Unraveled Wednesday

Unraveled is a good description for how I feel this a.m. Yesterday, I picked the last summer flowers and then went to the pharmacy for the first of two Shingles vaccines. Generally I have little trouble with vaccines other than a sore arm, a small price to pay for being less susceptible to illness. I planned to clean house and get groceries but may be taking it easy for a few hours. I was up during the night and don't feel well this morning. Oh boy, I try hard to keep medical issues to myself as there isn't much worse than an old lady complaining about aches and pains. I am just being honest here. We all prefer to be well and I am NOT suggesting that anyone avoid vaccines. Shingles and/or influenza are no laughing matter.

Maybe while sitting on the couch, I will finish volunteer work on a letter campaign to get out the vote. Through an organization called Vote Forward, I adopted twenty five registered voters and agreed to send a form letter along with a short personal message encouraging citizens to vote. The instructions state not to advocate for any candidate or party but to stress the importance of every vote. The goal is to communicate through a personal connection. Other than the occasional yard sign and visiting with local candidates who knock on my door, I have never campaigned. This effort seems important and something to counter the sometimes overwhelming feelings I have about the state of political affairs in this country. If I finish the first twenty five letters, I'll pick up another list. All it costs me is a little bit of time and postage.

I have a little unraveling to do on Norah's Christmas stocking. The stitch count of the yellow stitches is not correct. I was sailing along, managing all the yarn and bobbins. Then last night at 9:45 p.m. when my head began to ache, I noticed a mistake. I know I need to set this project aside about 9:30 p.m. but alas I wanted to get started on the horn. I have three or four rows to unpick, one stitch at a time. If I pulled these stitches off the needle I would make a mess. Since this is a slow-going project you will be seeing plenty of it here. These stockings are knit flat and upside down so that is the way I photographed it. My goal is to have it finished with all ends woven in, lining sewed and tacked in place in order to do a gentle steam blocking by the first of December. Time will tell. I am not quite half way through the knitting.

I am reading two good stories, Pachinko and A Warrior for her People, a work of nonfiction about Susan LaFleche who, in the late 1800's over came gender and racial prejudice to become a Native American woman physician. I've had the book since last December but put off reading it because I knew it was this month's selection for my book group. LaFleche's story and family are remarkable. The author, Joe Starita, was an investigative reporter for the Miami Herald before becoming a journalism professor at the University of Nebraska. He writes a compelling, well researched story. LaFleche kept detailed journals most of her life so he had a lot of primary source material. Starita donates all proceeds and honorariums from his talks and books about Native Americans to a foundation he created. The foundation provides scholarships to young Native Americans. I heard him speak last year and he told wonderful success stories. Reading Pachinko makes me realize how little I know of the history of Korea. The story of hard working women persisting through poverty and political upheaval as they create and sustain their family is engaging. I'm about half way through. 

Bright yellow leaves fall from the birch as I write. Two small nuthatches, dressed in delicate gray blue and light rust are feeding on safflower seeds and storing them in the birch bark. I don't often see this species in my yard so I am enjoying their company. Yesterday I noticed juncos in the neighborhood. They return for winter but I'd rather not think about that today. Tomorrow, one Connecticut grandson and his Dad are flying in for a long weekend on Thursday. My son-in-law is officiating at a wedding so the five year old, not yet in elementary school, is coming to spend some time with us. I told Micah we should rake a big pile of leaves and jump into them. We will also roll out crust and sauce up some pizza. This weekend is going to be fun.

Click to visit Kat and the Unravelers for stories from knitters across the country and then go enjoy this golden October day.

Home to Autumn

I have been away for a bit. We traveled to Connecticut and had the best week with our daughter and son-in-law and their busy family. While visiting I put my phone on silent and used it to take some photos and sent a few to our son and my sister. We shared pictures among ourselves so I wasn't behind the camera as often. Instead of checking the news and fuming over the latest event, I spent more time reading to my grandchildren, holding little Norah, playing ball, and walking a bit with my daughter and the children. I savored every extraordinary day.

