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An Everyday Fiber Obsession

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Knitting Woes and Crochet Foray Continues

Last week I mentioned that I ran into a snag with Caryn's gloves, but that I had also started over with the fingers. Yeah, well, I got that pinky all finished and had her try them on and yup, all was well with Annemor and I could start the ring finger. Well, right. I pick up the glove and lo and behold, the stitching came out for the weave in on the tip of the finger! Good Grief! Then the doubt began, maybe I am not able to make these dadgum gloves. I've made a glove before, I say to myself, but I did it using the I-Cord finger start and then picking up the hand. Maybe I needed to start over? Shoot, I hate that thought.

So, I go to work and tell my woes to my friend Karen and well, she has this miracle needle that might help my whole problem. Look:

See, I was having trouble getting that final loop through the last six stitches tied in neatly and finished off on the inside of the finger. This weaving needle, let me pull the finger inside out to accomplish all of that. So, now I am seriously looking for one of these babies to add to my knitting accessories! So, I am on my way again. . .

The join between the fingers is pretty crappy, and the more I do these, the harder they seem to be. I think this pair may be the ultimate test, and I will have to get all the kinks out to try these again. See the back?

See how bad that join is? Gahhh! Ok, so gloves are difficult to say the least, eh!!!? Maybe I'll do this pair and stick to mittens! lol! No, if you know me at all, I won't let this end here.

So, in the meantime I got some of Elann's Peruvian Highland sport wool to go with the sock yarn for Babette. I know I had all that sock yarn, but seriously, I can't put it together and have some squares in flimsy wool and others in nice substantial wool. So, I got this:
One of each with a couple of doubles. This wool is turning into this:

and this:

I am 100% happier with this now. I will probably, end up making it all out of this yarn, and pick up some more STR in the middle, to make a STR Babette. Maybe. It wasn't a total loss, I got all that sock wool rolled into balls! So, I guess I can crochet somewhat, but I don't think I can be classified as a hooker yet!

A Foray into Crochet

I think I have told you all, in prior posts, that I think at times I have ADD - and you know, sometimes, I'm not sure if I am kidding or not!!

So let me tell ya a story. Here I am drinkin' my coffee and perusing Ravelry, when what do I discover? Well, that I had made my fingers wrong on Caryn's gloves! Dork!! I'm a Dork! I'm a dork, dork, dork!!!! There is no quicker way for me to put a project down than to discover an error. So, I put Annemor aside. (just for the day, don't worry, I will finish them, I already ripped and started over). Dadgummit!

So, now what can I work on??? Hhhmmnn, let's see, what I can come up with now. Oh! I know! Another item I have been actively looking at on Ravelry is afghans. (Due to Goblin Eyes and Purple yarn I just made.) And in my attempts to find the perfect afghan, I found Babette. OMG! All the colors!! I love color! Oh, oh, oh , but gosh. . . can I crochet that???? I'm not really a hooker, I just pretend to do some crochet. But, hey, I can try right?

And off I go . . . Into the stash this time, because Lord knows I have lots of fingering weight yarn, sorry it's blurry:
I was all alone on Friday, due to Chris and Caryn going over to Lexington (in the snow, no less). So I had me a good ole' time pulling everything out and making up color combinations. But this is what I ended up with:

And here are my attempts at this hooking thing:


Nope, I'm not too good at it. It looks to me like your row isn't necessarily at the end of the square, right? And I always seem to end up with stitches that seem to be not worked. Well, I will have to do this with my good friend Karen at my side, as you can see, she can hook:


This is a comparison of yarns,

the darker blues are STR and the White is Lisa Souza Sock Merino! Well, I like LS don't get me wrong, but what the heck? The STR seems so much more dense, and more "afghan" like. The STR is bigger (maybe a quarter of an inch) Now, I don't know what to do. . .


I have two Merino Sock! in the line up, but I think they may have to be replaced. What do you think?

