Ram’s horn pattern – think I’m going to use for decorative trim at the neck of the tunic
Empty slot pattern – possibly to be used for hose garters, but I need some practice with this technique (where not all the holes in the cards have yarn through them, so there should be a weft pattern showing)
Combo narrow bands pattern – possibly for hem trim on the tunic or a belt, with some added columns – the pattern I wanted showed up on the “wrong” side? I’m going to try this again and reverse the threaded of the cards
Simple alternating thread sample – another belt possibility or hose garter possibility – easy to weave and easy to keep even
Other Stuff
Stuff I’m Watching:
Letter to the King – fantasy show on Netflix
Luna Nera – Italian show about witches on Netflix
RQ Streams – The twitch.tv game streaming channel from Rusty Quill (Also, back content on YouTube)
Detective Anna – Russian show set in the late 19th century about a young woman who can see ghosts and solves mysteries
Firewatch – story game, where you play Henry who takes a position as a firewatch person in Wyoming and have to solve a mystery – Steam, played on the Mac mini
Journey – exploratory story game, there’s no dialogue and the whole thing is told via the visuals and sound – PS4
Machinarium – point and click puzzle game featuring junky robots – Android
Life is Strange – story game, you play a young woman named Max who’s a photographer in college. There’s time travel, which is fun, but there’s a lot of dark, real-life type stuff in this game, so look up content warnings before playing if you are concerned about that. – PS4
Flower – by the same company as Journey, you play a flower petal on the wind and you make flowers bloom, but there’s a sort of backstory that’s told through the setting – PS4
Chuchel – point and click puzzle game featuring funny monsters, by the same company as Machinarium – Android
Revisiting Star Wars: Dark Forces – first person shooter – basically Doom reskinned into Star Wars – Steam, PC – the only game I can currently play on my PC, at the moment
Revisiting Fallen London – choose your own adventure, mostly text with some illustration, dark fantasy alternate history – browser game
Show notes and links to everything freakishlemon.com
Redford by Julie Hoover Machine Knit – Green Mountain Spinnery Lana in “Gris” – back piece finished, front finished, sleeves finished, need to do the little side panels on the machine, then seam and hand work.
Vest for Gabby’s Wedding – Simplicity 4762
Shirt for Gabby’s Wedding
Mad Color Fiber Arts “Life is Short and You Are Hot” SW Targhee – 2 ply fractal spin
City Limits by Samantha Guerin – swatching US 6/4.0 mm – Classic Elite Yarns MountainTop Crestone in Gray – knitting by hand because I know I’m short the ideal amount of yarn and I’ll be making decisions on the fly for the sleeves (¾ sleeves, contrast sleeve cuffs, etc)
Granny Square Blanket (improv) – US I/ 5.5 mm – Noro Ito – Granny Square (clusters of 3 dc, 1 ch between on flat, 2 ch between on corner)
Started Critical Role, but these early episodes are rough. I’ve been spoiled by RQG and Critical Hit (back in the day when I listened to that) where the players were very focused on creating a good listening experience. I don’t know if it improves later, but there’s a lot of cross talking, side chat, etc which makes it hard to follow what’s happening.
Plaid Shirt 1 – On hold, pending self draft pattern
Get Weaving 001 Vest for Ren Faire – Finished
Plaid Shirt 2 – On hold, pending self draft pattern
Handspun Sweater – Finished
Quilt – Worked on
Star Wars Christmas Sweater – Did not start
Thoughts about the MakeNine2019:
I like the idea of the make nine. I think it’s a good number of goals to aim for and it was nice to have a list of things to focus on.
I feel like it would work better for me if I didn’t already have a bunch of WIPs that needed work.
I’m also trying to work out how my brain breaks down tasks and I’m not sure the Make Nine list is detailed enough for my brain to break it down into manageable chunks, especially not with mixed making.
Knitting can be 1 task – knit a thing – or it can be multiple tasks – knit a front, back, 2 sleeves, etc
Quilting – I have to break down into smaller tasks
Sewing – the more I learn how to improve my sewing, the more I break it down into smaller tasks
Towards the end of this year, I ended up grabbing a white board for my craft room. Noelle of Costuming Drama on YouTube has a huge white board to track her goals and task breakdowns. It’s been useful, especially if my brain is Not Cooperating, to see a written list of small tasks. So I think I’m gravitating more towards that kind of task system for 2020.
City Limits by Samantha Guerin – swatching US 6/4.0 mm – Classic Elite Yarns MountainTop Crestone in Gray – knitting by hand because I know I’m short the ideal amount of yarn and I’ll be making decisions on the fly for the sleeves (¾ sleeves, contrast sleeve cuffs, etc)
Redford by Julie Hoover Machine Knit – Green Mountain Spinnery Lana in “Gris” – back piece finished, front finished, sleeves finished, need to do the little side panels on the machine, then seam and hand work.
Vest for Gabby’ Wedding – Simplicity 4762 – mock up for size M, but this pattern is apparently for stick people. Length and shoulders were perfect, but needed to add almost 7 inches to the hips. Second mockup fit much better and I ended up adding a second dart on each side to improve fit. I’ve cut out all the pieces and am in the process of pad stitching the lace to the front pieces.
My hypothesis regarding the indigo dye of the targhee yarns is proving correct. I’ve been scouring them in hot water with Kookaburra Scour that I have left from scouring the mystery fleece a few years back and a considerable amount of dye has washed out with the lanolin.
If you are going to be using a fiber that has a high grease content, scour before dyeing with indigo. I’m not sure if other dye methods are affected by the lanolin content in the yarn the same way, but I’m going to scour my undyed targhee as well, just in case.
FOs
Improv pillow covers – 2 square pillow cases with black piping – piping made with lucet tool and bias tape leftover from other projects – 1 came out exactly as I imagined, 1 got a bit screwy and has some haphazard patching, but it’s fine for what I need.
Palmer Ribbed Socks v3 – improv pattern – Palmer Family Farm CVM local wool, US 3/3.25 mm Cubics needles
Fingerloop 5 strand braid sample – made using cotton yarn and the tutorial byMorgan Donner on YouTube
Linen napkins – made from indigo dyed fabric
WIPs
Craft Room Round Up
Rainbow Jelly Roll Rug byRomaQuilts – Kona cotton roll in rainbow colors, hand sewing the construction bit because my sewing machine is misbehaving with zigzag stitches.
Jeans that need mending
Mom’s Christmas present – a Maker’s Tote for her electric eel nano
Brown Cormo Sweater Spin – Ashford Kiwi 2 – plying!
It’s like a very nice, long screensaver. The images are great and they move along in a pleasing way, but nothing of substance is happening. Honestly, watching the slideshow of the concept art during the credits is the same level of entertainment for me.
The Rise of Skywalker
I had a great time with this movie. It had a lot of the type of Soap Opera Drama that I love in the extended Star Wars universe books/TV shows/video games, so I had a blast.
Stuff I’m Listening To:
(audio podcast break, so it’s been audiobooks constantly)
Call Down the Hawk by Maggie Stiefvater narr by Will Patton
So many Lynch brothers feelings
A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Mass narr by Jennifer Ikeda
Definitely liked this book more than the first one, but there are some pet peeves of mine that keep throwing me out of the story
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black narr by Caitlin Kelly
The Wicked King by Holly Black narr by Caitlin Kelly
Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi narr by Banni Turpin
Stuff I’m Reading:
Tipping The Velvet by Sarah Waters
I cannot even explain how refreshing it is to read a book that starts right out with queerness. Less than 20 pages and queerness already abounds. No ongoing confusion and yearning, no questioning – just Nancy dressing up in her Sunday best and going to the theater daily to see the male impersonator Kitty Butler and falling in love.
This is an annual yarn crawl put on by the Western CT Yarn Council for 6-7 stores in Western CT. This year, the crawl ran from Thursday September 19 – Sunday September 22.
This year, the passport was free and there was a $5 tote bag designed to hold a pin from each of the seven stores.
Friday
Westport Yarns – Westport, CT
Didn’t buy anything at this location. It’s a smaller store in a wealthy area, so their stock is very targeted to the local clientele and is more expensive than other stores I’ve been to.
Nancy O – Ridgefield, CT
This store moved locations and the new location is really nice. It’s in this sort of plaza with lots of other small stores. It’s a larger space and this space is more handicap friendly with wider aisles inside the store. I didn’t end up buying anything at this store either, but Mom bought something.
A Stitch In Time – Bethel, CT
Gabby from Once Upon a Corgi was having her yarn crawl trunk show at this store and we ended up turning into the parking lot at the same time. Mom and I helped her set up for the day. The yarns had been out the day before, but that table needed to be cleared for knit night. I think we overwhelmed the shop staff a little because we just dove on in and got her set up.
Meadowcroft Dyeworks Yarn Rehab Rockshelter Sock in “Rembrandt’s Prodigal Son” – just leapt out at me and wouldn’t let me leave it behind. It’s been a while since a single skein did that for me.
New England Yarn and Spindle – Southington, CT
Usually we visit this store with the other northwestern CT stores, but the Mum Festival was happening in Bristol that weekend and the area of Bristol affected is right on our route to and from the shop. Friday during the day was likely to be less of a traffic issue than on Saturday.
Also, there’s an IHOP just down the street and pancakes for lunch in the best.
Cascade Yarns ® Heritage – 5881 — I’ve been trying to supplement specific items in my stash and when I took stock early this year, I found that I had exactly 1 light colored skein to use for contrasting colorwork.
Saturday
Stars Hollow Yarns – New Preston, CT
New shop! They just opened last December and it’s a nice shop. They’re currently showcasing BIPOC dyers, so they had The Farmer’s Daughter, Lady Dye Yarns, and Cashmere People front and center in the shop for the crawl. Pretty sure the whole shop was small dyer and small mill operations, but I can’t be 100% sure.
Just some accessibility points – There are steps to get into the store and an upstairs loft, so it wasn’t wheelchair friendly. I don’t know if they have an accessible entrance on the side or back of the building, but it wasn’t readily apparent to me. Also, the lighting upstairs in the loft is dim, so that may be an issue if you have vision considerations affected by lighting.
A note on this — I have, in the past, identified accessibility issues in yarns stores I’ve been to on Yarn Crawls before, but if you have questions about accessibility at the yarn stores I mention, please ask! I’d rather answer repeat questions or revisit the stores to confirm accessibility so that you don’t end up wasting your time visiting a store that you physically can’t navigate
Indigo Dye – Used pre-reduced indigo crystals from Dharma Trading Co and followed the directions on their website. In the future, I’ll be reducing the amounts in the recipe to half or a quarter because after all these items, I was still getting strong color within 5 minutes of the materials being in the dye vat. I wasn’t in a place to store the vat properly, so I ended up disposing of a lot of good dye.
Fabric – would absolutely do again
Solid/semi-solid dye
Muslin shibori/resist dye – thread drawn
Shibori/resist dye napkins – pressed tiles
Shibori/resist dye other fabrics – pressed tiles
Yarn – like the colors, but problems rinsing out the excess indigo particles
Sweater Quantity Targhee
BFL/BFL overdye
Mohair dye/overdye
Cellulose fibers/overdye
Pokeberries
Three stalks of berries, mashed with water in the sun for two or three weeks – deep reddish purple
Approximately 8% alum to water in the sun for two weeks
FOs
Two stranded colorwork hat – Brother KH836e knitting machine – punch card 2D, Dial 8 – Once Upon A Corgi “Dark Like My Soul” and “Snow Scout”
Comfort Fade Cardi by Andrea Mowry – Once Upon a Corgi Handmade yarns (Queequeg/Briny Beach,Tomorrow I Shall Be Fetterless/Lemony Snicket, Miracles and meatballs/ Ghoul Haunted Woodlands of Weir, Dark as a Crow at Night/ Dying to Burn at the Stake) – US 4/3.5 mm needle
Blue Cone Boxy Sweater – self drafted pattern, Brother KH 836e main bed, dial 1 (even on the tension rod), tuck stitch pattern punch card 2 on long, mystery cotton cone from a closing mill
Since my last episode, Ravelry has updated their TOS to be more strict with prohibiting hate speech and white supremacy, which I fully support. There has been a lot of emotional labour involved in the BIPOC community to push Ravelry to make their site safer for BIPOC members and I’m really glad to see that Ravelry listened.
Nathan Taylor and Benjamin Till.
Nathan made a post tone policing BIPOC contributors under the #diversknitty hashtag
When called out and educated on his post, Nathan closed comments and edited most of the text on that post.
I posted about this on Instagram, but I saw a troubling amount of silence from white folks regarding his post. There was also an unsurprisingly large base of fans supporting his tone policing.
His post was damaging and irresponsible, but I was not surprised by it.
Nathan is an openly gay man with HIV, which is not at the top of the priviledge ladder, but he is a white, cisgendered man in an affluent country who, from what he presents to us online, does not live on or below the poverty line.
Those are a lot of things that boost him closer to the top of that privilege ladder.
I have seen him more than once equate his struggles as a gay man with the struggles of BIPOC and non-cis folks, so it didn’t surprise me that when people pointed out how his words were harmful to BIPOC in particular and provided resources for him to educate himself, he shut down the thread.
There are screenshots of the original text of the post and of Nathan’s and his husband’s responses in the comments available on Instagram.
Benjamin Till (Nathan’s husband) posted to Nathan’s account saying that he had to be hospitalized and places the blame on people calling out the racism in the prior post. He continued to engage and encourage racist behaviour and language in the comments of that post.
Benjamin shut down his own Instagram account and has posted multiple times to an external blog, which has included detailed, graphic descriptions of his husband’s mental breakdown and calls to action against BIPOC commenters on Nathan’s account, singling out specific BIPOC Instagram users
Sunday, July 14th 2019, Nathan made an appearance at Yarningham to sell books and teach workshops (which had been in contract prior to his inflammatory posts on Instagram), despite his recent hospitalization. When he was approached at the book table by a woman of color and asked questions about his post, he attacked her, had to be physically restrained, and had to be removed from the event.
This is appalling and violent. This is why BIPOC do not feel safe in majority white spaces.
White supremacy is an infection. It’s everywhere, just slowly seeping in. We need to crack ourselves open and carve it out. There are many ways to do that and the amazing BIPOC in this community have been handing us the means to do it with books, workshops, videos, and posts on how to use our power, patronage, donations, words, and voices to make change and hold ourselves accountable.
There has been, and still is, a lot of disappointing silence from white makers, podcasters, and businesses in response to Nathan and Benjamin’s behaviour. It took physical violence against a woman of color before a lot of people even started to see a problem. This is not okay.
Online Responsibility
I also want to make a point about taking responsibility for your audience on social media and other spaces online.
For comparison, these are my numbers– YouTube (1389), Instagram (732), Tumblr (369), Twitter (187). If we pretend that there’s no overlap in those numbers, that’s 2677 people. That’s enough people to nearly fill the Danbury Ice Arena in Danbury, CT.
Nathan has over 20K followers on Instagram and over 17K subscribers on YouTube. His Instagram followers alone could fill Madison Square Garden.
His behaviour regarding not taking responsibility for how his audience will use his words is a serious problem.
This is a problem that I’ve seen time and again on YouTube and Instagram as people become online celebrities, since the first YouTube mega-celebrities back in 2008.
When you have those numbers, posting to YouTube and Instagram is not hanging out with a few friends in someone’s living room.
When you have MY numbers, it’s not just hanging out with a few friends in someone’s living room. I know it feels like that, but it isn’t.
When you have those numbers, ANYTHING you post is an announcement to a stadium full of people.
It is SO EASY for that amount of people- even if each one saw the post or video alone- to mob, to jump to conclusions, to react in a way that they never would if someone said an ignorant or hurtful statement one-on-one.
It’s okay to make mistakes. Offhand Twitter comments or troublesome language in a post is going to happen.
When it’s pointed out to you, feel your feelings in private and then stop to think about it. Reach out to people who are volunteering the emotional labour to educate you and, if they are willing, discuss the situation with them. Admit your mistakes. Own that you messed up and clarify your mistake and what you’ve learned. It’s okay to change your mind on something! This is how we learn and grow.
But when BIPOC point out how your words to 20K people are going to hurt them and your response is “I don’t care about that,” that is irresponsible, entitled, and damaging to the community that you INSIST you are trying to “improve.”
Alright. I’m going to ask you to pause this video and feel your feelings about what I just said. Come back tomorrow if you need to. The crafting? The crafting will be here.
Dye Stuff
Lichen Dye – I’ve had lichen soaking in an ammonia and water mixture since December and I decided that, since there is an ammonia base to this dye, I would be solar dyeing this mixture for less smell. It sat in a jar in the sun for about a week and a half.
