October 2012 spinning

My Rivendell socks are languishing. I think I am at mid heel flap on the first sock. Not sure why they are there. I think even with the change I tried of using larger needles at the cast on, they are still a little snug at the calf point they reach. I do need to finish the heel flap, turn it and then check to see how they hit on my leg. I may have to frog again, put it in time out and try with the larger needles longer. Sigh.

So after a few days of not working on anything, I went back to what was, spinning. I am trying to get spun up some superwash merino that I've had in my stash for over three years. I had Sara dye it up, I had hoped that she could come close to the BMFA red from the sock summit colorways. Can't find it on their web site, but Sara wasn't able to get it. It was two eight ounce bundles of superwash merino from Woodland Woolworks and a really great price. One bundle came out red-purple and the other red-blue.

I originally thought I would use it in my spinning for socks class and while I use a tiny bit there, when I came back to it, I decided to just spin each four ounce up on their own bobbin and ply them together.

Singles on the bobbins

I pulled out the bulky head for my Lendrum and used it to ply up the two bobbins. If they were that full as singles, no way was I going to get all eight ounces on to one of those bobbins!

All plied up!

Since the two four ounce bundles weren't similar in their dye jobs, there was no way to try to match them up  and I really didn't want to chain ply that much. So a barber pole skein with some matching up of colors.

Off the bobbin and in a skein

755 yards of light fingering weight superwash yarn

Close-up. Brandon thought it looked like a wine color, so that's its name. ;-)

I still have the blue-red to spin up and was given some Qiviut to spin for Carina. The blue-red first and then the fun stuff. ;-)

November Spinning

I was still using the Ashford Traditional, Miss Molly, to spin with. I really do enjoy spinning with her!  November planned spinning though was some 50/50 merino/silk that I had received from Morgaine with the purchase of my Lendrum, Miss Mabel.

This stuff was free because it had been bouncing around in boxes to many shows and handled and some slight felting had occurred. Just to spin it I had to get ruthless and shred it into strips. Then do some opening up of those strips to help pre-draft. Even with all of that the silk was hard on my right thumb. It helps pull out the fiber to be spun in the style I use for spinning.

So I was steadily making progress with it during the month, went from here at the beginning of the month:

 To this at the end of the month:

I decided that I'd give it a whirl with navajo plying so I could keep the color stripes intact. The silk had allowed me to get it really thin, so a three ply would still be a lace weight when done. The last time I had done some navajo plying I was still doing the chaining and then treadling it on to the bobbin. I'd watched Bobbie show Beth on our Black Friday Spinning so went for it. It worked! Found where the underspun spots were but it helped for moving the yarn up on the bobbin. I also plied it on Miss Mabel so it was a joint wheel effort. ;-)

Ended up with 409.5 yards of three ply lace weight yarn that I'm calling Summer Twilight Skies Yarn:

Close-up with a dime to give you an idea of how thin it is

Another close-up so you can see the color variation. Blues are so hard to photograph!

The whole skein. Not sure yet what I'll make out of this, but I'm sure I'll find the perfect pattern for it in Ravelry!

This is some Abstract Fiber dyed roving called "Blackberry". Its a 60/20/20 blend of Merino/Yak/Silk that I received as a thank you from Wendy for helping out her Knights celebration. Found out a few days later that it was the Knight chip that Intel had released. ;-)

I did have another roving from my stash that I planned to spin in December, but its undyed Perendale that isn't terribly exciting. I'll admit that I'm going to be shallow and throw it back into the bin and start spinning this lovely stuff. 4 ounces of December Joy! Wouldn't you? ;-)

I have next year's spinning all planned out. If you're a Ravelry member you can check it out here.  Its at the top of the list and number for the month it will be spun (hopefully). I still have some stuff that's been in the stash for a while and it will get spun, just might take a little longer. ;-) There's at least another year's worth of fiber to be spun up and I'm sure it will continue to grow.

Looking back through the stash of stuff to be spun, there are a lot of undyed fibers in there. Think some natural dying and some acid dyes might have to be played with over the next year or two. With the acid dyes, I think something beyond Kool-Aid should be the way to go. I also need a drum carder. There's a lot of uncarded fiber in my stash that will have to be run through one before it gets spun up. The Gotland doesn't count because I plan just to flick the ends open and spin from the locks.

How is your spinning coming along? Neglected fiber? Stuff you bought but now don't love? What do you do with it? I have some in my Trade folder but no nibbles so far, so it went in the list for spinning next year.

I tried it out

With the last post I showed that I had some yarns soaking in alum and cream of tartar getting ready to try out a natural dye bath of black beans. So as a refresher - a single of polworth, three ply of polworth, merino two ply and a two ply of merino-alpaca-silk. I put in two bags of black beans in a couple of pots and while the yarns were in the mordant, they soaked overnight.

The next morning I wrung out the water and transferred them to the bean pots:

Just added to the crock

Just added to the pot

After 24 hours

After 24 hours

After 48 hours all in one big pot

After 5 days

Kind of a blue-grey

Out in true lighting - very grey

So with the less than impressive results, I decided I'd do a Kool-Aid dye bath. Two packages of Blue Raspberry and one of Lemon-lime all into a Pyrex measuring cup (I have a HUGE one) but the green really popped as the dominant color. So I pulled out some Wilton icing dye and added in a dollop or two of blue. Stirred and popped the yarns into the cup and heated. As you can see below, they all took the colors differently. Fascinating really. ;-)

Left to right - three ply Polworth, merino-alpaca-silk, merino, and polworth single.

I am going to try dyeing again with the black beans. Next time I'll only use the alum to mordant and I'm going to try using vinegar after it comes out of the pot. I also think I could get away with just letting it soak for two full days.

Over 200?!

My Ravelry stash has gone over the 200 items mark. Luckily I think this also includes handspun items and I think its numbers are not totally accurate. Why do I say that? Cause whenever I click on the 'handspun' tab in my stash it always shows stuff that I've used up/gifted/traded in the pics displayed.

Does this mean that I added stuff this afternoon and why I know I just ticked over into 201 items showing? Ummm, yes, it does. ;-)

I was going to get the lovely Crimson from Sharon tonight, but she came to spinning and hung out and knitted on a pretty orange sweater and brought in her worsted weight yarns. I saw Cinnamon that was not shown to its best in the dim lighting of Haggen's last week. It's a pretty red-brown. It just looked so 'manly' and since its intended for a scarf for my dad, will work out really well. Still loved the looks of Crimson and if the budget allowed, totally would be scoring a skein or two of it also.

Here's Cinnamon:

The awesome Gail is also sharing 1/2 of her 1/2 pound of Louet Cultivated Silk Top she scored at SOAR. I plan to blend it with the black llama that is coming from Brenda in Mississippi. Since Angela and Tammy both will want to use the drum carder with their washed alpaca (Tammy you are going to wash yours soon right? ;->), when we rent it from Susan again I'll run it through then.

I spun up one ounce of the Louet Garnet that Gail gave me last week. It's really nice to spin up and I have my fingers crossed that there will be enough for a cowl.

I haven't forgotten its Veteran's Day. Thoughts of various family members who have served in World War 2, Viet Nam and during times of 'peace' in the Navy, Army, National Guard and a classmate of William's is going through advanced training with the Marines.

Yarn Monday

I love these!

I have been working on Bailey's Fairy Wings. They are all knitted. Then I read ahead and I had to crochet on the funky border. Then I re-looked at that funky border and I had done mine wrong. Not a problem, undid the cast off and tinked back ten rows and un-cast off twenty-five stitches and fixed both wings. Hey, if I'm going to do it wrong, why not to both? Once fixed I started the crochet portion of the wings. They use crochet to give an edge and condense down the number of stitches, giving a 'wing' look to them - use your imagination!

