Mark Sahlgren, DJ in Kalamazoo (Michigan/USA) writes that he will put a tune or two by either Fabulous Heftones or one of Brian’s solo works…

…on his show, Grassroots, which will air this Sunday at 10 am til noon; then repeat the following Saturday 8 til 10 pm.

The station is found online at: WMUK.org

You can stream the show online if you are so inclined. The times are Eastern time, same as New York City.

Mark, thank you again. You have been so kind to us.

Fall Slowdown
Maybe you have noticed that I have not offered many of my own photos lately. I tell you, the nights of short sleep while dyeing the yarns and making the buttons for my Trunk Show, as fun as it was, took me down. I’ve been trying to sleep well to make up for that, but have been having nights full of vivid dreams, apparently not sleeping soundly enough. I’ve always been able to sleep at the drop of a hat so this is puzzling. Maybe it’s allergy related, maybe it is just that time of year when the schedule changes and the body needs time to adjust. This too, shall pass…

However, the result is that I’m a bit distracted lately. I really have to watch myself when driving, I can be dangerous when tired and today I nearly pulled into a street with a car coming right at me. Ugh! Let us hope this phase passes and very soon.

Last Weekend’s Projects
The good news is that even though I have not had a chunk of time to put up my new yarns on the web yet, I’ve had time to do a little knitting. It seems everything is only partly knit, but I’m enjoying the process for once, without pushing to finish all the time.

For the Trunk Show I made a roll-brim cap with one of my buttons at top center. The yarn was my Cushy ColorSport in colorway Melinda (purple, pink and soft white). The button was translucent pink with silvertone leaf (foil) and it just went perfectly with that yarn!

I also made a tiny Fast Florida Footie from the Cushy ColorSport, same colorway but different dye lot. My yarn is the same gauge as Cascade Fixation so it worked up without any adjustment at all. Adorable.

Then after talking to Marcia and Wendy at Threadbear on Saturday, I put together two wristwarmers based on my pattern that I’ve been selling for a year or so. Except I used three colorways of my handpaint, alternating two rows/rounds for each colorway before changing to another. One wristwarmer is the simple garter stitch version of the pattern, and the other is a K3P1 knit in the round ribbed version. Both turned out really well with a spring green and turquoise for the first yarn, a pink/purple for the second, and a turquoise/purple/blue for the third. Just like a rainbow!!!

Personal Knitting
Now I’m knitting a hat for Altu’s nephew who will turn 4 next week. He fell in love with my pink/purple hat mentioned above, took it, put it on, and did not want to give it back. I told him I needed it for my work but I’d knit him one. He didn’t quite believe me but I did get my hat back!

It turns out his winter coat is blue and orange, and I just never seem to dye blue yarns (or orange for the most part). I went to Rae’s Yarn Boutique on my lunch hour yesterday and got a small skein of yarn Rae dyed in several blues, and a solid blue skein. I’m alternating every other row between the yarns so that the hat has a lot of different blues in it. The yarn is superwash wool and very soft, I think the kiddo will like his hat quite well!!! Now to pick a button for the top… I have about an inch or two left and that project will be done.

What else am I knitting? I knit the back of a tank on my bulky hobby knitting machine (Singer HK100, a gift from a friend and it remains something of a mystery to me 2 years after I first got it). I even knit the bottom of the front of the same tank.

And then my distraction level got in my way, I just could not handle the part where I had to decrease both the armhole and the neckline at the same time but at different rates of decrease. This is something I can do in handknitting but maybe it happens too fast for me on the machine or something!

I had to rip back several rows on the tank, and it’s just hanging on the machine right now, waiting for a time when I can keep the mind on just the pattern and not all sorts of other things. I am thinking I may make a little list on paper, telling me on which row to decrease on which side, and try again.

Stalled Projects
I have also set aside the Lily Chin bras for now (I’ve started on two of them in different yarns). However, I keep plugging on the Lucy Neatby Equilateral Vest which I adore. I let myself work on that for 20 minutes each week when I’m at the allergist. It is going to take a long time to finish at that rate, but I am not putting it aside anyway. I just do not have the luxury to do personal knitting very often, especially when it requires looking at a pattern.

…and I haven’t even looked at my socks I nearly finished on our trip out east a month ago, which merely need one heel to be grafted shut and ends worked in. I am also halfway done with Mom’s birthday socklets, maybe I’ll finish those this weekend when I expect to have a lot of knit time available to me.

We are already at September and I don’t have a knitted grass skirt ready for Midwest Ukefest which is end of October. Several of you readers have asked throughout the year if I ever finished that project. The truth is, the yarn I picked made a gorgeous fabric that would be better for a bag than a skirt, and no matter what I did it looked awful around my hips (small though I am, nobody looks good wrapped in carpeting).

