Pillows. Zentangles & a Quick Booklet

I was doing a scan of things stacked along one side of the garage and spotted this bag with the lace ruffle sticking out the top. What's in there? I move to this location in 2012, leaving some boxes unpacked in this area along with some other things I ran out of steam to deal with. I more or less know what's in them all and why I've not done anything about them in all this time but this bag did puzzle me, even when I realized there were pillows in there.

No immediate recognition nor memory of why they would have been relegated here and together. And then I remembered. I made these to use on a rocking chair I've always had in my bedroom. One for the seat, one for the back. The one for the seat which has hand quilting is the same block as in this exchange block quilt made prior to 2000 while I'm pretty sure the one for the back which has no quilting at all was made from leftover half-square triangle blocks or pieces trimmed off in the making of the block for the seat pillow. No wonder I was having a hard time remembering them! That exchange block quilt was always close by, either on a cedar chest in the bedroom or draped over the back of the rocking chair. In the new location, the cedar chest with quilt on top just fit in the new bedroom but there wasn't room for the rocking chair in either my bedroom or any place else - it has languished in the garage because I really don't want to get rid of it, always found it comfortable for knitting and other handwork. I'm forever a "some day maybe" sort of person. And that explains why these pillows had too been relegated to the garage. I think I'm going to have to do something about that.

In the meantime, the current pillow project is a bit stalled. When I went to Walmart to get a pillow form and maybe some buttons, they only had one size of pillow form and it wasn't the size I needed. Well, I've made pillow forms in the past so I guess I can do it again. And while I didn't score on any buttons, at least they had this fiber fill for stuffing a form. 

Speaking of buttons, it was driving me crazy trying to remember where the souvenir wood buttons might have disappeared to so I took another look in the drawer where I knew they should be. And I did find them in there, no longer along the side of the drawer but shimmied in between a stack of fabric. But there aren't enough, I didn't want to try mixing in other buttons and I think I'd rather save these for a cardigan sweater anyway. But it eases my mind to have put my finger on their whereabouts. I've cut the big rectangle of fabric for the pillow and can worry about the buttons later, so why can't I move on to the next step? Relatively easy enough to press in the folds along the sides of the pillow base.  Easy enough to cut a couple of squares of muslin, seam all around leaving an opening and stuff away. Should be easy enough to layer the block for a little quilting before attaching it to the pillow base.  Yet with each of the little road bumps I've encountered, I'm finding it more difficult to get with it to get this pillow made. That's the thing I've found about dealing with my auto-immune syndrome: the fatigue that often accompanies it can make even the smallest routine task feel like an insurmountable mountain. And that's sort of where I'm at right now. I know it will pass, and making this pillow right away is not important. 

Zentangling continues at a leisurely pace as it does NOT feel like an insurmountable mountain but something I can do sitting down and is relaxing as I follow instructions. Closer and closer to finishing the Be Well series.

Here's something I recently ran across that I found quick and easy and required absolutely no tools or supplies except a group of same size envelops. Karen Abend shared this method of making a pocket booklet in one of her e-letters and since I had a stack of these brown envelops sitting on my work table (and wasn't getting much else productive done it seemed), I decided to give it a try. The glue on the flap when moistened is what holds the flap in place when slipped inside the opening of another envelop.

It works remarkably well, and I'm probably going to add four or more envelops to mine. Karen tried different media to sketch on the right hand side envelop and says all worked well. I'm really not one for using pockets in my books and am not sure what I would stick in mine, but this might be fun to take on a trip to hold things like receipts, ticket stubs and other travel ephemeral while making a quick sketch of locations where they were collected. How might you use something like this?

 

 

That Unwanted Anniversary

F. Allen Barnes 1953 - 2000

As the anniversary of my husband's death loomed, I came to the realization that I have lived without him for as many years as we were married (we'd met and started dating only two years prior). Sigh. The day before he died was the Fourth of July and he was barbecuing up the traditional brats, showing his slight irritation at me and my camera, which of course makes me smile to this day. Traditional brats you may ask? Well yes, as we were living in Wisconsin at the time, and the all American hot dog just wouldn't do. I still fix brats every Fourth, although barbecuing is not my thing. This year I tried the Air Fryer and they turned out great.

Our 25th wedding anniversary was just a week later, and perhaps presciently, we'd done our celebrating early. I quickly chose to use the bracketing of those two events as a chance to go into seclusion, my own private retreat to reflect on our life together and consider how I might honor the support he always gave me by working on a special quilting project. I'm not doing much quilting at the moment but I'm sure he would be happy to see me take on any creative task that I've been neglecting for one reason or another. I started jotting down things I could do during this coming week and it is quite varied, mostly things that on their own would not fill up a week. So maybe a lot will get checked off my long want-to-do list. Or maybe I'll spend more time in quiet contemplation and walks down memory lane. However I end up spending my week of seclusion, I hope to maintain and even strengthen that connection I still have to that man who was the love of my life. 

What To Do With Orphan Blocks

Today I fired up the sewing machine and completed piecing a block I'd used for demonstration in a class I taught when I still lived in Wisconsin. This was not just to show the sequence of sewing pieces into sections but also which way to press seams for an easier and flatter joining of those sections into the finished block. I think I've put off sewing the block together because I really didn't know what to do with it. The quilt itself that was the sample for the class is done and on my bed. I don't need another patchwork pillow, which is a popular way to use up single blocks, not to mention the color doesn't fit any room decor except maybe the bedroom, but I no longer can wedge a chair into that room on which for it to sit. I'm not into table runners either, another way one sees lonely blocks fleshed out into something usable. I've added a single block onto a ready-made tote and also have a tote a friend made from a block I'd appliqued but didn't care for but suddenly looked good on that tote, but I have so many totes, I hardly need to make another. So what to do with this orphan block? I do have a printed panel (to the right of the block) that I bought from Angela Walters which I plan to use to practice her quilting designs (true confession - I was taken with the color as well as the design and also purchased a coordinating print) that is close in color but it doesn't feel quite right to pair them up into a wall hanging, for that is what it would be. I do have quite a bit of paisley and other fabrics leftover from making the top; surely I could come up with something. Any suggestions?

I found this little piece folded in the stack of that leftover fabric. This isn't exactly an orphan block but another result of a class I taught showing how to use ruler templates to cut pieces for Drunkard's Path blocks, then how to sew those curved seams. When arranging blocks, I was intrigued by this arrangement that looked a bit like Indian architecture. I did add a narrow border around the outside, thinking I could make a small wall hanging but it obviously has never happened. And look at how the blue fabric has faded. It must have happened when it was up in the shop where I taught - I had a sample quilt's back totally fade out where it was hung against wood paneling - or it might have been displayed in the shop's window. At any rate, it's hard to get excited about finishing it. What to do? 

This all got me thinking more about the orphan blocks I have stored away in a drawer, knowing that there were two problems with finding a way to finish them off (besides what I've mentioned above): 1) some are quite large, and 2) they are too diverse to be worked into a single quilt (although I do have a memory of making a rather wild charity quilt from different sizes of leftover blocks). The one above is one of the larger ones that if memory serves was from a block exchange where I ended up winning the blocks. Again, quilt made not needing this block, but I still really love it.

Now we're getting way back into my "origins" of quilting. I had a limited amount of the blue fabric but it reminded me of a shade of blue I'd seen in antique quilts and I made up these two blocks. No recollection of why I chose these patterns, but I'm pretty sure if I'd had more of that blue, I would have made more blocks to make a sampler quilt. Now that I have them out again, maybe I should reconsider making them into a tote bag for my knitting. Hmmmm . . . 

Nearing the end of single blocks, here are two that again, I have little recollection of. I used to cut up leftover scraps into what I then considered usable sizes and saved off-cut triangles as well. I'm pretty sure these were just me playing around with leftovers.

