My first spindle-plied yarn!

Here is my spindle work for today! I followed the instructions and photos in the Summer '07 issue of Spin-Off for Andean plying and plied my first yarn on a spindle. I'm such a geek to be so excited about it. I mean, after all, I'm embarrassed to admit I've amassed over 100 skeins of homespun yarn over the last few years...and it's not a business for me! But it's a new skill that was previously a mystery to me and there's something about unlocking a mystery, opening a door, whatever. I never thought I'd like those tiny skeins,preferring the large skeins you can get plying on a wheel, but it's so portable that I may become accustomed to it.






These are some Christmas gifts I knitted for friends. Small, pressure free little items. I love the instant gratification this sized project. The neck warmer and the tiny sweater only took 2 evenings apiece. But on other fronts, I've nearly finished my pink Notre Dame de Grace pullover and hope to finish that this evening.

Selecting the spinning for Tour de Fleece

...and it's a big decision!

I have been trying to organize my projects and make lists of what I hope to accomplish this summer. I'm about to make a startling disclosure: I have 12 quilt tops, 20 knitting projects and uncounted spinning projects in the works! Several of these are near completion, but my restlessness with the middle stages of a creative effort can not be appeased. About the time I get one third to one half way finished with something, I become disinterested and find either a new obsession or resort to another partially completed effort. I figure if I can channel my energies to the latter, I will be fine eventually. But this constant obsession with brand new projects must stop...yeah.

And that's why I'm planning to spin one pound of California red fleece this month for the Tour de Fleece. Here are the reasons for my choice:
1. It is washed so I can almost consider it an ongoing project
2. I have never spun this variety of fleece before and new is fun
3. It looks like it will process nicely and spin even more nicely into a springy yarn
4. It is manageable in the amount of time I have remaining as I am starting a couple of days late


So that's it, then. I have an appointment with my roving carder first thing tomorrow morning.

I am noticing something interesting about all of the organizing and listmaking I've been doing. Spinning seems to be exempt from it all. I wonder why that is? There seems to be no need to prioritize and itemize tasks remaining. I seem to always get back to spinning projects even without an end product in sight. My inclination is to say that my obsession is still running high with spinning; so high that nothing seems like a chore (slight exaggeration only - I don't love picking VM from some fleeces) from washing to fluffing to carding to spinning singles, dying, plying, washing again and skeining. The rewards inherent in adding lovely finished skeins to the already overflowing basket are enough to keep me creating. I wonder when I will be ready to part with any of it. Currently, I'm very attached to all of it!

Tomorrow I'll post pictures of the range of the coopworth yarns from the fleece I finished, the entire- if tiny -Jacob fleece I spun, and the first completed quilt top of the summer.

Thomas' new hat

Luckily, being sick on vacation had its benefits. I brought along a whole bunch of partially done knitting projects and actually managed to finish up a few. Here is an example. The boy is a work in progress, and what a work he is, but the hat is done! I used Paton's Classic Wool yarn, bamboo double points and only had to redo the decreases up the side once. I think the pattern is a mock rib - all knit on one side and knit one, purl one rib on the other. This late season storm has given Thomas an opportunity to wear it and the fit is great. What a boy!

Our new Siberian husky - Hunter

Isn't he beautiful? He's 4 1/2 years old and a very nice boy. We're all getting to know each other.

A whole "Turtle" fleece

This is the entire Jacob lamb fleece I bought at the Vermont Sheep and Wool Festival last fall. The sheep's name is Turtle. I plan to spin the colors separately and knit a round yoke sweater with sheep all around it. (Fiber Trends pattern) So far, I have one skein of the brightest, (I carded this with some angora, right), and one skein of medium colored, left. The remainder is the darkest colored and it is all carded and ready to be spun. It's a wonderful, soft fleece and I'm anxious to start knitting with it!

Currently, we're on vacation and I brought tons of knitting projects IP to finish during travel and downtime. What does it mean to spend more time selecting and packing knitting projects for vacation than clothing? And then blog about that rather than vacation? Hmmm...!

I love my secret spin to knit pal!

My most wonderful spin to knit pal send me a fabulous package from California which I received today. Hooray! And just in time for another portion of the ongoing reorganization of my stash.

Maia sent me an absolutely wonderful skein of chunky yarn, handspun and dyed from multi-colored rovings in just my favorite colors of mainly red and purple. And as if that wasn't enough, she also sent some wonderful hand dyed sock yarn. I bet it will be perfect for a pair of socks from the Fair Isling on Blue Moon book that I just bought. And roving - scrumptious merino and silk in the warm shades of a summer sunset, (rather hard to imagine right now as the snow falls yet again,) but this roving is sure helping. I think I will spindle spin it fine and knit a pair of socks with it.

