We have finally managed to resurrect a nice old personal tradition... one that has (sort of) a long (not personal) history before it became almost extinct.

Back in those days long before radio, TV and computers were there to spend the evenings with, but spinning was still a necessity for every rural household, there was a German tradition called "Rockenstube" or "Spinnstube" (literally: "distaff parlour" or "spinning parlour"). These were more or less regular meetings where women (including young women, of course) would get together to spin and chat. As helpers with the chat and other amusements (yes, all kinds) the young men of the community would come along to chat, sing, and do whatever else young people of differing sex might do on an evening that might, in some cases, have drifted off more towards the "party and amusement" thing than to a productive evening of spinning.

As a result of these drifts, Rockenstuben were banned in some regions of Germany, and later, the need for such spinning get-togethers got smaller and smaller until they died out completely. But the basic fact that once was the reason for Rockenstuben still rings true: It is much more fun to do crafty chores in good company than on your own at home.

Which is why, years ago, we introduced the "Hutzenabend" into our lives - "Hutzenabend" being another word for "evening where you get together to do crafty things in company" but less spinning-centred. In our case, we fixed one evening per week and told our crafting friends that that would be the evening where we would sit down and work on our projects, and they were very welcome to join us. I always loved those get-togethers, but after they had run successfully for a while, less and less people came, and finally, we were mostly alone on those evenings - jobs took too much time, folks moved away, other things in life got into the way, and for a while, we had no Hutzenabend anymore. But now, in the new home, we have gone off to a very glorious start with the first one - and I sure hope that our reborn tradition will continue strong from now on!

My normal life style does not include lots of reading or listening to the news, but even if you don't try to catch news every day, the big issues sooner or later still come up somewhere. Like the Haiti earthquake.
To help with relief in Haiti, the Yarn Harlot has put up the knit signal (like the bat signal, but with more yarn) and asks for donations to MSF (Médecins sans Frontières, which means Doctors Without Borders).

MSF has been doing great work all over the world for many years, and I personally think that they are one of the best humanitarian organisations to give money to - because besides other reasons, very very little of the donations does go into the overhead, and most goes to where it is needed. So if you have a little money left over, consider giving them a bit - and if you need a better pro-donation pep talk, read Stephanie the Yarn Harlot's blog.

I have safely made it through the text part of the thesis, and now I'm facing the ever-exciting catalogue part. (I've been dreading this a bit, to be honest.)

So I'm creeping along (it feels), and when I don't feel like reading any more and need a break, I'm trying to tackle the rest of the unpacked boxes here. Bit by bit, all the things that got somehow forgotten during the move are now also creeping up on my brain again and remind me of stuff that needs to be done, needs to be done quite urgently and has been needing to be done for ages (or so it seems). So in addition to reading and unpacking/sorting, I'm trying not to feel too overwhelmed.

Well. At least I won't get bored...

I am slowly but steadily reading and correcting my way through the book. As always, there are passages where nothing is amiss and then a bit where things come in groups, which is keeping the proofing work more or less interesting. I'm almost through the text part now and I hope I won't find a real bad blunder on that last stretch; and afterwards, it's onward to the catalogue, where I'll meet (and read) all those dear garments from all over Europe again. I'm almost half-way, page number-wise, and there are more pictures in the catalogue part, but still I'm in for many more pages (and probably quite a few rounds on the hat during the reading breaks).

Meanwhile, I have a link to share: I have come across the Antique Pattern Library, a page where you can find pdf files of scanned old needlework books. Whether you are looking for crocheting, tattting, knitting or filet patterns, that is a place where you will find something. There's even the reprint of a 1527 Modelbuch (pattern book) with pattern strips for embroidery - and lots more from the late 19th and early 20th century. If you have a thing for old patterns or instructions, that is definitely an online library to check out.

As today's blog entry title hints, I'm wondering what on earth rode me to write that much for my thesis. And from this, you can guess what I'm working on now... no, not a second thesis (thankfully), not even a second book (though I'm tempted to start all that craziness again, I really am), but plain, ol'-fashioned proofreading.

