Catchup all over

I got a ride this afternoon, to the food pantry to drop off canned goods before their next distribution, then to the library to return DVDs and donate a book, then upstairs for a brief reunion with my knitting buds.

The last bit was great, and I got useful ideas for my basket. Beads? A lid? A handle?  All noted.  And gave a rapid tutorial to a new member, on how to make cordage. Lucets came up, too, the spinner of the group having tried it but not with a lot of success. 

I also got renewed offers of rides, which will be great because the knitters are there as long as we need to meet. Today's visit was limited by my needing to let my ride get on with her afternoon. But it will be too cool to get back.

And interesting food has happened. Oatmeal wraps for lunches. These are fun to make, like clay time in preschool.

Breakfast 

The inner life of wraps, yogurt, spinach, walnuts.

All rolled up and a bit artisanal. One cup of oatmeal, one of water, pinch of salt, makes half  a dozen wraps.  I'm definitely doing this again, with various flours, same recipe.

The flatbread is flexible and wraps fine, so I have many ideas now about fillings.

The thing is that it's not as quick as the YouTube cooks would have you believe. This one is "five minutes". 

I wonder which five. The dough prep five, the cutting and rolling out five,  the time each takes to cook five, the filling and rolling up five?  They're nice and I have several lunches now, but why fib about how long? If people like to cook, they don't mind knowing the actual time needed.

Tuesday's garden, despite massive overnight rain and thunderstorms, serious flooding north of here, major highways closed,  was perfectly happy. The lavender had fallen over, but other plants were unworried, even budding out.

First morning glory bud in this garden's history, seed hand-collected in Idaho by Chris, thank you. A breakthrough.

Any minute now the hibiscus will open with a flourish of trumpets.

 

First zinnia flower, yay. Not many flowers get the loud greetings that mine do. And happy dances.

Gary was having phone issues before he left, new phone, unable to get contents and contacts from old dead phone, packed with pictures and videos, serious user. Then Monday night he called to check in then Tuesday texted this 

That's Billie in front. So clearly Gary's back in phone business. I texted back catalpa, before looking it up, such a smart approach, ready, fire, aim.

Textiles and Tea Tuesday featured Nicole Yi Messier, who with her collaborator Victoria Manganiello, is an artistic powerhouse, working at the intersection of fiber arts, fiber optics and sound.   She teaches at NYU and Parsons, and is the tech brain  in the weaving/tech partnership in which Victoria is the weaving driver. Their work has been exhibited in many venues, more to come.

Her works use LED fiberoptics, which respond to the movement of the people viewing them. One large installation is called Signal to Noise. Here the concept of seeing noise as interrupting the signal is changed into seeing the noise as a signal in itself. Like the shakuhachi concept, where everything is life, not an interruption of life. 

This is the Signal to Noise piece

The striped object is radio broadcasting ability, wrapped around the arm on the left, permitting transmission!

She's a great teacher, patiently explaining the concepts and intentions of the art, and you might want to go to her  website to learn more.

Every year her organization runs a fiberoptic/fiber arts tech camp for weavers and other artists. Next year it will be in Michigan in September. Worth checking!

Happy day everyone, Tuesday is usually great around here and this one came through.

Textiles and Tea, knitting group

Yesterday's textiles and tea featured Elizabeth Buckley, a tapestry artist, in the tradition of Archie Brennan, wonderful art in a variety of threads. Her warps are cotton, her wefts wool, silk, linen, perle cotton, according to need for color and texture.  She mixes threads on the bobbins, like mixing colors.

You'll see her drawing above is reversed from the cartoon -- that's the design attached to the warp as she works--because she works from the back of the loom. This preserves the surface of the work from friction as the weaving progresses and keeps the bobbins in sight and organized in front of the artist. 

Working from the back is an ancient tradition of tapestry. All the famous Unicorn tapestries were worked that way. She also works with the design turned sideways, because that is great technically to achieve curved shapes. A lot of tapestry workers do this. Working vertically, but across the actual design.

She rarely accepts commissions, because she says she'd rather do the weaving that needs to be done, than work the idea of a client. An artist after my own heart. I used to say I didn't get into the life of art in order to take instructions from people who thought art was a commodity.

