Sunday’s weather is perfect. Perfect. No rain, just 82F/27C (just below my favorite temperature, I like it hot), sunny, slightly windy, with trees just starting to turn colors.

VanAtta’s Greenhouse is wonderful, I can not believe I’ve never gone there before. I’m not a big gardener and that kept me from driving across town, though I knew about their great reputation.

I do love having fresh herbs in the back yard, and I have had good luck with growing Swiss Chard (no luck with spinach for some reason, maybe because I don’t plant early enough). I prefer buying plants over seeds, they are more certain to make it and a lot less trouble. I just have not had much luck finding herbs at the Lansing spots I’ve tried. You should have SEEN the basil and parsley they had today. I know where I am going for my herbs next spring.

Next year we plan to expand our “food garden” (which this year had one Swiss Chard plant, some dill, cilantro and parsley). I have grown carrots before and may do that again. I want to grow more herbs next year.

Our soil is not good at all, and that discourages me when I try new things. We have a compost pile just because it’s the good way to get rid of vegetable scraps, but we don’t use it up much because we don’t really garden. I figure right before the snow comes, I’ll put a bit of compost on next year’s garden area and hope it gets used to its new home. We can put more on there in the spring when we plant.

The RicStar Music Camp benefit was a lot of fun. We got there just as Jen Sygit was starting her set, so I sat and took a bunch of photos of her, Drew and Matt. Next we were on and Jen took photos of us. Here are a few of those photos from today.

I tell you, I just love being part of the music community here in Lansing. At one point we played Epley Breakdown (an instrumental Brian wrote, that is oft-requested by musicians, particularly Drew) and Drew did an impromptu dance for a second. It made me smile. This is the authentic-friend thing going on. I am so honored and happy to be part of it all. You can hear the Epley Breakdown in MP3 format by clicking here.
Some music communities are not so warm and welcoming as the one in Lansing. We’re a relatively new act on the block, we have maybe been doing this seriously as a duo for about 5 years. It is great to really feel included in something that preceded us.

Well, the sun is still up and warm. I have work to do (writing the text to explain the ZigBagZ pattern so that Karen can start to test it). But while it’s this beautiful I will take myself on a walk around the neighborhood. May you have as nice a day as I am having.

On Sunday (Today or Tomorrow if you catch this post before we’re off stage) The Fabulous Heftones are playing at the RicStar Music Camp benefit. The place is VanAtta’s Greenhouse, Haslett, Michigan (above link has address information).

Our performance time is 2:30pm. A lot of folks we know are performing (it is a multi-day event, so many folks have already played).

It’s spooky but very cool… we’re playing on the same stage as the talented and kind Jen Sygit again. Here’s a great photo of her (on stage with the Earthwork crew, but I zoomed in on Jen’s smiling face) from Wheatland music festival earlier this month. Well, the photo itself is a bit grainy but the look on her face is great indeed. She was looking at another musician on stage with her, maybe Daisy May or Seth Bernard, who were just to the right of this photo.

I love hearing Jen perform. She has an authenticity about her, and is a pro from start to finish. Her voice is low, expressive and bluesy; comfortable like an easy chair. You’ll find yourself waking up singing her melodies, and her lyrics hit home. For those of you who are Youtube fans, you can see a video of Jen singing (at Cappucino Cafe’ in East Lansing) her composition “The Rub”, or her Black-Eyed Susan, or at the Creole Gallery singing the standard Don’t Get Around Much Any More.

Also The Harvestmen (with Drew Howard/Captain Midnite) are playing, and a host of other folks I don’t know as well. It is bound to be an energetic and exciting event.

I hope I’ll see a few of you there.

The second photo here is of Brian and me as The Fabulous Heftones on stage at the Four Chairs benefit we played in Lansing last March. Jen was not there but a lot of her Earthwork Music colleagues were. Rachael Davis took this photo for us.

Life is full of a zillion relatively-unrelated things, you know?

• My car is fixed but I have to pick it up tomorrow.
• It has been relatively painless to be without my Bug because I drove Brian’s “yacht.” He rode his bike to work. I seriously benefitted by being married to this great guy, this week.
• We had another wonderful musical-performance experience at Foods for Living. What a great store. Great people, great food, great customers.
• The weather has been gorgeous, the light just glows right before sundown. We should not see rain till Sunday, and I will really enjoy this weekend.
• I have this weekend without classes. Then I have three weekends on the road, in a row (two strung together with no visit home). I need to bake and otherwise prepare food, clothing and class handouts, etc… this weekend. I feel really luxurious about it on Friday Night. I think Sunday night I’ll be a bit less so, but I’m OK with whatever it is.
• Diana is knitting sample ZigBagZ (a BabyZig and a BottleZig), I’m editing the text of the pattern. Karen has the yarn for her BurlyZig bag, Diana has her yarn, too, and when the words are set (the numbers are done), they will cast on that largest planned size and see how it goes.

The photo here shows two prototype BottleZig Bagz. Just so you can see how things develop. One has too much green at the bottom and is too tall. I re-felted it and it got less tall but the green was still too big, after this photo was taken.

The other has 8 fewer stitches around the circumference. That one works fine for small 10oz bottles (but not half-liter/16oz bottles). The interesting thing is that they both have exactly the same number of rows of the zig pattern. And I knit both, so the gauge before felting was the same. Can you see why I tear out my hair sometimes, trying to get it so that folks who get my finalized pattern will succeed and love the project? I do love making things up. I’m not so fond of the finalizing-the-pattern part. But hey, every job has something we don’t like about it.

I am counting my blessings this morning. I got a call from Diana while I was barely awake and she had done the match to help me with re-sizing my BiggieZig Bag into a BurlyZig. That means I’ll have the final numbers and be able to massage the text for this pattern.

Once I get a first draft, Karen in Houston will be casting on for a BurlyZig to test my public pattern. Up until now, Diana and I have been knitting samples but it was more about design than writing, more about numbers and proportions than making sense to a reader. I’m getting there!

So the bag pattern is inching along. Diana is also going to knit a BiggieZig *and* a BurlyZig to test her numbers. So I’ll have a tech editor and a test knitter here, and a bunch of store samples. I am personally doing a test bag on the BabyZig for the first try at an actual pattern with real words rather than notes and numbers.

So there I go counting my good luck.

But yesterday on my way to Charlotte to teach at Yarn Garden, the engine light of my car started blinking. Blinking. That means stop NOW. I looked at all my fluids and that wasn’t what was wrong. So I called Lindsay, cancelled my class for the day (she got me email addresses of the two students and we rescheduled later), and went directly to the shop.

Brian rides his bike on the Riverwalk to work. The shop took me home and I drove the Oldsmobile. Things could have been far messier. I missed one two-hour class session and the students are fine meeting me next week instead. Cool.

