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collections or clutter

I tend to grumble that G is a packrack and an accumulator of stuff, and I
am not. But that is not exactly true. Although I spent a large part
of the last weekend dealing with DH’s stuff, I also recently had to
come face to face with some of my own collecting propensities, and I
must admit that I am a collector of stuff, not the minimalist I like to
pretend to be.

Of course I still prefer to delude myself into thinking that the
"stuff" I accumulate is important whereas G’s "stuff" is just that —
stuff. But I am certain he feels the same way about my own piles.

To begin with, I spent the long weekend not sewing or working on
patterns but dealing doing battle with conflicting filing systems. All
the files from the office had been carted home in early April but
circumstances were such that I had not come to terms with them yet, or
integrated them into the existing files at home. That situation came
to a head last Thursday (see this post over at my other blog, purlsandmurmurs . Thursday I got stuff sorted into piles but those piles still had to be interfiled into the system we had at home

And this is were things got dicey. G and I might be adoring mates, but
our filing systems are completely incompatible. I am the kind of
person that breaks everything down into specific subjects and files it
meticulously, routinely going through the files and matching,
collating, and weeding the no longer needed or relevant. G saves
everything, every piece of paper, never goes back to weed anything out,
and has a system that is best described as "insurance in the left lower
drawer" and "bank statements in the right upper drawer"with the general
assumption being that the things on the top of the ever-growing pile
are the more recent. Something had to give, and the rule of the day was
that, since I do most of the filing, and G never remembers where
anything is anyway, my system won.

But that still meant I had to go through 30 years worth of comingled
insurance files to determine what was important, what we still had, and
what should have been long since relegated to the trash pile. 30 big
lawn and leaf bags full of paper, and four days later everything has
been accounted for and organized.

And I am sure that my organized file drawers could be further purged.
I tend to save and collect articles on many subjects and truthfully,
they are not at all frequently referenced. But they occupy space. I
am sure, if it came down to it, many travel files and design files and
files on various odd subjects could disappear without any great rift in
the universe, and some day that situation may arise. At the moment
though eliminating payment receipts for insurance policies that were
cancelled years ago will suffice.

But despite all this, and all my grumblings, G’s stuff only takes up a
little bit of the house (well most of the basement/garage, but I don’t
count that) whereas my stuff is everywhere.

And it is not just the yarn and fabric, which you know I collect but also books, and occasionally CDs. I can’t imagine a house without books.

In fact there are books in almost every room of my house and although I delude myself that I like minimalist architecture, it is not really true. I don’t like a lot of furniture, or photos, or things on tables or walls…. in that sense I am a minimalist. Some of my friends think my taste in furnishing is rather cold. And to some extent they may have a point. I could live in a library if I just moved in a fabulous kitchen and a bed, and the lack of other furnishings or the rows of books would not bother me — I would feel perfectly at home among them. I could make my bed in a yarn store or fabric store as well. But none of these places is what most people would call "homey".

Oh well.

The fact is, although I am currently sated on yarn and fabric, I will buy more. And although I am also overwhelmed with books, having piles scattered throughout the house waiting for more shelves, waiting to be read, I will also buy more books. Yarn, books, and fabric are each more than their physical presence. They all offer potential and dreams. I’ve talked alot about those dreams. And books also offer memories, memories of pages read. Oh I read books from the library….but I won’t say what percentage of books I read at the library eventually end up on my shelves anyway because I need to continue the conversation.

As I sit here writing this, surrounded by piles of yarn and fabric, and yes books, I feel very content, and very lucky to be able to collect these things I love and surround myself with them. And I can live with G’s piles of paper everywhere, and all the photo stuff in most of the guest bathroom, as he can live with piles of books and yarn and fabric. Although we occasionally grumble, it is an endearing kind of grumble, knowing full well that these piles are all only a little part of what endears us to each other and allows us the freedom and the peace for our more creative efforts.

May 29, 2007
Three Sweaters

I am dreaming of sweaters. I am dreaming of sweaters whose yarns are not represented in the pile of yarn-to-be-knit. I am dreaming of sweaters for which the raw materials are most likely not anywhere in my stash. I am dreaming of three sweaters. There appear to be some similarities between the sweaters, but appearances can be deceiving.

These sweaters invaded my brain in the order shown above. In terms of discussion however the last shall be first.

I first fell in love with this sweater when I saw an advertisement for it in one of the spring knitting magazines. The pattern book was not yet available. Eventually I ordered it and it arrived yesterday. The bodice and peplum are knitted separately in Stacy Charles’ Muse which is a 65% viscose, 25% cotton, 10% polyamide (nylon) blend. I find that I still love this sweater, I could easily order the yarn, and I might have something appropriate in my stash but there is still that pile of yarn in the corner.

