I Love October

I love October. I think it is my favorite time of the year, and this October is the best one yet, thanks to our friend El Nino. I have a picture of the begonias blooming in my garden on October 3 that I wanted to share, but the camera cable seems to be mafunctioning and I can't upload it. Suffice it to say, begonias in October are pretty rare here in the Canadian sub-arctic, but the weather has been so nice that most of my flowers are still blooming!

There are other reasons I love October:

• The colors!! The leaves on the poplar, maple and aspen trees around here are spectacular this time of year. (More pics trapped in the camera!)
• Cool nights, warm days. The sun always peeks out, even on the rainiest days, and warms things up. And no snow yet (touch wood!)
• Thanksgiving. Big turkey feast, the family all together---mmmm.
• Sweater weather. Or shawl weather. Or wrist-warmer weather. Or any other excuse to haul out the handknits.
• Maple machiattos are back at Starbucks!!
• And last but not least-HALLOWEEN!!!! The planning has begun, skulls and cobwebs are beginning to appear around the house. Costumes are being planned and sewn. Skeletons are being dragged out of closets. Hee, hee, heee!

Now to get my camera fixed--or replaced!

Avast Ye Swabs!

Today is International Talk Like A Pirate Day! Break out the grog!

In observation of this auspicious occasion, I have decided to cast on the Pirate Queen's Booty Bag from talklikeapirate.com. This bag will come in handy to haul my knitting around while I am in Keyano Theatre's production of Treasure Island. I play Jim Hawkins' mother, so I appear in the first 20 minutes of the play, then sit backstage knitting until the last 5 minutes. The director may use me for set changes and so forth in between, but nothing so far. The cast is mostly 16-20 years old, with the exception of two other actors, including poster-boy Norm above, and our director is the amazing Vern Thiessen from Edmonton. Great energy, lots of fun, and nowhere near the number of lines I had to learn for Southern Belle. Yarrrr!

Meanwhile, I am still chugging away at my Highland Triangle shawl. I've had a couple of delightful frogging days, but seem to have things back under control. I also have a "mindless" shawl project on the go--mostly stockinette with an occasional lace row for interest. That one is also getting perilously close to being finished, so I am on the hunt for new inspiration. Christmas knitting, perhaps...

I am also very happy to be back working on my in-depth study. I am working on samples, and now that everyone is back to school I have the time to really focus. I am up to 6 out of 16 samples completed, but I am beginning to suspect that I made more work for myself than I needed to. I am spinning 100g of each type of yarn because I am not only making the samples for my book, but a sock from each yarn. The socks will then be worn for a week by testers and rated for comfort, warmth and durability. Sixteen socks, all handspun, the blending and preparation, the notes, the testing...what was I thinking?!? Always the overachiever.

Shiver me timbers and hoist the Jolly Roger! I'm off to knit!

Serendipity

Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I love it when the universe conspires to give you what you need, even when you don't know what that is...

Life has been even more hectic around here than usual, with Steve changing jobs, kids going back to school, me gearing up to go back to work at the art gallery (under less than ideal conditions), HWSDA board commitments, my father's illness, an incomplete in-depth study and Treasure Island rehearsals. Then last week, I got hit with a kidney stone. Ouch.

I spent the better part of the weekend drugged and snoozing, but when I was awake, I pondered the pace of my life. I had hoped to have a quiet fall, travelling down to Edmonton to spend some time with my parents, sewing elaborate Halloween costumes, playing theatre Diva, and getting my in-depth finished. Instead, I had set up an insane schedule of work, volunteering and paperwork for other people. No wonder my kidney got cranky.

Then, in an hour yesterday, it all let go. The president of the HWSDA board called to express her concern over my prolonged silence. It's not that I have been avoiding my duties, just that I have had little to no time to communicate with the other board members. She graciously offered my the opportunity to step down, and I took it. One extra pressure removed. Then, not even twenty minutes later, I was informed that the art gallery job was suspended until after the political issues that were going to create such stress for me were resolved. Reprieve. So the frantic month that I was dreading has suddenly slowed down to an almost manageable pace again. All I had to do was answer my phone.

Thank you universe. Now I"d better get to work on that in-depth!

Catching My Breath

It's been a whirlwind of activity on the old homestead the last couple of weeks, and I am enjoying the first quiet morning since I can't remember when. The family is all out enjoying their last day of summer freedom, and I get some quiet spinning time. Ahhhh!

Sandwiched between a trip to Edmonton to see family and the beginning of rehearsals for Treasure Island, I managed to have the dye day from hell. Nothing worked out as planned--pleasing results, yes, but not quite as expected, or repeatable. I suspect it was because of a cool wind blowing that kept my dyepot from ever achieving an even temperature. Or old dye stock. Or both.

Anyhoo, I overdyed the raspberry pink shawl yarn from the last post with a purple that struck unevenly and has given me a bit of a handpainted look. Then I did a rainbow dyed BFL top, that came out lovely. I decided to exhaust the pot and wound up with another rainbow dyed top (Polworth), even though I had blended the colors and carefully reset the pot. Some of the results:

Not too shabby, and the rainbow dyed colors happen to match the colors of the fabric that I bought for my Halloween costume, though I have my doubts about getting it spun up and woven into anything by then. I already have a silk on the Schacht and some merinoX/silk on the Traveller, and in-depth study yarns to make. I guess I should be glad that my creative urge is up and running at full capacity, but now I need to figure out how to make a 28-hour day!