So I bought some totally different (softer and thinner) yarn from Kim at Yarn Garden at a summer sale she had and knit a very satisfactory swatch with it. The yarn is just a mess to work with, it falls apart from the ball into a fluffy wad of fur at just a glance or a puff of wind. However, if I put it in a small ziploc bag with a hole cut in one corner, and I thread the working yarn strand through that hole, it is manageable. I need to get on this project sooner than later so I will be able to wear the skirt on Halloween weekend.

Fall Term Begins
I started teaching a toe up sock class Thursday night at Foster Center which will go for 3 weeks. Very fun, and so I started a bulky alpaca slipper-footie for myself in that class as well. I didn’t get very far because the students needed me, which is as it should be. I’ll plug away at those this week as well, so I can be in the spot they will be in a week from now.

I do expect some knitting time this weekend, and I’m curious what I’ll end up knitting. You will be the first to know!

Photos: Fast Florida Footie and roll-brim hat in Cushy ColorSport Yarn, hat with LynnH ArtButton as a topper. Garter-stitch and rib-knit wristwarmers knit of three colors each, of Cushy ColorSport yarn.

I met Trish Bloom at Threadbear one day. She has read my blog for several years (blush), and she walked in when I was hanging out (or teaching) one day at the shop. She recognized me and introduced herself.

Trish lives in Michigan, but not Lansing, so we have not met again. We have corresponded a few times here and there.

Well, Trish has two new designs this week. First, she has a funky felted bag pattern, the B-4 Bag. It looks great in the new Karaoke yarn that we’re all eager to try out! As she writes:
Bobbles!
Bumps!
Beads!
Buttons!
(thus the name B-4)

It’s funky, wild and too-too much fun.

But I know Trish’s big excitement today is that she has a pattern in Knitty, the Bloom Shawl. It’s feminine in a colorful and soft but not fluffy way. I like it a lot. I bet you are eager to check it out! Anyone who loves the concept of ColorJoy will likely enjoy the rainbow nature of the Bloom Shawl.

Congratulations, Trish!

Prudence Mapstone, Australian fiberartist (known widely for her freeform fiberart) is listmom of a Yahoo email group called If the Hat Fits. They have occasional online exhibitions, and the current one was just posted to the web today.

Take a look at the Hat Exhibition! The variety of ways one can express the concept of “hat” is somewhat amazing.

Marie Irshad’s Knitcast interview of me is now online. I hope you’ll allow me to get excited over this one! It was as fun getting to know Marie better as it was being interviewed.

Marie is such a professional, I’m sure you’ll enjoy the show. If you are not familiar with podcasts, they are like a radio show that can be listened to any time you like, using a computer or a small portable device like an ipod. Knitcast is the first podcast about knitting.

Marie and I had a crazy time trying to get a good recording between me here in Michigan/USA and her in Wales. She had some editing to do, to pull out some fuzzy bits and make it sound right.

In the end, Marie pulled it all together in excellent form. I’m very pleased with the resulting version of the interview.

You do not need to have an ipod to hear the podcast. Just click on the link in the previous paragraph. For most computers, your system will just know how to play the program for you.

However, if you want to subscribe to her Knitcast program for this and subsequent shows, instead you can click the link in the first paragraph here. That will take you to the Knitcast home page. That page has an XML button that should allow you to subscribe, assuming you have done it before and know how.

I hope you enjoy the show!!!

I want to thank my friends Rob and Matt of Threadbear Fiberarts for sponsoring my Trunk Show this weekend. I had a wonderful time and enjoyed every minute of the experience.

Many of my students and friends came by and supported my sale over the three days. Every skein, kit, and button sold was appreciated. Thanks to you all for coming by and making it so very worthwhile.

(For the record, I’m taking Tuesday off, sleeping in and going to Ann Arbor to knit with friends. I’ll plan to put some of my remaining yarns up for sale on Wednesday or Thursday of this week, on my yarns page.)

Have I mentioned how much I enjoy my life these days? It hasn’t always been that way, and perhaps because of that I can appreciate it even more.

Saturday was my second day at Threadbear for my Trunk Show. The highlight of my day was that Wendy came by and we talked for a good long while. Wendy is my knitter when I need one… she knit two of the three sample socks for my series on Turkish-inspired sock patterns for Dawn Brocco’s Heels and Toes Gazette.

But Wendy is a busy woman, and I’m busy as well, and she’s booked all day while I seem to be booked every night. We have a hard time catching one another, and when we do cross paths it seems to be at a guild meeting when there is a crowd and many distractions. Having an hour or so to chat on Saturday was an absolute delight.

Wendy and Marcia have been friends a long time, and are both masterful knitters. When I have the two of them standing with me (as I did Saturday), I wake up somehow, and I get many ideas. They help me solve knit design dilemmas and they help me see outside my own mind’s limitations. By the time I left Threadbear I had this exciting plan to knit a wristwarmer with three colors of my own handpaint.

After work I met Brian and we went to a music party, a 5th anniversary party for some musical friends. They have a bit of land less than a half hour out of town. The company is fabulous, both for talking and for music-making. I knit for a while and talked, and listened to old time fiddle tunes. Then the crowd changed and I got out my bass and played and sang a while.

At one point, a few of the folks took turns playing Joni Mitchell songs. I love her stuff, and it’s great for singing harmonies. I really enjoyed that part of the evening! We don’t usually hang out with people who know modern popular music, most of what we and friends play is from before I was born. I really enjoyed the music Saturday, a real mix of styles and all good.

I’m nearly done knitting my multicolored wristwarmer and will knit another of a different style using the same yarns while at Threadbear on Monday. Yes, Monday! The store is open from 10am-8pm (even though it is a holiday), so if you are in town we’d love to see you. It tends to be quite a party on 3-day weekends, a very nice time!

Here’s a photo of the bonfire at the party last night.

Aaah, the long-awaited day arrived! My Trunk Show at Threadbear Fiberarts started Saturday. I arrived with boxes full of yarn and buttons, and a tired but happy self (and a full-sized thermos full of good tea). I had one person waiting at the door for me and my yarn when I arrived just after the store opened. It was a wonderful day.

I got to see several folks I’ve known for a long time. I had time to chat with folks. I got to talk about my yarns and show off the photos I have in Jacqueline Gikow’s book about non-jewelry polymer clay items.

And my Mother, Liz, came! She had never been to Threadbear before. She’s not a knitter, and she doesn’t live in Michigan all year any more, so she just has not seen all the spots where I teach. It was really great to have her there. I got to introduce her around to Rob and Matt (and Matt’s mother and sister who are visiting from Georgia), and Judith and Lisa and a few others in the shop.

Lisa took a picture of Mom and I. They say that the apple doesn’t fall very far from the tree, and I see why. Look at her dress and my skirt! The same colors are in both. I tried so hard to be myself and I turned into my mother. Mind you, I don’t even have children and this happened. Good thing I like how it worked out!

Mom’s very creative, she always has loved art and artful expressions of all sorts. I’m glad to have inherited those characteristics from her.

If you couldn’t make it out today, there are still 2 more days. There will be new yarns on Sunday to replenish some that were sold on Saturday, so come over and say hello!

I had a busy Friday. Altu’s daughter came over in the morning to help me skein my dyed yarns. In the afternoon, I had a dentist appointment for some long-put-off work (so happy I did it) and then at night, I danced as Eudora at New Aladdin’s restaurant. It was a good day.

Here is a photo Donna/Maya took of me while I was dancing. She has excellent timing, wouldn’t you say?

I’m crazy busy, too much to write. See some of my pretties? All for Threadbear’s 3-day event, starting Saturday. I’m getting really excited.

Rob at Threadbear sent out the weekly Wednesday email letter he sends out to their customers, and it’s so exciting to read the blurb about my sale. Of couse, I gave him some text he could use… but he tweaked it as only a friend can, and my artful ego is suitably delighted.

Here’s what it said:

LynnH will be presenting a special event at Threadbear this three-day weekend. Lynn’s work has never before been offered in any yarn shop.

In the yarn realm, she will be presenting her handpainted ArtYarns (alone and in kits), as well as ColorJoy Stole kits containing 5 yarns and pattern, ready to knit. Lynn will bring her signature Cushy ColorSport, a machine wash/machine dry 100% merino. She will also bring a handful of new types of yarn she has not typically offered before. Included in those new yarns will be some lovely laceweight handpaints, for knitters desiring a bit of luxury heading into the fall.

Of course, we will offer Lynn’s patterns as well. There will be a few designs available this weekend that we have not carried previously, in addition to our regular supply of her fantastic and very well-written patterns (she’s great about including copious illustrations, too!).

And the big news: LynnH ArtButtons! Lynn has been a well-known polymer clay artist for over a dozen years… photos of her creations are in Jacqueline Gikow’s book, “Polymer Clay: Creating Functional and Decorative Objects.” Now you can own a practical yet artful bit of Lynn’s polymer magic… a chunky-funky button perfect for a felted bag, bolero or cape. Each is one of a kind, never to be repeated again.

Please join us for the happening, this weekend. LynnH will be there all Saturday, Sunday and Monday, to meet you, inspire you, and chat about the yarns, buttons, and “Art as an Everyday Attitude.” See you then!

I hope to see you there!