The repair is going to be $600 or so (and two days in the shop, one waiting for the part). I’d rather do that now than have trouble on the road in October (I’m going to Stitches East in Baltimore and then driving to Ravensdale to teach in NY state). Nobody loves repairs but I am glad the car notified me in time and only about a mile from my shop.

Meanwhile, back in the good luck department, I heart Diana. She is no longer only a test knitter. She’s a tester, tech editor, number cruncher and spirit-lifter.

She posted a free pattern at her blog Otterwise yesterday. Twist on the Wrist warmers. Cabled wristlets/pulsewarmers for bulky yarn (she used Arucania Alpaca). It’s beautiful. Do go check it out.

There is a lovely locally-owned healthy food store at the very east edge of East Lansing, named Foods for Living. The folks who own it seem very fine and the people who work there seem rather happy to be there. (A good number of the folks working there are musicians.)

The store is well-organized, people smile and they have items I can not get elsewhere (pumpkin seed butter, whole grain teff, white buckwheat grains and a kind of cracker made with brown rice and nothing else, boring but useful on the road).

This month is the 10th anniversary of this store. They are having a lot of music this month because of it. Brian and I played there last Friday 4-6 and will be doing it again this week. Last week we got there a little early and got to hear Jen Sygit play banjo before we went on for our set. Jen always makes me smile (see photo).

If you are in the Lansing area and inclined to find some very nice organic produce (they have some gorgeous root veggies right now), unusual healthy foods, and take-out from some of the finest restaurants in town (including New Aladdins and Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine)… well, consider coming out this weekend. We are on Friday, but if you can’t make it then, you’ll find other good musicians filling the other slots all weekend.

For the record, Brian’s band Scarlet Runner Stringband is playing at Woldumar Nature Center for their fall public event on Sunday starting at 11. I’m not sure how long that goes. Then after that, Brian and I are playing for the RicStar Music Camp benefit at VanAtta’s Greenhouse in Haslett. There are a good number of acts playing Saturday and Sunday for that event. We are looking forward to that (we play just after Jen Sygit there, too). On Sunday we play at 2:30pm. I hope you can come out.

I think the stars all aligned properly again or something. I have been feeling stuck and now it seems many things went forward at once.

I felted my BiggieZig Bag and Rae says it is “Perfect.” Of course, the artist always sees things that might be done differently. Mostly, though, the things I could have done differently would make it harder to make, for my customers. In the end, they are collectively my “boss” and I do what I can to keep them happy.

I made several executive decisions to minimize hand-sewing, for example. I know that most knitters do not enjoy working with a sewing needle so this one is as simple as I can make it in that area. The bag looks very good, and its size is about perfect. I am more than pleased.

Now Diana can start in on her BurlyZig Bag (bigger yet, than the BiggieZig), and hopefully in a day or two, so can Karen in Houston. Diana is working on the tech end, helping me write the pattern and get the numbers/proportions right. Karen will test it and see if the pattern Diana and I come up with is understandable. Diana and I have worked so many hours on this project now, that she could not be an impartial test knitter any more.

When I went to the PO Box, I found a package from Diana. It contained a BottleZig bag and a Sassy Summer Handbag, both to be felted. The Sassy Bag goes to Yarn Garden tomorrow when I go there for my First-Time Toe-Up class. Right now she has *my* Sassy bag (the blue one with a polymer clay handle, shown on my shopping cart). I will enjoy having my bag back if I can talk her into giving it up.

The BottleZig was supposed to be for Rae’s shop, but she likes the one she has right now very much. We’ll see where this one goes. It has Patons Classic as its solid yarn and Rae is the only one I work for who carries that yarn. Maybe I get to keep it?

But at exactly 11pm Tuesday night I got my invitation to join Ravelry.com. I spent the next 3.5 hours uploading photos and filling out my profile.

My username is ColorJoy (yes, it has capital letters) for those of you out there already. I will work in the next week or so to add projects for every one of my current patterns, as Rae explains this is the place where the rest of the linking starts. I’m learning from Tracy and from Rae a little each day about how it all works. It’s pretty huge, and I know I will not participate in everything. For example, I really do not want to know how many sets of size 0/2mm double-pointed needles I own. Nope, not going there!!!

So many things are happening very quickly now. I was so ready for the change! Thanks for hanging in with me on this. I’m still dealing with photograph issues but other things are going well. At this point I’m giving you a photo of the before-felting fabric of my BiggieZig Bag.

I used two solid colors, the main one being a dark blue-teal, and the second one a hot pink. Then in contrast with the teal I used a Noro Kureyon self-striping yarn that was mostly pinks and oranges. In contrast with the pink I used a Kureyon in dark greens, blues, gray and brown. The effect is that you can not see the “stripes” because the contrast in one stripe is almost the color of the solid in the next stripe.

At the bottom of the photo, you can see the bottom of the bag where I did a checkerboard pattern rather than a zigzag. The checkerboard is the essence of ColorJoy, in my mind. I’m very pleased with how it turned out.

I am teaching a sort of knitting study-hall at Rae’s these days. People can come to me if they want to learn to knit from scratch, or want to learn to knit further than they have been knitting on their own.

They purchase four sessions up front, then they tell me when they will be there (I have times set aside for this but do not go to the shop if nobody makes a date with me). I walk them through new things. It is very rewarding.

Angie is one of my study-hall students. She came to me after knitting many garter-stitch scarves. She had purchased the book about knitting for Peace and wanted to try something new. She thought the next step would be a more complex scarf, then she figured she would make a hat. It was the hats she really wanted to do.

After getting clear that she really wanted to make hats, I convinced her that making a hat could be easy and that making a scarf would not get her directly to her goal (and honestly, making a roll-brim hat in stockinette did not require her to learn purling right away… just using circular and double-pointed needles).

So in just a few weeks, Angie completed this beautiful roll-brimmed hat. She learned other needles, but she also learned how to decrease with a Knit Two Together. She learned methods of working in ends, too.

I will be seeing her again this week. She will be learning how to purl and how to rib, which is what she wants to learn next. She is doing just great. It amazes me how people often limit themselves, thinking that if they don’t know how to do it, it must be very hard to learn. And the power of getting through that, and doing the things they thought were hard… well, that is why I teach.

(For the record, I knit garter-stitch scarves for 20 years. I knew how to backward-loop cast on and knit. I did not know how to bind off but figured out how to make them not unravel by putting the yarn end through the live stitches. I put fringe on both ends to hide the fact that they did not match. I learned to purl more than 20 years after I learned to knit. So I totally understand the inner workings of the thought process… I just think it’s great when people find their way out of it somehow.)

Go, Angie! I can’t wait to see your next project.

