these very subtle darker blue-green stripes that are appearing.  Very subtle.  I think I'll only be able to see them in bright sunlight.

Back to working on the Unity Canvas mailings and press. And dreaming of a wool pine forest.

Wish someone would invent smellovision for yarn like this. Can you imagine how cool it would be to feel like you were in the midst of a woolly pine forest? 

Really I'm going back to these mailings now.

Easter wool dyeing

This happened to me a few years ago too.

We dyed the eggs.  They looked great.

But there was all this dye left over.

Pour it down the drain?

Oh. No.

It really wanted to be poured onto, hmmmm, some wool.

Yes that's it.

Some wool that needed to be spun up. Some wool that would appreciate a makeover to show how glamourous it could really be. 

Here is the before shot.

From Misty Mountain Farm in Virginia. A Finn Lincoln fleece, bought at Rhinebeck a few years ago.  Long staple, soft. Washed.

Still full of lanolin. This became apparent later.

I actually really like the undyed color, so I only took part of it out of the bag to dye.  I'm going to spin it up creatively, mixing up the colors with the undyed wool. Not sure if I'll do it in the plying, or just grab random hanks of color.  We'll see.

So here are the two batches, ready to go.

And here is how I decided to group the colors, 3 to a casserole dish. 

OK, so I didn't have any more casserole dishes.

At least not big enough ones.

I didn't presoak because I thought I wanted the vinegar-laden colors to soak in, strike and stay put.  This is because I was using a pair of complementary colors in each threesome, so knew it would just be brown if they'd mix.  And brown over brown? Well, duh not good.

This is where the lanolin became a factor.

You may recall that lanolin repels water.

Indeed it does. Note how there appear to be dots of color on the top, and a pool of colors on the bottom.

I nuked it anyway. Too afraid to move anything, and certain that it was too late to add water.  "Oh the bottom at least will look interesting, and maybe the middle. And I was going to ply it anyway..." Sure. Play fast and loose with the dye rules. And see what happens.

I did presoak the next batch. It had a little too much water perhaps for all the dye I poured into the casserole, but I did manage to drain a bit of water off before pouring in colors 2 and 3.  Color 1 was the yellow which I didn't think would do much anyway.  I was surprised that the soaking allowed the color to soak in faster and actually seemed to stay put. 

After nuking, I also pushed the wool down in the first batch with the end of the dish scrubber.  That helped soak the color in.  It didn't look like it had migrated surprisingly enough. And then I zapped it all again. 

You can see that the colors stayed pretty distinct.  I think the saturation level though will be wildly different depending on whether the wool was on top or on the bottom.

One thing I really look forward to seeing is how this being a fleece as opposed to a roving will affect the dyeing.  The wool's in there in chunks, rather than having its fibers all lined up from being carded.  I have a dog comb and a brush, and after it dries I might play around with blending some of this up with the undyed fleece to see what happens before spinning it up.

Did I ever mention that my favorite class in high school was physics?  I love experiments.

FAQs: 

Q: What dye did you use?

A:  Paas. The regular stuff.

Q:  Did you do anything special to the dye?

A:  Nope.  Followed the package instructions for creating bright colors, which means adding 3 T of vinegar to the mix instead of just water.  I did this a few years ago over some grey roving and didn't add vinegar to the mix.  The dye seemed to take longer to exhaust then, but in truth the stuff is still sitting on my stovetop cooling so I can't really tell yet.

Q: How did you pour it?

A: In thirds, like pie sections. However this was rather inexact.  I don't know what it'll look like on the bottom part, or if the colors mixed or by how much. 

Q:  How long did you nuke it in the microwave?

A:  Two minutes a pop, rest a few minutes.  Repeat till dye exhausted or close to it.

Q:  Did you cover it?

A:  Yes, with clear plastic food wrap, and left the food wrap on while it was cooling down to enhance the steam effect.

Q: Don't the colors come out too bright?

A: That's why I dyed wool that wasn't white.  The brown in this one and the grey in the first one I ever tried toned down the colors and they turned out quite lovely.

Q:  Are you going to eat out of those casseroles again?

A: Yeah, after about 30 cycles in the dishwasher.  It's food grade dye but the fleece is a little scary with all that lanolin and stuff.  Never did like to make casseroles anyway.

Here they are cooling off on the stove top.

