Diff'rent strokes

Thank you to the blogistas who responded kindly and tolerantly about touch, much appreciated! Different strokes and folks, all that. I think it's important to avoid being dismissive about people whose perceptions are different from our own. 

Speaking of which, I notice how different my two knitting groups are. Both officially coalesce around knitting, crochet and sometimes stitching. But they're such different environments.

One is where we discuss anything but what we're making beyond show and tell, with people who are definitely buy the pattern, buy the yarn, make the project. 

The other has artists, opera singer, spinner of own yarn, freeform stitcher, where I can bring in things like the fabric book, the pinloom or spurtzler, knowing they'll be interesting and seized on to try. Talk there is largely fiberarts, relationships, different from the other more impersonal group. 

I love both of them, while marveling at the difference. Neither is competitive, though, which I value since knitting in particular tends to bring out the dogmatic if you don't look out! Like miniature making, it plays to the perfectionist approach, so it's good to be aware.

I wonder if that's why some knitting groups work well for new participants and some aren't ready to welcome them, despite what they say. I still encourage anyone to try though. A couple of meetings will tell you if it's a good fit for you. And if it isn't, not your fault!

And these are the projects I'm officially involved in. Moving from one to another, butterfly style, sipping and flitting, flitting and sipping.

Fabric book, embroidered leaves page

First of two jackets, edging with bias tape

Fusion quilting

Glove for the Sock 'n Glove Ministry

Socks for the Sock 'n Glove Ministry

And this bead and gold work piece I forgot about until I was looking for something just now.

I also came across a cool idea for resist dyeing which I have to try.. no end of interesting rabbit holes to plunge into around here.

Cool day, but I still sat out a while,  reading about the bishopric of Barchester

And here's maybe smart weed, still flourishing 

The temperature having gone to the 30s overnight, I switched on the heat, mainly to make sure it's working. It's working.

Happy day, everyone! 

Just another neighborly Sunday

Yesterday, early, I blogged idly about what I might do all day, and in fact did all the things I listed.  Walked, made yogurt, knitted, read Pym.  I'm still following a poem a day from my Book of Pomes, but lately nothing very exciting to share with you, a lot of Victorian rhyming couplets, but I live in hope.

What I didn't have on my bingo card today was Gary dashing in, mid morning, to say his daughter was coming over to help him rewire something something Manchester meat balls, which entailed fishing many cables through something something fishcakes, and the ends were incompatible, wrong caps something, did I have anything in a range of up to 20 colors to color code something something.

Oh.  Trying to think what I had that covered a wide color range and could be taped or something to cables or something. I suggested beads, tiny ones. No? Oh wait, yarn!

So I ended up sorting a lot of yarn, more than I realized I had, in search of a big color range. He needed two pieces of each. Which I found, cut, and loosely tied so he could find the pairs.

 

Is this what people do on Sunday mornings, or what? Anyway he was very happy when I showed up with them and I hope they work.

I have bags of dedicated yarn, one lot  donated by and for the knitting ministry, one bag for knitting comfort dolls, one bag of hand wash only, two bags of cotton for my lingerie department with some eventually going to the knitting ministry. 

This project caused me to assemble it all in one place, to search, what a concept, then put it all together upstairs in actual drawers easier to search through than bags. So that was a Good Thing tm.

Speaking of the lingerie department

Pair two, for actual use is under way. Pair one was a test run to act as a pattern. Here I've enlarged the depth of the ribbing for a good fit.

I was thinking about social craft and art groups after our recent comments and observations. Groups take a long time to develop, and  depend on a person or two showing up faithfully to create a core. I've started a couple of artist groups and three knitting groups, all of which are still functioning. But it took years! 

The latest knitting group, of which I'm a starter member, at my local library I'm planning to stick with, even if it comes and goes. 

The other,  established Friday group, different library, I was a founder member, about eight years ago, when for many weeks it was just the library lady and me! 

If at least one member of the public hadn't shown up, the library would probably have stopped supporting it with staff time and space.  

The second one I helped get going, at yet another library, then it floundered during covid, when they ran it online for a while, which I kept up with, then it moved out to sit in the parking lot in all weathers, which I couldn't manage. 

The second group library lady stopped in to the Friday, first group, last week and told me it was still going! She and I  founded the Friday group before she transferred to a different library, and I helped her found the second group there. 

Which all means if you want a group you might have to start it and keep it going!  It also means it can be fun and if it's important, you won't mind helping build and establish it. 

This recital has more in common with all the cables needing color coding than I realized at first.. all the groups and libraries.. you need a spreadsheet to figure it out, color coded by library and chronology.

I think the secret to the friendliness of all these groups is that they're library based. They're a tax supported community service, meant to foster social connections.  I hear less happy reports about local yarn store groups,  who are more about wanting members to shop there for yarns and patterns, not to bring their own, well, it's a business, cliques developing, and generally more about promoting lessons than friendly groups. Different needs and motivation.

Happy day everyone, just shows when you're lying in bed wondering about your day, you might be surprised at how it develops.

Painting may be back, groups, and Bert's gardening practice

Yesterday there was a question about getting into groups such as knitting groups, and getting through the first meeting. I think my best experiences have been with library-led public groups, less cliquey, and with someone whose job involves keeping the group congenial.

I've most often been an early adopter or founder, before there was a group anyway, and the early people have to be careful not to try to control events as the group grows and changes, as it will. That's where the group leader can shine.

My current knitting group has a great blend of several cultures and ages and loads of talent, but, partly because the library lady is adept, it's not competitive, but very interested in what each other is making.  The group has changed a lot over the years, people moving  in and out.

I think if you're hesitant, just go to one meeting. You don't have to commit, just see how it goes. Then, next time, decide if you want to go again. Just try the water. And let us know how it feels. Pro tip: if you can't do the craft in question, get lessons or a workshop before you join a group. The group participants are there to play and chat. They didn't sign on to be teachers!

Meanwhile, the Sock and Glove Ministry continues

I wonder if this will look anything like a pair, or like an artful mismatch, looking at the color changes coming up

I moved the coleus into its bigger home, and added in some offshoots I'd rooted in water. It can stay outside a while longer, before becoming a house plant, when the ficus comes indoors and fills the living room with foliage.

 Then lovely D.G. Strong of Modern Daily Knitting went and wrote this today

And modern daily knitting is offering this, watercolor  equipment to plan knitting designs, wildly out of my budget, but good luck to people who can go there. It did remind me it's time to bust out my watercolors again.

I love his approach, rapid studies from life, no dead on arrival laborious copies of photographs, just a quick fresh instant take, the real deal of watercolor.

Despite the prices of Case for Making's handmade custom watercolors -- you build your own palette and they're experts with questions -- I did sub to their newsletter

though I've produced some quite acceptable, some now in collections, paintings, with this pretty humble equipment. Also some duds, but that's not the fault of the equipment.

Unlike D.G.Strong, for me art doesn't start with shopping! But more power to those who shop and keep art suppliers in business. And more power to D.G. for funny and brilliant writing.

And while we're thinking plein air -- outdoor -- painting and flowers, remember Bert the gardener, and his credo

Nearer home, here's the latest flowers, from the faithful zinnias and marigolds. Here's a great watercolor subject if ever  there was one.

Happy day, everyone, enjoy your tea and activity and even shopping, if it comes to that!