Project 333: Spring Wrap Up

Today wraps up both Me-Made May and my spring rotation of Project 333!

Wearing: Railroad denim skirt, Railroad denim skirt, Asian florals dress, Art Deco blouse and denim skirt

I sort of gave up at the end of the month--not on wearing me-mades, but on wearing stuff from my spring rotation.  I borrowed a few things from my summer rotation, and also wore a couple of things that aren't going in for one reason or another.  (Although, the Art Deco blouse is more flattering than I remember--perhaps it will sneak in after all!)  I probably shouldn't have washed everything over the weekend, but with the sudden nasty turn in the weather, I was just done with everything in my closet.

Left column, top to bottom:

Brown wool/alpaca sweater, Navy cotton long-line sweater, Purple Rosemont cardigan

Liberty #3 dress, Axcess dark teal pullover/cardigan, Fat Face blue cardigan/pullover, Jeanne Pierre teal-green cotton pullover

Gray cotton cardigan, Coral-rose heavy weight cotton cardigan, Burgundy Irish wool cardigan

Middle column:

Blue knit eshakti dress, Liberty #1 dress, Poppy Parade dress, First Light dress

Second middle column, top to bottom:

Purple henley t-shirt, coral henley t-shirt, striped boatneck t-shirt, red striped cardigan pullover

Red merino cardigan, pink cotton cardigan, red cotton cardigan, royal blue cotton cardigan

Right column:

Yardley's dress, Bluebird dress, Green Cookie Book dress, Return to Tokyo dress

I felt that this rotation ended okay.  This season was very weird weather-wise--it was cold and damp all spring, until very suddenly, it turned very hot and humid this last week.  There really wasn't much of a transition.  This rotation ended up being cardigan-heavy as a result.  At the beginning of the rotation, I was constantly wanting more pullover sweaters, and at the end, I was wanting more short sleeve shirts.  I really couldn't win on this one.

I have some mending to do, as several of my dresses have some holes along the undearm seam (this usually happens once after I make them and is an easy fix)  I'm on the fence about the Yardley's dress as it is borderline too short, and I don't think it weathered the season particularly well.  I'm hoping some lavender crochet lace along the hem might spruce it up a bit.  Ditto for the Rosemont cardigan.  I like it as a loungewear sort of sweater, but I don't think it looks so great on me for day-wear.  I'll hang on to it to sleep in during the winter since I'm always cold at night and the Rosemont is nice and warm.

I ended up with some decent separates by the end of the rotation, but I could have used one more skirt.  The blue and green striped shirt is really on its last leg, but I think I found a replacement on ThredUp, so I'll store it for next spring.  I think next spring, I'll be sure to either keep one of my winter skirts out, or add in one of my summer skirts.  I also had some great dresses come out of this rotation: both Liberty dresses, and the First Light dress were clear winners in my book.  

I'll have my summer rotation posted later this week, God-willing.  I'm still waiting for one or two second hand t-shirts to arrive in the mail.  (I have a whole rant about t-shirts that I will save for another day)

I've been thinking some about what the goal of Project 333 is for me.  I think it isn't just one thing, but mostly, I want to stop feeling like my clothes own me, and not the other way round.  I've come to accept that I'm probably never going to start and end a rotation in the same place, and that is okay, but I'd like to get to the point where there is less flux.  And more cross-over between seasons.  I've written before that I find I have about two seasons in me for a garment, and then I want to see something else, but I'm not doing as good of a job of making that happen.  

Some of it is that summer and winter and so self-contained, as far as weather and wardrobe, and spring and fall are just kind of a mess of in-between.  I also have a different palette that appeals to me in the spring from the one I use in the fall.  So there's that.  I think it would be great to get down to x-number of garments that I own, but I'm not there yet.  (Right now, I have somewhere between 75-80 garments across my four rotational cycles)  It feels like too much, too decadent.  Yet, at the same time, I know that less than 25 garments per rotation and I start looking at ThredUp for something second hand, or scanning fabric websites to make something.  

The good news is that I no longer have reams of clothing going out the door all the time--my wardrobe is small enough now that it is a piece here or there, but not bags and bags like it once was.  I'm quick to pass along items that are too big but still have plenty of life, and now that H&M has started a textile recycling program, I'm putting worn out garments from the whole family into a bag that I bring to a store when it is full.

 Project 333 has helped me to plan smart sewing and knitting projects that fit into a larger seasonal scheme, rather than just making stuff that appeals to me in that moment.  

I suppose I need to accept that it is a process--to live with less, to be more.  I'm reading a ton of literature about Russia and the Soviet period right now, and it gives me some ballast, in a strange sort of way.  I remember that life, and what I had (and how overwhelmed I was by big box stores and the plethora of consumer choice when I moved back to the States); it was simple and good, even though there were many difficulties.  I need to remind myself from time to time.

