Weekend Update

We had a marvelous weekend, which felt slightly longer than an average weekend - always a good thing, as long as the weekend IS good! My dear friend Tomie traveled with her son to visit us. We hadn't seen each other since April, so it was very nice to be together again.

On Friday night, we went in a group to see the new Harry Potter movie. I think we all enjoyed it, even though it was quite bleak and scary. It was mostly true to the books, and it ended on that down note, just like "The Empire Strikes Back" - one of the darkest points in the entire story. I am SO looking forward to the final movie, and am pleased with the decision to split this complicated tale into two parts, so that very little story is sacrificed in the on-screen telling.

But you came here for crochet. So here it is.

On Saturday, we did a good bit of yarn-dyeing. It was almost like Potions class in my kitchen, with measuring out ingredients, bubbling cauldrons full of colorful but stinky concoctions, with often magical results!

Below you can see a more aromatic potion consisting of Kool-aid in lime and berry blue.

...and cooling in the pan, absorbing the last bits of color. MAN, that's bright.

Tomie tends to more natural tones and hues, and we did a few of those as well. In fact, since I am still new to dyeing, I have had my share of experiments that didn't quite turn out to my own liking - the colors being more muted than vibrant... but those are right up Tomie's alley, so I sent her home with a bag full of yarn!

Here is Tomie's palette of new yarn, all hand-dyed - some done this weekend, some I had done before. The striking blue ball, she did all on her own. The padawan has become the Master. :-) We used Kool-Aid and Wilton food coloring, and she really loved the dyeing process, start to finish.

On Sunday, Tomie decided to return the favor, and teach ME something new. She broke out her enormous tool box of painting supplies and a few blank canvases. I used to paint, way back in college, but never did anything of consequence.

How intimidating is this? Two white canvases and endless color possibilities. And what in the world will I possibly paint? I don't do living objects; they never turn out right. I have no sense of scale or perspective... my work always leans toward the cartoonish...

Having labeled me a "color hound" (and you know I am), Tomie whipped out a color wheel - IN PAINT - for my current and future use. Some of this I knew, but most of it I did not, especially as it relates to mixing paint for new colors.

While our boys huddled together with their video games, we sat down (me, Tomie and my daughter) and spent the entire morning and afternoon, painting away. Look at this glorious creative chaos. Can you tell what I'm working on (there at the bottom)?

I started off with red, yellow, blue and white. Tomie taught me to mix the colors, starting with light and gradually darkening to the desired new color. I learned how hard it is to do it the other way around! And I learned about adding a dash of complementary color to tone down the brightness.

I also learned how to block color, then add lighter shades for detail... and how to make little flowers... and so many things. And lookie what I made! A Babette blanket laid out in the grass.

Yep. If I'm not actually crocheting, I'll just PAINT crochet instead. :-) This was the easiest Babette I ever did, and finished in record time! Just a few hours, instead of a few months.

My daughter is a free spirit, fearless in her color mixing and application of brush to canvas. She was a prolific painter and finished four pieces that day.

Meanwhile, Tomie began by uncapping a tube of paint, tapping the brush thoughtfully against her lips and saying, "I feel like doing a landscape today."

So she did. Just like that.

And she also painted a Babette square, for me. Look at all those lovely, detailed stitches! You can't see it in this picture, but the stitches all wrap around the edges of the canvas, too.

Tomie decided to stay on Sunday night, instead of going home. We spent the afternoon painting and dyeing, crocheting a little bit, looking through photo albums at pictures of our boys when they were just toddlers together... back then, the kitchen table would be strewn with Play-doh in a hundred colors, and the boys would curl up together in a single comfy chair to watch "Blue's Clues" together. Now they're both in middle school and just rocketing toward adulthood - but they are both good boys, and still sweet to their doting moms.

My husband grilled out for us each night, and was a good sport about the rampant creativity and giggling going on all around him.

It was truly a golden weekend. We always part from each other feeling rejuvenated. There is nothing like being with someone else creative, when you yourself are creative. Tomie and I agreed - as we always do, at the end of our time together - that we should do this more often. And hopefully we will! :-)