Now, proofreading one's own writing is, as anybody will probably tell you, not easy - because usually you know your own text so well that you just don't see the mistakes anymore. When I try to proof a fresh text of mine, I have an even worse symptom: My brain just switches off after the first words (if the text is really fresh) or sentences (if it has already hung for a while). So I have now discovered one big advantage of the fact that publishing processes are looong processes - I can actually read my thesis again without the brain-shutdown!

On the flip side, though, that also means that I can now read my thesis again and find all those nasty mistakes, unpolished sentences and slightly unconnected paragraphs. And there's lots and lots of text in that book - but I can only read for a finite time before my attention does slag somehow.

And that in turn means that I'm currently getting a lot of knitting done - because I read some, then have a short relaxing break knitting a bit, then I read some more, then I knit a little again, then I read some more... you get the picture. You will get a picture of the knitting one of the next days, too - but for now please excuse me. I have some reading (and knitting) to do.

This year, there's proper winter weather in our spot of Germany - lots of snow, covering everything with a generous layer of white. There's so much snow that some even stays on the streets, which is quite unusual.

In spite of all the snow and the occasional icy patch, we are still using the bicycles to go anywhere in the city. It's fast (well, we go a little slower in the snow, of course), it's quiet, it's green, the bicycle always starts, and there's never a problem with parking space. Those bikes that we use during the winter get their tires changed in late autumn or beginning of winter - as soon as the conditions hint to possible ice on the roads - and then we merrily cycle through winter on spike studded tires. And these are really wonderful!

If you would like to ride a bike in winter, but don't dare to because of slippery roads, give these a try. Yes, they are rather loud on free road surfaces, but on snow or ice they have wonderful grip and make cycling so much safer. I used to have at least one fall each winter season, where a patch of ice turned up somewhere unexpectedly in a corner, but since we have the winter tires? None anymore. And this year, the tires are especially good to have, with these lots of snow around.

Somehow I have the feeling that blogging has gotten a little unhinged with all the gaps and holidays during the last weeks - I can't really remember any red thread running through the last time (except those off-blog), there's not much interesting going on here work-wise because I'm still in the taking-things-back-out-of-boxes phase. Well, there are two interesting things going on: Thing number one, we now have bought enough additional shelves that I can take the rest of my books (the work-related books!) out of their boxes and start the process of arranging things on the shelf space, and thing number two, I'm reading the first proof of the thesis-going-book. Nothing spectacular that is good to make a juicy blog post about, though!

But meanwhile, I have received a lot of interesting info bits in the mail or found it on the net.

So, in the hopes of getting back on track with things, here's an info dump...

There will be an international conference and exhibition about natural dyes in France, 2011: the conference webpage.

In March 2009, I gave a little interview for one issue of Huscarl On Air, the radio show from Huscarl, which is a forum and online magazine for the living history scene in Austria. The whole radio show is in German, but if you can understand spoken German, the podcast of this issue has recently been uploaded, and you can get it here.

There is a new database for radiocarbon-dated textiles, hosted by University of Bonn: "An on-line database for 14C-dated textiles (from early times until the end of 1rst millennium AD) is about to be finished. It is undertaken by the Dept. of Christian Archaeology of Bonn university
(Sabine Schrenk [responsible], Frank Albert, Anne-Sophie Lüttge; programmed by Eberhard and
Jan Orzekowsky), in collaboration with the KIK IRPA in Brussels (Mark van Strydonck). "
The makers of the database are actively soliciting data for their project. The database (and all relevant contact info, including a form to get your museum's data into the database) can be found at www.textile-dates.info. I think such a database is an absolutely wonderful idea!

And a last personal aside, I have finally caved and subscribed to Ravelry (because it irked me much too much that I would find patterns or photos referenced, but could not take a look at them). If you want to find me there, I go under the moniker "katrinknits" (yes, I know, very imaginative).