Wednesday, July 23, 2008

I should reach the point in the dinosaurs today where I divide the work for the neck shaping. You can’t imagine the excitement.

Kristen, I forgot to thank you yesterday for the reference to Bishop Rutt’s discussion of Le train bleu – the ballet with knitted costumes by Chanel. He doesn’t miss much, does he? I remember when Galina Khmeleva’s book on Orenburg Lace came out. I read it with interest and delight and thought, I’ve never heard of this whole tradition.

But then I looked it up in Bishop Rutt, and of course there it was. So I had heard of it.

Non-knit

Senator Obama will be in London later this week. Mr Brown and Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg are elbowing each other out of the way in their keenness to be photographed with him. Will so brilliant a star have time for Theo in his gansey? We’ll soon know.

I am grateful for the enthusiasm for the idea of a Kirkmichael Postcard Exhibition. And I agree, Stash Haus, that if things ever get that far, there ought to be a website. I really will show the cards to Jean B. next month – that will involve going through the whole lot and will give me some idea of whether the notion has legs.

I’ve just put in a killer bid for today’s eBay offering, for fear of forgetting later in the day. I’m sorry eBay no longer tells you the code names of your competitors.

If anyone is following my life with bated breath: we did put in a formal bid for the Haugh and the field beyond. We heard yesterday from our lawyer that we failed. We had started with the suggested price in the prospectus and increased it by 20% and rounded the result upwards. It shows that the newspapers are right and the prices being paid for agricultural land are not subject to the general economic misery.
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6 comments:

  1. Kate10:31 AM

    I was wondering what had happened about the haugh. perhaps it's not such a bad thing given your nnew year doubts about travelling up to TCOTU. I'd heard of 'kludgy' but only because of "Wee Free Fighting Men" by Terry Pratchett. Hilarious book, by the way.

    Yay for the postcard project getting legs and support the idea of its own website. Could find other collectors interested in the showing.

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  2. Kristen2:07 PM

    Jean, you're quite welcome. Rutt's book has been my summer bedtime reading for two years now, and I am just pages from the end. I found the early sections fairly tedious, but have been enthralled by everything from the Victorian period on. For me--someone who began knitting only the early 1990s--one of the most interesting aspects of the book has been seeing how Rutt recognized the importance, in the 1980s, of designers whose importance has endured (Kaffe Fassett, for one).

    I'm a Russianist by profession, so Rutt's discussion of the Ballets Russes, albeit brief, was particularly interesting to me.

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  3. MaryjoO3:12 PM

    tooo bad about the land -- find it hard to imagine that someone "outbid" you though!!

    On the Rutt book -- I have it, but haven't read it. Definitely will now though, esp. with my interest in Orenburg lace shawls and all of that ... today I was intrigued by something in the Evelyn A. Clark "Knitted Lace Triangles" book(let) where she talks about the "cat's paws" (very prevalent in the Orenburg lace patterns) being from Shetland traditions.

    And ... can you imagine, the Rutt book is now listed as used on Amazon for $77-$89??

    Good "knitting" on the dinosaurs -- you are an inspiration to all of us of "getting things done" LOL

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  4. MaryjoO3:28 PM

    Sorry -- not sure what "dope" my computer was smoking when it brought up "used copies" from Amazon.com for the Rutt book at $77 -- maybe that was for a first edition or something.

    Anyway, I'm not sure Amazon is working right. This moment's version has the book available from 7 vendors, starting at $32.91 and going to .... $213.00
    My cover is torn, so I guess that means I can't sell it for #213 LOL

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  5. Anonymous8:03 PM

    The first edition of Rutt's book has a few color photographs that were not reprinted in the second edition. One of them is a photograph of the 14th century silk relic purse at Chur, and it shows that he accidentally reversed the colors in his written description of that purse. $213 seems a little high - but remember, that's not what it's selling for, it's only the asking price.

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  6. Anonymous7:52 AM

    It's me again... "1910" and "all the postcards... have been in the album 100 years"? I hope they can mail things more accurately than they can figure dates! 98 years, yes... It's a cute card.

    Rutt is invaluable; he does have some outdated information and a few outright errors, but he's still the place to start.

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