I wasn’t going to post for a while,
but this morning it is so beautifully cool and foggy, and I feel totally revived from it!
Knitting a new lace design.
Life is good.
Category Archives: landscape
Out Walking
This morning we got out earlier than we have been.
I am hiking solo now, but sometimes I’ll drive up the road a little ways and give Emma a ride, then she waits in the car in a nice shady spot.
She still looks so healthy, but she does not like to walk very far. Isn’t she just beautiful?
Today I had my Nikon and took some photos of regrowth in the landscape. New shoots emerging prolifically from burned trees everywhere!
The wildfire burned so much foliage and shrubs on the ridge that I’ve been finding old dump sites and old roads long abandoned too, but mostly, trees are making a come-back , and the flowers bloomed as ever before…
On the way back to our Tiny House, stopping where our house “was”. Do you recognize the landscape beyond that I so often photographed from our deck?
Many trees I am finding , are still alive with green crowns, so all is not lost. In fact, the big black oak which shaded our house and most of the deck in the heat of the summer afternoon, was so badly burned we thought no chance, but now it has green sprouting out of ash-grey trunk! The wildfire brings so much perspective about potential of regeneration, that I must witness this as I walk through the seasons. I’ve put all my focus on the hill before me, and knitting as I go.
Life is good.
Afternoon Light
Wildflowers lingering in the whitening grass.
My favorites are the tall wobbly blue Brodea, and the dainty fragile wild roses, absolutely everywhere!
The cheerful wild peas climbing up the garden fence…
Yesterday walking about with Emma,
capturing just a few of the woodland wildflowers in the late afternoon sun .
Quite a different mood & light cast from Early Light that very same day.
Brodea in small little gatherings , as they wobble in the breeze in unison.
Everywhere these plump yellow-green shy flowers with their faces always cast down.
Life is good, and everything in its place.
Early Light
Large patches of trees not burned in their crowns, giving a flooding sense of hope.
This morning as I was taking pen into hand to write my morning journal entry, I noticed a warm orange glow cast from the sunrise, and giving an intense beauty into the forest. Early morning light sure does give me perspective, and so I grabbed my camera and just looked about.
My life hasn’t felt very photogenic lately, so capturing these images suddenly lifts me a little. It seems always less the subject, and nearly all the light, which makes or breaks a photograph. And as I have been feeling so overwhelmed with being uprooted during this crazy shuffling about, now seven & 1/2 months since the wildfire, this morning’s sunrise brings a delicate understanding of how both expectation & impatience are troubling me.
As I write this a very big and ominously black raven lands just outside the picture window, on the roof of the little shed next to Tiny House, and seems to be inspecting something. I love the ravens, I am so happy they weren’t away long. The wildlife is indeed more scarce since the fire, but seems to be slowly populating this lonely wood. I have felt thrown out of synchronization with the wild for what is half a year before we moved our Tiny House up here, and I realize this morning that I missed out on a full half rotation around the sun, from 10th of October last year to the 1st of May, being away from this place. That is a long time for a hermit (merely a soft kind word for agoraphobic) . I must just … b r e a t h e….. now back up on the mountain. Breathe it in! This month of May has been such work learning to live and operate inside of a small space. A really small space, and still doing without so much that makes the experience more like camping … as though my ‘real life’ is still on hold.
But life is not on hold, must forget how life once seemed, and open my eyes to the reality of being here, and now, and this could be as good as it gets. Still , my knitting design which has been seriously ergonomically tampered with, nothing in a neat orderly space, but in boxes, here and there, is going to hibernate a spell while we go through more harrowing experience with the demands of the county, which in the end may prove an ironic and impossible situation for rebuilding.
I strive to be happy for what I have. Namely, my charcoal forest, and sense of place…. the ones I love, and this Tiny House. I guess I just need more time, figuring my way forward, thinking about what matters. Life is so short, and I feel each day which slips by that even the rhythm of work of my knitting design has become distortingly hazy. I find I am caught in a sort of reflection of life up to the fire, and am wanting to set in motion the way forward, but frozen peering into that reflection.
Early morning reflection from window of tiny house.
Life is difficult often, but good, and everything in its place.
A tint of wild rose.
