the handmade life

Mark is building a boat.
Because he only has 10. and I guess he needs 11.
I'm terribly proud of him, of course.



(click to see these photos more closely)

1. 99 Bottles of Caustic Solutions on the Wall..., 2. Tea At Trafalgar, 3. inside, 4. Dead Trilobites, 5. Pastel Tracks, 6. Fabulous Flame Fetish Cape, 7. DSC09665.JPG, 8. Barrels, 9. cases and basket, 10. Sewing, 11. Jar of Rocks...... errrrr, buttons., 12. afternoon light, 13. t.i.l.t.: fairy blossom tea, 14. clearcut in progress, 15. Japan Yellow - 25, 16. Casks, Ardbeg

inspired by the new flickr group, www.flickr.com/groups/containers/

Nothing like the smell of fermenting cabbage to let you know it's a good day.

Our local farmer's market has started up and I bought everything for making kim chee, baby bok choy, daikon radish (I use the greens in the ferment, too), garlic, green onions. The ginger, salt, and chiles needed had to come from offsite, but it's going on now. I could make up a gallon a week and then have some for a few months! Oh heaven.
Speaking of local, last night's dinner was comprised of food that was almost all grown or at least processed in this region. flour, olive oil, and vinegar were the only imported items. Wild caught salmon, salad greens, potatoes, blackberry vinagrette, locally baked bread. I'm no foodie, but, damn that was good.

Alice knocked me out with her combinations of knitted textures today.

I made the shawl but not the sweater.

I love wool! I love wool! I love wool!
There, I've said it.

Speaking of wool, I have been knitting knitting socks. The end is in sight on this pair of socks for a swap, and it needs to be. I got my partner's socks in the mail Friday, so now I feel abashed. I can't show a picture of my knitting til I get them sent, I suppose, although I said right out what I making several posts back. let it suffice to say that I am extremely happy with the progress, late-ish though it may be.

Thursday I wrote a bunch of notes for a blog entry and then scrapped them as being too self-deprecating. Worth keeping is the clarification of the aesthetic that inspires me/I am striving for. It went something like "organic outcroppings from structured technique."
Look at kjoo's shop for example.
My work seems flat, but I think it because I have looked at it way too much. Plus, it is a bit flat.
I am praying to break through my aversion to trading my work for money. What's up with that? I am sure I subvert my success by being unable to imagine myself succeeding.
Wow, that's profound.
It's okay if people pay people to make what they do not! Or more specifically, if I am one of the people that gets paid!
Anyhoo, my problem is really that I imagine myself successful in an entirely different economic paradigm, and I need to get out of my hobbit hole and rewild the world I live in.
Which is, incidentally, what I am already doing. :)

and some thrift scores.







How I love my eclectic assortment of dishes.
I have the most casual collection of restaurant china. There are certain patterns that are recurring in my life, but none that I specifically seek out. Of course, if you were to run across any of this:

I wouldn't mind if you sent it me!

Here is a thought provoking post from Cosy. It gave me pause, and during the pause, I remembered a wee manifesto I had written a couple years ago.

Did I not mention dirt? well, here it is:


When I moved to this house I had dreams of gardening, but I quickly realized that there was no soil to speak of in the backyard, the place where my garden must be. The people who put this trailer in 30 years ago had scraped off all the topsoil to make a space, and the only dirt that wasn't strange sandy clay was all contained in the thin layer of sod. I set about to make dirt where there was none, a task that requires patience and taxes loving but more orderly partners.
Cardboard, manure, straw, rags, sand, layers and layers of these elements put down when I had them, no science involved.
This is the first year I am really feeling like my garden is worthy of that name.
A chaotic approach pays off!

One more thing to play catch up over the last few days.
I snuck in a project for myself; I was attempting to make the most unique head scarf with a pieced border (as my hair is getting long and I have to accept it) but the darn thing was too thick at the corners and wouldn't tie.

So now it is called a small tablecloth and for sale. What else am I going to with it? It is pretty enough though.

Beautiful beautiful day. This is where Opal gets to spend her horse time. It's quite a menagerie over at Joan and Vicki's.



These beasts have very very good lives.

