Butter wouldn't melt.......

Now.




But we didn't 'alf 'ave fun in the night. Why was only she there? What had happened to him And to make sure that I was really there, the game was to wake me up by jumping on to my bedside cabinet and knocking various items on to the floor - noisily - to wake me up.

But I love them really. Despite last night's shenanigans, and despite this being hunting season with a vengeance! I even did what I absolutely never ever do and let out a gawdalmighty yell the other evening, but anyone would if they thought as I did that the creature seemingly running directly at me across the floor (brought in by maelstrom of cat that had just entered the room) was a rat and not what it actually was - a bluetit. And there is an endless stream of ex baby rabbits, or parts thereof. Little buggers. The cats, not the rabbits. The trouble is, I am secretly proud of them because they defy the notion of soppy siamese too effete to left a paw except to scoop up caviar. Just how wrong can people be......

And where was himself? Out on someone's leaving do jolly in Blackpool, and given that the festivities revolved around beer and curry, I was, shall we say, not sorry that he wasn't coming home.

Progress report: the silk that went in to a madder dye pot is probably the worst so far (since the first effort! I am definitely finding the bricks harder to scour, I shan't do any more but concentrate on tops. The colour is not as intense as I had wanted either. Now I have to decide whether to put it in for another go or not.

Freyalynn's orange yarn is being knitted and it is not falling apart. It looks ok so far.

And - tomorrow we go on a road trip to Melton Mowbray........

gw

Perplexed of West Yorkshire

So, as I aforementioned, we set of like good little voters to the meeting along the valley. Arrive in good time, so as to get a place in the hall, anticipating a goodly turnout as this is a marginal. First clue: no cars in the carpark. And so on - doors closed, lights of, no posters or notes on doors. We turn around and go home, in haste, check local paper.

Yes, we did have the right day, time and place, according to the local rag. So we turn around and zoom back, getting there at a couple of minutes past the given hour. And it was exactly the same situation.

So, see why I am perplexed? Was there a meeting elsewhere? Had the local rag got it wrong? Had all the candidates lost their bottle? Sadly, we may never know. But never let it be said that for once, we did not take our democratic duty seriously!

Back to fibre. I'm trying knitting with the variegated orange singles spun from the top that Freyalynn dyed. I didn't think it would work, but it looks as if it is going to - I thought for a long time about weaving with it, but looking at my rigid heddle, the yarn would have been at severe risk of abrading badly. This might just work. We shall see.

I have a large pot of silk and soy silk dyed with logwood cooling, and looking as if it has worked out well, too. Madder next, probably with an acid shift to get more of an orange than a rose.

Then, I have been working on proposals for a couple of articles, one of which is to be about Woolfest 2005. I didn't have any images to go with it, so did a google search. I found some lovely ones of Cockermouth, which made me feel - well, I'm not quite sure what. Assuming that this works,the blue painted shop that you can see in both images is the shop that I used to run with a friend. And in the Castlegate one, if you "walk" up the hill to the left to the green painted house, well that is where my friend Marianne used to live. I had many a cup of coffee inside there. I would give a lot to have a cup of coffee with her now, but - well, she died several years ago now, and I still miss her. Ah, well, c'est la vie.....





Cockermouth was always a pretty town, but it looks as though the powers that be have decided to go up market, and paint everything - looks good to me. It is going to be interesting going back.

Oh, pooh. I have been unable to see my hit counter for several days now, so decided to try another one. Which I have done, and can see it ok, but also the little advertising thingy. That might drive me bananas. Requires thought, but not now.

Sigh.

gw

Um......

Which means, "I can't think of a snappy heading for this post".

Could have been "Progress", I suppose. For instance, the CVM shawl is finished! No photo yet, I want to wash and block it, but it is in fact quite a nice, plain brown, useful shawl. Tucks around the shoulders in an admirable manner, and I will try keeping it downstairs ready to whip around same when I have one of my cold fits. (Oh, I do so miss the days of yore when I had hot -for want of a better word - fits!) The reason for the "try" being Max, of course!

Then, I have, amazingly, been successful - in as far as it was anything to do with me - in selling an invalid scooter on eBay for my ma-in-law. It has not netted her much profit, but has achieved the main objective of finding someone to take it away for her, and without her having to pay. So instead, she has said that I can have a book of my choice - what a sweetie! - as my reward, not that I needed one. I am going to be very, very good and not order the most expensive volume that catches my eye on Amazon, but just get a nice mid-price hardback of some kind. I'm thinking beading or knitting, here.

(Pause for a mutter - the DSM has just got out his Pumpkin Harvest fibre from last year's SOAR, you know, the one I spun and was wondering what to do with - left it sitting right by me, he has, tempting me. 'Snot fair, whine, grumble....)

Then again - I have done the quebracho green soy silk, seems ok, or will be when dry and fluffed. I still have more fibre I can dye, so I went and had a look at my dyestuffs, and found that I had a lot left from workshops last year. So I am going to move on from extracts to the hard stuff, beginning with logwood.

Here are the quebracho green (ok, ok, bronze if you are being polite and goose shit green if you are not) on silk and the lac on soy - all scruffy and runkled. Soy silk is definitely harder to control, although it dyes well and comes up feeling very....well, silky (sorry!) I usually take photos on a neutral/plain ground, but I was so struck by the similarities between the colours when I dumped these on the spare bed, that I left them as was.



Spent a little time yesterday working on the next beaded doodle, and it is coming up very well if I says so myself. This one looks like a highly stylized flower.



So, I need to go get a meal prepared that can sit while we go out to a...Political Meeting. There is a four-way thing in town this evening, all the candidates except the BNP one. For which relief much thanks - I don't know whether he was asked and declined (I imagine so) or if he wasn't asked. But even in the interests of soi-disant democracy, I couldn't bear to be in the same room as such a one. For some reason, it is looking like a good idea to go, although I wonder if we will feel the same after the event? (Oh! Cynic!!)

gw

Plodding on

Which is a dam'fool thing to say, really, it is simply that I am not doing anything out of the ordinary. Just usual stuff and nowt wrong with that.

Usual stuff at present being still spinning the brightly coloured merino/tencel mix, I did not get it all finished when I had hoped after all - I am spinning it fairly fine, and it takes a surprising long time. Nearly there on that one, though. Then, the CVM shawl, which keeps hitting snags. You would not think that I could make so many mistakes in such a simple "pattern", but there you go. That's me and knitting for you. Yesterday, I noticed that my yarn overs had moved two separate jogs to the left. How?? Well may you ask. I had placed a marker, but in such a way that it was actually at the YO, so it had wiggled under a couple of times. Whilst chatting with a friend, of course - serves me right for not concentrating properly on either her or the knitting. Now, I knew that I had heard about unknitting a stitch down and taking it back up within the body of the work, which seemed a much better idea than frogging, as the shawl is getting quite wide. But I had absolutely no clue how to do this. So, how fortunate is it to have a dearly beloved life partner (this is called buttering up) who is a better knitter than wot one is? Dear soul, he sat and did it for me. Actually, I must get him to show me how to do it for myself, it can't be so very difficult, can it? Whatever, I am on my merry way again. Yes, another shawl, and very plain work. But gives me time to ponder on - what to do next. Something rather more challenging. Gawd knows what.....

Now. The dyeing continues, and really, is going pretty well. At the moment, one small step at a time, in other words I am taking around 150gm of either silk or soy silk, heating it up in slightly soapy water, leaving overnight, next day dyeing with at present, a natural dye extract, leaving overnight again, and then washing. Ends up looking like this:



This is quebracho red on silk. Came up very nicely. I have drying more lac, that worked this time, on soy silk, and just done today, quebracho green on silk. This is lovely, a greeny bronze, the lac quite nice, but it was harder to rinse, so the top is more disturbed. Photos soon, for the record. then I have to decide just how this experiment is going - do I continue with the extracts, or try some dyes in their raw state? I also want to expand the colour range a bit, I need an orange-tawny, and some purple, and, yes, blue. I keep putting off doing indigo because it is somewhat hard to get the colour right through the fibre, and I can't decide how to do it - risk doing just a very well wetted-out top,leaving it in the vat for quite a long time, which would be ok with silk or soy, I think. Or investing in a pair of "proper" rubber gloves, and doing the under the surface squeezy thing? Decisions, decisions, laissez-faire or bring on the Marigolds?

All the brouhaha about the pope seems to have died down for the moment. Quite interesting just how fascinated we have all been by this archaic ritual. Takes our mind off real life, I suppose. A debate rages about whether or not whoever it turned out to be would or would not affect all our lives. Directly - not at all. Indirectly? Opinion is moving inexorably in a direction I find disturbing, shall we say. Has been doing so for quite a time, won't stop any time soon. But one day - well, the breeze keeps blowing, the windmill turning, the beck running. (Around these parts, anyway.) Ach, I'm blethering! Time for a cup of tea, and a listen to Radio 7 where there are no news bulletins so I can avoid the horrors of the election campaign. Did we say nasty? Feh.

gw

Across the river and into the trees

Upfront: precious little of a fibery nature going on around here the last couple of days. Yesterday was guild, and a slightly strange, mixed sort of a meeting. A workshop that did not grab me, for many reasons that I will not go in to here, so, feeling considerably guilty, I took my wheel and spun me some pretty colours. In the event, plenty of people did do the activity, all was respectable, all was ok, in that wise. However, it was one of those days when several people seemed to have cares and woes spilling out all over the place, and I picked up the vibes, as I do, all too easily. Some should grow up, some should tell their significant others to grow up, for some there is nothing to do but offer quiet sympathy, and that is fine. No, I'm not grousing, it is all part of life's rich pattern, to coin a cliche.

Today, today, Sunday, Sunday. Out to lunch again. But first - we woke up to a very pretty golden morning, and considerably warmer than the night had been. I was looking out of the window watching the sheep and lambs. I do this a lot during the spring season that they are in the meadow opposite the house. Two lambs (said my eyes) were racing down the meadow to join the others at this end. No, no (said my brain) not lambs, too fast, wrong jiz...finally eyes and brain got themselves working together (it was an interesting example of how the brain first interprets incoming information from previously received data, and then adjusts to actual input) and I realised that what I was watching was two roe deer tearing towards me, veering right and fording the river, then disappearing into the wood n the other side. It was a lovely sight.

So, after coffee with H (ain't we the social animals) we put on our finery, ie wellies and Barbours, and trudged over the bridge and up the river path to a very overindulgent and lengthy lunch with other friends. It was very civilised, plenty of good food and alcohol (although I am not totally convinced about Watermelon Bacardi Breezers....) and plenty to talk about, including discovering a shared passion for children's literature of the 60's and 70's. We tottered home bearing a large carrier bag of snowdrops in the green and another of K. M. Peyton novels.

Now, not having to even consider cooking this evening, I can devote myself to finishing the colourful spinning and doing a little more on the shawl, which is progressing but slowly because of the circ I am having to use. I need an Addi turbo!

gw

One cup good, two cups better

Of tea, that is. I'm halfway down the second (very large) cup, and can feel the rehydration. That's the problem - I have been teaching today, and couple talking, dashing around, a slightly over-warm room and not drinking enough....get the picture?

There is a debate going on elsewhere on the net about spinners versus weavers. Well, I don't really mean as in textile rugby, or tag wrestling, but as in a lot of spinners I know feel that some weavers regard them as second class citizens. It's a really good debate, but I can't put in a link to it as it's a private list. However, I ran it past my class, and the response was a huge roar of "YES", quite heartfelt it was. So my perception that people still thought like that is right (it doesn't mean that weavers really do &etc, but that some spinners think they do, if you see what I mean.)

Now, if that last sounded less coherent than usual, its because I was interrupted in my ramblings by a phone call - my Timbertops wheel is going to be ready in a couple of weeks! That is much sooner than I had expected, and - well, YIPPEE!!! Now to break the news to the DSM that we have to make yet another road-trip....

Today is obviously my day - one of the participants in my class brought with her huge sackfuls of the most luscious alpaca fleece. A friend of hers owns these beasts, and apparently they are her babies, they get shampooed, and the best of everything. Lovely silky fibre, good staple length, fabulous colours. Please excuse the drooling. Thus far, I have some soft pale beige, and some silver to mid grey. But I brought two huge sackfuls home with me to take to Guild tomorrow, and I can see some more even paler beige in the top of one, and who knows what may lurk beneath....I deserve this, I really do!

gw

Plodding along.

Which is what I do when I have had yet another less than perfect night. Grr. Is it my age?? The three snoring creatures I share my bed with?? (There are four of us at it, but I don't hear myself, do I?) It could well be the relatively new dammit mattress. But last night, it was probably me talking about aforementioned RNDM with the DSM, and me daring to suggest that we might have to spend some serious money and his reaction to that and........

But I wouldn't have done much creative fibre or other work today anyway, as I have a class to teach on Friday, and fairly little clue as to what to say about tencel and ramie, other than here they are, this is how they are made/grown/look, nice, aren't they?

Jaded? Moi?

It will be ok. I will take along a handful of lovely spindles as well (secondary subject) and I can get very enthusiastic and lyrical about them, so all will be well. I need to talk about the programme for the next few months too, plus I can spend a decent amount of time with the one or two less experienced people who I know will be there. I always obsess about it and it is always ok if not damn fine. What an idiot!

This:

is supposed to be forming a birthday card for the friend turning sixty, but I cocked it up. I thought I had lots of aperture cards, found out at the weekend that I didn't, hastily ordered some from an eBay shop, thinking that they would go into the post on Monday and be here...and it hasn't happened. So, I use one that is a little too large, and get the placement wrong, so It Won't Do. Fortunately, I will be able to salvage the beadwork to go in to a smaller card - could send it to M as a belated, I guess, or see what my lady mother makes of it.

I was sad to see that to the names of the great and famous who have died lately we must add that of Andrea Dworkin. I can't claim to have read much of her work, and I can see why she attracted the vilification that she did - she told the world things that it really did not want to hear, in a way guaranteed to make it listen briefly and make it tear her to shreds. But I had admiration for her, for her intelligence and her bravery. Make of that what you will.

gw

Sunday lunch

Sunday lunch with friends is always likely to be good. This one was to celebrate the very nearly 60th birthday of my second oldest (by which I mean the length of time for which I have known her) friend. This gathered together several of her long-time chums all of whom I have known and loved to a greater or lesser extent for quite a while as well. Several of them have been battered rather more than it seems reasonable for life to batter anyone, and so it was nice to see them standing and looking the world in the eye. All together, a good day, a good feeling.

So, thus far, no - or rather very little - fibre or beads passing through my hands. I'll get to something restorative in a while. But at the moment, I need a strong cup of tea and a sit down. Quite apart from meandering down the back roads of my earlier life, I've seen the future and it makes me feel old and rheumaticky (g)

Take a gander at this. (It can be a little temperamental loading. If it doesn't work at all, can someone let me know, please?) OK, so for a start, I've never seen an address like that before, so that marks me down as a wrinkly old loser for sure. Now, I'm going to say upfront, Alice is my niece, she is a grand lass, and I have great respect for her talent, especially her talent for taking the piss. Quite right too!

Added to that, this is where she is about to have work exhibited. Now, that's a splendid idea, why should some poncy gallery get all the good stuff?

To continue: this definitely makes me feel ancient! But the web address came attached to the email telling me about the exhibition, because one of the band members is her fella. Mind you, the "tesco" part of the addy rather lets down the vaguely Satanic nature of the thing - or does it? The problem is, though, how do I manage to persuade the DSM that we should go incognito to one of their gigs? I reckon if we wear black clothes and dark glasses, we might get away with it........

Let me return this to something more approaching normal programming...... One of the books that I bought yesterday was this
Golly, if that link works, it will be a miracle! Anyhoo, I'm quite impressed with this book - ok, so it is something of the beading equivalent of the Jo Verso cross stitch books, but really, none the worse for that, and very nicely done.

I was going to include a photo of the little bead thing I have done for The birthday card, but I can't get a shot that isn't fuzzy, so I will wait until tomorrow, or whenever. I'm going to take my ageing carcase in search of gin!

gw

Shopping

I have been doing quite well on eBay of late - selling, that is. The time has seemed right for de-cluttering, divesting myself of some of the books and equipment that have served their purpose in the past but are now languishing in dark corners. I've raised a surprisingly tidy sum.

So - in the past twenty four hours, I have gone loopy and spent all of it.

A while back, I made a private sale and got rid of my Barnett drum carder. Now, these UK-made machines are superbly well constructed and functional, but to my way of thinking designed for carding fleece - the carding cloth is quite coarse. I couldn't do what I wanted to do, which was to make blends, luxury fibres or colours. So, Barnett, bye bye. What I needed, I said, was a Pat Green carder of some description. But as far as I know, there is no-one in the UK who deals in them now - there used to be, but no longer, sadly. But, occasionally, apparently, they come up second hand, and first I saw one on the Loom Exchange, but that went to someone else. Then, a few days ago, one appeared on eBay. I got lucky! I don't know which model it is, indeed, it may be one that is no longer made, but it appears to be in reasonable nick, and although it was an alarming bid to make for one of my impoverished means, it was, I think, not a bad price all things considered. I'm looking forward to it arriving and having a play.

So, today we go to Manchester for one of our occasional shopping forays. I'm kind of starting to look for something to wear to a wedding in July, and also for one or two things to spice up the summer wardrobe before going to France. OK, so lets be totally upfront about this - I like clothes. I consider those who say that it doesn't matter what they wear as long as they are clean, decent and if appropriate, warm, have a gene missing. Not only do I like clothes, but I like clothes shopping - well, in moderation anyway, my tolerance for cities, shops and all that goes with same is rather limited. But, guess what, I got lucky again - a really fabbo blue linen ankle length semi-fitted dress, sleeves just the right length, great neckline. What is even better is that the collection of lime green beads that is going to be a stunning neck piece at some point quite soon will go very well, the colours will be great together.

I did, over a rather nice Italian lunch, very nearly get the DSM to give me his Pumpkin fibre, but I backed off at the last minute, it seemed a bit mean. H'mm. Maybe I should reconsider that?

Now then, sometime last night, whilst not sleeping all that well (please do not let this become the start of a trend again, it is so tedious!) it occurred to me that while rabbiting on about dyeing the silk and soy silk I may be implying that I am not au fait with natural dyeing. Which is not, of course, the case. Whilst I can throw wool in and out of dyepots, or discourse upon the history until my audiences' eyes bulge and their ears bleed, what I have not done is much dyeing of silk, and none at all using soy silk. Hence all the experimentation. And what is more, I spent a small part of my non-sleeping time fluffing up the lac disaster, and it is going to be usable, if I card it - it looks much better fluffed up!

So, at this point I am knackered and my fingers are not obeying my brain necessitating much backing and filling on the keyboard, so I shall shut up. The rumour from downstairs is that our telly - or rather, the signal to same - is dead. Which means no Dr Who, and therefore I am cross....booze, give me booze.....


gw

Reasons to be cheerful......

(And yes, I did like Ian Dury!)

1: Despite the later, greyer nature of the day, this morning was all sunshine-sparkle with a brisk (and chilly, but can't have everything) breeze buffeting away at the daffs and primroses and forsythia, all of which were somehow back-lit by the bright sun and therefore a very intense yellow. Smashing!

2: This! Unreconstructed crone-relict of the seventies second wave that I am, I can't really express how thrilled I am to find this, courtesy of yesterday's Guardian. I need time to read it all, but if they have the balls (yes, ok, in a manner of speaking...) to use the f-word, then that's fine by me.

3: And this!


As is immediately apparent, I didn't manage to keep the top smooth and unruffled, but I did get it evenly dyed and to a shade that works for me. This is fustic, with alum at around 10%. I have soy silk, also evenly dyed, drying outside. I'm getting somewhere! Now on to trying other natural dye extracts, extending the colour range. I should also say that this is not by any means the best quality A1 mulberry, hence a partial explanation for the lack of sheen, but I think it will do quite nicely when suitably spun.

Next to report - the shawl has been completely frogged (this is getting a habit for me) because I had totally misunderstood the instructions on shaping. I now have it back on the needle and going right, with a few inches knitted, cooking with gas, in my terms of reference, in fact.

In hunting through my yarn stash for something to try the shawl with, I found these


The brighter orange (flame, actually....) yarn is the "Pumpkin" special from...Carolina Homespun? at SOAR last year. Then I found the slightly duller version of orange, this time in silk, from, I would imagine, Chasing Rainbows. Both very nice yarns though I says it myself. but that is all I have of them - about four ounces of the silk and six or maybe it's eight of the wool and silk mix. I want to do something nice with it, but can't for the life of me think what. Yes, it could be, and I guess most likely will be, a scarf. Not enough I fear, for even a small neck shawl. Ponder, ponder.

I was a total wuss and wimp today. I parked in town to run all the errands, and noticed a small gathering of people outside the Post Office. I realised, sharp as a tack, I am, that one of them was our MP (The election campaign has now begun in earnest. Sigh.) Through my brain ran all these ideas about what I could go up to her and say - it was such a good opportunity. Of course, I bottled out, and scuttled in to the PO. Ah, well. What good would it have done, anyway.

OK, so Blogger ate my earlier post, and my pc ate the copy I had, really had, taken of it. Lets try it one more time........

gw

Words

For whatever reason, I just cast an eye over my post from yesterday. Either I hung my cursor over the wrong button on the spellchecker, or Blogger was being cute with me. A "u" had mysteriously vanished from the word "labour", harrumph, and "Colinette" had transmogrified into "colonnade". One or two other things. Of course, if there is a spirit abroad, it will happen again, and then I'll be scared......

I woke up this mornin'...ahem. The words "naming of parts" sprang fully formed into my mind. Actually, this does happen a fair bit, because "Naming of Parts" by Henry Reed is one of my favourite poems.

To-day we have naming of parts. Yesterday,
We had daily cleaning. And to-morrow morning,
We shall have what to do after firing. But today,
To-day we have naming of parts. Japonica
Glistens like coral in all of the neighbouring gardens,
And to-day we have naming of parts.

This is the lower sling swivel. And this
Is the upper sling swivel, whose use you will see,
When you are given your slings. And this is the piling swivel,
Which in your case you have not got. The branches
Hold in the gardens their silent, eloquent gestures,
Which in our case we have not got.

This is the safety-catch, which is always released
With an easy flick of the thumb. And please do not let me
See anyone using his finger. You can do it quite easy
If you have any strength in your thumb. The blossoms
Are fragile and motionless, never letting anyone see
Any of them using their finger.

And this you can see is the bolt. The purpose of this
Is to open the breech, as you see. We can slide it
Rapidly backwards and forwards: we call this
Easing the spring. And rapidly backwards and forwards
The early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers:
They call it easing the Spring.

They call it easing the Spring; it is perfectly easy
If you have any strength in your thumb; like the bolt,
And the breech, and the cockingpiece, and the point of balance,
Which in our case we have not got; and the almond blossom
Silent in all of the gardens and the bees going backwards and forwards
For to-day we have naming of parts.

So I shall put it here, just because. Why do I love it? Oh, lots of reasons. It reminds me of lessons in summer, when it was a warm afternoon and the last thing we wanted to be doing was maths or Latin or some other abomination. Because it is such a subtle anti-war poem. The voice of the instructor, heard so pedantically droning on - "which in our case we have not got" creeps in to my everyday conversation from time to time as well. The fragile, warm, buzzing of life outside the window contrasted with the oily metal hardness of the - I believe Lee Enfield, but I could be wrong - it doesn't really matter.

But this morning it came in to my mind, and was rapidly followed by the thought that, no, not naming of parts, naming of the whole. Quite what this means I am as yet uncertain. I have inklings and I will ponder. I think I know, but it is so flaky....can't quite be certain.

I did finish the watch bracelet, only to find that the watch has defunctified itself - ptui. Fortunately, I should be able to remove the bracelet and re-use. But - silk! It is looking quite good this time. Still wet, and I want to photograph it dry, so no image yet. But a distinct improvement. Ye-hah.

gw

Monday is washing day.

And I do indeed tend to do my washing on a Monday. This is, of course, quite crazy. For most of my married life, I have had an automatic washing machine which in theory removes any particle of drudgery from the procedure. This isn't quite true in either fact or perception, but compared with heaving stuff out of a dolly tub or boiler, putting it through a mangle (which I have done in my extreme youth and tend to regard with the affection of hindsight) and then hanging it out on a line at the whim of the weather, well, comes close. Actually, I love to line dry laundry and one of the few minus points about living here is that there are so few days when it is a reasonable thing to do, and we have not yet quite reached the window.

I do wonder if labour saving devices are not something of a snare and delusion. I can't help feeling that ordinary women, rather than those with servants, those who did there own domestic work, probably didn't clean their houses as we think we should do with the benefit of vacuum cleaners and so forth.

Enough. Why am I blathering on about housework, fer......The same reasons as for why I do it at all, mostly. Displacement activity. I have no project twinkling at me at any stage that one might be. I am devoid of inspiration, and when that happens, the notion of domesticity always rears its ugly head. (Insert image of whole-body shudder, here.)

This is not to say that I have nothing on the go. Some soy silk is sitting in a Faustus debate even as I speak (but we won't go there, I have no even medium high hopes for this effort any more than the previous attempts.) I am still spinning the multi-brown-red-blue-whatever bat's. And I have cast on a shawl, from an idea being spread around by beryllium - I don't know if this is of her own devising, or whether she found it somewhere and liked it. But a neat shawl, anyway, which you start by casting on enough to sit comfortably across the back of your neck, and then increase two stitches either side of a single stitch at the ends of this section - so you end up with three triangular parts to the shawl which will then sit nicely around your shoulders. By golly, I explained that in a masterly fashion - not. Anyhow, I had some rather pleasant, cushy fawn yarn spun from some California Variegated Mutant roving (oh, how I love that name, sounds like something out of X-Files rather than a breed of sheep!) I bought the roving ages ago, spun it rather fewer ages ago and it needs using. It will make a good prototype. Did I just type that?? Obviously I do t some level have the intention of doing others, and I didn't know it! How clever and devious the subconscious is!



I suppose it is indeed not entirely accurate to say that I have no inklings about anything to do next. I doodled these



from some of the left-oversaw from the Colinette shawl, using the tapestry crochet technique. I quite fancy doing some more, but with handspun - I need to practice my fancy yarn spinning for some classes coming up, and they might be nice to do for a purpose rather than just doing any old how. I can at least mull that one over.

I also have another beading project coming up on the inside, hope to finish that today or tomorrow - another simple watch bracelet. Then I need to get cracking on a few things - another beaded thing as another gift, and some pieces for me to wear at a wedding....I don't need to worry about What To Do Next, do I!

gw