Along my knitting trail, explosions of new growth in the charcoal forest, and an occasional over-dyed skein drying from the branches.
A few weeks back, only a couple of days after we moved into our new Tiny House, I dyed this sock yarn with food coloring. My favorite shade of rose inspired by the old-fashioned roses in my garden …
But perhaps mostly, the dusty rose of my tea pot .
I was going to make this whole experiment into a dying tutorial, and had taken down the steps, but thought to wait how it turned out. At the dying stage, the experiment was working beautifully, having gone from two balls of Patons Kroy in color Linen ( in this post recently) , to what I was trying for ; a dusty grey rose tinted slightly variegated overdyed yarn.
The yarn came out exquisitely. So I decided to knit the socks. It took a few weeks, and now here are the results, of um, their good side …
Unfortunately , I am not impressed with this dye, not at all. Because although the yarn may have been dyed to near perfection, and even though I used vinegar to fix, as I suspected the food coloring would not last… which it did not… in the first wash, there are blotchy patches of fade, showing the tan shade of linen beneath, after drying in the sun, on the faded side …
So its back to my favorite Jacquard Acid Dye if I am ever to dye again at all. Dying is such a hazardous hobby, and I really was hoping I could rely on food coloring, but that was wishful thinking.
A lot of work to put into knitting these beautiful Fishermen Socks only to have the dye leech out. But with very little yarn left over, I am really happy of the knitting itself, which was very enjoyable, and I fear I am thoroughly addicted to knitting these St Andrews Harbour socks , piles of them, and may just keep on knitting them for the forthcoming winter holiday gift season.
This pair will not be worthy of gift giving next winter holiday, but they will be most excellent hard wearing boot socks for my LLBean gardening boots, and what I was thinking of back in this post , of roses captured in socks!
Pattern: St Andrews Harbour
Yarn: Patons Kroy Sock, color ” Linen “, overdyed with food coloring, five parts red to one part blue.
Ravelry details here.
Our Tiny House
Greetings from our Tiny House in the Charcoal Forest! Our Tiny House arrived here at the beginning of May, and now we have fully nested back in our charcoal forest. It was a major ordeal hauling it up the mountain with … Continue reading
blue things
In the last weeks I’ve been frequently knitting at the Oakville Grocery cafe to quell life’s blues. Just a quiet little deli & espresso place on the highway with vineyard views in all directions, and with picnic benches in the back where I can bathe in the morning winter sun while making progress toward the finish of a new pattern. And Emma and I are getting out a little bit for (mostly short) walks on the ridge.
Although it appears the walk up the ridge has lost it’s charm completely, I am trying to embrace it, hoping for better days ahead and the mysterious healing power of Spring. Other blues: An intensely blue sky over Oakville on Sunday. A blue balloon descended from the sky, tangled in the woods, omen-like. My blue knitting bag hung on a burned branch while walking up the ridge. Need I mention the blue knitting with cappuccino? I would like to see some blue wildflowers soon. Oh but hey, the vernal equinox is only a week away!
Into the mist …
Went for a stroll out in the drizzling rain, and took a few photos into the veil of mist. 
The mist softens the blackened soil, but the grass is growing up through it in the open spaces now, hovering over and caressing the wound of the wildfire.
I am feeling a nearly unperceivable whispering heartbeat of optimism …
… as if the landscape is tenacious, as much as it is vulnerable.
Tweed Chronicles: Manzanita Blossom
photo from archives: A Storm On The Way
The blossoms of the Arctostaphylos (manzanita) on the ridge trail of the mountain ~~ one with pink flowers, and one with white ~~ are the first blossoms arriving in winter!
pink blooming manzanita
Nestled side by side on the ridge, the two varieties are perfectly complimenting of each other, and as fragrant as they are breathtaking in beauty.
white blooming manzanita
((You can read more about the manzanita in this post ))
Now looking at my latest tweed yarn colorway: “manzanita blossom” … it will be a pink, with a just a dusting of white.
A blush of pink against rocky volcanic landscape is one of the most beautiful things in the mountain landscape, and I do think I found just the right shade ( although I wished I put a tiny bit more white in the last blending layer) …
A shy pink.
A pink which is the color of mid winter … pale and fresh.
