Orchid still going, doors, knitting group,Textiles and Tea

 

Morning light shining across the backyard and through the orchid blossoms.

Tuesday started with an appointment with the audiologist because I was missing words here and there and wondered if my hearing was deteriorating. Turns out it's Ruth and Laura's wires. They're now replaced and everything sounds clear again.

I got lost both ways. I often overshoot the ENT  office driveway because it's set back among trees, like a lot of destinations around here. 

Today I was about to turn in the drive and realized all I could see were earthworks and digging equipment. So I drove on thinking I'd turned too soon. No. They're digging up everything in front of the building which is still there and operating with half a parking lot and no exit. 

So I  got to the appointment after all, very successful, and managed to get out again after edging back and forth with another car whose driver didn't grasp this narrow area was now two-way. We managed not to back into the ditch or tangle bumpers and I was off home. Up to a point. 

The back road I take home was closed, with a detour sign in place.  I followed this but evidently missed the end of it and had a lovely country drive around a local science lab campus. Eventually I found a fairly legal u-turn place and wound my way back to a road I recognized, then finally, to my surprise, reached home.

I'd just put lunch -- roast potatoes, baby broccoli and a patty of spicy plant-based sausage -- in the toaster oven, when Mender Mike arrived with the newly finished drawer fronts and doors.  

Before

After, looking like new, worth the money 

Certainly a lot less than buying new. 

Then I was off to Tuesday Knitting Group, a cheerful group working in everything from a  stuffed cat, to a finished item being modeled here, with a terrible picture from your wobbly photographer, knitted socks, headband, a needlepoint seat finally picked up to finish after many years on hold.

The stickwoven strap on the bag interested the librarian and I showed her this model bookmark for beginners,  

woven, using drinking straws. I've taught this skill to kids but P the librarian thinks it might be nice for her monthly senior crafters. It can be done in one session, from first learning to finishing. And I had a request to bring in my weaving sticks next week, to see how it works.

Convo ranged over hearing aids, getting lost in your own town, forgetting names, cooking for one, baby pictures, face blindness, bees, bereavement, assisted living and more.

Home to a pot of tea and Textiles and Tea with Ruth Hallows, an indigenous weaver from the Pacific North West, who introduced herself in her own language.  She works daily in the practice of the traditional style and form seen in ceremonial regalia. Further down you'll see a picture of one of her ancestors in full dance regalia.

There are only fifteen of these robes extant, all in museums in Europe and Russia, not available for the sacred dancing,  but modern indigenous artisans have reverse engineered them to recreate robes.  

Laws were passed outlawing this weaving, on pain of having families broken up. Ruth's great grandmother had to comply in order to keep her family intact. In the US these laws have been revoked. In  Canada they're still, shamefully, on the books, though not enforced. So now the artform has to be revived.

She teaches the traditional Ravenstail and Chilkat designs, of the Northwest Coastal People from whom she's descended.  But she asks that non-native learners respect the sacredness of the ceremonial robes and significance of the colors and designs and use their skills making other weaving, not copying robes.

There are very few people who currently have mastered these twining skills, executed with a loose hanging warp, all the pattern tension and definition created by the weaver's hands. She would like more people to learn and preserve these skills.

She showed a couple of works in progress and a workshop of women learning the skill.

Sponsored by WARP (Weave a Real Peace), this was a powerful episode. If you're not familiar with WARP, check their website. They're active in grass roots peace work and intersectional connection via the textile arts.

Here's her great grandfather in ceremonial regalia for dance.

Here she's showing a drum which features the ovoid shapes characteristic of this art form, seen in the textiles. Each ovoid influences the next and all belong in the whole. It's a metaphor for their philosophy of life.

Simple setup to learn a difficult twining art form

Here she's showing how a piece is started on that stick, the warp threads secured at the top and left to hang. This is a Ravenstail design depicting the return of the salmon.

This is a personal artwork depicting the concept of unmasking

And here's a big artwork in progress started last spring, to be completed early 2026.

 Happy day everyone, Tuesday here was action packed!

Stretching, dancing, stitching, chatting then T and T

What with allergies and sneezing and tiredness from the remedies, walking was a bit off Tuesday, so I did a stretching video.  This included a few qi gong moves.

And here's kitty Mochi, photobombing. Or maybe directing. Cats know stretching.

Then laundry, dishes, chop wood carry water, make penne for lunch with red sauce, tomatoes, onions, butter, tomato paste, red pepper seeds, Parmesan grated over. No pictures, you've seen pasta before. Blueberries and yogurt for dessert.

Then off to the library to return The Imitation Game, very good, especially once I'd grasped that Keeley Hawes and Keira Knightley are two different people and this one was Knightley. I have face blindness, often can't tell one actor, or friend, from another. I did think Hawes had had an injection of intensity. 

Tuesday's knitting group was crocheters, knitters and me, stitching linen squares with vague notions of fusion quilting. I'm thinking of parallel rows of linen and woven squares.  

Notice my kantha stitched purse, gift of an Indian friend

Moms and daughters learning together. The member who teaches on request was away, so the rest of us helped as possible.  

But we had to explain yet again to yet more people that this an adult meeting,  not a class where children can learn. Every week a couple of parents try to drop off kids and leave. 

Our lovely leader, with her box of instructions and supplies. I asked her to consider a class for kids so we can refer parents. She's going to do it.

Here's my linen square collection; it's lovely,  stitching linen.

Talk ranged over James Talarico, nonbinary people, in-laws, weddings, Diaper Diplomacy,  learning violin, tai chi, the shakuhachi effect, knitting, native trees and shrubs, invasives, bees, kantha quilting and more.

And, as usual in this group, I got more ideas. I'm now thinking of tracing one of my line drawings onto some fine fabric and stitching it.  Maybe goldwork. Just what I needed, another idea. I've done this before in blackwork.   I think I'll revisit continental knitting too, to save my hands, while I'm having more ideas.

Then home to Textiles and Tea with 

Artist, weaver, activist, community organizer of women's voices and history, a powerhouse of a woman, who has woven great works, organized mass exhibits of women's woven stories, written a book on spiritual growth, and works now in silk, dyeing, weaving and stitching.

The blue work on the right is stick weaving. I've taught this, and shown you some of my work in an earlier post. She used drinking straws as a handheld  loom, and wove over and under them, gradually advancing the strip to create a weft faced fabric. This work used dozens of strips to create a waterfall effect.

Here's a collaborative work on its way to be exhibited. It's enormous, the work of hundreds of participants weaving strips about their lives and stories.

She's an amazing woman, check her website for more.

Before setting up the second Brideshead disc, I compensated for not being up to an evening walk by dancing to Dancing Queen, on e's blog. Thank you, e, that was a cheerful workout. I always want to dance to it. Not a wonderful dancer, more in the Elaine category, but who's watching. 

Happy day everyone, dance it however you can, even with your fingers dancing on the table. It counts.

Tuesday, Tuesday

Tuesday was hot, high 80s, but manageable, and I made it to the knitting group. At the library I picked up  

For Tuesday evening viewing pleasure. I've seen it before, but after a few clips on YouTube I felt like watching again.

Then the Tuesday knitting group, moved to a different room.

What a fun group -- three new members, friends, came in together to learn crochet. Or maybe review it, because they were up and running in no time, with the help of our teaching member. 

Meanwhile others of us continued on projects and I demo'd the 18th century adjustable skirt I wore, that goes with the Lucy Locket pocket, which I also brought along. These both went over to quite a bit of interest.

And we shared cast-ons. My thumb cast-on was new to some members. 

We also talked about the many anti Catholic laws in the UK. This led to my describing the massive annual Corpus Christi procession in my hometown, when laws were suspended for one day per year, the Feast of Corpus Christi, to permit Monsignor to appear in the street in his priest vestments and to carry the consecrated host through the streets.  Neither legally permitted since the Reformation.

Thousands of Catholics walked, kids in white. June in North Yorkshire could be bitterly cold and windy, but you wore your little white dress anyway.  Adults often wore warm coats. 

All the town bands loyally learned the Catholic  hymns, including the Salvation army, whose big bass drum kept the marching time, heard miles away. Bands from local industry joined in. Big deal. It really was a big deal, groups usually hostile to Catholics suspending it for a day and bringing music. 

We also, the knitters, not the bands, addressed travel, crochet with aged parents, eye care, financial planning, loud music at outdoor pools, and more. Lovely afternoon with friends.

We met this time in the science section of the kids department on the third floor.

New members plunging in

The green box contains yarns, needed supplies and simple instructions for beginners, the idea of the librarian who hosts the group.

Then home to a pot of tea and Textiles and Tea with Anastasia Azure, a weaver of fishing line and wire. Her works range from small jewelry to huge wall pieces.  

There's a video at her website showing the process. Not a live link, a screenshot of the link, for you to cut and paste.

Here she is with a large piece, and holding a small one

She dyes fishing line, which I didn't know you could, and uses a fearless array of line, wire and other fibers on a floor loom. Amazingly.

Happy day everyone, as Ana would say, if you have an idea, what if you try it? Then you'll find out! Words to live by.

Sez Ted and Big Ursy