Progress

Two more home projects - one large and one small. First the small: Several years ago I converted the front hall closet into a pantry. Great for food storage, but left a need for alternate coat storage. My brand new orange paint job called for coordinated coat hooks. I found some unfinished shaker peg rails at Lowes. A little woodburning and painting and voila! And yes, I did use wall anchors to secure the rails. Mitten storage was accomplished by hanging a felted bag from one of the pegs.




The bigger project has a long way to go. Having determined that the massively ugly and unhygienic kitchen carpeting was not glued down with asbestos-ridden glue, I couldn't wait to start tearing it up. I spent Friday evening tearing up about half of it. Then I spent much of Saturday pouring boiling water on petrified carpet glue and scraping with a variety of implements. Not a fun process on a particularly hot day. Very swampy. Sadly the installers used an orbital sander to rough up the 1956 linoleum, so the floor revealed is less than optimum. Even damaged, the scarred linoleum is vastly preferable to icky carpeting. Down the road there will be tile. Until then, there will be lots more scraping.

Back from vacation

As the title says, I am back. I took my very first cruise. It was beyond amazing! In one week I took about 2,000 pictures and ate enough food for about a month. I am slowly weeding through the pictures amid about 500 back emails, and a pile of mail and phone messages. Here is a picture of the view from my hotel room in Vancouver, the evening before boarding the ship. (No, that is not our ship - ours was around the corner of the cruise ship terminal.)

I knitted some during the cruise, but there was so much to see and do (and so many meals to be had) that my progress was limited. I have the first six mitered squares done and am working on the seventh. Each square should block to about 8.5" x 8.5". The plan is to make a checkerboard shawl using the 2 similar colorways, with an added lace border around. It should work up into an almost featherweight summer shawl (stole, wrap, whatever).

Change of plans

Not mindless vacation knitting after all

The purple hoody will not be done in time for vacation, so it has been set aside for a while. I need good travel-worthy take-along knitting. Lace weight yarn for easy toting about and a mindlessly simple pattern for social knitting. Jeanne assured me that the Shoalwater Shawl pattern would be a good choice. I splurged on some Lorna's Laces "Helen's Lace" yarn, liking both the color and the name. Turns out Jeanne is a much better knitter than I am. The Shoalwater pattern is doable, but not mindlessly simple for me. Another project set aside. Instead I have started a simple stole using the modular knitting described in "Knit to be Square". Helen's Lace on size 6 needles should make it light and stretchy.

Zachary standing in for test

Zachary standing in to test email posting.
Originally uploaded by Purple Fuzzy Mittens

This is a test of the Flickr to Blogger capabilities. If you can read it, then it worked.

The Orange Hallway

This one is a bit daring, but I'm happy with it anyway. I burned and painted the bulletin board frame to add to the festive color scheme. I used the yellow from the bedroom to paint the linen cupboard doors.

More home work

I have learned many lessons in the course of home improvement projects. This week's lesson is that the ease of a painting project is directly related to how many doorways the space has. One would think that painting the hallway in a little house like mine would be a quick and easy job. Not so. There are ten openings into the hallway: front door, kitchen, livingroom, 3 bedrooms, bathroom, linen closet, pantry closet, and furnace closet. Each opening, plus the ceiling-wall interface must be taped and then cut in with a brush. And every couple of feet along the hall required dismounting, moving, and remounting the step ladder. By the time I finished priming both walls and ceiling I felt like I had spent hours in a particularly brutal step-exercise class. Hopefully the heavy-duty ibuprofen will work its magic and I will be ready to tackle painting the ceiling tomorrow night and the walls Wednesday night.

Here's some pictures of the process so far:

Damaged drywall,















Repaired drywall (I learned this process in a home repair class taken at the local community college),















and wall primed and ready for painting.















And for those who have asked - the purple hoody is coming along nicely. Just half a sleeve, the hood, 2 pockets and the button band to go!

Overdue Project Report

The striped pieces on the bed will be sewn into pillows. The colors in the South American weaving (last picture) will really pop when I hang it on the yellow wall. The little lamp on the bedside table was an ugly bargain purchase that I sanded, painted with the Mango trim paint, then varnished.

Next project: painting the hallway "Mango Madness".

