Jacket components, some of them

 This is where we are. Jacket bits. Top left, woven lapel. Not yet steamed. Top right, loom warped up ready to weave second lapel. Bottom left and right, jacket lower fronts.

You see on the left there the section that juts out? That will go under the arm to meet the back. 

But first I need to weave the second lapel. I'm slowed down a bit by needing to rest between spinning. So supplying the yarn to weave is slow. 

Weaving is easier, once I get the yarn spun, because I can do it with either hand, so it's not a constant demand on one arm or the other. Then I'll attach the lapels to the lower section on each side.

We'll get there! Watch this space.

Storm prep. Spinning to supply the yarn

 

Left to right, the two back pieces, two pockets, front piece complete except for top shaping, next frontispiece in progress.

This has almost exhausted my supply of yarn.  In fact the last two stripes on the rightmost piece I spun yesterday and immediately knitted up.  So I need to spin seriously. This is good because we are about to have a nor'easter and snow, up to 18" of same and high winds.  This means I'll be home.  I did get my new supply of roving, so all's well there.  And there's food in the house.

Friday was an online knitting group meeting, which was very nice, except for one member whom I've met a number of times in person back in the days when our groups met that way.  She suddenly asked if I would accept spinning commissions!  As if.  I politely said, no, I really don't, which is britspeak for "in your dreams, Bunty!"  and she persisted, well, then will you teach me to spin?  And I continued with noooooo, wondering where she was brought up.  And how much she imagined it would cost to pay a person to spindle spin enough for a garment, she clearly not grasping the number of hours it entails.

But I did direct her to a couple of wonderful teachers on YouTube, Abby Franquemont and Spinning Sarah.  She made no notes about it.  But said maybe she could get her friend who spins to come and do a spinning retreat with her.  To which I said, that sounds lovely, feeling very sorry for the friend who is about to be imposed on. And seeing that here again is a person who thinks it's too hard to actually learn stuff, would rather someone inserted it into her abilities.

Why was this so ill-timed, you ask, puzzled.  Well, for one thing, a knitting group where people come to work and chat, is not a business opportunity.  For another, it's rude to even ask about commissions in that context, much less about teaching. That's not why I'm there.  And considering my age, even less appropriate, given that I am at the stage in life where my remaining energy and creative juices are better used in my own work. 

I've never accepted commissions. Not that kind of artist.  I used to explain that I didn't get into art in order to take orders from other people.  I work on what I need to until I don't need to any more, then I move to the next art form I need to work in.  It's inner directed, about making a life not a living.  No disrespect, in fact, great respect, to people who do make a living by making, but it's not my path. And a lot of people have bought my work, nice, but not essential.

I've always supported my art with a day job. I like to remind people that Borodin had a fulltime job in a chemistry lab.  Philip Glass was still installing appliances well after he was famous for his compositions. Leonard and Virginia Woolf had to run the Hogarth Press to support themselves. I'm not putting myself in their class, but in their frame of mind. 

I don't expect someone who only knows me slightly to grasp all this, but having been gently dissuaded and still persisting, that's a bit over and above.  So after I simmered down a bit, I decided it was a Father, forgive them, kind of moment. 

Pro tip: please don't assume other people are there to serve you, when they're in a group that's strictly about playing.  End of pro tip.

Back to spinning and getting this lovely jacket going again. It amuses me that, having spent years in my first serious art pursuits working in grayscale, largely black on white or white on black monotypes, which constituted a couple of my first exhibits, and all of my early invitations to gallery shows, with little interest in color, I'm in a different mode now.  I used to be much more interested in shapes and relationships, accepting that color has meaning but not wanting to pursue it. Now it appears to have invaded my life, too funny.  Ignore us, would you?  Take that, missy!

Second half of the back in progress

 And now you can see better what I'm doing.  This is the second part of the back.  Yet to come are two fronts and two sleeves and a load of spinning and plying before I can get to knitting

 

 Since I'm still waiting on news of the car, I've been busy at home trying not to think about it. A bit more knitting today. Here's how the two sides will make chevrons. I think I like the upward points rather than the other way up, more cheerful.  The way they seem to link evenly is a bonus, not planned, but a function of the size of yarn ball I've been making.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch..

 Back to the knitted and woven and spun and plied jacket.  I made a second pocket here

Using earlier yarn than I did for the other pocket. 

I like very much the way the changing colors create a design

And here's the second pocket

Remember I said that my spinning has improved, the yarn finer and more consistent, and it might show up a bit as I progress with producing yarn for the jacket?  Here's a case in point. The two pockets.  On the left earlier, chunkier, yarn, and on the right later, finer, more consistent yarn, the first pocket I made.  I may add a row of crochet to the right hand pocket if the difference in size bothers me enough. Right now it's just a useful observation.

This is all very well, you say, yes, pockets, but where's the jacket you're going to attach them to, huh, huh?  Well, here's one half of the back, completed, steamed and looking pretty happy.

Well, yes, half of the back, big deal.  Where's the rest of the jacket, then?

Well, some of it's here

And some of it's here

 And I may have to order more fiber.  Fortunately there's no deadline on this, unless you count wanting to wear it before the weather gets hot again.

This is like showing the window frames for the house that's still a heap of timber next to a hole in the ground, but that's fiiiiine.

I can't tell you how happy I am making this endless project.  When I get tired of rolagging, I spin, and when I get tired of spinning, I ply.  Then knit. By then I'm ready to make rolags again. I've learned so much about the yarn and the skills and myself in this process.

And there's always that stitched Robe waiting in the wings for her chance to work again.

One thing done, another underway and a third one just an idea

 So the jacket is finished, and I really like it. Once the weather cools off, it's going to be my go to.

All the seams are clean finished in different ways depending on location.

And here's me solemnly posing

Then falling down laughing at the whole idea. The weird thing in my throat is nothing more sinister than a trick of reflection.

The diagonal scarf, don't worry, I won't push yet another pic at you, is underway, and the next thing on the horizon is fabric dyeing and papermaking.

Half the chest freezer is for the raw materials, in fact the reason I bought it

Half is for food. Admittedly, to the untrained observer, it's hard to tell which is which. 

Seems like a fair distribution.  And I was reminded about my dyeing and papermaking plans by my neighbor's disaster recounted in Here

I need to do the papermaking before the weather gets cold, because it's outdoor work on account of the gallons of water involved.

Which reminds me, as I searched for the right word there, of a dear artist friend with whom I showed in a group, wonderful pastel painter.

 We hadn't had a group meeting for a while and she asked me if she'd missed anything. I said, no, I think we're in abeyance right now. Whereupon she said indignantly, "Nobody told me they were traveling!"