Cat in Space, yarn and bank errors

 

 navy blue cotton thread cone

ordered this thread online to try to weave something in all cotton - it is quite a bit thinner than I thought IT would be, but about the thread width of what I had previously wanted for another project.  So, we'll see.  It said I have 800 yards of it to try probably both projects out.  Been making a bit more progress on the navy blue weaving - did a big block of the blue and will be switching back to the red in a bit.  I have to pull it over the top to continue weaving soon.  I still didn't take the navy and green acrylic mat off the other small loom.  I did make a big waffle-weave dishcloth for the sink (needed a new one) and two potholders, both in just plain red yarn.  And that was my weekend, other than grocery shopping and working much more than usual.  It's Tuesday and I'm saying the weekend is done now, so see what that tells you about that /ha /sigh

This morning I was up from like 3 am to 5 am then even slept in and would have forgotten about the small route they had put me on except something nagged me in the back of my brain - and when I checked the schedule again yes lo and behold, there was me scheduled for it.  So I put some of what we were supposed to get done today off to tomorrow and went and did that.

It rained some yesterday and a lot this morning - and then even a bit more.  The garden appreciated it and nothing looked flooded.  I bought one more pepper plant for the garden when I went for chicken feed, and planted it after I got home.  

rant : 

I had a hassle with the electric company and a fee that was really their mistake, but I paid it, unhappily.  I was disappointed in their logic, and felt down quite a bit yesterday after I talked to them because it just didn't make any sense what had happened - they should have known better trying to double cash a 78 day old check when they were already paid in full (for the three month bills since then!) - there was no way to win-for-losing ...I would have gotten some fee from them or the bank any way you slice it apparently - yet, THEY 'have to get their fee back' from me and the girl was very bubble-gum chew and 'but yea, that happens, we don't like, control it or anything, it's all the computer now'.  Well then, the computer can be better, can't it?  Can't it? 

...(and there my faith in logic becomes Stoic Spock and I have to reorient that not everyone is this stupid, I'm sure... )  Esme and I have had this discussion about similar things - in the car, describing how many people don't think ALL the time, they simply don't have to juggle five streams of thoughts that are overlapping and reminding you about this thing and that and doing calculations - their mind is focused on one or two things at a time that are right in front of them usually and when they finish with it - they move to the next thing, and sometimes their minds are even just blank, and they like it that way, they often aim for it.  They don't watch a show or read a book and have it reverberate with a hundred other connected thoughts for weeks and years later.  They're definitely not estimating the number of cows in that field or thinking about dispersion patterns or trying to compare the electron shell diagrams of Strontium and Tin while driving to work.  They don't remember the last things said in one place returning like echoes of the past when you return there, or have a constant back-checker making math calculations adding things up and dividing percentages after they leave the supermarket.  

 

Strontium and Tin

 

They probably don't have a 'collision detection' system running all the time about what calamities might befall everything around you - people running into each other, cars on the highway, things falling, burning, breaking, times and schedules (it helped today, with the 'boy you should look at that schedule it looks weird from here (here being looking at it for thirty seconds last week)) - it involves everything announcing what could go wrong with it in some extra 'awareness' box like a red light on your mental dashboard that won't stay off... my mom called it the protector instinct, when we discussed it when I was a bit younger than Esme, before I got a good handle on it - it can get really loud some days when I've already got too much to juggle and keep track of actually doing myself and yet sometimes especially with radio or music I can tune it down to a normal level.  This is how my brain works - and Esme has some extent of it, and she finds it annoying at the very least but does understand it.  I know I'm being cynical in some percentage except, that she listens to my philosophy rant and says it 'explains a lot, actually' - about the world she sees, about why we are always anxious (because we don't 'turn off' our brains)  and why everything so spectacularly doesn't work in many places, even after a millennia of people fighting over the right way to do things.

Anyway, gah.  The more I think on it, the more lost I will feel about it having no solution.  So, I'm weaving, and knowing I need to sort a hundred other things in the house and I've only begun to do so in my head here and there and pick up and move a few things at a time.   There are one or two things in 'space' I would like to lay hands on again and I know where they are or were before the storage container fell a few months ago, and that I put them safely somewhere new, but when I tried to get them earlier today I didn't take the time to feel 'down the rope' to where they were now.  Instead I ran into something else that would serve, and grabbed that up, and hung up the phone on finding the thing until later.  I've done mostly Spanish today and will do my Russian program in a a bit. Hopefully, I can continue and finish running the errands tomorrow.

 

 

Lyffan in from the wet outside, after her dinner.  Mark had seen her chasing frogs when we first called her for dinner - after a rain like this there are hundreds of little hop frogs that appear all over - she was 'completely occupied' he said - and  so we watched a bit more of a movie for another hour and then all the cats were finally ready.  Now she is sitting here sorting out her belly fur and trying to fit in this too small of a space, and maybe knock my garbage can down.  Minion usually sits here - right next to my computer space, but she is downstairs taking Loki's chair away from him that he has been in all day.  I saw him stretched out in the hallway floor and that's unusual for him, peek in the bathroom and there she is licking her feet in his chair with Charlotte lying on the rug saying 'I don't get it - but I'm not involved, I just sleep here.'   As I type this Lyffan has now fell asleep and is shaking her paws and whiskers chasing some outside creature in her sleep.

 

seems relevant short story idea : several geeks in a big office with headphones on jacked into some machine they haven't been told exactly how it works yet.  And yet someone is standing there with a clipboard trying to see what the results are.  Hey, do we just say 'Aliens, Hello?' or what?  How are they going to hear us?  Where is the microphone?  Do we just think really hard : 'Hello?'  No, man, you have to try something original, like 'And here we are back from Planet Earth with another line of smooth jazz and greetings to tell you, 'hey, we're listening'.. to what though?  How does all this work?<--that was the line of reasoning in a dream this morning just before my alarm went off.  

textile play

just playing around with textile stuff - again, not sure what I might actually get done or not, but it's a journey and I do like the processes.  I usually find a use for whatever I end up with... sooner or later.

 

 

 

It is about 8 inches across and could perhaps weave something 3 times that in length when it is finished - we'll have to see.  I do like knowing what kind of dimensions I can get out of a setup.  I've saved that somewhere else for the other looms.

Took Esme out to town for breakfast, and library, chicken feed and grab groceries on the way home.  We also stopped in a thrift store and she chose a small sweater with lots of cables on it - and I picked up another picture frame to do more experiments in weaving on, but this one I didn't want to go through all the wrist-breaking action of putting screws in it right now, so I warped it up as it was with a 'pull over' warp that can be woven twice the length of the frame if pulled over the top once the one side is woven.  I've also been playing with the crochet techniques for the thread - although I'm using some 15-20 year old embroidery thread that we had bought on a closeout and I've never gotten to using too much of in the past.

 

I work again tomorrow, and Friday and Saturday and Sunday again after that.  But it was nice to get out for a girl's morning again, to break up the sit at our screens all day that we otherwise end up getting sucked into.

 

Mark is making dinner with the groceries we bought, after installing his new printer parts and getting that working doing what he wanted again.

 right now, the weaving is reminding me of this - a whale shark, but I'll get a little further up in a minute and start working on the red stripes - I really like this look, but I'm worried that the other grey yarn I have is not a perfect match, and I want to break it up a little with other colors so that doesn't matter quite so much

Notes : 7.5 inches wide, 4 inches gray (undetermined length, spare stash ball of yarn), 25 handwraps red to start next color

Weaving project, birthday and swimming

 

I strung up a little bag on the small frame loom last night, and since it was only plain weave, I had it done pretty quickly.  Sewed up the ends this morning and made a pouch for my pens to put into my other woven purse.

 

  

It's a tight fit in there with wallet and phone holder - but it does fit 

It was my birthday today - and we did quite a lot.  I took my pre-sunrise walk and took it slower than yesterday, staying out there to see the actual sun rise through the tiny keyhole in the woods where I finally found it.  I know of three places where I can see it at different points - all the way to the horizon, through the leaves - but it is finding them that is part of all that.  I also found the morning glories and took a picture of them.

 

Early in the morning we got groceries and a new garden hose and fittings that I've been planning in order to extend the reach in the raised beds in the garden.  A few weeks ago Esme helped me measure and our 75 foot hose wouldn't quite reach the back two beds that I've been having trouble with - needed 89 feet to make it.  So, over the next few days I will need to find time to put that on and test it all.  After we got home from that excursion I took Esme out to the swimming lake and we spent about an hour there.  There was a small school of bluegill fish that were curious at first, and at one point decided to take a taste.  Esme: One bit me!'  We fell out laughing, but were a bit wary about them after that - we'd already been swimming an hour, and both of us have sunburned quite badly in the past in relatively short amounts of time in the water.  I wore my big floppy hat - which looked ridiculous, but I think it helped.  

After we got back from that I threw all the wet and sandy things through the washer, and made myself a cake (with trying out the frozen lemon trick, so-so results), and then fell asleep for a few hours.  We made a pizza and watched one of my favorite movies 'Dark City', where the protagonist does not give in to repeated attempts to tell him who he is, he knows who he is, and it isn't that - and in the end when he has this amazing powerful gift to mold the world he could do anything with it - and he makes something beautiful, that reminds him of all the good things he wanted to be in the world but was having such a hard time finding and questing for... and it ends there, where we hope that he will continue to use his power for good, but we don't get to see.  Mark says it is a twisted flick, and he likes a lot of very twisted flicks.  He's compared it to 'Brazil' before, but I think the message is much more impactful and human in this one.

Now I work tomorrow, have two language programs to complete (did one earlier today) and fold laundry and get some more sleep.  It will be over 90 tomorrow again.

yarn and thread

 

So, is it madness or patience?  I tend to think, only based on what others say about it - that you have to perceive time on a different scale to work with yarn, weaving, crocheting, knitting, oh especially spinning then doing one of the above.  I didn't spin this - but I am crocheting it because I have thought about what it might be like when it is done.  It is forever time wise away from being done, so much infinite perhaps that it might not be completed, in fact, the probability (as so many knitters know with unfinished objects) is that it will not be done.  But yet, we begin, and often, we persist.  Is it madness or patience?  

Same with gardening.  Perhaps, with my learning languages without having any useful place to use them.  But I take a 'sense of cadence'? could it be a 'zen'?  from making something -for myself*- that takes a long time, and from checking on plants every day and eeking them along - from learning more again and again on ten different languages round and round and round the spiral.  It is like making hash marks on the stone wall except sometimes, you get to hold the object, or behold the plant, or understand the sentences in a foreign book or movie - and say 'hey, if I hadn't started this - I wouldn't be here now, using/admiring my persistance.'

So yes, a bit of both.  I still recall the (seriously different than me) lady who said I must be so bored to sit and knit an item - don't you have anything else you want to do.  Not that will become this, through me, and I will use literally for years etc...

I put on my little blue bolero thing the other day - one of those things made like this, out of fine blue yarn in a net foundation, with gold thread crocheted along the edges - and it has kept well over the past what.. nine? years, holding together, and being a pretty piece of clothing.  And there are a lot of things like that.  And if I hadn't started them, they wouldn't be something I have to use now.  And yet, we can't guarantee that we will finish things - we can't bank on the persistence part - so much could happen, and yet.. we start. And that depends deeply on who we are, what we value, how we reflect.  All of it.

//We shopped early early and it was already hot when we got back.  I did some watering in the garden and planted more seeds.  We planned to go out to a farmer's market today and get some produce.  It has started to rain a bit now, but we'll see what happens with it.  Mark has some alphabet and language stuff he wants me to look at - I made him a Czech list of 8,000 words, but he wanted 3 million, so he found some spell checker that has every form of every word in it.  I still like my 8,000 word list - it has a lot of useful words I didn't know all of, and could use for myself at the very least.  I did French and Spanish today, and a lot of Czech vocab, and need to finish out my Russian lesson.  Then I work the next two days.

*and yet, I have found that often, for others, I do not persist like this -- art projects, or specifically requested things that I did not want to make (because when I want to make it anyway, or made it and then give it away, it was the journey that was the reason for it, not the end point).. and the difference is in  because perhaps we never know how they will value it, and then when we do not have it later - that time is gone, but when we do have it, and use it, the time is still captured ... planting the orchard of trees that you may never see fruit from for years, means something different on another person's property when the chance to see them even if you live that long reduces nearly to nil by giving it away?  Sometimes though, we still persist on those - and that is why knitted and handmade gifts made with intention are special.//philosophy

Some more Crochet

 

  

Mark and I have been re-watching a tv series at night, and I've been using up some more stash yarn.  I made the green bag first, and have been using it as a purse.  The original reason to make it differently than my other net bag pattern was that it was more closed, and could keep rain off a library book.  I really like the way the stripes turned out on it, and the handles.

 I started making two other things out of the dark green yarn, but there wasn't enough to do much with - so I made a pair of slippers out of it instead.  I ran out of yarn just as I finished the second one -  and then ran an edge of gold yarn around it to make it a bit more even looking.

 

And the dogs had told me something about needing even more floor rugs - since we keep having to boot them off the one by the stove when we cook.  I'm not really sure where another rug could fit - but I used up a bit more stash yarn to make a really nice striped pattern.  I still have to tie up all the yarn bits on it.

When is it too much and too little

When it is too much, and too little, and everything in between.

So, there is a project I was asked to do before Thanksgiving, and it has stretched out through what was inarguably a very long, dismal and stressful winter, which could have been worse, and we were so glad that it wasn't.

And I have not done the project.  There have been several small attempts, one large attempt - and a lot of thinking about it and being tangentially frustrated about not doing much on it at all, and not feeling like I wanted to, either.

So, when is too much.  I tend to be a tenacious person about some things, and not at all - at all - about others.  I did try to say I wanted to pass the project on to some other person before - but the project's owner said they still wanted me to do it.  So I kept it, and Mark says it is just too much worry and frustration.  Perhaps, it is, for there will be no return benefit except saying that I actually got it done - it is not for money or for fame, but just what to someone else might be a few turns of the wrist and there - you're done.  

It would be so much simpler if it was like the first project I did for them (perhaps)... that was 'I'd like something like this - it doesn't exist - can you make it?'  This is : Here is the item, go make something exactly like it, the same size, the same look, I know you'll do a good job.  I find, that specifically, is something I'm not good at.  I am not one to replicate something, my perfectionism says I'll never do it.

So I procrastinate.  I attempt and fail.  I get frustrated and then it colors all of my other projects with the feelings.  And of course, I know if I did succeed it would do the same - color the rest with accomplishment... if I do not, and give up, it will remain in the back of my mind.  It is a skeleton I can do not enough good with, and even as a success it would be a three penny postage stamp.  What does that even mean?  I'm not sure.  I've been reading a lot lately, but in tiny pieces here and there and everywhere, and it is like a thousand birds in my air, lyrics, thoughts half-flown, and coming down in the field around me hoping to make some sense as I walk through picking up sheaves.

See what I mean?

Oh look, a rock I found, on a walk in the sun yesterday.  It looks like the ocean.

 

And poems too hot and fresh to have been trimmed yet, just because.  

 

Unspilled

the dark green ink

it beckons

with a swirl in the bowl

but only in my mind’s eye

because the darkness

is beset upon the morning still

and the sunrise, when it comes

will be full of bustling

and the dark green ink

will have to wait again

in it’s bottle, unspilled

like my thoughts, unspilled

Thermal

I’m not the only one who used to

lie out in the snow as a child

after pulling some sled up the hill

and coming back down

leaning back and throwing out my arms

there in the cold and the snow

staring up at the big wide sky, feeling alone

and wondering how long it would take

to freeze to death

I know I’m not the only one who did this

how many do this more than once or twice...

And I think I do it in my life with other things

we lie for a time out in the cold

against all natural instincts, it would seem

until that thing within us clicks over, urging

that we get up, and seek our homes

whether they be of body, mind, or soul

that place our feathered things retreat to

to sit by the fire and revive

and then – we appreciate the warmth all the more

Tides

You’re such a good girl, she said

you never want anything

but oh, how I wanted things

sometimes so hard that they tasted like the blood

from biting my tongue

but they were not things I could ask for

few of them could ever fit in my hand

and always, always, they would be taken away

somehow or another, I learned early

that nothing is forever

everything is always changing

and those things I truly wanted seemed

just beyond my grasp – intangible

until I learned, through much effort

to hold them in my eyes, and my heart

to weave them into those inner webs

and labyrinths that defy space and time

..and then, the tides rose and carried me away

and I was the boat, and the waters, and the moon

Echoes

There are always echoes in here

words to string together, this way or that

all the things said, and unsaid

from this morning, from three years ago,

there is little rhyme or reason

I try to connect the dots,

draw stars and equations around them

not enough paper, not enough ink

not enough thread, to sew it together

I turn on music, to try to drown it out

hum along, sing familiar words

but other words, other times, other places

continue to vibrate

in the in-between places of Memory

where Time is not the rule

one box always opening twenty more

a million scattered keyholes

and so few keys

I try to pick them up like tiny beads

that get stuck under my fingernails

I try to line them up like thin steel pins

to stick them all in place, but into what?

They continue to tumble loose, and rattle

against this box that is my brain

Heart Take Wing

There is only so much

you can choose to say

the rest is up to the heart

may it take wing

and sing to you

Downpours

And when all your years

you believed that the overload

of your senses meant

that you could not handle it

that you must run from it

put on your flat mask

pretend it was not there

like trying to ignore the rain

you can do it – stand there drenched

and be miserable for all to see

run for shelter each time it starts

or you can dance in the downpour

look for the rainbows – prismatic glories

and feel your limbs swimming

watch the drops fall from your fingers

and trace the holes in space as it

bounces off of everyone’s umbrellas

built-in for them – but not for you

perhaps, you are a fish out of water

that swims in the air

and without such rainstorms

where you would be?

I am amazed, also, and grateful - my book has sold nearly two dozen copies in something like a week.  Thank you.  I hope you are enjoying it.  Unspoken Things, Made Words poetry book by Marie Lamb

of rugs and cats

It's been a while since I mentioned this, but we're sort of a hobby farm - with all these chickens, and my gardens, our 'working dogs' who are Catahoula and mutt and protect the chickens and the cats - and Melody, our blind goat whose main job is to eat weeds.  I had thought at one time I might have sheep or goats for wool and milk, but I wasn't quite brave enough for that, at least.. yet.  I guess you could also say our cats are actually 'working cats' - although don't tell them that there are cats that aren't (they won't believe you anyway) - they catch mice, they patrol around the yard and the chicken yard perimeter and the gardens, the garage etc.  And we have lots of mud, and lots of cold floors in the wintertime (cement and wood). 

 

 

  

The first of the 'working rugs', shown with Loki cat, a large Manx (we bought him and his sister from a working farm near Milan, so our cat Minion would have someone to teach to chase mice after all of her kittens were gone)  Loki decided this morning he would sleep there - although our dogs have been loving them, as well, especially as 'parking points' while they watch us cook.  I made this rug years ago for use in Esme's room.. but it sort of phased out and ended up in an old hamper.  During one of these cold snaps I had pulled it out and washed it, and put it back to good use.

 

 

 

This rug is headed for in front of the chair in the downstairs bathtub area - where the green one was before I got very cold cooking one night and moved it to the kitchen.. then I moved it to another place in the kitchen, and that sort of set off 'You should make more of these'  So I did, I made two more.  And when they get really dirty (like these garden shoes here, which are some of my favorite, mud and all) they can just get thrown into the washing machine. 

The bits : I darned socks and blankets today, finished that rug, swept floors, (swept floors again, and again... it is like that here with dogs!) did lots of laundry - put away lots of laundry! --- that ice storm, and the frigid cold that made it last all last week meant so much got pushed to the back burner.  I've got to work the weekend so I tried to just put as much 'good' as I could without really wearing myself out.  Esme when she got home and saw the post : You know that's a cat, not a rug, right?  It's not a cat rug?  Maybe Loki thinks it is.  The post says 'of rugs and cats' : it's about how our cats are working cats and chase mice and stuff, and these rugs are working rugs - as in, we're putting them to use.  Loki is, putting them to use, too.

I also finished that thank you gift for the people who helped us pull our truck out of the mud -a couple of knit dishcloths and a little card.

Crochet Rug, Winter Weather, and Snow

This weather ( 9 degrees, 4+ inches of snow on the ground, more snow in the forecast, and no above freezing temps until the end of the week) just goes to show you what all that knitting and crocheting multiple pairs of gloves, scarves, slipper socks, blankets and rugs for the house really is worth... it's so nice to come in from fighting chicken water dishes frozen to the ground (they're great now) and snow falling all over you from the netting above the yard to change into dry things, have a dry pair of gloves ready to go for later and sit down to a project and be warm.

This is a second crochet rug, as I was using the first one to stand on to peel potatoes and fry onions yesterday in the kitchen, and all the animals were playing musical chairs with it, some even sitting on my feet while I was standing on it.  I had emptied an old hamper a few weeks ago that was full of 'not really used things' from years ago, and found that and decided it was in good shape to wash and put into use somewhere.  I had put it in the bathroom where I put on my socks and shoes and it was often commandeered by a cat there.  Last night, on the concrete floor with 9 degree temps outside, I decided I wanted it while I was cooking as the chill was coming even through two layers of socks.  So, it might be worth making more than one.

Working on some more French - then I might spin the wheel and see what language I land on and see if I want to switch for a bit.  I was being spoken to in Spanish and trying to respond in a dream last week, and told the person I could actually understand about twelve languages 'well'.. and then when asked further, that I had studied up to 22.  A bit after that I woke up and told myself I wasn't really doing that well in most of them, which is why 'dream me' would only admit to 12 until pressed.  I found that interesting enough to note for the future, even in my dreams, I underestimate because I'm worried I really don't know enough.

 

Aside:

donc se crois - sitting here crocheting on this and thinking, you know, now of all times you have a few days to do this without your hands hurting too much to drive tomorrow, you should probably string up your loom, (but no, I have this project, why start another?) when else will you have the time to start it much less work on it - and the last three projects off that loom are in well-good use right now (pillow on bed, mat on footstool, bag full of stuff) so it'll be worth it eventually, and kick yourself into the kitchen and start some white beans to soaking, as well, since you never have the time to do that.

 

arguing over who gets to sit in the sunbeam

little black cat (Minion) went out and came right back in... even with the sun up out there it is just so cold.  Lyffan (other fuzzy butt above) keeps popping her tailless Manx butt out the door over and over again, and I make sure I get her back in after a few minutes.  The Manx kittens can't make hardly any noise unless you accidentally step on them (or the goat does, that happens with some frequency, as the goat is blind) - so I get worried when they head outdoors in this weather.  All the other dogs and the mama cat and the goat can make themselves heard - but the kittens barely squeak you can be right next to them and not believe you've actually heard it.

dishcloth yarn comparison sugar and creme vs sugarwheel vs berroco linsey

A little yarn geekery.  I am comparing three different types of dishcloth yarn I used in the past few months.  I used the same basic pattern for three of the cloths, and one of them is my 'seed stitch' variant I use for oven mitts.

They were all knitted with a 5 to 7 size knitting needle.  I prefer my bamboo 5's or my metal 7's for knitting dishcloths.

The Contestants
Yarn A : Hobby Lobby Sugarwheel cotton
Yarn B : Mix of Berroco Linsey and Rowan Creative Linen
Yarn C : 'thick weight' ombre version of Sugar and Creme
Yarn D : 'thin weight' ombre version of Sugar and Creme

The Winner (to me): thin weight ombre version of Sugar and Creme

Yarn A : Hobby Lobby Sugarwheel cotton

The green yarn was the last bit I had left - there are like five other cloths from a previous post wandering around the house.  It was very fun to knit with, especially on smaller needles... and the color shifts were nice, green to purple, blue to grey etc.

HOWEVER... they don't make great washcloths (or dishcloths, whichever you call them).  They are not very scrubby.  Maybe for a baby, they would be nice, or for delicate skin.  But I like to use these washcloths because they are scrubby - and exfoliate.  When we use different ones for the sink, they scrub the dishes well.  I make larger cloths sometimes for 'mop-up' and cleaning, and it is important that they are good scrubbing cloths, too.

This yarn stretches, instead of compressing tightly, even when knitted on the same needles.  So, even though the yarn is very tempting and pretty - I don't think it is a good yarn for making washcloths.  With that stretch, it has a nice drape, and could make pretty shirts or shrugs, if knitted or crocheted to work with the bias.

Yarn B : Berroco Linsey and Rowan Creative Linen

Yarn B is something I bought on clearance, and intended to weave with.  It is Berroco 'Linsey', a cotton and linen blend yarn.  It is kind of expensive when not on clearance, and I wouldn't buy it specifically to make washcloths.  But, it is the project that called to me to test it out.  I knitted with two colors (the other was actually Rowan Creative Linen, which is very similar.. so take this with a grain of salt across both brands.  I made two washcloths, one green and yellow even and one mostly yellow with a few stripes of the green (rowan)... and like them both.  My husband says it has a hard core, with a softer outside - and it is scrubby enough, without being rough.  So, yes, I like this one.  It was a little tougher to knit on the smooth needles, but it came out nicely.  It stretches a little, doesn't compress to the tight square as much, but washes up well.

Yarn C : the cheap but heavyweight Sugar and Creme
Yarn D : the slightly more expensive thin weight Sugar and Creme

Yarn C and D are two weights of the same 'cheap' yarn available at Wal-Mart and such... sugar and creme or peaches and creme.  It is the most basic cotton available.  D is a finer grade weight that they had on offer last year, and I snagged about five balls of that ombre (it is usually the ombres that are fine weight) and knit them up into lots of cloths.  I love that yarn.  It knit beautifully (as fun as the sugarwheel) and it actually inspired me to try lighter weight yarns for this purpose.  It is scrubby, and compresses tightly to the square and holds well wash after wash.  The ends I wove in are coming out a little - but it is on several of the others, too.  I throw them in with the towels and other clothing so they are not treated with kid gloves!

The oven mitt is a thicker seed-stitch variant in a slightly thicker-weight ombre Sugar and Creme.

Cloths A, B and D are made with 'Grandmother's Favorite' simple dishcloth pattern - you can find it easily online with a search.  It is one of the very first things I learned how to knit and does a good job of teaching increase, decrease and yarn over.

Pattern for Cloth C
To knit the oven mitt / dishwashing sink variant :

Cast on 36 to 50 stitches, depending on how wide you would like it to be.  My husband likes the 36 for dishwashing, fits the hand better without being too large.  We leave one of these draped over the kitchen sink for washing utensils and other things.  The 50 stitches are better for the oven mitt / mop up type cloth because then you want it bigger than your hand.  It is also important to use a yarn with a good compression, the stitches hold tight to each other, for the oven mitt type.  A yarn like Sugarwheel would not be good at ALL for this use.

Knit three rows of garter stitch.
Switch to this pattern for the rest of the cloth:
Knit three, seed stitch nearly to end, knit three
If you would like, knit every fifth or sixth row throw in three rows of plain garter stitch.  This will give a ripply effect to the cloth and lots of grip.  You can see I have done that in the peach and brown 'C' cloth.
End with three rows of garter stitch then cast off.


The next yarn I would like to try out is Knitpicks Cotlin dishcloth yarn.  I think it would combine a lot of these qualities.  However, I am just using up what I have - because the best part about knitting dishcloths is that it can be done while you are doing anything else, watching tv, reading articles, reading a book, listening to music, sitting in the garden, talking on the phone, waiting for something to timer ding that you are cooking etc etc... 

Easter eggs 2020

Our chickens are laying about five eggs a day,  so we blew the yolks out of these eggs (by piercing both ends with a small hole, and blowing on one end over a cup), and the insides of the eggs can be used for food, while keeping the shells mostly intact for decorating.

We mixed a few colors of craft paint and each of us painted two or three eggs.  The shells would have just gone to compost, but we had a little fun with them :)

Next time I would like to try some of the natural dye methods, using turmeric powder, beets or blueberries, to see what colors the brown eggs will give with the natural dyes.

Knit we go in quarantine

Well, except that I am an essential worker.  But, I will remember this as the item I knit during this time.  I have a pink version of this one that I knit a few months ago, and I have worn it as a skirt (belly warmer) and a shawl, and used it simply to cover my legs while I sit and read or type.

It is a size 7 circular needle, and this particular one comfortably fits about 130 to 150 stitches before they want to pop off.  So, that is the size these blankets are.  It works out with the Red Heart acrylic yarn to be about 3 feet wide, and then I knit them about 4 foot long.

They are really handy little things to have around.
Weaving in all the ends of the stripes can be a bit hectic, but they look too plain otherwise, and I use up lots of little balls of scrap yarn in the process.

The nubbly areas are seed-stitch alternated for three to five rows and then back to garter stitch.  The stripe rows are two passes of each color.

Really simple but effective and useful knitting.

//

I saw a LOT of knitting posts lately, and yarn stashes, and deliveries etc etc... and I'm not doing anything fancy or ordering a lot of special yarn.. but I am glad to have something to work on.

I washed up and finished out the two Simply Soft scarves I had been making - one in magenta garter stitch and one in grey brick stitch.  They are about 10 to 12 inches wide and 5 and 6 foot long. respectively.  They are lovely and useful, as well.  I wore one of them around my neck up to the mailbox when it was cold the other morning, and the other one I had worn when I was wearing the pink shawl as a skirt and kept warm on top and bottom. 

That is a good yarn to hold up, although 3.68 per skein now at the store and what I have is mostly because Mark and Esme have given me them over the years as presents - silky and colorful yarns, they are definitely the type to draw the eye in.  I threw both of the scarves through the wash and they came out very nice - except I also threw in a wool scarf I had forgotten what it was made of and it came out really soft but kind of small - only 6 inches now by about 4 feet - but it is still a good neckwarmer type for tucking into a jacket collar.  I've worn a few of my knit hats, too lately - same reasons.. and making more of those for the 'pile' would be useful, too.

I also finished two net market bags, one book size and the other towel size for the beach.  The towel one is made of the same green yarn as this.

And of course wash cloths, I had stacks of them a few weeks ago - and they are all finished up and put into circulation.

January Journals #4

It is the fourth day of January.  Does it feel sometimes like you have lived ten days in two?  It does for me, even more the more I create.  I have some copper thread I found yesterday that I want to use in my sketchbook, and I am thinking it might be a good idea to find a magnifier loop to pull over my desk for doing small work like embroidery and tiny lines and dashes in fur and feathers.

It's the one in the middle

This is what I have in my cart to try out.   And I will give a review here when I get it how well it works.   It looks like it would be great to hold on to things and that would give me an extra hand, so to say, as well.  Even with my glasses on sometimes I find it really hard now to focus in exactly the right place close up to the project.

I am working much more in my sketchbook for the Brooklyn Art Project.  It is like these little Kraft Notebooks.  When I finish up with it I might even miss the size and need to order some more of them.

Remember you can still purchase my book 'Time in December', as well.  It is only 99 cents on Kindle, but the paper copy was larger than I thought and it turned out beautifully.  I have gotten two very nice reviews saying it 'reads so much like poetry', and that they wished to dream the poetry when they went to sleep.

 I am working a bit here and there on new short stories for 'House of Sunlight'.  I hope to have that ready to print or send out to an agent in March.  I haven't decided yet - and some of the illustrations need to come to me.  The first one came in the form of the yellow house, and I have others in mind.  The illustrations that are in Time in December did not come to me until a certain point, when I did them all in a few days.  Sometimes art is like that.

I made a ten minute sketch the other day and just really wanted to put it on this canvas.  However, I know my perspective is odd with one eye far sighted and one eye nearsighted.  I also HATE working over scratched pencil lines on my canvas.  So - last night the solution hit me.  I had done this in the past when making murals on the wall from photographs.

It is the mathematical reference to making a canvas.   All you need is a calculator (or your phone) and a ruler that measures to the eighth (1/8) of an inch.

This is the painting I am working on.  I used the mathematical technique last night to transfer bits from the original drawing.  I measured across at twelve points

in the picture from the drawing, did the mathematical ratio conversion and located them on the canvas.  Then using them as reference points, I drew the perspective in until it fit.

The drawing dimensions were 40 percent smaller than the canvas.  Because of this every measurement I made on the drawing became divided by .4 to locate where it would be on the canvas.  For example - if a point was 5.5 inches across from the left on the drawing it was located 13.75 inches from the left on the canvas and so forth.

Sometimes you have to wear your mood right out there on your chest. 

I have a shirt that says 'Be Amazing, but first Coffee' and it always gets comments. 

Jumpstart January

January begins tomorrow, and it is time to Jumpstart.  This year I have signed up for three things to do every day, although two of them might be accomplished at the same time.

1.) I will practice my Welsh
2.) I will find an art material, device or book each day that I have in my possession and give a review or demonstration of it, either with photos or with video, and post that to share.
3.) I will do some sort of art sketchbook or project every day even if it is a small one like my friend who does a single comic pane every day.

I did this sketchbook page yesterday, it reminds me a bit of the Farscape television show I had been watching.  And I did practice my Welsh, even though it isn't quite Janaury yet.

Materials :

This was done with Sakura Micron pens over colored pencil.
Micron pens are my absolute favorite for outlining and they come in several tip sizes, marked on the top of the caps.  My favorite size to do this sort of outlining is .45mm marked with a '08' on the cap.

My Absolute Favorite Pen
Buy a Package of 3 on Amazon to save and always have one on hand.

I am also reading this lovely book 'The Book of Delights', which is a collection of essays about one or many things each day that the author found 'delightful' and how he is more and more walking through the world feeling the delight in things around him and the joy of being alive.  Check it out below.

Bits

 I am working on my Brooklyn Art Project sketchbook.

  'Have You Come (in or out) To See Me Dear?'

It is due in February

Cornbread and mirror

We got up this morning and went to the flea market, and Esme sold some of her things.  We only stayed a few hours, as I was getting a headache.  It didn't let up much at home, either.  I made some cornbread (from a box). I had been thinking about cornbread crumbs mashed down into butter with a fork for about a week ... it finally got me and I bought some the other day.  Esme and I brought some tomatoes up to Grandma, and she borrowed me several magazines. 

After a bit with the headache still not letting up I started working on cleaning and painting this mirror.  Mark got it for free a few years ago with our dressers, and it has sat in a corner on the floor near this exact spot for all that time.  It was originally brown wood all the way around, scratched and really needed a cleaning.

 I had decided a few months ago I would probably paint it and also that it would end up red... I just needed to find the right day to tackle it.  It took two coats of paint on everything.

It turned out pretty good!

Much, much better than the way it was, and actually useful now.

Bit by bit I'll keep working on things I can continue to make and fix up for the house.

Later: 

It is 11:30, Esme has long since read her chapter with me and been tucked into bed, and I've still been cleaning for a bit.  The headache is finally gone... worked through it.  The laundry room and the bathroom are nicer for it.  The kitchen got a little bit of it, but there are things to do later.  Still... I really thought, as I scrubbed at a corner of the floor by the bathtub... I'm not just working through the headache, I'm worrying about Esme's school starting in a few weeks and sort of using up that energy elsewhere to keep from expanding on that worry too much.  I do that - I always have, it is a habit I learned from my mother.  At least it is getting some good results and I'm not just fretting idly.   

Fish Uncertainty and more Ecosystem

Esme had really wanted to go fishing yesterday, but it was just too hot.

So, we had an early morning fishing trip to the lake - and one small mouthed bass. 

It was pretty torn up by the hook, so I had her walk it up to the house for pictures.

As you can see, she was kind of uncertain about the whole thing!

We threw it to the chickens, but hours later Mark said they were still hiding in the corner of the pen and pointing at it like a threat to their well-being, so he tossed it behind the garden.

 

 More play and additions to the 'Ecosystem' project.

She had made a log to dig earthworms and termites out from underneath, but then she decided to add a squirrel, and a new tree for the squirrel, and (not shown) there is a little pocket in the tree for the squirrel to hide nuts inside.  She took the story book we wrote last night to bed with her again and tucked it behind her pillow.

Note: Also, she had gotten stung by a wasp on her foot (she told Daddy it was a horsefly bite) - watching it closely... she told me her sock felt a bit tight and she hadn't really realized it was anything different.  But, it is puffy.  Should go down tonight or by tomorrow morning... we'll see.  My family has a reputation for being very allergic to such things so for her I would call it a reaction, but not a serious one.

Ecosystem

Story by Esme, habitat project by Esme with help from Mom 

Once upon a time, there was a fox, that lived in a den.

A heron caught a cricket until two mice stole it and put it in their food storage.
The mice lived in the grass under the big tree, in the ecoystem.  They were husband and wife and helped each other get food, and to stay alive  They were in survival mode, and didn't want to be captured by the big snake.  Or, (eaten by) the fox.  The fox came out of his den and played in the lake with Larry, the heron in the lake.

A salamander crawled into the fox den and looked around.  He saw a picnic blanket and a chicken bone. He also saw a bed made of feathers and grass.  He got back out.  He asked the fox if they could have a picnic.  They would bring chicken, earthworms, crickets and bugs to the picnic.  And maybe a blanket, and maybe some fish.  The fox would bring some flowers, because he loves them.

The snake would bring some hares and rabbits for the picnic, because he is a top hunter.  He has poison in his teeth.  The bird came back from the South and joined the picnic.  Her eggs hatched in the nest in the tree, and it was a happy ending.

Minecraft Freeway World

This is in the Freeway world she has been working on with Daddy:

It is a flower stand - pick a flower, and put a dollar (gold bar) in the chest to pay

We have been playing with fireworks and also with making a 'currency system'.

They have really expanded the map lately.  They found a desert village and connected it to the Freeway, and this flower stand and a new 'mushroom soup' (Mushroom Dooshroom Family Restaurant) restaurant was built with fresh Mooshroom cows in the back pasture to assist the chef in his preparation.  She put hoppers for the tables so the waiter could dump the food order right into the hopper and the customer could leave their payment there.  She was using book and quills to write the orders down in shorthand and depositing them in the chest by the kitchen :)  

The serving area in front and the kitchen in back.  We built the walls of this together but she had the floor and counters laid out and the colors picked out for everything.

 The 'secret ingredient' ala Willy Wonka

The other project lately was the hospital - which Daddy gave her over an abandoned building of his and she built in ideas from a little map I sketched so there was a waiting room, and operating room and a recovery room.  We did a 'mock operation' there like the appendicitis operation she saw in the Emily of New Moon episode.  I wrote her several books in Minecraft about appendicitis and the names of bones to have in her hospital library.

 hospital outside -it was Daddy's build, and she put the cross on top and made the inside

The operating room.  The stone cylinder on the table in the foreground is a 'cylinder of coffee - for the doctor, when he needs it'.  There are beds to the left for recovery - in the 'broken leg ward', 'sleepwalkers ward' etc etc..

Tonight I made a large building out in some flatland just for the architecture of it -and because Mark said I needed to make something 'big enough to show up on the map'... should post the map soon.  His smiley-face bank building and her giant red T-rex do show up prominently :)

 Mama's build - it looks a lot like the civic center I grew up near..although I didn't have any plan when I started building it last night.  Mark says it is asymmetrical and that bothers him ;) heh.

Alien spaceship and lander - this was a pretend she really wanted to do the other night.

She then filled the spaceship with chickens *facepalm*


A cropped down map of Freeway World.
The T-Rex is left of middle... the hospital is in the right side edge...Daddy's smiley face bank is upper middle-right.. my civic center is lower middle-left

Unrelated Note:   I had her read more with me in the Little House book (we need to buy the next one...we're more than halfway through going a chapter at a time).  Her reading is getting more natural- still runs between her sentences sometimes where she has to stop and look back...still has some pauses and 'errs' while she is reading ahead faster than she can say the words.  But, she is retaining what she is reading -and some of what she is listening to (even though she was fidgeting and playing with flower petals while she was 'listening')...she was able to tell me several specific details from the story later while we were doing a bit of writing.