Currently still soaking in the sink are the wings. I need to get them out and block them. I have one wrist band crocheted and will do the other. The back and ties are also supposed to be crocheted and then sewn to the wings. I'm trying to decide if there's a way to combine those two steps. I'm sure there is, or I'll make one might be a better way of saying it. ;-)

I did a little spinning over the weekend. I spun up the single Abstract Fiber, think its Shady Glen, minus the black, 1 ounce bump I had from the Summer of Spinning prize package:

It rested overnight and then I took the time to chain play it into this:

I have 67 yards of it to play with. Not sure what it might become, but it sure is pretty!

Also in the mail is a skein of yarn that I traded my Knitters Without Borders sock yarn I'd gotten at the Yarn Harlot book signing. I wasn't really in love with the color combination together. So it had been languishing in my 'Trade/Sell' area. Sara contacted me from New Jersey and asked about selling it. I took a look at her stash and saw that she had something that might work as a trade. So that's what we did!

I now have Ellie a pretty dark reds and dark orange thick and thin yarn that I think might work out nicely in the Diamonds and Pearls Shawl that I've been wanting to make. Shelia is the designer. I'll show her the yarn on Wednesday at spinning and see what she thinks of it as a yarn possibility.

Well those wings won't block themselves so off I go!

Book Signing & WIPs & a yarn

Which order to go in? ...........ok

I arrived at the book signing at 6:30pm and was surprised to see over half of the seats filled. Last year when she was there I think there was a modest 15 people. That has clearly changed! So I didn't get a seat as close as I would have liked, and the only end seat was on the outside (aisle is best, you know for getting into the actual signing line).

Patty opted not to do a repeat of last year and attempt to sit on the stool provided especially since she's had back surgery since then. There was a twenty minute reading and then she moved into the Q&A portion. We learned that there are three more books for this series and at least two for the other that ties into this one. Yea!

Powell's opted to do the free-for-all get in line method that they hadn't been using for a lot of the book signings I've been to over the last couple years. Usually there's the orderly 'get in line by row'. If they had gone that route I would have missed chatting with Honor while we waited to get our books signed.

Honor was there to get books signed for a friend who lives in Florida and couldn't wait until Patty is there in October for them to be signed. Nice friend! Turns out that Honor has in the past tatted and been involved with SCA. While a child there was few years spent living in Australia where the neighbor taught her mother how to shear sheep and then spin and knit so she had a sheep to sweater that as she said had tons of lanolin still. Mom is getting up in years and no longer spins but still has some of those fleece. I didn't ask after them because honestly I'd be afraid of them this many years old. Honor had walked from MAX and when I found out she lived by the Quatama stop I offered to give her a ride, which she gratefully accepted.

Book signing photos:
blurry because she kept moving!


While at the book signing I completed half of the pink crane and started and finished the yellow crane:
These were fascinating to the five year old little boy sitting in front of me once he noticed that I was knitting. Little carrot top with big brown eyes. He informed me that he was knitting a cat but that it only involved 10 stitches. He asked how many I was working with. ;^)

Since I'd used up both of the crane yarns that I came with and still had plenty of time to spend doing something productive, I cast on the Salmon Dave Sunset Highway Scarf: Yarn is Stitchjones dyepot worsted in the Salmon Dave colorway and the pattern is Kathleen Fajardo's Sunset Highway Scarf. I have spun up Sharon's rovings but this is the first time using one of her yarns. It is delightfully soft and nice to work with. I'm looking forward to using the other two and getting more of her yarns in the future!

Last but not least is the second Abstract Fibers sample yarn I have done, her BFL in Shady Glade colorway. I opted to n-ply it just to see the colors stay the way they were. Definitely get less yardage with this method and I think I got about 31 yards.

Tuesday Tidbit

I plied the hydrangea roving and have started on the Shady Glade BFL sample. Here's the finished Hydrangea Yarn:

The single above and then I N-plied it for the following:


Approximately 23 yards of light fingering weight yarn. I'm thinking it should make a nice coffee cozy.

I've put lots of inches on the One Row Karma Scarf. I may be able to finish it later tonight. I still need to do some work on the baby alpaca so we'll see. (Would like to comb it with the mini combs or the dog combs whichever feels best.) I had used the dog combs to comb out the Shady Glade similar to the previously combed Hydrangea. There's a full ounce of it so I'm planning to do two singles and then ply together. Though I do like the color block results from n-plying the Hydrangea....tough decisions to make. First that alpaca.....

Forgot...

I forgot to say what I was totally thrilled to see by Lisa's roving - its already separated into what must be 2 oz braids. I don't have a working scale right now so I've been doing it by luck and have come fairly close. This will totally make it easier to spin each of them up on their own spindles before plying.

Stab needles in it, it's done!

After plying for three days. Not all day silly. Karma Chameleon is all done and ready for debut starting from this:


Spinning for a several days to get these:


I really should have remembered to take a picture while plying it.....


The drop spindles that got me here:
The one that looks like its carved on top has been my plying spindle. The purple glass with the gold in it is the one I started out with Karma.

I'm being tempted by this:


But I have started work on Block 20 of the Cascade Lizard Ridge afghan. I'll finish that today, if I ever get away from the computer long enough not to be taking photographs and editing them, or reading forum posts, or writing posts (you get the idea). Then it will just be laying out the blocks and deciding which order they'll be in. Brandon will help out with that part.

So now to try to get away from the computer...... ;^)

Last Day Tour de Fleece and Beyond.....

Sunday I spent the greater portion of the day spinning trying to get Karma Chameleon done. Here is what I ended up with by the end of the day:


Submissions close on Friday for Challenge Day and currently we are doing pretty good vote wise. I hope this next week of voting just continues to help improve our odds on winning. Is that awful of me that I'd like to win something?

Along the way movies were watched along with episodes of Stargate SG-1 season 1. Just a couple more of those left and then it's on to season 2.

I couldn't resist finishing up the Basket Rib Hand Towel:


I also couldn't resist trying out Deep Blue Sea and seeing how it knits up, the background doesn't help the colors:
This is one chart of the Sinuate pattern by Marnie Maclean. I've added another repeat and blocked it to see how it is. I think I'll keep going.

We had little visitors to the pond that I don't recognize. I'm wondering if one of their relatives was an escaped parakeet: Do you have a name for them?

Drop spindling is time intensive. It wasn't until Wednesday afternoon that I finished up all the roving into singles:

I then started plying them and even took them to the Wednesday night Sip n' Stitch at Hagen's and continued plying there. I was able to also show Judy and Mac what it looked like.

It's now Thursday and I plan on taking it with me to Insomnia for the Thursday group to hopefully finally get it finished up. I made one of my shoe boxes into a Lazy Kate and it seems to be working much better than the last plying session. I have Brandon tasked with making a drop spindle lazy Kate. He's working on it. The ladies at school are eager to see the finished yarn and what kind of project it can be made in to, so no pressure or anything. Summer school is done this next Thursday so I'll have to find a project for it also and at least start it so I can show why handspinning can be fun.

The rain and clouds were nice earlier in the week. Now we're back into sunny weather and warm, hopefully not too warm again!

School wise things were much better this week. My student likes the computer time-walk schedule that we have going and was even really happy and holding my arm several times today. Hopefully we can end the summer on a positive note.

Stage 19 & 20 and Challenge Day Prize

Stage 19 - Friday - I did an hour of spinning in the morning with Karma and then Will and I ran his errands. After dinner was made, homemade chili and cornbread, and eaten, and while watching Juno I spun for another two hours.

Stage 20 - Saturday - Time Trial - I got up and started spinning after doing the dishes. Spun for a couple of hours, got caught up on reading and also posting Deep Blue Sea in the Challenge Day Prize Contest in the Tour de Fleece 2008. The link is good if you're a Ravelry member. The contest ends on August 1st so I'll have a long wait to find out if we are good enough to win. Heck it was just cool to be able to enter, you had to have a completed yarn done.

I've spent another three hours spinning on Karma Chameleon while watching TV. I've only gotten two more blocks blocked today. Lots of cloud coverage and just a little bit of a breeze. The second one took hours longer than the first that had more sun. I'll wait to put out block 19 until tomorrow with hopes of more sunshine. Since this is a Time Trial day, I'm going to try for a few more hours tonight spinning. The left thumb is still feeling sore but I'm learning to hold it in a different position.

Another break to get dinner started, homemade chicken enchiladas, and starting some mustard. Yup, you read correctly, mustard. I made homemade mustards for Christmas last year, and they turned out well. I have some mustard seeds left and so I started two batches.

One is a German based one - dark beer is part of it. I did have a dark beer in the refrigerator, but it's Belgian and Raspberry flavored. I think it will still work. ;^) The other is kind of French, since it has sherry. Again, I didn't have sherry on hand, but I did have some Spanish sherry, Marsala. The seeds have to soak in the liquids for 48 hours and soften up as well as soak up the liquids goodness. Then they are blended with some additional seasonings and called good. You can use them immediately, but like other things, often taste better if allowed to age for a week or more.

I still have 27 Dresses and Atonement DVDs to watch, not sure though that the boys will be willing to join in though. The boys are currently playing D&D out in the garage. Something about more space, but there is a distinct lack of air conditioning.

Sometime tomorrow I need to get out into the garage. Brandon on Friday put legs on to my desktop. I now need to stain the legs and then put the sealant on. I'm going to add more to the desktop because I'm not happy with how it's not keeping the dust repelled. This I think will put us closer to rearranging the rooms where the computers are and my sewing/craft stuff.

Stage 17 finished plying, Stage 18 back to Karma

So Wednesday was a good day in many ways. I had a good day with my autistic student as school - yea! I also finished plying up the BFL and then with Brandon's help getting it off the spindle and on to the swift so that it could be wrapped for a wash set of the twist.

I just got that all done when it was time to head out for a busy evening. First stop was LaHaie's to pick up Will's lettermen's jacket. He'd gotten at the end of the year the wrestling patches and then also adding in his track patch. So the jacket is complete for his athletic career. From there it was a quick stop at the library to drop off movies and pick up books and then on to Judy's to drop off Brandon. I then headed over to the Jo-Ann Superstore so that I could pick up supplies to send off to my Dishcloth Swap Giftee. A quick swing through KFC for a few snackers and cole slaw and I headed over to Hagen's to meet up with the Sip n' Stitch ladies. I worked more on my Basket Rib Hand Towel as a nice easy not to mess up while talking and listening project.

I also finally have photos of what I received in the Dishcloth Swap Exchange:


Thursday I picked up my Karma Chameleon spindle along with some KC roving and took it to school to show one of the ladies there. She works in the Transitions Program through the district and from what I described to her thought it might be something that some of the kids might be able to do. So I gave her a demonstration, then ended up giving another demonstration again later to a few more co-workers. One lady was amazed when I told her that I had knitted the socks that I was wearing that day.

I came home at lunch and then finally got the BFL in a wash, swish out moisture then set it up to hang dry outside. There was just a faint tinge of blue to the water. I also set another block of the CLR out to dry/block. Down to just four left to do and the blocking will be caught up. I just need to finish the last couple of blocks this weekend. I spent a bit of time spinning more Karma too.

I snipped some fresh lavender for the Insomnia ladies and then headed over. We had a nice chatty session of knitting, beverages and discussions. Tammy had brought The Eclectic Sole and Little Box of Socks. Must have both of them! The 'box of socks' is cool. It really is a box that has the socks on card stock and one for each sock design. There are twenty designs so at just under $20 a really good deal, a great deal if you order through Amazon at the lower rate too.

I came home and rotated the BFL for drying in the sun to get all of it dry. Brought in the one block and setup another to start drying. I found out this morning that I forgot about it and left it outside over night. Thankfully no bird poop was found on it this morning. I did bring the BFL in and since it was still damp, popped it back on my swift to finish drying overnight.

It's all done and I introduce to you, Deep Blue Sea:


I scored last night at the library and picked up four movies: Sweeney Todd (boys liked it, me not so much, thankfully I could spin through a greater portion of the movie), Atonement, 27 Dresses and Juno. I've now spent the morning on sleeping in, photos, catching up on the blog. Still need to do banking, shopping, mailing my exchange package (after I photograph it all), drop off stuff at the library and I think a trip out to the financial aid office at PCC. We'll also most likely watch Juno tonight. I'm also going to try to get the rest of the CLR's blocked today.