I’ve been waiting to get into the online knitting community called Ravelry since mid-July. I’m #17481 on the list, whew, with 18,145 people behind me. It has been in a testing phase for a long time, during which they have added just a few people at a time, slowly. Just recently they have started adding more people each week.
Last night there were about 350 people in front of me waiting to be invited in. Today I’m number 55.

Even though I don’t have much time to get heavily involved right now, I’m very excited. Some people are knitting my patterns right now and I can be available for Q&A to those folks as soon as I’m in. I look forward to exploring the community aspects of the system.

Ravelry started as an idea where people could sort of get organized with their knitting things (yarn, needles, patterns) online. That idea did not appeal to me much, I would not spend time doing an inventory. I’d rather dive in and knit more. But now they have places where you can go and see photos of other folks’ finished projects in this or that yarn, or this or that pattern, before you decide what to do yourself. Brilliant. Once I looked at Rae’s Ravelry screen and there were photos of my Fast Florida Footies pattern posted, for example. I think this feature is brilliant.

And now they also have communities/groups where folks can interact on the site. You can find groups of folks from the same town, the same occupation, same hobbies other than knitting. For example, music teachers who knit might be one group.

This creates a connection between folks online. This is the strength of the internet, in my opinion. Real connections and friendships do grow between people who share common interests. I’ve met some very important people in my life this way, particularly in a self-employed group I was on before I even met Brian, so a dozen years ago almost. One of the folks I met in that group, I spent a day with in Dallas last April.

With all the bad press about the internet out there, I’m here to tell you that humankind is mostly good and there are many wonderful friendships available to those willing to be authentically themselves online. Now, if you go to a chat room called “hey baby!” you will get what you might expect. If you are inclined to make bad decisions in other parts of your life, you might just make bad decisions online as well. If you are young and inexperienced, you need guidance from more experienced folks in your life whether online or not.

But as in the world, where more people are good than bad… so is it with the Internet. Much good is available if you look for it. I’m excited to try out this new opportunity. Very soon, or so it seems.

I started the day really emotional, alternating between depression and anger. These are signs that I’m feeling powerless (in this case, about the computer issues and the slowness of the felted bag development). I decided to do something about it.

Actually, there was a time years ago when my life had many more difficult emotions in a day, and reasonably so. These days I’m living a bit of “the sunny side of the street” most of the time. My computer struggles on the same week as a slooow pattern development, meant that I revisited those emotions which mostly pass me by these days.

The first step toward an even keel was that I went to Rae’s shop. Between Rae and Diana I don’t know what I would do when I hit a wall. They take turns encouraging, suggesting, tugging me along depending on the situation. I have been struggling with the handles for this bag. It will be relatively big, enough that a single I-cord would not really be substantial enough, or so it seemed.

I contemplated several possible options but none seemed quite right. The best idea I had was impossible to guess ahead of time, how long it should be and whether I’d like it. I was really uneasy going ahead with something that might disappoint me after all the yarn and knitting time I’ve spent on this bag.

Sometimes I just am not a risk taker, and when it’s about precious time I’m even more “frugal” so to speak than when I’m talking about spending money. I don’t have much time to spare in this crazy creative life I’ve chosen.

So of course Rae had a great strap suggestion. I tried it, I’m delighted, I’m going with it. Yippee.

Diana then called to tell me she had finished two samples for me (a Sassy Bag for Yarn Garden and a BottleZig whose final destination is still undetermined). Sigh. And now she’s working on a BiggyZig for me. Sigh again.

And now Cousin Karen may be the test knitter for BiggyZig or BurlyZig. I feel very loved today.

Oh… and Tracy wrote and said she is already on Ravelry and is volunteer coordinator or whatever they call it for the discussion group about ColorJoy by LynnH patterns. I could HUG Tracy if she only was in Lansing!

So my day turned around. My bag has a button flap that it did not have this morning, and the start of shoulder strap #1 of 2. I may just felt this “puppy” tomorrow. Cross fingers.

I “knit like the wind” as Brenda Dayne’s knitting podcast Cast-On suggests. It was very helpful. I always say that knitting is a lot like “worry beads” and it was more true today than ever.

I’m working on the moderate-sized project bag in the ZigBagZ series. I finished the bag portion tonight, bound it off. Now I need to knit handles and button flap (which requires some decision-making but I’m up to that challenge). After that, I measure every possible part of the bag, then I throw it in the washing machine and cross all fingers and toes. After it shrinks perfectly (we can only hope), I shape it well, dry it, and measure it.

At that point Diana and I have a conference call and determine how many stitches we think she should cast on for the roomy-sized project bag. And then we see how long it takes to knit that, and felt/shrink that, and determine if we need even more test bags before going ahead. We do have a lot of small bags which were our felting swatches, so it may be that we’re good to go. Or not.

It’s one day at a time, you know? But although I still have no plan about my held-for-ransom photographs on this hard drive, I at least have done some constructive work. I knit fast which used up a bunch of the pent-up adrenaline that made me want to jump to the moon in a single bound. And now I think I’ll go to sleep, and finish my bag tomorrow.

Cross fingers for me. I need all the felting gods and goddesses and vibes and good karma and any other good luck charms I can get, in my corner tomorrow.

By the way, the fabric is reeeeally beautiful. Of course, I took a photo but now I am afraid to download the photo onto the bad-cop computer hard drive. It might not let me have custody of my own work.

I’ll show you more when I get more confidence, or maybe I’ll just start up that old beloved VAIO XP laptop (which still works, though it still makes bad sounds when it’s running). I would love to show you how pretty my colors are this time around.

WARNING: GRUMPY POST

I am so disappointed with Windows Vista. I have to type a password to do things as mundane as tell an icon to open as a full-sized (maximized) window. Come on!

Now this week I have had several “Windows Updates” which download automatically and then insist I turn off the computer and restart so that they can install. Theoretically the updates fix faults in the system and make me more secure. I think the structure of Windows sets it up to be eternally insecure and I wonder if that benefits Microsoft. If we are unhappy with our current Windows version, we’re more likely to buy a new version when it comes out, right?

So I rebooted as commanded. And now my desktop is missing the photo of Ethiopia which I had chosen (a photo I took in 2004), which was my wallpaper image. So I went in to re-choose it.

And it says that I do not have permission to access that document. It is in a folder assigned to the username I’m logged in as. I tried to open it in PhotoShop. It says my photo is locked. I even rebooted to see if maybe just there was a digital hiccup going on somehow. Still no access to my photo.

Guys, imagine this… it appears that Microsoft is so afraid I will copy someone else’s image that it won’t let me access my own? I understand and respect copyright… in fact, as a musician and knitting designer I benefit when others respect my copyright as well. But now I can not access or even view my own photograph? A precious one I took when I was in another continent? This is just plain wrong.