Today, though, I spin and knit and breathe.

Shawl-a-polooza!

I mentioned in the last post that I had finished two shawls and here they are!





















Shawl #1 is knit sideways in garter stitch using three different yarns, including the Hideously Expensive Skein that I bought out in Nanaimo in April. The other two yarns are different colors of a commercial mohair and silk blend. The photo doesn't really do it justice--there are dozens of different textures and colors in the yarns and it wears like a dream!
















Shawl #2 is the Sheep Shawl from the Vogue On the Go Shawl book. Mostly nylon novelty yarn, with the black bits being Paton's Decor. I love the little tails and feet! And it's super warm.

Lots of therapeutic garter stitch and my hand is pretty much back to normal for strength and dexterity. I still have to rest it a lot, but I think I'm ready for something a wee bit more challenging...


















The next shawl. My first spinning after the cast came off, it is an angora/Rambouillet blend, spun woollen to a medium weight. I dyed it this afternoon and will cast on Cheryl Oberle's Highland Triangle Shawl as soon as it is dry. It's a little pinker than my usual color range allows, sort of a dusty fuchsia, but I'm breaking out of my color rut!

That's Showbiz, Kids

After a couple of really productive weeks fibre-wise, my energy has been diverted once again.

I managed to spin up a lovely batch of Silver Valley Fibres's Rambouillet/angora blend sliver into a lofty yarn for a warm shawl, knit up the Sheep Shawl from Vogue's Knitting on the Go shawl book, and cut and resize another rectangular shawl into more manageable proportions before I was drawn by the lure of the stage...

I will be appearing in a production of Christopher Durang's For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls this weekend at our local theatre and arts festival, interPLAY. The play is a one-act parody of The Glass Menagerie, and I play the mother, Amanda, who swings from sweet Southern charm to raving maniac and back again throughout the half hour of the show. The cast also included Jonathan Pretty as Lawrence (Laura in TGM), Tim Cooper as Tom, and Sylvie Gaudet as the Feminine Caller.

In between rehearsals, I have been working with the Odd-Lot Puppeteers on their works for the festival. I gave a dye workshop for them in early July dealing with coloring fleece and foam for puppet construction, and then I got drawn in as a seamstress, sewing "skins" for several of the characters in their show Skeleton on the Run.

If I survive the weekend, I will have two weeks of peace before I go into rehearsals for Keyano Theatre's production of Treasure Island. I'm Jim Hawkins' mother, so I get ten minutes at the beginning of the show on stage, then two hours of backstage knitting til I come back into the picture. Yay! I foresee a few pairs of socks coming out of that venture. Hmmm, where's my Christmas list?

How About a Hand for the Little Lady?

I've been a little delinquent in the blogging department--but I have a good excuse. No the dog did not eat my computer...

I had been struggling with wrist pain and stiffness since I broke my scaphoid back in September, 2005. After months of pain and drugs, I finally opted for surgery to repair what we thought was a swollen tendon. At the end of April, I had a deQuervain's release surgery performed. Simple surgery, under a local. In theory. The tourniquet released, filling the surgical field with blood and the surgeon nicked the tendon. I was put under and had a tendon repair done, resulting in 3 weeks in a full cast.

Fine. The cast came off and all seemed fine for about two days, then I bumped my hand on the back of a chair. Agonizing pain, and the sensation of something crawling under my skin. My thumb went limp and wouldn't move. The day before the May long weekend. As we were leaving to go visit my parents out of town.

The next Tuesday, I saw the surgeon, who informed me that the tendon had detatched completely and that the only way to regain use of my thumb was to have another surgery. Swell. Two days later, I had a two and a half hour tendon repair. The surgeon found scarring in the tendon from way back at the break, as well as damage from his surgical boo-boo. There were even tendon shreds in my wrist joint. I woke up with this on my hand.

Note the lovely bruising. This is basically the same cast that I had had for the previous three and a half weeks, but with more padding on the thumb. Immobilized for another 4 weeks. Yup. I got the last splint off on the Tuesday morning before Olds College Fibre Week. I drove to Olds on Friday, took a spinning workshop with Carol Rhoades on Saturday and Sunday, demoed the Ashford Knitter's Loom on Tuesday and have not stopped spinning, weaving, or knitting since.

I am still going to physio and will be for some time. My thumb is still stiff and I have lost a fair bit of muscle mass in the entire hand and lower arm, but I'm coming back. Fortunately for me, knitting is one of the recommended exercises for recovery from wrist and hand injuries. I do have this lovely scar to remind me of the whole thing.

Not too pretty, but I can use my hand again. Nothing makes you as conscious of what is precious to you more than losing it.

Speaking of which, the same day that I was told that I needed a second surgery, my father was diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic lung cancer. But that's a whole other post.