Some links that have been moving me:
I want this wooden bento box. And this book on making old fashion root beer and ginger ales.
Recently added to the links list is Kiliii Dreaming. Nature photography for the most part. Here is a great picture of turkey vultures. They are among my favorite birds. Kiliii's site came to my attention after he built a driftwood kayak with Mark's friend Brian of Cape Falcon Kayak.

The recent disappearance of the honeybees has been really hard on me. I will need to make a post just about my thoughts about this. There are many.

You know I like to keep you abreast of Opal's musical preferences. They are so varied! In current hot hot rotation are Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express, an Old school hip hop mix tape that I have been dragging around for 18 years (Siberian Nights!), and Nightmares on Wax's DJ Kicks. Gotta love it, especially as it is playing all day. Poor Alice. She likes the dulcimer.

Opal says, "Records are like big, lo-tech cds. They got the grooves and stuff. They got the grooooooves."

hee hee. I have been needing a little sign along these lines for my craft table so I thought I would make today's random stitch exercise have a purpose.

so hey! I was tagged by helle the other day to do the 7 things meme. Random facts or habits? okay!
1. My car is usually at least half full of other people's recycling.
2. I have spiral tattoos on the top of both feet.
3. I lived for several years without electricity. We always kept a car stereo available, powered by batteries, and usually one light, but little else.
4. I have dandruff.
5. I am passionately interested in insects.
6. For about a decade (when I was a kid), I thought I was going to be a professional actress (not a star). I was really into theater. However, I haven't been in a play in over 20 years now.
7. I have a growing desire to be completely nomadic, on foot.

I tag 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

It was hard to pick people to tag. why? cause I don't read a lot of blogs (it's so hard to find the time!), and I have not commented on some of the blogs I do read, given the need for a google/blogger account which I haven't gotten yet. also, I haven't been blogging long outside of lj and I don't think my blog is widely read...yet.

So, I had a breakneck weekend with tons of fun and very few stitches (outside of my mandatory daily rows on the Irish Diamond shawl). Saturday was Mark's and my 16th wedding anniversary. Sally and Roger treated the whole family to dinner at Astoria, Oregon's new Fort George brewpub. It was great food and drink (wasabi ginger ale!) and after dinner we wandered the Saturday night streets in sunglasses (well, I was) looking for deesert and checking out the action.
I could go on about the wonders of being married for so long, but it will have to wait. It is amazing, though. Over these long years, I have learned things I never imagined existed.

Sunday had Kate and I driving up to Seattle for a glitter meetup, glitter being an online forum. It is an odd thing, being willing to drive hours to hang out with people you have never really met. But Kate and I are fast real life friends and we met through the internet so whatever. It was a blast.
Here's a funny photo of all of us. I'm in front, go check it out, I've got on this totally fab capelet somone gave me. Plus you can see the new sunglasses...

To add to the fun, a couple of us were stopped on the street by a young guy with a camera who said he was doing a street fashion piece for the Seattle PI. There goes one minute of my alloted 15 of fame...except I haven't been able to find the photo online...

well I have a bit of stiching to do before bed, so I'm off. G'night!

In a recent post, Helle talked a bit about training one's self to see light. Timely, as I very recently realized my desire in creating art is to capture lights and shadows in threads. It is true that I have no gift for figuring, so that forces me into the abstract, landscapes at best, but that is what moves me anyway! Daily I am brought into my wings by some play of light, be it delicate or dramatic, on the land or water.
Also, I have a growing sense of how to articulate the rich symbolic language that is always whispering in my ears or pounding in my heart.
Now I need to practice relentlessly techniques that will enable me to translate my dual visions of light and symbol, symbol and light, into stitched scraps of cloth.
I have been inspired by jude's textile studies, very much. These are right up my alley, and exercises like these would fit into my schedule. Also inspiring in the same vein are Lee's daily postcards. I don't have any of my own work to show you right now. I feel brand new and blinking in the light.
Nevertheless, I feel like I am in the process of discovering my peers through the blogosphere.
!!!

so you see dear people, I am not a daily blogger. It comes and goes with me, my desire to sit in front of this box. I have been so busy lately that I have two letters received over the past two days that I have not read yet! If that is any indication.

