Corn, beans and squash, mostly

Two weeks ago, we installed our first Three Sisters planting, inspired by the traditional agricultural practices of many Native Americans. We "sacrificed" the sunniest swathe of lawn to accommodate ten mounds:






























This is Oregon, of course, where everything grows with astonishing rapidity. Here is the same planting only two weeks later:






























We seeded an heirloom open-pollinated corn called Country Gentleman; there wasn't room for enough corn mounds to guarantee wind pollination, so we will have to fertilize by hand, "tickling the tassels." I certainly hope that process is self-evident.

In the far corner is a cantaloupe hill, and there is a sunflower mix interspersed on either end.

We've also just cleared a lot of construction debris out from behind the garage; there we hope to attempt quinoa, and a beautiful dried bean called Yin Yang:

For music lovers everywhere

The Leningrad Cowboys (Finnish) and the Red Army Choir (Russian) together again for the first time.

Do a search on YouTube. Yikes! These guys will take on anything: 'Delilah,' 'Gimme All Your Lovin,' 'My Way,' 'Stairway to Heaven.' Dylan. The Beatles. Eric Idle. The Turtles, fergawdsakes.

The problem with American music is that it just never got weird enough.

I felt, therefore I… was?

Lest you, dear reader, form the impression that I spend my time entirely engaged in abstraction contemplation, I submit the following:


If you have ever mistakenly thrown a favorite wool sweater into the washing machine, you know that wool fibers under stress, heat, and agitation will shrink and mat inextricably together. Sometimes this is done deliberately in order to produce wool felt, a dense and durable fabric.

A conscientious recycler, I try to use up the (inevitable) remnants of knitting efforts in some way —in what knitters call "stash projects." As part of the ongoing campaign to spruce up my dad's house, I've been working on bright new accent pillowcovers made from Marimekko fabric scraps, in keeping with the Danish modern decorating style my parents always preferred. There was also a large ball of handspun wool yarn in the stash bin, variegated greens which would coordinate with the fabric.

Of course I'd need some additional wools to match. That's the thing about stash projects, you often have to buy something new to use up the something old.

So I knitted up some little sample squares and felted them in the sink by hand, in order to estimate how much bigger than final size the proposed pillow cover would need to be knit. For a 16 x 16 pillow: 18 x 38. This actually came out fairly accurately. Then I tried a very simple knitting method suggested by my friend Trilby which uses three different yarns in sequence. Lovely subtle stripes.

The easiest way to felt is using a top-loading washing machine, which you can stop and start as you check on the progress of felting. Our machine is an efficient front-loader, so I must either borrow a washer or felt by hand— in this case, by feet, in the shower, with hot water and dish soap and dancing around on the piece to provide agitation.

(In the absence of a yardstick, a mini poodle was used for scale.) Before and after felting: