small steps

I was going to show you what I have been up to, but somehow the usb cable is missing that enables me to download pictures from my camera. So I have to do this sans photographs.
Over the past week, I was making another commissioned piece for Decadent Fibers, for them to take down to Stitches East. It was the scarf from the cover of the 25th anniversary issue of Vogue Knitting. It's a Nicky Epstein design, with 25 flowers that you have to make individually and then attach to each other and to a sort of "framework" of zig zags. While it wasn't hard to do, it was quite a bit more time-consuming than I had anticipated, and I even had to deliver it in pieces to be sewn together by them on the roadtrip down to Baltimore. I was glad in the end to see it go, as my hnds were starting to hurt. Size 3 needles (which I usually love), so many small pieces...

Today, I want to start a little campaign that I am calling Small Steps, to help save the planet. I guess I am getting used to the soapbox. :)

So today's Small Steps involves your dish detergent.

I switched over to environmentally friendly dish soap several months ago, and was recently delighted to find out that Seventh Generation is now available at Target. I remember the Seventh Generation catalog from years ago, printed with soy ink on recylced paper. Then, their products became available at the local health food store, then at the grocery chains, and now I see them at the big box store. More power to them.

My bottle of dish detergent says the following:
"If every household in the U.S. replaced just one bottle of 25 oz. petroleum based dishwashing liquid with our 25 oz vegetable based product, we could save 81,000 barrels of oil, enough to heat and cool 4,600 US homes for a year."

There are many more brands out there for you to choose from. These guys have a whole line of environmentally friendly cleaning products and paper products. In light of our natural resources becoming more and more scarce, it makes sense to switch.

Getting off the soapbox.

hand paint

Here, then, is my first shot at hand painting yarn.
It's the same as Lamb's Pride worsted, 85% wool and 15 % mohair, but twice the size skein (380 yds. each).

I'll be sellling this (and more) at the NYS sheep and wool fest in Rhinebeck, Oct. 20 + 21, in the Sliver Moon Farm booth.

I've stopped counting...

...the number of days I haven't heard from Amy Singer/knitty, re: my submission for the December issue. She is going away for a week this weekend, and I am just hoping I'll hear something before she leaves.

It's just that I hate the waiting game. I remember years ago when I had to have two separate biopsies done on my thyroid to find out if the nodule I have there is cancer. My son was in kindergarten. All kinds of thoughts went through my head while I waited for the test results.
By the time the results came, I was ready to accept anything, any news at all. I have had many more (different) tests since then, and I am still no better at waiting.

I know. Waiting for a submission acceptance/rejection is not the same as a test result. I am highly aware of that. It's just the feeling of it being so completely out of your control...that there is nothing at all you can do to change the outcome. All you can do is wait.

Now as to the global warming issue, I guess what I'm trying to fight is that feeling of helplessness, the feeling of having to wait for someone else (like a government leader, let's say) to do something about it. So I am trying to get people to do something about it, already, right now.

See, when I first came to this country 24 years ago, one of the things that impressed me the most was the fact that in times of crisis, a whole community will come together and help. If a family lost their house due to a fire, the whole neighborhood, or even the whole town would pitch in and help that family out with shelter, food, clothing.
I was part of a group once that took turns bringing meals to a family where the mom was ill with breast cancer. We brought them dinner to the house every single night, for many weeks. Pat eventually succumbed to the disease, but the help didn't end there. It continued.

And that's what I mean. Americans know how to get together and help each other out. Why can't we get it together now? Is it because the task seems so insurmountable?

I you haven't seen it, please rent and watch "An Inconvenient Truth". Also, the recently released "11th hour". Watch "The End of Suburbia" (there is a sequel out which I haven't seen yet, "Escape from Suburbia"). These last two movies discuss how we have reached peak oil production and what the consequences are.

If we all take at least one or two steps today, it will help. Then if you add two more things, it'll help some more. The task will not be so insurmountable if you look at it this way.

Jody, thank you for reminding me to mention recycling. I think I forgot to mention that we, too recycle everything possible.

Time to get off the soapbox again.

Hopefully by tomorrow, my yarn will be dry and I can show you what I did.

Big PS: for local people: Knit Night on the First Thursday of the month is changing!! We are meeting at Panera's in Glenmont (that new huge gruesome plaza) from 7 to 9 pm tonight! We are meeting there to decide where we will go next. Some folks have offered their homes. So, don't forget, knit night planning meeting tonight!

soapbox!

I am not sure what is going on.

I have had no news from Amy Singer/knitty.

I got two replies from folks who were ready to tell me what they are doing to help fight global warming. I am wondering if it is worth it to bring up the subject over and over.

It is my belief that we need to talk about it to everyone, at least once a day. :) Bring it into the forefront of people's consciousness.

Because while we are sleeping, lots is going on. Read this.

Of course I can't make anyone go to any of the links.....I also can't tell you what to do or not to do. If you are waiting for me to tell you what I am doing, I use cloth grocery bags. We have one car. Out of necessity, but there it is. I can't stand disposable anything, so cut back on that as well; we use cloth napkins at the dinner table; lights go out when someone leaves the room; I combine errands as not to use the car more than I have to. When I can walk, I walk. My dear husband bikes to work several times a week. We have been vegetarians for 20 years. I wear my clothes and shoes until they are worn out. In the winter, the thermostat is set to 64 during the day and 68 when the kids come home from school. After 10 pm, no heat. We use recycled paper products whenever possible. Non-petroleum based dish-detergent and laundry detergent. I am kicking myself for not having changed lightbulbs to the more energy efficient ones.

This morning, I was dyeing some yarn. I LOVE it, love the result, but am seriously concerned about my energy and water use. I will dye what I have and sell it at the NYS Sheep and Wool Fest, and then I have to make up my mind....I think letting go of things we love, or love to do, is the hardest. That's why people don't want to think about the consequences of climate change. It would mean letting go of certain comforts, or re-arranging one's life a bit. But think about what will happen if we don't do anything.

Do you know any babies? I know quite a few. I love babies. I love to hold them, and rock them, and knit for them. I love to see their personalities develop, the people they become.

Next time you are privileged to see or even hold a baby, just imagine what the world will be like for that child if you don't do anything at all to help with this global warming business.

Getting off the soapbox now.

in other news...

At this point, I really don't care what the reasons are or how much we humans contribute or not.
The ice is melting, greenhouse gases are a fact, global warming is happening, and we need to do something about it right now.

See this article in today's New York Times.

NPR is doing a series on it, too. See here.

Maybe we should start a group called Knitters Against Global Warming. I for one love wool sweaters, don't you?

Remember Reuse, Reduce, Recycle?

Please write to me with your ideas as to what measures you're taking in your life, at work, at home.

Creme Puff Jacket

Here are the pictures now of the jacket I designed and knitted this past week.
There is something going on with my camera--thank goodness I am meeting with my friend Laura tomorrow, who has a degree in photography. She'll be able to check it out.


The buttons are not the real ones that will be attached. These are still a work in progress, made by Pat Bull, one of the owners of Decadent Fibers, and needle felter and dyer extraordinaire. (And she didn't even pay me to say all that!). But when I arrived with the jacket today, we pinned them on to make believe.

Pattern and yarn -- called Creme Puff -- will be available at Stitches East and at the New York State sheep and wool fest, as well as online.

And we thank you for your support!

day fourteen

No news. I emailed Amy and am awaiting her response.

I was going to show you pictures of the finished jacket, but I am having problems uploading images right now, so it'll have to wait until later.

My next task is to make a wrap, and a scarf that was on the cover of the Vogue anniversary issue. So I'm off to wind some yarn...