Spinning my way through May

I have a couple of hats that are done, but haven't photographed them. One of them still needs the ends woven in and a nice soak and block. Not sure why I haven't gotten that done. Then again, I haven't had the knitting bug much, which is really bad because I have a project I need to get done for Knitted Wit! Delaying that a bit has been good because there was errata posted and then last week at knit night, Cindy started one and used Judy Becker's suggested of JMCO with the mod she has for it. So mental knitting, if not physical has been going on so it should work up quickly when I do get it started. I finally finished up the Quince Blossom fiber that I had gotten from Stitchjones two years ago. She has it labeled as a merino/tencel. It was kind of sticky, so unlike tencel, that I wonder if it might have been silk? My 5.6 ounces spun out to a two-ply lace weight with 1055.2 yards:

Almost three years ago I picked up some Finn from Crown Mountain Farms at Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival. It was a lovely white that I knew I would ask someone to dye for me. Trish of Rogue Adventures had been dyeing some colors that I really liked, so I asked her to dye them. One four ounce bundle came out muted and the other the more vibrant colors I had hoped for. I started out with the muted four ounces and spun it up in three days. So much easier than the merino/tencel!

I just need to spin up the second four ounces, I'm really looking forward to spinning it up -

I'm going back and forth on whether to chain ply them as either one or two skeins, or do them as a two ply and have the barber pole. I'm not a huge fan of the barber pole, so most likely will go with the first. At Faire in the Grove I took my Ashford Traditional and spun for half the day on Sunday. I took along some Romney-Perendale that I've had in my stash also for three years. Starting to see a theme here - I'm stash busting! ;-) It's a natural brownish colored fiber that I'm just letting spin as it wants. The traddy has a lower ratio than the Lendrum so I have to make sure I get enough twist that it will hold together, and I'm not really trying for a thin yarn. I have a nice start on the bobbin, but I have eight ounces of this to spin up. We have another event this upcoming weekend, June Faire, that I plan to take the traddy along and spin at. So might get it all spun up.

Spring Snow and Spinning

We have had snow in the area lately, but I've been fighting a cold this week and so missed any left on the ground early in the morning. The first day of spring was Tuesday, and this started Wednesday night and lasted into late morning on Thursday:

My Dogwood Wednesday night

Lovely bench to sit under the maple tree and enjoy the dogs and yard

Leeloo checking out the white stuff on the patio

Norbert all scruffy and looking red

Brandon's wind sculpture

Asian Pear with its leaf buds covered in snow

Pacific Maple leaf buds looking almost like pussy willows with the snow

I just liked the looks of the gray and snow and the branches 

I got a text from my sister, Tanya, then a phone call later that day on Monday that my Grandma Eileen had died in her sleep. She was 89 and had late diagnosed ALS and her lungs just gave out. I'm grateful that we got to spend time with her this last Christmas. She enjoyed talking with me about my spinning and knitting. She had made all the ladies a pair of shortie fingered gloves with the mitten flap, without a pattern a couple years ago for Christmas. I also have a little boy and girl that she did in pettit point along with a pin and a couple of quilts that she made. She was a lovely lady and will be missed by her friends and family.

Tuesday I started spinning the rest of the Opulent Fibers samples from the World Wide Spin in Public last year. I was spinning them on the Ashford Traditional. The Light brown on the right I did all but a smidge during the demo last month at the middle school. So I flowed right into the medium brown and then the dark brown.  

The pygora, far left below, I had been working on in January and February and into March on the Lendrum. I had also been fighting it the whole time. While nice and soft, it still had guard hair and a surprisingly large amount of vegetable matter for it to have been cleaned and carded. I decided that I just couldn't keep going on, so finished what I had cleaned and then put the rest up for trade or sale on Ravelry. The bag weighed in at 2.3 ounces on my scale. 

I got them all plied up and then washed them this morning and let them dry in the sun this afternoon:

Left to Right:
Pygora: 1.2 ounces, 188.5 yards, lace weight
Dark Brown Merino: .52 ounces, 95.33 yards, lace weight
Medium Brown Merino: .46 ounces, 104 yards, lace weight
Light Brown Merino: .38 ounces, 73.66 yards, lace weight

I'm also navajo plying some black pygora that Gail spun up. She asked if I would do it, since she says I'm better than she is at doing the process. Not sure about that, but she asked and I couldn't say no. ;-) So after all these dark colors, I'm definitely going to have to spin some brighter colors!

I also have a plan for my knitting and all those 12 groups. Not going to share what it is here for fear of jinxing the start. I have a bit more spinning before I jump into the plan. It might become obvious though in the near future. Let me know if you figure it out. ;-)

Beach Fiber Weekend

Friday afternoon I picked up Tammy and Sara and we headed towards the beach. While on the way I discovered that neither of them had actually been to Woodland Woolworks and since we were going to be going through Carlton, we had to stop! We technically arrived after closing, but the door was still unlocked and the open sign out. We went on in and started checking things out. Ran into one of the lovely employees there that said she'd have to kick us out at 4:45. Tammy found a skein of yarn to be able to put buttons on her Central Park Hoody. I found out that someone else had beat me to trying to put the New Zealand castle wheel on layaway. Wasn't meant to be!

We arrived at the beach house and met up with Shelia and Duffy. In short order we were all settled in and awaiting the enchilada dinner that Sara prepared for us all, along with the Spanish Rice Tammy made. After dinner it was a relaxing evening of knitting, chatting and some TV viewing.

Saturday we were up bright and early and enjoyed some coffee cake that Shelia brought for us to enjoy.  We then drove the half an hour further south to the spin-in at the Newport High School. We arrived early so that we were assured of parking and so we could pick out our seats. ;-) Robyn, we spin with her on Wednesdays, was there selling some of her handknits/crochet items along with a friend of hers that does handdyed fiber. Stitchjones, aka Sharon, was also there, so lots of familiar faces for us.

Our $4 entry fee, covered I'm sure the building rental, but also the snacks and lunch type items that the local guild provided. Soups, taco salad, dips and chips, cookies, and a variety of cakes. So more great food. After getting all settled and having our circle quickly filled, there were all the booths tempting you with their wares. I was quickly tempted by an oval basket and after resisting went back for it. I thought I was going really well at resisting all the other temptations - fleeces, hand dyed rovings, special batts designed to allow for striping, yarns, and buttons. Then I was going around with Sara and back in the Custom Coverups booth and found a bag of white Falkland that I couldn't resist bringing home. Kind of funny that I brought home some Falkland wool from South America and MIL, Judy couldn't get there on her two week cruise around SA because of rough seas!

By the time 4pm rolled around a lot of spinning, talking and shopping had occurred! I was almost able to do up the first two ounces of my second four ounce ball of Portland Punch. Sara was close to finishing up the green/blue that is also from Stitchjones, Duffy finished up some pretty blue stuff she had brought along, Tammy plied a couple of singles and learned how to use a nostepinne and create a center-pull ball. Shelia was also spinning up some yellow and green roving also dyed by Stitchjones. I swear we did not coordinate and plan to show off Sharon's stuff while we were there! 

As we entered in the morning we were given a ticket for the door prizes donated by the vendors. There were lots of very nice things being offered too! Imagine my surprise to have mine drawn at the beginning! At first I was a little bewildered by it, but by the end of the day I loved my prize. What is it? A seat cushion crocheted from Pendleton Wool Mill ends:

Abby's Pizza gave us the option to get personal pizzas and then we headed back to the beach house. I finished up my two ounces of Portland Punch and Sara tried really hard to finish hers up too. Other knitting and lots more talking and laughing occurred before heading off to bed. This morning I made up the buttermilk scones I'd partially pre-prepared and served those with the summer canned raspberry jam. Shelia taught us the joys of organic eggs from her chickens and scrambled some up for us. Delicious! Then there was the general cleaning/laundry duties before heading home. Shelia and Duffy planned a stop at the Outlet stores, while I stopped at the taffy store I grew up stopping at, different owners of course! Couple bags of salt water taffy and a few licorice pieces for me and I was set to head home. 

I've gotten everything unpacked, put away and laundry going. My brain said it was just too tired to try to knit, so of course it only made sense to pull out the second two ounces of Portland Punch to see if I can get it all spun up this week. 

Duffy was taking lots of pictures, so maybe more will show up on her blog. I teased Sara about her blog neglect. We'll have to see if the rest of the group posts anything.

I do foresee another fiber group trip to the beach house in the future!

Added, slurped from Duffy's Facebook Album:

Trickin' Out Your Wheel

I'm going to have to save my pennies so I can get three more stickers so that they are in each section of the wheel.

I like how it looks, but I haven't had the wheel spin to see if its going to bug me. I'll go do that, but until then. You can see what it looks like now:

Closeup

 

Didn't get it exactly the center of that section - oh well.

Monday, Monday

This morning Rachel and Hazel picked me up and we headed for Carlton, home of Woodland Woolworks. Originally we were going to tempt Rachel with one of the used Lendrum's there, but I was given orders that she couldn't come home with one. So ultimately the trip was for me and she was driving! How nice was that?

We arrived at Woodland Woolworks and then got a little concerned because the sign on the door still said closed. Turns out they were having a rough Monday - broken window, computer sparking and dying, that this was minor but a concern that customers may not have come inside because of the sign. Hazel got her first mini-tour of the place - sale room and the yarn/fiber room. No wheel room visit. There's a pretty Ashford Charka available if anyone has $200. I purchased my bulky/plying head and Rachel got some very soft Targhee to spin with.

We then headed for McMinnville and their nicely restored historic downtown area for lunch at a place Rachel had been to before - Sage. Nice restaurant above a store with soups, sandwiches and homemade bread. From there we walked a few blocks to the knitting store I've heard great things about - Boersma's. All the great things are richly deserved! Nice selections of yarn in easy to see displays and a wide variety too. We were amazed in some of the sizes of yarns too:

On our way back to the car, we took turns having our picture taken with Ben Franklin on the bench. I played with the setting and decided that sepia worked since Ben was bronze:

I wasn't as friendly with him as Rachel, but we'll wait to see if she posts those. ;-) She did so borrowed her pic cause its so cute. I'll have to remember to pose like that in the future.

After Ben we headed to the Walmart (we don't have one close to us) so we could pick up a KISS cd for friend Sharon. Apparently it was only being sold through them and their latest one out. Then it was a nice fall drive home.

Making good progress on projects. Still spinning on the cormo/silk. It just does not want to finish up! I even spun it this last Saturday at Spinnerati. Rachel was like, why don't you spin something else? My reply, because then it will never get done. ;-) Hopefully a happy dance later this week for the spinning and other projects being completed!

Long quiet week

Still trying to recover from Sock Summit. Getting to spend all that time with all those knitters! All those fiber fumes from the marketplace. Can anyone truly recover from that experience?

Monday night we headed over to the airport to pick up Judy, Brandon's mom from her trip visiting back east. I didn't have to drive so made sure to grab yarn, needles and a pattern. Someone forgot to check on flight status so we had 2 hours to entertain ourselves at the airport. Saw a few shops, checked with Trtlgrl to find out if she wanted a cute turtle packback we saw in one store. The little turtle actually detached from the backpack and was the softest chenille. Then wandered through Powell's for a bit. Decided that the wait deserved a Jamba Juice so crossed the concourse for those and found a table. I was fully prepared to entertain myself with knitting but suggested that Brandon go get one of the travel Cribbage games I had seen in Powell's. Off he went for it and we played for the next hour and a half. We now have it in the car for future trips.

I got a couple of inches knitted and then realized after getting home that I had gotten my right side and wrong sides mixed up so had to frog that work and start over. Sigh. I blame it on the yarn. Simple Yet Effective Shawl, even an idiot can mess it up. ;-)

The correct view!

Since someone hadn't gotten the broken part on his car fixed while he was driving his mom's car, that meant that my car for was used for the week. Sigh. So no Wednesday spinning, but did get to go to Haggen's. We are a happy noisy bunch, especially when getting to ogle others Sock Summit purchases. Some really nice yarns found their way into new stashes.

I finished up my second Hydrangea sock to find that Sock Summit knitting and lack of sleep impacted my socks. I have two different heel flaps. I could have sworn I was reading the pattern while knitting them but clearly two different flaps. Then again if anyone is that close and says anything, I'm doing what Lucy says - kick them in the face. That Lucy she is a riot! Judy assures me that if I were to knit them at the same time this wouldn't be a problem - she's right of course. LOL


With these socks done, I have hopes of casting on the Orion socks soon.

Saturday I picked up Angela and we headed downtown to go the monthly Portland Spinnerati meeting. Luckily I must have planned for bad traffic because at one point I was thinking we were going to be 20 minutes early and we ended up arriving just a few minutes late. Tammy made mention of reading about the closure of one of the lanes and redirecting of traffic but didn't remember about it until in the middle of the backed up traffic. ;-)

Michele was lured into the darkside as Sandy Kay (Knit/Purl) called it, by Leila's Turkish drop spindle, she saw it at the Ravelry Meetup and the next day went and bought one of her own. It was the magic of creating a center pull ball that got her and then after feeling and seeing yarn appear under her fingers I think we have her well and truly hooked. ;-)
Depending upon how much spinning happens we may have to get her setup with a shoebox lazy kate for the plying step before the next meeting or at OFFF.

We had a larger group than normal with several new people there. I'm terrible about names so don't have any to share. A few photos though:




After Spinnerati, Angela and I put the wheels back in the car and made the trek the few blocks over to Knit/Purl. I needed to get the pattern from Sandy Kay that I'm going to do a store sample out of the Habu Raw Silk she gave me at Sock Summit. She also let us take home a sample of Happiest Girl Dyeworks that they had been giving out in the booth. I brought home a pretty red one called Gypsy Petticoats:
I think a little wrist warmer should use it up nicely.

One lady in Knit/Purl asked about Sock Summit. She didn't come because she doesn't knit socks. After a stunned moment I mentioned the 150 booths in the marketplace but couldn't possibly depress her by the demos she also missed out. I just left her with hopefully there would be another one here in two years. She still seemed surprised by that thought. Why?

Finished Things & Other Stuff

As mentioned previously I finished up the cormo I had been spinning. This was an OFFF purchase last fall. I got it because it was ridiculously inexpensive for the amount of fiber given. Well the reason why is that it had lots of 'stuff' in it. Strands of some kind of dark vegetation and little bits of black seed like stuff. I tried picking them all out as best as I could while spinning but some did make it into the yarn. There were also lots of little nubs that I tried to pick out but a large number of them also made it in. This makes this a very organic yarn! Still very soft and sproingy though.



I also finished up the Wisteria Shur'tugal socks! Yea! Shibuiknits sock is a very soft cushy yarn and knits up lovely. Unfortunately the Wisteria line is being discontinued. This really is an electric purple but pretty nonetheless. One sock oddly, appears to be slightly smaller than the other but when lined up with the different areas are the same. Fit the same way so I'm not stressing.



Sock Summit news is that I did get the classes that I had hoped to get. It was an interesting process full of challenges to a knitter's patience but I persevered and was successful on my first attempts. I'm going to do a couple of 1 hour classes on Thursday - Chrissy's Toe Up Bind Offs and Merike's Darn It! I work on Friday so nothing that day. Then I'm there Saturday morning for Janel's Spinning a Painted Sock. I'm going to have some superwash merino hand dyed for the class too. Then I'll enjoy the Luminary Panel on Sunday. There's also a Ravelry meet-up in the works for Saturday after the classes. I'll be saving up money for some goodies in the marketplace too.

I had contemplated going down to Black Sheep but have decided to stay home and spin. There's also Tour de Fleece coming up in July that I can tie in with the Summer of Spinning going on. All this spinning should deplete the fiber supply just in time for OFFF. ;-) I've got some of the Knit Blogger ladies thinking we'll pay the vendor fees so that we can sell various items while we're there. I have various fiber related items I'm contemplating making for sale.

Alpaca Shearing

This morning was an extra early morning were I was out of the house shortly after 8:30am. I'm *not* a morning person so this was amazing for me. Cindy helped out with a Dutch Brothers Mocha. I just had to wait for it to cool enough to drink. ;-)

I picked up Cindy and Bobbie and we headed over to Islay Hill Alpaca Ranch where the llama shearing was already in progress. I have photos of of the llamas and alpacas here.

I did do a few videos. One I decide just wasn't showing much so didn't put up. The first one is the longest and the one I learned that alpacas spit. You can see me getting spit at and then further spitting. We all learned quickly to move if one of the alpacas started giving you the gimlet eye proceeding the spitting. It was like it was our fault they were having this indignity done to them.

This is the longer one:


Shorter one:


Towards the end we were taking the samples and labeling bags for the blankets and second cuts, sweeping and raking and encouraging the alpacas out of the barn after they were done. Yea, you would think after all the complaining they would be 'so out of there' but some had to be guided out. Then with the boys they would come back to check out the next one being done.

I was ready to be done by the time they were all done. My migraine medication had worn off and heat was starting to add to things. Cindy also needed to be home to do some transcription work.

Shelia brought home my Lendrum this evening after helping Morgaine break down her stuff from TKGA. Brandon put it together and Bobbie explained things to me, but my head bobbled things a bit so it was a slow start. I did start getting things going but will practice more in the morning with a head hopefully not pounding.

TKGA

I met up with Tiggywinkleknits and rode in on the MAX to TKGA at the Double Tree by Lloyd Center. We arrived around 11:30am. By 12:00pm I was the owner of a double treadle Lendrum spinning wheel after stopping in the Carolina Homespun booth. ;-)

I had on order through Woodland Woolworks the single treadle. The Louet I have on loan is a single treadle, I've tried Bobbie's single treadle Lendrum, so that's what I was going to go with. Then I read how Kathleen had tried the double treadle there at the show and thought I should try it out. Well I found out I can treadle just fine and that if my left knee that has been bothering me acts up I can always treadle with just one and have it still work. I did have to just go with the regular flier that it comes with and the fast flier. Getting the plying head would have just thrown my budget way out. I can always borrow Bobbie's if I need that much space. Shelia (as well as Kathleen and Sara) was working for Morgaine and she volunteered to bring it home for me so that I didn't have to try lugging it on MAX in the bulky cardboard box. Shelia will drop it off at my house Sunday afternoon. Gives me time to let Brandon know about the purchase. LOL

Morgaine let me pick out some fiber to go along with it, so I scooped up all of her merino/silk in blue/purple and the lone BFL also in a blue/purple:



Also from the booth I picked up an ebony tool made my Lacis. It has a crochet hook on one end and a needle point on the other so you can use it as a cable needle. In the same photo is a shawl pin I picked up as a sample of ones that I'd like to try making and selling. I'm not sure what the red wood is, but Brandon will tell me when he sees it later.

The last purchase from Morgaine was a shuttle for Judy. It will be a birthday present this summer. It's made out of Lyptus and very pretty.


Bobbie and I both came home with some saturated black mulberry silk silver from Klaus at Crown Mountain Farms. He's going to be very busy over the next few months and almost living out of his suitcase.


We were tempted at many of the other booths but using restraint in buying things. Mine because of how much I had already spent on my wheel! There's Black Sheep in June that I'd really like to go see and then Sock Summit in August and OFFF the end of September so lots of fiber/yarn spending opportunities.

Sunday its up bright and early (UGH!) and we're off to Islay Hill Alpaca Ranch to watch the shearing. There is the opportunity for more fiber to come home, we'll see how good I can be! I'm going to try to do some videos of the shearing too for sharing.