Just in time for the holiday gift-giving season, I’ve returned to this blog, which means I can’t post any pictures of any crafts that I have been making for the past 6 months. Alright, I may have one or two. I think I’ve worked out all of the problems caused by the hacked site, if not, please let me know.
I also purchased a smart phone after the hacking. Maybe I can just go mobile.
Thinking about a site redesign over the holidays. WOOT!
Hi Folks,
Sorry, We’ve been hacked. Thinks are going to look a little weird for the next week. Google is blocking us.
There is a person who really makes my life easier. I was really excited about getting to meet her and give her a gift. She’s a quilter, so I had to make her a pin cushion. Somehow along the way a butterfly theme developed.
This pin cushion is made out of recycled sweaters (a little touch of cashmere on the top), recycled buttons, fresh embroidery floss, and fresh quilter pins.
I can’t wait to give it to her.
Put together a Christmas gift to see the SUPERMOON tomorrow night. If I can’t focus on the largest thing in the sky when it is the brightest it will be in 20 years, I don’t deserve to have a telescope!
The best part about living in Arkansas is the warm weather.
Yesterday I went out to check my winter survivors: kale, cabbage, thyme, and arugula. I found two 7++ inch stalks of asparagus!
The raspberries and strawberries are coming up too. I let the spring fever get to me and despite wanting to hold off on my gardening, planted a bunch of radishes, lettuce, and spinach.
My friend Zachary Schomburg crisscrossed the US last year, reading his poetry and filming other poets. Here is a trailer for his film, Asteroid, which will be released by Rabbit Light Movies in June 2011.
If you watch it closely you will see my husband. NSFW language for you cube dwellers.
I got a really awesome 24-inch Ashford Table Loom this holiday season from my mother and father-in-law. We went up to Mountain View, AR last year to the Ozark Folk Center and I almost bought one.
While we were up in the Catskill Mountains for vacation, I started a project from the book, The Weaver’s Idea Book: Creative Cloth on a Rigid Heddle Loom.
The reed that came with the loom was 5 dpi, but the pattern called for 12 dpi, so this is a much more airy and open weave than the “Felted Scarf in Beige” pattern calls for. I like calling this pattern the waffle scarf, but most woven patterns look like a waffle so it is probably a bad name. Here are some pictures of the process. I’ll add some finished ones later.
Writer Matthew Pitt was just in town and we had a blast. We went out to Toad Suck Buck’s, a little steakhouse in a quonset hut across the county line on the Arkansas River. We found out that you can ask for your steak “rare plus” out in the country. Ty confused him with his “sear rare” and “char rare” questions. I had the fillet medium rare and the power of the flavor and the texture reminded me of warm sushi (but cooked of course). I love it when beef is properly cooked and cut across the grain and explodes into a million little pieces in your mouth without your teeth doing much work.
Matt was in town as apart of the Hendrix-Murphy Shop Talk series and it sounds like the students really liked him. He’s got a book out now, Attention Now Please:
It always happens during the holiday season…I begin working on gift crafts that I can’t show on my blog. It really tends to constipate my blog. This year I didn’t make many things, but I did make a really nice rug for my mother-in-law. The patter is from OneSkein. It is the best solution for scraps!
I cheated a lot with this one. I used the thickest pillow cord available (1 inch) instead of the suggested size (1/4 inch). I started running out of time, so half of the stitches were done on the knitting machine. The 20-stitch width and yards and yards of length is ideal for my knitting machine. I HATE casting on with the knitting machine and I hate casting on wide widths of knitting even more. Sometimes it feels like dealing with the wide cast on causes more problems than it is worth.
With the short width, I could just keep moving my toothed weights as the work progressed.
I gave one of these rugs to my mother, and she has it hanging on her wall. My mother-in-law placed hers on the back of her recliner. Half of the fun of giving these rugs is seeing where they end up and how the colors and textures interact with the environment the receiver chooses.
My in laws, Arnold and Diana, were just int town for two weeks. The entire time I had the theme to the PBS show The Victory Garden in my head. I used to love that show on Saturday nights while finishing off folding the 7th basket of clothes, just before watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and eating frozen pizza.
Back to the visit; we had a great time. We went out to dinner, we went to the Folk Art Museum in Mountain View, we went to a Halloween party all dressed up, and they got to watch my rock band play. I got to make them some bread, we canned a bunch of salsa and froze a bunch of spaghetti sauce. The more I hang out with them, the less I think how similar they are to my parents, but the more I think they’re really similar to Ty and myself. Maybe this is the anti-mid life crisis: not that you’re becoming your parents, but you’re becoming the type of person you would enjoy hanging out with…and for Ty, that his parents have raised they type of person they want to hang out with.
We played board games, watched movies, went to museums, and the entire time, Ty and I went to our regular jobs during the week. During the day, they would drive around and see the sights, water my garden, pick my garden, check out the RV parks, go grocery shopping, or just curl up with a good book. Seriously, you couldn’t pay money to have visitors like this.
Before they showed up, I took some video of my garden. If you want to know what my garden looked like in Mid-October, here it it is:
Part I:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0Abs2rJu3btmbkY
Part II:
http://juleejaeger.shutterfly.com/pictures/44
Part III:
http://juleejaeger.shutterfly.com/pictures/42
I’ll post some pictures from the trip later.