This one though is a real treasure in my book. After we moved to Wisconsin and I wasn't working anymore, I'd gotten serious about learning how to quilt. Quilting magazines at that time ran ads in the back for quilt shows and block contests you could enter. I got very into making blocks for various contests, even winning a few awards. This one came out so well that I took them up on the option to have it returned. It's a state block (Michigan Star) and I soon found myself dreaming of making a quilt with a block for every state in it. I went so far as to start researching and printing out patterns for state blocks (which is how I ran across my signature Idaho Beauty block) and collecting fabric in this same green, rust and peach palette, squirreling it away with this block in that same drawer where I started keeping the various orphan blocks. I find the palette a bit outdated now and I've lost interest in making a full state block quilt but I still love this block. And again, what to do with it?

This last one isn't exactly an orphan block but it IS a single small block that needs a home. I got the chance to see a lot of Hmong textile art when I lived in Wisconsin, so intricate and finely made that I knew I could never replicate it. So I bought a few small zippered bags with different types of applique and embroidery work on them and then this one 5 x 5 inch block. I'd totally forgotten about it, buried so deep in that drawer. It needs someplace special for sure. But I have no idea where that might be.

So help, my good friends! Any ideas?

End of Year Journal Prompts

I thought I'd share the journal prompts that helped me assess 2024 and settle on my resolution word. They were presented in December by Ali Manning of my Handmade Book Club, partly because so many members are at a loss as to what to use their newly-made blank books for. I was still in a mood when she first posted them and brushed them off as something I didn't want to do, but by the third time they crossed my path, I found myself pouring out answers on a scrap of paper. I know we are well into January, but perhaps you'd be interested in considering them:

• What surprised you this year?
• What habits or routines improved your life?
• What risks did you take and how did they turn out?
• What would you like to leave behind this year?
• What are your top priorities for next year?
  

As you might guess, a lot of my answers were quite negative, but it's good to get that out of your system. And it was pretty clear what I wanted to leave behind and make priorities for 2025.

I usually scan over the year's blog posts before choosing my resolution word and writing that post, but this year I did not. In retrospect, I think I left the impression that the year had been a wash, so easy to concentrate on the negative, but surely that was not true. So now I've made that scan and can say it wasn't all bad, by any means. I made quite a few beautiful books, many for gifts. I got back into knitting more often, completing a pair of socks and nearly finishing a sweater. I worked to improve my art journaling skills with several completed spreads and some small mixed media pieces. I added more Zentangles to my sketchbook, learning some new ones. I pried myself out of the house to do some urban sketching once the weather got nice. And organizing efforts throughout the year did make me feel better about my work spaces and a bit more in control.

Of course, I couldn't help feeling my crowning achievement was making that baby quilt for my goddaughter's baby, then following it up with the pillowcases and trinket bowls. And of course, even more trinket bowls! But I needn't overlook all the rest I accomplished, the year certainly not a wash. I'm disappointed that I couldn't convince myself to get out on a trail hike but I'm hopeful that what kept me home or on my secure daily walking routes will no longer be an issue. And I'm hopeful that my issues with my hands will be less of an issue with the help of compression gloves to wear while doing handwork and these fancier ones with heat and vibrations! In this clip they are charging up, the blinking red lights looking a bit like Christmas, don't you think?

So while I may be focusing on resisting less, I think I am right in thinking I need to resist being sucked in by free classes like that Year of Light one. Even though there are a few lessons I still plan to try, I realized that almost all posts from people doing them were direct copies of the instructor's example. And while copying is one of the best ways to learn, I thought more than once that no, I did not want to just copy, but use my own sketch or idea to practice a particular technique or style. That may be partly out of confidence or partly out of recognition of time marching on and I need to make better use of it. In truth, even in the learning stages of quilting, I was always thinking of little ways I could change things up to make it more my own. I will try to keep that in mind, that making things more my own, as I continue into the new year and keep creating.

Oh Look!

I got another trinket bowl made, using up the last of the blue ark fabric and what was left of the pinks. But that raindrop fabric - it will go into many more bowls, it looks like. That strip you see is four double layers  that will take 3 swipes of the rotary cutter across its width. Many more long lengths for wrapping around clothesline. I'm not as happy with this one as the others, not liking my decision to just go as far as I could with the first inner pink which made that second round short, and wishing I'd had some blue, even if a different fabric, as accent around the top to balance the blue in the center.

And we got our first snow over the weekend - only a few inches that quickly melted off even the lawns, but more is due in tonight and tomorrow. Oddly enough, my deck garden doesn't seem to mind. Small excitement on the home front: a new refrigerator got delivered today. The old one was starting to make some disturbing clunks when the condenser shut down. As a renter, appliances are included so getting a new one doesn't cost me a thing. Ditto with new sets of blinds for the upstairs bedrooms. Those bedrooms facing west get the afternoon sun and the plastic clips holding the vertical blinds in place started snapping from deterioration. Now I have working blinds again and really appreciate having a great maintenance man to install them. In the meantime, I've noticed that the new refrigerator sounds slightly different when running, causing me to cock my head to figure out what that sound is. Shouldn't take long to get used to it though.

Decisions Were Made

 

On my next grocery run, I was pleased to see my store had expanded its selections of bedding plants. No hesitation now; I picked out three geraniums, more snapdragons, a couple of begonias (I've not had these before), a marigold and whatever that lovely lavender bloom is. Also picked up potting soil while at Walmart on a different day, so with the weatherman predicting weekend highs around 80, I'm prepared to set up my deck garden.

I thought by now I'd have strips cut and maybe even a few blocks sewn for the rails baby quilt to show but alas, the day set aside for that was spent dealing with a dying tv screen. It had been giving me warnings so I was not surprised when the screen suddenly went black that morning. Couldn't help but research what might be causing it and if I could fix it myself, but without buying parts and wielding a soldering iron, it wasn't going to happen. These screens are so inexpensive that replacing them is the better option. Mine was not "smart" and just like the phones, I don't really need a smart one, but of course, that's all that's available these days. I wryly scoffed at the instruction manual promising I'd be up and running in minutes. Took more than that to screw on the feet! Won't bore you with all the hoops I had to jump through to finally be able to watch my Directv and synchronize remotes, but the upside is I can now access my Paramount+ subscription through it and be able to watch those shows on a big screen relaxing on the couch rather than on my PC screen sitting in an office chair. I've always been a pretty independent woman, but I tell you, it's times like these I really miss my late husband! I would have handed it all off to him and had my studio time.

So what have I decided about the rail quilt fabric? I gave up on the lavender, everything being just too dark or not working with the pink on the table. And then I gave up on that pink as well and shifted back to a slightly different stack of pink. I definitely was feeling that I had the above problem and wondering why nothing I was seeing felt right.

I decided to assess my blues and pulled batiks. Getting closer but still . . . I'm really struggling to feel like they work with the raindrops fabric, they are so "clear" while it has that nagging off-white background.

I was actually leaving the studio when it dawned on me there was one place I hadn't looked yet, and that was in the drawers holding my many fat quarters of reproduction fabrics from the "club" subscription I had for so many years. And there, in the top drawer, I think I found the answer to my problem. Not just blue fabrics but pink ones too, and some with children's themes to fit better with the Noah's Ark backing fabric I'll be using. Way more than I probably need but plenty to choose from. Maybe I can start having some real progress on this project.

I do some of my best problem solving and decision making when turning things over in my mind while going about the regular routines of my life. Over several days, I caught myself working through options on what to do with the lavender sweater I started and probably don't have enough yarn to finish. If no more yarn is to be had, I think I could easily turn it into a sweater vest, so I decided to just keep on knitting the back and see how much yarn it actually uses. In the meantime, I did go back to the store where I'd bought the yarn, and as I suspected, no more of it there. However, the owner said she'd just put in an order for more of these mill end skeins, but she had no control over what colors they sent. They won't arrive for awhile so I will knit away while I wait for her call telling me if I am lucky or not.