Now this sweater is somewhat problematic. I like the sweater, but I think it looks dumpy in the photograph. It is swirling around in my head at the moment because of its similarity to the Anny Blatt sweater (first picture above). But wait, you might say, those sweaters are only marginally alike. Well, actually…..

The shape of this sweater is very much like the first sweater, both are fitted classic shapes. I have checked the schematics and both are remarkably alike when knitted to the same size. Of course the yarns are quite different and the drapes of the sweaters will be quite different. The Rowan Sweater is knit in Cotton Glace which will not hang with nearly the body skimming drape of the Anny Blatt Sweater. But there are many color choices available and I think this sweater has great potential. And although I normally would wear the colors shown for this sweater, I think the muted color adds to the dumpy image of the sweater. I would knit this in something much more vibrant.

But obviously the Rowan sweater is an "also ran". I am thinking about it due to indecision about the sweater I really covet which is the Anny Blatt sweater, named Padies:

So why didn’t I order the yarn for this sweater when I placed my Anny Blatt order? Indecision. Simple indecision. This sweater is knit in alternating stripes of 5 yarns, all in the same color, except for the Victoria ribbon which is used in two colors in the bottom eyelet section. This sweater is shown in a color called Tango, which is a light orange (yellow red) with contrasting stripes in Crepuscule, which is deep prune (or a deep red-purple)

So what alternatives are there? I found two.
FAIENCE which is, as you might have guessed, shades of blue.
GERANIUM which comes in shades of red, perhaps pink-blue red

I like Geranium, but the new yarn used for the bodice, Selene, does not come in Geranium, although every other yarn used in this sweater does come in that shade. Selene comes in two shades of red and it is possible that one of them would work. As for the contrast, if Geranium is a medium-to-light red-purple, the contrast, in keeping with the design above, should be a deep Yellow-Red which would make it something that reads as a dark brown. I would think that I would try for the colors Ecorce or Moon. Of course if geranium is orange-red or true-red, the contrast option would have to be different.

Now, every yarn comes in color Faience. So that problem is solved. But I already ordered yarn Selene de Bouton D’or for this sweater (click to enlarge):

There is also a fair amount of blue yarn in that pile of yarn sitting in the corner of my studio, waiting to be knitted. I seem to be running a blue streak right now, which is fine, I can wear certain shades of blue quite well, but generally I am more of a green and plum kind of person. So I wonder if I want more blue.

Faience also looks, and it is difficult to tell this on web samples, like it might be a little darker than the other two yarns, although it is possible that other yarns could be blended in to give the sweater a more light-toned look. Also the yarn appears to me to read as more true-blue, which makes the contrast a little more difficult. In the model sweater the sweater is all made in shades of one primary color — in this case red. A light yellow-red sweater with dark purple-red accents. In the case of a Faience sweater I would need to use accents in another color, I suppose running to one of the secondary colors on either side — green or purple, but the contrast is not as appealing to me.

As I write this it sounds more and more like I am leaning toward geraniums doesn’t it? Originally I leaned toward blue, but that was before I started considering the contrast.

But I am not supposed to be ordering yarn. And I do, in truth, feel a little overwhelmed in the yarn department right now. Cotton Glace will be available, no problem, but the other yarns might not be…….

And this is how I talk myself into accumulating a yarn collection.

May 25, 2007
Crashing through

All week I had been looking forward to Thursday. Thursday is knitting night. But there had been no knitting the last few weeks and I sorely missed these get togethers. In fact I was feeling a little desperate for a girl’s night out.

Thursday started out bright with promise…..

But then I hit a wall. A personal wall, but still a wall I could not walk around, or climb over, or even ignore any longer. Tonight I had to take down the wall.

And I did.

It started with work. When we closed the office G brought home tons of stuff which has all been piled up in his den. 30 years accumulation of office stuff and files were crammed into that small 8 x 10 foot room and I dreaded going in there. But I had to. The office files were there, piled willy nilly on the floor and on boxes and furniture. The household files have long been stored in that room, but I could not get at the file cabinets through the piles of s.t.u.f.f. that blocked the path. There are two computers — one still running office files, and G’s personal computer which I couldn’t even find space to set up because I still needed access to the other computer as well.

