To A Better Year

Day 79: It goes without saying that most of us are glad to see the back of 2020, but the new year opens with a number of situations which could send us from bad to worse. I learned long ago not to utter the words, "What else could possibly go wrong?" because as swiftly as I spoke them, the universe invariably would take up the challenge and give me a demonstration. There is no doubt in my mind that it could be worse, far worse, but as surely as lichens and mosses weather droughts, we have it in us to pull through if we follow their examples of cooperation and tenacity. As a practicing shaman, I draw many life-lessons from Nature. Sometimes she is a cryptic instructor; leading, but leaving her pupil to draw conclusions independent of her tutelage. Or sometimes she is less than patient, and gives a brisk swat upside the head when she feels it's merited. Yet the lesson of the lichen is clear: without the cooperative venture of three partners (fungus, alga and yeast), the community of these remarkable structures would fail. Thus, dear readers, my wish for you in the coming year is that you will learn to live as the lichens do, and that Nature will repay you in kind for your gentle treatment of her creatures.

Cold Feet

Day 78: Hypothermia and frostbite are subjects with which most winter outdoor enthusiasts will be familiar, so the question arises: How do those little bitty birds survive? Why don't their feet freeze? The first part of the answer is relatively simple. A bird's body temperature is significantly higher (106 degrees) than that of a human. The second and most notable factor is that they are possessed of a "countercurrent" circulatory system in which the veins carrying cooled blood are intertwined with the arteries transporting warm blood from the body's interior. As much as 85 percent of the warmth from the outgoing blood transfers to that returning before it re-enters the body. This system of intertwined veins and arteries exists in both the legs and in the wings. Humans don't have this evolutionary advantage, so we must wear appropriate clothing to protects our extremities.

Blackbird Convention

Day 77: I am up to the eyeballs in blackbirds, all Red-winged and mostly male. I don't understand how they missed the memo that they were supposed to migrate to a warmer clime, although I suspect that discovery of a seemingly bottomless supply of black-oil sunflower seed might have been an influencing factor. Now it must be said that I love almost all birds (the short list of exceptions topped by pigeons and starlings), but these guys are drivin' me nutz. Even the Steller's Jays are intimidated by them when outnumbered five to one. I have taken to standing at the window and at the first sight of a blackbird incursion, I wave my hands or tap on the glass. That tactic is generally sufficient to move them into the contorted filber where they gather in droves as I wait them out. After half a dozen or a dozen attempts, they usually give up. At least my staying power is longer than theirs. Two or three Red-wings is plenty, thank you, and six is about the limit of my seed budget. Thirty is...well, thirty is more than any of us, Porch Parrots, Steller-fellers, Towhees or Sparrows can stand.

Buddies

Day 76: Pandemic notwithstanding, my buddies are starting to show up at my place to celebrate the turning of the year and lengthening daylight. The clmbing Hydrangea (Hydrangea anomala) is one of the earliest of my ornamentals to show new growth. As far as flowering is concerned, its small clusters of loosely-held white blooms are, unspectacular but I do not grow it for blossoms. Rather, it displays a wealth of verdure where it mounts the garage wall opposite my kitchen window (a much prettier sight than blank siding) and in autumn, it turns vivid orange, holding its foliage long and late for an even lovelier visual treat. Flanking it are the House of Chirp and Pussywillow Cottage, residences occupied annually by the swallows who enjoy the coolness the leaves provide. Admittedly, its holdfasts grip the wood rather tightly once established, but I keep it pruned back, loosely espaliered into a fan terminating at the height of the trellis (a support it did not require). Even now, in the chill and frost of winter, its early and anxious buds are a promise of warmer, brighter days.

