May 31
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

So I finished the Wed. postcard early Thurs morning, and started this one to finish in plenty of time later, and then Aerin was finishing a report and hogged the computer until after I had fallen asleep for the night. We may need to expand the family network. Heck, I might need my own machine. What a thought.

This is the last of the leaves for May. It is the back of the fabric I was painting with both transparent and metallic paints to see if I could get the metallic to show through the sun printed paint. It almost worked – you can see the outlines faintly on the front – but when I turned it over the back looked so organic, and interesting, that I used that instead. It felt weird to have real edges again. I liked the fringey edges, but I am guessing they wouldn’t mail well. I’m not sure how wedded I am to the whole mailing thing though. The biggest issues for me seem to be size, and sticking to the theme somehow.

May 30
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I found a little bit of my first handspun, and knitted it into these leaves from Nicky Epstein’s Knitted Embellishments book while watching the Yarn Harlot do her thing at the Calvin. She was great. I may even be a blurry face in one of the audience shots. I had written an email asking if she needed guiding by a native to important things such as pastry, great food, local beer or caffeine, and I got back what has to be the most graceful “thank you but no” I’ve ever seen. So I just had my usual day, which seemed to contain a lot of backing and forthing, as well as a new pair of shoes for Alice who had outgrown hers the night before, and finished up in an auditorium full (I mean, really full) of women and some knitting men and some simply supporting men, listening to the Harlot. She totally rocks. In the Q&A afterwards we managed to make her feel guilty for ignoring and not naming her dryer, accuse her of being an enabler or even a pusher for yarn abuse, and discover that she had played role playing games and still had (in a closet somewhere?) a half elf magic user character…

The day ended with a great surprise; one of my favorite people from my last town, serially the children’s librarian and then Aerin’s pre-school teacher – had come to see the Harlot, and shouted at me. So she came home with me and we had a great visit. Hi Mary!

That was Wednesday. I just barely finished my leaves and fell into bed.

May 29
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Finished this morning before everyone left for school – is that technically still yesterday?

I don’t mind the speed, or lack thereof, of handwork. Really. I just realize in a big way what a series of tradeoffs the whole time management thing is. Since I started the postcards, my reading has dropped to less than a book a week, and most of those are art books, so I can leaf through them and then drop them. I used to be a book a day, give or take; not serious books but stuff that I can think about and a plot I can follow, or interesting craft books to prod me into action. I haven’t watched anything – TV or movie – for months. I almost miss it, except when I sit down to watch anything it seems insanely trivial and horribly slow moving. I knit(ted) a lot last year, to the point where Aerin asked if I had given up reading just to knit (she was really mad at me about the very thought). This year, the socks are definitely a backburner, waiting room kind of deal, rather than curling up on the couch and meditating on another couple rows. The exercise thing went out the window. I am dragging more regimented
exercise back into the equation, and trying to get the sleep thing back
under control, and then I leave a postcard dangling.

Not to sound whiny or anything. I’m just nattering. Al calls it self discovery through nattering. He manages self discovery through staring off into space, a much quieter trick.

Yarn Harlot today!!
She’s coming to town, and I’m going to see her, along with several
hundred of my closest friends and other knitters. I have to dig out
Nicky Epstein (I almost wrote Knicky) and find a knitted leaf.

may 29 temp
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

The biggest problem with hand stitching is that I can’t finish things – this isn’t done, but I am finished for the day. The leaf skeleton will be done tomorrow and the fabric between the bones snipped and carved into. It’ll be cool.

I flew today:

And I based Kate today when SHE flew:

The woman basing me is Marina whom I worship. I mean, really.

May 28
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Torn strips of silk woven and embroidered. I love my sewing machine. I missed my sewing machine. At some point, I’ll have to return to the edges of the postcards, but this loose frayed edge thing is still interesting.

I am pleased to be home. I like handwork, but doing a postcard a day over the long weekend made me realize how much handwork is involved. I have been angsting about what to do about postcard making for the time we are travelling (England – more about that later) and I think I am going to take a vacation. I’m switching media, from cloth to paper, and I’m thinking I’ll keep some kind of journally sketchbooky thing and work on something every day, but I don’t feel like I can maintain the postcard stream the way I’d like and still be having a family vacation.

As for the rest of the weekend, Family Camp at Becket/Chimney Corners completely rocks. We did some climbing (Al summitted this once and it was a triumph, Aerin just had a jolly time messing with different routes and made it up twice),

some boating (Lee and Aerin), no swimming because the water was frigid (except Alice who is training to be a polar bear) some crafts (Lee and Alice) including a lot of woodshop

and some batik, plus a good deal of running around and we caught one red eft, more commonly known as a newt even though technically it isn’t.

You can see here the woodshop inspirations for me…

I’ll try to get some pix of Alice’s workshop output, because the messenger bird is wonderful. I have to paint the three-leg bird and then I’ll post him too. Elinor designed him, and I cut him out and sanded the edges off and he stands and looks happy, but still needs paint.

I can’t begin to describe how wonderful my own bed will feel.

May 27
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

The colors of the little sticks were making me happy, so I gathered a handful and wove them together with the floss to make a little stick rug. That worked as the centerpiece, but it looks more and more like a raft, so maybe it needs a passenger of some kind….

May 26
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I got the leaves on the pre-breakfast hike, the silk was speaking to me, but the pieces kept getting smaller and smaller as i ripped them. So I attached them all on one side and then the little pockets had a purpose – to hold the leaves. I like the rhythm of the stitches, and the way you can see into the layers of silk chiffon. The chiffon is a major pain to deal with – it is all wifty and wafty and sticks to my callouses and rough skin. But it does shine.

May 25
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Started Friday at Family Camp, finished after pre-breakfast hike.

Can’t talk. Must pack for Family Camp. Will return with our regularly scheduled postcards sometime Monday.

Will be making things while gone.

Happy Memorial Day – remember everyone who matters.

Stay tuned.

May 24
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

well, I know where my head’s at today.

You can tell a good deal about how a person lived life by the size and shape of the hole he leaves. Steve left a huge hole, and so many people showed up to remember him and hug his wife and kids it was astounding to me. The room yesterday at the wake was filled with small knots of people telling Steve Stories, frequently doubled up with hysterics in the retelling. He lived with a huge element of humor in everyday life – constant, casual and easy. People from work, family, friends from all his various sports, all came and said good things about him. The service today was a more formal version, again with stories of jokes he played on others, the precious few jokes played on him, his ways of coping with telemarketers (letting an aluminum siding salesperson talk for half an hour before revealing that the "several small houses" he’d just finished were birdhouses) and his generosity towards everyone. I’m glad I knew him as long as I did. I hope I live as much as he wedged into the time he had.

I am so pleased to be home.