An Empty Space at RiverWools

This is the space where the Galaxy Roads freeform hat once resided.

It now resides on Holly's head:

It doesn't get much better than a day when I'm sitting in RiverWools and get to overhear nice stuff about my work, and then get to see something I'm very fond of get a new home with someone I'm very fond of. Thanks, Holly!!

Two Tri-Loom Shawls

(Note: I added my mom's obituary to the "My Mom" post below. It took me awhile to write it...)

I finally finished two shawls I've been working on for ages. Both were made on small continuous weave looms.

The first is in Noro Silk Garden . I used 3 different Hazel Rose looms: 12" square and tri, and 7" tri. (Remember HR tri-looms are sized according to the sides rather than hypotenuse, so they can be matched up with the other shapes.)

The final shawl is very different than the one I started out to make, which was going to be a large triangle composed of squares and triangles. Instead, because of issues with the neck and drape, I wound up working in an improvisational way and ended up with this shape:


which sits very nicely on the shoulders and has an almost jacket-like appearance.When I first began putting the pieces together, my intention was to set the squares on point, with three forming the base of the triangle and then filling in with a row of triangles across the top. Somehow I decided that I liked the look of the central part you see below (2 tri's at the bottom, two squares at the top),
but discovered that the squares did not sit right at the neck and puckered and looked awful. This resulted in my making 7" tri's and gathering the squares just a bit to fit along the edges of those tri's, and then doing an interesting join between 2 12" triangles and one of the 7" triangles:


I edged each piece with a round of single crochet and joined with mattress stitch through the back loop of each sc. The whole shawl was edged with a round of single crochet and a round of slip stitch. I did not attempt to match edging colors, just used the Silk Garden color flow as it came.

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And here is the Forest Floor Shawl, which was started in the fall of 2006, finally finished. It languished in all-but-a-few-loose-ends state for months. I don't think I'll ever understand why so many of my UFOs wind up being virtually finished but for a wee bit of work left.
Quoting from my earlier entry while this was in progresss:

"It's made of small woven triangles in Noro Blossom, joined in a freeform fashion, with areas of
freeform crochet in the same Blossom. I'm also using some Noro Silk Mountain, for the edging and here and there in the body.

My guiding vision is of a shawl sort of magically whirled together out of all the leaves and twigs and seed pods and bits of bark on a forest floor."

I talked my yarn shop friend Jennifer into modeling for me. As you can see, the shawl either requires or inspires a bit of dramatic flair on the part of the wearer.

I swear....I shall wear this in public as soon as the weather becomes shawlish rather than longjohnish. (and a gentle pooh-pooh to the lady who said, 'but...but, there are HOLES in it!')

My Mom

Our hands, February 9, 2008

On Valentine's Day, my mom was granted her peace at last, after the long, hard road she walked with Alzheimer's (though the diagnosis while she lived was Lewy Body Dementia). I had the great, exhausting blessing of being able to be with her a lot during these last weeks and days. I'm sick with a terrible cold, and I'm a bit numb emotionally. The years of dementia were intense, these weeks of her dying even moreso.

I know she's free and at peace. And I think I am at peace, too.
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I'm editing this on 2/24/2008 to add the obituary I was finally able to write and put in the paper today (and editing again to reflect the post-mortem findings of Alzheimer's):
George-Anna Harbeson Carter, formerly of Coral Gables, Florida and Sylva, North Carolina, passed away on Valentines’ Day, 2008 after walking the treacherous path of Alzheimer's dementia.

George-Anna was a free spirit, a kind and generous friend, a devoted and loving mother and wife. Married for 37 years to John Channing Carter, Jr. (Chan), she raised three children: Suzanne Carter of Terre Haute, Indiana, Michael Carter of Orlando, Florida and George-Anna Lovett of Sylva, North Carolina. Her grandchildren are Ian and Shaun Hussey, their wives Lisa and Deann, Molly and Patrick Burkett, Eli Boston and Justin, Michael and Channing Lovett. Her great-grandchildren are Sophia Hussey and Raven Renn. Her husband and grandson Patrick preceded her in death.

Born in 1923 in Louisville Kentucky to Suzanne Danforth Peaslee Harbeson and George T. Harbeson, George-Anna spent her childhood between her father’s flower farm in College Hill, Ohio and a home in Coral Gables, Florida.

From her adored father, she inherited a love of nature and of writing. She began publishing her work as a child, in local newspapers and in booklets she and her father printed on a small press in their garage. Later, her numerous publications included poems, personal essays and photographs in the Christian Science Monitor, Good Housekeeping and Reader’s Digest.

Writing was her lifelong passion and when we were grown, she began to teach creative writing in continuing education courses at Miami-Dade Community College, Florida International University and the University of Miami.

She summered each year in North Carolina and started the creative writing group at the Golden Age Club in Sylva, a group that is celebrating its 2oth anniversary this year. She found enormous personal satisfaction in helping others find their writing talents and numerous people became published authors through her encouragement.

She loved to travel and meet new people. She was full of stories and told them in enchanting descriptive detail. Cheerful and bustling, she was unfailingly generous with her time, resources, and, above all, a love which was supportive and unconditional. Her childlike faith in the goodness and beauty of the world was inspirational.

Her unconventional soul was both the bane and delight of our existence. She took us shelling at midnight low tide, broke into public singing, made s’mores over candles and let us read while eating. She knew the names of plants and the calls of birds and from her we learned the ineffable joy of clouds and sky, and saw poetry in tiny flowers most people overlook.

