Winter is icumen in

 

This was a layered up walking day, but I still only went about 15 minutes. It takes energy to walk in the cold, but I needed to get out there even for a while.

So Monday the cleaners come and I have a ride service set up, to the library, where there's a new exhibit. 

I can walk from there to the PO.  So I plan to finish the second glove and I hope a lanyard, but at least gloves and socks, will be ready to mail out.  Then I'll set up a ride home one way or another.

I'm figuring out the strategy of getting errands accomplished using a mix of ride services and friends' help. You can organize more than one stop with ride service, as long as they're brief. Like dropping off items at the food pantry. This will work. I want to ask only infrequently for friends' help so as not to wear out my welcome. Everyone's very generous now, but that could wear a bit if it's overused.  

 There's a Marlow audiobook newly uploaded to YouTube to accompany my weaving and knitting, great timing, Murder on the Marlow Belle.  

It's a boat, small occupancy, so it provides a limited number of suspects and location, in true classic crime fiction tradition. Amazing how many shady characters you can find in a small region. They never run out.

Happy day everyone, shady or not. I suspect everyone. I suspect no one. 

 

Glove One done, Ikigai

 I found an audiobook to knit by

which accompanied me through Glove One and untangling the remaining yarn ready for Glove Two. After I'd done that I fell asleep for a while, the usual result of being unoccupied with a task while an audiobook plays.  The narrator is so calm and restful it's like having a cat reading to you.

Then later, the first glove is finished

Thank you for the kind comments about the little gallery of a few of my fiber art pieces. Here's a bit more about some of them. And since the light's better, maybe a couple of better views. And an explainer about the sawblade loom.

I thought Ceres deserved a better shot. I was too tired to climb up and get her off the wall then, but now I've managed it and here you can see her better.

 

Technically, this is one of the better fiberworks I've made. Ceres, aka Demeter, goddess of corn and other grains. 

I started at the top, adapting a complex Victorian knitted stitch pattern called Wheatsheaf. 

This is knitted, two-dimensional, then I moved into crochet for the full belly, and you see that it becomes three dimensional as the roots develop. This was a single skein of yarn.  It's about grain and fertility, as you see.

And the rigid heddle piece is the only one I did before giving the loom to an eager beginner. There are tons of experiments in this piece. Then I concluded this loom was too restrictive for what I needed to do, and passed it on.

Charleston, one of the red pieces, I wove on a cardboard loom I made, partly because I don't like red. But it's not what the artist wants, it's what the art wants. 

So I tried to make it frivolous and silly, with ribbon and interesting patterns, leaving the top of the warp bunched like shoulder straps on a dress good for dancing the Charleston. 

The dress needed red. The weft threads are mostly fuzzy, not out of focus -- some are hand spun, some are unspun roving.

And here's the saw blades, donated by contractor friend Michael, which I used for the circular parts of some works. They're too blunt for his woodworking, but you still have to handle the points with care.

I used some hand spun to show you how I threaded the warp. Back and forward over the teeth, progressing round the circle. Then you start weaving from the center.

Here's the back, showing how you just catch the teeth. Once it's woven you slip one or two threads off the teeth, a bit tricky,  and the rest come off more easily, giving you a circular weaving and an empty loom for the next project.

Anything can be a loom. 

Rainy here today, but I did a bit of indoor exercise, and made broth from the remains of the game hen, ready for soup. 

Then I made a pot of soup, game hen broth, diced tomatoes, chickpeas, fusilli, enough for six meals starting with Sunday supper.

Happy day everyone, the best loom of all is the enchanted one, our brain, where the magic shuttles work.

Sock one done, sock two coming up, Planet Hippolyta

Here's the sock done, not for me, bigger size for the Sock 'n Glove Ministry*, second one to follow 

Still to be steam pressed, but all the ends are woven in. 

*New readers may not know about this. During lockdown I lost all my contacts with life. My activities shut down, couldn't visit friends, even the house cleaners couldn't come, and living alone without even pets, was tricky. 

I joined various online activities including a centering silent prayer group, meditation, coming from the convent where I learned goldwork embroidery. 

Through the convent newsletter I learned of the sisters' knitting and crochet ministry, part of an outreach by their county sheriff's department to homeless people. 

It's a county funded project, where a van with paramedics, nurses, medications and supplies, goes out to care for street people. They also distribute handmade warm items.