The first few weeks I had this machine, I could NOT copy my documents from the old laptop to this one without sitting for hours and babysitting the process, restarting after about 1GB of copying. I had 25GB of digital photos alone. It sure feels like Microsoft won’t trust me, it should have been a non-issue. I mean, we tried copying four different ways and none worked properly.

Maybe I am misunderstanding the intent behind these issues but that doesn’t help me deal with my daily frustrations. I type my Windows password a half a dozen times a day, minimum. To do normal things like start my calendar program or PhotoShop. Insanity.

Only five years ago I was making a living as a Microsoft Windows/Office consultant and expert. In fact, I spent six years before my Y2K-Consultant career, as a Microsoft DOS/Windows/ Office Suite corporate trainer. Up until now I have been grateful that Microsoft has given me many years of making a living.

I’m pretty sharp with techie things, at least those a few years old. I worked my first job on a computer back in 1981, before the IBM-PC was even invented. I figured that if I had frustrations with Vista I could make peace with it given a little time.

It has been months. I’m less happy than I was the day I got this machine. Mind you, the hardware/machine is just fine… it’s the operating system (Vista) I dislike.

If I were a child I would throw a tantrum. It’s a good thing I have my mental health securely in place because this frustration feels explosive inside me. I should go hit my pillow a few times or run around the block until I can’t go any further.

My stomach hurts. I want my pictures back.

Karen and Rae and Deb were all right. I should have given in. Next time I’ll be a Mac grrl.

Brian and I will be playing again at our home venue, Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine, on Saturday the 22nd from 6:30-8:30pm. We would love to see you there.

I seem to be walking through mud with heavy boots for the last few days. I’m still working on the design/pattern for my ZigBagZ series.

I have the two smallest bags figured out (a small rectangular one, pictured here in the last week, and the bottle bag at left), though text and photos are still sketchy. The next size up looks like it will probably be something like the size of my Watercolor Bag or hopefully a little bigger. I really wanted a larger size so I am going to add a fourth bag to the collection.

The extra bag means a lot more knitting, a lot more yarn, a lot more waiting, a lot more everything. I’m working on the third bag right now.

As soon as we get gauge issues more settled, Diana will cast on the largest of the four and then knit a loooong time, and then we cross fingers toes and eyes when that one is felted, to see if it comes out the way we wanted it (or close enough to go ahead with the design.

If either of our bags does not work as planned, we start knitting again. With felted projects, you shrink it and then you can’t use the yarn over again as you can on standard knit items. It’s a lot of time and a lot of materials/funds to get things right, but that is just part of the process. I believe in this design so I keep trudging forward, slowly or otherwise.

This is all complicated by the fact that I can not seem to knit any single gauge for more than an hour or two, or at least not when using circular needles (rather than Double Pointed Needles which are what I usually use). Thank goodness Diana can achieve a more steady gauge, and she will no doubt knit the store samples when we get to that phase of the project.

Here is a photo of the finished design for the BottleZig. I like it a lot. This one is a store sample at Rae’s, and I have one that is similar but was a prototype so I get to keep it.

Today I tried over and over to get to this page to post a column for you, and I could not get the form to open fully. Today I also tried to access an educational website and had frustration there as well. More slogging through mud.

The good part was that our performance at Foods for Living was really great. We got there just as Jen Sygit was finishing up her set. It’s always great to see/hear her.

Of course, we got a few photos but I’m behind on downloading those to the computer. After the performance, we went out to dinner all dressed up fancy in our show clothes. That was fun.

More later… have a great weekend. It’s lovely weather here right now and the trees are starting to turn color. Really pretty.

I posted photos of The Fabulous Heftones at Harvest Gathering but I have other photos, of other musical acts. These folks in many cases are our friends as well as colleagues. I am still not quite used to having such peers. They are good people and great musicians.

I didn’t say much about our show yet. I want you to know how loved I felt singing that show. So many other musicians were in the audience, and this is quite an honor. Peter “Madcat” Ruth and Jen Sygit plunked themselves on the side balcony for the entire show, and we saw so many other musicians out there.

I still feel very new to this community, and I knew the musical work of both Madcat and Jen before I ever played a note on a bass. It is a deep honor to belong to this incredible group of caring and talented folks.

I couldn’t see everyone from the stage, but spotted Mark Sahlgren, Jack and Emmett (Mark’s son-in-law and grandson, Jack was in Lost World String Band but I don’t know his last name), Laura Bates and Brandon Foote were there at least part of the time.

Drew Howard/Captain Midnite popped in with a request, between his numerous performances. Andrea and Micah of Breathe Owl Breathe supported us with actions as well as their presence. Art and Marlene Cameron (musician/horticulturist and fiberartist) were there. Tamineh Gueramy (formerly of The Weepers and now in Rusty Blaides, among many other acts) and Josh Davis of Steppin’ in It were also there.

I’m writing this too many days after the show. I clearly have forgotten a few somebodies but all the support was fully felt. Sigh. It is good to feel loved, you know?

After the show, Laura Bates gave me such a high compliment. She said that The Fabulous Heftones are a musician’s favorite act, and that was why we saw so many peers out there listening. . I also met Daniel Kahn’s mother who was lovely and positive, and I met Megan Palmer who I mentioned a few posts previous to this.

We did not have a lot of time after the show before we had to go home (Brian had to play for a dance with Scarlet Runner String Band in Lansing) but Brian got to jam a little bit with Bob from Mio, whose wife is involved with the Noreast’r Music Festival, and with Jack and a few other folks (I wasn’t there so I don’t know who all participated).

We got to see a bunch of acts on Friday night at the Barn Stage. I wanted to see Robin Lee Berry’s show but it was freeeeezing and she was at the Solar Stage, outdoors without much protection from elements. I ended up staying in the Barn just for pure self-preservation and heat-retention. We did hear .

I know that in the frigid cold morning (before our show), Brian also jammed a bit with some folks including Susan Fawcett of Breathe Owl Breathe and Fox on a Hill. He loves jamming, I think more than performing on stage. I am glad he got that chance.

This is a public thanks to Seth Bernard for scheduling us at his festival. What a fine person he is, what a big open-armed welcome we felt! It was a wonderful time.

Photos: Jen Sygit and her band Spare Change (they put on a wonderful show… especially the vocal harmonies). A videographer who I did not get a chance to meet, wearing what looks like an authentic handknit Andean hat with those little bobbles used for children’s hats. Orpheum Bell (including our Captain Midnite on pedal steel seated with cowboy hat, center back row). Photo Micah Middaugh took of himself with my camera.

The wide photo is Brandon Foote and Laura Bates with a bunch of friends singing harmony. The song was “Hard Times” by Stephen Foster. I don’t know the first man at left, but then you see Seth Bernard, Daisy May Erlewine, behind her Drew Howard, then Brandon and Laura front and center, me in earmuffs and pink hug shawl, Jen Sygit and Tamineh Gueramy.

Rusty Blaides including friends Joe Wilson (also of Steppin’ in it), Tamineh Gueramy and (you guessed it) Drew Howard/Captain Midnite. I can not tell you how hard it is to take a photo of a band with six people standing up and moving all the time! Closeup with Joe and Tamineh in front row.

And last but not least, two shows from Saturday morning at the Solar Stage (this stage is powered entirely by solar power, very cool). The guy with an acoustic guitar-like bass (at right) is Denny, who works the sound in the Barn all weekend. He got to play a show outside before going in to his post for the rest of the very long day.

The final photo is “Scratch and Sniff,” Which always includes Phil Wintermute and Paul Bennett (seated center front, Phil in red hat/blue coat and Paul in tweed hat playing fiddle). The other musicians playing with them this time are folks whose names I do not know.

By all rights, I should be linking to every musician’s website here, but if I did I would never finish the post. Most folks can be found on MySpace or by googling for their band website.

Since I got my new laptop a few months ago, I’m using Adobe Acrobat Reader version 8.1.0. I use it to print out my patterns for sale on my site and to stores. It’s fall, which means more volume so I am printing a lot more this week and last.

Well, every time I print patterns using this program, it does not collate. I can click the collate box in one of two places after I go to File/Print. Neither does the trick. The Collate checkbox has a check in it… and yet I get twelve page 1’s then twelve page 2’s. I don’t have a place where I can collate twelve patterns without moving a lot of stuff.

Does anyone already know the answer to this? Adobe says the only update available is “language support” for spellchecking, which I clearly do not need for collating properly.

Any hints as to where I go next, would be appreciated. Thanks for listening.

I heard from Priscilla and my mother that today there is an article in the State Journal about the Habibi Dancers and middle eastern dancing (sometimes called belly dance though often our bellies are covered). There is a photo of four of us dancing at the Allen Street Farmer’s Market. I’m up front in purple (no surprise).

For the record, historically this sort of dance was performed in groups of women, for their own entertainment and health. The moves help the body strengthen muscles that are used in childbirth. In some cultures your friends would come and dance for you when you were in labor. These days the more scandalous something sounds, the more tickets sell, so there is little talk of the female-community aspect and much focus on costumes and skin. Notice in the article we are all covered but we’re still doing the same dance moves.

I must say that this sort of dance helped me love myself more. I had been no more than a brain and feet getting me from place to place. Dancing required that I move the whole body. You can not move your hips if you don’t make friends with them first. I am a much more complete person now that I am familiar and comfortable with my whole self.

And trust me, I dance a good dozen times with a room full of female friends (there are 30 women in Habibi Dancers) before I dance once in costume for the public. It’s a place where we can just be comfortable, a place where we get support and encouragement.

Photo is me as Eudora, dancing at Sparrow Hospital in August of this year.

Micah Middaugh of Breathe Owl Breathe (an Earthwork Music act) was kind enough to take photos of us during our concert Saturday at Harvest Gathering.

He not only took a few snapshots, but he crouched on the dance floor to get photos of us framed between the wildflowers arranged at the lip of the stage. He also climbed up on the side balcony for a birds-eye stage view.

We appreciate Micah in many ways… but these photos are more than we could have expected. Thanks, bunches, Micah!

At Harvest Fest, I met indie singer-songwriter Megan Palmer after our concert. She lives in Columbus, Ohio (sigh, lucky grrl). Her Myspace page is http://myspace.com/meganini and her own website is http://meganpalmer.com

We chatted briefly about our travels. I went to Africa with Altu, stayed in Ethiopia and Kenya with family and friends, and went to Egypt as pure tourists. Megan went to India with a friend, and stayed in the friend’s parents home.

The colors and food of India make me yearn to travel there sometime. I must work out my food-allergy issues before I can do another big trip, but India, Thailand and Europe are all places I haven’t been and would love to visit.

Megan has posted a Flickr photoset with her photos of India. She and her friends captured some wonderful shots, there are a lot of closeups of people’s faces. That is one thing I did not do when I went to Africa and now I wish I had.

I am so delighted with what I’ve seen of the 101 images that I’m here telling you about them before I even finish the series. I highly recommend that you divert your focus on this lovely Sunday and check out this amazing series of photographs.

We had a lot, lot, lot of fun performing and socializing at the Harvest Gathering Friday Night and Saturday. It seemed like I could not walk five steps without running into someone I really like, and perhaps do not see very often.

I have photos and stories, but for now you might want to check out Brian’s Flickr page. The very top few photos are from a Contra Dance Saturday night in downtown Lansing . Just under that is Harvest Gathering, and past that is Wheatland festival from last weekend.

Here is what it takes to make me warm sleeping in a tent in just-above-freezing temperatures (it was 39F when we went to bed and the National Weather Service says it got down to 36F… and 32F is 0C for my out-of-US readers):

Three pairs of Longjohns worn simultaneously
Tank Top
Two Turtleneck tops
One cotton Sweatshirt
One really-really thick/warm sweater knit just for such occasions (like a thick blanket, see photo)
Three pair of wool socks, also worn simultaneously
One pair wool legwarmers
One store-bought beret
One handknit pseudo-Calorimetry wool head wrap
One Pair handknit fingerless gloves of bulky alpaca, bought at an import shop
One air mattress
One sleeping bag underneath the sleepers
Two sleeping bags and a comforter on top of the sleepers
One wool tweed man’s winter coat over feet
Two human beings creating body heat
Very small tent to hold in said body heat

I really did sleep fine. I woke up when the rooster crowed but then went back to sleep (roosters remind me of my trip to Africa, a good memory).

I took a while to settle in at first… originally because of cold feet (at 1:30am or so) until Brian put the coat on the bottom part of our “bed” and later because it kept raining and then not and then raining again. Intermittent sounds will wake me, where louder sounds that are more even do not bother me at all.

However, when Brian woke up I stayed under the covers for an extra hour or so. I was not interested in leaving the warm, safe place if I did not need to get up. Finally I had to be a grownup and get vertical, and Brian was a sport and got me a cup of hot black tea right away.

It did get warmer Saturday around noon or so, and it did mostly stop raining (though there were clouds over most of the sky most of the day). Our concert was really heartwarming, all the support and fine reception we felt. If only we had more time to jam with friends, it could have been a little more perfect.

I must say that I’m delighted to have had a long hot soaking bath today, I’m clean and warm, and I do not have to be cold and wet in the tent for a second night. Gratitude is a powerful feeling for me tonight.

Photo: Wheatland Festival 2003, the debut of the super-warm double-thickness Lamb’s Pride Worsted sweater. I knit it because of a 45F degree night in a tent the year before. That sweater is worth its weight (two pounds) in gold when music festivals get frigid.

Anne Erickson writes a column in the Lansing State Journal’s What’s On section. She interviewed me a few weeks ago and yesterday did a lovely story about this Saturday’s show at Altu’s.

Doug Berch is a very fine musician, a wonderful person, and definitely puts on a nice show (he plays many acoustic instruments). I’m delighted that he has been highlighted in this way.

I’m hoping that a good crowd will come this weekend. The show is 6:30-8:30, map is here. I do not expect to be there. I’ll be up in Lake City at Harvest Gathering, performing on Saturday afternoon, and if I get home in time I’ll run over to Kristi’s for the Knitterpalooza gathering.

Well, I’m happier about my new design than I have been in months. I wish I had a photo of the second shape ZiggyBag (it holds a water bottle) but I left that sample at Rae’s shop before I remembered to photograph it. A third bag is in the wings…

This one can hold a wallet, cell phone, keys and maybe another small item. It’s perfect for wandering around an art fair or music festival with a little cash in the pocket for a cup of tea or something from the artist vendors on site.

I am excited to again be planning a pattern with many sizes/shapes in one pattern. This makes it a bear to write the pattern, but it makes a really solid collection that is worth the pattern price for my customers. I started with an idea for a project bag and it just multiplied before I could do anything about it.

Diana and I are still working on getting a sample bag of the full-sized project bag version (which will be even *more* colorful than what you see here, if that is possible). The larger bag will hopefully bring Turkish Socks to mind. I expect that early next week we will have a photo or two of that project, if it keeps going as well as it has for the last few days.

I tell you all, I do not know what I would have done without Diana for this particular project. I would sort of flip out and call her, tell her my roadblock, she would listen, hang up, work something out, and call me back with a solution. I am really grateful for her more and more every day.

There were questions and good input about why my preliminary bags might not have worked. It’s true, Noro Kureyon does not felt easily and Patons Classic felts very well. I have used them together in my Watercolor Bag, where I wanted more dense fabric at the bottom, handles and top edge of the bag.

For this design series, I am using colorwork with these yarns stranded alternately, two stitches of one and then two of the other. But what has caused trouble in particular for this pattern is the colorwork, more than the yarns involved. Stranded knitting just plain doesn’t stretch like other fabrics and it pulls in easily.

I started with a bag bottom style that has worked for me in the past (it was in one color). Then I added colorwork on top. They did not get along well. I had bag bottoms that were not flat at all, more like domes. This was pretty but it was not what I had in my mind. I thought that it would felt more than the sides (as it did in the Watercolor Bag) but stranding the colors together changed my felting proportions and changed all my plans.

I have really learned a lot through this. Sometimes we just have to puzzle and struggle a bit to learn a new lesson. It’s OK to have these things happen. Since I started with a really strong picture in my mind of what I wanted for the larger bag, I kept working on the shaping and proportions until I got it right. I made a small bag (picured here), and a water bottle bag which is delightful (Rae’s brother thought it was really great when he visited the shop the other day).

Diana has knit three or four of the prototype small bags/pouches already. I have knit three water bottle bags and this purple sample bag pictured today. Now I am working on the big one! I’m knitting what feels like a zillion stitches after those nice smaller projects.

The larger project bag will be larger than the Watercolor Bag (which was a relatively small and lightweight bag, by design). I want this one to be able to handle a larger project than the other style.

There is a chill in the air. It has arrived, that time I call Sweater Season. In Lansing, Michigan, we have sweater season a very big proportion of the year. I’m glad I love wool, mohair and alpaca sweaters. I do not like a chill much.

This week I will be listening to Kitty Donohoe’s song “Autumn Dance” a lot. I could just put that one on repeat and listen for an hour!

I have been working on a felted bag pattern (with tons of help from Diana) this last several weeks. Last night I felted the first bag that is actually “just right” by Goldilocks standards. It is the seventh test bag.

This pattern is really fighting me, and I’m not at all used to this sort of struggle. Usually I get bogged down by sizing socks, not by just getting a concept to come off of the needles the way I pictured it. I’m very lucky, I usually have success with the first prototype.

The one I just finished is a stranded-colorwork bag for carrying a water bottle. There will also be a small pouch (wallet, keys, cellphone size) and a knitting-project bag larger than my Watercolor bag.

These are tentatively called ZigBagZ because of the zigzag color pattern. One yarn is solid and the other is a slowly self-striping yarn.

In this photo the solid is Patons Classic (almost identical to Cascade 220) and the striping yarn is Noro Kureyon. The photo is imperfect in that the purse was a little scrunched up where the purple is at the bottom, but the warmer-toned top of the photo shows the patterning well.

I scheduled a bunch of classes, mostly through the first half of December and a few items in January. Most are in the Lansing area and Charlotte (about 30 minutes out of the city). Three days are at New York Sheep & Wool (also called Rhinebeck).

These classes will be the bulk of my teaching schedule for the rest of 2007, though I hope to add a few classes outside of the Lansing area before the end of the year.

I have been very behind in loading my schedule on my website for what seems forever. As of right now, the classes that are confirmed are on my Google Calendar and can be accessed on the top navigation bar of this site under “Schedule.”

It is too early for New Year’s Resolutions but it’s a new year for the knit-teaching business. I will do my best to stay more up on my online schedule page for you folks who are loyally following me.

Back to test-knitting a new pattern. More later…

Brian and I spent Friday-Sunday at Wheatland Music Festival. It rained before we got there on Friday which calmed the dust down. It rained for maybe a minute (we ran for shelter from big drops but it stopped quickly) around dinnertime on Friday, but there was not a drop after that.

I of course have too many photos to put up this soon. However, here is a photo of us on Friday night at the Seth Bernard/Daisy May concert (accompanied by Andrea Moreno-Beals, Dominic John and Drew Howard/Captain Midnite). It was taken for us by the young lady sharing a blanket with us. She had a great eye, centering Daisy May between our heads and showing Drew on the right hand side of the photo on stage.

Drew cracks me up, he’s such a fun friend. He’s thoughtful and grounded (aaah) with an ironic yet humorous way of looking at things. In contrast, I’m sort of manic when I get in public (though I’m thoughtful in less distracting environments).

So they introduced the band and I got up on my knees and cheered (this is normal festival behavior). Well, I was in the front row, which means the band could see me if they were looking that way. When I cheered for Drew, he said “Hi, Lynn… Hi, Mom.” Cracked me up… I’m honored to know these folks, though I know Drew best. Thanks for the public hello, Drew. You’re the best.

Anyway, you know that when I write columns about music festivals I have a lot of linking to do and a lot of photos to edit, and that takes a long time. Today I need to iron out my schedule and dye some yarn, so I’m choosing to delay that column a bit. For now, I’m pleased to say it was indeed a Happy Wheatland in 2007.