A Visit From Murphy

Day 75: Pleased that warping had for once gone without a hitch...no miscounts of heddles or dents, no annoying tangles in 21 feet of warp, no unnoticed manufacturer's knots...I sat down at the loom to figure out which bird's-eye pattern would kick off the new project. Little did I know that Murphy had not gotten the message about social distancing and was indeed standing mere inches behind me, chortling like Snidely Whiplash as he tied fair Nell to the railroad track. Nor did I feel his sinister presence when I said to myself, "Huh, that looks awfully wide." I did several tests of an inch or so of throws, each time saying, "Nah, that just isn't working" before picking it all back to conserve precious fibers. I tried overshot technique, spacing each pass of colour with a pass of white, but the designs were not showing up well at all. "Weird," says I. "Did I use a different thread the last time I did this?" I finally settled on making two passes in each shed, effectively doubling the weight of my weft. The pattern began to show itself and I wove about three inches before going to bed. This morning when I woke up, a thought occurred: did I use the 12-dent reed rather than the 15? The reed determines the width of the cloth. 288 threads spread out at 12 to the inch gives 24 inches; at 15 to the inch, it's a hair over 19. Even before I brushed my teeth or washed my face, I went to the loom and checked the reed. There, etched in the metal was the number 12. That's why the piece was wider than I'd planned. Murphy had exercised his law in a way it had never affected me in my entire career as a weaver, teasing me by smoothing the warping process all the while knowing I had the wrong reed in the loom. Now, I could have stuck to my guns and appointed the project to bathtowels, but that was not what I had intended. I made six more plain throws in natural, hemstitched the end and cut the "sample" away (that's what we'll call it: a sample...not a mistake, a sample). The right reed has been inserted and re-sleyed, and Murphy has been sharply reprimanded and banished for his unwelcome participation in my craft.

Update: Murphy has been defeated. The weaving is now progressing as planned. I believe I will still have enough warp for six hand towels in spite of having had to cut the "sample" off the loom. I always allow extra when warping.

Tabula Rasa

Day 74: Tabula rasa, a clean slate. That's what you see here, or close. Having taken two projects off the floor loom on the day of Christmas Eve and with a measured warp waiting in the wings, I spent much of Christmas Day dressing the loom while a ham sizzled in the oven. My back gave out before I completed threading the warp, so I finished it up this morning. The potential here is enormous. First of all, it is hung for a traditional bird's-eye treadling, giving many options as far as loom-controlled patterns are concerned. Then, there's a cupboard full of cones of cotton in a wide assortment of colours. Just changing up patterns and colours, the combinations are myriad. However, I've been wanting to fiddle with hand-controlled weaves with these particular fibers, and because the bird's-eye threading also gives me a tabby (binder) shed, that option is open to me here. Looks pretty boring, that plain cream warp, but wait until you see how it livens up and dances when the colours are introduced!

Merry Christmas!

Day 73: Merry Christmas, dear readers! I know that many of you (more likely, most of you) are finding it difficult to celebrate anything about the last year, so take this moment as I did earlier this morning to reflect on the things which have brought light and love into your lives in years past. As I sat in the sparkle of the lights on my tree, I looked at my ornaments: Tippy and Skunk's kitties; two Fimo sheep represening Cindy and Ivy, first of my former flock; a poorly-carved Carlo, my husband's overly territorial parrot; my mother's Balinese frog; and of course Cocoa, love of my life, represented three times in places of honour among the boughs. Newest to the tree, a slice from a branch with a photo of a certain Crow holding a dear little Pine Siskin on her hand, the ornament a gift from Kevin who, I suspect, will always remember me as a person who lived her motto: "The goal of life is living in agreement with Nature." At least I hope that is how I will be remembered. In this time of reflection, quietly meditating on the significance of many of my ornaments, I found the 2020 frown fading from my forehead, felt a calmness in my spirit which has been absent far too long. I felt a wash of love, years in the gathering of its tide, flow over me in that first hour before dawn. Then, with first light on the horizon (albeit dim and grey), I opened the gifts sent by friends, knowing as I undid each ribbon that they had made the effort to keep Christmas alive despite the weight of the times oppressing them. It gave me hope for better days. My wishes for you are that you find such peace in your own hearts on this day, and may Nature gift you with such beauty as she has placed along my path for lo, these many years.

Pickup Sticks

Day 72: This little weaving is actually a fiber test, but it will serve to explain the use of pickup sticks with a rigid heddle loom. You see, a rigid heddle is not as versatile as a shaft loom because with a single heddle (the bit which raises or lowers each warp thread), the weaver is restricted to two sheds (the triangular gap the shuttle passes through). These are called "up" and "down," appropriately. The threads pass through slots or holes alternately and the heddle is lifted or dropped, a process which only affects the warps in the small holes. The slot threads remain in one position as the heddle is moved from one resting position on the block to another. Some rigid heddle looms such as mine are equipped to handle two heddles, but the slot threads still ride in the slots as the hole threads rise above or drop below them. In other words, there are only three possible sheds which can be created with the warp using two heddles. That doesn't leave you with many options for weaving designs. The way you get around this limitation is to use pickup sticks to create a shed impossible to make with the heddles alone. Threads are manually lifted along the length of the pickup stick which, when it is turned on edge, forms a new shed. Complex patterns can be made using pickup sticks, including figures and geometric designs. As I mentioned at the top, this was a fiber test. I wanted to see if single-thread points would show up at the apices of triangles when using worsted yarn for both the floats (white) and the tabby (aqua) with a 7.5 epi reed. They did not. Rather than throw the experiment away, I decided to weave a different pattern. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the resultant four-inch wide, two-foot long sample, but it's fun to weave.

