The Crochet Pant arrives.

Wednesday afternoon? Time for the Wednesday Journal!

 Okay, it's no longer a secret that 1: I'm obsessed with my kids water polo play, and 2: I'm obsessed with crochet.  What you, loyal reader, may not know is that I'm also obsessed with our weekly newspaper, the Wednesday Journal.  Photographic evidence on display right here: proof of local involvement, civic pride, and a thirst for knowledge unparalleled in the Western Suburbs. Eat your heart out, Western Springs, we've got a fierce crosstown rivalry that is worthy of the very best sports writing, a world class High School, and a documentary film maker who's going to put Oak Park on the map (as if we aren't on the map already).  But I digress, this post is actually a shameless plug for my most recent wearable art happening:

It's a pant!

Doris Chan, Crochet Godess, has been at it again.  I can't crochet fast enough to keep up with her designs, and this one has been sitting in my *make it soon* pile for a few years, now.  After finally selecting the Designing Vashti color (mocha), and ordering this sumptuous thread/yarn, I was up and running.  The pattern, plain and simple in it's one piece design down model, worked like a dream and all I needed was enough couch time to finish these pants off.  The yarn comes in about 11 colors, so I'm looking at about eleven shorts and or pants in the near future...totally hooked!  For you pattern hounds, the so-called Gypsy Short/Pant pattern can be found in Interweave Summer 2014.

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Go ahead, try me. I'm totally ready.

And so...you guessed it.  I'm finally sporting some crochet pants and I'm not afraid to show it.  A lot of people have wondered at my face how I was going to pull this off...and, well, I don't know...seems like not a huge issue to me, but sometimes I get hung up on things that other people don't worry about, and the opposite is probably true, as in, things that other people get hung up on, I don't really sweat. 

So on full display on this May afternoon, I'm wearing some hip hugger swim trunks beneath the crochet pants.  Yesterday I wore some light weight tights beneath the pants, and another look will be to wear a smock-type thing over the pants and, well, the options go on and on.  

 Something tells me I'm not going to be taking a lot of orders for these bad boys, and that's okay, since I'm fond of one-of-a-kind projects.  They worked up remarkably fast, but once I got the hang of the pattern it was pretty boring, so....Netflix program required to work my way through another pair of these.

 100 percent cotton, made in USA, crafted here in Oak Park, IL.  Next time you think about finding some crochet pants or shorts, you know where to look.  I'll be sitting out front, enjoying some sunshine, working up some mad yarn arts, or maybe just working a crossword.

Unencumbered Woman breathes life into 2015

  Alas, the weight of it all brings the most active of us down to our knees.  Although I don't try to wash this blog with upbeat truisms, I do try to utilize my own adventurous spirit in designing tales about working at the process of making life a bit lighter in it's experience (ok, blah blah blah).  So I  try to take wacky times, sometimes awesome times, and inspired creations, and document as time blasts forward.

So what happens when the Unencumbered Woman literally takes to bed and plays sick for a month?  Although I've been tempted, blogging about my bedroom is almost (OK, not really) but almost off limits.  How many photos of myself doing crosswords in my PJ's can the world sustain, let alone this quiet little blog of liberation and freedom.  So, I put the brainstorms on the back burner and stuck to some of the domestic arts for which I have achieved little to modest amounts of notoriety for.  

Getting back in the saddle must require some application of the basic principles of the site, and so, I offer this, a study in the adventures and dreams that we find in our own comfortable home, while nursing illness, fear of cold and ice, and the inertia and ineptitude that only the greyest of Chicagoland winters can deliver.

James Garner in Rockford Files

So let us begin at the very beginning.  The very beginning, oh children of the 1970's, is Jim Rockford  (James Garner 1928-2014).  I spent so many weekends as a child stuck in a mobile home in the misty rainforest of the Oregon Coast.  We had one or two channels at our weekend getaway, and I always had some nifty craft or jigsaw puzzle to pore over.  Rockford was one of the higher quality standards that you could find on TV ca. 1980.

Rockford's home/office

And what's an Unencumbered care for?  It's just amazing, to think how far we've come in the intervening years.  Here's the lead character, always playing fair, never carrying a gun, tolerating pushy clients, living in a quiet trailer, parked right on the shore of the Pacific in Southern CA.  Look at how ratty the trailer is!  This, of course, was a symbol of his liberation.  The guy had served time, and now was in companionship, mainly, with his father, eats hotdogs at a stand by the water, and quietly pursues a life as a self-employed PI, "two hundred a day, plus expenses."