Today when I got a call and needed a chart right away to discuss something that was scheduled next week when I had been told that it was months away yet, I couldn’t access what I needed. I couldn’t find anything. I felt out of control. And I felt stupid. And I hate feeling out of control and stupid. I vowed that something had to be done today. I was literally locking myself in the den and not coming out until there was some order and at the least the beginnings of a workable system.

I succeeded. And it feels good.

There is still a lot of stuff that G has to go through and make some decisions about, but we can both work in there now, and I can get to the stuff that I need. And you know something? That pile of stuff was a big weight around my neck. It kept me from really being able to relax and work on things I wanted to do, like knitting. I knew I had to face the wall, but I dreaded it so.

And so only a few rows have been knitted on the linen tank. And only a few rows have been knitted on my socks, but some of the chains that have been holding me back have been lifted. My needles are ready to fly again.

May 24, 2007
I dream of a tee

Whatever I may have intimated, I have not yet abandoned the purple muslin project.

I spent some time on Tuesday morning morphing patterns.

You see there usually is a method and a plan to my madness, although it seems that I am rarely privy to the full detail when I get started. I seem to just jump right in and then the plan evolves as I get going. This does require time to step away from the sewing room and allow the details to float around my brain a little bit, but at the moment that is no problem as time away from the sewing room seems readily available and it is time in the sewing room that is in short supply.

I have a vision of a lightweight, loose tee in my head, one with cut on sleeves. Yes it will be loose and boxy, but the fabric is light and airy for a knit. I plan to wear it as at-home-wear with a pair of coordinating knit pants.

The purple muslin was made from this pattern:

It dates from 1985 and a small was an 8-10. This was before I ever traced off patterns. I had made view B several times, the one with the wide neck and the cuffed sleeves. It was so big on me, and the neck so wide that I took 1/2 inch out at the center fold to make subsequent versions fit. The fact that the purple tee, which was made from View A (same back piece, diffferent front piece), fit me, albeit snugly, was no testiment to my slimness, but merely evidence of how oversized clothes could be in the mid 80s.

But anyway, I knew I would be able to get into the tee without altering the pattern, and I was mostly interested in the neckline and the sleeves, which I recall that I really liked at the time.

Monday night I looked through my pattern collection and really found nothing much that was like the tee I envisioned. Oh this original Vogue pattern was pretty close, and I had Christine Johnson’s Three Tees pattern.

The Christine Johnson Pattern is more appropriate size-wise, but I really did not like the way the sleeves lay when wearing the tee, and I was not thrilled with the neckline either.

What I really want is something in between these two patterns. Once I discovered what I wanted, the path was clear:

I traced the Christine Johnson pattern in a size large (red lines in the picture above), and then I aligned the old Vogue Pattern over it to get the neckline from the Vogue pattern, which was actually a little tricky and I hope I got it right. I actually took the back neckline from CJ and altered it to join up with the front neckline from the Vogue pattern. Looking at them and taking a few measurements they look good, but only the next muslin will tell.

I then also moved the Vogue pattern out and altered the shoulder and sleeve angle on my new pattern to correspond to the Vogue pattern (in a bigger size obviously). As you will note the Vogue shoulder sloped downward slightly more (1/4 inch) than CJ’s, and there was an entirely different shape under the arm in the way the sleeve came out from the body on the Vogue Pattern.

Will it work??

I actually have no idea. I may actually need something more in the middle ground between the two patterns.

I considered waiting to write this until I had whipped up another muslin, but I had hoped to do that yesterday, and then again today, but I see a long day of paperwork and filing ahead with little chance of a muslin appearing in the next 10 hours or so. I shall continue to hope for tomorrow, or the long weekend…. but I am actually going to have workmen here Saturday and Sunday, and house guests, so extensive sewing time is not likely.

But now I must go back to work. How did all the office files and accounts get so out of hand while I was out on family medical leave???? How do I ever begin to sort them out???

I’d much rather be sewing…..but the penalty would be far too high.

May 24, 2007
Purple Muslin

The problem with internet and mail order fabric shopping is that once in a while mistakes are made. When I saw this knit fabric I thought "wrap dress". When it arrived at my door I wondered "what was I thinking?" The only thought that popped into my head was pajamas. But I don’t want knit pajamas.

Luckily this kind of thing doesn’t happen all that often. And now I have muslin fabric.

I made a muslin today from another old pattern that I used to love. It is cute enough. It needs a little work. Look at that big fold at the bust telling me that it needs darts. When I made this top before it was when I was a skinny minny and didn’t need darts in my tops.

Ha Ha! Not today.

I could fix it, but I don’t think that the pattern is so special that it is worth the bother.

Did I waste my time today? No. I did something I wanted to do. I had fun doing it. And I learned something.

If I bother to finish the edges of the tee I could certainly even wear it, and I would lay odds that most people wouldn’t even notice that big wrinkle because I see people running around in RTW tops that do the same thing all the time. H***, I think people wouldn’t even notice if I didn’t finish the edes. But I would notice. And I would still feel like I was wearing pajamas.

Bye Bye Purple Tee, you were never meant to be.

May 21, 2007
Green

The fiddleheads are up, both in the market stalls and in the front yard. The weeds are especially vigorous this year. I looked out the door and there was something 4 feet tall that I would swear had not been there the day before. I know it must have been there, but obviously it had not caught my eye until grew out of proportion to everything else around it.

Perhaps it was a beanstalk.

I was pretty efficient in my tasks today and I had time to go out in the yard a bit to begin to grapple it back under my control, but I decided I needed sewing time instead. The yard will become overgrown, and when winter comes it will all die back again, and sometime I will again exert my will on my little piece of land. In the greater scheme of things it is a small matter. As for sewing. I am a much nicer person when I can spend a little time fondling the fabric.

I almost forgot to bring the garbage cans down from the top of the hill. I had been left a note on the can that I should put all my paper trash in plastic bags so that it doesn’t blow around when they are emptying it into the truck. I know this makes sense, and I know many people are required to tie up all their trash in plastic, but there is no local requirement about this and the garbage collection company never demanded it before. Since we contract individually with collection agencies, it is not a service provided by the community and paid for by our taxes even though they are high enough, I never bothered.

I do understand the reasoning behind the request although I think it seems awfully wasteful of plastic bags.

But then I don’t want to run around collecting paper from the neighbor’s yards either.

May 21, 2007
Summer Knitting??

A few weeks ago, when I was looking for a new project, I started piling up yarn in a corner of my studio, in the hopes that I would make a commitment to a project. The yarns have been sitting there ever since and I have made a few additions to the pile as well. Today I sorted out the yarns into their individual projects, made a rough inventory, and tried not to laugh hysterically. This is more than summer knitting…..

I won’t go into the details. You will hopefully see some of these yarns emerge from this pile before the summer is over, perhaps even one or two before the summer officially begins. I am intentionally leaving the pile here out in the open where it can taunt me at those times when I sit down and don’t feel like doing anything.

Most of the yarns are summer weights. For example the bag in front is Rowan’s Summer Tweed purchased for a Kaffe Fasset cardigan LAST summer. I am determined to start it this summer, but it will not be a carry-along project as there are too many yarns, so it will likely be in process simultaneously with at least one or two other projects.

I also received part of my Anny Blatt order and those yarns are also in the pile. The order is not complete, but here is what I have gotten so far.

This sweater is(was?) high on my list because it just seems perfect for my mood this summer:

Unfortunately two yarns are missing, the blue Victoria ribbon and the blue Muguet. I will call the store on Tuesday to check on their status. These yarns are used at the very end of the sweater so I could start right away, but I hate to get something mostly underway and then have to struggle to find the finishing touch, or have to consider doing something different. I could use different yarns for the blue/green stripes, but I might not find something that I like with the pink muguet pictured above. So this sweater is still on hold.

The yarn for Padirac is complete:

But although this sweater is also white, it does not strike me as so explicitly summery. I think I could wear it in the spring and fall also with the right clothes. It is light but could be easily dressed up to go to a concert or nice evening out. Besides this is another relatively complicated project that cannot be easily hauled around as multiple yarns are used in each row. This will compete with the Kaffe Fassett for my attention.

May 20, 2007
Rainy day activities

Yesterday I just had to face the mountain of ironing that I had been storing up for "a rainy day".

Yesterday was rainy, and I had nothing left to wear that didn’t require ironing. I also thought it would be nice to wear something out to dinner besides my gym clothes.

So there was no sewing but there was lots of time in the sewing room looking at the stack of fabrics piled up near the ironing board, thinking about what I would be doing next, taking brief breaks from the ironing board to look at patterns, and so forth and so on…you know the drill right?

I don’t usually let the ironing pile up this much, but life has not been normal of late. I know some people don’t iron their clothes, and although I can admit it would be more environmentally conscious not to iron, I can’t bring myself to do it. I don’t iron my slips anymore, or my gym clothes so I think I am working my way into a more laid-back lifestyle, but very slowly. I still iron most everything else, including my jeans. G irons his own shirts.