Horticultural Experiment

Day 71: Here you see the beginnings of another of Crow's infamous horticultural experiments: the collection and seed-cleaning of Comptonia peregrina nutlets, preparatory to attempting to germinate them indoors. I was rather surprised to find out that the plant doesn't seem to self-sow here in the Pacific Northwest, although it does send underground runners out at least ten feet. On the East Coast where it is native, it often forms substantial groves of shrubbery. On the other hand, it's leggy and unkempt in its native environment, but mine keeps a compact shape with only enough pruning to keep its lush foliage from blocking my sidewalk. As shrubs go, it's certainly not what you'd term an "ornamental," but oh, the fragrance! It well deserves its common names of Sweetfern or Spicebush. Even in the winter months when the leaves are dry and brittle, they hold their scent. Freshly cut in summer, they will perfume a room. When green, the nutlets (inset) may resemble burrs, but they are softly spiny, not prickly. Each one contains several hard, dark brown seeds when ripe. Comptonia foliage may be used to brew a somewhat bitter herbal tea which may be drunk or applied to the skin to treat poison ivy rashes.

Tablet Weaving

Day 70: I've been drawing on old skills to keep boredom at bay as I shelter in place during the pandemic, and in most cases, that just means digging into the back of the cupboard for equipment I already own. That said, I knew I had thrown out my old cardboard tablet-weaving cards at least a decade ago because they had deteriorated to such a point as to be unusable, so I ordered a set of 25 plastic ones to replace them. Having not touched tablet weaving in ages, I was pleased to see the art benefiting from technological advances. Forty years ago, plastic cards weren't available. I started with a simple pattern "to prime the pump" (as it were): a single diamond which, worked with thrums from weaving gave me a sample piece about half an inch wide and five inches long. For my second project (shown here), I dug out two skeins of space-dyed #5 perle cotton which I had originally intended for hardanger, cut each in such a manner that I could best utilize the entire length, and doubled the pattern so that it would yield two diamonds instead of one. The space-dyed thread gives a shimmery effect to the weaving. Tablet weaving (also known as card weaving) is an excellent introduction into the art of creating textiles by manipulating warp and weft. Although I've used plastic cards here, you can make your own from materials you probably already have on hand. You'll need some stiff, thin carboard and a hole punch. Cut out 2.5" or 3" squares , punch a hole in each corner and round them so they won't catch on your threads. Then all you need is some yarn or thread (beginners should use smooth fibers, not yarn) and you're on you way to a weaving adventure.

Solstice Greetings 2020

Day 69: Dance the holly! / Dance the mistletoe! / The Light is now returning / And dark nights swiftly go! Solstice greetings to you, dear readers, with hope that this dark period in our history will be dispelled as surely as the gloom of winter gives way to longer and brighter days. It is the way of Nature to go in cycles: seasons, generations, epochs. The only true constant is that of change. Nothing endures forever and, as one sage put it, what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. Sometimes, especially here in the Pacific Northwest, it seems as if there are only two seasons, that of winter which lasts ten months of the year, shouldering on either end as two-week periods which slope gradually into that of a brief month of summer. Seasonal Affective Disorder aside, we northern-latitude humans are tried and tested survivors. As the days lengthen and Light, however dim, begins to encroach on the edges of darkness, bid your spirits to rise and join the celebratory dance.

Hot Ice

Day 67: Humans have a dreadful tendency to omit looking before they leap. Back in the 1950s, nuclear energy was looked upon as being the upcoming thing, and radioactive materials were often treated as novelties without any concern for the hazards they might pose. Radium was used on watch dials to make the numbers visible in the dark, as well as being added to paints and plastics. Indeed, I had a whole galaxy of glow-in-the-dark stars glued to the headboard of my bed (if you were wondering why I'm so weird, that may answer your question), and these radium-impregnated icicles have always been one of my favourite Christmas decorations. I never thought much about it until one year when I glanced at the Christmas tree after shutting out the lights. Not only were the icicles glowing, but so were the non-glow plastic snowflakes which had been stored in the box with them. I suppose the prudent thing to have done was to have trashed them right then and there, but that posed another ethical question: just how DO you go about disposing of radioactives, even low-dosage ones? Besides, I'd already lived with them for fifty or sixty years, and any damage to my health was undoubtedly already done. In the long term, radium's most stable isotope has a half-life of roughly 1600 years,, and although these don't glow as brightly as they did when I was a child, my "hot ice" will probably be capable of setting off a Geiger counter for many years to come.

Winter Hat

Day 67: First of all, let me apologize for the model. My new winter hat was too big for Tippy or any of my stuffies, so you're stuck with the little old lady who, in any event, is going to be the one wearing it. That said, it's not often that I find a new craft which I find as enjoyable as my usual fare of needlearts (knitting, weaving and crochet), but nalbinding has found a niche in my skills database which is likely to be visited fairly often. I love the look of the stitches, and even though their execution is repetitive and progresses slowly, the herringbones and plaits they create makes a dense yet light and flexible textile. If not as versatile as knit or crochet, nalbinding can be used to make sweaters, socks, mittens, bags, scarves, shawls and so on, and its unique look will have your needleworking friends asking, "What's that stitch? How did you do that?" The only equipment required is some yarn and a standard yarn needle, although specialized flat needles made of bone, horn or wood will make your stitching more uniform and easier. I used a 3.5" bone needle to stitch my hat, topped it with a crocheted "toorie" flower and added another one at the temple. You'll also notice that I made it plenty long to keep my ears warm! I decreased stitches in the last few rows to ensure a snug fit. Now I'm ready for some snow!

Leftovers

Day 66: Leftovers are always good, whether they're cold pizza for breakfast or thrums from the loom. With a bag of three-foot long warp tails in hand, I set up the rigid heddle loom using natural 6/2 cotton as my warp with the intention of making paired but random six-throw stripes to use them up. I spaced each pair with six throws of natural, and because I thought I had forgotten to roll up my stitch counter at one point, I wove straight through a 34-inch length. The piece will be cut in half and seamed up the sides to make vertical (not horizontal) stripes on two small bags roughly seven inches square. The bags will be lined with a lightweight fabric. I still have a lot of thrums left in these colours to make some sort of strap/handle. As a sidebar to this, it looks as if I'll have two or three other projects finished up by bedtime, leaving several open spaces on my crafts calendar. I wonder what other long-ignored needleart I can drag out of hiding to relieve pandemic ennui?

Fungal Associates

Day 65: Well, this is an interesting turn-up! My back yard has suddenly sprouted a lavish streak of Ramaria acrisiccescens radiating from...yep, if you've been paying attention in class, you should be able to guess what I'm going to say...the site where Corallorhiza maculata (my pet Coralroot, lovingly known as "Mac") cropped up last spring. While this is not conclusive evidence of a specific fungal association with a mycoheterotrophic plant species, it is certainly suggestive. Both Corallorhiza maculata and Ramaria acrisiccescens are common in Pacific Northwest forests, but until this year, neither appeared in my yard. The line of Ramaria is about twelve feet long, forming a gentle arc with Mac near its apex. There may be more hidden beneath the pile of pruned branches and lawn clippings which are heaped in the woods behind Mac's stronghold. A few other little brown mushrooms are also in evidence, although I believe I've seen them here before. Perhaps they were instrumental in establishing the beginnings of a fungal community which allowed Mac to grow. I may have to stake off a section 20' x 10' as "Local Research Area #1."

Holes

Day 64: "I have holes in my sprang." I can imagine the reaction from someone overhearing that phrase, ignorant of why it might be desirable to have holes in your sprang, most likely ignorant of the needleart as well, but carefully placed holes are what give sprang character. This particular arrangement is (warning: deliberate visual puns may be encountered) an eyelet pattern of six holes arranged around a center hole like the petals on a flower. By placing holes at strategic locations in a piece of work, the sprang artist can create geometric figures, anything from simple triangles to more complex designs like animals and people. I'm just learning to place holes. There were a few pick-backs involved in the process and an important lesson learned with respect to smugness and "safety strings" (the thicker thread at the bottom of the image), and now the process is moving forward without too many hitches (for the linguistically alert amongst you, this second pun was also intentional since there are no true "hitches" in sprang, only twists). It's my considered opinion that everyone should have holes in their sprang.

Floppy-Eared Cats

Day 63: Pandemic frustration has driven me to spend a lot of time perusing YouTube videos, and as you might suspect, that's a dangerous occupation for any crafter. That's where I found the instructions for a "Floppy-Eared Cat" quilt which was just too cute to pass up. There are two versions of the cat, one sitting up and one reclining, and they're meant to fit together in sets of four as shown above. Originally, I had intended to make one of each style just to be sure the directions were clear, planning to file the pattern away for future reference. I started with the pink sitty-up cat, mainly because I had an abundance of the pink fabric left over from the Kitty Quilt (I'd gotten a bargain on the remainder of the bolt), and then to find something to go with it, I made a laying-down cat with a pink print on a black background. Now thoroughly "pinked out" (my distaste for pink is legend) and also because I'm a crazy cat lady, it was only logical that I should make another pair of cats in blue. Four cats into an unintentional project, I had something which looked like it needed to be turned into a finished piece rather than being tucked away in the "prototype" bin, so I added a border, embroidered it with a stem stitch "rope" in black to tie in with the quilt blocks, and then hand-quilted the blocks. The YouTube pattern had not suggested any quilting design even though the individual pieces of fabric were rather large, so I added geometric legs, tails and face markings to the cats. Hey, it's a wall hanging! A black bias-tape border finished it off. And to think it all started with, "Hmmmm, that looks interesting."

Yew Berries

Day 62: I don't know if it's myth or fact, but I've heard it said that yew fruits every seventh year. I suspect there's some validation for the statement, although I would think the schedule might be somewhat less rigid. At least in my own observations of the solitary female yew in my hedgerow, I have only seen the berries (arils, actually) appear four or five times in the thirty years I've lived here. Aril. Yes, let's look at that word a little more closely while we're at it. Technically, these little red Christmas ornaments hiding in the deep green shadows are not berries, despite what they look like. "Aril" describes the fleshy outer covering of the seeds of certain plants like yew. In fact, the pips inside a pomegranate are also arils, each containing a single seed. As for the arils of the yew, be strongly advised that although the fleshy portion is considered edible, the seed inside is poisonous! The foliage of the yew is also poisonous when ingested, and the toxins it contains may be absorbed through the skin. That said, yew'd do well to leave the whole plant alone.

Twists And Turns

Day 61: Although this is another Red Heart "colour pooling" yarn, the shades are such that I don't want to lump it into the Ugly Yarn series even though it has a somewhat harsh finish. In fact, I find the pastels rather pleasing. Still, variegated yarns are best employed as novelties or small projects, so I thought I'd make myself a new winter hat using nalbinding. Having learned the Oslo stitch, it was time to move up to something a little more complicated, i.e., Finnish stitch. Finnish is more dense than Oslo and gives a lovely plaited effect reminiscent of four-strand braiding, but oh, the twists and turns! There are a number of variations to the stitch depending on how many threads the needleworker chooses to pick up from the edge and/or reverse side, as well as the number of threads carried on the thumb at any given time. Here, I pick up one edge stitch, then the innermost of three thumb loops, one "mouse ear" loop from the reverse, and then twist the three loops downward as I pass my needle under the remaining two thumb loops and the working thread. It sounds complicated, but in practice, the process is fairly obvious. Increases are made by utilizing the same edge loop twice in succession, decreases by picking up two edge loops instead of one. That said, the needleworker will not find standardized patterns for nalbinding garments or other items due to multiple factors including an individual's thumb size, the tightness of the work, the type of yarn used and so on. A willingness to experiment is crucial, and the experience gained by it will dictate your success with nalbinding, which is to say that my first try at the crown of a hat came out way too pointy, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

Ugly Yarn Series, No. 2

Day 60: All too frequently, some new craft or method will capture my interest, leading me to purchase all the necessary equipment and extras only to find out that the art is not something I particularly like. Such was the case with "colour pooling," a crochet/knit technique which creates large patches of colour using space-dyed yarns with more distinct breaks between hues than is seen in standard ombres. That said, colour pooling also requires the needleworker to adjust the tension of the stitches in order to maintain a pattern. The inevitable result is that some stitches must be tighter or looser than others which, to me at least, looked like sloppy handiwork. I gave up colour pooling for a bad deal and was then stuck with some rather garish multicoloured Red Heart worsted ("Fiesta") specifically designed for the method. This particular yarn reminded me of something a hippie might have found underneath the seat of their van after a rock festival, and I had three skeins of it I needed to put to good use.

Witness Ugly Yarn series No. 2. Workers of sprang advise that you should never use "sticky" yarns for warp. Well, I did, and although it took a lot of wrangling and fussing, I managed to turn almost a full skein into a tightly woven sprang "project tote" (stuffed here with more of the same yarn). I knit the top border in 2 x 2 rib, and ran a spool-knit cord through the neck to make it into a drawstring bag. With plenty left over, I turned out a pair of nalbinding ankle warmers, again with 2 x 2 knit cuffs at either end. Just for giggles, I then set up my backstrap loom and wove an obviously sectional band to replace the old backstrap band which was about four inches too long. I still have a little over half a skein to use up, but I'm pleased with the way all three of these Ugly Yarn projects worked out.

Traditions

Day 59: Traditions are an important part of life, not only for the sense of bonding which they carry but also as something to anticipate with joy and hope. When one lives alone, the former is diminished by lack of connection, but there is no reason not to exploit the latter to its fullest benefit. As I have said before, I do not celebrate Christmas in the religious definition. I do put up a tree and I do exchange gifts with a small circle of friends, but my solemn observation is reserved for the Solstice. And without family to participate in Yuletide sing-alongs or elaborate Christmas dinners, I have had to create my own personal set of traditions, one of which is the making of spritz. I make them only at Christmastime, and not a single soul is here to reproach me for my lavish use of sprinkles. I've seen far too many cookies which appeared to have made the briefest pass through the coloured sugar, picking up only the few grains which allowed them to say, "Look! I'm festive!" Nope, in this household, you get sprinkles, lots of sprinkles to give that sugary crunch to rich almond-flavoured dough. Once a year is not such a sinful indulgence, is it?

Yew Will Be Relocating

Day 58: The former owners of my property must have been on a tight budget. They planted a line of two dozen yews (species undetermined) along the front to serve as a hedge, spacing them uniformly until they ran out...about fifty feet from the actual corner of the lot. The remaining space was protected against trespassers by a three-line barbed wire fence which lasted a few years into my tenancy and then fell over. By then, a significant amount of unsightly brush had grown up in the gap where the fence had restricted mowing, so I left it as a deterrent and kept it trimmed back to a manageable mess. Then one day as I was walking around the yard, I spotted a couple of yew seedlings thirty feet from the hedge. At first, I thought they might have been the progeny of the sole female yew in the planting, but then I realized that they had propagated from pruned bits I'd dropped on my way to the burn pile. Nature herself had offered me a solution to the hedge gap, so I transplanted four or five to the line. Only one survived, possibly because I shaved the others off at ground level with the mower, not recalling where I'd put them until it was too late. Now I have another opportunity. I've staked out half a dozen volunteers, the tallest no more than six inches. Yew will be relocating some time this winter.

Fiber Artist In Residence

Day 57: Just so nobody thinks I'm slackin' off during the pandemic, I thought I'd pull a few of my current projects together for a group photo, emphasis on the words "a few." There are others which, for want of space, simply couldn't be accommodated, like spinning, weaving on the floor loom, piecework for another quilt. I do not believe in letting my hands rest idle unless they are holding a book or puzzle, and as I have said repeatedly to friends of late, I have the attention span of a nervous gerbil. Some processes demand longer stints of activity than others, but many of these crafts are such that I can do a row here, a few throws there, fifty stitches in another place and then move on to something else. This keeps me from getting bored (a mood I fall into all too easily), and a bored Crow is a cranky Crow, and a cranky Crow should really come with a big red warning label.

A bit of backstory here: one of the first full-time jobs I ever held was that of art-needlework consultant for a chain of three stores on the east coast. I was already well-versed in many forms of needlework, although at the time, I leaned more heavily toward knitting than anything else. It was during my employment that I learned to tat with a shuttle, rounding out a knowledge base of the most common types of needlcraft. As I matured, I kept searching out other needlework methods: tvistsom, Russian knotwork, netting, cardweaving. Admittedly, I found that I didn't enjoy each as much as the others, and some were abandoned forevermore (I will never be a fan of macrame, although I love marlinespike work). For the most part, I prefer to work with finer threads than with yarn, although knitting still ranks among my favourite pastimes, and when I do crochet, I seldom use a thread larger than size 30. Weaving, whether on the floor loom or my small rigid heddle, is also high on the list. It is a rare day when I don't have a knitting project in progress or the big loom stands empty.

So...to the details, then. My living space has been occupied with one quilt or another for at least the last four years straight, so the Hexagons form an appropriate background for (top left, going counterclockwise): kumihimo (beaded), crochet (a pineapple tablecloth motif using ecru vintage thread), peg-loom knitting, rigid-heddle weaving, nalbinding (an Ugly Yarn project), knitting, and last, hanging on an inprompu loom in front of the fireplace bricks, sprang (again using the Ugly Yarn seen in the nalbinding legwarmers). Ya think I have enough to keep me busy for a while?

Ugly Yarn Series, No. 1

Day 56: Let's call this the Ugly Yarn Series. This is No. 1, and you'll be seeing several more as I progress through the deep recesses of my stash. So that you'll better understand what's going on here, a little explanation is in order. You see, some time ago, a friend decided to clear out her own yarn stash and asked me if I'd be interested in taking possession of some (or all!) of it. I am not one to pass up free yarn, but I was not expecting her to offload enough to fill three three big storage bins. I could have taken even more, but honestly, I'd reached capacity. There were full kits as well as skeined yarns, most still with the yardage specified on the wrappers, and if there were partial skeins, I made sure that there was at least one unused skein to go along with. Much of it was worsted weight, good for hats, and although it was heavier than my usual preference, it was free. Free is good. You can't go wrong with free. Or can you? Aye, and there's the rub: ugly yarns.

Now by "ugly," I don't mean that these yarns were in any way unusable. I mean that they fell short when it came to quality. Perhaps the finish was harsh, the twist too loose or too tight, or that they were lumpy when they should have been smooth. Maybe the designated yarn weight was off, too heavy to classify as "#3" or #4" despite what the manufacturer claimed. Maybe the colours weren't the most appealing in the line. One way or another, once I'd used up the better skeins, I was stuck with almost a full bin of "seconds," skeins which were going to require some project planning to render into a functional and attractive item.

No. 1 in the Ugly Yarn series is one of those in the category of "harsh finishes." Even on #6 needles, it makes a board-stiff fabric. I needed to find a needlecraft which would permit it the space it seemed to demand. I did not want to move up to larger needles. We start getting into the territory I describe as "knitting ship's hawser with two telephone poles" if I have to pick up #7 needles. Likewise, crocheting with a hook larger than 3 mm makes me feel like I'm using a gaff. Having recently discovered nalbinding, I made a pair of wristlets using a few yards of the one-pound skein, but even that wasn't satisfactory. No, there had to be some other method.

Enter the knitting board, aka peg loom or knitting rake. By its very nature, the stitches created on a peg loom tend to be loose. This seemed to be the perfect solution. There was only one problem: I had only ever done spool knitting (the same principle). I had not used a peg loom. After multiple assaults on YouTube, I finally discovered a video which made every step of the process clear. At this point, I have almost two feet done on a soft, thick scarf which no one will ever call "ugly."

Red Sky In The Morning

Day 55: "Red sky in the morning / Sailor take warning / Red sky at night / Sailor's delight" is an aphorism based in observation, i.e., if clouds are painted by a rising sun, unsettled weather is forthcoming. Conversely, if skies are sufficiently open below the horizon that the sinking sun can turn evening clouds rosy, a clearing trend will ensue. At least that's the logic behind the rhyme here in the Pacific Northwest, although we seldom trust to any promise of sunny days. This morning's sunrise was particularly vivid to the southeast. The Mountain, however, was shrouded by greyer, lumpy wool: a quilt batting gone sour with moisture and mildew, heaped on the foothills without a hint of warmth in its layers. Still, I heard the crows calling up the dawn, revelling in a riot of colours visible only to their more discriminating and sensitive avian eyes. That thought was enough to make me wonder, "What am I not seeing here?" even as I marvelled at the sight.

The Bird Tree

Day 54: It's St. Nicholas' Day, and that means it was time to put up the Christmas tree. This has become my tradition, although it was not one which carried over from my childhood. The decorations have gone through several iterations, but when I no longer had a life-partner with whom to share the holidays, birds began to dominate the boughs. Nowaways, at least 90% of my ornaments are birds, the remainder largely dedicated to other creatures from nature such as frogs, a caterpillar on a leaf, a beehive and a few sheep. To be sure, there are snowflakes and icicles as well, presented as backdrops for my avian horde. One might notice a preponderance of cockatoos and to a lesser extent parrots, nods to feathered family members long gone but no less dear for the passage of time. I do not celebrate Christmas in the traditional sense, but rather as a somewhat tardy acknowledgement of the Solstice, a festival of light and renewal, and of remembrance.

Old Dog, New Trick

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Day 53: This old dog has learned a new trick: nålbinding (or at least the Oslo stitch, so far). I happened across the word in reading about språng, and from hereon out, I'm going to dispense with the diacritical marks for the sake of my English-speaking readership. Indeed, nalbinding can be spelled multiple ways including naalbinding, nalebinding, nalbindning or naalebinding, depending on what part of Scandinavia you're in. The term was only coined during the 1970s and means "needle-binding," although the process has been documented from 6500 BCE. You can read more in Wikipedia if you're curious, and especially since that is currently my main source for its history. Traditionally, it is done with a large-eyed flat and somewhat blunt needle made of wood, bone or horn, but not having one handy, I made do with a yarn needle to create a pair of wristlets. It took a few false starts. In fact, I still have a tendency to make a Möbius strip when starting the second row if I'm not paying close attention to my work. Strangely enough, once I had completed a sample piece, I recognized the technique as something I'd seen before and assumed was knit. Apparently, even the experts have some difficulty telling whether a piece is nalbound or knit when certain stitches have been used. Oslo stitch appears almost braided, and in worsted, makes a very dense textile with an attractive surface character. It has very little horizonal elasticity (i.e., following the direction of the rows) but is somewhat more stretchy on the vertical. The major drawback of the technique is that it must be done with short sections of yarn because the full length must be drawn through the loops as each stitch is made. When worked in wool, new strands are joined by felting, but in synthetics, the needleartist winds up with a lot of tails to tuck. Each wristlet was made over 25 stitches and required two 10-yard lengths of yarn to complete five rounds. Oh yeah, my real needles will arrive Monday. I like nalbinding.

Recommended By Experts

Day 52: Day before yesterday, I received an early Christmas present in the mail with no clue as to the sender save for the return address of the bookseller, but that was a dead give-away. I immediately sat down and wrote Arnie a letter of thanks. The arrival of the book was remarkably timely; I had been eyeing the ads for it in Scientific American and was very close to ordering it for myself because...well, because you just can't go wrong when David Sibley is talking about birds. His expertise is only surpassed by that of the birds themselves and, such being the case, I thought I'd put it to the ultimate expert for final approval. A bribe of a few sunflower seeds was all it took. "What It's Like To Be A Bird" has the official Beak of Approval from Mr. Dee.

How Many Angels...

Day 51: I think I may have come close to answering the age-old question of, "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" The mob of Porch Parrots (Coccothraustes vespertinus, aka Evening Grosbeaks) descended on the feeders (three feeders, mind you) as soon as I laid out seed, and it was "flapping room only" here when occupancy achieved eight, four on each side. Nine or ten managed to crowd into the two pole-mounted dispensers, but many harsh "CHURP" objections could be heard even from inside the house. Although this image only shows the males, there were ladies present in this flock, unlike the group which came a week or so ago which consisted entirely of boys.

Starring Role

Day 50: "Lifesaver Plant" (Huernia zebrina) is another one of those forgiving, go-ahead-and-ignore-me houseplants no one should be without. Unlike its cousin Huernia procumbens, whose sole mission in life appears to be to sprawl with abandon and drop bits of itself in other flower pots, zebrina rewards the lack of care it receives from its grower with displays of star-shaped blooms several times a year. The raised disk in the center of each flower give it its common name, and each one has more freckles on its face than Huckleberry Finn. Starts may be made by taking a section of the foliage and sticking the end down in soil, keeping it damp until it takes root. Indeed, segments may root themselves wherever they touch down. The "spines" are soft rather than spiky. I think of Huernia zebrina as a "happy plant," content to play its starring role without any great coaching on my part.

Sporophytes On Ice

Day 49: Think about this for a minute. What vegetation can be found in cold climates like the arctic tundra? Why, mosses and lichens, of course! While some vascular plants can withstand freezing temperatures, many others die off as soon as Jack Frost touches them with his paintbrush. What's so special about mosses and lichens in this regard? The answer may be in some part their ability to accumulate sugars in their cells. As cell walls shrink due to dessication, the sugars in the interior of the cell are concentrated into a smaller area, thus lowering the freezing point. Mosses and lichens can adapt quickly to even minor elevations in temperature, thus making it possible to uptake sugars on relatively short notice in a cycle of freeze-thaw events. Although we tend to think of mosses and lichens as primitive, they actually have some pretty clever survival strategies.