First Project with Handspun

Got some fiber from Lisa Souza. 50/50 fine-merino/bombyx-silk in Sourball, Winter Pansy and Leafpile. Started with 8 to 15g of each, split in half, then each half split 3 or 4 times and attentuated, with approximately equal yet randomly chosen amounts of each colorway in each single, which was spun long-draw and somewhat relaxed, and then plied moderately hard. Barberpoling could be a good thing.

So I have a few balls of yarn, spun at different times and temperaments during this month of March: 167g, 473y, predominantly fingering weight.

With this handspun I started another High Road yesterday, with a few minor modifications. We'll see how it goes.

A Week Later

Eliminate one sense and the others become heightened.

Walk in the dark after days and days of heavy rain and you cannot see much. Pay just enough attention to the ground so that you don't trip or slip and hurt yourself - you are not immortal anymore and an injury would be painful and very inconvenient. The moon is gone and the clouds overhead keep the warmth in the evening air so that it does not bite your nose or lungs as it did a few weeks ago. You realize that the air does not smell like cars or people or animals. It is fragrant, though. There is the heavy sweetness of mock orange, and high tones of early blooming bulbs like narcissus and hyacinth, possibly cherry blossoms. Although you cannot see these things in the dark, you imagine they are nearby. The scents that cannot be identified get parsed in the mind for future reference. Is that the sharp and pungent oil of native California sage? How can that be if the only other time you've identified it was on a dry warm day? Maybe you smell the fresh green of dandelions and grass and tender flowers.

It has been raining, very heavily at times, for over two weeks. But the earth is warming up, and it is no longer cold and sleeping. Time to take more blind walks.

Primal

Skins, metal, wood: percussion is made of these things.

Skins stretched over a framework, metal shells sheets and rods that ring, and wood blocks that are smooth or ribbed. Percussion is the beating of the body or stick onto these materials, and the beating transmits the rhythm and force of the body through the space of sound. We've been communicating this way for thousands of years. We dance, we sway, we shout with these instruments which are a direct extension of our bodies.

Les Percussions de Strasbourg performed recently, and each work was distinctive and from the 20th century. The tones, textures, timbres from skins, metal and wood were varied, complex and engaging. Although this modern music does not have "pitch" per se, it has tones that includes the growl of huge drums, tingling harmonics of metal triangles, and drones that are generated from drumming wood and skins in an acoustically live space.  I heard sounds I have never heard before. I don't know how much the pieces were intended to be "intellectual", or of the mind only. I don't know if this is even a consideration in the composers' mind. For me the pieces had dance, sway, and expression in them.

The last piece, Hierophonie V (1974), by Yoshihisa Taira, began with shouts and rhythmic taiko-type drumming, followed by a quieter section, and ended with the shouts and drumming again. Suddenly the earthquake, tsunami, and on-going nuclear disaster in Japan all came rushing forward in a huge wave that paralyzed me, and this piece became the voice of humanity.

Have mercy on us.

Farm

Recent quotes or posts that have stuck with me:

_Are you a jumper or wader?
_Every day should be a good day to die.
_“Those who are free of resentful thoughts surely find peace.” - Buddha

Intangibles

Happy Valentine's Day

This post is from a perspective beyond the consumer mentality of material goods - beyond the adage of "the one with the most toys wins".  The toy-laden one could win with a brittle and cold heart.  But interaction with people can keep the heart malleable.  Alert to the malleable heart however - learning to live with vulnerability can be a challenge, too.  Regardless, when we are burdened, intangibles can buoy us and provide some sense of stability as we flounder with everything else around us.

Physical places provide opportunities to engage with other people and form a community.  One such place is A Verb for Keeping Warm (AVFKW), where people welcome you and there is space to pause and work or peruse their goods.  The climate in the shop is literally warm - warm people, warm and true light, warm goods.  They have built a place of community where people from the broad spectrum of skill levels - neophytes, dabblers, and teachers - gather and share.

Another place is the Mahea Uchiyama Center for International Dance (MUCID), where friendly people gather to dance and make music.  Dance instruction and performance is typically with live music and drumming - energy is mutually shared between musicians and dancers.  Dancers and musicians convey stories and pay homage through movement and music.

In addition to bricks and mortar, the internet can be a vehicle for community.  Social networking sites like Facebook may provide some semblance of community, however the platform changes too frequently for my taste.  Ravelry is a specialized site with a particular interest and focus on knitting, crocheting, and spinning.  Interaction and observations can be shared in groups, forums, and messages.  I don't know what the privacy settings are on Ravelry.  I don't feel a need to know.

Other examples are simple and are highlighted here as a reminder: an invitation to a gathering where an activity or interest is shared - playing music or making things with our hands.  A conversation with a neighbor as we each tend our gardens.  An exchange of homegrown fruit for a homemade meal.  A place of time and space where the ground rule is that we enter with the same spirit we wish to be greeted with.

High Road

High Road modelled by AVFKW

After two weeks of "commuter knitting" and a final push today, I finished and blocked "High Road" designed by Mary-Heather Cogar and commissioned by A Verb for Keeping Warm (AVFKW)'s Proverbial Club. 70/30 SW Merino/Silk "Metamorphosis" was dyed "Pilgrim" by AVFKW and evokes the heat, raw land, and minerals of Santa Fe.  The unique construction of this shawl really shows off the variegated yarn.  The shape of the shawl blossomed as I blocked it - the process was similar to that of a wet chick drying its feathers and becoming the more recognizable form we are familiar with (huh? nevermind - the lesson here is to make no big moves before blocking!).  I learn much from this Proverbial Club.

Marmalade from Homegrown

No images, just notes.
Last weekend we picked the oranges from our tree-bushes. Whereas the navel oranges are mild enough to eat out-of-hand, the other unidentified type is intensely aromatic, nearly bitter, and must be good for cooking, n'est-ce pas? Many of them were scrubbed with a new sponge. Many more await.

Quick, here's the data before I forget: 8C fruit, 7 or 8C fluid. Batch 1 had 8C base, batch 2 had 6C base. Used some raw along with the white sugar. Total yield: 8-12oz, 2-8oz, 4oz dregs.

Longer version: 8C chopped oranges and pulp, 2C squeezed orange juice + 4C (or was it 5C?) water + 1C lemon juice. Simmer for 5min, soak 18hr, simmer 45min. 8C (plus all that sugar) for the first batch is almost too much for the 3Q skillet. Boil to gel state, yields 5-12oz plus 4oz. Second batch is 6C, boil to gel state, yields 3-12oz plus 2-8oz plus 4oz in the leftover jar.

Jan 17: a year

First One: 4g, 7ft

A year ago on January 17, knitflix taught me how to use my spinning wheel. I learned to spin, then ply some wool that I had from an intro class several years before. 

Group of First Ones

How could I have known that I would embrace this medium! I've also been introduced to wonderful and helpful people along the way - my local fiber shop was pointed out to me when I called knitflix and said that "I ran out of fiber and need more, now." Yeah - need more *now* - a familiar phrase.







more fun than a barrel full of monkeys

Spinning fiber on a wheel or a spindle alters the fiber as well as the brain waves. Someone find a neurologist and hook me up - let's see what the readings show.

Thank you, J.

Fire in the hands

...from the Kundert Spindle, which was a gift to me. It is well balanced and just keeps going with a single push. Sweet.

Singles and plying were done on the spindle. I tried to spin beyond my typical laceweight zone and produced something between fingering and sportweight.

30g, 69.2yd, 2-ply, woolen, of Fiberfiend's flame.

Defiant blood oranges

2.5 lb CA blood oranges plus one lemon (8c total) plus 7c water plus 1c+8.5c raw+white sugar yields 10c marmalade. Damn the lack of electricity and the lack of other things. I have water and gas and a third-world connection from the fridge to the neighbor's outlet and I am making something fantastic and heating the kitchen and myself in the process.