Happenings:
I have been diligently working on my socks for a certain swap. They look really good.
One of the best things about this current round of knitting, (which has been very educational, lots of lace) is that I now know how much I enjoy working on small needles. I got 3 sets of needles in the mail on Saturday and the 00s seemed so big in my hands after holding the 0000s. The above swatch was done on 0s, I think.

I should make mention of that background which is in so many pictures. It is my ironing board, some funky ol thrifted number padded with a couple blankets and a piece of cheap but lovely cotton. My main workspace for non-knit projects, and sometimes a cat bed, sadly. I love my ironing board.

I have been getting tons of materials from the library. My turn finally came around for Folk Shawls by Cheryl Oberle, and while I already have all these other projects going on, I couldn't resist and had to cast on for the irish diamond shawl (linking here to an example found on flickr...)
I am decidedly all about shawls and stoles these days. Long have I been of the mind that it is perfectly acceptable to wear blankets in public (I think I have mentioned this) and shawls are an extension of that. Finally I am free of couture delusions! HAH! Just give me a rectangle or triangle of fabric and I will be clothed!
In that Folk Shawls book, there is a pattern for a Victorian Wool Peddler's shawl, and the story she tells has it that red shawls were traditionally worn at market by women selling wool goods. I am so making myself one of these. I have an itch to get to market. I have a general all-around travelling itch, actually. I am ready to quit the cleaning job and get out on the road for a spell. It's not going to happen though, not for a couple months anyway.
Anyhow, I haven't enough inventory to go anywhere, and with all the errands I have to run today I won't be making anything new. I am buying Opal a horse riding helmet this afternoon as she is going to an equine expo with Sharin on Saturday. I am thankful that she is getting so much horse time, that kid, and I am holding my breath waiting for this good thing to end. (Remember, Bramble: live in the moment, make the most out of what is available right now. Enjoy it while it lasts.)

There are some whomping huge developments in the family life I should mention. I withdrew Opal from public school yesterday. For a number of reasons. The school scene here is so chokingly provincial, I am sick of living as a minority in a Dominant Culture. Opal has some overwhelming behavior issues to boot, and all the things weren't meshing so well. So it's back to homeschooling (well, unschooling, you know) two daughters, at least until next fall.

Okay, right. I am off to the next thing now. Tomorrow!

It's my sabbath, and I have been in the moment all day. On my sabbath, I take a break from Time, not from work...
I thought I would offer up this up for today's entry.

This is one of my favorite passages in any book. (Let it be known, I really don't read fiction. I pretty much read my same old reference books over and over.) In this case, the book is Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living.
This bit is about food and growing it, but one could be creative and apply these thoughts to other areas of life perhaps.

"The wonderful magic at the heart of a food-growing household is the magic that turns your home-produced turnips and cream, apples and meat into your meals. The moment of triumph is when you say to the family, "Here's what we worked so hard to grow, and isn't it good!" I think you cook most happily, freely, and independently when you make good things out of what Providence is giving you!
Lane Morgan, author of the Winter Harvest Cookbook (Seattle: Sasquatch Books, 1990), says, 'I agree entirely that cooks are spending too much money at the supermarket and at the gourmet supply store. But I think we would profit by spending more time looking at cuisines of other cultures, to help us better use what our particular gardens can grow. Country people around here will eat canned green beans and carrots all winter, which are considerable work to put up, because that's good Amereican garden food. Meanwhile they could be eating fresh kale and leeks and Japanese mustards from that same garden, which would be tastier, more nutritious, and easier all around, but they don't because that's foreign stuff and they don't know the Greek or Indian or Japanese techniques to make them wonderful. They'll make clam dip from a package, but they wouldn't consider an Indian chutney made of garden mint and chutney, served with garden spinach and potatoes. Too strange.'
Making menus out of what you can grow is the way that Great-Grandmother did it. Each week she looked in the larder and the cellar and took a walk through the garden to see what she had to work with. Then she made menus. When she had eggs and milk aplenty, a little honey and some stale bread, the family had a bread pudding. In May she served rhubarb in it, in June strawberries over it, and in September peaches --- because that's the way they grew.
To have 365 days of independent eating, you've got to learn to eat what you can grow, and you've got to learn to grow what you want to eat. At first it will be hard, but stick to it. If you don't like what you have, eat it anyway and use the energy of your distaste to figure how to get what you'll like better. If your only meat is elk, eat elk until you can raise something else. If you miss bacon, get four little pigs. In six months, they'll be 200-pounders. and you'll have a year's supply of bacon plus a sow to breed and keep the bacon coming. If you're still living in the city and you don't have anything but dreams, try for fun buying only what you imagine you could grow -- in a natural, unprocessed state -- like whole grains, and see if you can learn to live off it.
When lettuce is in season, have a salad every day -- you can't preserve it. If you miss it in the off-season, contrive a way to raise winter lettuce in the house. If you miss sweets, learn beekeeping. If you have barley and corn, make your bread, pancakes, and pie crust out of barley floour, cornmeal crust, and a bear-meat filling. If you have some tough old hens past their laying time, 3 extra male goats, and 100 rabbits, then learn good ways to cook tough old hens, goat meat, and rabbit."

