Spinning again

This is some American Top I had and had dyed years ago, back when I first starting spinning. I realized I wasn't enjoying spinning what I had on the wheel, so I changed to something easier to get back in the groove, as it were.I've had to reteach myself to spin, as I didn't have energy or muscles when I learned and now I do. Slowing down my treadling to match my drafting or speeding up my drafting has been my quest the last few days. Although this isn't a balanced single by any means, it's usable yarn for hats or scarves, mittens or slippers.

This is the alpaca I scored at the Renaissance Festival some years ago. It's got lots of guide hairs in it still. I'm hoping washing and blocking will help.

I moved the spinning wheel up to my room, and if I sit in front of the AC, it's comfortable to spin. Hanging around with the knitting groups at my LYS is diversifying my interests.... I just need to keep from creating deadlines for myself. Silly as it may sound to you "normal" people, if I start branching out with my hobbies, I start to feel guilty for the projects not being worked on. Now, snoring WIPs of all the same area don't bother me, but knitting instead of spinning or crocheting instead of knitting does make me feel guilty. There is no rhyme or reason for this, it just is me. I'm hoping if I can keep myself from obsessing over one craft, I'll be able to do more. Retraining and old mind with OCD tendancies is a hard thing to do. And spending money on learning a new craft and then abandoning it is even worse.... Welcome to my world.

With that said, I'm sorta keeping up with my Mystery Project over on KnitBabySurprise. It's a hat and I just need to do the decreases. The second half of the project starts up tomorrow, I think.

Today the knitting group is having a pot luck at the store. Should be a tasty day!

April 17, 2007

Hat Done!

I finished up the click--> Helix Striped Hat from Joanknits. It was fun to knit and I'm especially pleased how the yarns work together. They are from a group of skeins I dyed using purple Wilton's food coloring. The purple often splits and you get shades of pale pink, pink, red, magenta, lavender, purples, and blues. These three colors are all from the same dye bath.

I didn't get the second sock CO as I spent most of the day in my room. (What a treat!) My upstairs projects, of course, are hats! I did CO and got about 20 rows into the click--> Asherton Hat. It's a bit more complicated than I thought, but so far I've kept up with it! My issue is, I've gotten the bottom half of the triangles done and ran out of yarn. I thought the orange I had was the same as the orange I was using, but it's not. And it's just enough off that it'll look like a mistake rather than a design feature. Do I continue with another color, or visit the flippin' frog pond again?

I'll get the sock started today. My daughter is getting another tooth extracted today, so I can work on it while I wait at the dentist's office.

I did get some spinning done. Nothing spectacular, just some white American Top Roving from Brown Sheep. I've had it around for a long time. It's a good roving to use to get "back into" spinning.

I will be packing up my alpaca, llama and wool to send off to Jehovah Jireh Farms <--click shortly. If it takes as long to process as click--> the last place I sent to :::shudder::: I won't get it back till the end of the heat here and I can spin it this winter. Not to mention JJF is $9 less expensive!

It's been cooler here again. In the high 70s to low 80s. Cold in the mornings. My socks are getting a work out again!

March 22, 2007

Spinning....

F gave me an ounce of alpaca he'd bought on line from Common Threads. I decided to take a quick break from knitting (actually from housework) and spin it up.

It's a little hard to see the blue/brown combo of the roving in the yarn, but it's very pretty. Spun up like a dream! It's really inspired me to get the next step up from hand carding, The Minimalist Carder that F said he'd help me build in the works! It'll be much less expensive than sending it out and/or buying a nice drum carder. Hmmmm, rather than buying the carding cloth, I could take apart my hand carders and use the cloth from them..... Then I can get my alpaca carded and ready to spin!

I got some progress done on the sock...heel's all finished and I'm working on the foot. I'll tell you, hairy, angora type yarn is not fun to frog! Guess I'll just have to quit making mistakes!

