Ironing, comedy of errors and Textiles and Tea

Too tired today for the knitting group after yesterday's exertions combined with the allergy season. So when my ride texted this morning, setting up the pickup I texted back saying not today. She also asked if Thursday would be good to pick up an artwork, and I said fine.

This surprised me because last week she'd said July at the earliest. Fine by me. Then when I was talking to her later today she was puzzled. Thursday? You mean next week? Clearly had forgotten it was her idea. Hm.

Then I got on with some sleeping, then dishes and picking up before the cleaners come tomorrow, and was just ironing this afternoon when I heard the doorbell. And a knock. And a little voice calling, asking are you okay. 

I heaved a sigh and went down to find my friend anxiously calling and worrying in the front hall. Evidently my text never got there, so she concluded when I wasn't ready and waiting, that something terrible must have happened. 

The extent to which people are convinced I'm going to keel over if they're not right there is amazing.  I can't take a nap without someone thinking I've gone. It's very kind of them, if a bit unrealistic, considering my health is better than the people worrying. 

Anyway she finally left after making sure I was as fine as I said I was. And we had the odd convo about Thursday. I wonder if her memory's slipping, I need to tread carefully there. And I resumed the ironing since I was on a roll.

That's done for the foreseeable future.

Textiles and Tea featured the wonderful weaver artist 

She's part indigenous, part Mexican, started life picking in the fields, crossing the border frequently as her undocumented father needed to work and flee.

 

Her weaving, mixing fine linens and wool with barbed wire,  honors the history of her people and the suffering inflicted on them by racism and borders. She is now a tenured professor at San Jose SU. What a trajectory.

Here are rebozos honoring mothers including the Virgen de Guadalupe 

This piece is the moon and honors her father's love for the moon with mist over it

Three heroes in fiber 

Joan of Arc, with folds and softness 

This is the border and the vegetation around it

There two are the Mexican and American flags blended and combined in the hope of erasing artificial boundaries 

I love this piece because it has a frame loom. Her father used to weave on one, and this piece honors his life and struggles.

She's a great person as well as a great artist, and has fought to get fiberarts recognized as art, not consigned to the lesser category of craft.

To have risen from being a ten year old crop picker working in the fields with her family to being a tenured academic professor is an almost unbelievable feat. 

She's aware of that but not too impressed because she's looking ahead not back, now working on her Celestial series about the planets.

Happy day everyone, what a privilege to see this marvelous woman today.

Riddle, flowers and farmer's carry

I was out early this morning, watering the seedlings, now growing nicely. Gary gave me a bunch of gallon juice jugs last year, for watering. 

They work nicely, a gallon of water weighing about 8 pounds, a good weight for me to carry, one in each hand, doing a farmer's carry, great resistance exercise.  From sink to patio is a good distance for the purpose 

Later I checked the forecast which reported rain to arrive later this morning.  Too late, I'd already done the watering.

I think there are two kinds of gardeners. One kind loves to go to the nursery and buy plants to arrange in their garden or indoors That's Gary. 

The other has no interest in letting someone else have all the fun of propagating, but likes growing from seed or cuttings. They're likely to practice gardener's larceny, stealing cuttings and collecting stray seeds wherever they find them. That's me.

Both kinds have been known to rescue plants from the dumpster and give them a new life. One kind, Gary, would keep them. 

The other, me, would bring them back, maybe creating several offspring plants and, once established, give them away to eager recipients who are less familiar with plant care. 

I did get out for a walk to the pond before the rain arrived, passing neighbors busy gardening and doing inadvisable things to their patios. 

There was a team on one patio,  breaking up the concrete apron, to lay down bricks instead. I doubt if this is a good move the apron being designed  to carry rainwater away from the house wall, but they didn't ask me.

And I have a riddle for you. A walker takes a stroll past a public golf course, and finds a number of golfballs well outside the boundary and in next door's property. What day is it? Answer at the end.

There's a lone daylily in the trees.

And a natural bouquet near the pond 

It never gets old walking down here to see turtles sliding quietly off the logs and into the water while frogs leap right over them shouting, great big drama queens.

Answer to the riddle: Monday, of course.

All the duffers are out at the weekend hitting wildly all over. The other day I found three balls nestled together near the houses. Whatever that golfer's doing wrong, at least he's consistent.

During the week the retirees,  seasoned players, are out, very few balls out of bounds from them.

Happy day everyone, now you know when to score a few balls for your own frugal use. 

Repatriation has started.

Gary has started moving houseplants to the new place, yay. The bromeliad moved out this morning, the palm to follow. Meanwhile I brought down my snake plant to replace the bromeliad. 

The split leaf philodendron is to follow, also the charcoal drawing on the wall back there.

Every item that leaves is a relief. I'd like to have all the plants downstairs because I forget to water the ones in the guest room. And I don't get to see them anyway, when they're upstairs.

