A Change of Scenery

An optimist is someone who gets treed by a lion but enjoys the scenery. --Walter Winchell

I hereby declare myself a humbug. I can blame the current requirement for social distancing and the limiting of group gatherings, but the truth is that I am not so into group revelry. I don't think I have been for a long time.

We decided to forgo Halloween this year. I wasn't in the mood for figuring out how to give out candy safely to strangers. I was more in the mood for a change of scenery and some quiet solitude.

So we took ourselves to the cabin. Oh... the cabin. We haven't been for a while, but it seemed like a good time to go. It was Seymour's first time he loved exploring the area and snoozing near the woodstove:

 

Autumn was in full swing at the cabin. I was continually entranced by the rich colours that greeted me every time I looked out the window:

And I stopped many times to point my phone up at the trees to capture the brilliance above me:

I spent a lot of time thinking about how many of my projects have been worked on at the cabin. I feel like I could make a picture book of all the pretty wooly things that have passed through my fingers at that place. We don't own the cabin: indeed, it is available for anyone to visit, but it kind of feels like ours. I think I might know where all the utensils are in that kitchen better than my own. That is saying something.

We were lucky with the weather. I was gratified to have the fortunate problem of having too many warm things to wear. The mornings were chilly enough, but the sun came out to warm our faces as we walked around and explored. The bay was as beautiful as ever, frigid and blue but entrancing with its lapping ripples:

We stopped in at the village where the resident sea lions had returned to put on a noisy show. We thought Seymour would bark his face off at them, but he was more concerned that I might have snacks in my handbag:

We stayed away from people the whole time, which was as pleasant as it was necessary. The majority of time was spent sitting on the sofa, me knitting away while the hubby read and Seymour snored by my side. I put the finishing touches on my scarf based on the pattern Melody's Shawl by Melody Moore. It is such an interesting construction for such a simple pattern. I knitted it in the round per the instructions and cast off all the stitches apart from the group I had set aside to create the fringe:

Then, I took a deep breath and dropped all those stitches right to the bottom. That took longer than I thought because the yarn is spun in such loose singles that the strands were sticking to each other in the stitches at the edge of the dropped section:

The original pattern says to cut the strands and let them hang to create your fringe, but I decided to give the whole thing a good soak and straighten out the strands first. Then I took another big breath and found the centre of them and cut them. I wasn't confident that the sticky singles were going to work as a fringe, so I looked up how to do a twisted fringe as done in the weaving world and was glad to see that I could do it myself by hand. It's very much the same concept as plying singles in spinning. I got both ends done in one evening and then trimmed the ends once the whole thing had completely dried by the morning:

I had attempted to prevent the edges curling by adding five rows of seed stitch to the edge rows, but I could tell that I would have to block the whole thing properly to get a decent result. So I gave it another good soak when I got home and pinned it out for one of the longest blocked projects I've ever done:


And here is the result. I am very pleased with it:


I absolutely love its wispy. delicate nature. For some reason, it brings the musical Les Miserables to mind each time I look at it. It looks fragile and tattered but robust and beautiful at the same time:


And I can't stop looking at the texture of the fabric. It has a surprisingly regular pattern to it. I guess the seemingly random thick and thin sections of the yarn was actually designed rather than random:


I am a bit disappointed at the edges because they continue to roll inward, even with the seed stitch and the hard blocking, but that's just the way it goes sometimes. Perhaps it will sit flat after repeated washings. Or perhaps I can just calm down and accept that not everything is within my control...


I doubt it... but you never know...

Meanwhile, I have been working with another set of yarns in a stripey experiment inspired by a sweater I saw a glimpse of on YouTube one day. Ever since I started working on it, I have been seeing stripes everywhere. I'm not ready to share that one yet as I'm not sure how it's all going to work out and it has already evolved into three different things in this short space of time. I just know that it will make use of some of the stash that has moved to two houses with me. I'm very pleased just to be working with it.

Now that the time has moved back an hour, everything seems darker and colder in the evenings. It's time to settle in and daydream and enjoy the warmth we are so fortunate to have. If I have to stay away from people, I am grateful to be able to do so in a safe, warm place:


Keep warm and safe, my friends. Have a good week.

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