Color therapy

Crafty Sunday

Some were beading.
Sylvan, carefully threading the tiniest beads onto wire:
Jonas, making earrings to sell at the fair next fall, to earn some money towards next year's skiing habit:
At $15 these lovelies are priced to sell! Let's hope the "age 11" minimum is slightly flexible by a few weeks...

And the new knitting project, a shawl, first seen on Soule Mama's blog a few week's back. Called Simple, Yet Effective 2.0, the pattern is here. It's not free, but it's still good! It calls for one skein of Noro Kureyon sock yarn, which is self-blending, and I used it for my birthday socks last year. (And oh my gosh, if you look at that post, the sweetness of raindrops on irises in June!). For this pattern, you split the skein and alternate the balls so you get stripes.
For this shawl, I chose something in the rainbow family, mostly because I like the idea of wearing rainbows around my shoulders in bleakest March. But rainbows also have special meaning for me and my name: Iris is the goddess of the rainbow in the Greek Pantheon. When my mom was pregnant with me she saw more rainbows in those nine months than in her whole life! (Wait, what part of that last paragraph gave it away that I am a child of the 70s?)

I had overthought this simple shawl and won't bore you with the details, but I decided after about 8" that I didn't love the way the stripes were alternating. So last night ripped it all out, rewound one of the balls and began again. Much better this time, proving to me that listening to my inner-ickometer is better than listening to my husband because we don't always share the same aesthetic.
Both portraits are hanging in my dining room now. At right, the photo taken by my husband when Jonas was just a small angel, maybe only a year old or so; the shiny glass made photographing it here challenging. At left, the portrait in oil crayon by my brother (first seen here) and given to me this February. Two of my most favorite fellows.

One Morning in Maine

...the icicles outside the kitchen window looked like this, as the sun was rising.

I am gathering the contents of a package I am sending over a continent or two (depending on which way the mail goes) and across at least one ocean. It's a fun blogging swap! I am always interested in swapping, and the way we worked it out this time was to think of what could be made in about an hour...since we work in various media. I liked that way of doing it. And if you follow that aforementioned link, make sure you read this post about Nigel the robot who is always the life of the party.

The cute hat is complete! And I do wish I had some small ball or a tiny model head to show it on. I think the 3D effect would be delightful. It's a nice soft alpaca-silk yarn from KnitPicks. And I liked the pattern so much, for ease of completion, for just enough thinking knitting, for sheer cuteness, that I am already beginning a second hat. For some girl baby, with PINK, since I had no reason to knit pink for my own children. Someone will have a girl, somewhere, I hope.
Jonas made the butterfly cord for the ties. I have no idea how to do it myself, but it's something he learned in school.
We have to import our flowers here right now, but oh that color is such a feast for my eyes. (Notice the photo in the upper left corner? The very one that my brother used for his portrait of Jonas and I!) We're the care-takers of the flowers this weekend---they were given to Mr. E's class on Friday after their stellar performances of two marionette puppet shows. They wrote their own scripts inspired by African folklore, wrote musical accompaniment, and made their own silk marionettes! Here's a small taste, from How Monkey Got His Tail:
And I have been meaning to introduce you to a new blog, Totally Smitten Mama, and this amazing post in which she details all of the amazing crafty items she made for Christmas with/in-spite-of her three boys and pregnant wife! Those adorable little wooden peg people just about make me swoon whenever I see them.

Catching Up: 1

Catching Air: Extreme Sledding

Sylvan and I had a very brief trip south to see my brother's art show, in which there is a portrait of me and my older boy (when he was small).

There was a lovely fluffy snow storm and Bjorn (my bro) and Sylvan took full advantage. I was their team photographer.

Ready or not...
Here we come!

Some landing shots: wipe-outs are always more impressive the bigger you are.
Here's Bjorn, over the jump, onto the driveway (ow):
Sylvan:
Sometimes when you land, your face looks like this:
And sometimes your face looks like this:
I'm so glad to be back. I missed you all. I will be catching up on posts during the next few days. I am taking a deep breath and beginning my classes! New computer is on its way.