They look dark but will lighten up when they dry.  The dye hasn't yet completely exhausted, and I'm not sure if it's a function of the amount of wool being too small for the amount of dye, or some property of the dye that I don't know about. But it's almost clear. I may zap it one more time and let it cool down again.  Maybe even leave it overnight in the dishes.

Here's a detail shot of one of the dishes. You can see the colors better in this one.  It looks weird because I still haven't taken off the plastic wrap so it's through water droplets.

I'll rinse them out later and let them dry and see what's happened.

Back to checking on how it's exhausting.

Addendum:  They're drying.  The red end of the spectrum exhausted first.  On the other hand, the green dye just wouldn't exhaust.  After a few hours (like 3) I got tired of waiting so poured out the diluted dyewater after all. The bottom of the unsoaked one definitely got more color than the top, though the top did dye too. They look cool.  More later.

Carmen

Yesterday I took my oldest daughter (the one who's 9) to see Carmen at the NY City Opera at Lincoln Center.

It was her first opera.  It was the first opera I saw too, but when I was about 13. The tickets were well-priced so I figured hey why not.  As long as we are living in NYC I'm determined to get my kids to see things they won't see very easily in other places. And then I get to go.

Even though I listen to opera regularly, and they pretend to sing opera, and they've even made up operas (when they make a big deal over little tragedies like a fallen cookie I've told them to make up an opera about it) it wasn't that easy to get her to go.  (By the way those little cookie and spilt milk operas really are hilarious.)

"Wanna go see an opera?"

"No. Why would I want to do that?"

"Well it's got gypsies and takes place in Spain and has bullfighters and stuff."

"Yeah so?"

"How about if I sing one of the songs from it?"

"OK."

[Me singing La Habanera somewhat breathily with a few squeaks. Not at all majestically or silkily as I'm getting over a cold.  Yeah that's it.]

"Oh I LOVE THAT SONG.  YES YES YES PLEASE????"

So we went.

During the first act, I was afraid to look at her.  I didn't want to see if she was bored or didn't like it.  But I looked anyway.  She caught my eye, my raised eyebrows.  And met them with bright eyes wide as saucers, nodding rapidly and beaming. 

Whew.

After the first act, I asked her what she thought.  She raved.  Said her best friend was wrong, that opera isn't boring at all.  We both recalled our favorite Bugs Bunny operatic scenes. And then.

"I'm not at all like her."  Meaning Carmen.

Pause.

"Am I Mom?"

How do you answer a serious  question from your 9 year old daughter comparing herself to a gypsy cigarette-roller and free spirited vixen in 19th century Sevilla without bursting out laughing?

"Ah no, you are not."

But you know, I thought this marked opera success.  When the lead character can get a kid growing up 125 years later to see herself somehow and question whether she's at all like her, now that's a great opera, and a great lead too.  (Actually all the actors/singers were great. The production was just a delight. I really do like City Opera in some ways better than the Met.)

My mission was complete.  Another opera lover made.

Today she told her best friend that he was wrong, and gave him her version of it.  Now he might even go again.

Heh.

Cuadrados otra vez... Squares again

People sometimes say life is a big circle.

I beg to differ.

It's a square.  This is what I've come to realize.  You go around, but it's not a smooth trip.  You reach corners. You turn. Long-lost friends pop up, but not in the same way. New art projects echo old themes, but don't copy them.

So these days my life is going around in squares.

One way is that I'm pulling together an art exhibit for the month of May.  Back in 2002, for the first anniversary of 9/11, I organized a collective artists' response called the Unity Canvas.  My studio used to be in Tribeca, and we used to live in Battery Park City. For those of you not familiar with NYC geography, this means that I worked about 3 blocks north of the WTC, and lived about 3 blocks south and west of it.  Walked through it every day.  Luckily we had moved up to Harlem a few months before, but didn't move the studio north for another couple of years.  That was my old 'hood.

It started little, and then grew.  And grew.  Almost 300 artists participated in the end.  And they came from about every corner of the world.  Word spread by word of mouth and over the internet. 

The idea was to have artists do 12" squares of canvas, in the medium of their choice, about any aspect of 9/11 they felt compelled to express in their artwork.  Canvas is the traditional medium of artists, and widely available.  12" is not too big but big enough.

What started pouring in were images.  Some of peace, some of revenge, some of sorrow, some of horror.  Some abstract, some narrative, some representational. Some with photos, some painted, some sewn, some glued.  You name it, it came in.