Tidying up and Some Organizing

Taxes are done but I do need to gather up my copies and documents into a manila envelop for filing away, and tossing what doesn't need to be kept. There's always shredding to do as well - old bills and things no longer needing to be kept from the oldest tax file as I add the most recent one to the file box. But that can be done in bits and pieces. I got distracted when on the computer and decided it was high time to do some organizing of my photos, moving some into files and deleting others. These are the sorts of things I put off but irritate me whenever I access my two main photo files - one where I download pics off my camera or the internet and one where I temporarily put photos I've readied to upload to the blog before moving them into more permanent files. Both become a cluttered mess if I don't keep up with deleting and moving to appropriate files. Think of it the same as the piles of clutter on my worktable. However, one type of filing I do seem to keep up with is the organization of what I print out in the course of making books. I have two books made with those disks that allow you to add and remove pages, one for the monthly bookbinding instructions and one for the challenges and extra info like how to make bookcloth. Besides printing off directions and what the sample book looks like, I also like to print out any books others in the group have made with ideas I think I'd like to incorporate should I make the book again. There in the picture above is the latest challenge instructions and inspirational books duly put away.

This left me with a couple of quick finishes I've been putting off but will help with clearing off work spaces. In the course of going through the fabric stack that came off the floor when I had the rug cleaned, I ran across a few of these hot glue medallions I made back in 2019. Really liked the idea, wasn't sure how to use them. But the one I'd painted with the muted violet paint said, "How would I look on the cover of that "First Journal Challenge" book? I'd always thought it needed something, so auditioned the medallions, letting each sit for at least a day's worth of considering before settling on the violet one which picked up the same undertones as in the wrinkles across the paper. Wasn't sure about how to attach it (was NOT going to fiddle with my hot glue gun) and defaulted to PVA glue. If it doesn't hold up, I can always try something else.

And then there was the closure on the 2nd Celtic Weave Journal. I'd run the choices past members of the Handmade Book Club and of those who responded, all went for the wide flat elastic over the narrow green one. I was leaning that way too and felt it would attach well without leaving any lumps. First off was determining how far to cut the slits from the top and side. And of course, I cut the slits in the flap instead of the cover - I've been making all sorts of small mistakes like that lately. Fortunately, the unevenness of the handmade paper camouflaged the cuts which were on the inside anyway. Then I inserted the ends of the elastic (see arrows), securing them with Fabri-Tac.

Now I could cut pieces of double sided Scor-Tape to length to attach the flaps to make packets. Here the protective paper is ready to be peeled off.

And here is the flap folded over, adhered top and bottom to make the flap.

This is essentially the same type of closure as on my commercially made book I'm currently using for quotations. I like that the elastic does not go totally around the book.

And the elastic really does match the color of the leaves embedded in the paper. I may have made the elastic a bit snug, but I do know how elastic tends to give over time, and this is a book I think I will be adding to over many years.

I did spend some time yesterday on the resolution word art journal spread, trying to do some blending with paint and adding a few more strips of paper here and there. I'd like to get it finished up because I am taking another one of Laly Mille's free five day classes starting next week, more practice in collaging, and instead of using 4 individual small pieces of watercolor paper as she suggests, I think I will just work in this large art journal. It's a good deadline for something I think I have dawdled over too long. I definitely got stuck in that "awkward teenage stage" and can tell I am still struggling with not wanting to cover things up once on the page. But I think I had a bit of a breakthrough yesterday and am eager to proceed with my most recent thoughts. Will share when finished!

Bonnet & Sock

Did you all have a lovely Easter weekend? I sure hope so. We had beautiful warm weather that enticed me out for longer than usual walks and gave me an opportunity to try out, not exactly an Easter Bonnet, but a new hat for hiking. I don't usually buy hats without trying them on first, but this one looked good in the catalogue and is made from a UV protective fabric rather than straw like my other hats. Really wanted something for between stocking hats/ear warmers and straw hats. Not keen on the straight-on view but it probably looks fine to anyone else and the wide brim give good protection.

 

And for Sunday brunch, I'd succumbed to these luscious looking walnut caramel cinnamon rolls from my grocery store's bakery. They were just as good as they looked.

