Checkin'in

Yes, I did want that to be all one word.

The first Robin Hood Sock is finished, and I've got the second one well under way -- I started it almost immediately after kitchenering the toe of Number One.  That it took me over six months to get this far on a sock makes me look back and take stock of why that happened.  What have I done since October of last year?  I've knitted a cap or two, finished two lace shawls, started another shawl, and made a knitted messenger bag start-to-finish, all on top of teaching, some travel, and just plain life.  I've been knitting, off and on, but not really concentrating on anything.  It's been a real job keeping myself from starting anything new recently; I made a small order from Webs recently (the Emperor's Christmas sock yarn, actually) that included two balls of Douceur et Soie in a pink/coral color, meant to be made into a bed jacket shrug I've had in mind for at least five years.  Here I am, surrounded by projects and I caught myself digging into my needles so I could start one more that I don't have time to mess with.  I am hopeless, sometimes.

I could spend less time "strolling" on Pinterest, but that's such an interesting place!  I've found a bunch of patterns, recipes, and inspiration there, so it's not as much of a time-waster as it is an energy-spreader (not to be confused with a manure spreader).  One smart thing I did was to start a "Look, Sis!" board and tell my sister to "follow" it. Now, when I find something she'd like to see, or that I want to show her, I just add it to that board and it pops up on her end of the Nets.  She made a board like that for me in her site, too.  The thing I like about Pinterest is that it's a virtual collection.  I can save an image, idea, quote, or pattern and know just where to find it later.  Pinterest also helps scratch itches that I don't have time to pursue, like the Regency Wardrobe Madness that I have been resisting for the past year.  Other Regency-obsessed "pinners" put up images they find of everything from museum dress collections, to period fashion plates and art, to jewelry, to instructional videos and other materials.  On Pinterest, I can look at these pictures, think about my project, feel like I've done something toward it, and not have to put anything away or spend any money on it.  Itch scratched.

I've owned an iPad Mini for almost a year now, so it's time to review how I'm using it.  I was inspired to get it by watching a couple of students using theirs for school, taking notes and interacting with textbooks and other class materials.  I use mine for... um... mobile connectivity, for using Knit Companion, for Pinterest, for reading e-magazines, for listening to music, for taking photographs, for listening to National Public Radio.  I have a few games on it, and rely on my weather app during times when I need to pay attention to that kind of thing.  I found that I prefer to write blog posts on a full-size keyboard, so don't use the Blogger app; that said, I am going to experiment with using it to put images in the blog, so if there are photos in this post that's how they got there.  I also saved some images to my iPad, and opened them while shopping for beads and jewelry findings so I had some kind of reference for what I wanted to make -- that was handy!  All in all, I'm glad I have it.  Will it replace Yellow?  I think I'll always want a full-size keyboard and larger screen to do writing work, so that answer is "no."  In the next year, I want to learn more about using it in the classroom.  One of my colleagues puts his notes on his iPad, and uses it to refer to while he shows Powerpoint slides to the students.  I'll be giving some brand-new-to-me lectures next week so this might be an opportunity to give that a try.

 

Speaking of school, I've got a great excuse to try yet another artistic venture.  The HMS Acasta gang have put out a Mail Packet call -- they invite you to take part in their program by writing and sending a period-appropriate letter to be included in their mail packet that they open at the Jane Austen Festival in July.  The call came early enough that I could offer it as a rare extra credit opportunity to my students who might otherwise regret their first midterm grade.  I ordered some real laid paper from  Paul McClintock  as well as three goose quill pens.  In all of my days as a calligrapher, I never tried to use an actual quill for a pen, and I'm utterly captivated by the idea.  The quills arrived in the mail this week, and they're beautiful -- Mr. McClintock cut them quite gracefully, but they need to be hardened, which is what has set me to trolling the Nets for information.  According to his website, they're not hardened, but according to some sets of instructions, they are (two of them appear translucent).  Some instructions call for you to merely cut off the ends and plunge them into hot sand (heated to 350 degrees in your oven).  Some call for a soak overnight in water, then the sand plunge.  Some call for a brief boil, then a plunge.  Some call for them to be boiled in a mixture of alum and salt, then plunged into sand.  Yet another says you can boil them, then put them in the oven.  One claims success with a microwave oven.  The one factor that all have in common is the heat -- I think that bonds the proteins in the feather shaft and makes the point hard.  Note that the webbing is almost entirely gone -- if you study paintings of the period, most people wrote with bare quills, or quills with just a little feather at the top to use as a brush.  Mr. McClintock snipped mine into elegant shapes close to the shaft.

 

You knew there was going to be a story.  I've been out hunting for alum and sand, and despite the fact that this is big canning and preserving country, I can't find alum.  The only sand I've found is in 80-pound bags, and I only need enough to fill a soup can.  So what I'm going to end up doing is boiling them in water for  a few minutes, then putting them in the oven for a bit, and seeing what I come up with.  To be completely period-correct, I should use a goose quill to write the letter.  However, if I screw up all of my quills, I still have a few metal nibs in my calligraphy stash that I can use, and I don't think anyone would notice the difference.  But as it is in the planning of a Regency wardrobe, the hunt, the preparation, the doing-it-right is the fun part.

 

I think I'll go put some water on to boil right now.