An old idea resurfaces, and a new project

The $$$$ tub to shower idea isn't the only way to go. I checked into various versions, from complete tear out and rebuild, to prefab shower inserts, to revisiting an idea I had years ago.

I wondered if it was possible to just cut into the bathtub wall, remove a section leaving a step over, and cover and waterproof the raw edges. At that time Michael the Talented Artist Contractor was very dubious, and we didn't find anything available on the market to work for us.

Anyway now, years later,  there are quite a few companies doing this work and installing the kit, and I can get it locally, and will definitely investigate the best way to go. 

Like this 

And it's many $$$ cheaper than the reno. So I may be able to get the bathroom retiled and painted without going broke. Anyway that's where the thinking is right now. Old thinking not as impractical as it sounded at the time.

And the current making project consists of continuing one of the items that arrived yesterday.  

If there's enough yarn for a cowl, that's what it will be. If not I'll think again. I also repaired and rebuilt underwear but you probably aren't eager for pictures of that.

Thank you whoever recommended this book

I think it's been made into a movie which I don't plan to see because I've got the characters vividly in mind and I bet the movie won't correspond.

It's a book that's wonderful mostly, a bit chick lit here and there but who cares, it grips, that follows interesting people occupied in and around books, writing, selling, reviewing. 

The action is mainly on Alice Island in New England, hard to get to, largely a summer resort place but the characters live there. Not one of those affluent-family-at-summer-home tropes.  

The literary background is second to their lives, hearts, connections, births and deaths. I really encourage you to read it if like me, you hadn't even heard of it when it was a bestseller.

Happy day everyone, and let me know if you have any info, or experience, on the potential mayhem of the bathtub.

I have deleted the coverage of the nomadic textile presentation after finding the presenter doesn't permit recording. I took that to cover screenshots, too.  Just in case you notice.

About politics -- I don't come to blogland for armchair political opining. So I limit my coverage to a few pertinent actions we can take, and  acknowledgment of what blogistas are doing. I'm involved, not trying to ignore our situation, but not wanting to make more noise.  

I have taken to scrolling past blog posts, nothing personal, that include complete cut and paste of the newsletters I already follow.  Just sayin'. 

Great textile day with boxes

In the middle of the online Asian textile presentation which I think will be on YouTube too, highly recommend, the mail carrier arrived.

He waited patiently while I finally got the front door curtain open, it sticks, and handed over a Treasure Box from a blogista who had gone to some trouble to manage doing it, her day to day not being easy. Much appreciated, P. 

Long story, but it's about unused sock yarn and some unfinished projects from a skilled knitter. 

Complete with the needles. And pattern. I spent a while sorting and playing. There's yarn for a couple of pairs of socks, and a few balls which will be enough for lanyards to go with anti ICE whistles. 

What a day! This yarn is very nice quality, and I have some ideas.  I already have a good destination for the blue piece on straight needles. 

Earlier I'd started on a bergamot box. To show my brain feverishly trying to remember bergamot, it presented me first with bento, then with vertigo. No, I don't know why either.

What I do know is that this orange was light-years easier to manage than the lemons. 

It agreed to go on the jars, no argument. So we'll see if I get a box and lid. The smell of the orange in the boiling water was heavenly.

So that's Saturday. 

Happy day everyone, No Kings!

Foraged oranges, pasta measuring, plumbing thoughts

Friday's walk was mild, and loud with birdsong, and Happy New Year to the concrete rabbit. I wonder if his hearing is affected by ear loss.

I found abandoned fruit on my walk, and brought home two oranges.

I'm allergic to (eating) oranges, and these look like the windfalls Sally Pointer used for bergamot boxes, so I figured they're worth a shot.  Anyway they came home with me. Watch this space for potential boxes.

At home I saw this van in my former parking spot, and took a picture because it reminded me of vague ideas about getting one of my bathtubs converted into a walk in shower.  

They were working next door and I may ask, if it was about renovating, if they liked the work.  I notice the van refers to bathroom renovation, rather than plumbing repairs.

Right now I have no problem stepping into the bathtub to shower, and don't need to sit.  But that day may come. I do have that sliding bench thing I used after surgery, but I wonder if renovation might be good. Aside from the $$$$ involved.

Anyway shortly after that, Gary came dashing in to find out if I had a plumbing emergency, was I okay. Not my house, I explained, not my monkeys. He had a couple of good suggestions about bathroom contractors but agreed about the $$$$ side. 

Today's cooking involved peanut butter granola bars, breakfast for a few days.

And I was looking at one of those handy hack videos and here's one I never noticed 

I never realized those openings are measuring devices for pasta. I thought they were drainage. I must try this.

And one thing you really need to avoid, in online shopping, is clicking the wrong tiny box on your screen.

Years ago I was trying to order one bottle of malt vinegar, my favorite, and instead got a lifetime supply of single serve packets of same. I gave quite a few to the food pantry, but still have more than enough.

I like malt vinegar on roast potatoes with chicken, so I'm frequently reminded about this ordering miss. And wonder if I have a malt vinegar SABLE. Supply Available Beyond Lifetime Expectancy. This usually applies to yarn.

Happy day everyone, there's worse things than too much vinegar.

Furthermore..

