robknits

Crash and burn, with updates

To recap:
     Since late April, I have been attending knitting events, taking classes, put in a garden, buying books, putting a warp on the floor loom, collecting images, buying yarn, working on designs, learning design techniques, renting a table loom, buying patterns, visited my mother, starting a sketchbook, traveling, putting a warp on the table loom, buying more books, visiting museums, buying DVDs...  oh, and I was working full time.

     And no one called ADD-911.

     A week after coming back from Washington, where I walked and stood through museum after museum, bookstore after bookstore, I was dressing the table loom for my long-awaited MAFA workshop.  I was running up against a deadline.  I was running back and forth between my home and the not-so local LYS to get more heddles.  I was trying to get the warp ready in time to leave for Scranton at about 4 pm. 
     As I was measuring yarn and sleying the reed, I realized I had not really processed what I had learned at Knitters Connection about designing with strips, about color design.  I had not read the books and magazines I had acquired.  I had not yet found my sketchbook -- in fact, I had not finished unpacking from the Washington trip.  Hmmm, I said.  Maybe I am overdoing it.  (Ya think?)  I also noticed the huge thunderstorm-bearing front racing into this area.
     At that point my vision flickered, and the mother of all migraines hit.  I stopped puking (sorry, too much information?) midday Friday.  The pain was completely gone by Saturday morning, and all I had to do was deal with the migraine hangover, the shakes, and the knowledge that I had:

• missed my MAFA workshop
• completely ignored all signs of two months of overstimulation
• burnt out so badly I couldn't even look at my stash
• responded to about 3 or 4 possible migraine triggers, all at once.

   

Sigh.

The sad thing?  I assumed I could calm myself down by reading through weaving and knitting magazines.  My body knew better.

OK.  Now it is Monday.  The post-migraine shakes are gone.  I am knitting again on existing projects.  That means Campanula and the Bamboozled tunic.   By switching off between the two I am avoiding the tendonitis that knitting with the cotton/linen/ramie mix triggers (I am using Rowan Kid Classic for the Bamboozled tunic).  No design questions left to answer, all decisions made, stitches that require enough attention to keep me occupied.  Knitting as occupational therapy.

I am continuing to thread the heddles on the table loom.  Weaving occupational therapy.  The draft the workshop teacher sent me was for a crackle weave with 10 different yarns and still looks like fun.  The only problem is that she was going to provide the treadlings in class, so I have written to her asking for at least one, so I can weave off this warp.

The focus now is on basics.  Slooow and calm work on existing projects.  And my house as a project.  I took the trash to the curb yesterday, took a box and 4 bags worth of books to the AAUW book sale drop off, cleaned cat boxes, filled and emptied the dishwasher.  I am trying to establish Flylady routines in my life. Trying to establish routines and reduce the insane level of clutter in 15 minute increments. Trying to focus on the here and now, and not the next.  Today, hiding from the heat, I am knitting on Campanula and Bamboozled (making progress on Campanula but need to switch to Bamboozled, according to the tension in my right forearm) and working my way through the laundry.   Not very interesting blog fodder, huh?  I should be able to show you the finished back of Campanula by the end of the week.

Knitting in DC and more on sketchbooks

     Along with 29,999 other librarians, I will be in D.C. for the American Library Association meeting this weekend.  I actually am supposed to be there now, but am still running around getting packed (actually I am on the computer but I am supposed to be running around getting packed).  I met up with Martha in Seattle at our midwinter librarians meeting -- she was there with her librarian spouse, and we hit So Much Wool together.  So we are meeting in DC on Sunday, at 4 pm, at StitchDC's Capitol Hill store.  Sigh, a yarn store open Sundays.  A working knitter's dream.  Martha is bringing at least one friend from her knitting group, and I am hoping Lanea can join us as well.  If you read this in time, and are in the DC area, please meet us there!
     More on sketchbooks: Leigh and Robbyn, this is attempt number Gazillion for me.  I think what is helping me this time is a completely exploded understanding of a sketchbook.  The "sketchbook" consists of those index cards residing in a shoe box, pictures cut from magazines and printed from the web, random pieces of paper, and, for moment anyway, my new little sketchpad, all of which will -- might -- or might not -- come together in a looseleaf binder.  That way I can shuffle things, don't need to have one specific book with me when the mood or an idea hits, etc.   So far so good but hey, it's been a week.
     Gotta wash the dishes, load the car, double check my list, buy gasoline and hit the road.  To meet up with 29,999 other librarians, listen, talk, visit the Textile Museum, StitchDC, Martha, eat good food, maybe hear live jazz....