Anyway, this writer's dogma aside, this was a wonderful episode, which you will be able to catch on YouTube once HGA have uploaded it. You can catch older episodes there, too. 

She's a great teacher, in all the techniques of tapestry and design, including workshops on drawing tapestry designs, and executing tapestry works.

Yesterday's other highlight, the Tuesday knitting group, had two new members and one returning original one.

This is double knitting, two layers knitted simultaneously, the pattern reversed front and back, as you see. I tried double knitting a while ago and I thought I'd sprained my brain.

And here's our beginner, now moving right along, not such a beginner now. Her baby H.,  now five months old will soon have a blanket.

Here's a shawl in progress, like the one you see her wearing

And here's my latest glove cast on, because I didn't think I could do Tunisian crochet lace and chat. The shawl knitter is interested in Tunisian crochet so I lent her my spare hook,  gave her that sampler of stitches, and referred her to YouTube to get going. 

I'm hoping to see next week how she's doing.

And last evening I was in an online pod for caregivers, largely to support current caregivers and offer ideas I'd learned, which were useful to some of the group. Everyone in the group of about 20 has heavy responsibility with, in some cases, caregiving for more than one person, so I'll do more listening than talking, but if there's anything useful, I'll add it.  This is on Spoutible, a great online platform with a huge range of people and sharing across any subject anyone brings up.

Today it's tai chi online, courtesy of AARP. I'll let you know how it goes. 

Happy day, everyone, life's a banquet!

This day two years ago, and a red wheelbarrow

 Two years ago today,  this was the scene

Today, milder, damp, fine for getting out, Tuesday knitting group, visit from Handsome Son, return of Northern Exposure to the library where there are holds, to my surprise.

And here is a poem that isn't in my Book of Pomes but should be, because it's one of the most profound there is.

I won't lay my interpretation on you, but would rather listen to what you might fancy saying about it. 

Happy day, your words, and numbers, are valued here! Looking forward to Handsome Son's words when he visits to eat chocolate cake this afternoon, and before that the convo with my Tuesday knitting group.

New friends, new recipe

Yesterday's knitting group was fun. The library hadn't set up a leader, just a room, table of reference books and a visit or two to see how it was going.  

Four people, none of whom had met before, one a complete beginner, who learned to make her first knitted row, which I promptly commemorated with a picture. 

Third participant was self taught and well into a lace baby blanket. The fourth participant used to knit, crochet, embroider, and had forgotten how, so long. But in no time she got back her knitting mojo and was very happy.

For the total beginner, I cast on some stitches for her, another person guided her through knitting a few rows.  Then she unraveled, learned to cast on, and undertook to knit a square to show us next week! 

So I learned a new to me cast-on, and with any luck, we'll continue. The library had only set up for the month of January, so I expect they're looking to see if it gets established enough to continue. If they're not assigning staff time, it's easier for their schedule, though the other participants did ask for a group leader to teach new members. We did okay without one for that session. We'll see.

Then home to a New Year visit from Handsome Son, bringing shortbread, to complete the New Year rituals. With a pot of tea, and the walnut/cheese square things I'd baked, we were all set. We always talk about many things, politics, the economy, his current electronic DIY project, the latest shenanigans of our various neighbors, food, it's all good. 

After he'd left, I wondered what to have for dinner, remembered the shrimp in the freezer, and ended up with shrimp, penne, cauliflower all baked in a cheese sauce. Plenty of black pepper.

Paprika on top, beautiful color

It turned out very rich, and worked quite well. I wonder if it's one of those recipes I think I invented, but which turns out to be some classic pasta vol au vent crevettes fromage turducken or something. Anyway if it has a name, please let us know.

Meanwhile, today I'm returning to the skirt with possibly woven panel inserts, though the woven sections may end up being something different, we'll see.  I'll unearth the skirt fabric and see. You know how some people like to choose a word or phrase of the year as a kind of mantra? I think either "we'll see" or NADM  will be mine.

And here's someone who knows how to enjoy her knitting adventures. Get that cable panel! The fringes! This is one of those "knit stripes to record a year of weather temperatures" projects. 

Happy  day, everyone, safe travels to the people traveling.

Better days ahead for people suffering in war zones