The Spin goes on, Yada, Yada Yeah

Well, as predicted this was a week from Hades, but I have survived with help from my good friend, and co-worker, Karen. Thanks so much for all your help, girl friend! Three hours in on Saturday finished up the torture and now I hope it is clear sailing for a month. We got a good audit report in the end, so I guess that is all that really matters in the end.

So, in case your wondering about my over dying experience on Monday here is the result, although, I did change my mind at the last second and used turquoise instead of black to darken up that purple skein in the post below, (please scroll down just a bit!) and this is the result:

It's not real striking looking at it by itself, actually, but when I put it with the Goblin, it really looks like I know what I'm doing! lol So, what do you all think?



I am now leaning towards the mitered afghan from the Mason Dixon Knitting fame to work up this yarn. I plan to roll the yarn this afternoon and start on it tonight, probably. I am trying something different with the pictures, although I am not looking entirely successful, but I guess I'll let it go.














One more thing going in the wings right now (well, other than the Kai, which I did get my yarn for, thank you Karen, from Two Swans Yarns!) is the gloves:

One pinky done twice as the first one was kinda tight, even for my bitty pinky, so I ripped it out and started again. Then Monday rolled around and you know the rest from there.

Chris and Caryn go off to UK to sign her up for classes next semester, and to pick up Bryan, he will start his Spring Break on Friday. Next year, they will have a car and can come and go as they please, which will please us to no end. Getting them both up there at the same time will be a problem tho! Well, off to the shower for me, I hope you all have a great week!

Please don't be shy about comments, I really love to hear from people, so I know this is actually worth the effort! :)

Spinning up a Storm!

You know, this week I finished up the purple Romney! Actually, I finished it up last Sunday, but after my post so, here it is now:
The color goes pretty well with the Goblin Eyes, I think I have decided to start a free form couch throw and what ever I am not too sure about will go into it -I am kinda anal tho, and it will all have to match somewhat. I'm not that creative as you can see from the new quiz in the sidebar. It must be the accountant in me!

Here is the skein itself, I still plan to overdye with some black. I am planning a mental health day on Monday so I will try it then I think. Work has been a bitch lately, and I really need a few hours (days, weeks, months) to myself. I'm sick and tired of working for people who say they don't understand the language, or say they don't understand accounting. WTF? How did you get to be the COO then? Stupid man. I'm still dreaming of that yarn shop, when and if we ever find out about Caryn's scholarships for this upcoming year, then I will know what to do.

I got a deal on Spin Sales this week too, lookey, lookey! Well, maybe it wasn't the deal of the century, but I'm happy with it! As you probably know, Rick Reeves no longer makes any wheels. This frame wheel took me a few nights to get together and then a day to get my treadling down. It's really different from the other wheels I have, because it's a single treadle? I'm not entirely sure if that is the reason, or if RR made it function this way - heel toe, heel toe and a really, really short draw up distance!!

But, I am getting it and this is the result so far:


That picture is kinda dark, the color is a rich red coral by fiber monster on etsy.com. It practically spins itself! It shows up better in the picture above. I think maybe it will go with the goblin and purple I've got going -hmmmn? Have to think about that. . .

Have a good week everyone - I know I won't due to the work factor - auditor's plus month end. Yah, that works doesn't it? Insert Expletive here: "!"

So, What's up this week?

Well, I guess lots of stuff! I am still in my finishing mode, and I found out this week that I will most definitely run out of one color for my Kai Cardigan. So, I ordered another skein from Karen, at Two Swans Yarns, but haven't heard anything at all from her site, or her. I think this is a sign that she has been swept away by the Madrona experience going on up there! I know she is a great vendor, so, I will wait. But, you know don't you that patience is not my #1 virtue right?

Here is a shot of the sleeve in progress:

I got six of these from my sweetie for Valentines Day:

They are so perfect, what I mean is that they are opening perfectly and they are so, so fragrant! Oh man! I love 'em, but really, I keep telling Chris, just one! I only need you to send me one!

