Tag Archives: singing

Sometimes you get a little silly: Social Distance

Posted on August 4, 2020 | 4 comments

Claudia came over to pick up some jam, and to jam, socially distantly. Music is a balm to the soul. And a diversion, too. We missed our third Pie Bird Becky, but we sang our hearts out, 12 feet apart in my backyard. And laughed ourselves silly.

Social Distance. Apologies to Julie Gold, the composer of From a Distance.

Here are my lyrics, since it’s kind of hard to hear through the masks:

​Social distance ​we all stay at home
And wash our hands incessantly
Social distance: we wear masks to shop, and check out hurriedly
Social distance: we’re allowed on walks, if we stay six feet apart​
We miss all our friends, we miss happy hour, and museums full of art

Social distance, we would have enough hand sanitizer and TP
But there are hoarders emptying the stores, not thinking logically
So for instance, we would like some flour, some sugar and some yeast
We could bake at home, relieve some stress, and have some carb filled treats

The world is watching us, the world is watching us, world is watching us from a distance

Keep your distance, please just stay at home
Amuse yourself with your TV
Binge on Netflix, or work in your yard, while we anxiously await vaccine
If you go out, please do wear a mask, spread out and wash your hands
It’s for everyone, keep your neighbors safe, it’s the song throughout the land
You’re the hope of hopes, you’re the love of loves, it’s the song for all the land.

A little rough, but we had fun.

Also, if you’d like to know more about songwriter Julie Gold, her inspiring story is here.

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Posted in music, Pie Birds

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Braided Wristlets Class Debut, singing, and more

Posted on May 17, 2016 | 3 comments

I had a super busy weekend, and knittingly, this was the highlight.

pdxknitterati braided wristlets

I taught my new Braided Wristlets class at Twisted. I designed this pattern to be a workshop in herringbone and other braids, two color stranded knitting, and color dominance. We did cover all these things, and had a great time, too. And I made a good start on another one of these for me.

braided wristlet

I’ll be teaching this class at Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival in September. It will be an all day class on Saturday, September 24. Come and learn new skills with me!

But the weekend wasn’t all knitting. Sunday was Pentecost, and I organized and led music with the Pie Birds for worship. (The Pie Birds are a 3 part harmony group with guitars and mandolin: My friends Claudia and Becky and me.) So much work, so much fun. We sang Somewhere to Begin for the prelude; link provided if you want to give a listen. We closed the service with Turning of the World, with the congregation joining in.

We had a guest chorus from the Randolph-Macon Academy in Virgina sing for us. What a talented group of young people! They sang We Sing and All Creatures of Our God and King (not the version you might expect). Really wonderful. And they joined our choir for Spirit Come Down; it was so much fun to have all these voices singing with us.

I needed a recovery day on Monday!

PIe Birds mimosas

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Posted in classes, Knit, music, Pie Birds

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Sing to me

Posted on December 8, 2008 | 8 comments

Or, behind the scenes in the process of choosing a project.

The new yarn (Crystal Palace Taos) is being a bit difficult. It’s lovely stuff, very soft, and the colors are beautiful. But I’m still not sure what to knit with it. Nothing is singing to me.

At first I thought a bit of feather and fan would be fun. I’ve always wanted to knit a feather and fan lace pattern, and Two Weeknights with Warrick looked like it would be perfect. Great pattern, easy to memorize. Alas, it doesn’t do justice to the yarn. I’ll knit this pattern with a different yarn somewhere down the road.

So I cast on for the checkerboard scarflet. But the checkerboard was getting lost in the color changes, or the color changes were getting lost in the checkerboard. I’m not sure which.

I poked around on Ravelry to see what other people made with this gorgeous yarn. A lot of entrelac! And some mitered scarves. Aha. How about the Pioneer Braid Scarf? I cast on this morning and knit for a bit. The pattern is ingenious. Here’s what it looks like. And this is a much better depiction of the true colors.

pb scarf

It’s better than the first two tries, but it still doesn’t sing to me. And I’m not sure I want to knit an entire scarf right now. Tempus fugit! I’m thinking that I’ll play with some entrelac. I’d make a Quant, but the intended recipient isn’t a headband sort of person. On the other hand, I’m not sure she’d use the entrelac item I have percolating in my mind, either. But at least I’d get a design out of the yarn. If I do it. What I thought would be a straightforward project, isn’t. Le sigh.

Well, the yarn isn’t singing to me yet, but I was singing yesterday! The Day Old Pastries, my folkie group, played and sang carols at our church Advent Festival in the afternoon. From there I went to sing with the Everyone Welcome Community Choir at Artichoke Music, and that was a blast. Here’s a clip of one of my favorite songs from yesterday, Siyahamba. It’s South African (Zulu). Enjoy!

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Posted in Day Old Pastries, Knit, music, pattern design, ravelry

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How can I keep from singing?

Posted on March 29, 2008 | 2 comments

I went to a folk harmony singing class this morning; it was really fun. But it will take a lot of practice to be able to do it reasonably well. I can “hear” where the upper harmony should go, a third up, but my voice is pretty low, and hearing the lower harmony isn’t as intuitive for me. The subtitle of the class was: How to Find and Keep a Part. I found it, but keeping it was a challenge! The teacher is Lauren Sheehan. I would love to take another class with her. We worked mostly with “Will the Circle Be Unbroken?” finding tenor (upper) and baritone (lower) harmony lines, and then went freeform on “How Can I Keep From Singing?”

Working on surprise project number one. Whose idea was it to use navy blue yarn? It’s really hard to see what I’m doing. The sun has to be shining AND the lights have to be on. Oh, yeah, it was me. No picture yet, but soon!

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Posted in Knit, music

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