And then there are non fiber treats! Soap, (handmade,) and chocolate. I hadn't had any Black and Green Organic chocolate before. I'm trying to savor it, but both kids and my husband are savoring it with me and you can probably guess what that means! How did Maia know I love almonds? At least there will be no competition for the soap. Ahh, how I love shea butter. We're still on high maintenance skin programs here in the frozen northern sections of New York state, in an effort to retain some moisture before the furnace dries it out totally. But I have a thing about wrapping. And this soap is so beautifully packaged, I'll have to enjoy it for a bit in its wrapped state before I can actually use it out of its tissue paper coating.

Thanks, Maia! I'm off to go play!

My only tolerance for cotton yarn

And on the knitting front, I just love these ballband dishcloths - both knitting and washing dishes with them. Quick and easy. Sadly, they fade with using, all the more reasong to start out with wild colors!

Coopworth just waiting to be spun!

Triple Berries

I have finished processing most of this coopworth fleece. I bought it as a stash buster from Amelia at the Bellwether. Loved its curls and washed it bucket by bucket full in the bathtub. It came out a pure white. I dyed roughly 1/3 in greens and yellows, 1/3 in berry colors (that's what you see here all carded and ready to continue spinning, and 1/3 is being handcarded slowly and spun. All finished yarn so far is wonderful if it isn't soft. I've finished the mixed berries in their yarn form, gifted one skein of it to a friend and still need to ply the greens. Of course, the plain white has a ways to go. Maybe I'll get to it over our winter break next month.

Update on the Fiber Front

I've been busy. Yesterday I was determined to complete the lace scarf I had started using shetland handspun yarn. I got the last design charted only to discover after starting to knit that I hadn't enough yarn. I did have a bit of grey shetland roving so I started to spin. I finished a small skein of yarn before the fireworks started last night; I guess I'm picking up a bit of speed as that's the fastest I've gone from roving to finished product ever! Of course I couldn't knit as the yarn was still drying after setting the twist...so what did I do? Why, I started another project!

This lovely Noro yarn has been calling out to me from a corner of my bedroom and saying it wanted to become a Bugga Bag. OK, I started to make the transition. And I restarted the Unbiased recycled purse from Knitty.com for good measure. This time I hope the directions are error free as my last nearly finished attempt at Unbiased had me swearing and ripping. I guess these projects seemed so quick to finish that they hardly count. Now if I could finish my pi shawl that quickly, I'd be jumping for joy. That's currently on hiatus.

Strangely enough, the counter on my antique yarn winder has started working again. I assume the humidity has made the wood swell just enough for the gear to catch the cog. I was surprised as I wound on to hear that powerful snap again. I thought I had broken it. I wonder if there's a way to keep the wood hydrated all year long.

And my last thrill of the evening is that I found an ad in the local paper for a local spinning guild that meets in my little town on Thursday mornings. I'm very excited to think I might break away this week and spin with some experienced folks. What fun!

The baby went to camp

How does this happen? The maturity of your children seems to grow only with startling leaps. One minute he is holding your hand as he crosses the street and planning to marry you when he grows up, the next he is telling you that you are embarrassing him in front of the counselor. And he's gone. Oh, I've been through this before and I know he'll be back, but we have our children with us for such a brief time. And even this youngest that started out as a 5 pound little bundle is taking his first strides toward independence. I'm grateful that he is reaching out eagerly to embrace it, even at the alarming age of 8. And let's enjoy the prospect of a week of dinners with no scatological humor!

On the fiber front, I swatched half the way to camp this afternoon only to find out the yarn was just too bulky for the pattern I was attempting. It's an ebay purchase, a melon colored wool and acrylic blend, apparently bulky in weight. So this evening I found the pattern I had originally intended for the yarn, a cardigan in Family Circle's Easy Sweaters. It will work up fast and the yarn was so incredibly inexpensive that I don't mind knitting it up to match my favorite sunflower t-shirt. Frivolous, you say? The defining adjective of fashion! The real reasonI started it? I needed a mindless knitting project for the summer meetings to come. Sanity is possible only with needles softly producing something lovely. I'm 8 1/2 inches up the back last count. Photos to follow when the new camera arrives.

The perfect summer day

Low humidity, low temperature, clear skies...how perfect! I even had to wear a sweatshirt to pull weeds in the garden this morning.

Thomas is off to camp tomorrow. He'll spend a week and is very excited about it. We got him all packed this afternoon and he spent some time watching the Live 8 concert with his sister. Don't get any ideas about things being too idyllic around here. Although I was able to spin some wool/angora fiber I bought at our local sheep festival ( Jefferson County Sheep Festival), there was the usual dissatisfaction with dinner and the ever present namecalling. We wonder about charging for each name called and at the end of the summer we can send the proceeds to Heifer Project International or another worthy cause. A quarter per name, maybe? This could have many positive effects, one of which might be to slow down the growth of the new puppy fund that Elizabeth is accumulating. Do we really need another chewing and peeing machine? The possibilities are endless.

I look forward to some car knitting time as we drive to camp tomorrow. I really need to finish one of the shawls I've been working on.

Strawberry Season in the North

This morning we started the day by picking 18 quarts of strawberries. And the smell of them has been following me around all day. There's a wonderful roadside stand that I pass every morning on the way to work. It's run by a young couple who have built a home and worked the surrounding sandy soil to produce the best fruits and vegetables in the area - all of this in just a few short years. I love to give them business and stop every chance I get. This morning it was u-pick strawberries.

There was a lovely breeze keeping away most bugs and the humidity hadn't joined us yet. The berries were small, but they still produced that thrill as you crawled around moving leaves and suddenly, there it was: a lovely clump of ruby red berries. And this thrill is chief in mind even after hulling 11 of those 18 quarts. Here's another reason to frequent this stand; we paid 12.00 for the 18 quarts. And with any purchase over 10.00, a handful of fresh basil was free. Yippee - pesto and strawberry shortcake for dinner. Yes, summer is finally here.

I did a great deal of plying on my Babe today and still have a lot to finish. That didn't stop me from carding another batch of the excellent Navajo-churro fleece from a sheep named CoCo I have and spinning that up. It's irresistable and I plan to ply 3 strands together when I finish this last bobbin. I haven't done that yet.

Still looking at digital cameras to replace my Mavica. (We're leaning toward a Kodak EasyShare. ) I'm anxious to post pictures here again.

Talk me out of buying this Hitchhiker!

Look at this sweet machine!
http://www.themerlintree.com/oops011.htm
I have an irrational desire to purchase one. This is in spite of the fact that loose change is a rare commodity and we're planning a costly trip this summer, and the fact that I already have more than one spinning wheel. I consider riding time lost spinning time and this will solve the problem. Plus it's so darn cute I can hardly resist! Lame, huh? My husband just rolls his eyes and he's usually quite tolerant of my obsessions.

OK, back to paper grading now. Maybe I'll forget all about it! Or not.

Thomas with his favorite bleeding hearts in the background. 

He told me he was looking for patterns in the water as it fell. Hmmmm. 

Thomas bailing. 

You gotta love this kid!

How many active 8 year old boys can entertain themselves with such simple things? We love this boy who can take a job (if it involves water, that is!) and turn it into a pleasurable activity. Thomas had decided to create his own mini pool - in Dad's canoe. All fine and dandy until Dad needed to dump the canoe to mow under it and found it too heavy to lift. Thomas, in his bathing suit, to the rescue. He started bailing and just had to dump water over his own head and look for patterns in the water as it fell to the ground. Check him out!

Lura fleece after a rotten day

One of my favorite things happened today. I came home to find a new fleece to spin ( packed in a Huggies box. Happily, we don't usually have those around here anymore.) I bought a lovely Jacob fleece from a lady in Oregon - mostly black with some white mixed in.

I'm now debating about how to spin - as variegated or as black and white yarns separately. I've tried to post my picture, but it is saved as a bitmap and Luddite that I am, I can't seem to get Hello to read it. Maybe another day when I'm not fatigued to the point of nausea.

Source of exhaustion? Being sick at heart. Today I learned something I should have known all along: that this leadership group I'm working with at school doesn't share the philosophy we've been working toward for the last 3 years. I'm sorely tempted to close my door, teach my way, and wash my hands of the whole affair. Luckily, it's the last quarter and I can get through 7 more weeks of the nightmare. Thirteen more years of it? That remains to be seen. And I can't rely on a daily fleece on my porch to sustain me!

Check this out. The yarn on top is the nicest I have spun...and it's made from the nastiest fleece I have purchased. We went to Ottawa to pick up the fleece and I must have washed it 4 times to remove the gross parts. Then I learned that it is possible to comb fine not so long fleece and my worries were over. The purple was made with the same fleece carded. Not bad, but not as nice as the white. I'm dyeing it shades of green for a friend to knit a scarf for her grown-up daughter. Double winner.