Most boring blog post ever.

Hey friends, I'm one of those people that leaves doing the taxes to the last possible moment. Probably because painting season starts up again in the spring and we never have the money to pay the taxes early, say, in January.
So during my breaks while doing a year's worth of accounting in five days, I am doing some knitting, but photos will have to wait. I apologize for the silence. Really, it's kind of screechy on my end. Maybe this year I'll train myself to stay on top of these things...

Plains, Brown Bird, and Al Scorch in Portland this very night.

I do have a lot to catch up on here, but I waited too long this morning to get all the photos and links in place before heading to work.

So for now, I'm just going to say that tonight Jeremy and I are playing a show at the Apohadion Theater, which is located at 107 Hanover St in Portland. Tonight we're playing in Plains. Brown Bird and Al Scorch are also gracing the stage. Show will start 8:30-ish, please bring a donation for the traveling folk, and your beverage of choice.

Everyday life is so fascinating and rife with possibility and small wonders. I can barely keep up with myself. Raise your hand if you feel the same way.

Couldn't leave without one photo. Here is Fyvush, our resident kitty, facing down our resident dragons.

Home again, with lots more yarn and a new brother!

It seems like we were away for a whole week.

On Friday, Jeremy and I left the 4 inches (and counting) of snow in Maine and headed south to CT for the rehearsal. The wedding on Saturday was beautiful and super fun (and probably the shortest ceremony I've ever been to) despite my being extremely nervous about getting all of my notes right. Jeremy and I cut the rug big time at the reception. Literally, I have danced with my husband twice in the 9 years we've been together. I don't even remember much of his dancing, since the first time he got up I was laughing so hard I couldn't see him through my tears, and the second time I just couldn't keep up with him. The owner of the Saybrook Point Inn herself came to check out his moves. I would like to take this opportunity to express my appreciation for the Saybrook Point Inn staff, who were so gracious and sweet. Everything about this day was perfect. And now I have a brother!

 I have my sister Katie and future brother-in-law Jason to thank for these photos, as it is difficult to take good shots with my phone...none of the photos I took came out well. Here we are missing Andrew's forehead, but the shot was so cute I couldn't pass it up. Rest assured, his forehead is as cute as the rest of him is.

 My sisters. A lot of people seem to think we have an endless supply, but in reality there are only four of us. Aren't they gorgeous?

After the reception, we went to Mohegan Sun, my first (and perhaps last) casino experience. I came out of there after a half an hour with ringing ears and a stunned look on my face. Plus my eyeballs were totally dried out.

On Sunday, we drove to Providence and I may have bought some yarn at Fresh Purls.

Berroco Weekend, and the phone camera doesn't do the delightful orchid color justice. The other color is Mouse.

We then visited Dave and Morganeve at Machines With Magnets, where they were working on a couple more songs to add to the upcoming Brown Bird album. (We've met the resident hound there, sweet and friendly!) We were so lucky as to get to listen to the rough mixes late Sunday...we ended the day celebrating a friend's birthday and enjoyed some freakishly delicious cupcakes and carrot cake.

On Monday, chilling in Warren after a crazy weekend, I may have visited Bella Yarns:

More Berroco Weekend in Taffy, plus Pattern Booklet #296, and about 275 yards of Haze by Queensland Collection, Cotton/Corn Viscose fingering weight goodness...perhaps a summery shawl will come from this...

Taking a load off at chez Brown Bird

Next family wedding is in less than three weeks!

Recording and more recording...

Monday night Jeremy and I met up with our sweet friend Dave to do some overdubs for the new Plains album, a record that's been in the works for over a year:

Tuesday night Jeremy, Dave and I gathered again to lay down cello, banjo, and trombone for a Tin Ceilings track, to be released on the next Seasonal Disorder compilation from Burst and Bloom Records.

Wednesday night was for mixing...a perfect activity for starting my new sample project...

Pat Corrigan, amazing artist, illustrator, designer, and musician, has made a short film. If you're like me, and watching cats doing ridiculous things is one of your favorite pastimes, you won't be disappointed. The conclusion of the film is particularly riveting.

There's much more to this week than I'm letting on, but it will have to wait--we're driving down to CT for the wedding rehearsal in this special April Fool's Day blizzard. Slow going.

Updates and Musings

Morganeve's mitts have been cast on, after much swatching and calculating. Because I failed to swatch in the round, however, the cuff is coming out far stretchier than in the flat swatch I made. I ripped out and am convinced that I have the right number of stitches, so now I'm making sure that my tension in kept in check.

I finally got up the courage to undo and re-knit all three offending fingers on Mel's left glove. In a poignant hour yesterday, all of us at Revere St. (except for Dylan, who is on tour) sat around crafting/facebooking/making the cat comfortable while listening to "This American Life" amid a growing sea of boxes. This was my chance to weave in all. those. ends. So now, the glove is blocking peacefully and is mere days from going with its counterparts to a loving home.

Jeremy and I seem to be releasing new South China songs only on compilations this year, which is way easier than putting together an album, let me tell you. Last Thursday we recorded an instrumental song for a compilation to be put out by Tea First Records. We used a loop Jeremy recorded a while back, to which I added a couple of cello melodies (and harmonies). As we were thinking of what to lay down next, Jeremy started playing with a random fire ladder in the band room, and decided this would be the perfect "percussion" for the song. I, as the half of South China with way better rhythm, volunteered to play the fire ladder:

These I show you at the risk of also showing what ridiculous faces I can make...

As we were working out this new piece, I thought about the parallels between the knitting designs I've been working on and the process of songwriting. Thinking about songwriting as a design process is something I've never done before. Both processes involve the same types of fears: Is this idea going to go anywhere? What if I put all of this work into this idea and it doesn't work out? Am I really considering all the possibilities with this idea? Is this really any good? etc.

Somehow, frogging a piece of knitting seems way less frustrating than spending days and weeks trying to make a song work that is just not, well, working. It's as though I feel I have a never-ending supply of design ideas, but only a finite number of musical ideas, and I must cling to them, tooth and nail. Whitney Smith, a ceramic artist in the Bay area, often addresses the subject of having to let go and not become too attached to her pieces. In her case, when she puts her perfectly thrown and glazed items in the kiln, there's no guarantee that what comes out at the end of the firing will be usable: things crack, glaze runs all over the place, sculpted bits fall off and stick to other pieces, etc. Though a song or a sweater design is not a physical object that could explode if something goes wrong, the idea is the same--things don't always come out the way you want them to, and you can't be heartbroken with crappy results, or you might not want to make anything ever again!

One last photo:

One of our room mates found this upstairs as he was packing. I love maps, and I love origami, and using old maps to make origami? Such joy. I've made a ton of these over the past few years. Someday something amazing is going to be done with them. So just watch out.

Whipping myself into massive productivity

Several days ago, I was going to post a bunch of photos of my multiple UFOs, but the sight of all of them together just made me put away my computer and get to work. I refused to have another post without any significant progress.

I finished Mel's things Monday and blocked 'em, then tried them on yesterday morning and discovered that the ring, middle, and pinkie fingers are all too short on the left hand glove. I would tell you how this happened, but it's too sad and embarrassing to talk about...

 

One small triumph I had while working these though: the pinkie fingers kept being a wee bit tight. First I ripped back the bind-off and re-did it way looser. Then, when I blocked the gloves, I inserted a rolled-up sheet of paper into each pinkie, resulting in a very comfortable fit. I can't believe it worked!

Now I have to add two more rows to 3 fingers, which I'm patiently working at a few moments at a time, in between crying jags...

In the meantime, I've been working on a swatch for some mitts that I've been promising my friend Morganeve (she would be the hottie on the left there with the upright bass...) for months now. Her birthday is coming up right quickly, which seems a reasonable deadline for this project, seeing as I am using sock yarn and size US 2 needles, plus I'm making up my own pattern. Speed math just is not one of my strengths, and something I strive to improve.

The cable pattern, while not original (BGW Treasury of Knitting Patterns, Vol. 1), took some doing to determine how I could do the Wave of Honey Cable as fancy ribbing (as BGW suggests) and have it fall evenly under the Triple Braided Diamonds. I did so by eliminating one purl stitch from each end of the Triple-Braided Diamonds panel, since I opted not to put a barrier between the two stitch patterns. I may chart this one out when I write up the pattern, as the instructions get awfully wordy. As you can see, the Triple Braids grow right out of that fancy Wave of Honey ribbing, which looks like a lovely tree.

The silk chenille top...well it's just frustrating me. I have under two weeks to complete it so that I can wear it to my sister's wedding, and let me tell you, black silk chenille is hard to see. I am not convinced that I'll have it ready, especially since getting the performance part right is going to take up a lot of my time from now until then...priorities...

And here is my repertoire for the wedding:
Intro
-Allemande, Sarabande, Menuets I/II from JS Bach's G Major Suite for solo cello
-Arioso, also by JS Bach, from Cantata #156
-Jesu, Joy of Man's desiring, from Cantata #147 by my man JS Bach
Parent/Bridal party procession
-Prelude from said G Major Suite for solo cello
Bridal procession
-Trumpet Voluntary, by Jeremiah Clarke
Recessional
-Hornpipe, from Water Music, by Antonio Vivaldi
Outro
-Gigue, from Orchestral Suite #3 in D Major by JS Bach
-Gigue, again from the G Major Suite by JS Bach
-Courante, from the G Major Suite by JS Bach

Then, I'll be about ready for a stiff drink.
And, one last photo:

Knightsbridge by the Fibre Co. in Holly and Ivy, that used to be knit up in cabled arm warmers. I have some ideas for this yarn's new life...

Ceramics, Japan, and Silk Chenille

Tuesday was craft night, which always means eating too much amazing food, hilarity, inspiration, and spending time with wonderful friends. I scored a gorgeous bowl made by one of the lovely residents of last night's locale:

I have been wanting a shallow bowl for salads, but my money's always spoken for. Now I have one! Yay! And one hand made by someone I know!

Here was one of the highlights of my trip to Stitches West:

That, my friends, is Japanese breakfast at the Embassy Suites. Rice, pickled vegetables, seafood, seaweed, tofu, and there's a bowl of miso soup lurking outside the shot. I would seriously eat this every morning if I would only take the time to learn to make my own pickles.

My thoughts are often in Japan these days. I adore the culture, the language, the food, the anime, the textiles, there is just so much I love about the country and its people. It breaks my heart to see the terrible time Japan is having right now. 

On a lighter note, I didn't do anything for St. Patrick's Day except wear my February Lady sweater and have myself an Aprihop, which is an apricot-flavored IPA. The apricot flavor is subtle, and it balances the hoppy-ness perfectly, which sometimes can get overly bitter. This has got to be my new favorite beer.
We watched a movie while I worked on my silk chenille masterpiece:

It's a wonderful and lucky thing to get paid in yarn for the samples I've knit for Tess' Yarns. If I wasn't sample knitting, everything I make would be from t-shirt and plastic bag yarn, and that is no joke.

Oh yeah, and I nearly peed my pants when I visited the Panopticon.