The Season Approaches.....!

Do NOT FAIL to sign up for Candace Eisner-Strick's incredibly useful, ENTERTAINING workshops on the docket at Artisan Knitworks in mid-April.   Call 586-871-2884.  You will be a better knitter for it -- that much I can guarantee.

Also -- very soon, I'll be renting cute little Enterprise cars more and more often -- the poor VW Bug is getting old, creaky, like the rest of us.....and driving off to various fiber-related events, some of them quite small.   But that's where the new producers can be found -- testing their wings, toes in the water, whatever metaphor you prefer.  In Portland, Indiana, for instance, there is something called the Jay County Fiber Festival (March 8-10), which occurs on the eve of my spring-break trip to Minnesota to visit family and good friends..........might consider folding that one into the Minnesota trip.  The Great Smoky Mountain Fiber Arts Festival is held a week later in Tennessee -- I don't think Larry and I will go this year (it was small, and while the scenery was gorgeous, overall the 'take' wasn't sufficient to justify costs).  But then there is the March 24 all-day Festival held by the Black Swamp Spinning Guild in Bowling Green, OH, which is a must -- LOTS of high-quality yarn and roving, plus some good friends to squeeze.  That may be the formal opening of the fiber fest season for me.   More later!

svb

Off to Pittsburgh...!

This past weekend, I went off on a seat-of-the-pants trip to Pittsburgh -- actually Mars, PA -- to take a workshop with Stephen Be, who is an amazing designer-shop owner working in Minneapolis at a place called the Yarn Garage.  Google his shop name and prepare to be astonished. 

As it turns out, SB was trained at a number of art schools, including the Minneapolis Institute and the Parsons School before undertaking a number of detours into work that I took to be wholly unsuitable (I cannot imagine this quite interesting man working at Munsingwear!).  But now he's doing his thing with yarn and other fabrications.......The workshop was supposed to be about making creative use of knitting and ancillary crafts.  No rules, he kept saying -- and what happened wasn't his fault, to be sure.  As it turned out, I didn't feel very well, and so was absolutely not prepared to crawl around on the floor with everyone.  He decided we ought to work on ArtFelt projects, which involved ArtFelt backing, big pieces of thin feltable wool, and other kinds of yarn to create designs for scarves and hangings that woud be hauled off for heat treatment at the end of the workshop.  First, I'm not a wall-hanging, needle-felting kind of person -- especially when you have to do entire acres of it on your hands and knees.  I had brought a plain-jane felted mohair scarf that I had hoped to do something with and to with embellishment.....also a yard of gorgeous black suede that seems to me to fairly sing for "poncho" or "capelet" transformation, with some kind of artful crocheted trim and sleeves, etc.   But I frankly didn't think that I was going to get much help with these off-the-main-drag projects, given the size of the class, and the very idea of being on my knees did me in.  I begged off on the ground that I didn't feel good.  Not untrue.  I went to the market instead and connected with friend Demian of Blue Heron Yarn, walked off with three gorgeous skeins of his metallic-rayon yarn, and contemplated driving home.  The weather was turning.

I should have followed my first instinct.  Didn't feel good.  Postponed.  But:  How much harder would it have been, after all, to sit in a fancy rental car on cruise control than to sit in my room knitting?  Overnight, the weather turned really nasty.  VERY early in the morning, I got in the car, quite alarmed at the amount of snow, the wind, the weather reports, and began the trek back.   Just outside of Pittsburgh, things worsened -- there was a squall-type blizzard.  Cars were moving at about 25 miles an hour.....kept moving.  Then I got lost looking for some kind of decent breakfast (not to be found at the Sheraton Four Points, where the Pittsburgh Fiber Festival was held -- they wanted a HUGE sum of money for a big buffet, and all I wanted really was outmeal, which they wouldn't provide).  I found myself lost and hungry, having got off the road to wait out the storm, and then I really got lost -- decided just to drive and see where I ended up.

The result was just amazing.  Getting lost can be delightful.  I found myself in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, across the street from Geneva College -- which I gather is a Christian College of some quality.  I saw "coffee" on a big brick house, stopped basicaly in a no-parking  zone (who cares when it's snowing?), and went in.  I had accidentally stumbled on the Beaver Falls Coffee Company, a really great espresso and light meal place specializing in WAFFLES!   The coffee was superb.  The students with whom I got to talk were really really really FINE.  And then the waffle came -- a big, fluffy affair called a Veggie Waffle laced with -- you guessed it -- vegetables.  I skipped the sour cream -- it didn't need anything.  Savory.  A restful, delightful place to spend an hour.  If you're anywhere near this little town, it's well worth the detour.  The owners live upstairs!

