The Independent Stitch

KDTV, take 2

I'm not even going to try to make this entirely coherent. That's not how life is right now.

KDTV

Last week I flew to Cleveland again to be a guest for three segments of KDTV series 800. KDTV is Knitting Daily TV, a program that is available for broadcast on public television stations (PBS). A year ago I took this trip and appeared in two segments. I had the pleasure then of working both with Shay Pendray, an amazing woman who established a place for needle arts on public television, and with Eunny Jang, editor of Interweave Knits.

This time, I missed seeing and working with Shay; she had already completed her scheduled appearances and returned home. The trade-off was that because Eunny and I did all three segments together, we were able to get a little better acquainted and as a result could carry the positive energy from one segment to the next. In addition to the segments she did with me, Eunny was also taping introductions and finales and some technique concentrations, so she was busy changing clothes, getting the right demonstration materials ready, and talking to the cameras. Kristin Omdahl, who hosts the crochet sections, had finished her work early but wasn't scheduled to fly out yet, so we were able to visit in odd moments, and that was a treat.

Kristin's recent blog post shows the studio set-up and talks about the TV makeup, plus preparation, suitcases, and wardrobe issues. She's a pro at this and can show you the environment, while I'm just working hard not to trip over my own feet or end up stammering on camera: not much time or energy to document my surroundings or the process. Kristin's post also shows the amazing Annie Bakken, who last year and this managed to be in half a dozen places at once (or so it appeared), doing unobtrusive tasks that kept the process running smoothly, got us where we needed to be, and so on.

The segments are about 5 minutes long, and are timed to the second. The host—in this case, Eunny—keeps track of the timing. In addition to her microphone, which records the audio for the show, she has an earphone and has to listen and respond to information coming in from the production area. I just need to stay on my toes, follow her lead on the general timing, and be ready to let her wrap up when they call time. I imagine tightrope walking would be similar.

One of the segments was on using yak fiber. I talked about the basic qualities, and about using yak either on its own or blended, as well as why yak is a relatively new presence in knitting yarns. Eunny presented a neat hat pattern made with a yak-bamboo blend that features an intricate, but not so hard to work, cable running around its brim.

Back up two months, because it took me about that long to get all the swatches ready for the demonstrations of the segments that I did. For a 40-hour trip, I packed two suitcases and a large backpack. In the backpack and my carry-on suitcase were the absolute essentials: if the check-through bag had gone astray, we could have managed the segments, although not with the ideal array of supplies.

In addition to swatches, yarns, raw and washed fibers, and a bunch of sweaters to use as examples, the suitcases contained about a dozen different shirts and blouses. The garments all needed to be in specific colors, and had to be able to go on and off without messing up the makeup, which is done first and just once. I took the two shirts I wore last year, because I know they worked. I wore one of them again for the DVD I made for Interweave last fall. My daughter said I really shouldn't wear the same thing all the time, so I took along two other new tops I found on sale and a bunch of appropriate knits that I'd found at local resale shops. It's hard to tell in advance what will work best, so it's good to have alternatives.

Fortunately, one pair of black slacks, which I already owned, sufficed for the rest of what I needed.

We ran into a little glitch while filming the segment on why yarns pill. The numbering on one form was off, so Eunny wore the wrong sweater for our first take.

So we got to do it again. This was where it started getting nice that Eunny and I were working together repeatedly. The retake went smoothly. Here's the right sweater, and our smiles embody our confidence that we will hit the revised segment length. These photos are taken in advance of the taping of each segment. In addition to being useful for publicity, they are tacked up on the door to the green room, where everything gets prepared, to help everyone keep track of who wore what, and when. In general, they work really well.

By the way, the sweaters on the stands behind me are thirty and forty years old and have not pilled. In this segment, I talked about fiber content, processing damage, yarn construction, durability, and maintenance, and why and when we make trade-offs that result in pilling. (There is, by the way, an absolutely fantastic article by Erica Heftmann in an old issue of Spin-Off magazine on why yarns pill. Although I worked with other sources, if you want a one-stop overview, Erica did a fantastic job. Summer 1999, pages 70 to 77.)

The final segment involved some information on scouring and washing wools. Recognize Eunny's sweater? It belonged on this segment. I wasn't as happy with the content on this final bit. We did it twice as well, for reasons of the producer's, and I preferred the first version.

Still, Eunny and I managed to do two takes on two segments and keep them fresh-feeling each time. On one of them (and I forget which one), somebody mis-read the timing notes so Eunny was given the "wrap it up" signal at either 20 or 30 seconds too short or too long. I don't remember which. I think we needed to fill an extra 30 seconds on the second take. My job is to speak in ways that are conversational but that I can cut off at any time and sound like I meant to end there.

Then I packed up my suitcases and Kristin and I shared a cab to the airport. I heard she had a delay in getting home, including an extra overnight.

For me, this is what the day looked like, with all times indicated for Mountain Daylight Time, even though Cleveland is on Eastern Daylight.

• 3:45 a.m. Wake up
• 3:45 to 5:15 a.m. Yoga, wash and blow-dry hair, dress, breakfast, pack suitcases, check out of hotel, and be in lobby for ride to studio. I wanted to walk to the studio to see if I could stretch out my back some more, but it was raining and I needed not to show up with wet hair. I am so not a TV-ready person in everyday life!
• 5:15 to 7 a.m. Unpack show materials and begin arranging them on working trays; professional makeup (an hour).
• 7 a.m. to 10:15 a.m. Tape all three segments, two of them twice.
• 10:15 to 10:45 a.m. Lunch.
• 10:45 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. Repack all suitcases, then catch up on e-mail and a little work.
• 1:45 to 4 p.m. Cab to airport, check-in, and security. Buy a salad to take with me because the availability of future food is not at all certain. (Yes, I carry Luna Bars, apples, and other compact, security-friendly emergency fuel.)
• 4 p.m. to 8:45 p.m. Fly home, changing planes at one airport or another, very glad that I have the salad (run from first gate to second, and make it on board as one of the final four passengers).
• 8:45 to 9:50 p.m. Disembark and reclaim the one checked bag. Miss the 9 p.m. shuttle by about 8 minutes. Grab a chai as the airport concessions are closing their accordion barriers for the night. Drink chai and do some reading while awaiting the shuttle.
• 9:50 to 11:45 p.m. Shuttle ride home.
• 11:45 p.m. to 1 a.m. Dinner, shower, bed.

Next day: in bed with a cold! Likely the result of not being able to dodge secondhand smoke (to which I'm allergic) while in the shuttle areas outside airports. I need to get rid of the congestion and start packing for SOAR, in addition to doing enough work at my desk that the office won't collapse while I'm gone again.

Packing for events other than KDTV involves a lot more fiber, but much easier clothing options: t-shirts, jeans, whatever sweaters I want to wear. And no makeup at all!

 

Part of why it's been quiet here on the blog

I have many half-written posts. Getting one finished is a challenge right now. Here's an inkling of why:

Well, rats. The photo I need is on the other computer. I'll add it later. (I wonder if one of the advantages to Apple's new Lion operating system may be the ability to sync photo libraries, and their labels and keywords, between computers. Haven't had time to find out. Haven't upgraded yet; no time. Mostly I keep files accessible to both computers through Dropbox, which is a blessing, but loading all the photos up there hasn't seemed feasible.)

SOAR preparation

Here's that photo I wanted to find:

I'll be teaching at the Spin-Off Autumn Retreat in a little under a month. I'll teach a three-day workshop, a one-day workshop, and four retreat sessions (half days). All are on rare-breed wools.

1. I've made up the handouts, three separate versions for the three separate formats (one handout is in the middle of the picture). I've sent the PDFs to Interweave, and the very on-top-of-it SOAR coordinator Maggie Reinholtz has already duplicated them and has them ready to ship to New Hampshire and deliver to my workshop space!
2. I prepared files for, and had printed, additional materials that I'm supplying instead of asking SOAR to prep. These items require more than straight photocopying. The photo shows just one stack; there are 18 more just like it. I've packed the box and it's ready to ship (20 pounds / 9kg), as soon as I get information on when and where to send them. Other boxes of materials will be going, too.
3. There are also 900 (yes, nine hundred) fiber samples to be prepared for workshop and retreat participants, representing 19 (nineteen) rare sheep breeds listed by the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy and Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Folks in the three-day workshop will get 15 breeds; those in the one-day workshop will get 8; and those in the retreat sessions will get 6. (Longer workshops get larger fiber samples, more background information, and more time to get to know each fiber. EVERY session will get a solid grounding for future explorations, and a carefully chosen selection of fibers that demonstrate different qualities.)

We'll be shipping between 35 and 40 pounds of wool to use in these workshops. Every bit of that has been acquired from a shepherd who keeps rare-breed sheep. Every bit of that has been washed—a bunch of it by hand, and some of it at a fiber mill. Every bit has also been measured and packed into a labeled bag, ready to be distributed in class. (Prepackaging improves the likelihood that fibers will be divvied up pretty evenly, and . . . if we didn't prepackage, we could easily spend two-thirds of our workshop time on administrative matters, rather than discovering things about wool and spinning.)

I could not be doing these workshops at all without the amazing help of

• Beth Pink Smith, at The Spinning Loft in Michigan (who is also teaching at SOAR)
• Jennifer Tepper Heverly, at Spirit Trail Fiberworks in Virginia (who will be at the SOAR market)

Before I agreed to teach at SOAR, I contacted both of these wonderful people and asked if they'd be on board to make sure we had the right fibers in the right quantities. When they both said "yes," so did I. We've all been working since last December to coordinate all of that prep work. (We warmed up by doing the same set of tasks for the Conference of Northern California Handweavers in May, which involved one two-day workshop, a dozen breeds, 12 pounds / 5.5kg of wool, and 192 packets. Everything went beautifully. Now we get to ramp that up by more than 5 times.)

So there's that.

Fibers are being prepared and shipped. Somewhere between $1000 and $1800 has been invested in materials and their preparation. ( Do I want to know the precise totals right now? No. Do the materials fees people pay to workshop facilitators matter? YES!) Boxes are packed. Handouts are ready.

Now I'm working on the slide shows. I like pictures. So I have pictures of sheep, and pictures of wool, and pictures of places where sheep live, as well as some different ways of looking at the information on the handouts. (All the nitty-gritty numbers people would be tempted to try to write down while I'm showing them pictures are already printed on the handouts, so they can make personal notes but don't need to transcribe the basics.)

Lots of the components of the slide shows are already in my files, but I'm upgrading some of the sheep photos (which involves finding alternatives and writing to request permission to use them). I've also discovered that a few photos of locks are missing, so I've pulled out my samples and taken snapshots.

As you might have gathered, there will be three slide shows, one for each format. . . . They work off the same basic material, but it's selected and combined differently.

By the time October comes around, I'll be close to ready.

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Knitting Daily TV

SOAR is still a few weeks away. Sooner than that, however, I'll fly to Cleveland to tape three segments for Knitting Daily TV (KDTV).

Although each segment is only 5 to 6 minutes long, the day requires significant preparation. There's the segment outline, defining the key concepts to be presented and how they will be made to work for the camera. There are the samples to gather and prepare (more raw wool to be found, locks to be washed, sometimes yarns to be spun, and definitely swatches to be knitted or woven). There are the clothes: We're supposed to have a different "look" available for every segment, along with a couple of backup options. Detailed specifications guide clothing choices: no white, red, or black; jewel tones and pastels are good; no stripes or large patterns (basically, solid colors); garment design must accommodate a microphone and must go on/off without messing up makeup. My daughter suggested that I not wear exactly the same one or two outfits for all the DVD and TV appearances that I ever do. I thought it was a good idea because it would be much simpler. I've been to the closet and to the resale stores. I think I have some possibilities, although I haven't had time to really try them out.

I wish I had time to knit a bunch of alternatives. Last year I tried to get that done, but didn't have time. No time this year, either. The kinds of things required aren't in my usual knitting repertoire, although there's no reason they couldn't be. Except then I'd want to use the same handful of options repeatedly. . . . There's something to be said for radio and podcasts, at least in terms of wardrobe requirements. . . .

Add to list: steam out wrinkles, and/or press, and carefully pack. (I have already washed all the clothing to freshen it up.)

This afternoon I need to wash a few locks of wool for one of the demos. That's today's step in making progress toward this event. After that: wind four more skeins into balls, and knit a few more swatches.

For one of the segments, I had planned to knit a demo object but the yarn hasn't arrived, so I need to figure out Plan B for what to show on camera to make the point. The positive side of this is that I don't have to iron the shirt in the background of the photo just above (it shows up at the lower corners), which would have gone with that now-nonexistent idea.

____

There's more . . .

but I'm not thinking about it right now. I did go for a bike ride this morning, to get to the coffee shop that was open on this holiday and could accommodate some writing time (most of this blog post).

Now it's time to wash wool, make sure the bank accounts are all okay, and do some freelance work.

It's not boring around here!

Knitting Daily TV segments

Last fall, I flew to Cleveland for a day to tape two segments for Knitting Daily TV (KDTV). I just had a chance to see what we did! (It's very strange to see myself in makeup. This is not normal at all.)

Yesterday the folks who put together the TV series released a blog post that contains some of the information I posted here after I got back from Ohio. What I wrote has been edited for length, but the KDTV blog post includes both of the segments that I was involved with, in their entirety. I hadn't seen them before. Considering how brief the segments are (five minutes each), I was pretty surprised at how effectively we covered some territory that most folks may not be aware of about wool and mohair.

In the segment I did with Shay Pendray, part of episode 612, we talked about how many different types of wool there are, and how they behave differently. 

Those skeins across the front of the table appear in The Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook (which is currently on press). From left to right, and from finest to strongest, they are Merino, Cormo, Dorset, Bluefaced Leicester, Romney, Coopworth, Wensleydale, and Leicester Longwool.

I collected the skeins during a one-day trip to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival a couple of years ago. At the time, going out to Maryland for a single day seemed absolutely frivolous, but it was a fantastic trip, one of the best of many wonderful trips to Maryland. I not only saw friends but collected a number of items that became extremely important parts of the book project.

In gathering those skeins, which I did from a number of locations throughout the festival, I was looking not only for a variety of breeds but for colors that would look good together in photographs. The three light blue skeins were intentionally similar in tone, because I intended for us to photograph them to show differences in luster and to capture whatever tactile differences could be represented visually (which we ultimately did; they're the Cormo, Bluefaced Leicester, and Wensleydale).

***

Speaking of the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival: It is always held the first full weekend in May, which this year means it's May 7 and 8, at the Howard County Fairgrounds, in West Friendship, Maryland. The big news around here is that The Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook will be launched at this year's Maryland festival. True, the book does not officially release until June, but advance copies are being shipped to Maryland. Both Carol Ekarius and I will be at the festival. We're thrilled. This will likely be when we'll get our first glimpses of the finished books, and we'll get to celebrate with friends old and new.

There will be a reception on Saturday night, in conjunction with the becoming-traditional party hosted by Guido Stein and friends. There will also be a signing at the fairgrounds on Sunday.  We'll have a short slide show about the book on Saturday, and on Sunday we'll have our pens with us to add our autographs to books.

***

Back to the business at hand.

The segment I did with Eunny Jang, part of episode 603, delves into the transformation from raw fiber to finished textile, paying special attention to cleaning fibers without damaging them. There's a lot more to be said on that topic, but we covered the basics for folks who haven't had fleeces in their bathtubs, with, I hope, a few tips as well for those who routinely wash protein fibers like wool and mohair.

That shawl at lower right is by Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer, and you can't really see how gorgeous it is: the photography only hints at its qualities (for example, I'm not sure the beads show up on camera—they accentuate the mohair's shimmer). Behind it, moving toward me, are the yarn Jackie worked with and a sample of the raw mohair fiber from which the yarn was spun.

Many thanks to Jackie for loaning us the shawl! I've been so busy spinning samples (for several years) that I don't have anything other than swatches around (some of which show up in the segment with Shay . . . and some of those were knitted by my friend Dee Lockwood, because of the short prep time we had). Whatever I made would not have been as exquisite as Jackie's shawl in any case. I only wish you could see it in person.

___

Let me tell you something about the makeup. It's really weird to see myself in makeup, as I've mentioned several times. What's even weirder is that Mac's iPhoto has a "faces" function, which identifies people's faces in photographs, making the labeling of who's in which image far speedier than it would be otherwise. The software "learns" identifying features, and while it's learning those it picks up a lot of family resemblances, initially suggesting, for example, that my sister, my daughter, my niece, and I might all be the same person.

Yet iPhoto's "faces," which by now has a lot of data in its reference base through which it can readily identify and distinguish the people I just mentioned, didn't recognize me in these photos. I was "unnamed person."

Anyway. You can now watch the two five-minute segments and see what we did, even if you (like me) don't have much television reception.

UK Knit Camp aftermath, and human/dog creative play

I'm working on another post about UK Knit Camp. I don't know when I'll get it finished, but in the interim I have been doing what I think is an amazing job of dealing with the follow-up stress.

Yet there have been indicators that all is not as mellow as I wish, perhaps because I've been on the road a lot and my yoga practice has been even more abbreviated than usual.

The mess is not the item on the right, which is proof that despite the fact that Ceilidh is amazingly calm for a year-old Border collie she is a Border collie. She has already removed the tennis ball from the end of her new rope toy (it took her two days: Ariel would have completed the job in less than 20 minutes). The toy still works just fine for playing tug, which is its purpose.

The mess is the item on the left. When I got the call asking me if I could get to Cleveland to tape two segments for Knitting Daily TV, I realized that my wardrobe did not meet the criteria for clothing. T-shirts don't cut it. While I have a closet full of handknits, none of them is TV-ready. They're too warm, have the wrong sleeve lengths, are in the wrong colors, or have necklines unable to accommodate a mic. (I received very detailed instructions. I will also need to get a manicure. Plain polish. That part's okay. The time and the expense of getting it done will try my patience, however.)

I thought that I just might be able to knit something in time, if I kept it simple. I found a pattern (one likely to be troublefree), buzzed over to a nearby shop and found yarn, and started knitting in my spare time. When the body was about 2 inches (5cm) along, I spread the fabric out on the bed, smoothed it thoroughly to check that I hadn't twisted the cast-on (which I'd already checked before and after knitting the first round, of course), and re-measured my gauge, which was right on. So I kept moving.

When the body was about 5 inches (12.5cm) long, I started to knit on it during a meeting and something felt wrong. I knitted a couple of rows and got that sinking feeling. I stretched out the fabric and moved the circular needle this way and that, hoping that it would straighten out into a tube. It wouldn't.

Despite my 2-inch check (I smoothed it out fully on the bed), it appeared to be true that I had managed to put a full twist into the starting row. I asked a knitterly friend if my brain was deceiving me. She said it was not. I took the object home and asked my daughter to confirm that I was seeing what I was seeing. She did.

There's no way I'll make that deadline. A friend has loaned some alternatives, but I'm supposed to have multiple choices (in case the TV stylists don't like what I offer) and each episode has to have different clothes. Fortunately, only the TOP matters. I can wear slacks that I already own. I've headed to TJMaxx and Marshall's to fill the gaps as inexpensively as possible. AARGH.

I have never missed a cast-on twist for more than one row beyond the start. It's a sign. All is not quite well balanced around here.

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My recent travel book was Jon Franklin's The Wolf in the Parlor: The Eternal Connection between Humans and Dogs. It's a personal exploration by an experienced (Pulitzer-winning) science writer on some questions that began bugging him, like why humans and dogs have been hanging out together for so long and why they continue to do so. He ventures some theories that he doesn't present as more than that, and that may agree or disagree with other folks' ideas, but I found it a fascinating ramble through observation and, among other things, brain science by a smart guy who's got enough background to say interesting things.

Ceilidh

And looking at a similar topic from a completely different angle:

Tussah

News of the choreographed rock video with OK Go and a dozen dogs has been traveling around the internet, but in case you haven't seen it here's the YouTube location (3.5 minutes). It might be seen as a visual representation of some of the ideas in Franklin's book.

Here's the story behind making the video; that link has another link to the video at its top.

. . . and here, just for quirkiness, is a parody involving a cat (1 minute). . . .