Morning Sun on a Forest Clearing Kimono

It took a while! Life intervened, as usual. But as long as it took, I am happy with the result and so that's all one can want, can't one? Started last year in May, not really knowing whether it would turn into a wrap, a shrug or vest, the  project started quite sometime ago finally turned into a Kimono.

I completed it on February 27, 2010 and took it on a three-week journey through Viet Nam. It was the perfect travel outfit, not too warm yet providing protection against the sun and cooler late evening breezes in Hanoi.
All parts finished, I added a slanted collar, adding short row after short row until it was just the perfect neckline for most of my tops, just covering them. Some beadwork brought in some glizz and a crochet border along the bottom, also beaded, gave a bit of structure to the stripes.

And here two pictures of the Forest Clearing with wild orchids and marguerites.

LUFFS

At the moment, Valerie's PC is standing on a glass table and her thin arms get cold when typing on the keyboard - so this fingerless "manchon", long cuffs or gauntlets should protect her against the cold. I used some of my first handspun wool and silk yarn in this project. The grey parts are either knit double with padding inside or done with brioche stitches, occasionally adding small strands of unspun sheep wool.
And I just found out that the use of unspun fleece in these gauntlets has a name: THRUMMING. Whisps of unspun fleece or roven is added now and then to the regular yarn and knitted into the rows, adding warmth and a nice fluffy and hazy touch!
Here's a link to the thrumming technique Hello Yarns

Tiny Rippling Waves

This is the second scarf I make from Knitting New Scarves by Lynne Barr.
The pattern is an easy repeat, the waves generating extra warmth by the doubled structure, while the technique for the waves comes into good stead for other self-designed projects. Lynne Barr's architectural, three-dimensional approach to the 27 scarves in her book is exceptional and innovative.


The first scarf from the
book Knitting New Scarves
by Lynne Barr was for Anthony

Pattern name: Striped Illusions.
I like having small projects on the side. I would not necessarily call them mindless knitting, but they do let you relax and your mind wander, across large distances and time.
A day later. Come to think of it: those small projects always deal with a new or neglected technique or stitch pattern, new color combinations or design tests - so nothing is lost, it all serves a purpose!

Log Cabin Blanket for Victor

A fast-growing boy needs a larger blanket!
So I enlarged his Log Cabin Blanket (known as Oma Blanket) by adding
a full skein of Kauni Rainbow EQ and slip-stitched the edges with six rows for a firm border - resisting
those gnawing little teeth...
Also see this blanket on Lauragais' page on Ravelry.
A smaller travel version was added in spring 2011,
as Oma Blankets appear to work miracles -
children and adults have no trouble going to sleep,
even if suffering under insomnia!
Click here for the story of  HOPE, my first Log Cabin Blanket.

Ashford Cowl

The weather turned really cold. This carrot-colored Ashford Cowl shared on Ravelry by designer Nicola Faull will certainly help to keep warm! Made for my wonderful friend, Helga.




Adding to the heap of
cowls, here is one more,
also an Ashford Cowl.
Made of beige tussah
silk and ladder tape
yarns in two blue colors.
Festooned the edges
and wrap-stitched
them with transparent
thread while adding
blue seed beads.
The edges are pretty
firm and the top
edge stands up nicely
around the neck.
Knitted for Agnes i.e.
her daughter Sabine.

Imagination and the Purple Tree - continued

"A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral."
Antoine De Saint-Exupery French Author, Aviator

Just think about this! A strand of yarn, a shiny silk thread, a whispy tuft of fleece will set us knitters' heart aflutter. Wonderful projects arise in front of our eyes, wraps, sweaters, blankets... intricate patterns, embroidered with precious bullion yarn and glittering beads, a multitude of colors are blending or contrasting in that imaginary knit, a cathedral arises...

It is like a painter's need to transpose what she or he sees or imagines to a canvas or a wall, like a sculptor's vision of the finished artful sculpture while standing before that marble block, that ancient tree trunk or chunk of metal, a jewelery maker's intricate pieces evolving from an ingot lying on the worktable.
Or a child's vision of a Purple Tree...