Art and Fear

     I have been on a spree since Maryland Sheep and Wool.  It works that way every year.  The long hours of light in May and June really get the juices flowing, MDSW inspires ideas and excitement and purchases, my birthday -- and my LYS's annual sale -- at the end of May inspires extravagance, and I love June so much I just keep going.    But the spree this year has been very focused.  Two events: MDSW and Knitter's Connection in Columbus.  The purchases have been focused.  I did really go to town with books though this past month.  A gift in the birthday card from my sister-in-law and brother turned into 3 books on fiber arts from Amazon.  I bought my own copy of Francoise Tellier-Loumagne's The Art of Knitting: Inspirational Stitches, Textures and Surfaces  , her Art of Embroidery: Inspirational Stitches, Textures and Surfaces and Creating Sketchbooks for Embroideries and Textile Artists by Kay Greenlees.  All extravagances but that's what surprise money can be for, right?  I love studying both Tellier-Loumagne books, in which she classifies stitches and then shows them, in gorgeous photographs, near images form nature or other dramatic compositions that inspired or relate to them.  A very inspirational and motivational process, reading those books.  My interest in Greenlees's book on sketchbooks came out of my long long years of attempting to create a functional system of gathering my ideas, swatches, clips from magazines, photographs, etc and working from them.  Judy Ditmore had us bring colored pencils and graph paper to her class on strip-knitted garments, and we also used strips of cut paper.  She said she finds she can knit anything she can make with strips of paper.  I found myself using the pencils at odd moments to develop the ideas of color progressions Ruth Lantz had talked about. 

     Greenlees's book, besides being very pretty to look at, helped me realize that I do not need really to choose among my earlier attempts at recording my ideas, swatches, etc.  Instead, each one -- and that includes the blog, a shoebox in which I throw index cards I have scribbled on, the 3-ring binders, the notebook of graph paper -- can be used.  Each one has a function.  And I went downstairs and found 15 Prismacolor markers that I bought in a moment of extravagance years ago (when did I do that?  What was I thinking of using them for? Why did I buy only 1 blue?!) and found a small sketchbook I bought at some earlier moment.  She mentions some folks have trouble starting a sketchbook, thinking that first page needs to be some kind of dramatic introduction to their work (I imagine that future scholars will pore over and analyze in academic papers!!) so I used the first page of mine to scribble examine the colors of each of the Prismacolor markers.  Then I used the markers to "take notes" on a couple of images from the latest Fiber Arts.  It is really hard to draw a woven item, by the way.  Makes me realize how much each thread counts in a woven piece.

     Another motivation for getting a sketch/notetaking system together is that I am heading, reluctantly, to a very long work-related conference.  The good part is that it is being held in Washington DC, and that I have Friday all to myself.  I am going to spend it at the Textile Museum and wanted to make sure to have some way of taking notes, both visual and textual.  So as usual I have had a wild wave of images, information, interests and inspiration crashing down around my head. 

To add to it, two new additions, no, three new additions.  Until last night I had not even picked up my knitting since the end of the Knitter's Connection show in Columbus.  Instead, in a enthusiastic rush I built another raised bed above the clay that lies under my back yard and put in a garden of herbs (in the beds and on the deck) and a variety of tomatoes and sweet peppers.  I put in multicolored Swiss chard, my first cucumber plant, some leaf lettuce, and even some tomatillos.  Then, last night, the yarns and threading draft arrived for my weaving class at the MAFA conference in Scranton after July 4th.  I think the teacher did a great job of pinpointing my skill level, but now I have to find the time to measure the warp and thread the loom before and after the conference in DC! 

