Crazy Lanea

Chicago

Last weekend, I went out west to visit with Two Sock Knitters, and another Sock Knitter, and a whole passel of contra dancers.  The University of Chicago hosted a fantastic dance weekend, complete with the fantastic bands Cosmic Otters and Nightingale, and the amazing callers Adina Gordon and George Marshall.  We went to tons of yarn shops, a quilt show, three of the four contra dances the weekend provided, restaurants, Irish sessions--I haven't caught my breath yet. 

We get the fun started with a trip to The Fold.  Of course we did--how could we not.  Jonathan got some spinning pointers from Toni, and Meg and I dedicated ourselves to supporting small business in the greater Chicagoland area. 

Toni has a thing or two worth considering on offer, in case you haven't had a chance to stop by.

   

As usual, I didn't take enough photos, and many of the ones I did take aren't great.  Our surroundings for the dance weekend were beyond compare, though.  The university's buildings are gorgeously ornate.  Even the locks were gorgeous. 

The stairs were worth the price of admission.

And the dancing and music?  Hot.  Inspirational.  Astoundingly good.   What a dance weekend. 

As if I wasn't happy enough with all of these things, both bands included footwork in their sound.  Ahhhhhhh.  These are Keith's feet during Nightingale's Friday night dance.  I couldn't take pictures on Saturday night because I had too much dancing to do.

I'll tell you about the quilt show and my visit with another sock knitter next.  Now, I need to go prepare for the continued remodel here at our home sweet home and count the days till my next chance to dance.  Soon, I'll be able to dance on my own floors for the first time in years AND I'll be rid of the biggest source of allergies in my life.  The mere thought is making my eyes well up with tears of joy.   Get on your feet, and tune up your instruments, people, because the floor is going to catch fire under your toes if I have anything to say about it. 

Kate's Mare

I've been plotting a great trip out to Chicago for a dance weekend and visits with some wonderful friends, and I am giddy with excitement.  Giddy, I say!

And in that spirit, I figured I should hop online to post some clogging cue sheets.  Kate's Mare is one of the coolest clogging steps I know, and it's notated here, along with some other good ones.  Don't worry if they make no sense to you--if you're learning to clog with the peeps, I'll explain it all next time we get together.  If you want to understand immediately but it's making your head explode, email me. 

Download cue_sheets.pdf

And now I'm heading back to the sweat shop.  My lace cardigan has two full sleeves and six inches of body below them, and there are another 10 or 12 sock bags in progress on my sewing table.  And all of that counts as prep for replacing all of the floors, right?  Sure it does!  Using stash=cleaning.  Soon, I'll even be able to dance in my fiber-arts studio.  Though clogging while sewing sounds mighty dangerous. 

Brush heel slap heel shuffle step leap
Brush chug slide stomp brush chug slide stomp
Brush heel slap heel shuffle step leap
Brush chug slide stomp brush chug slide stomp
And a basic

Patchwork

In footwork news: I taught a very informal clogging class for some friends Sunday, and it was an absolute hoot.  It felt great to be encouraging other folks to stomp about.  I think percussive dance is particularly appealing to folks with some strong tendencies towards rambunctiousness, and most of my friends could be described that way.  In fact, we had so much fun that we decided it's going to turn into a biweekly thing, complete with live music and potluck. 

 
Now for the handwork.  Two giant potholders,  each about 10" square.  They're both made up entirely of scraps from other projects, which always makes me very happy.  The Crazy patched one is actually greener than it looks--winter morning light is very blue near us, for some reason.  Both are entirely machine-stitched, which is still making me sort of twitchy.  But they're a quick use of leftovers, and making these will force me to get much better at quilt binding, my least favorite activity these days.  I'm not sure what I'll do with this pair once the second one is finished, but I may go make a few million if they continue to be so fun. 

In all its rumpled loveliness--my lace cardigan. 

I finished that first sleeve last night, and am a couple of inches into the second one.  This is going to be one warm sweater.  I'm so glad it's lace.  I think it would be nigh unwearable otherwise.

And some felt patchwork experimentation is underway.  I've been playing with feltable wool scraps for a while now, looking for a good way to use recycled sweaters without stockpiling dozens of thrifted bits and bobs.  I think I have a plan now. 

 
I cut a few felted pieces into squares, and then joined them by stitching them to little scraps of twill.  The twill should give the finished item a fair amount of stability. 

C is for Contra, and Clogging

C is for Contra dance, and Clogging--two long-standing passions of mine (and two things that are downright tough to photograph).   

 

I haven't talked about either enough here on the blog, because I've been dealing with a few  chronic injuries over the last several years, and it's been keeping me off the dance floor more than I would like.  But I should talk about dance.  When someone asks me about myself, "folk dancer" is one of the first descriptors I blurt out.  I dance in my dreams.  I was in a clogging troupe in college, and it changed so much about my life I barely have words to describe it.  Teaching other people to dance is an avocation for me--so many of the dance forms I love can only be transmitted from dancer to dancer over years of interaction, and I hate to think any of the steps would fall out of the communal repertoire  So when I got the go-ahead from my physical therapist, I  checked out the Glen Echo dance schedule so I could start getting back on the floor and also take some photos for you crazy kids.

 

And that's when I saw that my friend Morna was in town from Montana to call the Friday night dance, with the open band as her musicians.  Talk about serendipity. 

The dance community at Glen Echo has been hoofing for decades, hosting two weekly contras and scads of other social dances year-round.  I started dancing there when I was 16 or 17--I can't count the number of hours of fun I've had, or the steps and dances I've learned, or the fantastic bands and callers I've heard.

