Weaving Spanish and Misfits

 Here's a heading I translated for myself!

It means clasped weft on a rigid heddle loom. So I expect that's perfectly clear to English speakers.  Yes?  My weaving Spanish is  moving faster than my weaving.

Misfits annoyed me again today. The new useless delivery map stated firmly that delivery was due 8:45 --9:15 am.  A minute later I checked and it's now due 12:45 --1:15 pm.  It also shows the driver heading for Philadelphia. That's the wrong direction if he plans to arrive here today. Breaking news: it arrived at 3 pm. I was sleeping, missed the Arrival of the Pink Van.

And my phone now can't access my bank app to deposit checks. They've "improved" the bank app, and the new version is no longer amicable or complicit or whatever that word is. Compatible. That's what it isn't.  And there's no app for my tablets. I think I can still pay bills through my browser, though.

Another user in the help function said they uploaded the new app and it doesn't offer check deposit anyway.   So there's one check I receive monthly I need to figure out. It may mean arranging a ride to the ATM.   Which involves remembering the PIN.  But I don't want to replace the phone for one small function.

And my dermatologist is retiring in September, despite having an appointment with me in October. There are no other dermas in the group, so my primary doctor gave me a couple of referrals to outside practitioners, lots of luck getting in there though. Fortunately I don't have any pressing issues I know of.

Other than that, Mrs Lincoln..

But this morning's walk, wearing the shady international spy hat I made, was lovely, greeting neighbors, hearing the frogs shout and jump into the water as I got near.

And the roses, probably planted by birds, we have a lot 

Then home to rest and read Wings, the magazine of the Xerces Society 

They're great people. We need to protect the insects because everything depends on keeping the web of life intact. Otherwise there's no point in fighting for our society.

And today's tussle with the weaving yielded results 

I'm finally getting the hang of this design. Now, when I make a mistake, I catch it and even know what's wrong. This is an advance on my previous mystification, and I'll take it.

Anyway, Misfits

I was sleeping on the job, well,  on the deck, officially reading, when the box arrived.

So here we are 

 

Sugar because I seem to be low, mixed grated cheese, with dandelion quiches in mind, block cheddar for tuna melt, pumpkin puree for probably desserts beaten with yogurt, q.v., 

Envy apples, bigger this week, peaches for fresh or sauce, depending on how sweet they are, teeny toy sweet peppers for maybe that tomato egg dish name escapes me but I never have peppers for it and now I do, Bananaz, strawberries for shakes and with yogurt.

Missing in action: cans for the food pantry, cilantro for me, poor us. Not available but them's the breaks in this opportunistic business model. I'm not complaining,  I get wonderful food at good prices. And I play fair with the food pantry.

Happy day everyone, there's good things all over. 

This message endorsed by Big Ursy and Pony and Ted and  Pony and Ursula and Pony, guess who wrote this bit

Health, check, sun, check, krokbragd check

This is brief tonight, because the day got all filled up. Annual physical at which my doctor pronounced me very well, continue whatever I'm doing. 

Handsome Son drove me, picked up sandwiches for lunch, then we came home and lunched on the deck then when it got a bit hot, came indoors. And drank hot tea (!)

After he left I slept, then I was in online meetings. 

While he was here he helped me put up the summer linen panel sunshade in the passthrough. This is where that lucet braid will be stitched, on the hem. 

I thought you'd like to see what the afternoon sun is like, western exposure, and why I have the panel and the door curtain.

There's a reduced glare also reduced heat build up.

And I did more krokbragd yesterday, tomorrow I'll continue.

I'm getting the hang of it. This looks so simple but it's very clever. Each pick (row) sinks into the previous row to create the design. But it also makes it difficult to read as you go, unlike most weaving. 

After I finish this piece I'll get on to that hall floor design. First I have to figure out what kind of weaving it needs. 

Happy day everyone, from fit Boud, now battling our Governor and State Police on account of the appalling scenes at Delaney Hall ICE prison.

There's a hunger strike inside because of filthy conditions, by hundreds of people who have not been convicted of any crime and are being denied attorney access.

Large crowds have been demonstrating peacefully while ICE has been pepper spraying and teargassing. 

Then Gov Sherrill sent in the state police who, instead of protecting protesters from ICE, turned on them with pepper spray, rubber bullets and charging horses. Our senator Kim was pepper sprayed. 

He and another Congress member got inside, reported first hand on the conditions, spoke to many detainees. 

I tried repeatedly to contact the governor's office and the state police, and none of the online contact access points worked.

So I took a tip from a seasoned activist and contacted Gov Sherrill's endorsers for her position. The main higher education teacher's union and the NJ AFL-CIO.  I presented my family credentials -- three generations of union members -- and demanded they rescind their endorsement and notify their members why.

Then, gosh, amazing, late today I got four count them, acknowledgements from the Governor's office.  So now we know, if the principal ignores you, chop at their support.

A good day's work, I'd say. Someone thanked me for doing it. I explained that there's nothing a tiny Yorkshirewoman likes better than a good fight to get into.

Happy day everyone! Fight the good fight, it's good for your health.

Especially in Pride Month 

 

Tuesday, knitting group, Textiles and Tea

But first, my horoscope explains my downfall

Guilty, guilty, guilty!

I can't claim to be concerned, though.

Yesterday I trimmed a low hanging bit off the Japanese maple that kept catching my hair, and here it is, in water, raising the tone of the joint.

Next to it is a bird's nest Gary found in his downed tree. It has ribbons and bits of paper woven in. Not sure what bird made it.

And Accidental Afternoon Art in the living room

 

The weaving is one I made years ago from yarn I'd spun and dyed.

This morning I decided on a new approach to krokbragd. I ditched the YouTube teacher, switched from the frame loom to my lovely handmade handheld Hokett tapestry loom, and found a much better YouTube teacher 

She's speaking in Spanish, old video, no translation, so I'm learning Spanish at the same time. It's not the Spanish you learn in class though -- I'm learning weft and warp and threads and design and other weaving language. 

Here's the result, much better 

As you see, the flower motifs are appearing.

The Tuesday knitting group was short a couple of members but still lively with a brand new person wanting to learn crochet 

 

Here she is with her first chain

Downstairs the beginning crochet class members exhibited their work which looks advanced to me, after half a dozen lessons 

Home to Textiles and Tea with a great person, fizzing with energy and making everything with great skill. She's also a beloved teacher and supporter of artists. 

She's credentialed in book art

Also she's endlessly ready for fun

Here she's showing two extremes of making. 

Left a silk dress -- she designed the fabric-- had it printed by Spoonflower, then made it from an old Simplicity pattern. 

She  contrasts it with LMEM, a robot figure about a foot tall, with movable parts and a door that opens. She created this real life figure as advertising for an AI company! They went with the real thing.

eyeglass cases with embroidered appliqued animals

She's written and produced children's books, the illustrations being her handmade animals

And this dress she designed, to show how to create a complex image from simple beginnings. The design started as a stack of random papers arranged diagonally showing part of each, then mirrored, and manipulated with software to create what looks very complex. Printed by Spoonflower

she makes boxes using fiber art techniques on paper components.

These dresses were in a museum exhibit, all made from six inch squares of paper

with Spoonflower she literally wrote the book! Now out of print and needing a search if you want to buy it.

This was a breathless and exciting episode with one of the nimblest, most inventive minds I've ever encountered. She has such talent and she's also a happy person!

So that was today. I had egg 'n chips (roast potatoes) for dinner and danced in the kitchen while I waited for the potatoes to crisp up.

Happy day, everyone, a very pleasing one for me, I hope yours was good too. Or at least okay.

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..