Time Marches On

My friend Chris Smith from El Cajon, way back in the day, stopped by on her way driving from Portland to South Dakota.  She is our first guest of 2016 and the first one to use our RV space.  I gave her a cooks tour as she hadn't been in Bend in years.  She had never seen the Old Mill District which is on both sides of the river and is the area of two former lumber mills.  (Everyplace in the city is a district - our house is in the Old Farm District.)  I took this selfie in the REI store which is a building from the sawmill and lumber days. I didn't think about how short she is when I took it!

We did a quick tour of the downtown area. This little statue is sporting one of the yarn bombs from the fiber arts symposium a couple weeks ago.

 Chris drives a 24' foot RV which has also been her home for the past ten years, so it was a quick visit as she wanted to get on the road early.  She left me with this Amish-inspired wall hanging.  She's had to downsize her love of quilting and this is a perfect addition to my studio.

I'm sampling again on the two-block profile draft but with a black warp this time.  I was so full of myself, thinking that I had come up with something ingenious, a faux counterpane.  We watched Madelyn's DVDs at the weave/study group this past Wednesday.  It was there I learned that this had been a weave-along in a Handwoven issue a couple years ago but since I only starting taking the magazine last summer, I was oblivious.  I guess I'm not the only one who thought it was a good idea :)

An exciting and energetic discussion followed afterwards.  I asked a by-the-way question - how do you get fringe knots to be the same length all the way across?  Stephani said to tie a loose overhand knot and then afterwards adjust the knots up or down.  It cut down the twisting time by half and the knots did line up.  I realized after it had been washed and dried that I hadn't snugged up the knots evenly and they no longer line up.  I will try this again on my next scarf.

The scarf is finished but the matching teal Tencel M & W pattern is lost in the stripes.  I thought this yarn would be a little more variegated.

The light has to hit it just right for the pattern to show.  I think the 6/2 bamboo is a little heavy for a scarf and is probably more appropriate for a knitted lace shawl.

This is the other skein of 6/2 bamboo.  There's a little more contrast here so I'm hoping for better pattern definition this time.

Just a year ago we were here in Bend, enjoying a visit with the kids, and a year later it's where we live.  I had my first appointment at radiation oncology this past Tuesday.  The preliminary stuff is over and I start treatment next Thursday afternoon.  Fortunately we're meeting friends from tai chi for lunch that day, a little dose of laughter with friends to sweeten up the day.

Sampling

I make a mistake on this warp that I've never done before.  I usually warp with stripes so with a solid color I was very careful to use a counting thread and recount the total threads at the end of each bout.  Yet I wound 19" instead of 20".  I lied to myself!  I didn't notice it until I got to the center and realized I didn't have enough to make the check pattern that appears on both corners, so I punted.and treadled one Block A, two Block 2 until I had used up those threads.

Next I tried red and I could see it kinda has a counterpane look so instead of making a long stripe down the center, I wove Block B until I had created a solid red block.  But I miscalculated the size of these two patterns and ended up using an extra 2 inches of my precious warp

If the first two samples are Papa Bear and Mama Bear then this one is Baby Bear, because I got it just right.  I will have to finish these another day though as yard work was calling me outside, and tomorrow our family is getting together to celebrate Mother's Day at McMenamin's.  Reversations are for 11:30.  I'm really anxious to see these finished and hemmed.

 I worked on this until 1:00 when I could no longer stand my hunger.  This is two hours of work.  The water feature is in the back and it's the area in front of that I am working on first.  Because of the underground maze of drip lines I have to be very cautious when I dig and use a hand trowel but I got ten more plants in the ground today.  Fortunately the soil is very easy to dig in but boy does the grass absolutely hate being pulled.  The large plaster duck is guarding my just-planted lavender from careless dogs.  We've talked about just mowing this grass now and deal with it next year when it starts to grow again.

I know I'm probably not supposed to do two hours of yard work yet.  And it was rigorous work - my Fitbit buzzed 10,000 steps while I was still working.  My incision is healed and nearly invisible, the follow-up appointment with my surgeon is Tuesday morning, and it's then that I will be referred to a medical oncologist and find out what comes next.