Imagination And The Purple Tree

The little girl showed her teacher a picture she painted of a tree. The tree was purple. The teacher said, "Sweetheart, I've never seen a purple tree, now have I?"
"Oh?" said the little girl. "That's too bad."

For a child, there are no limits to imagination.
When we become adults...

Also see later blog entry on Imagination.

(Picture credit) Jakaranda Tree

Green again - A Wrap Scarf Shrug Vest ...

Nature's many green colors outside and JANET THORNLEY's magnificent use of color in her projects led to this project - I will try not to get overboard with green stash picking!

For this multi-yarn project I am using Russian Grafting (Russian Join) in prominent places, such as the front closure or tip of the sleeves. See bottom of post for link to finished Kimono Vest...
Now be it a wrap, shrug, stole, capelet, vest or bolero - these are all less age-defining garments than most - maybe that advantage is one of the strongest appeals of Jane Thornley's patterns (i.e. non-patterns). They defy short-lived seasonal fashion, color trends, fancy line dictates, or fitting requirements, they are not country or continent-bound, they are perfectly practical, gently forgiving (spots and bulges don't show easily on a generous multi-color wrap), wonderfully warming, kindly concealing, fantastically flattering and fun to make. Whatever the outcome - it is sure to fit.


Progress: 20 June, 2009 -
the right front is finished.




Progress: July 2009 -
Click on Wrap Shrug for a larger picture, as it is taking shape.
This is how it looks so far, the left front needs
to be done, and then some beading and embellishing. As I post this, October is ending. I am definitely suffering under the multi-project syndrome, or rather:
so many projects - so little time.

Finished on 27 February 2010 - see post.

Green Easter Egg

A green knit and beaded Easter Egg for Kri's Easter Egg Hunt- hopefully someone will hide it in a green bush...
This is made with a set of 5 double-pointed needles with DMC yarn, starting with an Emily Ocker CO. Increase 8 stitches evenly in every row until the desired circumference. Knit straight for 3-4 cm, adding the pre-strung or hook-introduced beads. Decrease 6 stitches in every row (oval shape), stuff it with cotton wool or fleece just before the opening becomes too small, attach a transparent thread loop to hang it up.

Listen to the Music...

Violinist in the Subway

A man sat at the L' Enfant Plaza subway station in Washington DC and started to play the violin. It was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes, starting with the difficult Chaconne in D-minor. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was a musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds, and then hurried up to meet his schedule. A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the violin case and without stopping continued to walk. A few minutes after that, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for something.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy.
His mother tugged him along but the kid stopped to look at the violinist and listen anyway. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time to look back.This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32,17. When he finished playing after 43 minutes and silence took over, no one noticed.
No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the musician was Joshua Bell, one of the foremost violinists in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written... with a Stradivari once played by Fritz Kreisler, worth 3.5 million dollars. Two days before playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the ticket prices averaged $100 each.

Joshua Bell, playing incognito in the subway, was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and people's priorities. The outlines were this: In a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour, do we even perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?

White guy, khakis, leather jacket, briefcase. Early 30s. John David Mortensen is on the final leg of his daily bus-to-Metro commute from Reston. He's heading up the escalator. It's a long ride -- 1 minute and 15 seconds if you don't walk. So, like most everyone who passes Bell this day, Mortensen gets a good earful of music before he has his first look at the musician. Like most of them, he notes that it sounds pretty good. But like very few of them, when he gets to the top, he doesn't race past as though Bell were some nuisance to be avoided. Mortensen is that first person to stop, that guy at the six-minute mark.

It's not that he has nothing else to do. He's a project manager for an international program at the Department of Energy; on this day, Mortensen has to participate in a monthly budget exercise, not the most exciting part of his job: "You review the past month's expenditures," he says, "forecast spending for the next month, if you have X dollars, where will it go, that sort of thing."

On the video, you can see Mortensen get off the escalator and look around. He locates the violinist, stops, walks away but then is drawn back. He checks the time on his cellphone -- he's three minutes early for work -- then settles against a wall to listen.

Mortensen doesn't know classical music at all; classic rock is as close as he comes. But there's something about what he's hearing that he really likes.