They were all from the heart.  Many of the artists told me they had been blocked in those awful months, and that doing the piece freed them up to start working again.  I was in tears opening up some of them.  They all went in the show.

It's still one of the things in my life that I'm most proud of doing.  Proud's not really the right word.  It was humbling.  I felt like the guardian and caretaker of some very powerful mojo.  When I put it all together it was an act of reverence.  It was shown for the first anniversary at the Williamsburg Art & Historical Center in Brooklyn, which has more artists per capita than anywhere in the US.  It was arranged as an installation, and in groupings evoking the stained glass groupings you see in cathedral windows.  Each panel had a name like "Requiem" and "O Fortuna" and "Dona Nobis Pacem."  A combination of sacred music titles and not, like from Carmina Burana. 

These photos are of the show at the WAH Center, and only show a fraction of the works.  The top panel was titled "Dona Nobis Pacem," as it had a lot of peace-themed works in it.  This panel to the right shows the incredible diversity of media and viewpoints.

You can see more about it here and here and here.

And it's going to be in the NY-NJ Port Authority for the month of May.  The Port Authority lost about 75 employees on that day, and owned the WTC, so it's good for all of us.  It'll be at the Port Authority's main bus terminal to be exact, so zillions of commuters can see it every day.  Not quite as big as the original, because the space is smaller.  But still big.

So if you're in NYC in the month of May, stop by the Port Authority to find it.  42nd Street between 8th and 9th Avenue, towards the 9th Avenue entrance. Open 24 hours, and it's free. 

(If you would like to help out with the costs of the project, it's a New York Foundation for the Arts fiscally-sponsored project so it's tax deductible.  You can donate online here and designate the gift for Unity Canvas. But I really hate asking for money so forgive me if this sounds weird. But just in case you want to help out that's how.)

Today I'm getting out a mailing.  The first of several. This week brought news that first-responders are getting sick and dying now from their heroic work in the first days and weeks and months, from breathing in all those poisons. Bringing this project to public view again feels timely, and not laden with the fog of war. 

This is a good thing to work on during Holy Week come to think of it.  Sacrifice, death and life all together.

Happy Easter, and Happy Passover.

Visito, visitas, visita, visitamos, visitando... I visit, you visit, she visits, we visit, visiting

La semana pasada fue' tan divertido por unos dias. Elisabet de Sincontrol y la fundadora de BarcelonaKnits vino a NY.  Como verdadera campeona de lana, ella fue' a las mas famosas tiendas de lana en NYC.  Impresionante.  Yo tuve el placer de acompan~arla a unas y al fin de conocerla en vivo, en vez de solamente por el internet.

Tan encantadora.  Pero, desgraciadamente, no tengo ni una foto de ella. Ni de su lana.

Pero, ella me dio un regalito.  Esto.

Lindisima, no?  De lana y seda, de Yanabey de Argentina.  De lo que yo sepa, no lo venden aqui'.  Estoy buscando patrones para hacer un chal.

Algo como Flower Basket, pero con motivos de hojas. Ya hice el Flower Basket. Dos veces me gusto' tanto.

Creo que voy a usar esta, de Fruitcake Knits, pero todavi'a no he decidido por cierto. Estoy pensando en poner otro motivo como un punto de hojas pero no se'. Tengo uno en un libro viejo de motivos de Espan~a, asi' que la romantica que soy pienso que eso sera' justo. 

Pero ahora que lo estoy mirando otra vez estoy pensando que este motivo de pino tal vez sera' perfecto.

I had such a blast last week.  Elisabet, of Sin Control blog, the founder of Barcelona Knits, the knitting circle over there, was in town for a yarn crawl.  Talk about a woman with a mission.  I was impressed.  I had the delight to meet her in person and go with her to a few spots. 

I love the internet.  I just do.  We've been corresponding via blogland, and what a blast to finally meet her in person and talk yarn.  IN SPANISH.  And history, and patterns, and fave yarn suppliers, and fave yarns. Like a dork, did I take a picture of her? Ah. No. But above is a picture of the beautiful yarn she gave me.  From Yanabey of Argentina, sold in Spain.  As far as I know it's not sold here.  Wool, with little blue silk slubs.  So incredibly soft.

It is telling me it wants to be a shawl.  I'm thinking something like Flower Basket, but not. (I've already made two.)  With a sort of leaf like motif to show off the luscious greeniness of this yarn. 

So in the lead right now is this really cute pattern from Fruitcake Knits.  Fir cone motif.  But I'm also thinking about swapping out that motif for a leaf lace pattern in one of my old Spanish pattern books.  Hmm.  That of course appeals to the romantic in me, and there's something about the symmetry and poetry of using a Spanish stitch pattern for this precious gift from my fellow Spanish language knitblogger that just feels right.  Then again, I just kinda wanna get knitting it up. We'll see. 

I like these sorts of decisions.

Cuadrados... Squares

No se' por que', pero este mes ha sido lleno de cuadrados.  Para cubrecamas para amigas o sus parientes. Aqui' en los EEUU, hay una tradicion de amigas haciendo en un grupo una cubrecama.  A veces son de tela -- "quilts".  Los que yo participo son, naturalmente, de punto o de ganchillo.  Aqui' estan' mis cuadrados.

I don't know why, but this month has been full of squares.  For afghans for friends or their relatives.  You know the drill -- a group comes together to make an afghan and everyone makes a square. So here they are.

Esto es para una amiga que va a tener un bebe'.  Es una sorpresa.  Es hecho de lana que yo hile'.  Actualmente, es hecho de casi la primera lana que yo hile'.  Pues, lanas, porque tiene dos tipos de lana.

Para mi' significa la tierra y todos los colores, quiero decir todo lo bueno para el bebe y la mama'.

This is for a friend who's going to have a baby. It's a surprise.  It's made of my own handspun, actually my almost-first handspun wool.  I used a natural fleece and a rainbow dyed roving, and kept the color changes by navajo-plying the colored roving. 

For me it symbolizes the earth and all the colors of the rainbow. In other words, the best things in life sorts of wishes for the new baby and mom.

Aqui' tenemos un cuadrado para una amiga que esta' haciendo una cubrecama para su suegra.  Ella y otras parientes.  El patron viene del Great American Aran Afghan, creo que asi' es como lo llama.  No esta' "blocked" todavia.

Here's a square for my girlfriend's relative's afghan.  The pattern is from the Great American Aran Afghan (I think that's it; I always call it the GAAA).  It's obviously not blocked yet.  She's getting a blocking lesson with this.  Yarn is a superwash wool; Knitaly.  I wasn't crazy about working with it because it's a little splitty, but I do think the stitch definition turned out well and it is really really soft.  So the afghan ought to be really really soft.  Blankie soft.

Last and not least is a square for another friend.  Her life has been pretty hellish lately so a bunch of us made a bunch of squares out of Koigu.  Because she deserves it.  This is mine.  I'm putting it together this week (single crochet, not mattress stitch) and the other squares that have come in have been just spectacular.  I am convinced that you can not fail with combining Koigu pretty much any which way.  You'll see a picture of the final product, but not till the worthy recipient sees it first.

Al fin, aqui tenemos un cuadrado de Koigu. Este es para una otra amiga a quien ha pasado unas cosas recientemente que son, pues, tristes y horribles. Asi' que nosotras hemos decidido a hacerla una cubrecama de Koigu, porque ella merece algo asi'.  Lujoso, suave, de colores vivos, y que se puede lavar. A mi' me encanta Koigu. Colores tan preciosos todos. No se puede combinarlos malos. Yo voy a coser-- pues, a enganchillar --los cuadrados de este proyecto.  Voy a poner la foto cuando lo termino pero despues de que ella lo vea.

Ademas he hecho otros cuadrados como muestras para patrones. Pero no puede ponerlos aqui todavia.

I also made a bunch of squares in the form of swatches. For some new patterns. But I can't show them yet...

Hooker, The Happy... Ganchillo Contento

So at last I received my copy of Debbie Stoller's new SnB book -- The Happy Hooker. 

Hee.  Hee.  In my quick perusal, it looks good.  Good illustrations. Cheeky and funny. Quite a few projects I would make (if my to-do list weren't quite so long).

Including this one.

Oh wait.

I DID make it.

Heee. 

It's called Strut, and it's on pages 128-131.

It looks different on the model.

It's a really fast hat to make.  Then you felt it.  Noro Kureyon does all the colorwork for you.

I see no conflict between the knitting urge and the crochet urge.  They're completely different.  I could never get knitting to work like this for this sort of hat.  I like that I can make forms more easily with crochet.

Unless I want something drapey and fluid.  Then it's knitting.

Love having the choice.