for the record, I don't like turnips, I have eaten bear meat (and it is good), and I am so not there yet.

and also some knitting.

I had a rich day, spent lots of time with nature. Things I did: saw a harrier hunting not 10 feet from me; lay in Mark's little boat just to let the current rock me; spyed the moon through maple leaves; stretched out on the warm rocks in the driveway next to a snake, each of us checking out the other; sat for half an hour under a larch tree, blending with it, and willing the seeds I gathered and planted from that tree to hatch and grow; and shucked oysters brought to me by Sharin, and sucked the salty water and slippery beasts out of the shells.
Now at the end of the day I feel so good!

As promised, here is a page from The Night Life of Trees. This is a book "of art and folklore from the Gond tribe in central India. In Gond belief, trees stand in the middle of life, and the spirit of many things lie in them. They are busy all day, giving shade and support and shelter and food to all. Only when night falls can they find rest for themselves, and then, under quiet dark skies, that spirits that live in them are revealed."


The Creation of Trees.

more to come.

Here we have a bit of the two-blog lag time. Posted Sunday on the other blog.

WARNING: Non-craft content to follow!



I was listening to some bad disco tonight...(is any of it good? I love it)... and thinking about my mother, circa 78, 79. Those were some days! She really took us for a ride.

For those who don't know, my mom died on Halloween 2006, at the age of 57. She lived hard, that's for sure. She did love to party. I think about her a lot, and try as I might to have it otherwise, my memories of her are of this partying hardcore broad (her word, not mine). I have some stories! but it wasn't a really kid-friendly environment. If my childhood were rated like a film it would be a hard hard R. Not quite Boogie Nights, but still I couldn't finish that movie, ouch.
I am aiming for a nice quiet PG-13 for my daughters! (for language and smoking)

here's a story: When we had just moved to Astoria from Isla Vista (where they burned the Bank of America in 1970), my mom fell in love with a Turkish sailor who was passing through on one of the big ships. We were going to move to Istanbul! (if that didn't work out, then we were going to San Francisco...) We even started to learn turkish, as a family. Taskin, he seemed like such a gentle soul, but then he went upriver and got into some trouble. Got drunk and knifed someone. So much for that plan!
Something my mom was always doing was taking me to movies that were totally inappropriate for someone my age. I think she was so used to me being her best friend, or else she felt guilty about leaving me at home. She said she was working 90 hours a week in those days. Days at the cannery and nights at the bars. So it was off to the movies we would go. American Gigolo (there's the Giorgio Moroder connection), Midnight Express, Saturday Night Fever (hey I got that record for my tenth birthday!), Rocky Horror (okay that one wasn't so bad), and there were other earlier shows that still nag at me. At least she didn't take me to see Looking For Mr. Goodbar, but she still told me all about it, down to the violent end.

here I am in those Diane Keaton days, so pleased to be able to wear this coat for a night! I was 9.

of course nighthawks is hanging on the wall... they were like that, such nighthawks.

here's my mom's 20th birthday party:

that's her with the skinny legs. check it out, she's smoking, of course.

