Collection

I'm a collector (let's not say a hoarder) by nature: beads, books, buttons, yarn, china dogs, vintage bakelite dresser sets, kawaii, pressed glass, vintage textiles, comic books, postcards, cards for my stereopticon...I won't go on...

But my favorite collection is the stack of humble hand made dish cloths that sits on the shelf above my kitchen counter. Each of these was made for me by a different lady, given through swaps, as gifts, just to be sweet. I treasure their homey cottony presence in my kitchen; they are good will and sentiment, the kindness of strangers; they recall an earlier time, before dishwashers and even cellulose sponges and paper towels. Sometimes I spend a moment or two staring at them, thinking of the many hands that made them for me, and I feel a little brighter, buoyed and cheerful.

Distractions

I am, alas, disgustingly adept at procrastination;  I have elevated the formerly humble pursuit of the minor distraction to a high art.  Avoiding my work has become something of an obsession.

Today I was in rare form.  By noon I had accomplished the following:

I stared at my freckles in amazement, for quite awhile.  I have a lot of freckles that I never noticed.  It seemed suddenly important to catalogue them.

I called that long-suffering Sarge long-distance to discuss Victorian costume with him.  He obliged me for a few minutes, and then finally cut me off with a terse "What next, celluloid collars?"

I thought about Sarge in a celluloid collar.

I thought about Snape in a celluloid collar.

I thought that they could both pull it off, but only one would and that one wouldn't be Sarge.

I thought about whether Victorian boots would be too '80s.  And I don't mean 1880s.

I thought about how my fantasies are becoming repetitive and I would need to come up with something new if I wanted to keep my self-respect.

I drank a whole pot of coffee and then had to walk off the jangles.

I argued with my step-dad about the First and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution.

And then, when I thought I had exhausted all other options and had no choice but to begin my work again, I had a crafty brainstorm and crocheted a little stuffed turnip with a face, for my friend's baby.

So, what do you think?  Is he turnip-like?

A Quick Knitting Post

Switching gears rapidly from my deviant sexuality to knitting dish cloths...

For any reader who happens to be living in the United States and is also a knitter...

and that leaves out, oh, pretty much everyone...well, there are a few of you, aren't there?...

I just wanted to direct you to the most fun you'll have with your knitting needles:

Dish Rag Tag

Go to the link if you like and see what it's all about; sign-ups just opened, and will close when it reaches 220 people.  Hurry hurry!

The Winner of a Nice New Custom Pair of Handmade Socks is...

CYBERPETE!

Cyberpete, you won with your hilarious dissertation title, "Two Years' Research: Men in Uniforms are Hot"

You were all funny, though. I wish I could share the sock love even more...

Next step--CyberPete, email me at "theweatherinthestreets@gmail.com" and tell me the length of your feet in inches, as well as a few of your favorite color choices for socks.

Thank you all very much for being so game!!!

Sock Contest Redux: Name that Dissertation

It's time once again, as it is every hundred posts or so, for me to spread the Hand-knit Sock Love around the world, and so opens my third Sock Contest. If you win, I will knit a pair of socks for you and you will be very very glad to own them.

The rules are a little different this time around, however. The last two contests were simple random drawings. This time, you must work a little for your hand-knits.

THE RULES

1. Please submit, in the comment section below, a title for my doctoral dissertation (which is, in case you're not sure, just a glorified academic paper that gets me a Ph.D if I manage to finish it). Dissertation titles, like most academic journal article titles, should ideally contain the following: a pithy set-up sentence, giving some general information, followed by a colon, followed by a pithy, more specific explanation, relating to the thesis or general topic area.

some examples are

"Graduate Students in Limbo: A Survey of Lackluster Excuses for Non-Completion of Dissertation"

"Holy Knockers: A Comparison of Cup Size in Urban and Rural Housewives"

"Uniform Fetish: The Demographics of Women Who Fantasize about Being Handcuffed, Batoned, and Roundly Kissed"

Some info to get you going on this: I've been working on this piece of shite half-heartedly for several years now, whining and worrying ceaselessly the entire time. My general topic area is rural police departments. The even broader field is Criminal Justice.