Then I got back in the white Chrysler 200 and found the freeway with the help of my trust Mathilda, who I had thought I wouldn't need.......got to the Ohio border, when all of sudden another big blizzard.  At that point, I was really glad I'd grown up in Minnesota.  I'm generally not undone by snow and ice.  Just slowed down.  And, predictably, I got to the studio in late afternoon.  

But the 4.5 hour trip had become 6.5 hours, I was exhausted, and so I went home and dropped into a chair, thinking that I'd never get up again.

I did, of course.  Everyone, stay well, and happy looping, whether knitted or crocheted!   svb

Back Again!

Sorry for SUCH a long wait for another entry -- or two in this case.   First,  let's have a look at Knit Michigan.   Every year, a number of Michigan shops gather in a Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, school for a charitable event called Knit Michigan.....This year, I offered a couple of classes -- one of them involved making knitted and crocheted flowers, and it was immensely fun.  We made a huge pile of yarn in the middle of the table and, working from my overlong handout, just lit into it and made some blooms, which is a lovely thing to do on a February day in Michigan.   In the market area, I caught some quick snaps of good friends -- among them, Joanne Cole, one of my favorite yarn company reps:

....and then there was Deanna Van Asche, who does the most amazing vintage-style beading (on the left, with the beautiful necklaces):

......and of course our great, great friend Sybil Williams, who's seated just to the left of center in a shawl that she started and finished in one of our Knit-Togethers:

....and finally, a spinner whose name I didn't learn, but who epitomizes the event's ecumenical spirit:

....and now let me move on to a description of my recent trip to Pittsburg.   See next entry!!!!    svb

Spring Before Winter???

Snow melts the minute it hits the ground.  Surely this is some kind of bizarre joke -- when does winter start?  It's already February first.  Or maybe I'm just being a Minnesotan who KNOWS (has always known) that Michigan typically has really pathetic excuses for winters.  This one is just particularly wimpish!

The plans for the spring season are already forming.  I really look forward to the fiber festival season this year; I am yearning for a series of road trips -- anything to get me away from the computer and these messy, unfinished footnotes, maybe with chunks of text stowed on a laptop so that I can work them over in the peace and quiet of motel rooms, where phones don't ring and e-mail doesn't seem so urgent.

There is an intriguing tiny festival (maybe a dozen vendors) in Indiana in early March -- the Jay County Fiber Festival in Portland, Indiana, from March 8-10, to which I've never been.  Might be the first year of the event -- can't tell from the website.  I may just rent a car and have a look on that Friday -- it's only 4 hours, maybe less, the way I drive..........I note with more than the usual interest that Portland, IN, seems to be some kind of mecca for antique shops.  Larry might want to come with me (buttons!!!!).  Then Greencastle, also in Indiana, and of course after that, the pace quickens.

Also, Larry and I will go to Minnesota at some point in my spring break -- between March 12 and 17th -- for at least 4 days.  What a good thing.  I can see my dearest old friend, Julie, and her partner, plus my two (or three or four) nieces and favorite nephew -- and maybe hit all the antique shops and wool shops while showing Larry why I think St Paul and Minneapolis would be good places to live.  I really do think that.  I have some fears about such a return, which I won't spell out here -- it's family stuff.  But in the end, I have yet to find an affordable city with such wonderful amenities.  Chicago is better in physical terms, but it's WAY too expensive for people like us.  The only down side, of course, is the horrible winter.  But the cool thing about Minnesotans is that they adapt -- really well -- with tunnels and lots of other clever apparatus.  So we will go look.  If he hates it, we'll hunker down here, once I retire in a couple of years.

svb

OOPS!

Sounds like Rick Perry, doesn't it?

Except it's me.  I am SO sorry to have neglected the blog.  It's the start of semester and I"m really done in with three classes this time -- my payment for having only one last term. 

But I'm excited about some things at the studio.

First:  Candace Eisner Strick will be coming April 26-28 with two fabulous FABULOUS workshops -- the first a day-long treat called 25 Slick Tricks for Knitters (life-saving and ingenious), the second a long half-day's workshop about socks -- employing her amazing book, Strick-ly Socks.   So call the shop and ask quickly.  We are already getting some reservations based on word of mouth and Larry's newsletters.  It's 586-871-2884.  

Second:  I can't reveal much now, but.....four shops are working on a Big Deal for September, 2012.  Mum's the word.  But look for a huge, huge announcement.

Third:  I am half-done with my wonderful little vest (for Larry, but really as an addition to my pattern series -- the world NEEDS men's patterns) that I'm going to call Eastern Shore Vest, because the  yarn in which I'm working is Solitude, a truly stunning real American wool, handdyed in Maryland, by two women who are part of the small farm movement.  They sell it at Maryland Sheep and Wool and also at a farmer's market in D.C.  My god it's wonderful stuff -- toothy, spongy, as good wool always is, with a little bit of the lanolin remaining after the hand-dying (no chemicals!!!!), and so it's like putting on a thin film of hand lotion every time I pick it up and knit for awhile.  This Aran-weight yarn will wash like a dream and plump up into a spongy, springy pile of fat stitches -- something that I wish knitters would consider when they pick up these gorgeous American or old-breed wools and say OOOOOH it's PICKY.   Not picky.  Just wool.  That's the way wool is supposed to be until it's washed in gentle soap -- or, better yet, a rinseless agent like Soak, which was created by two Canadian women trained in chemistry.  You can have softer wool, you can even have single-ply wool.  But often (not always), it's overprocessed.  It will pill.  It won't wear as well as plied wool.  And odds are that neither single-ply nor overprocessed yarn, when made into knitwear, will be heirlooms.  Solitude (and maybe the Eastern Shore Vest, unless Larry drops food all over it!) will be found in a tomb or some kind of basement in an urban ruin, long after we're all gone, ready to wear, albeit with some dust and maybe some worm holes.  Knitting has been found in Egyptian tombs, for heaven's sake, still in good enough shape to be recognizable.  You just have to pick the right materials.  I will be glad when knitters come to their senses about wool, which really DOES come with texture sometimes!!!!!  The range is much broader than people think.  Outwear (thick cardigans, peasants' vests, some jackets, coats) really benefit from sturdy, toothy materials.  Merino is only one kind of wool.   And toothy wool really DOES bloom and soften in water.  Remember how sheep stand out in the rain?  Nothing horrible happens.  GOOD things happen.  Too bad they don't know how to wash themselves -- they'd smell better AND soften in the summer rain!

Anyway:  I promise to check back more often, with some photographs.

svb

I-Phone Covers

....so I got a new Android Scary Telephone -- it actually responds to voice commands, which is uttery terrifying -- and decided that it needed a simple cover to protect the screen.  Here is (roughly) what you do (I made five of them so far to sell in the studio):   To make front, wIth a size G hook and DK-weight cotton (or rayon ribbon) yarn, chain 15 +1 to turn.  I used a cool variegated cotton by Gedifra for most of them and a true blue Karabella rayon ribbon (with acrylic 'beads') for one of them.  You need about 90 yards.  Work about 24-26 rows in SC, ending with a WS row.  The number of rows depends on the size of the intended telephone -- you might want to check against the actual instrument.  My Samsung Galaxy S (i.e., the spaceship phone) with plastic back-case attached required 26 rows in the DK cotton and 24 rows in the slightly more rigid rayon ribbon.  Fasten off.   For back and foldover flap:  Repeat the exercise for the front until you have completed the 24-26 rows.  Work 2 more rows even (fto give the flap you're about to make an opportunity to fold over the front of phone).  Then, on RS rows, decrease one stitch at each side of the flap (which will emerge, as if by magic), working even in SC on the WS rows, until you have about 5 sts left, ending with WS row.  (To decrease, pull up loops in the next two sts, YO, pull through all 3 loops, work to the last 2 sts, pull up loops in 2 sts, YO, pull through all 3 loops).  When done, chain 7 or so for a button loop; It should arc slightly over the 5 remaining sts.  Anchor the chains at the far side of the button hole area to form loop; work back over the chains with slip stitch (to strengthen loop); securely attach at the point of origin (slip st deeply into the appropriate SC).  Now, place WS's of the two pieces together, pinning if necessary at the 4 corners.  For DK cotton and other smooth yarns, work a row of SC all around the body (3 sides, excluding the flap) with 3 sc's at the two corners.  I wouldn't use a contrasting yarn because, with simple SC edging, the wrong side is actually less attractive than the right side.  For textural ribbons and other unsmooth yarns, you can 'sew' 1 st in from the 3 sides with a simple slip st.  Darn in all ends, working a couple of whip stitches at flap end to better secure the points about to be subjected to lots of stress.  Put phone (or a phone-sized object) into the cover, close flap, and mark the location of button with a T-pin.  Sew on the button (you probaby will have to fold the body of the case back to do this).  Pick one that has some size and glitz -- at least .75 inches.  I chose even bigger ones.   Fun, huh?  Also easy.  It's all in the yarn and button choice.  You can do the same, of course, for low-tech cell phones -- just chain only 8-9 sts (use your phone as a model) plus 1 to turn and GO.  Variations:  Depending on yarn, you of course can vary the st pattern, use a crab stitch or picot edging, make stripes -- on and on.

You could, of course, do the whole thing in the round and simply work the flap upward, once the body tube is done.  But I wanted a flat case, one that wouldn't be tempted to roll around.

Or you could just buy one in the studio for a mere $19.50!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   smiling

Happy Christmas Eve!    svb

At the holidays...

I'm not quite done with the mountain of essay and final exam grading that inevitably follows end of term.  But, as usual, I'm drawn into a series of waking dreams about holidays past -- Christmases, Hannukahs -- in which the healing, life-saving qualities of wool have figured large, at least for me.  I have been thinking about the long drives in very old, ramshackle cars (and in one case, a 1952 Ford pickup truck) from various small towns in Minnesota to St. Paul, where the grandparents lived, just in time for Christmas -- and for quiet times beside the fire and the jovially lighted Christmas tree with steel crochet hook, working steadily toward the lace curtain, the lace edging for a cheap pillowcase.  Those were my grandmother's habits, the ones that helped her survive poverty, a partial mental breakdown at menopause, the hideously unexpected birth of yet another son at age 54.  She would crochet.  And she taught me to do the same thing.  From tragedy and desperation came things of achingly beautiful delicacy.

I remember making my first sweater -- I'm about to reveal something I almost never talk about -- when my father filed bankruptcy.  They hauled away his grand piano.  I had never seen him cry.  He cried and cried and cried.  And so mother and I did the only thing we could do, once we had hugged him for awhile -- we took out the crochet hooks and worked on some squares for a blanket.  And then we gave it away.

At every Episcopal church to which I belonged, and to most of the parishes for which I served as church organist -- something that continued until age 29 -- there were church bazaars at Christmas.  We would make endless objects with needles, hooks, sewing machines, many of them literally out of nothing.  My mother and I transformed old quilts into new ones by recycling the padding and making new covers; we covered cardboard boxes, tubes, and squares with all manner of cloth, embroidery, crochet.  We made belts out of crochet thread and beads.  It was the original environmentally sound society, wasn't it, this society of thrifty, lower-class women?  And at the heart of it were our hands, our imaginations, our crafts.

When my first husband died, I knitted in the big maroon chair in the living room deep into the night, almost every night, and then slept there, because I couldn't stand to be in the bedroom.  I don't think I would have got through it without my knitting.  When the school year ended, I hit the wall -- so I piled an immense pile of wool in many colors into the trunk of the VW Beetle, complete with jeans and sandals, and headed west, making green modular squares at each stop between Michigan and Washington State.  I made a particularly garish one in the Black Hills waiting for prairie dogs to pop up on an off-road departure from the main highway.  I made others in Sioux Falls, SD, after driving right up to my old childhood home at 106 South Prairie, and Worthington, Minnesota..........and so on.  When I got home, I assembled the whole thing into a cardigan that I now call my Running Away From Home Sweater.  Wool kept me sane, didn't it?

I went to Rome the second year for Christmas -- with wool and needles, of course -- to forge new pathways for myself (it was a city that I associated with him), and I remember vividly sitting on the balcony of my gorgeous old hotel listening to the Christmas bells from St. Peter's Basilica, pealing over rooftops and onto the balcony like some kind of presence -- I knitted until there was no light, and in the morning knitted some more, and then wrote a long, long poem about being there and listening for the bells, hearing them fall away into darkness.  Then my niece and nephew came, and Rome was saved for me -- because of them, of course, because they saw the place with new eyes and not with my old, saddened eyes, but also because of the rhythmic movement of yarn over needles.

For the next Christmas, I went to Barbados -- a huge pile of wool in tow -- made a sweater while I was gone, just made it up, free form -- taking color cues from the water, the sand, the sense of joy as water slapped against rocks.  I sold it only a year ago for far less money than I'd paid for the yarn -- but it didn't matter.  The knitting had done its good work long before the sale.  And then, midyear, when I felt uncommonly sad, I made arrangements with my dear friend Vivian Hart (of Essex, England) to meet in the Orkney Islands.  How could I forget sitting by myself (Vivian was watching birds) on a tiny spit of an island called Papay Westray, a game preserve, with seals not ten feet away -- and my knitting needles, a gorgeous pile of Scottish wool assuming the shape of a pullover, colors like moss and lichen and rock?  The seals had no idea that they ought to be terrified -- though not of me.  I cannot imagine harming something so gentle, so innocent and trusting.

There are more instances.  Everyone who works with wool knows what I mean.  Happy holidays to all of you, each and every one, and guard yourselves.  We come this way only once.

svb