 For those of us who dare, or try to experiment with alternate life paths, trying to balance, family, health, values, interests, sleep and circumstances, Rockford's story is all too compelling.  To quote Sarah Silverman, "How do you even make money??"(on In Bed with Joan, episode 1).  The more I think about this question, the more often the response is, "live cheap."  What's cheaper than Rockford's setup? I'm also obsessed with all of the quickly LA ladies he works along side and with as clients.

defense lawyer friend, Beth, played by Gretchen Corbett

 It's easy to find sexism in this dated show, but looking at the "lady lawyer" "lady hippy" "rich lady murderess/theif" the range of characters that we were exposed to seems deep in a fashion that is often missing in TV programming today.  One gal has the full on crochet poncho and fringe boots.
And so, in a roundabout fashion I tell a tale of January 2015 as sitting watching marathons of Netflix programming while crafting and plotting creations (and a hefty dose of NYT Crossword Puzzle).  And, fellow athletes, I've discovered, happily, that, as long as you have an obsessive activity, exercise is NOT absolutely necessary to fulfill obsessive desires.  Bonus?  Skip the workout, and you get more crafting done!!!!!

Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura

Today we discuss the beloved Uhura Dress, #2.  Hot off the hook and I'm thrilled with the results.  It's one of the more difficult pieces I've worked, following the pattern designed by Crochet Goddess Doris Chan, but as this is the second time I attempted the piece, it was a little more free-flowing.  I skimped on the yarn, so ended up with a product a lot closer to the length of Nichelle Nichol's original Star Trek dress.

100% Bamboo Yarn, Southwest Trading Co.

So, in the name of indoor activities and adventures to be had while nursing illness and down-times. We celebrate with a photo shoot in teen-bedroom.  Willing teen photographer is a bonus, so, here we go!

These are the eyes of an adoring mother. No less than thirty minutes before a Driving Lesson(!)

See, kids!!! This is fun!!!! We have fun, even in January, we make things and do things!

We're sort of lucky that the teen allowed us into her room for the photo shoot, and it's not altogether obvious that we were soon rushed out.  But that's life with a teen.  You take whatever little bit you get, whenever you can.  It's nothing like those younger years when they hang on your every word and action.  But this, friend, is the cycle of life and I'm preparing myself for the inevitable.  In this much, I'm sure that spending more time around the home is a good thing.  With college and beyond around the corner, if there was ever a time I wanted to see my kids at breakfast and dinner it is now.

If you must know, this quiver stitch is a magnificent creation requiring great concentration.

Proud Crochet Goddess

Truly, for the needle and hook obsessed, there is no limit to obsession, and no limit to the love.

Taper, you say?  I'll show you a taper fit for a queen.  Taper time, in Ironman Speak, is all about cleaning house, organizing tri-gear, catching up on the Netflix queue, and finishing projects.  Throw in some yard work, garage & and basement cleaning, you get the idea.  Last night we polished off the summer skirt project, otherwise known as the Zuma Skirt, designed by, yes, Doris Chan.  Hooked from the always divine and not too-ungodly expensive, Tahki Cotton Classic Lite, we're lookin' stylin for a late summer evening.  

And: "You treat me like I'm an adult and I'm just a little kid!" 

I brought out one of my main photographers, and she did me justice.  There was a bit of arguing about the clarity of shots, but, as my companion insisted: "Mom, If you get mad that it's blurry I won't take pictures of you anymore!"  And so, again, point taken.   

Our fine photographer also insisted that we pose in front of the "pretty bungalow.  I was going for the art shot of the soon-to-be Oak Park teardown.  Not much agreement, here.

Just you wait, this'll be gone soon. Or, at least unrecognizable.

"Now...Get me like I'm tearing down the house, get it?"

Yup, it's vino time.

See, that's a good one, Mom!  I was trying to capture all of the extra western light that's flooding over the former attic and roof of the house, but the haze is pretty sharply white.

Great Teamwork.

And, taper time, lots of sing-along music.  It's what gets us through on race day and until then....

Thus complete, the Rockin' Red Dress, designed by Doris Chan, Crochet Goddess

Lakeside.