There in the pink is the saturated neutral too.
Now, let me show you how I do it…
♣ ♣ ♣
Techy stuff for Manzanita (pink)…
- Color Saturated Neutral recipe for approx 5g each of primary triad of blue, red, and yellow: Blended thoroughly on blending board with 15g of white as many times as necessary to fully homogenize…
- With neutral-white mix, layer alternately with 5g each of Fuscia, Rose, and Flamingo Pinks, and 5-10g more white (see Blending For Tweed Simplified)
- Lift batt, and layer again twice more. (Note to improve: try last layering with another 5g white. to get more white ‘streaking’)
- Draw off rolags.
- Colorway blend: “Manzanita blossom” .
- See ALL color blending experiments & recipes archived in Tweed Chronicles
Tweed Chronicles: The color of fog …
photo from archives: Shades Of Fog
Fog is a huge part of life on the mountain, for me, and I just love the fog show …
fog in January, 2015
I love to watch it pour over the ridge from the Pacific, fluid and volatile, and into the valley, or splashing up from it. I also love it just thickly hovering about …
photo from archives: Foggy
So naturally, my next tweed endeavor must capture the color of fog !
It is my basic white, well, a near white, where like fog, you see faint color of images behind …
Just a tiny bit of the color-saturated neutral to start, then blended several times with increasing amount of white wool, so you’ll see flecks of blue, red and yellow upon close inspection.
I really am enjoying developing a personal hand-spun color palette, and see no end to my combing wool in different combinations, racing obsessively from blending board to the spinning wheel, grabbing my camera to photograph, wash, dry, wind on swift, photogragh again …
… then on to the next !
♣ ♣ ♣
Techy stuff for Fog (white)…
- Color Saturated Neutral recipe for approx 10-15% base, primary triad of blue, red, and yellow: Blended thoroughly on blending board. Note: for a more dramatic tweed, with gobs of color splashing through, blend only once , then continue.
- Starting with white, layer alternately with neutral (see Blending For Tweed Simplified)
- Lift batt, divide as needed and layer again and again with more white, repeatedly fully hemogenized, more or fewer times until white/neutral values balance as desired.
- Draw off rolags.
- Colorway blend: “Fog” .
- See ALL color blending experiments & recipes archived in Tweed Chronicles
Buttons
I’m going through my numerous button jars, sifting and splashing about, trying to decide which one to finish the latest vest… I really love the wild cat-eye buttons in square one, but there are tragically only three, and the … Continue reading
The events of the day…
Emma has gotten herself somehow mysteriously injured, and has been hobbling about for a day and a half. I suspect she may have slipped and fallen on the stairs while we were away at a neighbor’s for dinner on Saturday, because Sunday she just could not move hardly at all. Today she is a little better, at least been able to walk a little ways although very stiff and sore, far beyond her normal senior-dog arthritis.
Emma sleeps in our bedroom upstairs, but in recent months she has been getting very unsure of herself on the stairs and has been needing help up and down because of the slippery hard-wood surface. Last weekend I cut up a big old rug for the turning area of the stairs, which helped a lot for that was where she was slipping the most, but the straight sections were still needing to be covered–insert Emma’s injury Saturday evening. So Sunday morning I went into town and I bought a smattering of small throw rugs, sewed them end-to-end to make runners, cut more rug matting, and created a patchwork of rugs on the whole stairway, which is now very cluttered, and a bit odd, but no longer slippery.
I was so worried last night I slept on the couch downstairs next to her to give her moral support, and joy of joys, today she is much better and at least able to walk around a little outside but won’t be able to climb the stairs for a while yet. Wish her well, she’s looking up, and I’ll give her a good pet from all of you.
Knitting Track News: I have measured with this wheel the feet distance of the whole knitting track. The actual ‘track’ is a sloppy figure-eight looping through woods very near our house, total of 1448 feet. Not a big deal, I know , but as the track itself is over 1/4 mile around, so three times around the track plus the walk to and from the track is 1 mile…. and folks, that is not nothing ! 5x is 1.5 miles, 7x is 2 miles, you get the idea. Just think of the knitting I can accomplish while working up a sweat!
