My remarkable week

The week is remarkable only because I am making remarks upon it. It is Sunday, the last day or the first, depending on point of view. As irritating as I find that hashtag, POV, it was relevant there. So far today I've had breakfast (a poached egg on an English muffin). learned both the Guardians and the Cavs won yesterday and started my laundry.

Yesterday, Saturday, was interesting. As the morning progressed, I grew colder and colder. Eventually I checked the thermostat and found it blank. I opened the little door and saw two triple A batteries. Bonanza, I knew I had some (of indeterminate age). 

I fiddled with the two batteries in the thermostat and managed to light up the screen once to find it had defaulted to "Off". The room temp read 64, and when I pushed the temp button, it began at 52. I got it up to "my" setting, 72. On the way up, the heater came on.

My replacement batteries did not work, of course. I called the front desk, and began explaining the problem to Cathy, a lovely woman but not the best in analytics. I explained why I needed two new batteries. "I'll bring them right up and put it on your statement." I explained why I preferred not to pay. 

"Ooooohhhhhh................." Long intermission while she explained to a bystander why there was no work order for Monday, and she was taking up "stock", not "maintenance." Fast forwarding to the conclusion, within an hour or ninety minutes, I had reliable heat again.

I've been weaving. My first "maze" attempt was laughable, so I pulled it out and began threading up a new pattern. The threads feeding into the heddles now are a tangled mess, but the warp is dwindling down, so I'll go back and comb them occasionally.

So, I threaded this maze, and wove essentially one complete diamond. This pattern is fascinating. not what I was expecting In this drawdown I see all the escape paths. On the fabric I see expanding pools, like a stone in a pond. I think I need a heavier weft to approximate the drawdown, but I don't have it, so pools it is.

And finally, I took Rose for a haircut. So much excitement at the old folks home! We were an hour early, because I was trapped by digital time. Laura should have been here to laugh at me. The appointment was 1:45, but in spite of Rose's best effort, I could not get my "quarter of's" straight. 

Since I was the ride and Rose wanted her hair cut, she played along., right up to not laughing or saying "I told you!" when we pulled in and I suddenly grasped the error. When Rose made her next appointment, I insisted it be a whole number. Next haircut for Rose is May 31st, at 1:00 pm.

My week in review

In reverse, yesterday I had a visit from Ann. She came for lunch yesterday and left just before supper. In four or five hours we discussed all the problems of the world, as well as our own. We solved none. We have not seen each other except for an on the fly visit immediately pre-pandemic. Yesterday was a wonderful time.

Toward the end of the week I visited the quilt show at Lake Farmpark. I took Jane, a quilting friend who lives a few doors down, and we met Ruth, who needs no introduction. Or, as I explained to Jane, "We are the world's most fortunate mothers-in-law."

Ruth and I have visited this annual show many times in the past, but the last time was also just before the Covid lock down. In fact, there may have been no show this past two or three years. Ruth arrived a few minutes before Jane and I, and met us at the door. "Joanne, we have never seen anything like this." Indeed, we hadn't.

The next is a vintage, hand appliqued and hand quilted entry. I can visualize it gracing a child's bed for many years. It certainly could have been on my childhood bed. Following it is a picture of the description given it by the person who entered it.

Ruth and I always have a little competition. We compare notes at the end of seeing the show and see which one we would pick "to take home." This year I picked the following, a small wall hanging. I could be very happy looking at these little birds all day.

There were close to two hundred quilts entered. I've missed one or two of the photos I took. I like clean looking quilts, and see I generally took pictures of very busy quilts. My sister quilted several quilts I took notice of, and one of the ones she quilted was so dark I wondered how she could see the work to quilt it. Can't find that picture.

And finally, because it probably was the last in my lifetime, The Eclipse!

We had an absolutely stunning day to view a total eclipse! It was warm, the breeze was light, and the chairs comfy. 

True Confessions

Where have I been? Under a rock! What have I done? Laid on my back, stretched out my arms. Wiggled my toes and ankles. I actually had a dream about doing that; lying in something warm and encompassing, wiggling all of myself, settling in. Then I guess I woke up. 

In the midst of housekeeping last Tuesday, I rashly asked Diana to fold up the top quilt, put it in the basket and stow it on the shelf. And now spring has fled. It even snowed yesterday. Temps are in the forties, day and night. Blah. Plus chilly, but I can't reach the shelf, and spreading out the quilt is too much. 

