Civic duties done, germination under way

The mail yesterday brought my voting receipt with peel off sticker

And the Xerces Society stickers 

I'm doing my best for the pollinators.

And here's what's happening on the patio

Most of the pots now have seedlings, the zinnias the biggest, the wildflowers microscopic. The peppermint has kept the squirrels away and the seeds are undisturbed. 

The bottom picture is for you, Chris -- I poked about and found the morning glories have self seeded from last year. I'd just let the seeds fall as they wanted and here they come. This is the first time ever they've done that. Always they've grown one year, rarely even blossomed, so no seeds to fall. This year your flowers are doing as you promised. Yay.

Then after this early morning wander about the deck, I made coffee and finished the weaving on the repaired loom. 

It's now a rug under my water glass on the coffee table, with room for the pill I take three times a day.

This was mainly a proof of concept piece, to be sure the loom was in working order. Now I'm going to create a narrow band weaving on the other loom, with the same krokbragd motifs, which will work better smaller and tighter. At least that's the plan. 

And here's the band design coming up after that, courtesy of poet Padraig O'Tuama who took the picture. 

This is looking like a tapestry to come.

He's a brilliant poet and nice man, very thoughtful and maybe what I make might end up with him. We'll see.

Here's some of his recent thinking 

This reminds me of the narrator in William Cooper's novel Scenes from Married Life, musing on how people tend to get attached to their problems. They're reluctant to solve them, even when there are available solutions, wondering how their lives would go on without them as the mainspring.

I've often thought about that since I read Cooper decades ago, so astute and so ruthless. 

Happy day everyone, beautiful day today, out walking and terrifying local teens busy hanging out and being cool, by greeting them! Shock, horror, mumble mumble.. I have to say something back, mrmrm. Tiny smile. They'll learn I come in peace.

Make all the things, grow all the things, greet all the passersby..

Loom Victory Lap and other activity

One seasonal thing I do is this:

The kitchen faces west, so the afternoon summer sun pours in, through the passthrough as you see, and glares in my eyes.

On the right you see the hallway with the same issue, the sun glaring on the flooring is blinding, so I have the door curtain in place. 

For the passthrough I put up this linen panel I dyed and painted and stamped years ago 

But I thought the hem could do with some help, and I'm making a braid with the lucet. This one was too thin and I started over with a sturdier yarn 

I'll stitch it across the hem, for a better finish and a nicer hang.  This makes the afternoon light softer and much easier to deal with.

I got into this while I was waiting for the loom repair to dry and cure. Which it did, and it's working.

You see it warped up, and I started learning a new to me weave pattern, a diamond twill. But I found I didn't have a chunky enough yarn for the pattern. It doesn't work unless it's chunky. 

So I started over and figured out the number of warp ends per inch, did a bit of back of an envelope work on the numbers and adapted another pattern, krokbragd or words to that effect, and put my narrowband experience to work. 

This is a kind of repeat floral pattern.

I'd set up the loom at 27 warp ends for the diamond thing, only needed 17 for the krokthing, so I assigned five each side as borders and I'm working the main design on the middle 17 warp ends. 

This flower like design is one I'd had in mind when I was originally thinking about narrowband weaving but didn't find anywhere. Now I realize I was in a different tradition. This is Norwegian, I think but not in the pattern band book, different weaving form.

So I may warp up the other, narrow band loom, at the same time and figure out this design to fit, to make a band. The design works like the Sweet William idea I've been fiddling about with. It's all good! 

I'm learning such a lot in the course of these attempts.  Also using up yarn that needs using.

About the ill fated Cowl That Broke the Loom, I decided to cut both my losses and my fringes, knotted them, washed and dried it and it came out pretty well.

It's short, and works like a shawl, in fact I'm wearing it now.  I might add a button and loop, we'll see. But it's staying here, not useful for the knitting ministry. 

So that's the Learning Workshop for the day.

I did stop to roast chicken dice and potatoes for lunch, then assembled a Three Bean Extravaganza for quite a few meals.

All the usual beans, with potatoes, celery, chives, red onions, in red wine vinegar with the usual salt and sugar and pepper. 

This will go well with roast chicken dice. Or most things.

A pretty accomplished day. I did spend part of the afternoon sleeping. 

Happy day everyone, do all the things and see what happens.

Lagom, loom repairs and flowers

The Lagom book turns out to be nice gentle deck reading.

About balance, finding it, and an honest appraisal of the downside of balance. She acknowledges that in some societies, the stress on community and fitting in leads to hostility to excellence. 

The best student is knocked down, the high achiever doesn't fit in. Not a team player is a serious judgment, particularly in the corporate world. 

This is a big point, and the reason some people leave their native country in search of opportunities. Where the average is prized, the unusual eventually becomes marginalized. 

Emigrants by definition are the unusual, with drive enough to look for a life that works better for them and their children, then take the initiative and make that big scary step. 

You'll notice that they tend to go for their own enterprises, small businesses, scientific research and the nonprofit, rather than the corporate business world.  They tend to go for places that are more likely to reward, not penalize, excellence and initiative.

Anyway the book is thoughtful and I just added in here my own thinking about the downside of balance.

There's an upside, including Swedish food, and she includes recipes! There's one for cardamom buns I must try sometime.

Early this morning I spent a few balanced minutes with my plants.

The cotton plants are getting used to being outdoors and I'm hopeful. They're in a spot that gets the most sunlight on the patio.

Roses planted by birds, they're all over the development, no human intervention.

I need to cut chives soon. They're good with eggs. And in wraps.

Meanwhile in the loom repair shop, things look hopeful up to now

The technician tells me later today we can do a test run.

Since I was ordering the glue I added in a few other things I've been needing and here's the jolt of color that showed up 

This time I got the right size gloves. Last time they were big and a bit clumsy for doing dishes. There will be fewer drops and splashes with these. And the microfiber cloths will mop up any that happen despite the user. 

Happy day everyone! Remember most things can be fixed with aspirin, pachysandra or super glue. Or new dishwashing gloves.

Turtles ahoy, Misfits and map woes

Yesterday though I was tired I still made it to the pond and was rewarded with frogs leaping everywhere and turtles swimming happily then sun bathing on a branch. The water looks a bit weird, I'm wondering if there's runoff from the golf course spraying. But the wildlife seems fine.

Today I tried out another Yeung Man Cooking recipe, for brown lentil wraps. I remembered to put the lentils in to soak overnight, then blended them in my ancient blender with the tinfoil hat, the lid having fallen down and shattered.

I made a stack, cooling then stacking them for future use. The first couple went out for the squirrels before I got the hang of waiting longer before turning them. After that it went well. I flavored them with pink salt, onion salt, crushed garlic and turmeric, with a spoonful of ground flaxseed.

Then I saved one to go with the tomato cannellini stew for lunch. Remember the three bean salad recently? I liked the dressing enough to freeze it. 

Then it became a dipping sauce for the tofu dice I made a day or two ago, and the leftovers with additional ketchup I added into today's stew. At this point I think I've had all the mileage I'm getting out of this sauce. 

Then Misfits let me know my box was on its way, see map. And shock, horror, they've changed the software. There used to be a friendly local map with readable fonts and nice graphics plus the name of the driver and a messaging option to him.  

Now there's a huge impersonal display showing half of Pennsylvania (neighboring State for them as needs footnotes) and showing me where I live, where the driver was hours ago, who cares, no name, no way to contact him.

This is not trivial -- I've messaged drivers with directions when most of the entrances to the development were suddenly closed, weather, and you had to live here to find the one open street. GPS would never do it. I've also done greetings and thanks which they really appreciate. 

Anyway I wrote to Misfits to protest and ask to reconsider. Maybe the new one is cheaper, but I counted on the personal touches and they're gone. If they make more changes I'll reconsider my options. 

Anyway they did arrive, I think the driver was Jeff, and mostly the order was fine, except the wrong eggs. 

I order a certain kind because it comes in the paper mache boxes, and they sent me the more expensive in arghghgh plastic.

I'm getting a refund, and I may put the plastic egg box in the recycle materials they pick up, and let them figure it out. I very honestly told them that I did get eggs, but the wrong ones, and they still processed a refund, so I'm good.

Celery because it's ages since I had any, diced chicken to roast with diced potatoes, three beans for three bean salad again, it was good. 

I just made a big donation to the food pantry, so no other cans this week.  The wrong eggs and shredded mozzarella plus block cheddar for quiches again, with dandelion greens from the freezer. Envy apples, Bananaz, to go with yogurt. Bread for the freezer, but meanwhile I have virtuous home made wraps.

One wrap accompanied the tomato cannellini bean stew

Nothing fancy, just rolled plain like bread. That stew is so easy and very good when you can't be bothered to cook. 

Then I flattened the box and delivered it, with the ice blocks, to Gary, who continues to move.

Later today I plan on repairing the loom. Then we'll see. I'm really in withdrawal from weaving, so I have to start something, just deciding what. The frame loom won't be ready for at least a day or two so maybe I'll work on a band, that Sweet William idea. The band loom is working. Aren't we all.

Happy day everyone, use all the things, make a fuss when companies make a baaad move

Sez La Flufferina

Food, books, votes and glue

Today I got a ride to donate a bunch of food to the food pantry, getting all the food to some of the people. Getting rides has aroused interest in my drivers, one of whom is now a donor, and today's was asking what they accept. Now she knows where to take donations, too. This is all good. People are generous once they know how. 

And I picked up two reserved books at the library, which Blogger won't insert in here, keeps putting after the end of the post. 

Anyway, one's Live Lagom by Anna brones which I  think works very well as a regular book, because it's a nice size and shape, with soft illustrations and a good feeling. 

The other's Antonia Fraser's Must you go? an account of her marriage to Harold Pinter, which should be interesting, two big egos.

I remembered to check the status of my primary ballot, our primary is in early June. Ballot tracking was one of the things I helped bring about (played a tiny part).  This is important particularly in view of the USPS today.

There we go. It's been received. So far so good. I had to change my password to get in, no doubt a security feature.

And I Got The Seeds In, complete with squirrel-deterring peppermint oil soaked qtips. I have another packet to plant and I think I'll wait to see if any container doesn't do well, to add in seeds. I put out the cotton plants, too, in great hopes.

The back forty is now ready for the season.

In other news, I will get some gorilla glue today and set about the BrokeLoom.  

I'm also figuring out if I can finish the cowl backstrap style, though I don't have a big enough rigid heddle in the right dent. 

Meaning I have one with the right spacing -- like knitting needle size -- but it's not wide enough for this item, not enough openings. Still considering this.  It will be much harder to maintain good width and selvedges without a heddle. That's the part that keeps the threads evenly spaced.

When something goes wrong like this broken part, it really triggers a lot of possible solutions. It's all good. My inner Rube Goldberg is on it.

Happy day everyone! It's not a problem, it's an AFGO.