What a week...

it’s been, that last one. The election in the US, the end of the German coalition government, a football match in Amsterdam gone riot. Excuse me? No comment on either of these happenings from my side. We all have to live with it, and …

I spent a few days at my mother’s place, first celebrating her birthday, then tackling tasks of dealing with the aftermath of my father's passing end of July. There are numerous visits to her place ahead of us in the near future. Donating his clothes to a charity was probably one of the easier ones, although not really easy for either of us. I took some of his shirts, thinking I may use them for comfort quilts. And his hankies, which I already turned into an advent calendar for my son. That now needs to be shipped to Amsterdam when I have found a suitable box ( and no, he did not get caught up in the riots, his campus is far enough away from where things were happening).

Advent calendar for a big boy now out there in the big world...
perphaps more of a comfort for the mother to make it than a necessary gift?

 Now my husband and I are getting acquainted with the situation of being together only the two of us again, an empty nest in a new place. A lot of things still need to find their place and although only a relatively small number of boxes remain to be unpacked (but first we need to get hold of a shelf to be able to put the contents somewhere) and some order has indeed been achieved I would not say that I have developed a real sense of belonging. In fact, I am a bit at a loss when people ask me ‘and have you settled down yet?’ 

We go for walks to explore the surroundings.

The area used to have granite quarries, and porcelain factories,
but most of that has disappeared.

 

I did enjoy the last couple of days of the so-called ‘inversion weather situation’ when I could see in the weather app that almost all of Germany was covered by fog, cold air trapped beneath the higher, warmer layer that we were fortunate to enjoy. 

 

That is a benefit of this place I had not taken into consideration. It used to be that I was the one caught below, under the fog, and that always was a difficult situation for me to bear. 

 

One of the still-not-turned-into-order places is my studio. Smaller than before, fewer shelves, and I just haven’t been here enough to work myself through it all and establish a decent system. But I have sewn a bit, even finished a top already. In the summer I was invited to join the international quilt group Voyage, and although I was a bit at a loss for an idea to sew something for the theme ‘Alchemy’, I wanted to make it a point to participate right away. Once the idea had surfaced it all came together quickly and I have already basted it. Let’s see how quilting goes.

A pre-final view of 'Alchemy of Fabrics', using a number of 'special'
fabrics that have either been treated with a special dyeing method
(indigo, or rusting), or have a special geographic origin
(African countries, Japan), or a special emotional connotation (custom
printed fabric with my son's handwriting from a few years ago).

 Another object that needs to be completed is my first piece for 20 Perspective’s current year-long topic which will eventually count three pieces by each of the members. The first one was due in June, and I did not finish on time. The second reveal within the group took place recently, and I haven’t started the second piece yet, although I do have an inkling where the fabrics might be that I want to use. I hope to be back on track for the third reveal date in January.

(Things are) Moving on

With all the things going on this summer I took a difficult decision late in August and canceled my trip to EPM in Alsace, although I really had been looking forward to it. There were several exhibitions I would have wanted to see, people I would have loved to meet personally, and it was the first time that the EQA exhibition was opening there, even being shown there.  Life then threw another unpleasant thing in my way, and I also had to cancel the workshop I would have taught at my beloved Petersberg. Fortunately, a long-time participant and friend agreed to act as substitute group leader and the workshop took place without me. The group is well established and many of them are so advanced in their patchwork proficiency that they don’t really need me as a ‘teacher’ anymore, and they could easily handle the newcomers. Keeping my fingers crossed that now, finally, things will begin to smooth down and the next time this workshop will be just a weekend as usual without any emergencies and unpleasant surprises or cancellations.

‘On the side’ of all this my husband and I packed up our belongings and house where we had lived for 19 years and 2 months. Our son had already left for Amsterdam in August, and it was our job to sort through too many items and stuff and books and and and… The movers arrived on a Monday and by late Wednesday morning every box and our furniture was on board. A last and final (14^th!) visit to the recycling station after the moving van took off, and then we followed the moving truck, spent a night on mattresses on the floor in the new apartment, before the movers joined us again to unpack on Thursday and Friday. Ever since then we have been working away at boxes. Most, but not all, have by now been unpacked.

 

It took a while before the kettle reappeared and we could make a decent pot of tea. And we were searching for the box with contents of the fridge for several days which somehow had disappeared. When we finally found it – out on the balcony, covered with a plastic sheet to protect it from the rain – the cheese was still edible as it had been a few cool days (although we merely grated it onto a veggie-dish baked in the oven.)

Other things have re-appeared, too.

Project for 20 Perspectives, already way overdue,
and not finished yet.

 

My sewing room is smaller than in the former house, and because the whole apartment is smaller than the house we need to readjust even further.

 First job was to make curtains for my son’s room. Rather idiosyncratic, and certainly not capable of winning a design award, but they do keep the early morning light out when he wants to sleep in a little bit.

And I have put something on my design wall, although it hasn’t progressed far yet.

 

I had a chance to take another look at my Sweater Somewhat Slanted, which keeps changing as it grows. 

 

This time the change was due to the need to re-dedicate the blue handspuns in the bag to enlarge the result of my Tour de Fleece 2024 effort, which had been to spin ‘all my blues’. That ended up with a good amount of 3-plied yarn, but not enough for a complete project. The slanted sweater, however, is so versatile in color placement, it doesn’t really matter what color goes into the remaining length of sleeve 1 and then sleeve 2. 

Still debating how I will fare with the neckline. Not sure yet...

 

And I had the immense joy of meeting up with Kathy (i.e. Kathleen Loomis), who had three hours off the boat on a river cruise in Bamberg, which is now relativle close to where we live. We had a lovely couple of hours in a café, catching up and chatting about what’s been happening in our respective lives. We agreed that it had been too long since we saw each other in person, and that it really was too short a visit, but better than nothing. Hopefully it won’t be quite as long before we get a chance to meet the next time!

 

One day left before Diamond Day

 As every year for a dozen or so years now I have contributed a donation to the SAQA Benefit Auction.

With all the things going on in my life I did not have time to get going about putting out a post "Bid on Me!", as SAQA offers for all donators every year. Nor did I have time early on to publish my Dream Collection, as many other contributors have done and I used to do in other years.

Only today did I take initiative to do so. And found myself in trouble, because how to choose from more than 460 artworks...? At first I thought I might try to find a topic, as I have done before, but that didn't work out for me. Then I thought I might take all members from 20 Perspectives who have donated. But there are more than six of us who have donated, and Dream Collections are supposed to be only six pieces. Of course, this being a different format altogether I could have jumped that regulation, but then I decided to abide by those rules and took six pieces from friends of mine. (Note that, amongst 464 pieces, there are many more from people whom I know personally and admire their work, so the choice to limit myself to six was even harder with the 'friends' category than the 20 Perspectives category. I hope nobody complains about the choice, it is absolutle no indication of the degree of sympathy I feel for the people.)

Here is my 2024 Dream Collection "Works from Some Friends of Mine":

Anne Bellas, Souleil Couchant

Linda Colsh, Narrow Days

Judith Content, One Winter Walk

Dolores Miller, Venice Vessels

Claire Passmore, Neon Upccyle II

Shoshi Rhimer, Reflection

Of course, there is the temptation to include one's own piece in the Dream Collection, but as jurors are not usually allowed to enter a piece in the show they are jurying yet may show one piece of their own, I will add, as a repeat showing, my piece as well.

Uta Lenk, Small Study in Yellow and Blue, p.C.

Diamond Day is tomorrow - any piece may be bought at the initial starting bid of $1000, after that the 464 pieces go up for reverse price bidding in three sections. Do take a look - it is a wonderful way of acquiring a piece of original textile art and supporting SAQA at the same time.

Farewells, too many

 

Waiting for a train last Saturday I strolled around Hambur harbor
for a little bit. Remembering the concert in Elbphilharmonie that was
interrupted by a fire alarm - and today I saw that that had happened again...

It’s all been a bit much lately, as I already wrote about a little while ago. So far, it hasn’t exactly eased up. The weekend before last brought two decisive farewells to go through.  Either of which would have been enough on its own, but both of them within less than 24 hours, and in the wake of all that’s going on…

The first one was the last and final farewell to my father, who had peacefully passed after four long and hard months in hospital. 

Hans Lenk, 1935-2024

 

We took him to his hometown to be buried in a site where he looks across the lakes that were so important in his life as a rowing champion, right next to the church where my parents were married. 

Looking out over the lake from a different angle.

 

The Eight that went on to win the Olympic gold medal in Rome

As sad an occasion as it was, the whole family agreed that it was a very comforting get together, to see each other after sometimes many years.

