Color Inspiration - Fall Flowers

Sometimes people ask me where I get my color inspiration from.   I get it from all over.   Sometimes, I'll see a few yarns together and think 'Yes!'  and sometimes I see things in the real world that make me want to drop everything and go wind a warp.

Things like these late summer flowers.  I love to weave towels in these bright colors.

Here are some of the towels inspired by these flowers in my garden.  They make my heart go pitter pat.   I love these towels.

From left to right:  zinnia plaid, party red plaid, party gold plaid, leaf plaid.

Want to see more of my towels?   Check out the towels in my etsy store! 

Inspiration - April Flowers

One of my favorite colorways came about as I was looking at the flowers that bloom around here in April.  

These flowers were the inspiration for the Nepeta colorway.

Inspiration - British Gardens

It's January and I'm sure I'm not alone in needing a bit of garden cheer to get me through the winter.   I have two books to recommend today about gardens.  The first is about one of the most famous gardens in Britain, Sissinghurst.   The second is about a fictitious garden in Cornwall.   They both make me very happy.  Links at the bottom of the page.

Gardening at Sissinghurst, by Tony Lord, is a beautiful description of the garden rooms at Sissinghurst estate, which was owned and landscaped by Vita Sackville-West and her husband, Harold Nicolson.   The photos are wonderful and the descriptions of the estate and her gardening and design methods are very instructive for those of you who love gardening and garden design.   I noticed when I was linking this book that there are several other books out there now about Sissinghurst, so if you fall in love with this garden, there's plenty more to read about it.

I love stories about less than perfect, less than beautiful people finding themselves in situations where they have the chance to believe and follow a dream.  I also love gardens.  Nancy Atherton is the author of this series of mysteries featuring  the supernatural Aunt Dimity, who continues on after her death to watch over her friends and family.  Aunt Dimity and the Duke is the second of the books published in the series, but the first chronologically in the stories, and it's the only one I really consider a gem.  I smile all the way through this book, every time.  It's about a middle aged gardener starting over, a stained glass window, a magic lantern and the restoration of an old garden inside the marvelous grounds of a Cornish estate.  It is the literary equivalent of a chic flick, but if you need a little dose of optimism and a happy ending, then I highly recommend it.

Role Models

Why did I really really want to move to the country?  It was time for a change.

The idea to choose the kind of life that would allow me to avoid the pretentious rat race that exists in most cities is not a new one.  Everyone who has ever packed their bags and headed for parts less populated has more or less had the same idea.  I first started thinking about this type of life choice for myself when I picked up a copy of Cross Creek, by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. [Links at the bottom of the page]  She wrote about her decision to buy, sight unseen, an orange grove in central Florida during the late 1920s.  The book is a long description of the changes that occur in her philosophy of life as a result of her decision to trade her upper-class New York lifestyle for the rigors of tending an orange grove scraping out a living in the wilds of Florida to give herself a chance to become the writer she has always wanted to be.  It is clear throughout the book that her new life is very difficult and that her troubles didn't magically go away just because she moved to the country.  However, it is also clear throughout the book that the experience allowed her to identify and develop untapped abilities and grow in unexpected ways, mostly as a result of having to depend on herself and her own judgment to survive.  I admired that.

I love books about the rural south and find myself rereading them often.  I have worn out a couple of copies of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, which is also about people who, due in part to the Great Depression and in part to personal philosophy and a regard for the hardships of others, have chosen a less pretentious, simpler way of life.  A Place Called Sweet Apple was written by a woman (Celestine Sibley) who also chose to escape the rat race and find a few quiet acres on which to plant a garden and listen to and nurture her inner self.