Outside the daylilies at my door are opening.

The kimono sash is completely finished now. I ended up with the knotted finish you see.

Note the use of the clipboard as an art tool. It's very useful as a third hand in various weaving stages. Also it works like a small drawing board when you don't need to wrangle a full size one. Mitchell probably knows this of old.

Along with the current braid on the lucet, and the linen jacket finishing, I fancy making another clasped weft weave, with half the warp threads one color, half the other. Like the eyeglass case, only a band, and the same two colors for the wefts. 

I'm also thinking about making a braid to finish the jacket fronts. Hm. After the current one on the lucet. 

I could remove the current one and come back later to it, but I think it might be wiser to finish the one I'm on. Or I might contract Second Braid Syndrome.

Or I might find fabric for the finishing and pockets of the jacket to match a skirt. I'm pretty sure I have some bits from when I made the skirts. Or maybe this is when I bust out that pink and white stripe cotton fabric, which is still waiting to be pressed.

I'm never short of ideas, as you see. There are only the ones I can be bothered to enter here, one finger typing, you remember. The brain is a busy old loom.

The hobnobs were well received by Gary and New Friend, who is now a new person in my circle too, lovely lady.  I thought they needed to keep up their strength, still packing cars and driving back and forth all weekend.

Happy day everyone, happy solstice, summer or winter, depending on where you are. 

This is as technical as I plan to get about it 

Finishes and finches

Early morning on the deck in June 

This is a good start to the day.

I finished the kimono sash, at least finished weaving it. Now I have to decide on the actual finishing, braiding, knotting, something. It's long enough, so that's good 

And here's why I love clasped weft.

Every pick (row) presents a new decision like a brush stroke. You see this in progress. Where should the blue thread land? 

There's nothing rote about this, and for me that's where the joy is found. It's a conversation with the threads.

This afternoon I was out just sitting, reading a bit, mainly listening to the wind in the trees. When it eventually died down, birds started up. 

I heard a lovely melody and saw small birds whipping past. I thought at first goldfinches because we have a local pair. Then I noticed a pair of house finches, the male doing the singing.

So I opened YouTube to a video of housefinch song 

And we had a duet. I think the real life male may have thought there was a male intruder in his territory, so rather than upset him, I switched off.

I've done this before with recorded sounds and real birds, but only briefly, not wishing to upset their domestic arrangements. 

Please don't come at me with that bird app, I would rather observe and detect. That's the fun of it, not having an app jump in, know-it-all, and spoil the joy. Just sayin. Some people like them, I don't.

Today I baked hobnobs, which seem to be a lot like ANZAC biscuits which I usually make for the Day, in honor of my NZ and Oz blogistas 

I sampled a couple of them on the deck between bird sightings with a pot of tea.

Happy day, eat cookies, watch birds, just generally do nothing, in honor of the Summer Solstice, whenever it comes, I usually miss the solstices by a day.

I swiped this from Barbara's blog. I like how it honors the fields of grain and Ukrainian artwork.

Juneteenth, bands and upcycling

Happy Juneteenth! It's been a federal holiday since President Biden declared it, a few years ago. High time.

It took a while for the news to get to Galveston, no doubt slaveholders weren't hurrying it along any.

Meanwhile back at the loom, I'm nearly at the end of the warp threads. In case any expert is reading and needs to know: this is 8/4 cotton. 8 relates to the weight, 4 to the ply, 4-ply.

Soon I'll be taking the finished band off, and seeing how it works. I'm really glad I got this loom, easier than backstrap, much as I like the simplicity of backstrap.

And, in case there's any danger of my running out of things to make 'n do, here's a linen top I made a while back.

It fits but just doesn't suit me. There's not enough me to fill it curvily. 

It's nicely hand stitched, with a pleat detail on the sleeves

And a bit of fancy stitching there 

So I needed to decide: upcycle? Freecycle? Both?  

Then I did my usual procedure on a top that isn't working, cut it up the front to make a jacket.

I'll stitch the raw edges probably blanket stitch, up and back again. Probably in white.

After that I'll see if embroidery or stamping or dyeing might happen.  Also I wonder about adding patch pockets. Maybe in a fancy print, hm, I need to check what I have. 

If none of it ends up suiting me, I expect some keen Freecycler will appreciate a handmade linen jacket with pockets. There's plenty of summer still to go, to wear it.

Which all reminded me I need to iron my linen jackets. They're clean but a bit limp and crumpled, aren't we all. 

I did iron one jacket,  which involved filling the water reservoir in the iron, which involved finding and filling something to use to pour the water into the tiny awkward opening.  After all that I decided one was enough. It's a Federal Holiday after all. Or some such excuse.

Happy day everyone, enjoy your day even if it's not a holiday where you are.