Asian Florals

Today I present The Dress That Didn't Make the Cut.  Otherwise known as The Asian Florals dress.  This dress was an experiment.  Earlier this spring, when I was putting together my summer sewing projects, I was thinking about interesting ways to change up my Dottie Angel pattern, and it occurred to me that it would probably mesh well with the Afternoon blouse pattern, which had just been re-released as a dress pattern.  I bought it when it initially came out, probably two years ago, and printed it and cut it out, but never actually got around to making it up.

The shapes were so similar, the sleeve treatments, etc, that I figured it would have to work.  I had the blouse pattern already printed and cut, and decided to overlay it on the Simplicity 1080 and figure out the lines from there.  I was eager to find a neckline treatment that would allow me to use some of my button collection.  I do love me a good vintage button card.

My first problem is that I had cut the Afternoon blouse pattern when my bust was significantly bigger than it is now (40+" vs. a scant 36" today).  The blouse has no shaping or darts, other than a curved side hem, so it should have occurred to me that this would be a problem, since the Simplicity 1080 pattern gets its shape from bust tucks (or in some of my iterations, elastic).  I also didn't account for the wide v-neck shoulders.  My shoulders are fairly narrow, and a wide neckline is almost always a mistake.

The good news is that the Afternoon blouse pattern helped me to fix the cut-on sleeves in my sloper for the Simplicity 1080.  I prefer more upper arm coverage than the original 1080 has, and have been tinkering with the shoulder length all spring.  By the time I got to this dress, I knew that I liked about 9" length and 9 1/2" opening.  The Afternoon blouse is basically that straight out of the packet, and has a nice curved under sleeve to boot.  I basically used her sleeve length, opening and under-sleeve length and transferred them to my Simplicity redraft.  I've not had any problems with the sleeves since I did this--I recommend it if you are struggling with the kimono sleeves.  

The nice thing about cut-on sleeves vs. kimono is that they are easier to finish with bias, but they also give a good range of motion, whereas a kimono sleeve can restrict the shoulder slightly.

So I made the dress up, finished the edges with bias, tried it on, and realized it was way too big on me.  And the color (which had looked more saturated on the screen when I bought it) really washed me out.  I wasn't really sure what to do at that point.  I pinched the excess material in the front and put in two pretty large bust tucks, and decided to call it well enough.  

This dress isn't going into my summer rotation because I don't think it is particularly flattering on me, but I did want to show the pattern experiment, because I do think that was worth it.  (Plus it is a nice dress to wear on an icky-sticky day at the end of a weird spring rotation; I've washed all my spring rotation clothing and sort of don't want to sweat through anything before tomorrow)  If the fabric looked better on me, I'd probably take the time to unpick the bias on the neckline and take it in, as well as fitting it better through the body.

But I just need to get over it and let this dress go.  It's just too big, and the color is not good on me.  I'll keep the buttons for another project, as I have quite a few of them (I picked them up in a clearance bin in a random fabric store downtown).  If I tried it again, I'd size down the top, take in the back neckline with some darts, and probably narrow the v-neckline a tad.  

Win some, lose some.

Railroad Denim

I cheated a little and pulled out a tshirt and skirt from my summer rotation.  We are dealing with the effects a tropical storm in the Atlantic, and the weather is truly nasty right now--low 90s, high humidity, bright and sticky.  I just couldn't face anything in my spring rotation today, especially after going to the gym and logging 4 miles.

I made this skirt as a way to test my skirt sloper after I made some changes to it, but have been saving it for summer, and thus haven't blogged it yet.  The fabric was part of a Craftsy kit that was on clearance, and I bought it in part because it was so inexpensive ($20 for the fabric and pattern!).  I also wanted to try a shaped waistband because I wondered if some of my skirt fitting problems were due to always using a straight waistband.  The pattern was a Palmer/Pletsch pattern--McCall's 6361--and intrigued me, because I read their book, Real Fit for Real People, sometime last year.  

The kit came, I prewashed and dried the fabric--a railroad striped lightweight denim from Robert Kaufman.  It washed up nicely, and I commenced to fiddle with the McCalls 6361.  The written length was easily 3" shorter than my skirt preference, so that was the first thing I needed to tackle.  I slashed and spread and started filling in the gaps.  I got one pattern piece done, and started on the second, and decided to compare the fit and flare of it to my Anne Adams 9481 pattern, that was very close to a perfect fit.  The M6361 was way off.  At that point, I decided to give up on the pattern, but to apply the shaped waist band to my Anne Adams pattern.

I also decided to redraft my Anne Adams pattern to incorporate all the changes I had been making on the fly.  I've been removing all the written seam allowances, and making the seam allowances quite large, as well as tinkering with the length but I wanted something that was consistent.  I redrew it all on freezer paper (a lovely invention for sewers, if ever there was!) and decided to use this railway denim as my test project before cutting into my red twill.  I figured it wouldn't be a great loss if it ended up not fitting properly.  The cutting was a near thing--I must have lost a bit of yardage in the wash, because I had to get pretty creative to get the whole skirt out of it.  The McCall's 6361 also had a two-part pocket piece that I wanted to try.  I like my Hollyburn all-in-one pocket a lot, but sometimes you need the option to reduce bulk on the pocket bag.

I cut a shaped and straight waist band, just in case the former didn't work out--the straight one was a squeak!  I ended up kind of chickening out on the shaped waistband, and went with the straight one in the end.  I actually think it was a good call.  Taking a wedge out of the back skirt pieces fixed the problem I was having with excess fabric pooling at the base of my spine, and I think I got the seam allowances how I want them on this skirt.  I still had to add an extra set of darts in the back, but given my hip to waist ratio, I think that is inevitable for a decent fit.

All in all, a decent skirt!  It is lightweight, reasonably comfortable, and I think will be nice for the summer.  More importantly, it allowed me to make three other well-fitting skirts that I really like (two that are unblogged) for my summer rotation.  (And apologies for the rubbish photos--I usually try to take photos first thing, and going to the gym this morning kind of messed up my schedule.  There are a limited number of spots for photos after a certain time in the morning because of the light)

Just the facts:

Railroad denim skirt: Anne Adams 9481 (redrafted); Robert Kaufman railroad denim, all purpose zip, dress hook and eye, snap

Tshirt: Eddie Bauer via ebay

Shoes: Dansko via ebay

Jewelry: Etsy/Ireland

Me-Made May, Week #4

Wearing: (left to right) Liberty #1 dress, Bluebird dress, Green Cookie Book dress, First Light dress, red twill skirt, Yardley's dress, Liberty #3 dress

The weird weather continues--I started out the week still needing tights and a light sweater, but by the week's end, we had popped into the low 90s and I'm suddenly pulling out my sandals and anti-chaffing gel!!  (That stuff is magical, by the way--I'm never going to have a thigh gap, and I don't care one way or the other, but I do care about friction rashes while walking in the heat, and since I don't want to wear tights year round, this has been a life-saver for me)

Only a few more days of Me-Made May to go!  Now that the weather has really heated up (we went from late winter to summer literally overnight), I'm eager to switch over to my summer rotation on Wednesday.  I keep going back and forth as to whether I have enough stuff for my summer, since I tend to sweat through my clothes more frequently, and thus need more frequent laundering, but I guess I can always whip up another Dottie Angel frock if I find myself short.  I'm aiming for about 27 garments per rotation, which seems to be about right for my needs and laundry cycle.

Some thoughts about clothes this week.  After the heat of the last three days, I think I can safely say that lawn will be a great fabric choice for the hot weather.  It is cool, thin, and has a nice feel against the skin, even in the drip.  The Liberty #1 dress continues to be a favorite, and I rediscovered my liking for the Green Cookie book dress this week as well.  I really love Cotton + Steel fabric, and am so eager for their Rifle Co. fabric collaboration to come out in August!  I had planned my sewing projects for the rest of the year, but I think I may have to work in a few dresses from that collection.

My Yardley's dress needs some attention.  I still think it is borderline as far as length, and am considering adding some lavender trim to the bottom to visually lengthen it a bit.  The fabric also is pulling a little under the arms and has developed some holes along the underarm seam.  It is fixable; I just need to take the time to do it.  I made this dress when I was still tweaking the shape of the armscye on my Dottie Angel sloper, and the early iterations didn't have enough of a curve on the underside of the sleeve, which makes it pull at the seam over time.   I've since fixed this (I'm hoping to write up something in June about all my changes) and it hasn't been a problem on the more recent dresses (except for the Pots and Pans dress-turned-blouse, but I think that was a function of old fabric being brittle, rather than the pattern shape)

I'm holding 3-4 pounds of water with the heat and my cycle, so I'm feeling a bit sloshy today; my legs and feet feel tight.  I went for a run on Wednesday and it felt really good to put on my sneakers and hit the pavement, but I'm really sore after not exercising for so many months!  I'm hoping to get to the gym this weekend, or possibly later today.  I've been eating a lot of salmon this week, and finding it to be a good thing for my system.  Unfortunately, it is kind of expensive, so I don't know how long I can keep it up, but I'm trying to experiment with different ways to keep my calorie counts reasonable, my blood sugar levels steady, and still feel like I'm actually eating during the day instead of having a liquid or mush diet.  Today I tried having Greek yogurt with honey for breakfast instead of my usual corn chex.  I find that the extra protein really does help me feel full longer, but I have a lot of trouble getting the yogurt down since it forms a bolus and kind of sticks in the webs in my throat.  As long as I take it slow and take small bites, it is okay.  It is not a food I can just gulp down and go.  (alas)  But that is progress, I think, so I'll take it.  I'm to have another endoscopy with dilation on the 6th, so perhaps that will help some as well.

I'm planning to wrap up both my spring rotation and Me-Made May on Tuesday, and will preview my summer rotation on Wednesday, God-willing.  I've finished Crawford's book, and am reading some really interesting stuff right now; I hope to discuss it in more detail soon.

Yarn Along: Down the Rabbit Hole

~knitting~

As promised, photos of the Saucy Librarian sweater!  I confess, I'm a little meh about this sweater too.  

Blocking helped the length issues considerably, but also made the neckline much wider, and some of the shaping given by the ribbing was lost in how I blocked it.  I realize I could reblock it slightly less aggressively to fix that, but I dunno.  

I just can't decide if the color suits me--it is so dark!  The fabric does feel slightly better on that the Sapphire sweater, even though they are the same yarn, so that is something.  

Having a layer underneath seems to help too.  I guess I'll just put both sweaters in the bin until the winter and reassess then.

This photo shows the color most accurately--it tends to read quite dark at a distance, but it really is a lovely shade of green.

But!  I also promised a yarn stash post.  Since I've discovered some new-to-me yarn lately, plus taken advantage of some sales and overstocks, I've got a lot of projects in the hopper!  This is just a small selection of what I've got planned (I have yarn for kid projects that I'll get to as I have time)

First is O-Wool.  It is super local to me--the shipping address is less 2 miles from here, as the crow flies!  I bought some overstocked Balance, which is a cotton-wool mix, and this stuff is delightfully squishy and soft.  My primary complaint about cotton yarns is that they are too round and feel really awful to my hands while knitting, and then don't hold their shape afterward.  I've had some really great wool/cotton sweaters in ready-to-wear that felt similar to this yarn, so I'm hopeful that this will be a great sweater.  I'm planning to make the Rincleau sweater, also from O-Wool.

Next is Quince and Co.  I've been sort of peripherally aware of their yarn for a while, but never really took the time to check out the offerings.  I decided to start with Lark, which is their basic worsted weight, and bought the Cypress colorway.  It is not quite as bright as I was expecting, but I think it will make a superb pullover.  I'm planning to make the Stokey cowl neck from Amy Herzog's book with it.

I bought some Valley Yarns Northampton in charcoal gray to make a button down vest for my husband to wear with his cassock (he has a linen kombu, and I have to remake his woven woolen one, as he just lost the old one...tragedy!) but he wanted a knitted one as well.

I was sad to discover that Valley Yarns has discontinued their Stockbridge line--I made my Rosemont cardigan out of it, and I really like the yarn.  They still have plenty in stock at yarn.com, and it is on crazy good sale, so I bought the red-purple colorway to make a sweater for next winter.  I've not decided on the pattern yet.

After much trepidation at the price, I also bought a couple skeins of Malabrigo Rios over the winter, just to try it out, and I think I'm going to make it into a L'Enveloppe.  I find in the winter I often want something extra over my shoulders, but a scarf feels too bulky or something.  I really like cowls and neck warmers, but wanted something more like a shawl that I didn't have to hold or pin together.  This pattern intrigues me.

I've had some navy blue Misti Alpaca that I got on clearance last year and have been dithering about what to use it on.  I think I've finally decided to make Clouds in My Coffee by Elizabeth Smith.  I was debating between it and another cardigan pattern, but I think I will get more use out of a Clouds cardigan.  I'm simultaneously intrigued and daunted.

As for my current projects, I decided to scrap my plans for another Ramona, and use my bulky gray yarn on a Sulka cardigan instead.  It has a nice shape and texture to it, and so far I'm enjoying knitting it.

It is knit in pieces from the bottom up and then seamed, so I'm currently working on the back part. I'm debating adding waist shaping because I'm making it longer than the pattern calls for.  I'm not feeling that great this week (GI flare) so I'm not really getting a lot of knitting done.

I'm also still working on my dad's vest.  I'm shaping the arm holes right now, and have a few more rows to go.  Now that the lower body is done, it is going pretty quickly.

I'm not sure about the look of the arm hole bind off--I wasn't expecting such a strong line along the edge, but it doesn't look that obvious in the finished photo on the pattern, so perhaps it just gets subsumed into the ribbing on the edges at the end.

~reading~

I finished Putin Country in two afternoons over the weekend, and I will say it is a mixed bag.  I would recommend it to anyone with a serious interest in Russia but with caveats. The book is part-journalism, part-memoir of Anne Garrells' many years visiting the Chelybainsk region, which is just to the east of the Urals; it was closed to outsiders during the Soviet period because of was the site of many military and nuclear installations.  There are still several closed cities in the area, because of ongoing nuclear projects.  I like her writing style, and mostly appreciate her perspective on things, but I think there are some deliberately misleading sections that blatantly ignore the longer history of the region (for example, she calls the Bashkir and Tatar peoples that live in the region "indigenous," which is far from true; they are what is left of the Mongol hordes that brutally occupied the country for 400 years...a fact she conveniently forgets to mention and which goes a lot of the way to explain why ethnic Slavs don't have a high regard for them)  The past is longer than 200 years, and Garrells seems quite short-sighted in this regard.

She brings a totally secular eye to religion in the area (and in Russia more generally), and seems incredulous that people might really believe what they say they do.  She has a fairly jaundiced view of the Orthodox Church in particular.  She doesn't seem to understand faith, or the historical role of Christianity in Russia.

It is true that Russia is a huge multi-ethnic, multi-faith country, and that historically, keeping it all together has been a gargantuan task.  It is also true that the Soviet period was one of tremendous secularism and enforced atheism, but Ms. Garrells seems to discount the earlier history of religion on the country, and the different ways that the churches and other faiths coped and struggled to survive under Soviet rule.

Her reporting on the environmental degradation in the Chelybainsk region is superb, as well as her chapters on medical care, parenting special needs kids, and the basic poverty of the villages and the lack of prospects, combined with galloping corruption.  It made me think of some of the Rust Belt areas in the United States, or even my own poverty-stricken, corruption-ridden city.  There were a couple of chapters where I was left wanting more information, and wished she had given more space to topics like Memorial and its being shunted to the periphery of public discourse.  (She has a few paragraphs on the legacy of the purges, but I really wanted to know more about that, both what people think about it today, how it is being "officially" handled, and the effect on the region as an historical matter)

I think the weakness of her book is basically that she interviews people she meets here and there, and it seems a little unrepresentative, given the title of the book.  She says that the region is largely supportive of Putin, but her interviews and friends would seem to fall mostly into the opposition camp (or at the very least, sodden despair and resignation).  She only profiles a few people who are staunch Putin supporters, and they are one-dimensional portraits.

Ms. Garrells also assumes a fairly intimate knowledge of Russia, Russian political figures, and the history of the past 30 years.  I happen to be familiar with much of it, so casually throwing around names like Boris Nemstov or Chernomirdov or referring to the economic turbulence of the mid to late 1990s without any context was fine for me, but would be confusing for a reader with only a passing knowledge of Russia.  The book is quite brief for the ground it purports to cover.  Still, I'm glad I read it.  It makes me eager to get to my Mandelstam, Kolyma Tales, and the other Russia books in my stack.  I may have to revisit John Thompson's primer on Russian history, Russia and the Soviet Union, vol. 4.  The title is basic, but it covers a lot of ground in a relatively short space, and and covers it well.

As for other reading, I'm about 2/3rds through The World Beyond Your Head (helped along by a middle of the night stomach issue that had me up most of the night on Sunday night!) and am still finding it very useful. I have a lot of dog-eared pages and am wondering how to cohere my thoughts about it into something written.

War and Peace is on temporary hold, and Ivan Turgenev's Sketches from a Hunter's Album is next up in my queue--I started it yesterday afternoon.  So far it is interesting.

~watching~

Nothing new to report from last week.  I tried Julian Fellowes' Doctor Thorne on amazon but I just couldn't get into it.  I could tell from the second scene with Ian McShane exactly where the plot was going, and my flagging interest was gone by that point.  I also didn't really take to the actors playing the parts, so that is some of it too.

Linking with Ginny for Yarn Along!

Talking Tuesday: Endurance

all images via Google Images, of St. Herman of Alaska Monastery in Platina, CA

We live in interesting times.  I could not have predicted the speed with which traditional Christianity would be marginalized in American society, nor ways in which Christians would be forced to abandon the public square.  

Rod Dreher had a great analysis on his blog last week, following a link to a great article that I recommend reading as it lays out some practical examples of Benedict Option style activities that some Christians are undertaking in order to live out their faith, and foster a faith-community in our society which becomes ever more hostile to small-o orthodox Christianity and indeed, most traditional faiths.

I'm very interested in the Benedict Option; I'm always thinking about how to consciously structure our family life to revolve around the life of the Church, and to make sure that our children are firmly grounded in the Faith. We will have to be much more deliberate in choosing a Christian path as a family, because we can no longer count on the surrounding culture to shore it up.   

"Over and over, we see that the biggest problem in even the healthiest churches here, where kids are being raised well in the faith, is that the rhythms of kids’ lives are not being shaped by anything related to Church,” said executive director Brian Brown. “They’re being shaped by the rat race, by the constant pressure to get the kid into college, whatever it may be. We have ‘liturgies’ that are formed by checking our smartphone for Facebook every hour, that are far more formative than the liturgy of our religion that’s supposed to be the center of our lives.” ~John Burger, What is the Benedict Option, and Why it Might be Coming to Your Neighborhood, Aleteia blog, May 11, 2016

I worry about the world my children will inhabit, because I think it will be very different from the one that I knew growing up.  I want them to have the tools to live as exiles from the world, to stay strong in their faith, and to order their lives according to the rhythms of the Church.   We can learn much from monasteries--I've discussed previously how much I admire the rhythms of life at the monastery of St. Herman of Alaska in Platina, CA.  Their lives are not physically comfortable, but I find there is much to learn in how they live them in accordance with the liturgical life of the Church.  It is not an easy path, but it is one that Christ called us to as Christians. 

If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you....He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. But this happened that the word might be fulfilled which is written in their law, ‘They hated Me without a cause. But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. ~John 15:18-27

The analysis of the current state of affairs in America comes from a reader of Dreher's blog, and I recommend reading the whole thing, but here is the first part:

"I think the story goes something like this: In the first centuries of the Church, Christians were the minority and the outcasts, at times even enemies of the state. Over centuries, and through much toil and blood, we attained toleration. Eventually, that developed into acceptance. Finally, we were ascendant. Christianity became the faith of the Empire. Along with this came positions of power and influence for Christians, who no longer had to fear a conflict between their faith and carrying out the duties of state.

That arrangement more or less persisted for centuries. Obviously, for Orthodox Christians in the East it ended with the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the rise of Islam. In the West, however, the Church remained integrally involved with the state and persisted as a preeminent influence on culture.

Much good has come of this, most especially the influence of Christian anthropology on the arts, philosophy, and political theory. The Church, too, benefited from the need to articulate uniquely Christian understandings of aesthetics, ethics, and political philosophy. The greatest achievements of Western civilization all rest on this foundation laid by Christianity.

However, as has been much discussed, especially by you in connection with the Benedict Option, this longstanding position of power and cultural priority for Christianity has also enabled an, at times, unhealthy laxity within the Church. I’m talking about the propensity of Christians, after they have baptized the culture, to kick up their feet and relax, thinking they have constructed some sort of perpetual motion machine. Once Christianity has formed the culture, this unspoken thinking goes, the culture will perpetuate Christianity. The Church need only see to its rituals, acting as a sort of all-encompassing master of ceremonies for the culture as a whole.

The error in this, or least one prominent one, should be obvious: it ignores the Fall and the reality of sin. No culture will persist in virtue without the constant guidance, admonition, and even judgment of the Church. In the absence of these, the seeds of original sin will again sprout into tares that slowly spread and choke out the wheat of the culture.

This is essentially what has been happening to the West since around the time of the Reformation. And yet it has not been until recently that things have come to a head.

What is different now? Well, the Church has neglected the culture for so long that [the culture] now advocates for beliefs and practices that directly contradict the Christian faith.

This is where the difficulty begins, because Christians have gotten soft. We’ve gotten used to our positions of power and influence. When faced with the choice of keeping their faith or their cultural relevance, an increasing number of Christians have been choosing the latter."

~Frenemies of the Benedict Option, Rod Dreher, American Conservative Blog, May 16, 2016

Our task is to live our lives with integrity, in accordance with God's laws and the Tradition of the Church, with an increased care for that which goes on in our back yards.  We must recommit to doing all of the the things that Christ commanded us as the Church to do in our communities, with the person in front of us.  This is difficult.  I freely admit that the pace and structure of modern life make this task a daunting one, especially for an introvert like me.  It is hard to invite people over, to find the time and energy to bring like-minded people together to build community, but it is absolutely necessary to shoring up our faith, and also to give us strength to continue on the Way.  Being a Christian in the new order will require some hard conversations--indeed, some hard decisions--about what we will and will not do as Christians in a hostile land.  I don't have any answers, only my poor prayers that we may endure.

Me Made May Week #3

Wearing (left to right): First Light dress, Liberty #3 dress, denim skirt, Liberty #3 dress, Return to Tokyo dress, denim skirt, Poppy Parade dress

The weather continues on its weird course this month.  I'm mostly wearing lighter sweaters and in the last day or two have put my tall boots away (again!) but am still wearing tights for at least half the day.  Today is supposed to be freakishly warm, but then it will drop back down to the 50s tomorrow.  

I'm trying to wear my hair down more lately--just for a change of pace.  I can't really stand to have hair on my neck once it is hot and my hair picks up a lot of static when I wear heavy sweaters in the winter, so I figure might as well get it in while I can!

I rediscovered that teal-blue cardigan this week and am glad I hung on to it.  It is ending up a great transition piece that I can wear with a dress or as a top.  I like the shape of it and there is a slight bit of texture to the fabric that makes it slightly interesting.  The color is pretty good on me too, I think, so there's that.  I've gotten a lot of compliments on the Liberty #3 dress, so I think it is a winner!  I feel good in that dress, as well as the First Light dress.  Both excellent late additions to my spring rotation.

I think one of the pressures I feel during Me-Made May is to wear something different each day, just so the photos don't get boring (I picked my dress this morning largely on that basis).  But that's just silly.  Most of us wear the same things all the time, and the point of Project 333 is to learn to work with less on a seasonal basis.  I'm not really one of those people who gets really creative with a small wardrobe and wears things in unexpected ways.  I tend to wear the same cardigans with the same dresses, same tops with the same skirts.  I suspect many women do the same.  That's okay.  I've been thinking more about why I do Project 333, and what my ultimate goals are with the project, and I hope to come up with something a little more coherent soon.

I don't really have much to say about this week.  I'm having a lot of bad food days--both from a too-many-calories perspective, and from a "I don't know what to eat anymore and my insides hurt" perspective.  I'm discouraged.  My food list is still about 5 foods and I'm tired of feeling sick from eating.  

I looked back over some reports from My Fitness Pal and I realized I have been gaining and losing the same 3-5 pounds every couple of weeks since the beginning of the new year.  I don't really feel very good about that.  I suppose it is better than gaining back everything I lost last year, but I still feel like I have such a long way to go, that it is hard to feel stuck.  I know that I should just buckle down and cut out another 300-500 calories per day, but with my diet being so severely restricted, particularly in regard to high volume/high fiber foods that help keep things steady, I'm just kind of lost as to how to do that, and still be functional as far as blood sugar goes.  

I started using Duolingo for Russian language this week.  I have been studying Russian since 1998, and would describe myself as functional, but not literate or particularly conversational.  I want to learn more, and I want to revisit some of my PhD research on the imagery of the Soviet Union. I downloaded a Cyrillic keyboard which helped a lot--I was super frustrated with the program when it was in Beta, because I found the it didn't really like transliterations that weren't precisely what had been programmed.  I probably should have been able to test out of some stuff, except for that little quirk.  I just decided to start at the beginning and go from there.  I'm worked for several hours yesterday before my brain fried and I'm hoping to get in some more practice this morning while my sitter is here.  Better get on with it before the morning is gone.

Yarn Along: Saucy Saucy

~knitting~

So this happened yesterday:

Apologies for the flash photos--it was the only way I could get the green color to show up somewhat accurately.

I finished the Saucy Librarian sweater and am blocking it now!  The body of this sweater seemed to take forever to finish, but the sleeves went surprisingly fast.  I'm blocking it rather aggressively, in the hopes of salvaging the length issue, and possibly improving the fit, so we'll see how it comes off the pins.  I cannot believe I'm writing this on May 18, but I think I may be able to model it for photos this week!  (I'll share them for next week's Yarn Along)  It is still chilly and damp, especially in the mornings, and I'm still wearing tall boots and heavy tights most days.  I'm mostly wearing light weight sweaters, though, so that is something.

I've made a little more progress on my dad's vest, but not enough that is worth photographing.  Just a few more inches on the body.  I think I have another 2" to go before I start shaping the arm holes.  I bought a bunch of yarn lately in some sales, so I have pretty much planned out the rest of my knitting year (and then some!)  Maybe I'll do a yarn and knitting plans round up post soon.

~reading~

I bought a couple of knitting books lately, as I want to figure out how to fit my figure, and be happy with the results of my knitting.  I bought both Amy Herzog's books (Knit to Flatter and Knit Wear Love) and Top Down: Reimagining Set-In Sleeve Design by Elizabeth Doherty.  I read Knit to Flatter and Top Down earlier this week, and I think Knit to Flatter is going to be a very useful book, as it looks at knitting garments by body type.  I basically understand my shape, but didn't really understand some of the best ways to fit it in knitting.  The Top Down book I wanted to have because I wanted another option for fitting my narrow shoulders besides the imperfect fit of a raglan sleeve.  I've not received the Knit Wear Love book yet, so can't speak to that one.  I'm also intrigued by You Can Knit That, also by Amy Herzog.  I really like her approach, and her patterns seem mostly doable to me.

I am about half way through The World Beyond Your Head, and it is very very good.  I'll probably write it up here when I'm finished--there is just so much to mine there.  Crawford's writing style is funny and deprecating, and I've found myself laughing out loud at a few points.  Not exactly what you'd expect from a mostly philosophical treatise.  He makes it interesting and points out a lot of connections that I wouldn't have seen otherwise.

I've temporarily set War and Peace aside in favor of Crawford, so no new progress on that this week. I'll get back to it.  At the good advice of a friend who reads Good Books, I've taken the plunge and ordered Sigret Undset's Kristen Lavransdatter.  I've heard other bloggers rave about it, and my friend really loves it, so I'm curious to read it.  It will probably go to the middle of my stack, as I have several other books I want to read first.

Speaking of reading lists, I just ordered Putin Country, and I think that one may have to jump the queue.  It is a clear-eyed look at contemporary Russia, particularly outside the metropolis of Moscow, and examines why people in Russia continue to support Putin, even if they don't particularly love him.  I've got a rather nuanced view of Putin myself, and am eager to read what Anne Garrels has to say.

~watching~

I'm watching Person of Interest's final season on cbs.com, and while I understand why the first two episodes of the season had to go the way they did, I felt like they didn't really settle into things until episode 3.  I wouldn't be bothered except the season only has 13 episodes, so I hope they make the most of the rest of the season!

