natural fiber and color

Kamath

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:29:00 +0000

fairy circle

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 14:39:00 +0000

what popped up in our garden this fall
i wanted to go out at midnight and see if any wee people were dancing there, but never made it

Little Miss by the Day

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:05:00 +0000

This was one of my favorite books when I was a child. I have a copy, but its cover is ripped and the spine gone. Still, I would have a very difficut time parting with it.

alpaca yarn

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 21:23:00 +0000

I have wound off another skein of 2 ply alpaca Danza. Here it is on my antique clock winder.

Fall

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:31:00 +0000

It's finally beginning to look and feel like Fall around here. Perhaps the cooler weather today helps.

This is a photo I took on my trip to Kentucky in October. I stopped in the grand metropolis of Crab Orchard near what I guess is the city park, or the town square. There are always a few locals selling stuff at tables there, I wanted to walk Buddy, but one guy had his hound keeping an eye on things from the back of his truck and I didn't want to stir up trouble. Crab Orchard is interesting and I like stopping there before I have to get back on the interstate.

Anyway, I haven't written much about my Kentucky visit on either this blog, or my other one, Johnson Family Bible, but guess I should start putting down the information I gleaned from relatives, Neville mostly. Or it will be lost in the vagaries of my loopy handwriting. Next post.

goldenrod roving, Etsy

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:22:00 +0000

This is some roving I dyed with goldenrod and posted for sale on Etsy. I'm not sure why the photo is coming out so small.

Quiet

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 10:41:00 +0000

Halloween was quiet. I felt a bit under the weather, we went out for breakfast at McD's, Brian worked on the kitchen, I made Cushaw soup and dessert, read an interesting book, we had a few, very few, trick-or-treaters. The weather was grim Saturday, but Sunday was lovely and eventually we went for a ride to TR by back ways to look at Autumn leaves at sunset and explore. It was lovely, we found a fabulous view of the mountains, and the moon was rising, but we didn't have the camera. Well.....

Another week of physical therapy, doctor's visits and the hope the B holds onto his job. Same old scary routine.

a bigger photo

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:49:00 +0000

handspun alpaca

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:47:00 +0000

I have been comissioned to spin alpaca. It is lovely stuff and all my free hours are spent spinning now. I have five bags to spin.

a better Monday

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:52:00 +0000

Life has been complicated recently. Grace had a bad wreck. We are grateful she did not get badly hurt, although she is still struggling with pain and tight muscles. We took our vacation to Santa Fe anyway (we had the airline tickets) and it was her vacation week. Last week was consumed by post vacation and trying to find a car to replace the white one that was destroyed. We found one in Columbia and the whole process was complicated by driving back and forth twice to that city. But there was success despite the stress and...

Just to update, we took the little red car to Fisher's this morning to have it checked out. Yesterday we drove it up Caesar's head and had a picnic of tomato chicken sandwiches. It was surprisingly cool up there, refreshing really, although we shared both the road and the park with a gaggle, roar (?) of motorcycles.

The car handled beautifully, took the hill with no apparent strain, the lighter body apparently compensating for the 4 cylinders. It took the curves nicely, hugging into them. No problems with the brakes on the return trip, either. All good news for you, Grace.

We saw a hummingbird drinking out of jewel weed blossoms and Dad, of course, was targeted by a couple wasps. But the breeze kept the mosquitoes at bay and it was heartening to see how the vegetation has recovered in this rainy year, despite the drought of the previous 3.

Bubba

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 09:35:00 +0000

Bubba is suffering from kidney and thyroid problems. We don't know how much longer we will have her. We will board her at the vet when we visit Grace next week and hope they can get her stabilized. We have her on pills (ever try to pill a cat?) and special food right now and she is slowly, let me emphasis, slowly, improving.

Bubba this past Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 09:34:00 +0000

Bat box

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 08:35:00 +0000

Well, the bat box is up. John did an absolute meticulous job. Nice guy. Kudos to anyone willing to dig a post hole in summer!

I will post a picture later as I was too tired yesterday to get a shot and it is dark outside at the moment. B spritzed the little brown things to give them an incentive to go looking for accommodations outside our attic.

The garden is not as prolific as in past years, but has been producing a steady stream of cucumbers and tomatoes. The beans have started to come in. I planted a number of home grown seeds and have a bean plant that seems to be a cross between what southerners call field peas and black beans. OK with me. Seems just right.

There is a red and yellow theme to this time of summer. Blooming are fennel, evening primrose, those native cone type flowers whose name I do not know, and red swamp hibiscus. Also some fiery hot peppers are reddening. I don't think I planted any fiercely hot peppers, so there must have been a mix up in the seeds somewhere. Of course, they are prolifically thriving, while the tamer peppers are just in a medium mode. What shall I do with all those intensely hot peppers?

wild rabbits - bad knees

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:28:00 +0000

OK. So hubby spotted Ears (a wild brown bunny) in the veggie garden this morning and went out with a broom to evict him. I followed more slowly (as I do most things these days). Turns out Ears had chewed himself (herself?) a neat hole through the plastic fence. Grrrrrr.

So what is so fabulous in our garden, you might ask, that Ears with a world of wild green around him, has to go to so much trouble? Beans! Seems that bean plants are the chocolate and caviar of rabbit gourmets. Go figure.

So here is the schedule me and my hobble knees have worked out. Get up. Let dog out. Make tea and drink it with synthroid. Walk the dog a short distance down the street, trying to increase a few steps each day. Return. Make another cup of tea. Make husband's lunch. Drink Tea 2 with Sam-e, folic acid and B complex. Kiss husband goodbye. Pick up rabbit food scraps and, followed by dog, head to the back yard for a weeding, veggie picking, rabbit feeding, cage cleaning session. Return inside and make another cup of tea and grind flax seeds. Make morning oatmeal including said flax seeds. Take tea, oatmeal mix, E, bee pollen, calcium with mag and Vit C to computer to have bkfst and read emails, explore blogs, etc.

All of this is not finished until 10:30 or so. By then it is to the kitchen (in wheeled computer chair to save my knees) to process morning picked veggies, clean up kitchen, etc. Usually it is noonish by the time all this is done. And that means more ground flax seeds and whatever.

My afternoons are my own with the exception of ingesting another Calcium mag, C, and two
Ever-flex. But I am limited by the amount of pain I am experiencing on any given day and the immediacy of tasks awaiting me. At 5 I start preparing dinner and at sixish hubby returns from a hard day of slogging it out in the salt mines. We eat, watch TV, retire to respective corners to read, sew or get on the computer. Then I try to take another walk down the street with dog going a few more steps than the morning. My goal is to be able to walk to the elementary school and back, but since I haven't made it to the first cross street yet, I have a ways to go.

Wish me luck. There does seem to be some improvement with this regimen, however slight.

we have bats in our belfry, ur, attic!

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:22:00 +0000

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:24:00 +0000

One fox, two fox
Red fox, blue fox.
No, wait, wait, that's not right.

The socks in fox
fall mainly in the box.
No! No!, That's supposed to be
about rain and Spain. Sigh.

Twas brillig. Oh.....not right either.

When Knox in socks
drinks whisky on the rocks
Nope, nope, nope.

Wait, I got it!

When young foxes in sockes
learn to think outside boxes
they invent new visions of eggs
and ham. Sam.

Play it again.
I am
Carolyn

Open Letter to Depak Chopra

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 13:09:00 +0000

"I matter, I belong, I am worthy, I am safe, I can express myself, I am loved."

I don't believe any of the above.
Isn't that sad?

Life has taught me that these things are only for the beautiful, the rich, the powerful, the well placed, the healthy.

The rest of us have to figure out how to do without them.

shadows

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 02:33:00 +0000

Finely drawn shadows surround your eyes,
Night scrapes our window.
Behind dark, a penciled star.
Everything is cold now.

Still Life with Cat

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 09:05:00 +0000

Our sweet and independant Bubba.

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 04:32:00 +0000

How did I get so old and beat up?

Why do my adult once children live so far away?

I remember the day each was born and now they have lives that seem as distant from mine as the evening stars.

Fish Bait

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:27:00 +0000

Antin, Lake Lure

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:27:00 +0000

Sunshine on a Grey Day

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:26:00 +0000

Rainy Day Lilly

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:25:00 +0000

Cosmos

noreply@blogger.com (naturalfiberandcolor) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:24:00 +0000

A dye plant!