Mid-project Report

Let me just say: home decorating shows that transform a room in just a couple days are very likely pure fiction. Needless to add, my Memorial Day weekend room re-do project has hit a few speed bumps and I am now an entire day behind schedule. Along with way too many trips back to Home Depot, I made the unpleasant discovery that buglight yellow paint requires specialty primer.

The ceiling is done and, despite the funny look the paint guy gave me when I requested semi-gloss, I am quite pleased with it. I put the ceiling fan back together and the way the light and fan shadows reflect is vastly cool. I have also completed the priming, so the walls are currently the color of instant lemon pudding. I will forge ahead with 2 coats of the final paint color tomorrow. Then the trim. Then scrub the floor and put everything back....

Despite being behind on the main painting job, I have managed to finish a bit of artsy stuff with an old cabinet. This old cast off cabinet is destined to be my nightstand. As always, I free-handed the pattern in pencil, burned the design, then painted using artist acrylics and mat media. I have the first coat of varnish on and will finish up with a few more coats tonight. I know I have done a bunch of snakey pieces already, but they make me happy. So there. The bright colors should be just right with the bright yellow walls.

I also whipped out a custom light switch cover. Now if I can just get the walls painted I can install it.

Big project

The spring zipped by faster than a speeding train and my promise of home improvement during Memorial Day Weekend is at hand. Time to paint the bedroom. I took today off to give the project a full 4-day weekend. Wednesday night I moved the wall o' books and disassembled all five bookcases. Thursday night I pushed and prodded all the remaining furniture out of the room and into whatever space I could park it. The queen size mattress only made it as far as the hallway outside the door. I ask you, why would anyone manufacture a queen-sized mattress without giving it handles?! (Not as bad as the 100 lb marshmallow of a futon I helped Laura move, though.) I even took apart the iron bed frame and stowed the pieces in the front hall.

So far today I have shop-vac'd as much cat hair as possible out of the room, taken down the curtains and rod, removed the ceiling fan blades and glass shade, and visited Home Depot for paint and supplies. Unable to avoid it any longer I then tackled the worst job of the whole project: scrubbing the walls and ceiling with TSP water. The ceiling is particularly bad, leaving the scrubber (me) an overheated slimy mess. Double uck. I had to be mighty stern with myself to complete the job right. Given how long it takes for me to get around to things, this paint job will have to last a very long time, so I better do it right.

Spackling is next, then taping, but (I tell myself) I will need to wait until the walls are thoroughly dry. Time for a break. I think I will go knit for a bit. The purple hoody is coming along nicely. Perhaps a short nap...

Purple Swatch

And oh-so-soft! The slight waffle pattern is the Boxcar Willy stitch pattern. I like how it feels, so I plan to do the whole hoody in it.

More Purple

It's a good year for the lilac:




The mock orange and the Scottish broom should be blooming soon. Then my favorites - the lavender.

Purple

What do you see when you look at this basket of freshly spun wool? I see a deep purple hoody with roomy pockets to fill with pretty pebbles and other interesting things. The wool is extra fine merino raised here in Nevada. Oddly in an un-sheeplike manner, the fleece is white on the outside turning light gray on the inside (bit closest to the skin). Washed, carded, and spun it just looks kinda grubby. No problem - I planned to dye it anyway. I spun it up fairly lofty, but will need to hold 2 strands together to get the thick, squishy, warm fabric I want. For extra depth of color, I split the 3 lbs of yarn and dyed them two different shades of purple. Laura will be impressed to hear that I actually calculated weight of goods and measured out the dye for desired depth of shade. The first half was dyed with Landscape Dyes "Sarsaparilla", resulting in a deep lilac blue-purple. The second half was put in the same amount of "Sarsaparilla", but I added an additional 10% or so Landscape Dyes "Gravillea", resulting in an amazing intense royal purple. Unfortunately the pictures do not do the colors justice. I can't wait for it all to dry so I can see how the colors will look knitted up together!

A few images...

Sorry to be so long gone. Here are a few pictures of recent events in garden, fibers, and home renovation, along with a promise to properly post soon.

Yes, pineapple yellow IS a bold choice for the bedroom. :-)

March in Northern Nevada

East of Reno along Interstate 80.

