1.15.2016

Old Orchard...

[having survived the recent biological onslaught, i want to get back to my original plan of talking a bit more about the three yarns pictured in the first post of this year-long exercise in self-inflicted torture. enjoy!]

a strange thing happened on a recent trip to my local yarn shop. i should begin by saying that this is a shop much like similar establishments that cater to my people. once you step through the doors, even the most experienced fiberista can't help but feeling a bit overwhelmed by the magic of the place.  it's as if the whole world is suddenly filled with color and infinite possibility. your heart skips a few beats, and it takes the pulse straining against the side of your neck to remind you to breathe. seriously, it's that wonderful.

so, there i was, walking up to the register with an armload of yarn (cause i didn't already have enough of it at home to last at least two very long lifetimes). i deposit my items on the counter, and find myself face to face with the shop's proprietress, a woman who usually reminds me of my calico kitty as they both tend toward a demeanor that screams "we are not amused". however, unlike my cat (who's skill set peaks at keeping the arm of the couch warm), this woman is a walking encyclopedia of all things fiber-related.  you could enter the shop, describe a knitted item you saw in a random magazine, and she will not only know the name of the pattern and the designer, but she will walk you over to the section of the shop that houses the exact same type of yarn used in the sample, pointing out at least half a dozen alternatives along the way... all of that without having to look up a single thing. i'm pretty certain one has to master all 35 chambers of Shaolin before achieving this degree of prowess.  but i digress...

so, there i was, enduring the minute or more of silence while she sorts through my purchases (i don't do small talk, neither does she, so the silence suits me fine), when i recall the ball of yarn in my purse that i'd brought along in hopes of finding something that would go with it for a striped cardigan.  i start fumbling through my bag and absentmindedly pull out a different yarn that'd been lurking in the bottom of said purse for countless months and place it on the counter... then it happened.

it was as if all the universe came to a sudden halt.  she paused the steady rhythm of entering numbers into the register, gave a quick sideways glance to her assistant who was standing a few feet away, then both their gazes darted back to the yarn. "you dyed this", she asked, and i replied, "yes", my attention once again focused on searching through the crowded bag. i look up at this point and realize that she has my yarn in her hand, her assistant has drawn up to her side, and they are both studying it like one would a recently-unearthed treasure... and she's smiling!!!  and in that moment—in that fraction of a speck of time—it felt good to be reminded that i can occasionally get something right.

the yarn in question was part of the massive marathon of dyeing i did a couple summers ago.  i have a hard time letting go of my own yarns, so most of that fiber was either buried away in moth-proof packaging or put on display in my wall-of-cans. [the cans are currently packed away in one of the large boxes occupying much of the floor space in the studio, where they will remain until we get around to finally painting the apartment (which will happen as soon as we stop changing our minds about the color scheme), but that's a subject for some other day].  the colorway is Old Orchard—named for one of the streets that abuts our neighborhood park. i was undecided as to whether i should use that particular combination to dye pre-spun yarn or unspun fiber... so i did a bit of both. [the fabric they're laying on is destined to be made into cafe-style curtains for the kitchen window, which will happen once i figure out which box contains the sewing machine... and which one contains the collection of threads].



the yarn to the front/left is the subject of the above-mentioned shopkeeper's delight, while the one to the back/right was from the fiber i (finally) spun up a month (or two) ago and plied on Christmas Day (hey, how else was i supposed to test out the new jumbo flyer???). it's really fascinating to see how differently the same dye process behaves when applied to different fiber preparations.  the finer yarn may one day become a pair of socks, while the thicker yarn is almost certainly destined for life as some sort of neck-warming device... or they may end up displayed in cans for years to come, inspiring me to dye more beautiful things.



in other news, it is still cold.  after a couple days of above-zero temperatures, the numbers took a nose-dive back into the minus teens range.  the feels like temperature bottomed out this week at around -18°C (for my fellow-Americans, that translates to very cold, which is only one step down from stupid cold, which is anything lower than -30°C ). it's pretty much been life-as-usual around these parts. mama kitty is still working hard to keep that blanket warm...



we toyed with the idea of doing a meatless Mercredi [pictures are fuzzy due to tummy rumbling]...



but sanity prevailed, and it turned into wings Wednesday. in my defense, i only ate two of those wings, but they were all gone by the next morning...



and i found some pears and blueberries lurking in the back of the fridge, so i made an upside-down pear cake... with blueberries.  smiles and happiness all around.  cheers!


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