     And finally, I was at Barnes and Noble yesterday and found a book called Art and Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking .  A very thoughtful book, a quick read that I will probably keep rereading.  A number of its most useful points were made later in The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron, but Art & Fear does it without the intense therapeutic and spiritual rhetoric Cameron uses.   (They  present the amazing statistic that 98% of those who do an undergraduate art degree stop making art fairly soon after graduating, and ascribe that to a lack of any continuing support structure.)  The book is organized into sections on fears about yourself (i.e., I am not really creative, I am not perfect, my stuff in not new or good or interesting), fears about others (approval, understanding, acceptance), "finding your work," and more, and provides very useful ways of thinking yourself out of those dark, gloomy and unproductive traps. A very very good book.  If you hated The Artist's Way, try this one.  If you liked The Artist's Way, try this one.

    Last night, finally, I got back to my knitting.  I did another partial repeat of the lace pattern on Campanula, then, worried about my hands, put it down and picked up the Bamboozled tunic being made from Rowan's Kid Classic.  Very possibly my favorite aran weight yarn.  And the cats did not take any revenge for my having left them for 4 days.  Frannie has even gotten brave enough to sit on the back of the couch, or the arm on the other side of the couch, when I am sitting there reading and knitting.

A love/hate relationship

    I am making huge progress on Campanula.  The pattern is very well written.  And lace, it turns out, shows up beautifully in this rayon viscose, cotton and linen blend yarn.  So much so that I went back to Elann and bought some more in another color (a dark olive).  So, love all around.
     On the dark side -- I now remember why I don't usually work with an all-plant-fiber yarn.  Or rather, the pain from my reawakened tendinitis reminded me why I don't use those yarns.  Rats rats rats!  So here I was, focusing happily on one project, only to do myself damage.  I am being forced, yes forced, to start something else. 
     OK, life could be worse ;>  I have decided to treat the tendinitis (small doses of ibuprofen, heat and cold, etc.), put Campanula down for a few days, use something stretchy for a few days, then ration work on Campanula.  I will probably finish it in time for our first big snow storm.
     So.... what to do?  Socks are surprisingly hard on my hands.  Lace is very easy on my hands.  Wool and alpaca don't cause any strain.  But I don't really want to do another stole or scarf at the moment.  A different lace garment?  Done in wool?  What happens when it is 90 degrees with 90 degree humidity? Oh wait, that was yesterday.  But seriously, I am not going to want a wool sweater on my lap.
     I could weave and spin, but I really don't think I am going to want to severely reduce or even abandon my knitting.  I may look for one of those bed trays -  folks have suggested putting the large wool item on the table instead of suffering heat stroke while knitting during the summer.  This one would be cool, but not at that price.  This one is more likely to find its way to my house.
    I like Campanula a lot, so this is a bit frustrating.  But, hmmm, I could work on the Sally Melville vest.   Remember this swatch?  That is a purple Noro Shinano done in a slip stitch with an oatmeal-colored Rowan Magpie yarn.  I swatched it for this vest. The back is ribbed and I would do it in just the Shinano. This project has been teasing me, so maybe this is really an opportunity!! (Oh ick, Pollyanna.)  Anyway, it would be fun, and fast and it is a project I really want to do. 
    For the moment, though, I have to do 3 strips 6 inches long for a class I am taking at the Knitters Connection in Columbus OH this week.  I am meeting one of my Ohio cousins there, and spending a few nights with family.  It'll be fun, but I have to make those strips.

     On Friday, a friend and I drove to Bucknell University, about an hour and a half from here, to listen to a truly spectacular jazz concert.  The drive is beautiful.  Central Pennsylvania is very lush and green right now, and we drove through small towns, some very charming, through forests, and over one of the passes and down into another valley.  All this through a wild thunderstorm with very dramatic lightening.  The Bucknell campus is very traditional and pretty, lots of green space surrounding traditional red brick buildings.  I was wearing my new birthday shoes (some girly girl sling backs) so ran barefoot in the rain from the car to the little, charming auditorium.  Perfect.  So maybe we should set up our fiber arts community in central Pennsylvania.  It's affordable, lush and green (which I prefer to desert).  There's a spinning, weaving and knitting shop in Centre Hall (that's the name of a town), near Punxsutawney, and in Lewisburg, and of course the Mannings store is in south central PA (no mountains nearby that part of PA though).  There are local sheep farms.  And local farms, for those who would want to grow their own fiber.   Because the other suggestions -- Santa Clara, Sedona, the Maine coast -- are a bit pricey, and we could spend that money on yarn or looms or roving.   Of course, come March I may wonder what the hell I was thinking.