I found that none of the sisters could knit socks so I asked if they would let me be an at-large member taking on the sock needs. Well, yes. Later I tried them also with fingerless gloves and they too were added in to my work.  

That was five years and many socks and gloves ago. It's the only thing I knit and the people's needs make it a priority. I've been given lovely sock yarn, since buying is beyond my budget, machine washable always. Wool or cotton, I work with it all. 

So this has become an important part of my life and Sister Monica, my nunly contact, is lovely.  For ages this was how I felt included in life and it really got me through that fearsome time, especially before the vaccine was developed. 

Back to the everyday. I've been thinking about finding paper for a hat pattern,  since I don't take a newspaper and Gary is away so I can't get a nyt from him. Cutting up for patterns is a good use for it, but, moving along,  this political paper arrived in the mail.

No idea what this is, aside from being Democratic, Cittarelli being the T-endorsed candidate for Governor this year, but it's nice quality paper, right for patterns.

I did a few of those small jobs you can get to because house cleaners have done the heavy lifting. Like cleaning the patio door tracks, which had debris in them from summer use and the door was getting hard to move. 

Cleaning faucets. Getting between fridge and wall to sweep. Dusting underneath chairs to thwart spiders, poor ladies. 

I also repotted the philodendron, and pinned the vines down in a couple of places to get roots going. I really like a curtain of foliage rather than fabric. 

I walked a bit Monday, but my plans then to sit and read the Cazalets on the deck were quickly changed when swarms of mosquitoes arrived and bit me a lot.  So tea on the deck became tea indoors. I can't complain after an almost bug free summer, never had so many undisturbed afternoons before.

I made a great discovery in the Living Human book, too. I've been meaning to remind Handsome Son to let the funeral people know about my titanium hip.  I remember they needed to know Handsome Partner had a pacemaker -- they explode -- and I assumed they'd need to do something with Hippolyta.

Turns out they remove and recycle the metal, which is valuable, and is used in various equipment, including -- satellites! Just think, after my body is no more, you might see a satellite whizzing above you in the night sky and it might be Hippolyta!  Be sure and wave. Boud, overdoing it as usual.

Tuesday is Heat pump installation day. Everything crossed it goes smoothly.

The general $$ pain was slightly relieved when my ANCHOR check, homeowners' rebate program, arrived. Well, most of it went right back out to pay my auto insurance, but it all helps. 

And I think the heat pump people can do their job better than this "search" tool

I did find out, but not here.

In praise of Fall

Happy day everyone, you, too, can go to outer space! A bit late to take pictures, but you can't have everything.

Singing for freedom, and walking for spring

 Here's where blogista Anne will be next weekend, taking part in a singing rally

Let's join her in spirit, even in person, if you can.

And today, here in NJ,  warm sunshine, the daffodils bursting out, insects busy everywhere, emerging from underground, the Korean spice bush budding up, some cosmos maybe, self seeded from last year, first forsythia down the street. Lovely day.

And more women's art, from the Fils et Aiguilles blog

And, speaking of hand made items, this morning I sent off a pair of socks and two pairs of gloves to the knitting ministry, with a note taking a little leave of absence, but promising to return.

Happy day, everyone,  so many reasons to keep going and stay joyful. Now I'm off to sit on the deck, to read and to watch and listen to birds.

Freecycle again, learning to dress, Knitting Ministry, and reading

 For people who missed my last explainer about free cycle

To start, you do a search on Freecycle.org to find your town to sign up. Choose a screen name, password, and you're in action. You can browse on the offers and want requests, and get the hang of how your own community does this. It's good to check what's been taken, too, for an idea of what's likely to go. Sometimes you can be surprised, too.

In other news, as part of my pre Helen-replacement prep, I started this morning learning to dress myself using the grabber. Because I don't want to ask handsome son for very personal assistance, this is a good thing to learn now. I will need his help with compression stockings, but that's not too personal.

And I'm currently listening to yet another Andy carpenter mystery while finally getting to the second glove, yarn courtesy of C. thank you.

His titles are great. The reader, Grover Gardner, does a nice job of sounding exactly the way I think Andy should, complete with timing on his jokes. 

And when I have to switch from knitting, I've started this on Kindle

I've liked other novels she's written, in the early quarter of the nineteen hundreds, around World War One and the aftermath. The characters, not visualizing there could ever be another world war, usually refer to it as the Great War.

She has quirky, daring women characters and is definitely worth a look.

Happy day everyone, try a new skill, or not, if you can't bear to learn one more thing.