 

Taxes are getting there, wrapping up the Federal ones that I do with TurboTax software. They made a lot of changes in how it looks moving from screen to screen and a specific change in one part where I have to manually add information on my many investment transactions, the main reason I use tax software. These are the redemptions that provide what I live on each month, otherwise I probably wouldn't have to file at all. Anyway, I ended up on the website to discover others were questioning how to enter info as we've always entered it and that they'd been unable to file because of this obvious bug. The complaints ran through February but the issue had since apparently been fixed. Once I learned where to enter my info, I had no problems getting through to the end, which left me thinking, sometimes procrastination actually pays off! Now on to the state taxes which are simple enough not to need software help.

 

And yes, I was still procrastinating through the week, to the point I picked up the sock knitting again. I was farther along when I last put it down than I remembered so it wasn't long until I was binding off and hoping that I didn't do that too soon, that both socks were the same length. So much dawdling, so many frustrating moments, so many mistakes had left me with very mixed feelings about these socks. I do like them, generally speaking, just not how I had to make them.

 

The directions did say the starting tail thread at the toe might need to be pulled up to close holes. And yes, I have a hole to fix in the toe.

 

But there are also holes in the heel-turn to fix (down by my thumb and to the left of my finger where the stitches make a right angle turn). I don't think I ever "got" exactly what was going on there with the stitch used to increase and decrease to make the turn.

 

However, I do like the 2 x 2 ribbing, and they sure are warm and comfy. I want to make the knee high version because I think with that ribbing they would stay up well. I even stopped by one of the yarn shops in the area to see what was available in sock yarn, commiserating with the owner over my struggles, only to have her say, "And you're going to make another pair with this pattern?" Well, yes and no. I've already perused other patterns with different ways to start at the toe and turn the heel (yes, when I should have been working on taxes!), and will substitute a different method when the time comes.

Getting There

Tiny needles, thin thread, slow progress . . . this second sock is taking forever even though I am now past the heel turn and into a steady knit two purl two ribbing. I pick it up in the evenings when watching certain tv shows that don't require my eyes to be locked onto the screen but many evenings I find I'm too tired to move from the couch to the big leather chair with the good lighting to work on it. Ah well, eventually . . .  In the meantime, I keep running across sock knitters who talk of blocking their socks when done. Somehow I don't feel the need but there must be a reason. So with nothing better to do, I started searching for sock blockers that would accommodate knee highs since I plan my next pair to be a pair of those. Such a wide range of blockers are available but all short with one exception. These birch blockers with free customization were a bit pricey but since they come from Ukraine, I decided to splurge. My name and logo are burned into the birch, and the length of the foot can be adjusted for many sizes. I am pleased!

I'm about ready to dive into the baby quilt. My ironing board is functional as an ironing board again and half of the work table cleared of bookmaking projects etc. so I can get that new fabric washed and ironed and start cutting. While I'm at it, I'm planning on washing the last fabric splurge I made back before I started having physical issues keeping me from sewing - they were one more thing I'd left on the floor and never got around to tending to. One is a batik with mariner compasses on it that I thought I could pair with one of the specialty fat quarters - why I didn't want to put either away. Maybe I'll finally get them together. Three or four spotted batiks which I've always loved, reminding me of water and were on sale. A dark brown solid that I thought might bleach interestingly. A rusty orange batik that I thought could work into one of my nature-inspired art quilts. Time to get them washed and into the stash.

Speaking of art quilts, Ellen Anne Eddy recently described art in conjunction with her work with some students. Ellen was quite prominent in the quilting world when I landed in Wisconsin in the early 1990's and discovered what a hotbed of quilting the Midwest was. My late friend Judi somehow knew so many of these quilters who taught and hung out at quilt shows and Ellen was one she introduced me to as we queried her about dyeing fabric. I'm not a particular fan of her heavily thread painted nature pieces, but she knows her stuff and is a delightful person still. Here is what she said:

"I run into a lot of people who tell me they aren’t artists. Usually, that’s because they’re more verbal than visual. If you talk with them they can explain their images and the concepts in a way that brims with art.  Perhaps the problem is how do we define art?. If it has to be set in a mold, like figure drawing, or landscapes, that’s a pretty big limit on a much wider world. But if art is, vision out of chaos., order out of disaster, and the creation of beauty and sense in the retelling of ourselves., that may be where my definition hovers. Art is life. The way we live creates our own beauty, our own songs, soothes our worst fears, and helps us to see ourselves in a different mirror that focuses on our strengths and beauty, instead of our failures and misgivings. Art simply flows out of that. The things we produce our wonderful. But they are largely the byproduct of the process of restructuring who we are through our imagery. These kids already have it. I believe we all do, from birth."

