It's Sunday morning, and Blogger is letting me post again. Mid-corrie and all. Blogger hasn't let me log in since V-day, which is a shame as I had some thankyous to post! I also had the workshop blogs to update. A note to my students and muffins, class notes shall be up later today. Remember to comment and let me know how you're getting on.


Watching Coronation Street just now, I'm realizing that I may have found my next series of crocheted dollies: I shall do Vera and Fred first. Dev and Fizz soon after. Of course it would be fun to have Baldwin vs. Barlow action figures. Then I shall turn my hand to my American Stories. What the world clearly needs is a crocheted Erica Kane and assorted husbands. (hee hee with two adams, travis, and dimitris for double marriages).

Every Sunday morning I like to pretend I live on the street. If I did I'd spend everyday in Roy's Rolls or the Rovers, work at Underworld, (I feel like I do already, but it would be nice to have Danny to make the occasional knicker snicker) and Rita would be my best mate.

I've already crocheted my Saturday Morning. Here's Yam Roll!

ooops almost forgot:
Soundtrack: My kick@ss Lindsey Buckingham station on Pandora.

The yarn to continue my Bavarian Cardi won't arrive for a while so I've cast on for Kaffe Fassett's Brocade from Rowan Magazine 38 (which I got for christmas!). I am such a big fan of Rowan Magazines and this is my first copy. Like many many people I think the magazines are over styled and I often have trouble figuring out *what* exactly I'm looking at ie which part of the outfit is the knitted article. I also think they are ridiculously priced.
Oh, but gosh, they're pretty!
I drop a lot of money on magazines each month and think that if Rowan Magazines were priced as, say, architecture or some fine arts magazines are, I would pick them up even if I didn't knit. hint hint
.
I also received Rowan's "Vintage Style". Both came from Gwin Gryffon, one of my favourite places in Downtown Kingston. Soooo beautiful. It's impeccably styled by Kim Hargreaves herself, which I thought was v.impressive. Also v.impressive is the delightful 'Charlie'. Charlie is a man who knows how to wear a sweater. I think it's something you're born with. Charlie is also a hat person. Two for Two. I shall need to find a Charlie2 before I move to the country, knit everything in this book (from my own sheep that Charlie2 tends to), and live in what the locals refer to as 'the manor' where I make assorted spiked jams and jellies in pumps and heavy circle skirts. That's me smouldering behind Charlie2. He forgot to feed Peregrine Took the Alpaca again, and he hasn't even noticed the Tyrollean details or embroidery on my Sweater. Even in my fantasies Men are useless about some things.


Sans Charlie 1 or 2, I will be spending Valentine's Day trudging up to Le Marchant St Thomas where I'm teaching a lunchtime knitting course. We began last week and are going to have lots of fun! Everyone has knit before, so we will be tackling some things I didn't think we'd get to; cables, intarsia, circular knitting...yeehaw!
I think it will be a perfectly acceptable way to spend Valentine's...although if I were to fall in love again on the way there...well that would be nice too. He just better notice my sweater.

Soundtrack: "Deep Henderson", King Oliver And His Dixie Syncopators

The other night I busily grabed a little notebook and a pen and tried to bang out as many missed Illustration Friday topics as possible. Here we go. Last week's 'sprout', along with 'buzz', 'smitten', 'smoke', 'peace', and 'might'. Now I'm up to date and can do this week's topic 'crash' with a little more time and thought.






"(Honey, Baby, Hurry!) Bring Your Sweet Self Back To Me", Lefty Frizzell

I would Love to knit this. However, working all that plain creamy oatmeal stockinette at such a tiny gauge would probably send me into instantgratification overdrive and my entire apartment would be cozied. (actually, that sounds attractive-like l'Homme de Verre in Amelie but with multicoloured phentex.) At any rate I think I'll buy a long sweater, felt it down a bit and then embroider/kitchener stitch on top of it. It reminds me of Karin and Carl Larsson's work.

Carl Larsson, Suzanne and Another, 1901

I'd like to think it's something Karin would have knit. Did she knit? I don't know. She did a lot of needlework and designed her own dresses. Lately I've been musing about what various artists would knit were they so inclined. For instance, Zinaida Serebryakova. Would she have knit? What would she have made?
Zinaida Serebryakova, At the Dressing-Table, 1909

It's near fact that she would have been trained in some needlework and I would think that making her own textiles would have appealed to her sensibilities.

Just think of all the women (and men in many cultures) who, before they became famous for whatever fabulous thing they ended up doing, practised needle arts either out of necessity, nicety or simply because it was the thing to do.
I'm sure that in countless attics, hope chests and other secret places, there lurk works from the mundane to the inspired created by great artists of other genres, and spheres quite removed from those of textiles or homemaking. It's quite a practical assumption when you think about it. Interestingly, the first examples that spring to mind share a second link: social commentary and political rebellion through fine textile work. Gandhi's campaign of spinning and weaving, and Mary Queen of Scots' courtly embroidery skills which she put to good use in the tower.

Edit: This is not from the Marian Hanging, but yes, the Ginger Cat is Ginger for a reason. ooooo, catty! Non Inferiora Secutus!

Soundtrack: "The Tower", Stevie Nicks