The parking lot trees are blushing. This redbud hasn't long to go. I showed the picture to Rose, and her first comment was "No cars!" Right she is. That is busy state highway 43 out there, and I watched cars going left and right for some time before I tapped the shutter. There are cars out of frame, left and right.

Weaving has occurred possibly half an hour some days. I'm tired of Whig Rose, and ready to rethread for a maze type pattern. I have several in mind, but I think I'll select one that has an escape route. But there are so many others. And here is one other, not a maze, but enticing. I'll put it in the que.

It needs to visually sparkle, but how to make it do so. That is my conundrum. And in the meantime, I shuffle along.

Beth and Ruth came for my birthday last week, carrying a very heavy shopping bag. After some brief preliminaries, Ruth flung open my freezer door and began inserting pints of ice cream. Seven, to be exact. I've thrown away two empties, so far.

Last Wednesday, in the middle of yoga class, my phone rang. I grabbed my shoes and hurried out to talk to Ruth. She wanted me to know, with apologies, I would find one of the cartons half gone.

While we were at it, we arranged for next Thursday to go to Lake Farm Park for the quilt show. We've gone often in the last many years. In the beginning I walked, then a cane, then two. Now I use a walker, unabashedly. People often hold open a door for me. If they cut me off, well, their mother did a poor job of raising them!

What beauty

How can such small steps take so long? Friday I had the entire day to myself. No appointments to keep. Yet it took me the entire day to wind on four bouts. Part of that was the error I made thinking I could salvage the thread I tediously chained off from the back of the loom. I think, had I been my mother or grandmother, it could have happened.

The tangles and tedium did not frustrate me. I patiently combed out the mess, a turn at a time. Then I came to two broken threads with no matching ends. That did it. I admitted there was no using the old thread. It went in the trash; I set up the spool rack and turned on three of the four bouts by dinner. After dinner I turned on the forth and last, cleaned up the area and fell into bed.

Saturday I threaded heddles and sleyed the reed. I could have worked faster, but to what end. I ached all over. I left the weaving to today, after the laundry. And look what I have!

The pattern is named Whig Rose, and it is a lot of shuttle throwing. Here is the completed block:

I wondered if I'd put an extra petal in the first rose, and when I came out at the other end, I see I did. Oh well. It's not a mistake in the draft, it's a case of overenthusiastic weaving. I won't do it again, but it's quite harmless here.

The pattern is a two hundred plus year old coverlet weaving pattern. The Whig Rose is linked to the American Whig party of Andrew Johnson, which was a precursor to Abraham Lincoln's Republican party. However, the pattern did not acquire the name Whig Rose until the twentieth century depression. We won't go into the name of the party of Lincoln.

The pattern originally was called the Democratic Rose, and goes back to the seventeenth century British Whigs opposing the power of the monarch and attempting to increase the power of Parliament. King Charles II lost his head in the short lived attempt.

This scarf will be a couple inches narrower than my blooming leaf scarf. I'm looking forward to that; I want a narrow scarf. I also believe I've found candidates to model this version. Stay tuned.

The new Instagram

I decided to get with the times and be back on Instagram. The last time I used it, three or four years ago, it was clumsy and inappropriate for me. It didn't go with my flow. As I remember, I had to post a picture from my phone and go back with my computer to leave any text. That is because I am not a phone typer. In fact, any type lettering on my phone occurs via my spoken voice.

First I asked the internet how to be rid of some of those old photos. That was a piece of cake. I did it via my PC no less. And all the new photos went up the same way. Somehow people are notified, or else just find new stuff they follow, the same as scrolling through Facebook every day, or whenever.

The biggest change I saw is that the whole platform now resembles Facebook. There is a menu down the side to select a way to look at Instagram. Not so great, in my opinion, are all the ads in the "Home" section. That's like FB, and worse. I'll have to read how to get rid of them. Well, for better or worse, I'm back on Instagram, for my weaving. 

And that is to the end of the line. I'm amusing myself, seeing how many inches I can get from one thread. You remember the mess I left myself to work with.

On the left are a couple of "full" bouts, taped down so they don't fly away. To the right are some of the central bouts I was weaving from. They are close to gone. Down to bare wood are the tail end of a bout I'm both chaining off and weaving from, and a bout that I cut away, except the one thread I am using. There seem to be four turns left, but a lot of that length is "loom waste"; the distance from the tie on cord, over the back beam, through the heddles, etc. I have an eighty inch long scarf woven so far, and I think there will be about ten more inches.

And just so you know I have a real life, here is Rose, as the two geriatric ladies embark on another outing.

Next time I'll have her take the picture, so you know we both went.