And here's another from that same time, 1969:

warhol could have done something with her, it's true.

There were some hard times, and I don't need to tell all the stories, not here and now, anyway.
She loved to smoke and she loved drugs and she loved her kids. When I was younger I worshiped her, and then I got angry, and nowadays I just shake my head and wondered what she was thinking, with love, and humor, and respect for her struggles.

today was one of my days off, and what did I do all day but knit!
The morning brought my friend Sharin for coffee, and she is such a do-er, she couldn't sit still and had to go into the "studio" and begin folding fabric. We ended folding and sorting a whole bunch of my stash, laughing and inspiring together. It is so nice to have a nearby friend to brainstorm with!
Then it was time to trade sheep duties with Alice, so I got to go knit topless in the sun. No bitiing flies yet to bother me.
I finished another pair of cuff blanks (and I think it will be about the last of this style for awhile), and I started on a project I have been wanting to do for a few days now.
Here it is, not yet done, but mostly so. It has plans to be an actual piece of wall art.


You know how the quilt block patterns have descriptive names, well this is called "falling down cabin." We sure have a lot of these around here. This deliberately caddywompus, (not laying on the blanket at angle.) Hence the name.

Knitting this and thinking about a: log cabin quilts and b: the women who made them and c: Sharin and I visiting and sorting fabric, I had to think about how during the early stages of this internet craft community's formation, one would see such-and-such described as "not your grandma's craft." More than once I saw this! And I really have to disagree, at least from my vantage point. I feel SO connected to what the women of previous generations have done, and inspired by them. Granted I can live without acrylic yarn embroidered strawberry baskets, but beyond those, there is such wealth in the crafts of our grandmas! I sleep on pillowcases embroidered by those women and under blankets crocheted by them, I visit homesteads that are still blooming with flowers they planted, I find recipes in church cookbooks that they compiled. They were using everything as many times as they could (if not the grandmas, then the great-grandmas) and so am I. I plant food, I raise animals, I cut buttons off of my old clothes before they go into the rag basket. I would be proud to be the next generation of "my grandma's craft."

Okay. That said, when I needed a break from the scritchy black yarn, I started a pair of perdita.

I know, me using a pattern? I do it occasionally....

And, Soph, have you seen this book? I think you would really like it.


I got it at the library yesterday, and I am so going to purchase a copy for myself. I am absolutely blown away by the illustrations, and I promise to photograph a page or two soon. Just so you all can see the amazivity of it.

April has been gracing us with some mighty fine skies.



If you look closely, you can see the green haze that is the hills over yonder.

I'm back.
what with Alice gone last week to sailing camp at the Center for Wooden Boats, I found myself out in the pasture every day with the sheep. I really have an appreciation for Alice's contribution to the household, I tell you!
So many thoughts crossed my mind, and I wanted to write about half of them, this being journal as well as public space, but alas, I had absolutely zero time for sitting at the computer.



(there's a stash shot for ya)

I did manage to get a lot of cuffs knit. I could do about a pair and a half done while watching the sheep.
All this cuff knitting was brought about by a pending swap with Soule, which I completed yesterday. I traded these cuffs made to order for a few pieces of art which I need to photgraph yet.




Not the greatest photos, but as I said, I was under diress!

I look forward to having a bit more time to read all y'all's blogs. Then I will be able to talk about other folk's cool happenings.
I did get turned on to the event that is going to be the apex of my summer perhaps. Pickathon! It's been awhile since I went to a three day camping music event.

Opal has been in horse heaven what with the new alliance I have formed with a local lady. A friend, I think I can say! Yes, my new friend, Sharin, takes care of other people's horses when needed, and has been facilitating Opal's passion for the equine. Opal even got to ride a horse yesterday, but honestly, I think at this point the child would be happy mucking out stalls.

Oh, and yesterday I got home from work to find I had sold two cd pockets (here and here) via my etsy shop! I was more than surprised. I forgot I even had a shop. hah hah.

so, that's all for now. I need to go generate more experience so I can write about it.

