Fiber Arts and Equipment – Page 19

How to spend a snow day.

It started hours later than predicted, but the snow is quickly covering the ground and roads and the “Winterstorm Warning” is still saying at least 8″ maybe changing to sleet later today, with the heaviest bands yet to come.

The woodstove is burning and will continue throughout the day and tonight if I can drag myself down to the basement to stoke it in the middle of the night.

Though the house isn’t any cooler than usual, with the wind blowing outside, it seems colder and I am ensconced in my chair, wrapped in the wool shawl that I spun the yarn for a couple years ago for the Shave ’em 2 Save ’em event, then knit into the shawl, and draped in my Breed Blanket that I spun last year on my Jenkins Turkish spindles and knit for the year long challenge. A cup of hot tea, my spindles and wool, and I am set.

The chili and stew will be saved for rewarming if the power goes out and homemade pizza was on the menu for lunch while there is power to cook it.

An after lunch quick trip to dump compost and give the hens thawed water and scratch grains in their coop and gather eggs before they freeze, allowed me to see that the cover is now about 3″ and still falling fast, from an easterly direction so drifting into the coop through a drop window that doesn’t close fully.

The wild birds are flocking to the feeders, Nuthatches, Titmice, Chickadees, Wrens, Finches, a couple of woodpeckers, and a pair of Eastern Bluebirds that should be much farther south by now. I took a short video, but can’t get it to load.

So far we are warm, hope to stay that way. It is so quiet as it gets when snow mutes the outdoor sounds.

Sunday Olio

Olio: a miscellaneous collection

I haven’t done an Olio in quite a while. They are easier to do when more activity occurs outdoors, and this definitely hasn’t been a week for that. With snow twice, temperatures rarely getting above freezing and even dropping to 8 f night before last. With hubby gone for several days, I have literally stayed in and kept the homefires burning. The wood stove is in the finished basement and though it makes that area too warm, the warm air drifts up the stairs and warms the upper reaches of the house above. The winter setting for the thermostats is 68 during the daytime hours and with the stove going, it will show main floor temperatures of 72 or 73.

Today is warm, going up into the upper 40’s and it is raining, all day long according to the forecast.

The remants of snow will disappear today, but it is going to get cold again tonight and stay cold but sunny for several days. It is winter.

I did make it to the Farmer’s Market yesterday, and the donation center. Though there were some icy spots on the mountain road, the highways were clear and dry and the new car handled it nicely.

With hubby gone for those days, lots of soup was made and consumed in single serving batches. There was a half loaf of sour dough bread from a Farmer’s Market vendor that was enjoyed with the soups. My cooking will return to the fare favored by hubby now that he is home.

My time was spent spinning on my spindles some and working on using up the bits of yarn left over from making the blanket last year. Those bits are becoming bulky hats, the first one sent home with Son 1 after Christmas. The second finished last night.

They are a great way to use up the small yardage as 4 strands are held together and when one runs out, another is added in, making a marled look. The pattern calls for the purl or “wrong” side out. The first one looked better on “right” or knit side, this one is kind of interesting on the purl side.

My time was also spent with cleaning, organizing, and destashing unused items. A box of random clothing, bags, and household goods was taken to donation. and a major overhaul of my craft area that still needs more work. I think shelves that have bags of fiber will be cleared and the fiber stored in a sealed plastic bin and yarn in another so only tools and books are on the folding and fixed shelves. I am putting myself on a “low fiber” diet, no more fluff in until what I have is used up. A lot of the natural colors are being spun a bit at a time to make a second, probably small blanket. The remaining square that was too small for last year’s blanket will be the center of a log cabin style blanket.

The rest of my spinning time is starting on the 4 ounces of gorgeous Marion Berry colored BFL wool that hubby gave me for Christmas. It is a gradient dyed pair of batts and I plan to spin them in the gradient to make myself a large scarf.

After being housebound for days, I’m looking forward to sunshine tomorrow even if I have to bundle up and get outside for a good, not icy walk.

Another year is closing

Today marked the last Farmer’s Market of the year, as the next two Saturday’s are holidays. It also means that some of the vendors are finished until spring and I will miss being able to do the bulk of our weekly groceries locally sourced, regeneratively and/or organically grown. There will be a few vendors through the winter when travel from their farms allow and some products still available, but it is always sad knowing this marks the beginning of real winter.

Today was also the last Holiday Market as well and this year I didn’t participate for several reasons. There are more and more vendors selling similar products, and competition is good unless your handspun, handknit hat is competing with bulky knit acrylic one. And the uncertainty of Covid sent me in a different direction last year, slowly spinning on spindles and knitting a blanket for us instead of product for sale, so my stock was low. And the cost of participating was too great for my stock availability. I limited my events to three at Wilderness Road Regional Museum, and one outdoor event at Montgomery Museum this past year and not until I was fully vaccinated. At times, I wonder if that adventure should cease and just donate my time spinning at the Museum or heritage craft events without vending. With this in mind, some of my equipment is being sold off and keeping only that which I love and use. Now with the new variant spreading like the wild fires of the midwest and western states, we are again wearing masks even in crowded outdoor venue, and I guess will stop going in restaurants again for a while, though that had only resumed occasionally.

This week hasn’t felt much like winter, with warm daytime temperatures and mild nights, but tomorrow is supposed to be more seasonable. Today it is raining, yesterday too, but we squeezed in a walk only getting a light shower during part of it. I don’t think we will get one today. We won’t have a white Christmas this year, but it may be cold enough for a fire in the fireplace. We won’t be totally isolated from our family this year either, but still only a tiny gathering. We were so fortunate to be able to meet up with Son 2 and his family week before last and enjoy their children.

One of my hydroponic gardens has not been doing well, so this morning, I broke it down, totally cleaned it, reset the plants that were growing and started some new salad greens. The other one has gotten off schedule with maintenance power outage by the power company and power flickers due to wind. I may put both of them on an easy to control power bar with a timer as the internal timers on the units can only be reset by getting up very early and restarting them and they don’t run for the same number of hours.

I will end this not very positive missive with a holiday photo.