And Caryn and I went prom dress shopping yesterday, and found the most perfect dress for her. Her date is 6' plus, and she is a bit nervous about that, so we got some sandals with heels for her too! D-A me, I forgot the camera, so I have no pictures to share, but suffice it to say, she is perfect in purple!

Speaking of purple, here are the finished purple romney bobbins:

And still in finishing mode, I am working on these still, slowly, as I was trying to make Kai the #1 project at this house, (until I ran out of yarn that is!) . . .

These are really fun, I am now working on glove #2 and will do all the fingers at the same time. That way, hopefully, everything will be even and the same size!

And you know, we had a little snow this week so Caryn got this great shot of Blazer:


Have a good week, everybody!

It's All about the Eyes. . .

That would be the eyes of the storms that missed us this past week, but wreaked havoc in the State below us. I personally live two miles north of Tennessee, and the tornadoes that ran though last Tuesday night were not personally devastating, but they were definitely personally memorable, as Caryn and I were alone with the doggies and quite scared to go to bed!

Got my eyes checked on Monday evening and have a new prescription, yeah! Maybe this will help with the constant headaches. Yesterday, I had to have the dilation of the eyes so the Dr. could see the optic nerve. All is well there, but it was finally a bright sunny day, and I ended up with a headache all day that wouldn't go away.

First off, I must apologize for the size of these pictures! I am still not moving at normal speed, I don't think!

I tried to do some Navajo plying, where I normally sit to spin, and nope, that wasn't workin'! So, I moved onto the carpet, and then I couldn't see the yarn coming off the bobbin:

Ok, so try looking at it this way:

But, now you must imagine that your eyes are not entirely seeing this against that carpeting! Ok, well, I managed to move off the carpet and onto the hardwood flooring and then managed to do this:

I really liked the color of that shirt underneath the skein, and thought I would be able to crop it out, but, well, I guess I wasn't seeing things very well yesterday. Here is another shot:

Considering how bad I felt, I don't think I did that bad a job with it, I do think it is over plied, but after I soaked it I whacked it and snapped it pretty good, and it all seems to be ok today.

I plan to do the second bobbin today. This skein above was 4 oz. of Goblin Eyes from Spunky Eclectic's Fiber Club, and I got 149 yards from it. I have another full bobbin to do, so then it will be the uuummmhh, what do I do with 300 yards of this? Hhhhmmn? I will probably do some fingerless gloves or maybe some mittens.

So, Chris took me to the metropolis of Bowling Green last night, and I found some glasses I really like. Have to go back on Monday to get them all worked up as we got there late, and the place needed to call the insurance to even work them up! I plan on two pairs this year, as I need a pair of sunglasses too. Well, that's it from my corner of the world, so I leave you with a Happy Valentine's Day and Big



From Me!

Birthdays, Kai Progress, and Football!

You know, we all have to have 'um. Yup another birthday for me this past Friday. . . but, it was great! Went to lunch with the work buds, and got presents from a special work bud, thanks Karen! Looky what Karen did just for me:

Please ignore the shopping list, Karen had absolutely nothin' to do with that! Good Grief! Anyway, isn't that bag simply awesome and I plan to make either stitch markers or just add to my key ring with those great charms!

Caryn, my dd, got me a journal and my favorite movie! Yeah, I'm just a kid at heart -

And Chris got me this great work station so I can use my combs and drum carder any darn time I want to! It folds up flat and it will hold up to 450 pounds! Pretty cool huh?

We had Coldstone Creamery cake and we went to The Bistro for dinner last night, so all in all it was really great. I heard from everyone, and that is what really does it for me, it's not the presents and food it's just that the people I love remember me on my special day.

Ok, enough and on to knitting! Here is the progress on Kai, here is a close up of a three needle bind off on one shoulder, I have, of course, done both shoulders!

