Whatever happens to strike my fancy, but surely some sort of fiber content.
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| Like The Queen Whatever happens to strike my fancy, but surely some sort of fiber content. |
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3 Comments:
Ah, Bess! You are chamomile, dear...for you entertain, enlighten and sooth the savage breast -- er, beast. :-)
We can be tea together, since I'm Catnip!
Hi Bess,
By Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom] Sunday, January 15, 2006 Well - I am so glad you all enjoyed Friday’s post. Be assured, I enjoyed it myself; enjoyed coming up with the idea, enjoyed carrying it out - they’ll be laughing down at the courthouse for a long time - and enjoyed sharing it here. I can also promise you that I will enjoy fulfilling it. I promise, I wouldn’t have started down this path if I hadn’t wanted to arrive at the destination. The pledge is not something to do with deprivation, mind you. It’s to do with opening up horizons that are right within reach of my fingertips. It’s to do with valuing things I had been taking for granted. It’s to do with telling the truth about myself, to myself, and to others. And the truth is, I want to do things differently. I spend an awful lot of time daydreaming and talking about and getting ready but never getting started. I seem to be always ready to get ready to get going. Then suddenly I look back and it’s been 3 years since I bought that Brown Sheep Hand Paint yarn and I still haven’t done anything with it. But, right now, with the flush of January upon me, I feel a bit more like getting on with it, for a change. My very precious BD has always been an enthusiastic diner - a bit of a gourmand with an adventurous palate and a metabolism to support his hearty appetite. In fact, it has been a joy to cook for this man because even when I’ve made things that I wouldn’t eat, he would merely shrug, say, “not up to your usual” and clean his plate. Then he’d go out and saw down trees with bucksaws or some other Herculean task. His reputation sur la table was legend among family and friends. But time eventually catches up with even the most fat-tolerant metabolism and in his case it did so with a one two punch in the heart last spring. To a man, every visitor who came to see him as he recovered, both in hospital and at home, ribbed him wickedly about how bleak his dining experiences were going to be. I suppose it was to be expected, but the protective tigress mama in me was roused and each time someone laughed and said “It’s sawdust and straw for you now” I bristled with swift indignation and parried with “Not at all. We are going to have Dining Adventures - all new tastes - experiments with flavors and textures and foods we’ve never heard of before.” We did, too. I didn’t try to find the lo-fat equivalent of my spaghetti recipe. It’s a perfect recipe and it’s a killer and we just dropped it from the menu. In the 9 months since the big one hit, we have had spaghetti only once. We’ll do so again one of these days, but in the mean time, we’ve just tried different things. But the important thing is that we approached a situation, not as some horrid burden that we must submit to - but as an adventure full of mystery, newness and opportunities for personal expansion. And that’s really how I’m looking at the Stagnant Stash. As a new country I get to visit - like a year abroad - a visit to foreign shores. I’ll have to speak a new language, the language of creating; with luck and hope, the language of completion. I won’t forget how to speak yarn-shop crawl and shopping with friends. I know it will be waiting for me when I master this new language. In the end I’m really hoping that I’ll be able to combine the two into something that is better than the sum of its parts. Lucky readers will be able to follow my progress through the land of TheQueen’s Stash. To catch you up with what I’ve been working on lately - I spent Friday at B’s house - or rather, in B’s studio. I am completely envious (in the healthiest way) of B. She has that dream object of every crafter/maker/finger person - a studio. It is a fabulous studio with walls lined with deep cabinets, so you can put everything away if you want to - and three huge tables so that you can leave everything out if that’s what you want. A whole quilt can be laid out on them. There are bright glass doors and skylight windows. There’s an a/v set up with a rocking chair in front of it - in case you need to watch an EZ video or a Deb Menz tape. And there is a space that looks like a 3 car garage with an enormous counter down one side, piped with H/C water and just begging to have a dye shop set up in it. It’s really almost enough studio for a couple to live in, since there’s a sleeping loft and a library and room for a pool table. It’s really a space I never want to leave once I get there. We played with her toys all afternoon and I knit a bit on the BSHP sweater. I’d hoped to have the front done by the end of this long weekend but I’ll have to stitch all day to get there now. Partly that’s because I’ve been working on the Austerman Barkerole swatch. THANK YOU Isobel - that was exactly the stitch I’d remembered and I even checked out the book SocksSocksSocks from the library. Alas. It won’t work with this project. That stitch is knit from the top down - perfect for sock cuffs - and if you want to knit a hat/sweater/garment from the top down it is just right. But I’m developing a sweater that’s knit bottom up and there’s no way I can catch those wings with a bobble. Sigh. The upshot of that disappointment, though, was a Saturday spent experimenting with a lace angel. I think I have something that I like, though I haven’t knit it to the exact dimensions yet. I’ll do that today, before getting back to the BSHP. This is the very first time I’ve ever tried to design a lace stitch all by myself. I’d call myself an advanced beginner when it comes to lace, but it’s one of those skills I know I could develop. It all makes sense to me at some intuitive level. So this mental activity is very rewarding in spite of the knitting and frogging I have to do to make it happen. And even if the pattern turns out to be too big for the sweater design I’m imagining, it’s one I can use in something else - maybe a Heavenly Shawl. There are 2 more days of this sweet long weekend and this one is both sunny and windy. A cold front swept in last night and blew away the rain. That means I will do laundry today, a task often complicated by winter weather, since I don’t have a dryer. Tomorrow a friend comes over to learn about spinning. My - I really like this working part time. I wish I could get the full time paycheck and keep the hours. I know this is the wordiest of blogs - and wish I had more pictures to brighten things up around here. Perhaps, my stricter shopping habits will leave some $ for a digital camera. But at least I can offer someone else’s picture - from another cute quizilla quiz. I would rather have been basil but this will do.  YOU ARE CHAMOMILE What herb are you? brought to you by Quizilla posted by Bess | 8:44 AM |
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