You can see some of the kids' beginnings of their fabric art on Ellen's blog post here as well as read more about the project.

Holiday Greetings To My Faithful Readers

May your holidays be bright, full of love and laughter and remembrance of those who have gone before us into that good night. 

We didn't get any new snow, but that just makes my walks around the neighborhood easier - don't want any falls dislodging any of the hardware in my back! There are quite a few new renters on my street and not as many decorations as I've seen in the past but these two put a smile on my face - and they are lighted up at night!

And there have been deer browsing behind our row of townhouses and yesterday I noticed one reason why. There is quite the apple tree a few houses down from me and it is still just loaded with apples which the deer obviously love. Sorry not to get a better picture but it's this cheap cell phone of mine . . .

The one was in a staring contest with me while the other soon fled back into the bushes - look at that white tail warning!

So peace to you all! Don't forget to put your feet up and relax, go for a long walk, enjoy any visitors you might have, and maybe sneak in a little creative endeavor. Mine will be knitting on that sock - I've just turned the heel!

Merry Christmas !!!

Kicking Off the Holiday Season

We all have our holiday traditions, and for me, I don't touch anything Christmas until the first weekend in December. On that Sunday morning I break out the 3-disc set of Bach's Christmas Oratorio and I'm off! This year my niece sent me this advent calendar with specialty jams and spreads behind each day's door along with a brief message like "Be Merry!" And after brunch while the Oratorio was still playing and snow falling outside my window, I worked on my sock - so very Christmassy. The knitting seems quite slow going to me even though I am now past all the increasing and have the ribbing pattern set up, so I can just knit away without much thought. Those are size 1 needles I'm working with so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that progress is not speedier. However, I am halfway now to turning the heel.

Now that more of the sock is visible, I can see how the hand-painted yarn's variegation is working to create a subtle pattern. But I can also see now something I couldn't before, that this is not just gray yarn of different values light to dark but that there is also a purplish blue in there, also light to dark, so very pretty. No plain Jane Gray here. Working on this has not just scratched an itch, but made the itch worse! I keep finding myself picking up pattern books and going through my yarn stash to figure out what I might knit up next.

I've just learned that my goddaughter finally had her baby, a couple of weeks late but just fine. She had originally told me that she planned to have 3 kids and that was it, and she was no spring chicken when she started. So she had the 3, I dutifully and joyfully made a special quilt for each, and thought I was done. But no, she has surprised me with a fourth. I will wait until after Christmas to get started on one but to be honest, I have no clue what I will make. I am so used to having ideas just waiting for an excuse to make up but I'm drawing a blank. Time I guess to start looking through my many books and patterns saved from magazines and find some inspiration! You can see the previous 3 quilts here, here, and here. If you check these out, you can see why I feel that I can't make just any old baby quilt. But hey - it's a girl baby so I can break out some pink!

Loose Ends & Scratching An Itch

How was your Thanksgiving? Mine was quiet, just the way I like it, and I spent part of it scratching this itch to start a knitting project, specifically trying out a "toe up" sock pattern. I kept getting the nudge, remembering how I spent so much of my school vacations knitting by the fire, and the yarn with pattern has been sitting out for longer than I care to mention. I bought the yarn on sale a very long time ago, pretty much at the beginning of the sock knitting craze and I remember how hard it was to make up my mind about what color yarn to buy. Ever practical and not sure I'd like bright multicolored socks, I opted for the one called "Gray Matters", which is a wool/acrylic hand painted blend made in Turkey. In my defense, I've written before about the positive attributes of gray, and then recently ran across this praise of gray:

“Gray isn’t just for shapeshifting clouds or sophisticated business suits. There is so much more to gray than that. It’s not a cliche. It’s a marvel. Gray is the disputed territory between the light and dark. It’s a color that has one foot in the shadows and one in the sun. I don’t know when we decided that the color gray was “boring” - because it’s anything but.”- John Roedel

There you have it, complete with "foot" pun, and the hand painted variegation should produce a more interesting and beautiful sock than a solid yarn would. This particular toe up pattern has a cast on not unlike the one for the mobius scarves I've made, but by starting with only 4 stitches on each of two needles and a method of increasing I was unfamiliar with, I found the beginnings of this sock challenging and giving me fits. But as the space grows it is getting easier, although working on multiple needles in the round is not my favorite. I'm ready to set up the ribbing pattern so things should go more quickly now.

 

As for loose ends, I feel I have so many as I look at what's scattered around my studio. But I took care of some of them last week. I got all the bits of ephemera added to the gratitude journal and started writing in it. I experimented with something the teacher showed us: masking off the center of a page to preserve it for adding text, then painting the rest of the page. I used that Fresco Finish paint again, partly because it dries to a matte chalky finish which, unlike regular acrylic paint, doesn't stick pages together and is easy to write on if one chooses. This is such a great look and will keep me from getting too wordy!

 

I had a little paint left on the palette so I experimented with a fan brush, mimicking the flowers in the adjacent page. The camera didn't pick it up well, and you can't see the green that I also worked in between the pink, but I was pretty thrilled with the result. Funny how this particular journal is unleashing something in me that is unexpectedly liberating. I'm usually such a regimented and chronological person but this format has me jumping around all through the book. It's really fun to work in it.

Another loose end is adding quotations to this journal which I believe is the second book I made once I'd joined the Handmade Book Club. The journal itself has lots of issues, but it was a way to use some of the eco-dyed watercolor paper I'd made and then add lots of tree and leaves related things to the blank pages. There are paint experiments in there and a few pictures from magazines pasted in. Some actual dried leaves glued in as well. Still lots of pages to fill but I see it as an ongoing project. But I did want to get the poems and quotations added once it dawned on me how many I'd collected referencing trees and leaves. It will feel good to have that loose end tied up.

 

 

Pause and Gratitudes

Yet another week of distractions and diversions, appointments and phone calls, basically not getting too much done in the studio in spite of good intentions (more requilting though - one grid line at a time will win that race!). I did take advantage of an opportunity to participate in a 5 day November Pause offered by Michelle GD whose e-mails in general are full of "gentle thoughts and inspiration". In a world so rattled with horrid and discerning events, and the average person's life so full to the brim with activities and expectations, this would be a chance to slow down and reflect each of the five days, exploring what "pause" may mean and listing gratitudes in different ways (she's particularly into making lists). Why not, I thought. We were encouraged to go at our own pace, not feel obligated to do each day's journaling and listmaking on the day it arrived if it was just too much, not even do each part of a day's offering if it did not feel right. She so kindly said, "I want everything about November Pause to be gentle and spacious. Our hurting world doesn't need another hurried-harried, frustrated-frazzled, overworked-overwhelmed, tired, feeling-unworthy being. You, or me." I started off well, then began "having a week" and did have one day when I just couldn't face the subject we were to explore. But the next day I could, and it led to an epiphany I've been searching for. The last day we were encouraged to write our gratitudes in circles on the page and jazz them up with "lots of art". Oh, I am not good at this and didn't want to invest a lot of time in adding artsy things so just grabbed the set of fine point pens of many colors on my desk and played a bit with shapes and doodles. Overall though, I found these 5 days of exploration full of insights that made me feel better about myself and understand the value of the pauses I work into my days. A lot of guilt got off loaded.

Each day included a short reflection, several journaling prompts, that invitation to practice gratitude in different ways (which she called "a grateful heart", a short breathing practice to ground, a "what if" invitation to take a small loving action (after all, we're all in this together, or should be), and a poem. Here's the poem she shared on the last day, actually a blessing from my favorite author of blessings. As you are off however you celebrate Thanksgiving in a few days, may this blessing settle around you. And don't forget to pause if things get frantic!