Make Me

[shanmonster]

Today has been a day of making. It started with making my room neat. I won't say that was a total triumph, but I certainly made a dent. I also started the process for traveling internationally by beginning to fill out the paperwork for a passport. Of course, I realized my birth certificate is AWOL, so I had to fill out paperwork to order in a new one. But the process is underway. I will travel. I really want to. I've never been to Europe. Yet.

I made myself a member of CADA today, which means I can now get reimbursed for a lot of my dance training. This will make it much easier for me to continue to progress as a dancer. It also gets me accident insurance, which could be handy in case I break myself in half doing splits or something.

And then I slaved over a sonnet for a few hours. I've decided to work in the Shakespearean form (rhyme scheme of ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG), and that was a struggle and a half. My brain rebelled the whole time, squealing DO NOT WANT DO NOT WANT DO NOT WANT the whole time, but damn it, who's in control? My brain or me? I say me. And so I got the first stanza finished, and am on my way with the second. So there, brain. Suck on it.

I finally relented and gave my brain a break by knitting another cowl scarf, this time out of wool/rayon and mohair/polyamide (whatever that is). It's very silky and soft, and not nearly as froufrou girly-girl as I thought it might be, despite its purple/pink combination.



And then it was time to challenge myself again, this time with naalbinding. This is my very first attempt:



It's a bit wonky, but it seems to look right. Not knowing anyone who actually practices this ancient art, I can't exactly ask for advice. But the incomprehensible (to me) Nordic woman in the tutorial video seems to be making something that looks like this. So I think I'm on the right track. My next couple of attempts were worse, so I think that's my brain saying "Enough!" for now. Ok. I'll give it a break. Poor brain. I asked so much of it today. What it doesn't realize is how I'm going to make it do my bidding again tomorrow. Shhh.....

Comments

[clevermanka.livejournal.com]

I might have to commission a local friend to make me a cowl. She usually does fingerless gloves for me, but man, that cowl look is just saucy. You wear it well!

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

Thanks! It takes me about an hour and a half to make one.

[mysteryelfx.livejournal.com]

Are you on the LJ knitting community?

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

Not yet! If it's an extremely busy community, I probably won't join. I already have gazillions of things on my online reading list each day.

Have you any idea if there's a loom-knitting community? Or a naalbinding one? I'm betting that if there are such communities, they're not super-busy.

[mysteryelfx.livejournal.com]

It is somewhat busy. It would be a great place to put your finished stuff, though. But if you're too busy, then maybe not.

I don't know any of the other communities that you've mentioned. I only ever heard of naalbinding in the "Vogue Knitting" book I recently purchased, in the history section. I don't see why there wouldn't be a community for loom-knitting. I just didn't search for that.

And there's Ravelry.com, which I recently joined, that you can upload and track your projects. But again, another time suck.