144 finished feet done & dusted, about 1300 feet to go. I did about 60 feet just today, and I’m tired! For now it may seem perpetually under construction, but one day I will be finished and it will be a great accomplishment !!
See my recent post How To Make A Knitting Trail ,
or all knitting trail & knitting-while-walking related posts HERE.
How to make a knitting trail.
October is the best trail-making month in the year, as the ground is just moistened by a couple of rains at the most, but not muddy. I have been doing a lot of walking in the woods, both with and without knitting, always with Emma, and we have staked out where we want it to go, our ‘knitting and sniffing track’ !
Oh! But I have left you a little lesson on how to make a knitting trail in the woods for yourself, if you have handy … a bit of woods.
First, stake the trail out with sticks and walk it for a few weeks, or months, refining path to contour the land well, satisfied that it is a pleasure to walk , perhaps even while knitting. Be sure you love walking your trail as it is, before you disturb the soil and take tools to it!
I go ahead with the long-handled pruners and bow saw, clear debris in the way that causes tripping, etc. during the first walks. Then walk some more weeks.
When you’re ready to commit, begin!
Rake aside duff, sticks, fir cones, remove big rocks, etc.
Scrape aside the composting layer gently, (to be raked back over) to expose dirt.
Pick, hoe, and scrape, loosening soil beneath the compost layer, and leveling side-to-side by eye. Or , if you want a really level path as this one will be…
use a level straight edge to check that it is roughly level side-to-side (not fore & aft). Tamp earth down, firming walking area only.
Finally, lightly rake compost layer back over tamped, leveled trail. It should look like the original forest ground, essential to replace plenty of compost over raw soil, and even a sprinkle of the raked-aside debris of small sticks and little cones.
I have worked out a method whereby I am working both start and finish in a 20-foot section which moves along as I work, then finishing my work by covering the soil as I close up the gap so that there is no more raw dirt, and lay my tools down for next work session, whenever that can be.
There is a lot to do yet before I will take out the measuring wheel and see how it measures up in distance. It will look like this for many weeks , perhaps through the whole Autumn it will be a work in progress.
And now if you will excuse me, my coffee break is over, and time for me to go back out. I am so very excited that I am finally making the Knitting Trail ~~~ joy of joys!!
Knitting In The Wild
We have been walking through the morning hours of Autumn. Miles of yarn and prints of dog paws, and shoes, side by side. More chaotically spaced actually, mine straight forward, destination ahead, focused on the rounds of lace, of sleeves, of precious warm cardigans, and Emma’s prints with her own agenda, as the wild life is speaking to her and new smells are exciting her in zig-zag directions and renewed vigor giving her incentive to come up to the peak with me these days.
Our walks journey through Autumn, with the arrival of rain, we seem to be experiencing a gradual awakening of our dormant selves, as is with the succulent green mosses everywhere … our joy of joys.
To the peak we have walked a few times this Autumn already. On the ridge right before the peak, like a comfortable old bed, there is a soft pine needle layer from an eerie forest of stick-like old trees composting on the jutting toothy rock beneath … it is so dreamy to walk through, I just had to hang my knitting on it and be silly.
Everything is in its place, and life is good.
Equinox Walk
Happy Autumn Equinox everyone! It is in recent years, my favorite day of the year. This morning the equinox occurred at 7:21 in the morning, and I planned to get to my secret knitting spot on one of my trails, overlooking a vineyard and hazy Mt Diablo in the distance, only about a ten-minute walk from my door at the most. Here are some more photos of our little early morning walk out to greet the new season…
Emma enjoyed the scent of the fresh wildlife tracks from the night, and I enjoyed the brilliant angled light fuzzing through the trees. We then reached our secret spot on time, about 7:20, here standing on the big stump of a very large fir, gives a wonderful vantage point of the area we live in.
The light at sunrise had an amber glow and the air is cool. I thoroughly love this little loop in the woods next to my house, at first light. Tomorrow and often in the days following, I think I will come here to greet the sunrise and feel Autumn’s transitory beauty. Perhaps a thermos of tea and sit on the stump here, knit, and thoroughly enjoy the season as the leaves slowly turn.
I also have a little new knitting going on, but I won’t give details for another week or so…
Enjoy your first-day-of-Autumn and happy knitting!