Tag Archives: stretched the line

tangent

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ears

eyes

cookies

these are a few of my favorite things

but really.

these are just a few of the things my two youngest kids think that the covered cds i crocheted for the ends of itsybittsysider’s log cabin carrier should be used as.  i may whip up a few more for them to use for toys when i’m ready to assemble with the current ones.

as far as knitting goes, i have often knit with two, or even three, strands of yarn held together.  i like big needles and this is a good way to bulky up most any yarn so i can use them.  but it has always been more than one strand of the same kind of yarn.  this week i’m using knit picks wool of the andes bulky which is plain wool (although calling the great colors it comes in ‘plain’ is quite an understatement).   i’m knitting this together with knit picks suri dream which is light and airy.  the resulting fabric is not really much like either of the yarns knit up seperately.  it’s sturdy like the pure  wool but has this great ‘makes me want to stroke it’ halo to it.  already in my head i have ideas for what else to knit in this combination and i’m not yet done with the pillow…

since i am known for not thinking in a straight line, it should be no surprise that there’s another project in the works (or should i say another new project in the works).  it’s still hush, hush but i can say that the soft touch of plymouth yarn company‘s kudo silk blend is really nice to work with. watching the colors stitch by stitch as they gradually change from light lime green to muted pink to soft brown is fun and there’s a tweediness to the whole skein that really attracts me.

see no evil.

hear no evil.

eat no cookies?

how about have no fear?  there, that’s better.

‘fear’ taken from 23:4 of the psalms.



routine

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my eldest is back to school today. d is back to work. the little ones and i are falling comfortably back into our ‘normal’ day to day stuff.  see, today i am content.  one down …

i’m 13 1/4″ along on ‘refuge’ now, but who’s counting.  since all the figuring this one out is over, i’m ready to see what it’s like when it’s finished about 27+/- inches from here.  it’s a very comfortable thing to knit though, since it’s the same two rows repeated over and over (except for the shaping on the ends).  i hardly have to check back to the pattern at all except when i first pick it up to refresh it in my head.  being paper (pattern) free is a treat since my youngest likes to ‘write notes’ on any paper she can snatch leaving the original wording all but obilterated. 

things checked off on the ‘to do list’ today that seem more worth mentioning than laundry and packing lunches:

decided to try out bird’s eye lace for ‘sojourners’ & see if i might like it better.

finished writing up the pdf pattern for ‘stretched the line’ so now it’s available.

got 1 box mailed and 2 more packed.  good.  boxes out = space in.

set out the two yarn possibilities for ‘song in the night’ that i bought at fancie purls last week and am thinking on which would knit up into a better wristlet bag for an evening out and about.  (note:  it’s hard to see in the photo, but ‘ivy’ is riddled with cool metallic flecks.)  anybody have any thoughts or even a preference? 

trendsetter yarns 'dune'

nashus handknits 'ivy'

 

‘song in the night’ is taken from 77:6 of the psalms

perspective

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'stretching ...

… the line’

so my loosey goosey method of storing yarn has led to this.  and i like it.  the smooth and even  rows of the cloudlike burly spun contrasts so interestingly with the mercurial personality of the aquarella.

today it feels a bit like life:  the organized bits crammed right up against the ducks that refuse to stay all neatly in a row.  praiseworthy actions tucked closer than sardines in a can to the urges that should be resisted.  so like my life.

this is knit in one long flat strip and then sewn up at the edges.  it keeps the stripes from having that changing colors blurp that can happen knitting stripes in the round.  with stitches this big the sewing up is easy.  you just thread your tapestry needle through the end stitch of each row being sure to keep the color changes lined up when you come to them.

today my mind is a deepish well.  so one more ‘like life’ idea.  the stripes here are thin on one end and thick on the other, so depending on your vantage point the look really changes.

funny how the same conversation can be heard

to mean two almost completely opposite things

by two different friends or such.

funny like hmmm …

(not ha-ha).

 

 ‘stretched the line’ is taken from 38:5 of job

proximity

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the subject came up, how do you keep your yarn safe where moths can’t destroy it?

lots of ideas were tosed around in the taunton s’n’b:  plastic bins, wishful thinking, cedar, special plastic bags from walmart.  all well and good, but my grandma keeps my yarn safe

from moths.

sort of.

see grandma had these big metal canisters in her carport.  when she no longer needed them, the canisters came to me.  they sit on the floor and stand about halfway up my thigh with lids on top the size of large pizza pans.  they arrived full of her things which have now found their niches about the house leaving them free for my yarn to lay claim to.

now my friend h has a beautifully elaborate system of sorting and storing her yarn in it’s own special closet.  my yarn is divided a bit more willy-nilly.  there are two large bins stacked on top of each another: one of wool and one of cotton.  nearby are the smaller bins i have picked up at thrift stores and yard sales.  these are mostly divided by weight: one for fingering, one for worsted, and one packed with a virtual rainbow of allhemp6.  there’s also a red one full of what i think i’ll use next and often on top of the lids are the leftover skeins that i’ve yet to take the time to put back inside.

i tell you all this to explain how the burly spun and the aquarella, an unlikely pair, have both wound up in the same pillow.  the 1st  is as orange as orange can be, very bright, and very very thick while the 2nd is all sorts of muted shades (red to orange to brown) and the weight varies inch by inch as it is thickly and thinly spun throughout.  i’m fairly sure i would never have thought to put them together, but as i pried the lid of the ‘wool’ bin open a few days back, i saw that they had rolled together and were sitting there at the edge a little tangled into each other.  and they looked good together.  it struck me right then that the smoothness of one complimented the unevenness of the other both in color and in weight.  who knew?

we’re told, ‘bad friends will destroy you’, so perhaps it is also true that good friends (even unexpected good friends) will build you up.  or at least make things a bit more comfy as you go along.  i am expecting this pillow to be very comfy.

knock, knock

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wallace and grommet.

d on the couch beside me.

the lingering of all that ‘away in a manger’ means.

sz 13 needles wrapped in w’s brown sheep ‘orange you glad’ burly spun.

                     knock, knock.  who’s there?  banana.  banana who?

              knock, knock.  who’s there?  banana.  banana who?

       knock, knock.  who’s there?  orange.  orange who?

                               orange you glad i didn’t say banana?

well, orange you glad?