bee creative

progress of some sort

Adding some blue and decorating the counting paper with coffee rings...

Next color, green.

Stormy weather here, perfect for knitting and sewing.

numbers

Yesterday morning I took this photo, more thinking about the colors of window sill and cup.  While playing a bit I found my reflection layered over the paper lantern hanging outside in the image and then decided I liked it better in black and white.

Sunrise: 7:44 AM   Sunset: 6:04

Last night's low was 34 degrees F.

A gift in the mail was perfectly timed, reminding me to play.

Keeping track of my rows.

Typepad is doing weird things right now.  I had to downsize photos so that the whole image would show.  Comments have been wonky. 

casting on, early in the morning

Second sleeve.

kinda blue

Today I harvest almost all of my indigo and blended it up with an immersion blender.  Works way better than the blender I've been looking for and haven't been able to find.

This is a dish tub full of indigo and water. It was strained for dyeing and added to a larger tub.

I used this technique because I wanted to dye some yarn and there was a lot of yardage. I dyed about 5 yards of fabric and over dyed a jacket that I've been working on. All the fabric is silk or wool.

The first layer of color on the jacket was walnut.  The jacket seems darker but nothing is blue.

Along with another 2 yards of fabric that I dyed earlier this year, I now have enough fabric for a skirt and 2 tops plus a bit more for something else (maybe a vest?). My goal is to make a capsule wardrobe of clothing dyed with plants. So far I have a pair of pants dyed with walnut and a top dyed with indigo. They don't really go together though. I am hoping these projects will solve that problem.  

I am probably going to use the yarn to make a shawl I have a bit bigger (it was dyed with indigo as well) and make some wrist warmers.

Should keep me busy for awhile with everything else I've got going on.

It chases away that other kind of blues...

not quite but another kind of good enough

There was so much I wanted to do this weekend that didn't get done....

There was a lot of this.

I guess it was what was needed most.

And some of this.

I am finding I much prefer hand sewing.  

I also finished the first sleeve.

So now quite what I planned but good enough.

I meant to...

And that seems to be the way it goes.

I am untangling yarn as well as a few other things,

dressing up left over curry corn chowder from work with spinach, pumpkin seeds and panner, 

and glad that beets and carrots keep well. 

I really haven't been cooking much lately. 

The carrots are really yummy raw though. 

Maybe I should go put some beets in the oven right now!

hanging on

There has been cat rescue.

And a little bit of knitting.

And some more yelling at the squirrel...

who likes to eat cherry blossoms.

10 minutes or so: knitting because it soothes me

Of all kinds of making I think that knitting or crochet soothes me the most.  There doesn't have to be thinking, just motion on repeat.  Yarn that keeps coming for long than a needle can hold thread. 

This morning, listening to Wendell Berry read, "The Peace of Wild Things" here.

(The creek has been high the last few weeks.)

And Mary Oliver reading "Wild Geese," here.

Imagining the two of them having a conversation.

(Not the best photo as it was taken through the window, but oh it made me laugh!)

 

60 minutes: listening

Sometimes I listen to podcasts while working on a project, like when I am trying to make yarn with coffee filters.

(Not going well, need the cats to take a nap.)

Other times, like this morning, I listen after waking up very early and am just not ready to start doing something.

"On Being" remains a favorite and funnily enough this week's interview was with an author, Oliver Burkeman, who has written about time management.

One of my favorite parts

"Every new, extraordinary thing that a small child does is the end of the time before that time. But it occurs in everything, all through the day and all through one’s work, all through everything, that to do anything is to forgo all sorts of other things. And this isn’t some recipe for making the pain go away, but I experience a sort of amazing drop of my shoulders and all the rest of that whenever I can recall that this is just built in. This is like, how it is."

Another podcast I've found recently and have been really enjoying is "The Ezra Klein Show."  I've listened to several episodes from the archives now and am thinking about much of what I listened to.  One interview was with Richard Powers, author of The Overstory.  I am about half way through the book and am loving it.  A favorite passage,

"It feels good, like a root must feel, when it finds, after centuries, another root to pleach to underground.  There are a hundred thousand species of love, separately invented, each more ingenious than the last, and every one of them keeps making things."

Last week's walk through the park.

Always time well spent.

30 minutes: sleeve

3 rows done.

Maybe the daily-self-challenge I need at the moment is what can I do in 15-30 minutes that feeds the non-work side of me?