The next farewell, on the morning after the funeral, was to send my son off to college. The original plan had been that I would have driven him to Amsterdam and set him up in his dorm. As plans had to be changed and I had to go back to work on Sunday, that was not feasible for me, instead, my husband took him there and then continued home on his own. He did a lot of driving that day! (I had told him to stop and check into a hotel along the way, which he didn’t, just catching a bit of sleep in the back of the van and then continuing on, so I’m afraid I don’t really need to feel very sorry for him.)

Hard to say which one of the farewells is more difficult to deal with.

I feel immense relief that my father has been spared further suffering and treatments in the hospital, or even the care-taking situation he might (most certainly would) have found himself in had his weakened heart not finally given up. And I feel rage at all the back and forth he had to go through for almost four months when doctors kept operating on him, he was being shoved back and forth between various hospital wards and receiving more and more antibiotics that weakened his body and enabled an infection to grow so they could not get it under control in the end. It’s bitter to have seen a strong, successful, smart and intelligent person like him diminished into the weak, suffering and sometimes deranged vegetable that he was during his last weeks. And I question the ethics of modern-day medical technology and their ‘let’s do this and try that’, putting elderly people through ordeals that yes, perhaps increase their life span by sheer number, but at what cost of quality of life? (I also see this at work, every single day, and I have had several people my father’s age and older talking to me with tears in their eyes at what was happening to them and why did they have to go through this – well, at least my father was spared their specific kind of medical ordeal. Which doesn’t make it any easier.)

On the other hand, my son, a grown young man now, taking off into the big adventure of studying, moving to a different country, setting out to conquer the world. His arrival in my life happened when we had given up hope that we would be able to have a child – and then the miracle happened after all, completely natural, and he was a fun and vivacious boy with a strong personality, a compulsive and recognizable laughter and a charming personality. 

 

Yes, some issues between headstrong mother and headstrong boy, but no drug incidences (at least none that I heard of), and he spared us the possibility of the tattoo he and his friends were talking about just before their last joint vacation venture (they came back with ugly crew-cut kind of haircuts, which, thankfully will grow out before they grow seriously older). He was a fun kid to have, and as I have been noticing that the covid-lockdown-induced-sullenness seems to be lifting somewhat he has recently been developing into a very amiable youngster, I have also been hearing such appreciative things about him from outside that it truly has given me joy. Even if sometimes parents wish the children would act differently at home, it seems he has been doing just fine outside the house, and what else does one want? I did not get to take him to Amsterdam, but first reports have been positive and buoyant, and we are optimistic that he will find his way.

He left behind his piggy bank into which he had been depositing his small coins. 

 

I sorted through that heap of change, differentiating between 10- and 20-cent coins (my pocket), 5-cent coins (counting towards my next visit to the Munich Readery bookstore for second hand English books) and the 1- and 2-cent coins I will dump into the coin-collector at the local supermarket where the amount will be deducted from your next bill. The pig itself was mine, anyway, which he claimed at some point. It has lost its belly-button-stopper and I need to find a replacement for that, but I suppose I can now claim it back, for a while at least.

I admit, these farewells have left me frequently welling up in tears lately. Still packing up the house – my desk and more of my sewing room are next and highly urgent now. Creativity is still on the back burner, only infrequently do I find time and leisure to sit down and ‘make’. A bit of knitting here, a bit of spinning there.

"All my Blues" is taking all my blue spinning fibers,
these two bobbins remain to be plied.

The next spinning project in preparation: "All my Reds"

The towel somewhat slanted, growing slowly,
with a few more mistakes incorporated.

But I have challenges coming up that I can at least think about and do a little bit of research for. I have been invited to become part of the group ‘Voyage’, which was a pleasant experience. Depending on how quickly I manage to unpack my stuff at the new place after our move at the end of September I may join in with their planned exhibition for March/April (although that would mean a pretty tight timeline for completing the quilt). And there are two more pieces to be made for the current theme of 20 Perspectives.

Life goes on, despite farewells (more coming up, but those won't be as significant as these recent ones) and difficult times.

100 years after...

On August 1, 1924, my grandparents on my mother's side got married. (Only in the last few days did I start wondering how much of their attention was directed towards the first Paris Olympics back then…? Olympics being an importanst part of my family history, but that is a different story.) Fifty years later we celebrated their Golden Wedding anniversary with a boat tour on the steamer on Lake Ratzeburg.

My grandparents as the jubilee couple in front of the brick cathedral.
My grandmother absolutely loved this Norwegian cardigan and
wore it until it virtually fell to pieces, at which point my mother sat down,
copied the pattern in colored pencils and we then proceeded to recreate
the piece. I got to do the major part, knitting the body and the top part
after the body had been joined with the sleeves, which my mother had made.
We knit with rather different gauge, so it was a bit of an awkward piece in the end,
definitely the result of a labor of love rather than a beautiful piece...