 

Just a small sampling of events and protests all over my little state, with outreach to other states.  This is how enlightened government is created and supported. I'm glad to take part in all the resistance I can manage. And thank you to all the blogistas  who do what they can where they live.  Encouragement to those who haven't done much up to now to get cracking. Even in the reddest of states you are not helpless. 

Springlike walk and Misfits

Thursday was springlike, just for a day or two, and my morning walk under the trees was full of birdsong and animal tracks. 

I heard a downy woodpecker rattling then saw her (no red hat) start pecking on a tree. Very early for nesting. And I heard but didn't see chickadees and Carolina wrens, saw but didn't hear a little flock of juncoes.

The downed trees are usually left where they fall if they're not in the way,  and they provide habitat for a lot of animals and birds

At the top of the standing trees there's a whole colony of mourning doves, and, lower down, the juncoes flitter about.

A bit further along, you see where squirrels demonstrate their bite strength on these black walnuts.

If you've ever tried to break into black walnuts you'll know what pressure it takes. 

The prescribed method is to spread them on a hard surface, such as a concrete driveway, place a board on top and drive your car back and forward to crush them. 

Then you can spend the rest of the day picking out the delicious fragments of nut, before deciding to just go with regular walnuts. Besides, the regular ones can be cracked to make two miniature doll beds from the shell. Just sayin. 

Misfits pickup is out ready for Haleem, whom I messaged with a New Year greeting.

He got back with a very appreciative text.

Canned goods and mustard for the food pantry, oats and peanut butter for granola bars, cod pieces (!) because I need fish 'n chips, potatoes for the chips, also for roasted dice with the chicken pieces I just roasted, apples great relief, I really missed them last week, mushrooms to slice and freeze ready for omelettes, and to accompany chicken and roast potatoes, sardines for sandwiches for my brain, BananAZ! dundeedeedundeedee etc, mango pieces to go with yogurt, blueberries likewise, avocado oil because I finished the last of it in the red chili oil.

This was a nice order. 

Happy day everyone, I hope you're as well fed as I and able to get out among trees and calming nature,  in our current turmoil and tragedy.

Fluffageddon says breathe, plan, persist, resist 

Meanwhile the NJ legislature takes action against ICE

 

Just fyi. We're not helpless.

Woven potholder done, foxen, and carfree

So here's the last of the weaving, then seen with the skewers removed in order to complete the last couple of rounds, then the cardboard loom removed, and the potholder in action.

I needed to attach a loop to hang it by, and a bit of reinforcing crocheting down the sides, and it's done.

This will save the back of my hands from endless burns while I cook, usually when lifting something out of the oven. I tend to forget the shelf above is hot. 

This was a pleasing experiment, largely because I was able to remove the loom undamaged, which had been a question.  

As you see, I bent it to release the warp but the channels for the skewers are fine. I want to use it again.  And the seamless concept worked out as figured, too. 

A friend asked Tuesday, as we drove to our knitting group, how the carfree life was working out, probably wondering about her own plans when she eventually moves on. 

It's working out to the point where, while I was waiting for her, a neighbor came over, asked me where I needed to get to, and offered a ride!  I explained I had one, and he went away content. 

I did wonder if he thought I was just hanging about in the hope of an offer!  But I literally haven't had to ask for a ride, other than two ride services to learn how they work. 

Handsome Son theorizes my friends and neighbors have heard of old people living alone and giving up driving, who then become isolated and a bit weird. So they want to avoid that. 

As to weird, I plead the Fifth, but I'm clearly not isolated. One part I hadn't realized was how much less tired I am when I'm not the driver. The anxiety, added to the focus needed, added up.

Happy day, everyone, be weird if that's your thing. And why do we say oxen but not foxen? I know only about two of these kinds of foxes. Or foxen.

Tuesday Knitting Group, Textiles and Tea, Roxie Fricton

Tuesday was about waking early, still dark, early breakfast, some weaving,

Near the end of the potholder pocket.

Then a nap. No need to get carried away. The luxury of being older is being able to get up as early as you like, knowing you can sleep in the day if you need to.

The knitting group was the core members, with new projects and old.

This is double knitting, such a talented knitter, just learned the technique, now working like a veteran.

Foreground a glove in progress from yarn she spun and dyed, background a piece of cotton fabric being hemmed as a table napkin.

I started a glove and forgot a picture till I got home. 

Home to Textiles and Tea with Roxie Fricton, a young weaver still in graduate school but already doing public large scale projects.

Here's A large piece which she wove in patterns resembling the texture of the original building it's based on and displayed in. She dyed the fiber with magnolia buds to acknowledge the magnolia tree by the entrance.

She's from Appalachian family background and is interested in honoring their Scottish-origin coverlet tradition of overshot weaving,  while making her own ideas count. 

She works in cotton, in various weave pattern on a four harness loom.

This is painted warp style portrait work, left Vita Sackville West, right her sometime lover, Virginia Woolf. 

Here's overshot gone wild! Many optical illusions and mixes of color.

This is overshot to resemble wallpaper torn  onback and revealing the underlayer.

She's a lively and very analytical researcher and weaver, still very young and with a bright future.

Happy day everyone, join me in celebrating young people showing us the fiberarts are in good hands