Another Albers Rug: Play of Squares

Another knitted & felted rug I made based on a design by Bauhaus fiber artist Anni Albers. This one is based on Play of Squares.

Pattern available here.

99 Views of Wilco

I've been having a great time going through my pictures of the Solid Sound Festival three weeks ago (June 24-26). And, since I imagine that everybody else can't get enough of my concert photography, here's a collage I put together of of 99 pictures I took at the two Wilco shows.

Actually, to be honest, it's 98 pictures of Wilco and one picture of Pajama Club.

Full-screen downloadable version here: http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/59408454

Black-White-Yellow Bauhaus Rug

Another book-review-vacation post: check out this pattern for a knitted & felted rug based on a design by Bauhaus fiber artist Anni Albers.

Black-White-Yellow Rug Pattern

I think I'm a bad dumpster diver

The other day I saw a mess of two-by-fours in the dumpster at a home that's being renovated around the corner from us. I grabbed a set of them that had been nailed together three different ways and spent about 45 minutes ripping them apart with a tiny little pry bar and a 6 or 7 ounce hammer, until, finally, I broke the hammer. I got all the nails out of two of the boards, which are eight footers, and the third one is still riddled with nails. Seems like a lot of trouble for wood that would have cost me $5.42 cents. At least I didn't hurt myself.

Dibbles

This morning I passed a small pile of recently-pruned cherry tree branches at the Arnold Arboretum. Some of them still had flowers on them. I thought about taking a big fat section home to make into spoons, but then I remember the stack of curing maple and wild cherry wood I have already waiting for my attention, and I took a small branch instead.

I took the smallest piece--about finger-thick--and stripped the bark off with a paring knife. Then I whittled away the dark, moist outer layer, leaving just the inner wood. Then I used a handsaw to cut off the sharp ends where I had snapped the branch into dibble-sized pieces.

I feel like I should know what that middle layer is called--sapwood? Cambium? Or is it simply the inner bark?

At any rate, I know have two lovely, handmade dibbles that I plan to use (tonight if I can get myself organized) to start seeds for my new garden.

Felt

For my first attempt at knitting in the continental style, I decided to make felted pot-holders.

I made a pair, one in all knit garter stitch and one in all pearl garter stitch. (I even did a few rows of pearling in the "Portuguese style," [with yarn tensioned around neck, which I think would be more properly called Arab Style], which was amazingly fast and easy for pearling. It's a bit tricky for knitting but I think maybe worth learning.) It turns out garter stitch is not great for felting pot-holders, but they work fine as hot pads for warm serving dishes on the table. And the felting process did a nice job of evening out my sketchy first-time-ever-knitting-this-way tension.

I have also been using them as a bottom layer of insulation underneath the warm jars of fermenting milk when I make yogurt.

Color Theory

Two caps, same plate, same lighting, same settings on the camera.

Dishrag (Detail)

Inspired by the lovely handmade dishrags I saw in the eponymous book from the good folks at the Mason-Dixon Knitting blog, I recently made a simple garter-stitch cloth from a small stash of cotton yarn I've had in my hoard for more than a decade. The yarn is Classic Elite Provence, made in Greece for a company based in Lowell, Massachusetts, where a fair amount of spinning was done, back in the day. The color is called Lapis.

The idea behind the dishrags in the book is to teach beginners that it's okay to actually use hand-knit items – they don't all have to be kept in acid-free tissue paper as heirlooms. I've never had a problem using the things I make, but I do sometimes tend to hold on to things for a long time, waiting for the perfect project to use a piece of raw material (be it a hank of yarn or a writing idea). So for me this dishrag is a little reminder that sometimes it's best to find the most useful thing we can do now with what we have on hand, rather than waiting for perfect to come along.

It's also nice to have this beautiful, soft, drapey piece of cloth that I made myself, with great pleasure, to use on more mundane tasks like getting pureed spaghetti and cheese off of Dahlia's plate.

Live, Bubbling Yogurt with Whey

1-2-3-4 Cupcake with Sour Cream Frosting

A New Sweater for Lucas

Wollaston Beach

Broa

Drop Spindled, Gartered

Drop Spindled