 

A document of family history: my cousin on the left, me, my father,
my two brothers and my aunt who was living in Eastern Germany
and had received permission to come for this celebration. Despite the adults' efforts
of persuasion she refused to 'stay in the West' despite the fact that her
marriage was on the rocks already. She did not want to be dependant on
anybody and thus faced another 15 years behind the iron curtain because
after separating from her husband she never was never again given a permit to travel
and reunite with her parents, until the Wall came down.
By then both my grandparents had passed away.

Having recently moved ‘back’ to Ratzeburg I thought I would do a very personal commemoration of that event by taking that same boat ride, only it could not happen on August 1, so I went a week before.

 I just love this lake and am very happy that I decided to go for this big change in my life. Even if it meant that there is some upheaval going on right now and I still don’t know when that will end…

 

The day after that boat ride I went south to see my family and continue packing up our house for the grand move in the end of September. The big spinning wheel and the big sewing machine have already been transferred to the new apartment and my possibilities for making and creating have slimmed down. But since there is no time for that right now anyway I would rather have these two items transported securely by ourselves, and not trusting them to the moving services team.

 

But I had already shipped my contribution to this year’s SAQA Benefit Auction, which will take place in September. As readers of this blog may have heard my last two contributions did not fare exactly as one would have wished – two years ago my piece sold at the last minute, a few days before Christmas, from the SAQA store, and last year I took my piece with me at the end of Houston Quiltfestival and then gifted it to a good friend of mine.

However, I was early in making mine this year. I managed to ensure some clandestine shipment option early on, saving a number of euros in postage, and had a secret contributor who kindly shipped the little item from within the US. It has a two-digit-inventory number in the listing (not that that is something to be particularly proud of, but I noticed when I scrolled through last night.) Now I am hoping that this year’s piece will be a little more successful.

It was crafted from leftover blocks and pieces in my boxes, feeding creative juices after the pandemic, which consequently found its way into the title as “p.C” (meaning ‘post Covid’).

 

Small Study in Blue and Yellow (p.C.), 2024

Let’s see how it fares… You can preview the auction pieces here: https://www.saqa.com/auction

A Towel, somewhat slanted

 I confess, when I wrote my last post, it was a little bit with a mind towards 'talking about it all may take the dynamics out of it and perhaps things will turn to the better'. Rest assured, so far it hasn't. New happenings on the parents' health front, and being in the midst of packing, sorting, clearing out... I wonder how I can cope with it all, and I do wonder, when things will get better!

In any case - to please my battered little soul I gave in to temptation. Anybody who has been reading this blog for a little while may have noticed that I have been struck with a bit of infatuation with Sarah C. Swett and her textile adventures, and am an avid reader and big fan of The Gusset on Substack. 

My Sweater Somewhat Slanted is still in the making.

 

A few weeks ago she posted about her handspun and handwoven towels and showed pictures that were so lightweight and enchanting that I felt very much of the "Oh, I would loooove to have one like that" kind of yearning. Of course, I haven't spun any linen yet, nor milkweed (but I do think hers were made from linen), nor do I have any weaving equipment left in the house. (And being in the middle of a move to a smaller place there is no possibility of acquiring anything in that direction any time soon.) I do have linen to spin, but it didn't make it to the top of my spinning projects list that is currently being worked on with the Tour de Fleece 2024.

But as I was rummaging through my yarn stash I came across a large bag of natural colored cotton which had been a sweater and was taken apart a while ago, and something gave me the immediate feeling that this is the closest I was going to get to a handmade towel anytime soon. Again using the self-delusory trick of telling myself that one slip stitch is not casting on, I started to knit a towel. Planning as I go, embracing mistakes, adjusting the separating number of stitches between the stitch patterns on the go when I have miscounted, I am slowly working on it.

Of course, it is nothing as airy as the woven ones by Sara, in fact, it looks a bit clumsy. It won't be exactly lightweight, first of all because it is cotton, and secondly because knitting does not result in as lightweight a product as weaving. Which may in fact lead to the experiment being reduced in size, although I am determined to make it more sizeable than a wash cloth. Not sure how outside factors may come into this decision making process. But in times when there is basically no free minute to sit down at the sewing machine it is fun to have something 'new' to pick up to keep my hands busy.