Loyal Followers know my hero worship of the crochet goddess, Doris Chan.  Here she served up a dress design in crochet magazine, Interweave of Fall 2012 that would put hairs on just about anybody's chest.  I mentioned it in a post earlier this summer, while I toiled away at the beginning stages of my Rockin' Red Dress, otherwise known as the Lt. Uhura Dress.  Some combination of delight, pride, relief and excitement for the next project is filling my heart as I look at a few of the photos we compiled during our recent trip to Ontario.   Here is a sampling of the growing organism that is a lovingly crafted handworked piece, as it travels far and wide.  The journey begins in old Oak Park, but my life here at home is just complicated enough that I didn't get far before shelving the work and waiting for quiet resort time. 

two months of on and off work, figuring out the quiver stitch.

First stop home on the coast.  We muddled through the early, and most complicated stages right here in Florence, Oregon.  There were quite a few points in which the ever resource-laden website, Ravelry, came in handy.  Those of you who are handworkers, if you haven't taken advantage of the gift that is Ravelry, check it out, ASAP.  This is such a terrifically designed site and a functional joy to use.  It's on Ravelry that I can find other like-minded aficionados who have toiled on the same design.

Finally. A perfect swatch. 

Mom & Dad's old Patio Chaiz Lounge.

Poolside, I crafted the base of the yoke/neckline.  One tiny misstep here, and we have a crooked dress down the line.  Not loyal to the beauty that is expected in this work.

The beginnings of collar/yoke.  Needs to be absolutely perfect.

By the time we join the yoke at the back I realize that I actually have the workings of a dress.  Up until this moment, I was sort of wondering.  But alas!  I've got it!!!! Ready to rock and roll, although the troubled times are not over.

Yoke Complete.  I'm exhausted.  What a puzzle.

Forming shoulders, sleeves, all with the seamless magic that is a Doris Chan design is an art form of rare beauty.  Traditional yarn-wear often involves pieces, as in fabric-formed garments, that must finally be assembled by stitchwork or sewing.  Not this, oh, no.  Last crochet stitch--dress complete!

Work.

Well.  It wouldn't be called the Unencumbered Woman if it didn't at least look effortless.  And of course, there are many many days when it feels just that.  Effortless.  Living a life with integrity, appreciating the beauty that is available to us, building something, creating something beautiful, and expressing love and appreciation and support for those people that surround us.

On to the torso, there's a matter of calculation and size.

And then we're back in the throes of midwestern living and Ironman training.  This quiet afternoon spot was one that I stole while on a visit/training ride in beautiful Madison, WI.  I walked around a neighborhood and found a quiet bench behind some fabulous homes.  Lake Monona is incredibly calming as a spot to sit and crochet.  I snuggled up past the two kids who were hawking lemonade and performed my typical no thanks nod as they pushed their wares upon me.  I know it's not always true, but today it was: "why is it the kids with the really huge brand new rehabbed house and the super expensive cars in the driveway with the killer view the ones making money off folks and lemonade?"  But that was the extent of my snark for that moment.  I figure, this is just the beginning for this neighborhood, and I'll be able to say that I saw it when....right before everybody started building really big, perfect houses crowded onto the narrow water-side lots.

Roman Candle Pizza, Madison, WI

Toronto, Ontario

Is it just obnoxious to say that I went from Madison to Toronto in less than a week? Perhaps, but that's how it goes, sometimes, and I'm thrilled for it. By the time I was climbing a giant web and hauling my crochet to the top, I was quite sure that I was practically done with the thing.  Counting necessary, and a bit of sizing work, but for the most part, I was in the homestretch.

The Well, neighborhood

And on to the country cabin in Ontario.  I do believe we stumbled upon the most beautiful place on earth.  I know that British Columbia brags about it on license plates, but that sort of over-hype just isn't necessary here.  Muskoka, Ontario, we all fell in love with you.  And here's a completed dress to prove it!

Lake-water blocking.

A morning on Pine Lake, such as this, just about does it.  Garment is dry, ready for a swim, and as loyal follower can see, I've accumulated some particularly nice CAN bling.  Yes!

Quiver aflutter.

And about the Birkenstocks.  Love my Birkenstocks, and I couldn't go anywhere in Ontario without seeing oodles of folks walking around in Birkenstocks!  Yes!!! I fit right in!!!
Yup. That's a dog.  Spent a delightful week with the two most amazing border collies that one might imagine.  Running with these two put me to shame, and reminded me why we have not right now the time or the inclination to go this route. What a lot of work, and what a lot of running these pups need to do!  Beautiful, smart, athletic.  A dream companion, of course.