As it happens, he's arrived at the moment that Bell slides into the second section of "Chaconne." ("It's the point," Bell says, "where it moves from a darker, minor key into a major key. There's a religious, exalted feeling to it.") The violinist's bow begins to dance; the music becomes upbeat, playful, theatrical, big.

Mortensen doesn't know about major or minor keys: "Whatever it was," he says, "it made me feel at peace."

So, for the first time in his life, Mortensen lingers to listen to a street musician. He stays his allotted three minutes as 94 more people pass briskly by. When he leaves to help plan contingency budgets for the Department of Energy, there's another first. For the first time in his life, not quite knowing what had just happened but sensing it was special, John David Mortensen gives a street musician money.

One of the possible conclusions from this experiment could be this: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world, playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

[Source: Washington Post?]

Baby Blanket HOPE - for Joy

The Log Cabin Blanket is the pattern "How to Log Cabin" by Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne, made with Kauni Effektgarn 8/2, Rainbow EQ, color scheme by Phazelia (Ravelry).
Please read the story behind this particular blanket on Ravelry. It was made as a gift to Joy, who gave us so much hope in difficult times.
Thank you Joy - hopefully your lovely baby daughter Holly will like the blanket!
"Dear Joy, you untiringly gave us hope when my husband suffered a stroke this May and gave him the strength to pursue his goal to walk again. You are expecting a baby - and with every stitch I knitted at the bedside of my husband I wove in our gratitude and hope - and so for us, your baby’s middle name will always be HOPE.
Thank you forever."
 Also read the story of  travel version of the magic Oma Blanket on the Lauragais project page on Ravelry or in this blog.

The white blanket is a Reversable Basket Weave Blanket
(by Chrissy O'Malley) with Wendy Pearl DK, a lovely soft yarn.

Purple Scrumble Crochet + Knitting

Onward Scrumble
Leslie52 of Ravelry was looking for knitted scrumbles or hybrids. It interested me to specifically integrate knitting into a crocheted scrumble so that it does NOT cry out "I am the knitted part"! The black knit part adds interest to the crocheted scrumble, in my view.

Where did all the hours go...

It has been a long time since I started this blog - a lot of things happened since then.

The year 2007 passed quickly, lots and lots of translation work, taking care of the family (husband had broken his leg), work in the house and garden and a fascinating trip to China with all the family. I did get in some freeform work and knitting for friends! And I discovered wonderful freeform artists and their work on Ravelry.

In May of 2008, visiting our daughter and husband in the UK, my husband suffered a stroke from which he recovered admirably during the following 6 months, with the help of incredibly patient, hard-working and encouraging physiotherapists in the UK and later in Germany at the excellent Kliniken Schmieder in Allensbach, where we experienced and received so much help, support and guidance beyond measure. And the family pulled together, our daughters and son-in-laws, no effort was spared, we had simply every imaginable, loving support. We were able to get back home in October. Our life together found and settled into a new routine.

While staying in the UK, not only did our UK-based family provide every help possible - we were overwhelmed by the thoughtfulness and kind offers by people we had not even known before, such as Pat Ashforth and Steve Plummer of Woolly Thoughts and in Germany the local Ravelry group (Bodenseetreff) went out of their way - literally! - to help us. We even took smaller trips, perfectly organized, lovingly and patiently carried out by our Germany-based family. To ALL a big thank you from both of us.

So now I am back to a renewed effort of writing a blog more regularly than on a yearly basis :-) You might want to read about the log cabin blanket called HOPE that I made as a gift for Holly, daughter of Joy from the Chorley Hospital. The second one was for Victor, our grandchild, who was born in March 2009.

It is still cold here, pheasants and partridges are slowly strolling through the meadows and the occasional woodpecker raps his staccato beat on the ancient oak trees...

May 2010. Reading Antonio Tabucchi's book "It is getting later all the time" I found a wonderful Haiku:

Das Blatt fällt
Im Oktoberwind
Leicht schwankend.
Schwer wiegt die Zeit eines Sommers
Den wir in der Ferne verbrachten.

The leaf falling
In October winds
Gently swaying.
Heavy the burthen time of
The one summer we spent away