Your title doesn't need to follow the above format if it seems too complicated; one sentence will do. The title may reference Criminal Justice, police, my laziness, or all of the above.

Make me laugh if you can.


2. You have until the end of the day, Wednesday, March 11th.

3. Enter as many times as you like!

4. I will choose finalists, and you good folks will vote for your favorite.


5. I will then knit a pair of socks for the winner.


Don't be shy! I really hope to see some entries here!

Thankful for Yarn

Today I'm thankful for yarn. It's so lovely.

Thankful for Yarn

Today I'm thankful for yarn. It's so lovely.

I Knit and Knit and Knit...

...and knit. I've gone fiber-crazy and have hundreds of skeins of yarn, silk and cashmere and merino, hand-dyeds, hand-spun, imported, local, one-of-a-kind and mass-produced, then hundreds of needles, notions, crochet hooks, pattern books, knitting magazines...

I must have thirty or more projects in my queue at this point...and more in the hopper...more and more...it's soooo out-of-control...

I decided to post this little interview I did with Sarge; it's been floating around and about, with knitters asking their partners these questions...

Me: What is your favorite thing about my knitting?
Sarge: That you’re good at it. Cause you’re good at something, I like that. I like being impressed by you.

Me: What is your least favorite thing about my knitting?
Sarge: you go a little bit overboard. Too many needles, and they’re all over the house, too much yarn and it’s all over the house, too many swaps and they’re all over the house.

Me: What is something I have knitted, that you recall as good?
Sarge: I really really like that leaf pattern that you worked into a scarf. It’s not knitted, but I really like the ornaments that you made for my mom. I love the giant ripple in Rowan Glace. The drape is fantastic. [yes, the man knows what drape is] The multi-colored baby blanket for Hedgehog I love.

Me: What’s something you recall as being a disaster?
Sarge: That friggin afghan out of that garnet and grey squares, out of this terrible acrylic, that was unpieced and sat around for years. Tell me you don’t remember it. God, even you've blocked it.

Then let me talk about my birthday sweater…it wasn’t so much that the sleeves were too long, and one sleeve was longer than the other, as that it was never actually finished. Cause the sleeves I could have rolled up. You must think you’re married to Lurch from the Addams Family. Or an orangutan. Or a Gibbon. And who knows, maybe I am.

Me: Do you think knitters have an expensive hobby?
Sarge: Yes. Yes, I do. I don’t think it’s necessarily an expensive hobby, but people who become deeply committed to it want more and better everything, bobbins and lace treadles and yarn shuttles and spinning wheels and looms, eventually alpacas…

Me: Comparing hobbies, who spends more?
Sarge: You. Because I tend to binge, whereas you steadily spend.

Me: Do you have a stash of any kind?
Sarge:You better believe it.

Me: Of what?
Sarge: I have so many model airplanes, I’ll have to live to 140 before I finish them all, certainly at my current rate of building. And then there’s the guitars…

Me: Have I ever embarrassed you, knitting in public?
Sarge: No.

Me: Do you know my favorite kind of yarn?
Sarge: Rowan Cotton Glace, is that right?

Me: Can you name another knitting blog?
Sarge: Knitty, is that a blog?

Me: Do you mind my wanting to stop at knit shops wherever we go?
Sarge: No. I mind your wanting to stop at generic craft stores for knitting supplies wherever we go. Sometimes.

Me: Do you understand the importance of a swatch?
Sarge: not in a knitting term, no I’m sorry I don’t. Is that like a test square?

Me: Do you read "The Weather in the Streets"?
Sarge: Yes, occasionally…

Me: Have you ever left a comment?
Sarge: No.

Me: Do you think the house would be cleaner if I didn't knit?
Sarge: No, I don’t think it would.

Me: Anything you'd like to add?
Sarge: I think it’s kind of interesting that of all the stuff you’ve knit, you’ve never actually finished anything you’ve started knitting for me.

************************************
Oh, and p.s. I'm answering these two other somewhat random questions posed by Suzanne, and others:

1. What do you admire most about each of your parents? I admire my mother's creativity, kindness, and wacky sense of humor. I admired my dad's ability to treat each thing that came his way, including his impending death, as a great adventure!

2. Which would you prefer and why? To have every stoplight turn green upon your arrival for the rest of your life or to have one week of the best sex any person ever had?: Oh, definitely best sex ever for a week. Not that I haven't had it already, but imagine how mind-blowing it would be if there was even better (with Sarge, of course). Sitting at red lights gives me a chance to knit that extra sock!!!!

We Have Two Winners! Just because I couldn't stop at one...

The first soon-to-be proud owner of a pair of handknit socks in Koigu premium merino is...




KRISTEN!


Congratulations Kristen!


Details for Kristen: Now go to the previous post and then to the link to Koigu. You'll see all the gazillions of colors there--choose a first and second choice, and then please email me at theweatherinthestreets@gmail.com, letting me know your color choices, as well as your foot length in inches. Oh, and don't forget your address, so that this can get to you!

Edit: Simply because I couldn't stand to not spread the sock love a little more, and because I LOVE to knit socks, I have to choose a second winner to receive a pair of sock. So I put my names back into the random list generator, and the name that randomly came up first was, fittingly,


RANDOM CHICK!


Well, Random, same deal for you...go to the previous post, pick your top two colors, and shoot me an email with your choices, foot length, and address! Sock love will be yours!

Thanks so much to all who posted the wonderful descriptions of favorite childhood toys. I had such a good time reading them. Stop by anytime

And I must say, contests are fun! I'm brainstorming my next one, perhaps sooner than the 300-post mark.

200th Post and Sock Contest II

Well, it's officially the 200th time I've given myself license to maunder and meander on, covering any and all topics of greater and lesser import. Ah, blogging...

So, going along with tradition, and because I had such a good time knitting the last pair for the very sweet and talented Miss Kim (you can check out the socks here), I'm again holding an Every Hundredth Post Sock Contest. The winner will, as last time, receive a pair of socks knit by me, in the color of their choice, of Koigu Premium Merino.

May I say, as I did last time, that hand-knit socks are really quite a divine experience, if you've never received a pair. If you have, you know what I'm talking about. You just can't beat the spongy comfort and cuddly feeling.

What do you have to do to win these socks? Simply post a comment here, before midnight of Tuesday September 16th, telling us about your favorite childhood toy. I will have a random drawing on September 17th and let you know then who the winner is.

Everyone's welcome to post a comment, don't be shy!

And if you like, check out my other blog, Just a Housewife for another contest...

Did a Muppet Cough Up a Hairball, or Am I Spinning My Own Yarn?

Well, a little bit of both, I guess:





I'm revealing this gruesome objet in the interests of full disclosure.  I'm not too proud to show you the very unlovely thing I made, because I sort of treasure its unloveliness.  It's been a long time since I've been a greenhorn, and in a way, it's sort of fun to suck at something.  It's relaxing to begin at the beginning.  I haven't done that since...well, since I gave birth to E.  I had no idea how to be a parent...okay, I still don't...but I have faith that I will know how to spin yarn, eventually.  At least at this I can show tangible improvement...and, Lord knows, I have nowhere to go but up...

I suppose I had a romantic idea about spinning from reading "Farmer Boy" by Laura Ingalls Wilder, about her husband Almanzo's 19th century boyhood:

"Mother always flew.  Her feet went pattering, her hands moved so fast you could hardly watch them.  She never sat down in the daytime, except at her spinning wheel or loom, and then her hands flew, her feet tapped, the spinning-wheel was a blur or the loom was clattering, thump! thud! clickety-clack!"

I have some housewifely envy of Mother Wilder's abilities, and her skill at managing the complexities of a farmhouse before washing machines and frozen food...and I love to connect with the past in this way, even though it's just a taste of it.

What's the last thing you learned to do from scratch?

Teeny Tiny Knitting

After reading this post at Too Little Time's place, I was seized with a tiny sock mania. It seemed like the perfect solution to my, of late, inability to finish an entire pair of socks. I was definitely suffering from Second Sock Syndrome. Tiny socks are perfect--not only do you make only one, but that single is, well, tiny. I actually balked when E asked me to knit her American Girl a pair. A pair?! Never again, not even weeny ones.

So, between TLT's post and this instructional one, using size 0000 double pointed needles, I came up with this little guy:

This one, as suggested, will become a keychain very soon.  I sense more tiny sock keychains in my future.  

Baby Surprise Jacket

Here she is, the BSJ that is my new BFF. I only wish I'd taken photos of it at its weirdest most mystifying stage, when it looks, as variously described, like a "rumpled bath mat" and a "manta ray," the part of the pattern where Elizabeth Zimmerman says "...trust me, and PRESS ON." Once you've folded it, all is revealed. Actually, A could see from the pattern how it was going to fold, and made me a little paper model to show it would work. You know, I really was good in high school geometry, and also the part of the IQ test where you have to make up patterns from individual blocks...but still, even with the paper sweater model, I could hardly see how it was going to work. But work it did. This is a virtuosic pattern. If you need more convincing, read this. I can't wait to try this with all different yarns. I want to adapt the recipe for E. And don't all of you preggies need one for your nascent gals?

Scarves

I've mailed off my ISE packages--one to my pal and one to an angel-ee--and thought I'd post some pics. The first is a zigzag pattern done in jade Tillie Tomas silk:



This is the unblocked scarf. It had a persistent tendency to roll at the edges, nearly into a tube. I'm praying that the aggressive blocking ameliorated this somewhat, because I really did love this scarf...oh, dear...

The second, a surprise for my angel-ee, whose partner dropped out of ISE at the last moment (bah on them!), is shifting sands. I loved this pattern, done up in Schaefer Yarns memorable women series--the Frida Kahlo colorway. I think these are fabulous. I also have a skein of Catherine the Great. I have so many suggestions, though, for colorways: shouldn't there be a Shirley Jackson color? Maybe blacks and greys with a hint of blue? And how 'bout Madeleine Albright? She deserves a "memorable women" yarn named after her. I digress. Here's the scarf:

SeaFlower and so many socks

I've reentered the land of the thinking people. After six years dormant, many of them happily so, I'm back in the Ph.D. swing of things. I'm enjoying it, too, sort of. I like my field (Criminal Justice) tremendously. And I think I like my dissertation topic.

Anyway, we've all been very busy up here in the Adirondacks. E has her first business. She named it SeaFlower, and she makes one-of-a-kind (as she puts it) earrings. It reminds me of my many businesses as a child, ranging from elaborate sidewalk bakesales with my special friend Al, to a short-lived industry of velour doll blankets, from scraps my Grandpa Ozzy gave me. He was a dry-goods merchant (fancy for he sold fabric and notions at a booth in a bazaar, the Busy Bee Market). My mom was also put in mind of her own summer business, making personalized macaroni letter pins, which she collected money for but never delivered to her customers...

E's earrings are quite pretty--she's been selling them mail-order, five dollars a pair (which I think is a bargain!) to an assortment of friends, and I promised her end-of-summer booths at both the craft fair and the local church lawn sale. Here are some of her offerings;





In the meantime, I've been working on socks. I'm well on my way to many single socks--I have a fear of the second of the pair--so boring to knit!










And here are my beautiful rosewood Lantern Moon sock needles. I treated myself at my new beloved upstate yarn shop:



I'm also working on baby gifts for the many enceinte among you...but those I can't post pictures of, because they're to be surprises.

Now I must return to the articles on rural policing, which call out to me their siren song...

Firebird

Firebird, my new love, moved in with me today...my Sock Club package for June arrived today, from Blue Moon Fiber Arts. I think this colorway may be my favorite I've ever seen in variegated yarns, and that includes the often hauntingly beautiful Koigu colorways.

I also loved the April colorway, but wasn't too partial to the sock pattern that came with. Someone commented that the colors got lost in the shading created by the pattern's mesh sections, and I agree totally. So, I'm going to use that yarn to make a plain-Jane pair of socks from Nancy Bush's "Knitting Vintage Socks", which I cannot recommend highly enough for a good understanding of sock-making, toes, heel-turning, kitchener stitch and all...for sure, this beautiful yarn can be shown off to great advantage in simple stitches. That said, I do love the fancy June pattern that came with the Firebird yarn, and will use it.

A New Afghan and Some Random Yarn

I've almost completed the second scarf for E's head teachers--the first a red feather-and-fan pattern from "Scarf Styles," and the current one in moss green, a simple lace pattern from Knitty. This is the one I used for my scarf pal's scarf. I'm using the other recommended yarn, a silk-wool mix, a little more warm-weatherish than cashmere.

In the meantime, have begun a vintage striped blanket in a relatively inexpensive Paton's pure merino. Anyone reading this, you really should check out this link. Her blanket is so evocative and appealing. Plus, there's a very clear picture-tutorial. I love my palette, but as crochet can do, the wool is working up into a sort of rough, unyielding fabric. I remember some of Grandma Eva's afghans having this texture, and I guess I'm willing in this case to forgo the tactile for the aesthetic...





I'm also wondering what to do with two balls of VERY cheery cotton twist given to me by Megan--who ultimately rejected her first ripple in favor of more subtle hues. I still can't help but love these, and I really want them to become something:



Any suggestions?

Also, a word on dinner. I must air my grief. How to please everyone all the time, expediently and even healthfully? It just doesn't seem possible. How many times has E rejected my offerings and made herself waffles for dinner...tonight, however, I've been inspired by Faycat, whose lovely blog always has incredibly appetizing food pics as well as great recipes. So, I'm now off to concoct my version of her latest pasta dish and accompanying salad. I really believe that tonight, we'll all be eating the same food. Thanks, Faycat!

Busy Crafters

The first beaded bracelet knit up quickly on size 0000 needles...although I have eyestrain from knitting with what are essentially sewing needles...I hope the colors aren't too frou-frou for E's teachers; they are rather pastelly and glittery-pinky...fey (as in fairy-like), just E's taste...



I do like the dragonfly clasp:





And while I've been dealing with beads, A was finishing his Imperial Walker. He used the spray booth that E and I got him for Father's Day last year for the first coats, then did the weathering and faux-dirtying. Plus the joke. I think it's great:







Pippin snoozes through it all, as usual, oblivious until food is in the offing...



And sweet to my ears...my mother, who swears she's a total wash in the needle arts, looked at our Ripples and commented casually..."I wonder if I could learn to do that..." I'm treading lightly, but I have very high hopes for her ultimate indoctrination...perhaps at our next Ripple Clinic (which, I believe, is tomorrow).

I Have Finished a Scarf

Yes, it's true. I have completed a project. I used to be a consummate completer, but lately my lust for newer and better projects, more and more of them, has left me with with an inundation of works-in-progress...but, yes, I have a full-on scarf for my scarf pal. This has galvanized me to complete two afghans tonight. They are so very very near to graduation. One is Rowan Ripple, and I shall be sad to see her go out into the world. She is like a daughter to me. Okay, don't tell E I said that.

Bright Colors and Plastic Bits: My Marriage

A's craft is model airplanes, WWII-era fine-scale military aircraft. He gets the same feeling of happiness and quivering anticipation from this




that I get from this



A, with his stacks of unmade plane kits, respects my shockingly comprehensive yarn stash. With his drawer of tiny little bottles of paints, my box of needles and hooks. I even began to peruse "Finescale Modeling" and take an interest in faux weathering tecniques, and A admired the sock heel-turning process. I think an entire marriage can be built on co-dependent crafting! That, and music.

The finest product of our mutual obsessions is E. She knits AND models--her first little knit purse this past summer, and just last week, with Alex, a snap-tite model of a Blue Angel. She'd seen them flying in formation over her preschool roof garden during last spring's Fleet Week, and especially asked to make one. That's one crafty girl.