We met our newborn granddaughter, Norah and once again marveled at this beautiful new little one - so welcomed and so loved. I played catch with Micah and read to his preschool class. 

We played"diggers" with Jonah and read to him for an hour at a time. We walked Emmett to and from school and played with all them on the playground and indoors on a rainy day. I hoped we helped more than upset their new routine. 

After two weeks of rainy gray weather in Nebraska, I loved seeing the sun above the cloud cover. The travel angels shepherded us out to Connecticut. We encountered no flight delays even though our connection was in Atlanta the day Hurricane Michael swept ashore. Our hearts go out to those picking up the pieces in Florida and elsewhere. 

Perhaps it was a good omen when my knitting matched the color of the sky during the early morning take-off. I cast on socks just before we left. The free pattern with the easy mock cable motif down the leg is a nice uncomplicated diversion from plain stockinette. The sock yarn has a great hand and comes with generous yardage. I knit a sock and a half so this project will go with me to Texas in a week or so.

We arrived home to gorgeous autumn days. The Connecticut foliage was just beginning to turn, a little unusual for October in the Northeast. Today in Nebraska, the crimson maples, the rich golds and bright yellows against a bright blue sky lift my spirits as I miss the hugs and shoulder to shoulder time with Kate and her family. 

After the usual returning home chores and errands, I picked up Norah's Christmas stocking. She doesn't need the Christmas quilt until she is out of her crib but should have a stocking on the mantel this year. I ordered some new-to-me bobbins called E-Z Bobs. As long as I don't make them heavy with too much yarn, they work better. The plastic sides flip open and closed keeping the yarn securely wound. The old-style bobbins constantly unwound creating even more tangled yarn.

I must go out and enjoy this crisp fall day. We are going to pull the tomato and zinnia plants that froze while we were gone. The tomato party is over but the pumpkin spice season is in full swing. To everything there is a season . . .

Have a good weekend. 

Ordinary Days

Last night as I drifted off to sleep, the wind began to blow. Today promises to be warm, windy, and sunny. The wind matches my unsettled spirit. Although I try to separate from the cacophony of news coverage, I find it hard to ignore undercurrents of wide division. My feeble answer is to smile and offer courtesy to fellow citizens while savoring ordinary days. This week I joined good friends for coffee and dinner in addition to completing chores, errands, knitting, walking, and reading. Monday I came out of a store and noticed a large flock of migrating birds, perhaps sandhill cranes. I waited for them to pass overhead, hoping to hear their calls. The noise of vehicles and construction across the parking lot made that impossible. Somehow in spite of our strife, the birds respond to patterns of light and darkness in each season.

Late one night, I pulled an old favorite from my bookshelf. Louise Erdrich's Books and Islands in Ojibwe Country, published in 2003, is an account of a trip to Lake of the Woods in Southern Ontario. Traveling with her baby and the baby's father, an Ojibwe spiritual leader and guide, she "reads the islands like a book." (Erdrich, 2003) They also visit a fragile island housing Ojibwe artifacts and the large library of Ernest Oberholtzer. In 1912, Oberholtzer, an immigrant of German heritage and an Ojibwe man, Billy Magee, canoed and mapped an area bounded by Lake Winnipeg, Hudson Bay, and Reindeer Lake. As Erdrich reads the island paintings and visits the Oberholtzer cabin lined with books, she explores the question, "Books: why?" as well as the importance of language to the Ojibwe culture. Small beautiful illustrations by Erdrich accompany the text. Although I have read this book previously, I am enjoying her meditation on the North Woods, language, and Ojibwe culture.

Last week I cast on Norah's Christmas stocking but am waiting for another skein of red yarn. I am not interested in playing yarn chicken while knitting a good sized intarsia Christmas stocking. Even though the yarn will be a different dye lot, I plan to use it for knitting her name and the red parts of other small motifs. I found several yarn shops with an online presence still selling the Brown Sheep Lana Loft in sport weight. Now I wonder if it might have been better to order three skeins and just knit the entire stocking in the same dye lot. Time will tell.