Tyco

Photo session courtesy of Peter.  A trooper, indeed, and he hasn't lost his touch.  Sometimes we're so busy that he's not around when we're shooting for the blog.  It was truly a family vacation, screen-free, that we needed desperately.

Finished!

If, LF, you think that the hat is the only CAN bling that I picked up on this trip, you are undoubtedly wrong.  There's more, oh, so much more, but the bling that matters most is what we hold near and dear to our heart, and when you start with a vision in the dark of winter and a skein of Soy Silk yarn, the sky's the limit baby. The sky's the limit.

Happy! Proud!

http://dorischancrochet.com

Where Unencumbered Meets Obsessive.

Yes, friends, it's that time of year again!  You might think, swim? Bike? Run?  Oh, no, on the contrary, it's time to crochet some hot-rockin' wear.  It's warm, we're sitting in a lounge chair, and hell if we're going to dither all our time away with a magazine or even our smartphone.  Girl, it's time to finish those projects that have been sitting around all through the nasty season.  And when I say nasty, that word has so many delicious implications I can't begin to tell.  First, a moment to acknowledge the completion of the hot-pink cover-up.  Started this thing as a tank top, last summer, even as a potential gift for training buddy, Jilly.  When Jilly announced that she hates pink, what was I to do?  Immediately begin shaping as a full-length rrrrarrrfest for summer 2013.  And here we go:
I can't say I loved working on this thing. 

OK, I'll say it: "rrrrrooooaaaarrrrr!!!!"

the lovely fisherman knot that weaves the whole object together got tiresome, and I had some difficulty with sizing ( I figured it would be hanging off of me and I'd be stuck with a sack.   When I finally shrank the dimensions, my method was haphazard at best. What can I say? Sometimes the idea is more important to me than the execution).  Finished this bad boy ON my forty-sixth birthday.  Hell, if this dress don't say Cougar, nothing else will.  I'm in the game for good and that's where I'll leave it.  Woman, Hook, Italian 100% Cotton Yarn (mille fille) and I'm ready for whatever.  Next Installment, Ashby wants one for herself, and naturally I have a bit of this delicious yarn leftover.  But of course!  It may take another year, but most likely ready for Door County--love shaking up some protestant sensibilities up north, and this is the game that'll do. 

And on to my Ode To Crochet Goddesses!  Doris Chan, as has been mentioned multiple times on this very blog-site, has created yet another feast for the hook and eye.  She calls this the Rockin-Red Dress, from Interweave Crochet, but it's actually an ode to Leiutenant Uhura's Dress in Star Trek. 

Peter Nolan loves Uhura, and so what would I do but re-create this fab streamlined one-piece dress?  We're far from completion, but when I ordered the yarn, months ago, I knew I had my work cut out for me.  This, as we say in the trade, is a design meritting serious, or complete concentration.  Not for the faint of heart, or for anyone who is even thinking about multi-tasking.  Started work on reading the pattern a few times in the deep dark months, but there was no respite from the insanity.  Now, with a few days on the pristine, still, Oregon Coast, I am able to read, study, puzzle, ravel, and unravel.  My heart is a-flutter. We are actually making progress:


A swatch. Standard quiver pattern.  This took months, alone.

As I muddle through the pattern, my brain loosens up, ever so much.  Deciphering a Doris Chan pattern feels like a complicated math or programming problem.  Of course this implies that I think that Doris Chan is about the most bad-ass programmer on the planet.  Yup.  She's one smart cookie and her work is so incredibly beautiful.  

Day four in Oregon.  Yes, this is 10 full rows of the pattern and it's my yoke/neckline!!!!

Here we are poolside.  I'm finally breathing the satisfaction of knowing that we're not going to be ripping out the first four rows for ever more, in fact, there is hope.  This deadly soy-silk variegated yarn is going to be put to good use and Uhura's dress will live on, further into history. 

Unencumbered Meets Obsessive.

And then there is this. Woman, hook, yarn, sun, poolside. Need I say more? Unencumberd on steroids.  Pump me up with some free time and some fresh air, detox after a long run with my seventy year old companion, throw some blue water, chlorine and poolside chat into the mix?  Golden.  Now why was I slamming the Kava Tea last week??  Who cares.  Unencumbered Meets Obsessive.  This is where fulfillment lives.  Go out there and find it for yourself, because lord knows nobody's gonna let you feel this good on your own.