And now it’s February of the new year. I spent the last month taking inventory and getting my myself organized in Notion, which was also a way to prioritize where I’m headed this year. It was a great exercise, and now I’m implementing what I discovered about my work.
I am halfway through my time onboard this winter and so I’ve begun to plan what I’ll do when I get home. If you set aside small projects like knitting or spinning or embroidery, you can continue to work on other projects. You change the bobbin on your spinning wheel, or get out another drop spindle. Same for knitting. You put the knitted item away, get out more yarn, more needles and off you go on another knitting project. This has gotten me in loads of trouble over the years–no, wait! Over the decades. I have knitting projects that might have passed 20 years since I filed them away.
Weaving projects can be set aside, but you can’t move forward with a loom until you weave off the fabric. Some of us have multiple looms, but none of us can set aside nearly as many weaving projects as we can with other handwork. I have the rest of my sashiko warp waiting for me at home. Lucikly, I’m still enthralled with it and look forward to weaving the rest of that fabric. I am also very much looking forward to putting on a warp for double weave huck once the sashiko is off the loom. Cally Booker’s workshop on double weave huck has me excited to do a few projects. On the sample warp which will come first, I hope to advance to making some cowls at some point on the warp. The main project I want to do is a ruana type wrap which will be a bigger warp and a bigger weaving commitment. I have in mind a double sided ruana, each color staying on its own side, stitched here and there so the fabric stays together, and I can wear it on whichever side I fancy. I love big commitments!
This is a double sided, machine knitted wrap that caused quite a bit of swooning among the group in the workshop Italy. One woman had this one with her, five more of us found them in a shop in Orvieto and bought our own. I would love to make something similar in double huck.
I have gone as far as I can go on the sweater I am knitting with some beautiful baby alpaca/silk/cashmere yarn that my older son gave me for Christmas. I have to order one more ball (but which color?) in order to get the sleeves the length I’d like. It will take only a couple of hours to finish this once I’m home and have ordered the yarn. I am dreaming of wearing this sweater in early spring in New England and also in Scotland in summer.
In order to knit the sleeves I had to divide each of the remaining balls in half. After wondering how to do this, I remembered that Bob had made me a PVC pipe niddy noddy a few years that I store onboard. I had no idea where it was, but Bob found it immediately.
I’ve turned my attention back to a knitted work in progress, although it’s quite a usurper in the UFO category. I started this vest only months ago, and there are far older UFOs that should have been higher on the list. I love the combination of charcoal and marled taupe in this design by Hanne Falkenberg, called “Avenue.” I particularly love the little tool bag that a good friend gave me for my birthday that looks perfect next to the vest in progress. It’s a gem.
It’s such a gem I decided I should carry it as a purse sometimes.
During January I also researched where I might go this summer when I need to get off Pandora while Bob sails from the Azores into the Mediterranean, to Spain. I have a week to ten days to do something. In the long run, I have decided to take more time, 14 – 21 days, to travel through Scotland. I have a lot on my list to see, including the Dovecot Studio, the “Hunt for the Unicorn” reproduction tapestries at Stirling Castle, the Great Tapestry of Scotland in Galashiels. My luck here in the Caribbean has been such that I have now met two women who had a hand in that epic embroidery. I look forward to seeing it in real life. Luck has also smiled down on me that my English friend will meet me somewhere on the West Coast of Scotland, and a dear long-term friend wants to join me on this adventure. We want to include some of the islands which is what will make our trip longer than I originally planned. I met a yacht captain who is from the Isle of Mull and now lives on the mainland. He has invested in a small start up for a friend who wants to knit traditional garments with a flat bed knitting machine. This friend gave Martin a long cowl made on a similar machine by Marie Wallin. He showed it to me and offered to take a photo of me wearing it. I’ve now learned that Marie Wallin runs workshops in her croft where students design and knit a Fair Isle garment. So, so tempting.
I don’t want to leave anything off my list for this Scottish adventure. I can’t count on going back again, only forward. Scotland in July….the light will be beautiful, the weather at its best, and there will be midges, lots of midges.