Stage 16 plying

Okay, I finally figured out that my days weren't coming out correctly. I was seeing Star start out with days, then somewhere switched to stages and I got mixed up on the count. Today really is day 18 but stage 16. I think because of those 2 rest days?

I finished spinning up the BFL earlier. Took a little break then got them both off of their spindles, after of course taking pictures of them. I have them on little cardboard tubes but couldn't find planter pots to help out with the plying.

I think I have about half of it plied. I can definitely tell the different spindles. My first one has more thick and thins than the second one does. I was much more consistent with keeping the spin thin. I hope to get it all plied up tomorrow. Not as fast as I had hoped.

The new spindle has awesome spin! Lot less work than the other two donuts. I'm definitely going to use it for Hydrangea. If I weren't thinking of plying it on itself, I'd also use it for Karma.

No knitting and no blocking. We've had overcast skies today and I got so caught up in the plying setup and then the actual plying that is all I've done today. Which also means that while I took some pictures, I haven't taken them off of the camera.

Tomorrow night, Wednesday I'll take Brandon over to his mom's for socializing and I'll head over to Hagen's for my knit socializing.

Finished up Small Favor late last night. That last 50 pages where the author sucks you in wrapping things up and you can't put the book down syndrome. I'd hoped to get to the library this afternoon to pick up books waiting there, but as mentioned above plying happened. ;^)

Domestic Goddess & Day 14

Today has been busy and productive, all without leaving the house. ;^) A blog post in progress throughout the day:

Get up, wash dishes, see that the potatoes really need to be used up before they go bad. Only three left so add those and eggs to a pot of water to boil away for potato salad. Decide that I'm on a roll so make pancakes for breakfast. More dish washing.

Have towels that need to be washed so check the drier, those clothes aren't ready yet, so start another wash load. Since sink is now clean and empty grab one of the Cascade Lizard Ridge blocks and get it wet so it can be blocked. Pull out the fabric pad that I got for quilting and using the mini-iron that has handy grid lines on it to block the block. Set outside to sun/air dry. Please don't tell me this is bad for the yarn!



Grab camera and take pictures of some of the backyard, the dried first block, and the finished BFL from last night. Come back in and make up the potato salad and a pastrami sandwich. Get second block blocking.



Brandon had dropped a piece of wood on his foot Thursday. Doesn't think anything is broken. That night has a lovely bruise from where it hit that he does ice a bit. Spends Friday outside doing stuff around the yard and more time upright on the foot than he should have. Today, instead of gaming with Luke and Will, he's got his foot finally elevated and icing (RICE - Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation). He'd been using his shoe for the compression, but totally skipping all the rest until I strongly suggested that he do that. Foot looks worse with the bruising around it that probably came from being on it yesterday. Men!

Since he's not gaming I'll watch some shows with him and spin. The boys are on the xbox gaming until their 4:10pm showing of Wall-e. Off to eat that sandwich....

A few hours later....I've done more dishes, the second block is done drying and I have a third one drying. I've divided up the BFL into eight little bundles and have spun up two and started a third. Good progress there.

ETA: sorry, the photo that was here was deleted to make space on Flickr, I refuse to pay for the Pro service when I'm already paying for a web site....

Put on my landscaping hat, really clippers, and finished up the bushes in the front yard and moved into the backyard. Trimming up berry bushes: blueberry, honeyberry and gooseberry, as well as the grape vines that were running rampant. Speaking of rampant vines the hardy kiwi was also running amok so trimmed it back as best I could. When Will mows the lawn tomorrow he'll mulch all that into the grass.

The CLR blocks are blocking out at 10"x15" so a little longer and narrower than gauge. Well the three so far, and since they lay like the others, I imagine they all will block this way.

I've heated up the leftover Papa Murphy Chicago Stuffed Pizza for dinner, off to eat that and continue spending time with Brandon and spinning the BFL. The boys are back from the movie and in painting their figurines.

Not a bad day.