While I wait for the yarn to arrive, I picked up scraps of Cotlin, the cotton linen yarn I use for wash cloths. Garter stitch is always a good idea. After knitting blanket squares, I am giving in to the siren call of mitered squares. I have used this yarn enough to be fairly certain it isn't going to fade. Fading and color bleeding has kept me from knitting a sock yarn blanket. That and the amount of knitting such projects require. I admire those of you who do make those blankets. Now I wonder if my leftovers of Chickadee by Quince and Co. would knit up into a scarf or small lap blanket of mitered squares. These squares are a rabbit hole but first I have some gift knitting to do. I plan to savor autumn but as sure as cranes fly south, Christmas will come. 

Today, I join Kat and the Unravelers. What do you read and make on an ordinary day?

      

A New Season

The Autumn Equinox marking the time of equal light and dark has come and gone. On September 21, the last day of summer, my daughter and husband delivered a healthy baby girl. She arrived safely via a scheduled C-section. Monday she and her Mom went home to her wonderful Dad and three big brothers who are lining up to "keep care of her." When I heard they were headed home, I suggested someone tell Norah to take a deep breath. She is loved to the moon and back. On her first evening at home, the family watched part of a televised baseball game and the five year old wanted to make sure she could see the game.

Our hearts are full of joy, wonder, love, and gratitude. I am so so thankful for this safe delivery and a new granddaughter to add to our fabulous four grandsons. Though as my daughter says, the celebration would have been the same for a little boy. The news came to us early Friday morning and by Friday evening she had a name, Norah Jane. The name Norah comes from a Hebrew word light, as in God created the light. I was surprised and honored beyond measure for her to carry my name. The name goes back at least four generations in our family. I have a niece with the same middle name. And so little Norah brings joy, love, and light to her family. 

While I was waiting for her birth last week, I knit toddler sized mittens and hat. Our new little gal has plenty of warm knits so I plan to donate this set in honor of her safe arrival. The color work was a bit of an experiment and worked out better in the hat than on the mittens. The mittens don't match perfectly although they are the same size. They are soft and snug and will keep a little one warm. I also finished this toddler sweater for later because babies grow. If this child had been a boy, this sweater would have been a gift for someone else. I will pick up three buttons this week.

While I "kept calm and knit on," I finished reading A Gentleman in Moscow. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing, character development and narrative of the novel. The writer's comments and asides to the reader were very well done and added to the story. I also read a few poems from Voices on the Air by Naomi Shihab Nye. Recently she read her poems on the podcast, "On Being." Nye and her work are remarkable in many ways. She works with young people around the world. If you need your spirits lifted, read or listen to Nye.

I am joining Kat and the Unravelers this week with my knitting and reading. Kat is working on a mitred cross blanket project, seaming together squares contributed by a group of knitters. Holy cow, that is a big project.

The season is changing. Norah has arrived. Monarchs are fluttering over the zinnia patch. Last week a pair of ruby crowned kinglets stopped in the birch on their way through. When the pesky squirrels aren't chewing on our deck, they scramble up the trees to pad their nests. Soon we will travel to meet little Norah and her family. All is well.

Watching and Waiting

On Monday my sister and I spent the day together. We planned to pick apples and share a picnic lunch. Although our apple picking wasn't the quintessential outing planned, we had a nice day. I had missed the notice on the orchard website stating they were closed on Mondays. Even so, the owners graciously let us pick and buy apples. The recent hot weather and above average rainfall made for abundant apples and mosquitoes. Although we dressed in long sleeves, long pants, and hats, they swarmed around us. I used a little insect repellant (I hate the stuff) on my neck and around the bottom of my pant legs but it didn't phase them at all. We picked as fast as we could and took our picnic lunch home to eat indoors. The apples are tart, crisp, and delicious. We escaped without bites. Thank goodness as West Nile Virus is reported in the area.

Mosquitoes or not, we chatted away about our knitting and our families. Naturally we talked about the baby my daughter will deliver any day. We are eager to welcome this new little child. Though there is no reason to expect anything but a safe delivery, I am a little anxious. My sister, who knows exactly what I need to hear, remarked, "We will knit this baby safely into the world." So we shall. I used to tell my son nearly the same thing when he went to school in Laramie, Wyoming. He thought nothing of setting off at 5:00 p.m. and driving home through the night. I usually talked to him before I went to bed and would tell him I was knitting him safely home. That winter I knit him a sweater. One winter evening, I knit so furiously I overshot the body length by ten inches.

My sister and I are knitting this week while watching and waiting for Baby Coconut. Last week I reknit the infamous mitten, managing to get the cable and thumb in the correct place. I ripped out the rose colored shawl and cast on in yet another pattern but will create Ravelry notes when I know it is a go. Yesterday I needed some easy knitting so I cast on a baby hat. I don't have a pattern. I adapted the color work from a free mitten pattern and am using a tape measure frequently. I plan to knit matching mittens.

I am thoroughly enjoying A Gentleman in Moscow. The story "shows instead of tells" as the main character creates an interesting life in spite of house arrest in a hotel. Call me old fashioned but the characters' good manners and courtesy are refreshing. The writing, dotted with sly humor and asides to the reader, is excellent.

Linking with Kat and the Unravelers today.  I am looking forward to see what others are knitting and reading.  Then I am off to make some applesauce.

Summer's End

I walk in my neighborhood all year long. Each season brings its treasures. This summer I saw the wildflower, Hibiscus trionum, tucked in around the bottom of a street light pole. The plant is commonly called "Flower-of-an Hour" because it blooms for a short period in the morning. The stem is prickly but the cream flower with the maroon center and yellow stamen is beautiful. Blue jays flew from tree to tree with their familiar shrieks. They seemed to be checking in with each other. "I am here. Where are you?"  "I am just down the street." All summer the trees do a yeoman's work absorbing noise, dust, and carbon dioxide while giving back green color, shade, and shelter. When we moved into this subdivision in 1991, the area was being developed. Newly planted saplings now provide bountiful shade. As summer ends, the vibrant greens fade. The trees begin to let go of leaves, following a natural rhythm. 

Whether the life cycle of a tree is long or cut short by disease or storm, losing one is hard. Trees are lovingly attended on the Great Plains. Willa Cather once remarked, "Trees were so rare in this country we used to feel anxious about them." Thousands of ash trees grow in southeast Nebraska. All of them are threatened by the emerald ash borer beetle. The landscape will look very different without the ash. As I understand it, chemical treatment may extend the life of the tree for five to ten years but eventually the tree will die. The poison treatments damage the tree and need to be repeated. We don't have an ash in our yard so don't have to decide whether to remove or treat a mature tree. I understand it is a tough call. I venture into controversy when I wonder: What are the long term effects of the chemicals on ground water, or the birds that shelter in the trees, nearby pollinators, or children who play in the soil underneath the canopy? What conditions created the ability of this insect to thrive? I don't know the answers but I think the long view is worth considering.

These ideas are on my mind as summer nears its end and I unravel my knitting. I am knitting swatches and then unraveling them. I knit loosely so achieving correct gauge can be a challenge. I'd like to knit the sweater Archer. Both stitch and row gauge are critical for shaping the yoke of the sweater. I have modified patterns based on a different gauge but the construction method of this sweater makes modifications seem quite daunting. Monday evening I ripped out and reknit the thumb gusset on the second mitten. Last night I knit on the mitten only to discover the cable was two stitches too wide and ran up the side (instead of the center!) of the hand. What was I thinking when I set up the pattern on this mitten?! I unraveled it and went to bed to read A Gentleman in Moscow. I've only just begun this novel but am enjoying it. Reading about the gentle kind intelligent man is a treat.

Linking with Kat and the Unravelers today as  I leave you with a poem I wrote over the course of three summers of walking. Who knows I may unravel and work on it again next summer.

Morning Walk

Walking with knives and forks clattering

in my mind, I sink into the stretch of my calf.

Air conditioners hum as the sole

of my shoe scuffs the pavement.

I nod to a runner. Chickadee calls.

Cardinal marks his territory.

I pause under trees, compare

canopy of pear, linden, and ash. 

Beneath a maple I plant my feet,

breathe into side ribs.

Rib to vein, vein to spine, breath

from breath, I meet another.

Jane A. Wolfe Copyright 2018

 

Hello September

Heavy rain fell on southeast Nebraska over Labor Day weekend. The coming week looks to be just as soggy. No matter, I had a lovely birthday weekend filled with phone calls, FaceTime, flowers, and many birthday wishes. My husband brought me a sweet red and white bouquet and the Connecticut team sent very September-ish flowers. My sister knit me a pair of beautiful cozy socks.

Our son, Aaron was here for his annual Fantasy Football draft with friends so having him was an extra treat. Although the weather was warm and muggy, he and I decided a soup supper was in order. We made a pot of chili and semmel, a family recipe for a German hard roll. Although the rolls are made from basic ingredients of flour, water, yeast, and salt, the ratio of flour to water varies with the brand of flour and the day. The best way to learn is to apply one's own elbow grease and experience the heft of the sticky dough under a wooden spoon. After the dough rises it is dropped in big clumps onto a well seasoned cookie sheet to bake at a high heat. The well seasoned, battered up cookie sheet is another factor in getting the outer crispness of the bread just right. Sunday was a good day for his semmel making lesson.

This hard roll comes down from my Dad's family. My grandmother and her sisters, as well as other cousins in the same community, stirred the dough up on Saturday evenings and then baked semmel for breakfast before Sunday church. I imagine Grandma Catherine learned to make semmel from her mother. These hardy rolls supported hard working farmers and their families. My Mom learned to make them and added poppy seeds to the top so I do the same. My siblings and families like them with soup or breakfast. My Connecticut grandchildren call them "Grammy Bagels." Every family member has their preferred topping - butter, cheese, jelly, peanut butter, or honey on a warm semmel. The second and third day after baking (if they last that long) they are a little tough but quite good when buttered and warmed under the broiler. Sunday evening, the three of us ate a few and I sent the rest home with Aaron. I didn't think to take photos but loved being shoulder to shoulder with him in the kitchen. He is a great cook so I have no doubt he can make these at home.

Sunday evening I finished two mitered blanket squares that will be part of two blankets for cancer patients. A number of bloggers are making squares. My skills in picking up stitches have improved since I knit one square twice. The pattern is a bit of a puzzle. I just had to trust and follow the directions and guess what? Designers know how to write patterns. This one is written quite clearly. The squares are blocking and may take a bit longer than usual to dry in this weather. After I weave in the ends, I'll send them to Kat who, bless her, is sewing them together and knitting the edging.

While knitting on the blanket squares, I listened to two Mary Russell mysteries, Locked Rooms and The God of the Hive. The mitered squares will forever remind me of this September weekend, stirring up semmel with Aaron, and the Russell and Holmes stories. This series by Laurie King, is a spin-off from the Sherlock Holmes stories. I have read some of them - out of order - as they were available from the library. I love the library but I get a little annoyed when part of a series is missing. I haven't read or listened to this series for awhile so it was fun to return. The series begins around 1915. Mary Russell, a smart independent woman, marries Holmes and together they travel the world, have adventures, and solve mysteries.

Yesterday I played around with a sweater swatch to no avail and then picked up mittens and knit on them. Someone can always use a pair of mittens. This yarn was to be part of a scrap blanket that I am not very enthused about knitting. The project has been sitting in the basket in a closet all year. I may reclaim the unused yarn for other knitting, most likely mittens and hats. The main color of the afghan isn't in my favorite palette of blue/gray/purple/sage green.

Linking with Kat and the Unravelers on this first week of a new month. Hello September.