Purple Basil Dye – True solar dye, about 50g purple basil leaves from my garden in water in a jar in the backyard for 4 days, 8% alum solution on the fiber, fiber sat in the dye stock for about a week
Eco Printing
Oak leaves, maple leaves, ferns, sumac leaves and berries, queen anne’s lace, sprinkled some calendula petals
Tea – Fabric was folded and tied into a cube shape, 12 teabags from a box of English breakfast tea, brewed at a simmer for 1 hour, no other fixative on the fabric.
Coffee – Fabric was rolled into a cylinder. 50 g coffee grounds, brewed at a simmer for 1 hour, no other fixative on the fabric.
Tea Dye – Wool – Second dye bath. No other fixative on the fiber. Fiber sample sat in tea overnight.
Tea Dye – Handspun – Third dye bath, sat in tea over the majority of two days.No other fixative on the fiber.
Coffee Dye – Wool – Second dye bath. No other fixative in the fiber. Fiber sample sat in coffee overnight.
Coffee Dye – Fabric – Third dye bath, sat in coffee over the majority of two days. No other fixative on the fiber.
FOs
Fall mini-batts drop spindling – with new Turtle Made top whorl drop spindle
Darth Scabrous mini batts – Turtle Made top whorl drop spindle & Classy Squid top whorl drop spindle
Sew Liberated Forager Vest – naturally dyed linen and linen/rayon from my dye experiments, flat felled seams
WIPs
Comfort Fade Cardi by Andrea Mowry – Once Upon a Corgi Handmade yarns (Queequeg/Briny Beach,Tomorrow I Shall Be Fetterless/Lemony Snicket, Miracles and meatballs/ Ghoul Haunted Woodlands of Weir, Dark as a Crow at Night/ Dying to Burn at the Stake) – US 4/3.5 mm needle
Blue Cone Boxy Sweater – self drafted pattern, Brother KH 836e main bed, dial 1 (even on the tension rod), tuck stitch pattern punch card 2 on long, mystery cotton cone from a closing mill
I just wanted to make sure to point out that this video podcast does have Closed Captioning and there are transcripts of that CC file included in the show notes on freakishlemon.com. I think that’s something that I’ve been forgetting to mention in my intro. I’m updating my default notes file to include this information, so that shouldn’t happen in the future. Also, if you use the transcript included in my show notes and have any feedback for me, please share! Shoot me a message somewhere, comment below, comment on the blog post – I’ll find it at some point.
Dye Stuff
Memorial Day Weekend Dye Adventures – Natural dyes, all-in-one dye method using two pots on two portable burners using 8% of the fiber’s dry weight alum as a fixative, all samples sat in the cooling dye bath for at least 8 hours (most of them overnight)
Yellow Onion Skins 1
Red Onion Skins 1
Yellow Onion Skins 2
Red Onion Skins 2
Yellow Onion/Avocado Pits
Red Onion/Dried Clementine Peel
Yellow Onion/Avocado + Red Onion/Dried Clementine Peel Combo
Apple Tree Twigs
Yellow Onion/Avocado/Red Onion/Dried Clementine Peel + Apple Tree Twig Combo
Petals from 1 dozen dark red roses
FOs
Handspun sweater – Knitting Pattern Essentials by Sally Melville – machine knit LK 150, dial tension 4 – Autumn Spinners Hill and Classic Elite Yarns Mohawk Wool – Still have a full skein of handspun left
Comfort Fade Cardi by Andrea Mowry – Once Upon a Corgi Handmade yarns (Queequeg/Briny Beach,Tomorrow I Shall Be Fetterless/Lemony Snicket, Miracles and meatballs/ Ghoul Haunted Woodlands of Weir, Dark as a Crow at Night/ Dying to Burn at the Stake) – US 4/3.5 mm needle
Blue Cone Boxy Sweater – self drafted pattern, Brother KH 836e main bed, dial 1 (even on the tension rod), tuck stitch pattern punch card 2 on long, mystery cotton cone from a closing mill
Blackout – Fiction thriller about a radio DJ in smalltown NH
Stuff I’m Playing:
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite – HP game in the style of Pokemon Go. It’s alright, but I think it’s leaning too heavily on the aesthetic of the HP world. The animations are so long compared to Pokemon Go and I think that’s entirely to the less detailed design of the Pokemon franchise.
Freakish Lemon 