We've had a cold spell come through. Lots of wind yesterday, some rain last night the hint of thunderstorms today through Saturday. It was up in the 80s and 90s last week and now down in the high 60s to mid 70s. Quite a bit of a drop! The weather really is "different" this year. Extremes of everything. We watched The Day After Tomorrow over the weekend and one just has to wonder.....

In answer to some of the questions in the comments section from yesterday's post: Trish: I'm not really using a pattern. My daughter likes the shortie socks with her work shoes, so I just checked out a couple patterns for the length of the leg and went on. Michelle: My grandson is 4, 5 in October. Thanks for all the comments on hiding stash from others in the family. Most of the people that answered my question on one of the knitting boards said the same thing. They would admit "sins of omission" but not direct out and out lying. I guess I just take things too literally!

And here's your dose of cute. This is her newest pose. She does the cross the arm thing all the time!

I've noticed there are generally only pics of my youngest grand daughter. The older one is in school or getting ready for school when I'm doing this, so no pics get taken. Maybe this summer it'll be different!

March 13, 2007

One down, a heel to go

I finished the sock and added the heel. Now to heel the other one and another pair of socks are done! I used yet another heel this time. It's called the Afterthought Center Decrease heel. The decreases are down the back of the heel rather than on the sides. If you look closely at the picture (click on the little magnifying glass at the lower right corner) you'll see the heel looks like it's knit along with the leg and foot of the sock. The decreases run up the back of the heel

and down under the heel.

They look like they'd be bulky and uncomfortable, but you can't feel the decreases at all once it's on the foot. It's done excactly the same was as decreases on a "normal" heel would be, except the are done at center front and center back.

I didn't get a chance to play with my alpaca yesterday. Ended up running errands with my daughter. On Saturday, the people that live across the parking lot from us decided to use their car as their stereo system and for four hours we were "treated" to rap music with bass loud enough to shake our windows. Because it was the weekend, I didn't know where to call to complain. One of our errands was to go to the office and find out what could be done. It seems there is a weekend security company and that's who we are to call. In the winter it's not so bad as we already have our windows and doors closed, but in the summer, when we depend on evaporative cooling which has to have openings to create the draft to pull the cooled air through, the noise is too much. My chair is only 6 feet from the TV and I had to turn it up to "way to high" in order to hear it Saturday. As F would say, "Ah, the joys of apartment living!"

Today is my day off. My time shifts when my daughter's schedule shifts. F and I haven't made plans yet, and the only real problem is I don't have a car today. So I don't k now if I'll be at home playing with my alpaca, or with F knitting up a storm.

March 11, 2007

Can you guess what this is?

This, my darlings, is almost two pounds of alpaca! There is a re enactment group at the Ren Festival every year and they set up a camp and cook all their food, etc., as well as spin, weave, etc. One of their group had bought alpaca to spin. She found she was allergic to it so she bagged it up and sold it. For $8. I got almost two pounds of raw alpaca for $8!

It's pretty clean, although I will spread all of it out today and check it. I may just be able to pick out the vegetable matter (VM) and card it. If not, I'll wash it once just to get the dust out and then card.

I was a very good girl and knit part of the way both up and back to the festival. I have less than an inch left on the cuff of the second sock and then put the heels in!

This is the Swan ride at the Ren Festival. It's totally human powered. That grungy young fellow on the left and his buddy push the swing back and forth until it gets about 8 feet off the ground. No big deal, but it adds to the ambiance of the Festival.

F, B and I had a great time at the Festival. We watched three shows. Zilch the Storyteller transposes beginning consonants on words to create hilarious fairy tales; the two nuns in Hey Nunnie Nunnie! cast an irreverent look at Catholicism/Christianity. Irreverent enough to be funny, but not to be offensive; and Cast in Bronze is a musician playing a medieval instrument called a carrillon.

He played among others, Carol of the Bells (one of my very favorites) and Tubular Bells (better known as the theme for the Exorcist). We sat a little too close, but it still was absolutely wonderful.

Oh, and F got his chocolate covered strawberries. Lots and lots of chocolate covered strawberries!