Over the last few seasons, I have really come into my own where trades are concerned. I have been swapping for a long time, sometimes in a rather flakey way, but the whole romantic notion of trading that lived in my imagination wasn't really coming to life. I mean, I had visions of running these trade routes, picking up lemons and pepper at my dad's in SoCal, and bringing them up north and trading them at Barter Fair for, I don't know, onions, or something suitably northern. And of course I would have brought my dad some things he needed.
That kind of thing.
So, what has been the hold up? Really. I grew up amongst enough hippie faire vibe to be able to hold my own, it would seem. I certainly can speak the language of non-monetary dealing. I guess I can chock my recalcitrance up to good ol' Inhibition. If you know me, you're gonna laugh, but really! I'm shy!
Well, last year I made a commitment to myself to follow through on my desire to attend Last Thursday Street Fair on a regular basis. This event is right up my alley; you don't need to register, or pay a fee. You just show up and find a spot to pitch your sales table. It is a madhouse at times, but I feel very much at home there.

Somehow, that cracked the ice for me. I'll be honest. I don't sell much stuff when I try to. My etsy shop never really yielded me much, and now that I don't make many things for sale, it obviously is super stalled. Besides, I hate feeling like I need to argue about what a thing is worth. It's worth a lot, damn it!

I know I go back and forth about the selling thing, but lately I have been back, or forth, or whichever direction feels wishy washy about it. I told the Universe that I was ready to start trading, and all of a sudden it's going on.

here are some successes, and successes to be:
I swapped this hat to a friend who was admiring it. She is a block printer extraordinaire, and made the lovely prayer flags you see above. For the hat, I'm going to get some more of her cards.

my favorite of the bunch. This is for lughnasa.

Soule on flickr (who is actually lives real close to me) was admiring these cuffs, and therefore I am making her two pair in trade for some art, or something. I haven't decided yet.

the beginnings...

The person who received the pink cuffs sent my girls a humungous box of books from the publishing company where she works. It was an amazing bounty! The funny thing is, I thought we were trading cuffs for a skirt, but I like the books better anyway.
The thing about trading is you know the person loves it. And that is what counts.

here's alice with a groovy outfit she put together. And a bunny smile.

But first, a kid moment.
Opal had a friend over today and they were having a grand time chasing the big sister.
They came up to me and O said, "Mommy, have you seen Alice?"
Me: "No. Have you?"
O: "No. We want to find her so we can drive her out of all Brittania."

???

Here is the house I am going to be moving into this summer.


I am very very excited.
Now, I have to say, moving back to town is going to be a bit weird. I have lived in the country for 12 years, and we are talking the American West. There is a lot of open space here, and there is a lot of Wildness. How am I going to adapt to living in town? where will I find the untamed space? Granted it is Astoria, where the wind will blow your flesh right into your Dreaming.
I guess I asked to be a bridge builder. So now I will practice bridging the gap between town and country.
Urbanruralferal, baby!

It is spring break, which means that Opal is home with us all this week. Alice, of course, has scrubbing vacation every day, smart girl that she is. (Oh, okay, O's smart too, she needs public school and she knew it before I did...)
It does mean a higher noise level for sure, what with the constant litany of book and movie plots, dream details, and just general O drama. Not to mention her penchant for music. We have been on a Magical Mystery Tour for a while now. And when the tour bus has to stop for gas, we switch to Marit Bergman, the Ramones, Yma Sumac, Mary Poppins, Deanta's rendition of Willie Taylor (scroll down to read the lyrics...) For the most part, I like the child's musical taste. Alice on the other hand does not.
So, what about it? There have been a few good homeschool moments in the last couple days... Alice wanting a quick fiber project in which to channel her enthusiasm for color (see photo below), Opal learning a bit about pattern drafting (for use in future doll clothes), as well as whipping up a nice if slightly lumpy crepe batter this morning (infinitely expandable ratio: 1 cup flour to 1 cup milk to 4 eggs with a bit of salt and oil thrown in for good measure, let sit for at least 15 minutes). Plus the kid learned how to use the washer finally and did two loads of laundry!
here's A's pillow:

It's stuffed with some fleece that felted in the degreasing. (Future pillows will be stuffed with the washed and cut-up "skins" of thrifted plushies, left over from the girls' brief project, "Animal Rescue Plushie Purses and Packs.")
The girls' favorite websites are also worth mentioning. Opal spends a lot of time at Spatulatta, which is a cooking site for kids. (She learned how to separate eggs from one of the videos. We had to make cake to practice this skill, only when you haven't an oven the cooking of cake gets a bit tricky. We ended up steaming cupcakes in the rice cooker.)
and then there's MuseBlog for Alice, the writer in the family. MuseBlog is for fans of the great magazine, Muse, which is absolutely A's fave mag. A joint publication of Smithsonian and Carus Publishing (think Cricket magazine). We had a sub to this for one year and the girls have read those 6 issues (or whatever) so many times. Anyhow, MuseBlog is the ultimate answer to a 13-year-old's search for a suitable internet forum. Bravo!

'kay, that's all for one night. I promise you some non-kid content the next time.

I have this small thing done.

Actually the endless hours aren't so endless, and I have a large portion of the next section finished as well. Too bad that I had the camera pointed off in some weird direction for this photo, but I need to get this posted and a better picture will come later.
This is for a swap I am doing, but I am seriously considering taking this technique farther, as it is as close to being able to paint with yarn as I have found thus far. I have long admired hooked rugs, but after a few square inches of hooking with a crochet needle, I decided I had had enough.

I have been neglecting the garden. These daylilies have been patiently waiting to be planted.


I picked a basket of nettle tops yesterday, bare-handed as usual. I find that the deep sting has become a part of my spring, and I am certain that nettle helps with arthritis, which is becoming a minor problem in my right pointer finger. And I a stitcher!
I love to cook the nettles in more or less this fashion. I dry them too, for use as tea and a nettle powder that is a good addition to many foods. Eep, I had better check the nettles I have in the dryer. Normally they are air dried but this year, I through a bunch over lights and they are probably crispy by now.

Another thing done this weekend was this hat

with which I was testing a pattern for an as-yet-unnamed crafter who is putting together a book. It came out large on me; a bit of felting fixed that. The first hat I started (without checking for gauge, tsk tsk) came out way too big. But it reminded me of cake, and before I ripped it, I took a photo, which you can see here if you so choose.

***This was written for the other blog which is called Five Gallon Bucket.

I was tagged by Shula to explain the name of my blog. I'll bite. There's a good story there.
Way back when I lived in the hills of Northern California. (Land of outlaws!) My home away from home was the Paddle Ranch Music Farm; we spent many an evening on the porch, smoking cigarettes, swapping songs and stories, planning gardens and gatherings.



This was the home of two of my dearest friends, Kent of Lokoyokol, and me best gal, Amy. (one of them still lives there.) Kent was trolling for band name suggestions, and Five Gallon Bucket was put forth. I thought it was capital, but he wasn't into it.
You see, as Joel Salatin, pastured poultry pioneer, states, "Life on the farm wouldn't exist without the five gallon bucket." It is ubiquitous and can be used for almost anything.
The beauty of it, and why it fits my life so well, is that the five gallon bucket is garbage, cast off, a by-product of modern life. I am a super-recycler, it is my passion in all forms, and almost everything I utilize in my craft (and in my life, excepting food) has been thrown away by someone else.
Actually, this is a limitation as well as a gift; I really am unwilling to expand my business venture in any direction that would have me reliant on purchasing large quantities of New Supply. Therefore, I am (happily) locked into one-of-a-kind, which consumes a tremendous amount of energy.

(I have been using five gallon bucket as a business name for years. It is the name of my etsy shop, which I am not supporting at present.)

I tag jarvenpa, Rineke, and Helle.

Since I had the real photos out in search of that porch picture, I thought I would give you an archival kid pic.



Taken during a photoshoot here at our place, back when I had 50+ chickens, and was featured on the cover of our local cultural monthly rag.

I was thinking about this today. why do I do this? I am so aware of the temporal nature of life. Security is not much of a concern to me; in fact, I am inherently unstable, but well able to navigate through my days despite this. This is not to say that I lack a solid living situation. Quite the contrary. Still there is a whirlwind nature in the way I live.
Maybe it comes from having grown up in teepees and caravans.