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Wrapping mind around string theory and time......

Thinking about time in the context of string theory ... factoring in the concept that past/present/future are taking place at the same time ...  playing with the awareness that in the experience of Now the present moment is all that matters ... realizing we have the choice to use our own energy for vibrational alignment ... think with the body and feel with the mind ...  expansion into the last frontier ... us.

Lost and found ...... handmade items

Articles of clothing are not uncommon streetcombings washed up on urban shores by the tides of humanity and I come across such on early morning stolls.

This morning this pair of socks had been put in a tree so whoever lost them might more easily see them:  the day before they had been squashed and wet on the road.

I'm not sure how long these three pairs of shoes have been hanging about, possibly from when school let out last June. 

This - I think it is a dressing gown - was in a local "free pile" spot up near the corner.

A few houses along this woolen scarf was draped on a fence pole -  looking still quite chipper and possibly a Christmas gift.

Lately I have come across handmade items like this beautiful  cowl knit in a cable design with possibly baby alpaca wool.  It was lying in the roadway when I first saw it so I draped it over the realtor sign.  A day or so later it was still there so I brought it home,  washed and dried it,  took it to the Koffi Knit group where it was appreciated and then adopted.

A few days later I came across a handknit hat, again on the street, and I put it on a fence post.

Next day it was gone.

These were in the newspaper lost and found.

I've never seen people go to the trouble of trying to locate owners of handmade items.  They must be knitters.  It cheers me enormously.

Now part of this appreciation comes from having many years ago - back in the three small kids and husband stage of my life - had a dear friend make me the most exquisite lacey shawl in a sunset red.

I loved it.  I lost it.  It still makes my stomach clench to think of it.  I tried to find it,  to recall where I had been,  when I had last had it.  I never found it.  So when I see those ads in the paper,  when I hang something in fuller view -  I  fondly think of that shawl. 

Safety pins .....

I imagine this is a very small sampling of the variations on safety pins - and what I use for closure or decoration on garments.  Many times  across a lifetime have I thought grateful thoughts for whoever invented them!

I don't know the purpose of the long one at the top with the bend along its length;  it says Tomado Holland on the head.  ??  It spans the breadth of a shawl very nicely with a weft effect.

The large and small one with a solid head are heavy and likely have some specified use, perhaps in industry. 

The curved ones are diaper pins, I am pretty sure.

Kilt pins are recognizable.

The long ones without circles at the ends also mystify me. 

The brass shower curtain ring slips easily through woven or knit or crochet fabric and acts as a closure as well as giving a loop on which to hang looped yarn from which the garment was made.

The stitch holders can be used likewise.

To the right of these is an interesting paper clip which 'pins' safely but not as handily.

If you can tolerate the damn red bouncing balls or know how to stop them this site tells about the inventor of the safety pin,  Walter Hunt.

Art deco clock .....

If you come across a splendid old art deco clock that is working but not working in the way that you can depend upon to get you to the airport on time - which is likely why it was at the church rummage sale - then you can stop the time at some meaningful event like a birthday or anniversary or a time of day most meaningful and enjoy its new purpose.

U is for Undertow

Three thumbs up for Sue Grafton's  twenty-first  Kinsey Millhone  book  U is for Undertow!!!!

Fibre archeology : it's in the airmail!

I can remember both sending and receiving air mail letters similar to these and that was many many years ago, back in the Sixties.

  So when I came across a  bunch at a sale I trotted along to the post office and learned that I could indeed still send them - in Canada there is more than enough postage for them to go - by air, of course! - and I could even add a page or two inside. 

To the US or abroad I would have to add extra stamps.

Next I googled to see when these would have been issued and came up with 1985 - but that was with 68 cents postage.  Hmmm?

In any case it is going to be fun sending them to people. 

Merry Christmas Eve!

Gloves or mittens : chill test

The birds were chatting merrily and leaf-mould fragrance was in the air but there was frost on the car windshield so for my early morning stroll I put the first completed mitten (made from a fingerless glove) onto one hand and ....

glove and fingerless glove onto the other.

After a block or so I was pulling my increasingly chilly fingers out of the glove fingers and cupping them up against my warm palm.

The mitten was living up to my expectation of clothing as architecture housing the body and making use of our natural heating and cooling system but it was not toasty.  The stroll-through-stash back is perhaps a bit too airy and lets the cold in.

Once the second mitten is finished I plan to put glove linings on and then the mittens and see how that works the next cold day.  Or maybe cut a thrift store cashmere sweater sleeve and sew it into a mitt shape and use that as a liner.  Any tightness does affect circulation so eliminating finger squeeze may be the answer.

Solstice

Years ago it suddenly made sense to me to celebrate New Year's on Solstice  when the shortest day of the year occurs and then the days begin to get longer and the light returns. 

This salt lamp celebrates the occasion with its glow and its warmth:  there is something deeply satisfying about gazing at it and putting one's hands around it.   

Garlic in glass vase

This year's garlic harvest - all four glorious bulbs - were dug up with great contentment and three are being given as Christmas gifts.

The bulbs from which all the four individual cloves that grew into a 'family' were  obtained came from different places and the discussion about them,  their origin,  growth habits,  culinary preference added to the adventure.  

The one kept for my own kitchen was hanging around with the others,  drying,  and, when it was time to use it and then store it, this glass flower seemed most appropriate. Sort of the reverse, I suppose,  of the song my mother would sing when I was a child about being  "Just a lonely petunia in an onion patch".  Garlic in a field of daisies? 

Gingerbread cake with a built-in vase

In the spring, summer and fall it will more than likely be a carrot cake that gets baked in a tube pan and garden flowers  - or the green top from a carrot! -  put  into a small glass in the center.  But at Christmas time it's gingerbread cake  with some sprigs from the evergreens between this garden and the next which were once Christmas trees for that household.

The cake pleased me but so did the act of making it so I took its picture as well.