After doing this you end up with a sack:

Look at that front steek! Holy crap all those ends! But you don't have to weave them in unless you want to! They will just be rolled up in the front edging if you feel lazy, and besides that, I always machine stitch my cut steeks and a lot of them get sewn down to boot. So, after all that it's time to cut, and I only cut what I am working on, so just one at a time, here is an armhole after cutting and sewing an armhole steek:

Looks pretty ugly doesn't it?

Well here it is with stitches:

It calls for 160 stitches, but I am thinkin' that's a lot! I need to look up my sunset cardigan and see what it called for and reconfigure for this pattern.

Ahh, football knitting! I know the Pats will win, but I always root for the underdog, so Go Giants!, just make it a good game!

Two Steps Forward . . .

And I'm not going backwards, for once . . .

I thought I would show you what that purple roving looked like after I put it through the drum carder. I only gave it one pass as it wasn't horribly felted. I just knew that trying to spin it straight from the roving would have made me a little stressed, and let me tell ya, that is not the point of spinning! So here is one shot, and I just want to say that I know it is not the best shot. As you can see there is an open cupboard door in the background, on the bottom left, well behind that I had three more open. . . and there was all the stuff from bringing in the groceries. . . so, this is the best I have, Gheez!


And a little closer:

Chris said it looks like it multiplied! That was funny, as it did appear to do that, I guess that's what a little bit of air does for you. It's been fun to spin up, but now I have decided to overdye this with just a hint of black and see what that gives me. I will definitely overdye the plied yarn. And after all this work, I have ultimately decided to Navajo ply the Goblin bobbins and use this as an accent to Goblin. So you ask, "what are you making?" Well, Uhhh, I dunno! Do you spin to knit or knit to spin? That is the question . . .

Anyway, here is a spinning progress shot:

I think that one is actually a little closer to the true color, it's really tough to get good shots in the cold gray gloom around here.

On the knitting front, I have made some progress on my Kai Cardigan, I put a pin in from the last point that I think I showed you. Don't you just love that motif? I know I do!

Have you ever noticed that when you are working on size 3 needles, it takes freakin' forever to get 10 inches done? Especially when doing three rows a night is a big deal during the week! Well, it's coming along, and I only lack about an inch and a half now. . . then the neck bind off and I can cut the armhole steeks and start the sleeves. I was hoping to get there this weekend, but I am obviously a slow knitter. Here it is all laid out with the armhole steek right up front and center!

This color shot is pretty good too! It is definitely pretty, I just want to be done!

Forays With the Dye Pot

So, do you all remember my dilemma with the bobbins of Goblin Eyes?

Do I want to ply the two bobbins together? Do I want to Navajo ply? Do I want to ply from a ball? So what do I decide to do? I always hem and haw, do I want to spin the fiber then dye or dye and spin the fiber?? See all this procrastinating going on? And the bobbins are still not plyed! lol,

All rightly then, I decided to dye up some roving dying yesterday! I think, that a really deep purple would look fabulous with Goblin and, well, I have lots of Romney roving (I love Melissa from Skylines Farms) so I will dye up roving! This roving from a ewe named Peggy Sue in the following experiment.

One messy kitchen counter! Note the note pad so I can recreate this again, although I'm not sure this is exactly what I was going for! Here is one dyepot with 8 oz of roving, at this point I am thrilled and thinking I got exactly what I had planned, well, not quite eggplant color, but a really deep purple anyway!

All right, so lets lift it out of the dyepot, after 30 minutes of simmering:

Well, %$#@^&*! What, what, what is this?? Fuchia and blue-purple?? Apparantly the dyes need to be pureed together or the dye paste needed further mixing or something I don't know what! This is quite a bummer I must say!

Here it is drying on the clothes rack:

I am planning to put it through the carder this morning before spinning to try to homogenize the colors a bit. It wasn't a total failure, I think it will go well with the Goblin Eyes, look here: