Summer meets September

This summer, I decided I would take better care. You could list just about anything there, and it would fit. Eat better, walk more, cook (I used to) more, separate from work more, connect with friends, write a letter, sew, clean, read...

The last few years I have been particularly unkind to myself, and it doesn't help me care for others particularly well. I got a little lost.

This summer I took a couple road trips. It sounds super ridiculous any way I type it, (and I've backspaced five times now), but I had lost track of my better me.

I'm happy to report that I'm hanging onto a bit of that summer resolution. The fact that I'm hanging onto a bit of it in what is usually a whirlwind month of activity is pretty remarkable.

My alarm just went off. I have to get a cup of tea going so I can get into my next several hours of work with lots of people.

Here's a glimpse of my September report:







I'll come back for story telling. In the meanwhile, I hope you'll make something yummy. I may make another apple crumble tonight!

So International

The pattern designer is from Germany.



She gave the pattern an Italian name.

Frangiflutti. (Pattern on Ravelry.)


I picked up the yarn on a trip - Happy, by Wendy - at John Lewis in London.



So this is a British Breakfront. (Frangiflutti, translated, as I understand it.)



The yarn is bamboo - a little nylon for stability.
Really, you know, I think it looks kind of wabi-sabi.

======
Knitting details - used US 7 needles. Used up all but 2-3 yards.

It's now in a gift bag, ready to move on.

Enfin quoi?
(Oh this internet and it's fancy dictionaries....)

About that Pagona post

My posting skills the other day were pretty sketchy. I lost part of the original post.

About that Pagona. The post title was not carried out in the post. I gave it away. (I also went back into the post to fix that.)

It did not need to be a scarf I should keep. It was the PERFECT prezzie for one of my costume grads. Even when I was knitting it, I kept thinking the color would REALLY suit her. And, as I said in the newly edited post, she's a good match for the spiky drama of a capelet sized Pagona.

Now knitting another giftie scarf out of Happy, a yarn from Wendy, the UK yarn distributer/manufacturer.



The pattern is Frangiflutti, an interesting little assymmetrical kerchief.

Almost done, actually. End of summer knitting push....

Not a Keeper - and I'm okay with that

Finished the scarf.

Enjoyed the knitting. Both pattern, Stephen West's Pogona, and yarn, Tosh Light Merino, were pleasant to handle.

Love the color - richer than this photo, but I just want to post today and move along.

And I gave it away. It was the PERFECT prezzie for one of my costume grads. Even when I was knitting it, I kept thinking the color would REALLY suit her. And she's a good match for the spiky drama of a capelet sized Pagona.

Own. Up.

After funny angles and triple chins and odd incognito sunglasses, I give in.

Thanks to mittenfarce for the Habu Moire which inspired the whole deal!

Incognito Finito

Nearly Done & Nearly Gone

Not sure what would run out soonest, the moire, the shoshenshi, my single crochet mojo, or the day.

Time to sleep. I may use up the yarn pretty nearly, but not this weekend.

Linen Fix

August can seem sometimes a month of Sundays. I love the drama queen "forever" of the phrase "a month of Sundays."

August holds a long deliberate stretch of heat and rest. It wants quiet and a book and a cold glass that tinkles with ice and leaves condensed pools of liquid on the table.

August demands the attention of the last preparatory stretch before the big Monday of school.

August tells me to hustle with all the things I've not yet readied.

August tells me to slow down before the real hustle begins.

This August weekend I paused for a little linen fixation.

Feels like August. Needs a great brim, one that goes forever.

Classics

Can't put a date to the cartoon, but it has been clipped to this page for a long time.

Food on a stick.

Expanded - more food, more fun!

So it's true. I have both of these.
Yes there is some crossover. Perhaps a fair bit.

But hey, it was on sale.

And as I was no longer living in Minnesota, it was an extra fix of food writing fun.

Kathy's Uncle Al Has a Goofy Fan

Before there were food blogs, there was the lovely ritual of catching the Minneapolis Star Tribune food column by Mr. Al Sicherman.
I only lived in St. Paul for a year. I have a vague memory of reading it aloud: oh, those green days of being newly minted theatre grads trying to find jobs.

We'd read aloud, yes indeedy, at each other.

Socks, Blended

I MUST get batteries for the camera. Phone photos are lousy for color.

Yarn is Dyeabolical Alter Ego.
Colorway is Frogs IAB - that is, In A Blender.
Pattern is Wendy Johnson's Sunrise Socks.
Needle size 1.5, US.
Sock size, the smallest width, curiously.

Will be interested to see how the color holds and how the size holds.
As they are for me, there's no stress hidden behind that statement.

I forget when I started them, but they are done.

Time to get knitting sorted out for camp.

Starfall - Look for this book in the fall!

Lovely book coming out this fall. Starfall.

My dear friend Diana wrote the story and is the lovely clown in the hoopskirt.

I'd embed things, but the photos are ABSOLUTELY copyrighted, and I don't know if the trailer has limited access. Posting the link to the publisher and the trailer, this I can do.

It's charming. CHARMING. Plan ahead. Tell your indie bookseller.

Great towering cat blankets!

