jodi's weblog

jodi's weblog

 

 

cutout

arms

For a woodcut.

Posted by jodi on March 10, 2010 at 7.05pm

turned the heel

heel turned

Time to set it aside and start the other foot.

Posted by jodi on March 9, 2010 at 9.08pm

don’t forget to bring a cowl

It’s a fact that as the light returns, winter coats get heavier and heavier until it’s a chore to put them on in the morning. It may seem too close to the end of winter to knit such a warm thing, but this cozy cowl will help to balance out a too-thin spring jacket on those cool mornings when the temperatures are still in the single-digit minuses but winter coats seem too drab under such bright skies.

new cowl

new cowl

The pattern is Ha’Penny Loop by Staceyjoy Elkin (again; she’s one of my favourite designers, can you tell?). Yarn is Berroco Cuzco, same stuff I used for the legwarmers.

new cowl

Posted by jodi on March 8, 2010 at 10.41pm

thinking of spring

And handknit socks that let the warm breezes in.

new sock

So here's something new, started this morning with the handspun I got from Stacie recently. There’s no pattern, just a bog standard toe-up construction with a simple diagonal lace that will spiral up the leg. I’m using 2.75mm needles for these rather than the usual 2.25mm, and marveling at the difference half a millimetre makes to the speed of a project.

What’s that other knit in the background, you ask? Why, that would be the warm and cozy and gigantic cowl I finished just in time for the temperatures to rise above freezing. Typical. I’m counting on the end of March to provide me with some opportunity to wear it. Pictures tomorrow.

Posted by jodi on March 7, 2010 at 10.56pm

back to basics

Yesterday I taught a small beginning bookbinding workshop. Participants made models of three simple book forms: a single signature pamphlet binding, a Japanese 4-hole binding and perfect binding. Here are some of the finished samples:

book samples

book samples

Because we have no bindery equipment here, I brought up this somewhat primitive trimming apparatus that my dad made for me back in the 1990s when I was doing a lot of bookbinding but didn’t have any money or any tools. Propped up on one end (the end you can see here, with blocks under it to keep it steady) a pair of backing boards can be slid inside and the book clamped for rounding the spine. At the other end it’s got a nice high smooth wooden wall that’s used for a guide to keep the blade nice and straight for trimming the clamped book; it uses an old blade from a plane with leather wrapped around it, and back when I was trimming twenty textblocks a day with this thing I’d wrap my hand in leather and fabric as well and still get blisters in two lines across all four fingers. It’s a grueling job, but it does the trick.

trimming the hard way

Using this old trimmer again has me really looking forward to getting the new (to me) Chandler & Price paper trimmer up and running once I’m back home (remember how I was going to get the base sanded and painted over the February break? Didn’t happen). Did I mention that I’m planning to spend my whole summer down in the basement just cutting up books all day? Any books I can get my hands on. Because I can, that’s why.

Posted by jodi on March 6, 2010 at 9.08pm

goat trail, now with 30% fewer trees!

Some people came and cut down a bunch of trees near the Monastery today. When I went over to take a few photos after work, there was a group of deer standing around the (now quiet) machinery, looking confounded. Of course they’re camera shy, so all you get is one tiny deer hiding in the shadows framed by the tree-ripper there. No, really, she’s there. Look harder.

destruction

Across the road the carnage was worse, and the steep, rocky little goat trail that the students walk (us middle aged old coots whose best years of cardiac health are behind us take the longer, more gently sloping path) is now a clearing big enough for a game day tailgate party. I can’t imagine what they might be building in such a spot, although there is a sewer at the top of the path. Where the path used to be, that is.

Phrases I need to work on saying less often, all of which show up here in my video narration, include:

1) adding “right now” onto the end of an otherwise perfectly finished sentence;

2) “. . . I tell you what” (picked up while living in Georgia, reinforced by a recent King of the Hill binge);

3) “Jesus Murphy”.

I’m clearly some kind of hayseed. At least I didn’t swear. Wait, is one of those a swear?

Posted by jodi on March 5, 2010 at 11.14pm

spring is coming

spring is coming

Posted by jodi on March 4, 2010 at 10.11pm

studio video march 3

Posted by jodi on March 3, 2010 at 7.34pm

legwarmers, y’all

Well, they might not be folded down over a pair of high top sneakers (untied laces loosened to accommodate as many friendship pins as possible) the way I used to wear them back when I was cool (or thought I was; circa 1983), but I tell you what, these are the nicest leg warmers I’ve ever owned.

legwarmers

Pattern: Sydney, by Staceyjoy Elkin.

Yarn: Berroco Cuzco, a wool/alpaca blend

Now if only I hadn’t forgotten my new red boots, the ones I made these legwarmers to wear with, back home in Windsor.

Posted by jodi on March 2, 2010 at 8.20pm

roll up the ripoff

turn up a winner?

On first glance I thought that perhaps Tim Hortons had, after all these decades, changed their colour scheme. But, no. This Country Style Donuts coffee cup is nothing but a dashing imposter, laying its glitzy colour scheme over the well known design of Tim Hortons’ nationally beloved and highly anticipatedRoll up the Rim. Here, have a look at how similar the design is:

RRROLL it! by western tragedy on flickr
photo by flickr user western tragedy

(for my non-Canadian friends: the other side of the Tims cup also has little black and white photos of the SUV and the television and whatever other stuff you can win on it. Just like the imposter cup).

Posted by jodi on March 1, 2010 at 11.28pm