I defend myself briefly by saving the ironing up until I have a pile, I don’t iron the clothes for each day in the morning before getting dressed like some people I know. Mostly this is because it is wasteful of time (I would rather sleep in a few minutes more) and energy. The most energy is used during that initial time when the iron is warming up, and it seems a waste to warm up the iron and then use it only a few minutes. I usually don’t heat it up unless it will be on at leat an hour. I think that is part of why I have never been good at sewing in 15 minute intervals. I can’t sew much before I need to press and I refuse to heat up the iron unless I will be there for a while.

Anyway, the circuits were configured in this room so I could use the iron with other equipment and not blow any circuits. And the new Naomoto iron takes less energy than my old Sussman, and in fact it uses less energy to warm up than the coffee pot uses every morning. After I blew the kitchen circuit the first few times I had to run around the house, tapping into the different circuits and measuring the actual energy use of various appliances and pieces of equipment in the house. I am such a nerd that I found this highly entertaining. I can iron, but I can’t make coffee and toast at the same time, which sometimes requires some interesting choreography in the mornings. In fact, if I didn’t sew, I would use less energy ironing than I do making coffee over the course of a year.

But then I do sew, and I am not going to stop. Nor am I going to stop making coffee, although the espresso machine draws less power than the drip coffee pot for some strange reason.

So just call me energy hog..

Pink Energy Hog.

I don’t know why it took me 8 months after making this skirt to realize that I could wear it with pink. Now it is a perfect skirt for a cool spring day, not just a fall and early winter skirt.

Duh.
.

May 20, 2007
Picking up the (pattern) pieces

Thanks to a generous offer from a dear friend to run an errand for me yesterday I actually found a few moments to focus my efforts in the sewing room.

There is a little more fabric in residence at the moment than will fit in the allotted storage area so a few pieces have been allowed to take up residence on the cutting table. These are knits that should fill my immediate requirements for summer tops, a few pieces that are crying out to be made up soon, and a couple of other pieces that I just want to get off the fabric shelves and into the closets.

Then, because I had "free" time, I actually got some of the fabric washed and ready to cut and I was able to pull out the two versions of the pattern drafts I made for that last Burda knit top and start to compare what I had done, so that I can make the necessary fixes and continue my work on this pattern. I may interrupt for a few projects, depending on mood, but I definitely want to perfect this pattern a little more, and I will definitely wear it again.

And you know what? It was so nice to play with fabric, dream of garments, and actually look at pattern pieces and try to reassemble my thoughts after a couple of months absence.

May 18, 2007
Blue Sock Two

In my normal distracted, scatter-brained, and bordering on chaotic life, I find that linen does not make for the most portable of knitting projects, no matter how much I enjoy the wearing of the resulting finished garments, either sewn or knitted. Linen yarn seems to resist all my attempts to remain wrapped in a ball, and it possess a powerful self-attraction, not being able to resist the urge to grab itself and form complex tangles and knots.

It seemed wise therefore, for the Thursday’s spell of sitting-and-waiting, that I bring along those tiny size 0000 needles and start the second blue sock. I actually do enjoy knitting it, aside for the two difficult rows, first the yo, k2tog row where I create the picot edge, and later the row where the initial cast on is knit with the live stitches on the needle to form the hem at the top of the sock. These, try the patience on such small needles, but they were accomplished without incident.

I even continued knitting the sock into Thursday night. The darling husband was entertaining himself in front of the TV and I decided to join him. It was not long however before I was dangerously close to the point of bored desperation. Luckily G decided to go look something up in some other corner of the house and I was left in control of the remote for a few minutes. I figured that even a few minutes of mindless entertainment bliss would be welcome so I switched the channels. G is a charming sweetheart, but how anyone can sit and watch the weather channel for hours continues to confound and amaze me. I know he is not unique. I know several highly intelligent scientific types, renowned in their fields who also drive their wives to distraction with their affection for "local on the 8S".

But I digress.

As I flipped the channels I was thrilled and amazed to watch a wall of sea water pouring through the streets of Manhattan. I picked up the needles and knit in absolute fascination, the needles clicking furiously as the citizens of New York climbed over cars trying to escape the wall of water.

Have I mentioned that my knitting movie standards aren’t always particularly high? I don’t want a movie I actually have to think about when I am knitting, and certainly The Day After Tomorrow was obliging on that point. I think it is a movie that would not stand up to much scrutiny, but it was more than adequate for background entertainment value. I might even be able to watch it again and actually see the beginning. Even G was easily sucked into watching (maybe it was that giant weather vortex that got him) even though I offered to let him change back to the land of endless weather maps. So we watched through to the end and I got easily got through another inch of sock-knitting:

May 18, 2007