The Healing Power of Koolaid

So why is it that a fruit smell, wet wool and gleeful kids are such a great combo? 

The magic of kool aid dyeing.  Today I volunteered to dye skeins of Knitpicks dye-your-own wool of the Andes.  With about 22 3d graders as the actual dyers.  The price is right, and the wool is actually pretty soft and has a great put-up (220 yds).

All for a good cause:  the PS 75 school auction. Next week. You too can bid on a slew of items here.  Vacations, massages, NYC restaurants, you name it.  Even knitting lessons.  I'm counting on there being a lot of knitters at the school, and that they will want this hand-dyed yarn at the auction.

What fun we had.  The kids worked in teams of 2, with their line partners.  I decided that it would be best to limit the palette, so we had plastic cups of ice blue, lemonade, and cherry or watermelon cherry.  Oh and one of grape too.  Two squirt bottles contained lemonade and blue for that dotted spotted look, and for color changing accents.  Each kid got to pick one primary color to start.  They either poured their color, or spotted it on from the squirt bottle.

To start.  Then creative madness took hold.  Stripes appeared, dots over stripes, and who knew that cherry with that blue and some yellow would look like an icee?

Finally, each skein was zapped in the microwave for 2 minutes, a bit more if they needed to exhaust the dye.  After cooling down, they went to drip dry -- and I do mean drip-- to the PTA office.  Which now smells like koolaid.

Some of the kids in the class had done this with me a few years ago, when they were in first grade.  This was better.  Much less nerve-wracking.

What happened to the yarn we had left over from a few years ago?  It went to make this.

For the first child of the kids' first grade teacher. Who remembered the many fun classes we had, and the many skeins of koolaid hanging from clotheslines strung across the room. Enticing the mice with that fruit smell.   She is not a knitter, but appreciates those who knit.  And dye. Especially her own kids.

It's that circle of life thing.  Very satisfying it is to give back a present whose roots reach back a few years.

This was also my first ever Baby Surprise Jacket.  As much of a fan that I have always been of Elizabeth Zimmerman I can't believe it took me this long to make this pattern.  It was fun.  I would make it again.  Especially in variegated yarn; I think in plain it would be a little boring, for me anyway.  But it really shows off color changes. The pattern is in EZ's Knitting Workshop and I think also in the new Opinionated Knitter.  (One of these days I will stop sighing over Opinionated Knitter and tell myself that yes it's ok to buy it for myself as a present.)

See the little goldfish bowl buttons?  Aren't they cute? They came from Knitty City, the new yarn store on the upper west side. The *other* yarn store.  Say hi to Pearl the owner if you go.

And here's the sweater from the back. You can see that it's gradated in color from bottom to top.  What I did was find the color that all the little balls of yarn had in common.  That was yellow.  Then I organized the color changes to go from the red end of the yellow spectrum to the blue end.

I so lucked out on those buttons though.

The wool was originally LB fisherman's wool, a worsted that takes up dye well.  I've also used it in felted koolaid dyed projects and been pleased with it. The KnitPicks though is just a wee bit softer.  We'll see how it handles when it dries.

So color, wet wool and kids are an excellent tonic for the soul.

Meantime, don't tell anyone but that auction always has some great deals in it.

Testing... testing...

Ahem.  Testing. Testing.  Phth phth.  krghh krghhh. Anyone out there still?  No I have not abandoned you dear readers.  Only crawled into a hole out of which I'm now ready to leave.

Since last we saw our intrepid heroine....

We had the biggest blizzard snow dump ever in NYC history. Twenty-nine inches in Central Park. 

At left, the view from the front parlor window.  Note the taxi's front wheel and how you can't see it.

Here you see the charming juxtaposition of snow on the outside of the air-conditioning unit.  A lovely reminder of better times to come, and the impermanence of all pesky things such as weather conditions. 

And to round out the admittedly narrow window tour of Harlem in a snowstorm, here is the back fire escape, from my studio window.

I love snow.  I really do.

But....

that's not all folks.

Lookie here.

Oh my.  What could it be.

Hmm.

Why, why yes. 

It's the most recent issue of Wild Fibers.

Hmmm.  Myrna Stahman's in it, and there are some great patterns, and a most fascinating article about bison and their delicious fiber.  But, wait.  Could it be?

Heeeee.

My article about the efforts to revive rare native breed Hebridean sheep on the Hebridean  organic farm of Ardalanish.

