Flowers at Heath

Last weekend Heath Ceramics in SF offered a flower arranging class with Studio Choo. I learned so much by actually doing.  I love their book of recipes. It has easy to follow, beautiful photographs to inspire arrangements, from simple to Dutch painting-looking. All week I have been diligently changing the water in my vases and re-snipping the stems. I have a small cup of basil clippings in the kitchen that smells wonderful. I am going to make arrangements for beside our beds - things like basil and lavender. My favorite flower smell is the marigold. I like to have pots of these where I sit on the deck. 

Bringing New York "Down to Date"

To prepare for our week in New York, I've started reading H. Allen Smith's Rhubarb and E.B. White's Here is New York. Rhubarb is the story of a cat who inherits a baseball team. The book jacket claims the author "has batted out a double-header of a novel-every inning loaded with laughs." 

Here is New York was originally written for Holiday magazine in the Summer of 1948. The essay was published again as a book the following year, and in the forward White apologizes for "certain observations to be no longer true of the city, owing to the passage of time and the swing of the pendulum." He ends with, "I feel that it is the reader's, not the author's, duty to bring New York down to date; and I trust it will prove less a duty than a pleasure." 

I'm bringing my copy along as a travel journal so I can bring New York down to date in the margins and back pages and inside covers. I am looking forward to this.

The moebius cowl is my current obsession. I cast on 200 stitches using Cat Bordhi's cast on and two skeins of aran weight Malabrigo, then seed stitch until the yarn runs out. Sometimes when I am wearing it I like to take it off so that I can feel for a moment how chilly I would be without it.

Out of Print

As the holiday season begins, I am adding old books to my lists. Often the easiest way to find a gift for a reader (that hasn't been read) is to delve into second hand bookstores, in person and online. Slightly Foxed is a wonderful resource for discovering stories. 

A Christmas library addition from last year: The Coat-Hanger Christmas Tree by Eleanor Estes. 

Library books

I highly recommend both Print Workshop by Christine Schmidt and The Handbook of Natural Plant Dyes by Sasha Duerr. They are both great inspiration for Summer craft projects.

Bookshelf

This Fall I am thin-skinned. I strive to be 'even-tempered, prudent and resolute' and so I am reading Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf with Tolkien's essays. The introduction alone is wonderful. I am also paging through my old favorites in the housekeeping and parenting category, but I am haunted by images of swimming in chainmail and magic swords that are powerless against monsters, and Grendel's patchwork pouch of dragonskin. Perhaps you have some interesting leftover skeins of metallic this and that that could be swatched up into all the stitch patterns resembling scales? Then you could wear your pouch 'intracately strung and hung at the ready' for marauding farmers' markets!

"Handmade Modern" inspiration

This book is a mini introduction to many modern designers and contains DIY projects inspired by their styles. The bedside table with the stained cork board top would make a lovely table anywhere, especially if you painted a design on the cork! I like the idea of finding a table top and adding modern legs.

The Last Dickens

This book was a good time. I had to google all the publishers in the story - those Harper Brothers! I'm so excited about nineteenth century magazines. Don't you love magazines? I want to make a magazine - mostly I want to make the ads and write the "in the news" bits! The Christmas issue of Tiknor and Fields's Every Saturday features "No Thoroughfare" a story by Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins. I'm also going to keep a diary this year and write to my future self.

Pantries

Many thanks to Mary S who suggested I look at The Pantry - Its History and Modern Uses (Pond). It is a wonderful illustrated history of how we store our food. I love the modern DIY pantry a woman built by hacking open the wallboard to store canning jars between the wall studs. 
I have read that designating a place for things (Julia Child's pegboard kitchen walls) is akin to scheduling time for things (Twyla Tharp's Creative Habit). Making a pantry and taking the time to stock it creates order in place and time, and it creates confidence in a future place and time. Pantry-making is going to be my act of confidence in the future, both in earthquake country and shaky times.

Design as Art

I am very excited about the mobiles in Bruno Munari's Design as Art. 

Time to cook!

I've been reading books about time. Michael Pollan's New York Times Magazine article this Sunday fits well with Stefan Klein's The Secret Pulse of Time. How do you spend your time?

Summer reading stack

Sometimes when I am collecting my books from around the house I realize how well suited they are for each other. This week I will be known as Mustard-Maker. 

We have been talking about the history of keeping time and wondering if Summer lasts longer without a calendar. Our "sequence of nows" can be counted so many ways. I began with a draft for a daily planner but I am drawn to a weekly bead bracelet, like prayer beads, on which you keep track of all the "nows", or mornings you can read in bed, market days, afternoons when supper is early, evenings in the studio. 

What a nice way to capture a favorite week - and then walking to work, you reach into your pocket and begin counting the beads of "now": this was the morning we walked in the rain, this was the market beneath the tracks, this was the lunch chosen off the grill, this was the washing machine in the alley, this was the snow cone that saved our lives, this was the bridge we decided to cross. Next week I will be known as Vacation Bracelet-Maker.

Books for Japan

I'm hunting down children's books set in Japan and looking for some historical fiction for myself. I also want to make a fantastic daybag that is part How to Wrap Five Eggs and part waterproof nylon that looks like antique silk. I'm reading Write It Down, Make It Happen and I realize that many of my projects come to life because I write them down here first!

Of Sugar and Snow

Mr. Lear and I were enjoying a wonderful lunch this afternoon when I looked up and thought I recognized Carol Field from her photo in The Italian Baker. Mr. Lear (who has made many many treats from The Italian Baker) swore I had been brainwashed by nonstop Splendid Table podcasts. And then he stared at her for a while and thought so too. I don't know if we were correct, but we did see this book being handed across her table: Of Sugar and Snow. Back at home, I googled the poetic title and now I am really looking forward to Jeri Quinzio's newest book on the history of ice cream due out this Spring. Till then, I have her blog. 

Altered books

The cover of the FT magazine last Saturday featured Su Blackwell's "The Girl in the Wood" - a handmade popup carved into a book of fairy tales. I found a lovely book to re-use as my daily planner. Perhaps I should forget about pasting calendar pages into it and instead concoct a popup for each month.

The Three Kings Go Shopping

A Small Miracle by Peter Collington is about a nativity set that gets ready for Christmas. There are no words. I like to listen as people read it.

Mason-Dixon Knitting: Outside the Lines

The new Mason-Dixon book is out today.  Make yourself a pot of coffee and find a little something to munch on, because once you open this book you will not be able to move. I'm so proud to be included in this wonderful book. There are over 30 patterns - women's coats to tiny felt trees.
Not only are the patterns wonderful as written, they inspire other creations as well. Cristina's Via Veneto Table Runner in something silky would also make a lovely wrap. The Margaret sweater is so adaptable, and the embroidery directions would create an incredible baby blanket. The Belinda wrap in two shades of linen would make a wonderful window hanging. All the blanket patterns could be used for smaller projects like pillows or the felted bag. Kiki Mariko is driving me crazy - a rug, a bag, a floor pillow, a slipcover, a king-size bedspread! I want to make the tiny girl coat, Fern, for myself, but I can see it as a long wrap as well using the same shades for the stripes, but something like Silky Wool or Rowan's Summer Tweed. I'm going to use the Superfestive Lantern pattern to cover artsy Ikea lamps. I haven't even talked about the stories, the techniques, the top-down sweater, the Jane Austen dress and shrug - and the potential holiday gift items, like my Monteagle string bag available here. 

Watch band

I want to make a series of beaded watch bands that I can quickly change - seeds, Sculpey in the shape of old bones, those little silver charms at the bead store. The only thing holding me back is "connectors". I'm going to go through Bead Simple again and make a shopping list. I also love those teeny macrame bands - wouldn't that make a simple band? 

Embroidered baby wrap

Inspired by an old Debbie Bliss pattern, I'm using Barbara Walker's top-down directions for a baby kimono. I'm going to embroider it with something wonderful from The New Crewel. This may be the prototype for my own kimono. 

The Minimalist Cooks Dinner

I love this book. My Cafe Bastille sweater is coming along, but it is too hot to even pick it up. I'm going to start some socks and listen to the speeches.

Readymade Eames cabinet

I checked out the Readymade book - a collection of DIY ideas from the magazine of the same name. I love this Eames-ish cabinet made of discarded drawers. Gansey front is finished and blocking! This weekend I'll sew it together and knit the neck! What next?!