I think I mentioned that I started back at the beginning of The Americans, whilst I wait for season 4 to hit prime on amazon.  I'm a couple of episodes into season 2 at the moment.  I remain fascinated by Philip and Elizabeth's strange relationship.  Since Blindspot is wrapping up for the summer, I'm probably going to start Outlander S2 soon.

In addition to my knitting, I've been doing a lot of puttering around the house this week--I finished (hopefully!) the last sewing project for my summer rotation and cleaned out the bathroom cabinets in both bathrooms, and reorganized and cleaned out the linen cabinet as well. (Our linen cabinet is this weird pentagonal shaped closet that is fitted into the ridiculously tiny landing just outside the 2nd floor bathroom.  It is difficult to store things in neatly because of the odd shape, and it just isn't very big.  We can't even get a proper door on it because the corner is so tight in relation to the bathroom door, so it has a curtain instead.  I mostly store towels that are not in use, cleaning supplies, and travel toiletries, but somehow it gets messy throughout the year.

I've also been trying to plan our summer; the kids are going to be home a lot more of it than we had originally planned, and so I'm scouting out craft supplies, looking into outings and day trips, making a daily schedule, trying to set up various therapies for the kids since we have so much more flexibility in the summer, etc.  I feel sort of overwhelmed already.  I mean, I know it will probably be fine once we get into it, but having the burden of all of it fall on me just feels like a lot.  Yes, I'll take some cheese with my whine.

I'm hoping to get back to running this summer, and want to pick up my Russian again.  I have a rather impressive stack of books to work through, and I want to do some more writing, both here and on some fiction projects I've had percolating for a while.  All in good time, I suppose.

Linking up with Ginny for Yarn Along!

Talking Tuesday: Piketty's Crumbs

Economist Tim Kane critiques so-called "inequality economists" like Thomas Picketty who argue that we are no better off than our forebearers of a century ago. Kane points out that this sort of neo-progressive thinking is ignorant at best, and willfully misleading at worst. 

“Three years ago, Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2013) made its author the most famous economist in the world. The book caused a sensation by highlighting rising income and wealth inequality in the United States and Europe, especially in its jarring claim that inequality is just as bad today as it was a hundred years ago. Piketty writes: ‘The poorer half of the population are as poor today as they were in the past, with barely 5 percent of total wealth in 2010, just as in 1910. Basically, all the middle class managed to get its hands on was a few crumbs.’

“These two sentences sum up a profound irony—the central contradiction of modern progressives. They do not believe in progress. A century ago, America’s first progressives believed very much in the power of their reforms. Theodore Roosevelt was proud to protect the environment. John Dewey was busy promoting universal education. Alice Paul was busy fighting for a woman’s right to vote. They succeeded. Today, neo-progressives would have us forget all that, and maybe it’s because economic hindsight is anything but clear.

“As a professional economist, I find myself haunted by Piketty’s book. After reflecting on the issue many, many times, attending conferences, and reading dozens of scholarly papers, I keep coming back to his disturbing comparison of our time to the year 1910. Why 1910? He could have picked 1960 or 1800, I suppose, but the year 1910 seemed to float in the back of the mind like a silent paradox. Have we nothing but crumbs to show for a century of capitalism?

“One way to value the progress enjoyed by everyday people is to imagine having to do without all of the material things we have that our ancestors lacked. How much money would you be willing to accept to give up indoor plumbing for a year? Having water on tap in every home in 2010 offers us no point of comparison to 1910. The current crisis of toxic tap water in Flint, Michigan has caused an uproar, but it’s in part a story that shows how much we take clean tap water for granted. Most homes have five or more taps between the kitchen, bathroom sinks, shower, and washing machine. The cost of tap water across the United States is roughly half a penny per gallon, which is surely far less than the actual value we get from it. But few homes in 1910 had any taps. Treating water with chlorine to cleanse it of toxins was first done in 1908.

“How much money would you demand to give up modern public goods such as highways or emergency fire and ambulance services? How much is air conditioning worth to you? What about penicillin? Entertainment of any kind that is not live? The ability to travel to Australia from Minneapolis in a day’s time for the price of five men’s suits? Recorded music, movies, and cable television? How much would you have to be paid to surrender the Internet for a month? No Facebook. No Netflix. No email. No Google searches. No Google Maps.

“These are Piketty's crumbs."

~Tim Kane, Piketty's Crumbs, Commentary Magazine, April 14, 2016

Read the whole thing.

The very fact that many of us sit in temperature controlled environments, sleeping in comfortable beds, with the leisure to read such things on tiny screens with vast computing power that we can carry around in our pockets proves Piketty wrong.  I'm not an apologist for capitalism--I think unfettered capitalism has very serious issues--but it does unquestionably bring about economic progress and a better quality of life overall.  Let us remember the past, and be wary of the tunnel logic and ahistoricism of our age.  We forget at our peril.