A truly magical place, run by enchanted people with the impossibly poetic names of Aeneas and Minty.  I had the privilege of visiting their farm last summer.  They also have one of the last weaving studios in the islands, where Bob Ryan makes the most gorgeous items.  They do sell Hebridean yarn, as well as shetland -- just email them.  And you can find their incredible blankets and couture wear made of their fabric at Thistle & Broom.  When I grow up I will get myself this gown. Yes indeedy.

It still gives me chills to think about Ardalanish.  I was there as part of the Mull adventure that included such fine folks as Jean and Liz and Freyalyn and Debbie New, and about 20 more most excellent knitters and spinners from the US, Canada, Australia, Tasmania, Ireland and England who do not have a web presence.  I've probably left off a country and for that I am sorry.  But I do not exaggerate when I say that week or so was one of the happiest weeks of my life, and the friends I made there are with me in some way every day.  And they always will be. Especially when I swirl just enough water into a single malt scotch. Or spin. Not at the same time though.

Anyway, there is magic in Ardalanish, and I hope I was able to give a peek of it here, as there is no way I could have fully done the Mackays and Mull justice.

The biggest thing though that's happened in the last few weeks is that we've been in intense negotiations with our employer for the artist program we've run in France for the last decade or so.

We are not going back.  You may remember the very public passing of the baton last summer from Doris to me.  Here.  Followed by the awarding of the French Legion of Honor in the fall to her.

It was the Americans, not the French, who, um, uh, ah.  Yeah, let's just leave it at that.

We love the French.

In times of trouble, I go back to channeling the high school musicals I was in.  Sometimes it's Anything Goes, sometimes it's West Side Story.  Pretty much never is it Bye Bye Birdie. With all that's been going on, it's been The Sound of Music.

Especially that scene where the Mother Abbess is telling Maria "when God closes a door He opens a window," and proceeds to belt out Climb Every Mountain.

So I'm looking for open windows these days.  Especially now that the blizzard's over.

Part II of "wtf happened to ..." next time.  With more goodies to show.

Where are they now? Xmas present followup

First off, sorry about the light postings, but I've been kinda down because of still more memorial services and news of more near-and-dears-to-my-close-friends dying. I'll be back in full swing though soon.

In the meantime... we bring you..

Where Are They Now?  aka what's become of this year's knitted Xmas presents. 

Many of you know that when you knit up a present it takes on a life of its own upon giving.

Sometimes, the gift is received joyfully and worn with panache and enthusiastic words of appreciation are uttered.  Every time you see the recipient they are wearing it, and they gush for years about how meaningful and beautiful the gift is, and how it saved them from a pit of despair, or turned their life around, or something like that. This is optimal.

Sometimes, enthusiastic words are uttered but the item is preserved unworn in a closet because it is "too nice" to wear. The recipient marvels at the beauty and care, the perfection of the craftsmanship, but this stops them from wearing it. This is less than optimal.  You want them to enjoy this loving stitchwork for pete's sake, not preserve it like Stinky Pete the Prospector from Toy Story 2 in a box, resigned to a bitter fate as moth treats.

On the other end of the spectrum, you get the recipients who say things like, "Why did you make it when you could have bought it?"  Or, "I put it in the machine and something happened to it.  Can you make me another one?"  Or, "I'm allergic to wool." Or they never wear it. Or never comment about it.  Or you see it crumpled up with the paint rags. And you get that sinking feeling. And vow that's the last time you'll ever knit that person anything again.

This year, I'm pleased to report that my gift list was on the good end of the spectrum.  Without further ado...

Told you it would look better on her than on my piano.  How cute is this picture.  And what a clever way to wear that scribble lace stole/shawl. 

And she even sent me the picture of her wearing it !  This is good.

Now this one was interesting. Intended recipient loved them. However, so did her college-age daughter.   She begged her mother for them, saying that she would be just the coolest on-campus if she had them.

Mom?  You guessed it.  These are now being flashed around at USC's film school.

They've gone Hollywood. Not at all what I expected.

As for lil Juju.

She of the devilish glint and gold lame.

I'm pleased to report that the recipient's luck appears to be turning around since her arrival.  My angst about contributing to bad karma have been eased.

Heh.

It's not because lil Juju's had pins thrust into her.

How indelicate.

No.

Rather, she has become the favorite toy of Whiskers the wonder cat.

Everyone's a winner.

But I probably should make another pair of gauntlets for my SIL.