time and focus

    

Leigh was looking at the last entry and sighing about how long it takes her to get knitting projects done.  Meanwhile I have been over at her blog staring in amazement at a series of weavings she did, trying to understand the structure, and at the spinning she then did...  My knitting is progressing but I am still taking baby steps in weaving and rarely get to my spinning.  I have no intention of giving up any of these ... techniques? skills? crafts? ... but certainly see the effects of the limited amount of time most of us have to devote to such things.  Meanwhile, this weekend I am going to try another couple of repairs/improvements to the warp on the loom.  After driving to Bucknell tonight with friends for some great jazz!
    On the knitting side of things though, there is rapid development.  The peplum at the bottom of the back of Campanula is formed by 23 rows of ribbing, followed by some decreases, and then an eyelet border.  The pattern and charts are, so far, very clear and I love the results.  I have finished charts 1 (the ribbing and decreases) and chart 2 (the eyelet border at the top) and I think I start the lace pattern on the next chart. 
     This yarn is Elann's Callista, 50% "viscose rayon," 25% cotton, 25% linen.  Here's hoping it won't grow as I wear it.  The care label says not to dry clean it, and not to iron it.  So I may iron the swatch just to see what happens.  The pattern is showing up very crisply, as you can see, and I like knitting with it.  It of course does not have the stretch of wool or wool blends, and I have to consciously relax my hands as I knit.  But as you can see it is going very quickly.
     I still don't get the point of Ravelry.  I have a yarn inventory for myself, and a bit of it on the blog.  Why put it up on Ravelry?  Laritza, I think, said it was like the Library Thing for books, but I don't get that either, and I'm a librarian!!!!!!!!  Eventually of course you might see me posting about what a cool idea Ravelry is, and I will have to eat my digital words.  On the other hand, there are knitters who don't get blogging.  Actually one said she loved her writing blog but didn't see the point of a knitting blog.  so I thought through my motivation and it is the same it was when I started the blog: I know very few people -- actually, pretty much no one -- in my daily life who is as absorbed in knitting, spinning and fiber as I am.  That was very isolating, and probably one of the reasons I loved going to Stitches.  The blog lets me blather on and on about fiber arts, and only folks who are interested can come and listen and talk.  Until I move into the mythical fiber arts, seaside, mountainside community I am searching for, this will have to do.

New project

I really tried to go back to some of the projects that require very little to finish them, but as the weather man said on this morning's news, we are getting July-like temperatures here and I can't bear to touch the wool and mohair.  At some point I will turn on the air conditioner just to get it done.  But now....

I swatched the Elann Calista for Campanula, from Knitters Spring 2007.  Hit the gauge called for too, using a size 3 needle.  This is my first use of lace in a garment, and I have a loooong list of other lace sweaters I want to do.  The Calista is a cotton, linen and rayon blend and I am hoping that if I work just on this (and on socks for those mindless moments) I will actually get to wear Campanula this summer.  Two other patterns from that same issue of Knitters are on my to-do list too -- a much higher percentage than in other recent past issues.  They have also already posted the gallery for the summer issue, and I am interested in taking a closer look at 4 of those patterns.  I don't know when that issue will be on the newsstands though.
     The Regia Line Step socks are almost finished, which is very gratifying.  I am already auditioning other yarns for the next pair.
     And finally, I am trying to understand Ravelry.  From what I gather from other blogs, this is going to be an online knitting community that will let users list their yarn, needle and pattern inventories, show off their pictures, etc.  There must be more to it than that, since folks with blogs are excited about it, but I haven't yet figured out what else is being offered.  Between blogs, Yahoo groups, and Knitters Review, do I have time for this?