More Rs and something to show for it

Reduce, reuse, recycle has rightfully become a common mantra. Although I am still striving to achieve the reduce bit, I do believe in it and I do my bit as I can. But these three words are not enough. I would like to add four more: repurpose, renovate, restore, and my favorite: reimagine. My latest artsy effort is mostly reimagined.

This little step stool dates back, probably, to the 1950s, and has had a long life helping folks reach the top shelf. When I adopted it, it was a scuffed and worn looking, but still very sturdy, brown wooden step stool. Ordinary, yet very serviceable. I did not change its use, or recycle it in any way. I did reimagine it by giving it a new look.

Just like a number of previous projects, I burned the pattern on with a burning tool, then painted it using artists' acrylics mixed with matte media. The wood-burning creates a relief texture that you won't get just by painting. You can't tell from the pictures, but the stars are iridescent gold paint (leftover from Sharon and Ian's farm sign). I put a pattern on the bottom, too. Having hidden patterns is like opening a drawer and finding an unexpected little present.

Next project: Reimagine a worn wooden cabinet into an interesting nightstand.

Handwork

Today I read an article from a recent Publishers Weekly. Despite the overall book publishing business being in the toilet, there is one segment of the industry that is doing great. Sales of craft books are booming and the customer base is rapidly expanding. Great news for craft book publishers and crafters alike. What I don't buy is PW's explanation. Clearly the article was written by a non-crafter - someone with that age-old misconception that crafters hand make things to save money. Yeah, right. The two comments in the article that I do concur with are: 1.)In times of trouble there is an increased attention to home and family, and 2.)As the working world increasingly means spending all day in front of a computer, young professionals are turning to crafting for non-virtual balance.

The satisfaction of creating something by hand is hard to describe, but very real. It is more than pride in the execution. At its best, it involves an intimate relationship between artisan, tools and materials. When I took a class on Japanese style woodblock printing we learned that top quality barrens (disk-shaped tools used to rub the paper onto the inked block) are hand made from natural materials by skilled artisans. Could you get the same print using a low-end plastic substitute? Possibly, but the experience of the artist is integral to the product. Among my fiber craft pursuits, the most indescribably satisfying activity is to spin beautifully-prepared natural fibers on a perfectly-balanced, hand-crafted, exotic hardwood handspindle. Fiber magic.

Still winter

As I write this wet sloppy snow is falling. A good day to stay holed up at home. And a reminder that there is still plenty of winter left up here in the high country.

Yesterday was a spinning guild meeting - much visiting, but no pictures. Today I have been making serious progress on an art project I started long ago. I hope to have the woodburning phase done by the end of the evening. One thing this project has taught me: don't burn the date onto a project until it is actually finished (maybe I can fudge the 7 in "2007" into a 9...). Here's a sneak preview:

Full moon rising over Reno

I grabbed this shot from the end of my driveway when I took out the trash tonight. No tripod, so I did my best to hold the camera steady. A cold, but pretty night.

Tablet Weaving

Inkle weaving leads to tablet weaving. They have different origins and very different structures, yet inkle weavers sooner or later tend to give tablet weaving a try. Both techniques result in warp-faced fabric, and both are great for making belts (or other long, skinny bands), but I'm guessing the common attraction is for trying new skills that give big design payoff with low start-up investment. All you need to try your hand at tablet weaving is the fiber and some cardboard. That's it. Really. You cut the cardboard into a series of square cards and punch holes in the 4 corners to run the warp through. (I bought mine, rather than cut them myself, but they still represent the cheapest loom ever.) Turning the "deck" of cards opens and closes the sheds. You can read all about it lots of places on the web - just type "tablet weaving" into Google.

For my tablet weaving project I used 15 cards strung with 4 colors of crochet cotton. Due to the lack of an appropriately placed doorknob (traditional end tensioning device), I chose to anchor the warp on an inkle loom and to string it as a continuous warp. I wove about the simplest pattern possible: 16 turns forward and 16 turns back. This created a pattern of Xs and diamonds separated by chevrons.

The result is a new custom lanyard for my geek tag (aka key card/ID).

Sidetracked

Despite the best of intentions to show you all the fine things I have been working on, I have been sidetracked by a new toy. I promise more project reports to come. Meanwhile, here's a picture I made using "SpinArt" on my new iPhone. :-)