As you know, within the past year our house went from three to four and then back to three. I finished a this sweater as we were still four, and its christening coincided with a backpack in to Dogie’s favorite stick chasing lake to distribute some of his fur.

Wie ihr wisst, im letzten Jahr waren bei uns zu Hause erst drei, dann vier, und dann wieder drei Mitglieder des Haushalts. Als wir noch zu viert waren, habe ich eine Strickjacke gefertigt. Ihre Taufe traf mit einer Reise nach Dogies Lieblingsteich um ein bisschen seines Fells zu streuen zusammen.

The pattern was Peasy. Knit with Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool. My row gauge didn’t quite match the pattern, and I also wanted full-length sleeves. Oh, and the leaves needed lace at the cuffs to match the bodice.

Der Muster was Peasy. Der Garn, Elsebeth Lavolds Silky Wool. Ich habe die Ärmel länger gemacht, und mit Spitzenaufschlag wie am Leibchen.

And the Beer? Le Quatre from Red Rock

Und das Bier? Le Quatre bei Red Rock

It was Lizzie’s first time to Haystack. We got rained and hailed on, threw disk and went on hikes. I think she had a good time.

Es war das erste Mal bei Haystack Lake für Lizzie. Es regnete, und hagelte. Wir haben Frisbeescheibe gespielt und sind wandern gegangen. Ich schätzte, si hat Spaß gehabt.

Whenever we visited Haystack Lake, we’d stash a ‘good’ stick or two for the next visit. Dry sticks that would float well and were large enough, but not too large either. At the lake shore there was one in just the place we left one last year. The same one? Maybe, maybe not.

Jedes Mal als wir bei Haystack Lake waren, verstauten wir einen ‘guten’ Stock. Einen der trocken war, der git flössen wurde. Gross genug, aber auch nicht zu gross. Am Ufer des Teichs fanden wir genau so einen, genau dor wo wir einen letztes Jahr gestellt haben. Der Selbe? Vielleicht, vielleicht auch nicht. Egal.

So, the volvelles did not start out that way. Initially, the idea was for a series of prints each with a different type of treatment for certain ailments. As I worked on the treatment types: Common Western, Traditional Chinese, Self-Medication, etc., the idea of a volvelle came into my head. I was taking an advanced letterpress class at the time and was encouraged to give it a shot. Holy crapamoly, i had no idea what I was getting myself into.

My initial layout was done on paper, sketching and turning so that the eventual holes in the front of the piece would like up with different parts of the body, or ‘areas of malady’. The trick was that with 6 different treatment type stations, things had to be placed so that text would not overlap or be visible in another hole. It sounds simple, but with my layout, and my brain, it wasn’t.

After the first consult on my piece, I was encourage to make te volvelles larger – ending up with an 11.5″ (cm) disk. Somehow, this messed up my initial sketches and I spent way too much time in Illustrator repositioning everything and finalizing what the areas of malady would be. Eventually I wound up with a hole layout like this:

Which would result in reserved spaces for 6 alternate text blocks like this:

No overlaps!