Going deep on a couple of subjects...

Let's face it, getting Covid on my trip to Sweden has derailed my travelogue...  I will get back to it... but meanwhile, this is some of what I'm doing; I'll go deep on a few things instead of being comprehensive.

Sourdough

There was something wrong with my starter... I suspected mold so I discarded it and tried to capture wild stuff. It's an interesting process; at first it smelled like dirty socks, then more dirty socks... but after a week it had a nice sour taste and smelled like beer. I assume it goes through phases as it acidifies (lactic acid) then finally settles on a colony of yeast and bacteria that are more pleasing to my nose. 

After 10 days, I'm baking bread... the starter doesn't seem as robust as it could be and I frankly was out of time baking-wise so I had to just slam it in the oven; it hasn't risen as the other batches did.  I've parked the starter in the fridge for the week (too much discard to process into crackers!!) and will revive it and try again next week; if it doesn't work I'll start over in October with the freeze dried starter I just got from the mill. 

V. mentioned that you can ask a nice baker to give you some starter in France... I may talk to Tartine if that doesn't work.

Cowl

I realized I didn't have enough yarn to finish... And I don't want to buy more (it's an indy dyer, so probably couldn't get any to match well enough anyways!) The cowl has an interesting feature where it increases 10 stitches then decreases 10 stitches then joins for the neck part. I asked my knitting buddies and we have no idea why the pattern maker did that; the only thing we can figure is that it might be to make it lay flatter on the back? So I ripped out the section of 10 increases and 10 decreases and joined it. I will have plenty of yarn now to finish. I need to buy a brown top to wear it with...

I think the reason I ended up short on yarn is because I've doubled the icord edge on both sides (knitted the 3 stitches twice), to make it lay flatter. I'm happy with that decision.

Weaving Stuff

Crappy hotel room pic of 
the rag rug

I might have implied I was in Sweden to weave a rug (I was) and so there is a new rug... It has these cute little bow inlays that probably won't survive an vacuum cleaner so it'll be a wall piece. Right now it's laying over an ottoman at the lodge, and I think I'd like to weave a rug to lay over the ottoman...

The rug is about 2'x4'. I was inspired by the water lilles (neckrosen) I saw in the Lund botanical gardens and in the river backwaters in Broby. The challenge I gave myself was to use whatever yarn was left after folks picked their colors and make something attractive... It's based on a VERY similar rug made by Nina <last name> our stand in teacher in <get the books name>. 

I'm currently dyeing fabric according to Marie Rollander's instructions, but using procion dyes.  Looks like the ingredient quantities are the same, but she uses washing soda instead of soda ash; I assumed I needed half as much soda ash as washing soda (I need to verify that). I used WAY too much blue dye and not quite enough green dye, so I have dark blues and lighter greens; I like them though. I dyed sheets I had here, plus some from the Thrift Store in San Carlos; the thrifted ones cost me less than $5 a sheet and one was a fun grey pattern with green animals on it. These will become placemats and a runner for the lodge.

Runners on the loom

I'm also making a couple of runners... One for a hostess gift, the other? Maybe we'll use it or maybe it will go in the potential hostess gift pile. I'll attribute the designer and pattern source in a later post.

Other

I've been trying to recover from the Covid episode... mostly I've just been fatigued. Until late last week, I could do one thing per day and the rest of the time I laid around or napped. To be fair, sometimes the one thing was two hours of chopping down brush and hauling it to the chipper pile, so it's not that bad. But I'm finally able to get back to a normal level of activity, and starting to build fitness back. 

I've been doing a fair amount of cooking as well... the only recipe of note was the peach ice cream recipe from The Perfect Scoop.  The fresh peaches give it a beautiful taste and a wonderful peachy pink color. If I made it again, I'd use half and half instead of heavy cream, but it was a delightful dessert along with a plate of fresh berries and sliced peaches.

Travelogue, Broby part 1

 I took the train from Copenhagen to Hassleholm, Sweden to meet up with the tour. The trains are neat and well kept and relatively ontime. What a pleasure to see Sarah and Simon again! We settled down in Broby to start our explorations the next day...

Broby Gastis

We stayed at the Broby Gästgivaregård, a 17th century building that was probably originally an old farmhouse... During the years that Skania was ruled by Denmark, the Danish King established a chain of stables through the region so he could change out his horses when travelling through the region; this became one of them. The last remodel re-exposed a lot of the old beams and gives the building a lot of character; despite it's age it's a comfortable place to stay. It wasn't clear to me if Sylvia and Frederick own it, or just run it; but it's well run with exceptional food.

The very. next morning, I woke up feeling super-crappy and emailed Sarah asking her to bring me a covid test. I tested positive and crawled back into bed. I had about two days of mild fever and slept a lot; then spent the next few days taking slow walks around town while the rest of the group went to the weaving class. Of course I could not join them.

Usually when we travel, DH and I are quite active and busy seeing everything we can possibly fit it... We don't have the concept of "slow travel" figured out. This forced quiet time for me was actually very enjoyable, just to slow down and look at what was around me. 

An old bridge

There's a history park with some old buildings

View from another bridge... this place is beautiful

Old railway converted to a rail-bike path

I also walked through the grocery store a few times, masked... I found this in the cat food aisle. The brand is pronounced Meow...

On the day we left Broby to transition to Lund, I tested negative, but a couple folks were not comfortable sharing a car with me; they took the tour van and I took the bus and train, which was frankly more enjoyable than a trip in the van!

Travelogue: Copenhagen day 2

Half of the hall of Danish chairs

On my second day in Copenhagen, I walked out to the Design Museum. About a third of the museum was current exhibits, one featuring avant garde fashion, the other, Japanese woodblock prints similar to the ones at the recent SF exhibit. The room full of chairs (I think 120?) was interesting as well a few rooms focusing on specific Danish designers (i.e. Poul Henningson). There's also a lovely textile section.  I enjoyed lunch in the garden at the museum cafe! I had the unpronouncable Smørrebrød.

In the afternoon, I did a walking tour with the Danish Architecture Center; we walked through the Borgen, and looked at a variety of older buildings, when across the river to see more modern buildings. The guide, and architecture student, talked about how the river was a run down collection of old warehouses, and the ways that Copenhagen had revitalized the area. It's now a hip collection of restored old buildings, new buildings incorporating old buildings, and straight out new buildings. It's clean, feels safe, and is a lovely place to be. 

det kongelige Bibliotek

Here's det kongelige Bibliotek (the Danish Royal Library), which is relevant to me as it's a source for book info in LibraryThing. 

Dinner was Fiskfrikadelle which was darn tasty.... I ate at a small restaurant on the square with the fuck you statue.  It was fine but I think there's far better food in Copenhagen...

Fiskfrikadelle

More photos at the same location as Day 1....

Social Protest