My mother and I compared notes about what we did on the 4th. "My usual," she said. She cleaned and did laundry, preparing for her sister's visit today.

I did much the same, though my company is further down the road. I continued my summer project of cleaning out the Andy Warhol boxes from various stories and stages. Filled up bags of paper recycling, found - at last! - the missing box of denim scraps. Washed up a bunch of fabric and sorted vintage sewing supplies, putting some in the freezer for quarantine, some into bags to donate to the shop, and the rest of it into the right places on the sewing shelves.

I gave myself a break by tackling the towel and sheet shelves of the closet. This extended to purging and tidying the storage of other household textiles in other closets, tubs, and bags. Packed up a bag for the Animal Care League. Towels are topped by a stack of 8 quick little cat quilts - pillow cases with stitched-in folded quarters of old mattress pads. None of the materials would have been suited for thrift, and it took no time at all to whomp them together.

Time to go drop them off at the shelter.

I know. None of this is particularly sexy blog posting. Still, the amusement of it all is keeping me on track.

Wonder what I want to get done tonight....?

Full

A Paltry Summer to Summer Count and other lists

What am I thinking?
Not only is this post late, the summer to summer tally is short, short, short. From Memorial Day to Memorial Day was the initial intent. An appropriate textile year - not calendar nor fiscal - June lets me start fresh. It's almost the end of June. You'd think I'd forgotten.

What did I knit?
This year was BUSY. The knitting was not so great. I completed knitting a grand total of:
Three Whole Scarves
One Cowl
One Pair of Socks

What, no more knitting?
Au contraire. True, much of the knitting in progress this year has drifted in and out of actual progress:
1. There was a variant of an 1860's "bosom friend" shawl destined for costume use. Sewing took priority, and so that is languishing.
2. There's some progress on the cotton blanket.
3. I stalled on a pair of gloves for my nephew, who will likely not be wanting them for cross country in fall. Stalled for questions of size, the glove has now had a fitting and should be fit to return to active knitting.
4. After a false start of a third of a foot, one of the socks from the wonderfully named Frogs in a Blender colorway is actually done, and the next is underway.
5. Knitting a Stephen West scarf for myself. I am doing the dance of no leftovers, hoping that I will gauge the knitting correctly so I have the perfect amount of yarn left for the finishing.

What DID I do?
A. A year long project involving Civil War era costumes. I have increased my lifetime count of making men's tailored jackets from two to well over a dozen.
B. Tenure and promotion.
C. Directed two shows.
D. Put on unnecessary weight. (See A, B, C, B, and B.)
E. Lowered my blood pressure and cholesterol, despite D.

What am I doing now?
Excellent question. That's for another post. Some evidence in the previous post.

Knitting Summer

Practicing slowing down.



Visiting friends.
Remembering I cook.
Walking.

Getting rid of stuff.

Thinking about blogs and letters.

Going to a few plays.

Oh. Look at the time. I better not slow down now. Curtain waits for no slowpoke.

On We Go

I wonder what I would draw today, were I to follow the steps Betty Edwards describes in Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain for creating analog drawings of abstract ideas or emotions.

I might draw a crossroads, though that feels puzzling to have just typed. I foresee no change of job and am not organized enough at the moment for a house purchase. I don't have large questions hanging in front of me with audiences rapt for an answer. But then, I might not draw about me.

I might draw a blank, all puns intended. I am tired, that's for darned sure. I have had twelve months of crazypants, if I may borrow the clever term from the glamourblogs of knittinglore. I have a lot I want to do, wish to do, and still must do in this transition from spring to summer. Finding it hard to start today. And then, I might not draw about things to do.

I'd steer away from drawing the symbol or the icon: no sad face, no tear. Though an old friend of mine has died, a too-young friend, and I cried today at home as I needed, the stories to tell are not as simple as those symbols.

I'd draw, though, with purpose.

I'd draw lines full of energy. I'd draw a line which bursts into more lines, which gives new starts, which starts other tragectories. I'd draw a line which looks for new space, for new beginnings, for other fascinating and glorious lines to support, shape, embellish, and let go. I'd draw a line that let go.

I'd draw a line that would say go on: On we go!

In memoriam: Randall Wreghitt

With thanks for friendship, support, a bit of mentoring, and laughter that spanned almost 30 years.
You were a gift to many - and a great, great example to follow.
Your online status always closed with the phrase above, and it will be no surprise that your love for the theatre will go on in the work of so many you celebrated.

Sadly without you, happily for having known you, on we go.

Worn out but in awe

I consider myself quite fortunate.

I have had some amazing students. They work hard, they struggle uphill when they must, they challenge themselves, and they go extra miles.

I am exhausted right now. It has been a spring of madness on the heels of an endless winter and an overbusy fall.

I'm also looking forward to having them go away for a little while: I can't wait to have some knitting, sewing, and cleaning time for myself.

Still breathing. That is, when they don't take my breath away.

Awe, I tell you.

Oh Heck, it's up to my neck!

With apologies to Shel Silverstein, as I misappropriate and misquote "I'm being swallowed by a boa constrictor."

Busy. More later.

Too much sewing. I have to scramble to the top of the pile.