Once someone asked each of us who we thought was Mom’s favorite child. And each of answered, “Me!!!”

She was a wonderful long-distance grandma and her Christmas in July packages were remarkable for their abundance of odd gifts and for the enormous amount of duct tape wrapping.

The best way to honor George-Anna would be to tell someone you love them, hug a friend, smile at a stranger, dance with daffodils.

We have missed you for a long time, Mom, and we believe you finally have the abiding peace you so richly deserve. Love, love, love, Susie, Mike and Georgie

3rd Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading

Once again, I'm participating in this blogosphere poetry event, dedicated to Brigid
great Celtic goddess who watches over poetry, among other things. Details of this annual event here.

For my contribution, I'd like to share my collection of ee cummings poems and lines with the word "yes" in them, followed by a poem of my own.

POEMS AND LINES BY ee cummings WITH THE WORD YES IN THEM


I imagine that yes is the only living thing.

------------------------------

"i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;
and for everything
which is natural
which is infinite which is yes"

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love's to giving as to keeping's give;
as yes is to if,love is to yes

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yes is a pleasant country:
if's wintry
(my lovely)
let's open the year

both is the very weather
(not either)
my treasure,
when violets appear

love is a deeper season
than reason;
my sweet one
(and april's where we're)

-----------------------------------------
love is a place
& through this place of
love move
(with brightness of peace)
all places

yes is a world
& in this world of
yes live
(skillfully curled)
all worlds
----------------------------

MINDFUL HOUSE

In a little rock house
on an empty beach

pairs of pure white curtains
flutter from open windows,

pale gestures of mute obeisance
to the wind in the briney air

while

a sprig of thyme
is rubbed and released
over salted red tomato wheels
on a dark blue plate

where

the only sound is ceaseless
susurration of sea

and the light!
the light is full
of water.

the light is holy


Here the dark blue plate has always
been cracked, will never
be repaired

and the wind wanders endlessly
in and out dancing
with the curtains,
unsettled as a ghost--
unsettling--
shimmying over the face
of the whole
earth.

and my soul sings in this place,
whispers like wings
in this place I can never seek
but only find
where light is holy
always
and always life
is a moment:

blue plate.

tomato.

thyme.

-- Zann Carter (2002)
---------------------------

blessed be...may there be mindfulness and many yeses in our lives!
Zann

Wild Spinning, Freeform Hat

Just wrote my second-ever review on Amazon - for this book, Intertwined, by Lexi Boeger of Pluckyfluff. Here it is: (I gave it a 5-star-I-love-it rating)

"When I realized that Amazon was sending me TWO copies of this book because I managed to pre-order it twice, I was a bit perturbed. Then I got the book. It is such a beautifully done book, both in content and in the appearance of book itself (that pink cloth spine pleases me to no end), that I decided I didn't mind being "stuck" with two copies. I wasn't stuck for long, however, because when I showed it to a sister spinner, she wanted it immediately.

An earlier reviewer mentioned that much of the spinning information was covered in the author's first book, and that is somewhat true. But that first book is far more expensive and has much less content than this one.

This book has instructions for spinning wild yarns, projects that use those yarns, is loaded with photographs and has some wonderful text. I especially love the Spinner's Journal chapter, and the section devoted to the freeform crochet work of Ana Voog. I was delighted to see a two page piece written by one of my favorite fiber artist bloggers, Jacey Boggs.
[note: I could have linked over her name, but I love writing the name of her blog: Insubordiknit]

For those who tend to take off on their own, who tweak patterns to suit their own style and work methods, who like freeform work and play with fiber, this book provides ample, well-illustrated instructions and an abundance of inspiration. ---Zann Carter"
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So, inspired, I decided to use this fine singles leftover after plying:

and paired it with some lovely hand-dyed roving from Deb :

and one of my many containers of bits and pieces snipped as I knit:
to get a chunky yarn that is looking like this:
It is slow going, but at the best times, there is a certain frame of mind that I get into, and if I lay out the bits and pre-draft, I can do it with a kind of Tai Chi slowness that is flowing and meditative.
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I'm pleased to have finished a hat that I started months ago. It has actually been sitting here for most of that time in a state so close to finished I cannot believe I didn't do it sooner! Just a wee bit to fill in a space that needed filling in and less than a dozen ends to tuck in....

The hat started with this scrumble (and I'm having a kind of memory of actually writing about this hat before....), created for the Women's Artistic Soul yahoo group exchange:

I liked the colors so much, I made more and more scrumbles, added a few new yarns and then began putting them together. This is the first time I safety-pinned the scrumbles together and worked on a homemade hat form. It was a great way to work and made the process of putting-together so much easier. The bottom band was made separately in one piece.

Here is one view of the hat, along with the yarns I used...some Noro Kureyon, Naturespun sport weight, Twinkletoes sock yarn, Harrisville tweed (Highland??, something discontinued I got on eBay ages ago), Jojoland sock and maybe a Trekking sock (all the sock yarns I use doubled.)
I like to name my hats and scarves and shawls.
So far the name of this is "In the Green, In the Blue, Always Thinking of You."

Colors are showing up a little dark, as I fulled it a bit and just couldn't wait until it dried to take a picture!
Here's another view:
That styrofoam head is a little small - on an actual head, it is much more cap-like and snug to the head, rather than having a brim.

It's a good day to be inside, fulling caps and spinning:
and getting up every 15 minutes to let Clover in or out:
When she's in, she's peering out the back window, thinking she wants to be out romping in the snow and when she's out, she remembers she'd rather be inside where it's warm....

a slave to my dog-being friend,
Zann