I am doing what I can to catch up on old photos here. The photo today is what was my 150th pair ever, since I started knitting socks in 2001.

This pair was for my mother, back in May, for Mother’s Day. I started to make her a different pair and realized almost at the end that the yarn I had chosen was not machine wash/machine dry. Mom needs easy care, so I put aside that pair and started in again.

The construction of these was this: I used the toe from my First-Time Toe-Up sock pattern. I knit to where the heel should go, knit a placeholder (to be ripped out later) in “waste yarn” and then continued to the top.

The foot and leg are all knit totally in stockinette, no ribbing, so it does roll a bit at the top. I bound off using a single crochet (inserting the hook first into the next stitch on the left hand needle). This is a stretchy and satisfactory bind off.

I then went back, took out the waste yarn and placed the now-loose stitches on sock needles. I then knit something like a top-down toe but with a different rate of decrease (so that it would fit a heel better, as heels and toes do not have the same shape). I placed the decreases evenly (sometimes called a star toe) rather than on the left/right edges (called a wedge toe).

I finished this pair by running the yarn end through the final eight stitches like a drawstring and fastening the end. There are many ways to make afterthought heels, this is merely one way.

I think the yarn is Austerman Step (standard sockyarn with wool/nylon . It has very long bands of color. I think I may be unable to resist sockyarn with turquoise in it, so I got this. I was not sure how I would like it knit up, but it’s just lovely.

Wow. Sometimes life sends you a mental U-turn!

I was searching for a knitted tank top (which is called something else in the UK). I found instead a photo of a military tank with a knitted “sweater” on it… looks like an afghan made of pink knitted squares but with fitted pieces for the tube which extends out front, and a pom-pom hanging from the very tip of that tube. The tank looks like it’s sitting in front of a Gothic-era European brick building. The website seems to be British (a child is wearing “nappies” not “diapers,” for example).

I don’t own the copyright for the photo so I can not show it here. I searched all over the site Google Photos says it came from, but I do not find the post it was connected with. Here are the two links…

Tank Photo:

http://madelinetosh.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/tank_knitting.jpg

Website:

http://madelinetosh.typepad.com/my_weblog/knitting/index.html

For those who are new to ColorJoy, Brian (hubby) and I perform as The Fabulous Heftones. We sing the popular music of the 1920’s. (Click band name link for free downloadable music.) We love it.

Sometimes we play far away at Ukulele Festivals (New York, Indianapolis, Chicago). Sometimes we are delighted to perform at festivals that do not focus on the Ukulele (Coopers Glen in Kalamazoo; Evart, Michigan Dulcimer Fun Fest)… and often we play at our home venue, Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine in East Lansing. If we are lucky, we get to play private events and weddings between the public performances.

We have had a few weeks of slow times for the music. This is always a good change, and we get to learn new songs during those slower times.

Now we head into busier times again. This weekend we will go to the Wheatland Music Festival in Remus, Michigan (very near where I went to college) as participants rather than performers. The next weekend we will be performing for the Earthwork Music Harvest Gathering. This is a relatively new and smaller festival, very rustic, in Lake City, Michigan. Wonderful people, great musicians, great organic food.

We will be playing on Saturday, September 15, at 2pm. There are two stages at this festival, and we will be in the barn, a nice intimate space (with the benefit of good protection if it rains). Just some of the musicians at the festival who we know/hang out with, will be playing there, are:

Jen Sygit & Spare Change

Steppin’ in it

Rachael Davis and Dominic

Laura Bates and Brandon Foote

Madcat & Kane

Breathe Owl Breathe

Captain Midnite

Sam Corbin

Robin Lee Barry (I’ve known her since at least 1973, believe it or not)

This is going to be one heck of a music gathering. I dare say there will be some jamming into the wee hours at this event.

For those staying more local to Lansing, we also have several events coming up:

Foods For Living (healthy food store)
September 21 & Sept 28 (both Fridays)
4:00pm to 6:00pm

Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine
September 22 & December 8 (Saturdays)
6:30pm to 8:30pm (Dinner Hour)

RicStar Music Camp Benefit
VanAtta’s Greenhouse
September 30 (Sunday)
2:30pm (other acts before and after, including Jen Sygit just before us)

Back when there was snow on the ground, I thought I had finished a pattern. It was all written, tested, proofread.

I got photos. They looked fine on the screen. They looked awful printed.

I bought a new camera (never mind that it supposedly isn’t as good as the other… it takes color more accurately.) I had to get samples back, take a number of new photos, edit, correct color, correct for my printer, do all sorts of things I barely know how to do.

Thank goodness I’ve had a few classes and a lot of years (perhaps 10) working with PhotoShop. I still feel like I’m groping around in the dark sometimes, when these sorts of issues come up. Most of my PhotoShop experience has been for web design, and print is a totally different animal.

So today I’m pleased as punch to announce: The Party Stole Pattern is ready. It’s beautiful, it’s for sale on my shopping cart, and the photos look good to me both on screen and printed. Rae agrees, Diana agrees. Sigh…

This pattern includes instructions on how to choose five yarns which complement one another in texture and color, but which do not match. On all of the Party Stoles that I have knit, I used two ribbon yarns, one brushed mohair and two other yarns of different textures.

The one in the photo which I am wearing, looks like the one I made for myself and have been wearing for a while. The one in the photo, however, is the store shop model for Threadbear Fiberarts.

There is one in beautiful blues, turquoises, greens and purples, at Rae’s Yarn Boutique (see below, although it’s much more beautiful in person), and I’m nearly done with one in rainbow ribbons plus black mohair (striking… see at left) for Linda at Little Red Schoolhouse Yarns. (All three of those shops are in Lansing, Michigan.)

This is the easiest wrap yet. One yarn per row, knit stitches only with a grand total of a dozen increases in the whole piece, easy fringe. The whole piece is carried by the yarns, and there is subtle shaping at the top edge to keep it from falling off as you reach for something while wearing it.

It looks like it is woven from a distance. It’s light enough to scrunch up and act like it’s a big scarf under a winter coat, but it’s fluffy enough to wear indoors in the summer against air conditioning. I just loooove mine. I have worn it a lot this summer, as I do not tolerate Air Conditioning well.

(Would anyone be interested in kits, where I chose the five yarns for you? I’m willing if I get any interest at all, to put some up on my shopping cart.)

Some things just take time, including this pattern. I hope this works out as well as good wine.

(May I insert a quiet WooHoooooo!!!???)

Diana told me about something called Dragon Fruit. It’s decidedly ColorJoy on the outside, a wonderful hot fuschia with hot green leaves or bits sticking out. The one she had looked like a fish to me, shape wise. It was goooorgeous!

She ate one. She took a photo before and after and goes into detail on how it tastes, texture, you name it. The look of its inside is an absolute surprise.

You guys seem to love it when I write about food. I figure some of you will want to check out Diana’s post on her fruity adventure.

Friday night, Brian and I went down to the REOtown festival in South Central Lansing. This area has been called REOtown for only a few years, and has really been coming into its own lately. The festival is relatively new, maybe three years now. We thought we’d check it out.

This area was once home of a Diamond REO truck factory, and many of the people who worked there lived very close by and walked to work. From what I have read it was a pretty good place to work, as factories go. The letters REO were the initials of Ransom E. Olds, founder of both Diamond REO and Oldsmobile. He lived walking distance from this area, though a little far for today’s walkers, in general.

I once read a short history on Ransom E. Olds. It turns out that he grew up in a family that had a carriage-building business and they let him putter with the resources they had available.

He also distinctly did not like horses. He was driven to figure out some type of transportation that did not require getting along with those particular large animals. I find that somewhat amusing. I’m not particularly good with horses, either, or I was not when I tried (I was a loud and fast-moving teenager at the time, not the sort a horse would be instinctively drawn to). I never had to depend on horses to get me anywhere, though… thank goodness.

But I’m getting away from this weekend’s story. We found parking within a block of the event even though we headed down there after 9pm. It was only $5 on Friday to get into the area in front of the stage. They had local musicians on Friday, and only a part of a day’s worth of music. For the other days, there were full days of national acts planned and I believe the entry fee was $15 for those days (yes, it’s still on all day Monday).

The first thing we saw was two small tents set up for one guy who was carving tree trunks into different things. He had bears that were quite realistic, and a lot of mushrooms with gnomes as their stem.

I particularly liked this incredible table-like fantastic being, something like a modern version of any number of indigenous artforms… it reminds me of native works from Mexico and Alaska, maybe even Australia for starters. I love its intense look and the bright colors… and the faces on his torso. Later we saw a 50-something tattooed guy tooling around the carnival with a mushroom/gnome under his arm.

It was an older crowd for the most part. We are in our late 40’s and we were among the youngest, with the exception of a few mommies toting along kids for a fun evening of dance. I liked the cultural mix there, with some local blues cats, a bunch of UAW folks (United Auto Workers, people working in factories for GM/Oldsmobile which has been a huge employer in Lansing for generations), a good representation of Lansing’s Mexican/hispanic population (some beautiful ladies in that crowd indeed), a bunch of biker folks with tattoos, leather and long chains to their keys, neighborhood people who live nearby and walked on down, and actually a few folks I know because we work together at Foster Community Center. Cool.

I took some great shots of the carnival area (the lights are wonderful, and my current camera does OK in half-light with a bit of motion). I also got some fun shots of folks dancing in front of the stage, and the interior of the Cadillac Club which is located just to the side of the main stage.

Photos: Two shots of the carnival, first a long shot of the “Zipper” ride, and then a closeup of the pirate ship ride with a ferris wheel in the background. Next, the elephant ears booth which I would have expected near the carnival but it was closer to the music area. Then the cool carved table guy, an interior shot of the Cadillac Club (those cars sticking out are actually benches you can sit on… don’t miss the giant fish hanging from the ceiling), and two photos of outdoors.

The first outdoor photo is the sidewalk in front of the Cadillac Club (CC) with a local guy who came down on his bike, near CC customers at outdoor tables just to the side of the dance floor; and the final photo just to the right of that scene… dancers in front of the dance floor/bandstand. I think the band was the Old Town Blues Band at that time. Whoever it was really entertained well!

To me, a lazy day is one without an appointment. That is to say, I’m not particularly lazy but I like special days where I am mostly alone. I still work, I always do, but my work is my favorite subject, so it is not a problem. To work in jammies on the couch with my laptop on my lap and sock on needles, is a good day.

I still puzzle out how to write instructions or size something, how to shape a shawl, choose the right yarns for a pattern. I answer email inquiries, install software, write my blog… it’s all work-related and I love it. But to sit at home and not worry about how I look and whether I’m being cheerful, grumpy, manic or pensive… well, I love those times.

Friday was relatively low-interaction. I taught a private lesson and went for a long walk with Kristi and her boys. I also popped by Rae’s just before she closed.

Brian and I did go to REOtown festival for a while, just to see what it was like and to peek in the Cadillac Club (a renovated bowling alley which has a lot of entertainment and some lovely food offerings).

It was a happy and happening scene, a different crowd than you’d find in Old Town or the East Lansing folk/art festivals. There were Elephant Ears (a fried bread with cinnamon and sugar), carnival rides, and a very good “cover” band on an outdoor stage, playing singable and danceable tunes, mostly from the 70’s and 80’s.

Saturday I stayed home with doors closed, radio off. Those days are few and precious to me, as I can really get more done with no outside distraction. I stared at the computer while solving a pattern problem, test knitting a pattern and editing photos. We did go to a music gathering at night and I enjoyed that a lot.

Sunday I woke up earlier than usual, went for a long, purposeful walk, came home and made wonderful pancakes, and now I’m preparing for a loooong soaking bubblebath to relax.

I think I will go out, though, to Lamafest (yes, one “L” because that is the group of animals including alpacas) at Mchigan State University. I won’t go for long but once I saw a vendor there with beautiful child-sized handknit hats, probably from the Andes. I’m always hoping I’ll see them again. They were not there last year.

I’m kicking myself that I did not buy those hats when I did see them maybe 5 years ago, but the end of August/early September is typically a low cashflow time of year for a knitting teacher, and I opted to hold on to my cash that day. I couldn’t wear them and I was not yet teaching ethnic knitting of any sort at the time.

Hindsight is 20/20, you know? I do have four hats from this general realm but the ones I saw there were different, and I’m so very interested in ethnic knitting styles. Pooh.

Anyway, back to the weekend. I hope I won’t even leave the house at all on Monday. That’s the plan. I will continue to plug away at patterns and dyeing yarn.

I sort of accidentally finished another pair of socks between last night and this morning. I have much “real” knitting to do, where I pay attention and log what I do and doublecheck new projects. However, in public I can not concentrate on those things so I keep cranking out simple stockinette socks for myself.

I went to log the new pair in my sock log and realized I hadn’t logged a previous pair. That puts me at 157 pairs of socks since Spring 2001 (when I knit my first pair, ever). I do not count single socks I knit as test socks or samples for shops, I do count full pairs whether for myself or a loved one.

I am really behind on photographing this year’s socks, though. I have at least five pair I have not photographed, and therefore have never worn. I need to get on that task soon!!!

I’m working on patterns again. It looks like I may have a pattern ready on Tuesday, cross fingers for me. I also have newly-dyed sockyarn photographed which I’ll post soon.

Photos? The music party Saturday night. A fire pit, great music and harmonies, and beautiful food. The quiche was made by a fellow knitter/musician, Cynthia. Food is definitely art.