And as if getting to dance while one of my good friends is calling wasn't good enough, Brooke and the kids were there too, as were my friends Joni and Adrian, and several other dancers I haven't seen in far too long. 

When I Contra dance, I clog.  When I first started hitting percussive licks on the floor of the Spanish Ballroom, I can't say it was generally well-received.  Back in the day, clogging was seen as anathema to the soft, whooshing sound of feet gliding over the dance floor during a contra.  I was too loud for many of the dancers--my feet were loud, and my hair was unnaturally bright, and my clothes were just plain too strange.  Times have changed.  Lots of folks clog during the contras these days, and some guys wear skirts, and I no longer look like the punk rocker I still am at heart. 

 
(Morna took pictures of my feet, and I took pictures of hers--it's like yarn-porn, but with worn old dancing shoes)

In the spirit of me dancing more, and teaching other folks to clog (while also reducing allergens and improving the resale value of our house) we're gearing up to remove all of the carpeting in our house and replace it with 1,400 square feet of bamboo.  Hot dog, I can't wait.  Come for lessons, friends.  You just have to know how to walk and how to count to eight.

Whirlwind weekend

(Before I begin an actual post, I just want to point out that the fact that so many people mistakenly say "worldwind" when they mean "whirlwind" makes veins pop out on my forehead, and may eventually result in my death from aneurysm.  So if I do pop a vessel and kick it, please honestly list my cause of death.  Maybe it will help people learn the word.)

Thursday, the charming and witty Stephanie Pearl-McPhee gave a reading nearby, so a bunch of us met up for some big knitterly fun.  I saw Noreen and Jayme as soon as I showed up, and soon ran into Mapgirl, Elizabeth, Lu, Nicole, Lynn, and a whole bunch of other wonderful folks.  We snaked through the stacks waiting for our line tickets and knitting, and a bunch of wonderful folks asked me about my knitting bag and about the blanket, so I was blushing like mad.  Knitters really are very kind.

And then Stephanie gave her reading, which was really more of an extemporaneous comedy act.   

I don't know if you can get the sense from this little photo how many knitters came out, but there were hundreds. 

Then there was a signing, and I was caught pushing sheep-themed beer on a known Canadian.  I won't bother to deny it.  Jayme, Mapgirl and I ended up going out for some food and hanging out for an hour or two. 

Friday, morning, I needed to be available for a worker to come by and set up our new tv/web/phone cables, so I decided to start experimenting with the pumpkin muffins.  I used this recipe as my jumping-off point.  Take one was passable, but not quite good enough:

Take two got some additional spices, including cinnamon sugar on top and many more spiced pumpkin seeds. 

They're still not ideal, but Etaine suggested something brilliant, so take three will be even better. 

Next, I headed out for the Watermelon Park Festival to meet up with the Celts.  I couldn't swing the whole weekend this year, but I had to make it to the park to see the Carolina Chocolate Drops.  I knew they would be amazing because Brooke and the gang  vouched for them, both as red hot musicians and as wonderful people.   So I could not wait for their show to start.  But I had to wait for their show to start.  So, you know, beer, guffawing, force-feeding muffins and pumpkin seeds to my friends, etc.  Somehow, we got Jer to not only put on Aes's pink cowboy hat but to let me photograph him.

I think banjo-picking makes a young man particularly confident.  When we were young, weren't teen-aged boys jerks?  Because Jeremy is really wonderful, as is another friend's son Dominick.  Maybe their parents won the kid lottery . . . Anyway, you can't really tell from the photo, but there's a river right behind where we set up, so in addition to amazing music, good friends, and lovely weather, we had fishing and swimming right there. 

The Chocolate Drops took the stage at dusk.

My photos are all terrible, but we had a great time.  Most of us were dancing through their whole set, and Nessa, Rona, and Lily learned several new traditional dance steps and moves.  Nessa officially wants to be dipped all of the time.  I personally can only dip even a beanpole of a girl 30 or 40 times before my shoulder attacks me back, so I may need a dipping minion.  We also gave some serious thought to monthly dance classes for several of the Celts who want to learn some clogging steps and figures from me.  Just the thought makes me giddy. 

I had to head home Friday night to retreat from allergens (very bad symptoms right now).  Saturday was taken up primarily by knitting (proof soon), setting up our new DVR, and dinner with Bodwin and Ruadhan.  Sunday, more knitting, some gardening, and roast pork burritos.  All told, I feel like I've had two weekends right in a row. 

Water water everywhere

Ernesto is soaking us.  It's been chilly and rainy for the last couple of days.  I happen to love it, of course, and I'm eyeing that cabled sweater I was working on in the winter. 

Have I mentioned lately that we've started a Print o' the Wave knit along?  We have.  And it doesn't require a blog.  Please join us. 

I'm having a hard time getting started, though.  I keep ripping out my swatches.  I am pro-swatch, of course, but I think I've crossed the line into manic perfectionism.  I didn't like the texture of some, I tried the lovely brown Juno gave me, but feel like the pattern demands a water color. 

And then last night?  Last night was all my fault.  I finally settled on some JaggerSpun merino lace-weight in a color called Mallard.  And then I betrayed the yarn.  I decided it made sense to actually start the shawl proper while watching Gumboots.  The problem?  I have to actually watch Gumboots when it's on.  It's entrancing.  Of course, I have a percussive dance obsession that not many people have.  So, I loved the show, and I ripped out all of the lace once it was over.  I'll start again today.

If you haven't seen Gumboots, get thee to Netflix.  It's a performance by young men from Soweto, dancing a style of percussive dance that developed inside the oppressive gold mines of South Africa.  The music is wonderful.  The dancing is electric, and strong, and sad in parts, but ultimately triumphant.  I watch it every year or two.  I may have to go watch it again.