Yarnivorous

G'day all!

Lynne's a bit busy today and can't come to the blog. Instead for your viewing pleasure, a pic she took from a friend's property just outside Bozeman, Montana.



Back later with Stuff. Possibly Lots of Stuff.

anon!

G'day again all!

I was a naughty bad girl today. At the shop I found a discounted bonus pack of omnigrid rulers (useful for quilting and anything where you need a straight edge) for the same price as the one I was going to buy (except the one I was going to buy was also discounted, so I spent more than I needed to). So I bought the set. I brought them home and just thought I'll open up the pack and pull out the one for I need for marking my current quilt project.

The beast BIT me! (not for the truly squeamish) It cut my thumb tip open! My main knitting thumb! Gosh now I am cranky with it. I didn't realise the edges of those things were sharp! But they are really quite sharp and the corners? Yikes, you could have an eye out with those things. Maybe the bonus packs are made cheaper than the single rulers - my green one has sharp corners but you'd have to do more than run your finger along the edge to cut yourself on it.

I'll show it! I'll USE it with eXt…

G'day all!

Yesterday I finished my July PSC socks. Yay! Cleopatra's Stockings by Yarnissima in STR lightweight Shrinking Violet, part of last years Rockin Sock Club.

This is a very nice pattern and makes one think about as one's knitting but I really didn't enjoy it.



Why not?



All those knit through the back loops!



Why do I hate ktbl?



Cos I knit using the "lever" method (English style, yarn in right hand, right index finger flicks the yarn around the needle which moves from 10am to 12:30ish as I flick the yarn, stitches move from left to right needles). I only take my hand off the right needle at the end of a row or to retension the yarn. You might ask why this makes ktbl annoying - after all the needle feeding stitches is on the left side. My left index finger helps both feed the stitches and also controls the tip of the right needle. With my normal knit into the front of the stitch, the tip of the needle slides sideways along my finger tip. With ktbl, I sta…

G'day all!

I hope this is the last time I rave about the Tour de Fleece. I just had to take these pics of my bike, with all the handspun (from the three weeks I was part of the tour) and fleece that is begging to be spun up.



Bike or yak?



LOL!

Back another time with this month's PSC socks. Plus I've added a pattern to the prize pool for the wotisit draw - Cleopatra's Stockings. I am pretty sure I will not make these again (nothing at all wrong with the pattern, just me!) and someone else can share the love!

anon!

G'day all!

Today I am showing you something a little different to the things I've been showing you recently. And I am not showing you all the interesting links that I had lined up cos my browser crashed and I started over - had waayyy too many tabs open anyway.

So, I've been busy cutting up material for the second in the quiltalong series. I am making two smallish quilts - two because I can't choose between the materials. I thought I would use up stash, except I had to go get more of the material that forms part of the quilt and the backing. Ah well. Them's the breaks.

You wanna see the colours I am using?


Hot hot hot! Rasta stuff. Brown contrast fabric.



Cool! Eggplant/aubergine contrast with pinks, purples, blues - even though there are two pics, they will be one quilt. I just couldn't fit them all into the space available.





Believe it or not, there's only one colour in the eggplant - it is the changing colours that it is sitting on that makes it look d…

G'day all!

After a bit of a break (ie I forgot to post anything and also I was away and frantically treadling for the Tour de Fleece*), Wotisit Monday returns!

Last time I showed a picture of some fleece all taped up inside its plastic cocoon. A few people guessed correctly but I didn't email anyone, cos it all happened when we were away. Anyways, it is good to have a few people with points on the board!

This week's wotisit was spotted at Crater Lake in Oregon. You don't have to go to Crater Lake to see things like it - they are quite common. Honest.


Wotisit?

Next week I think I should have another little prize draw. Remember to send your guesses to me via email to natielthreeoneone at gmaildotcom. You must email me the guess to get into the draw and surely you want to win something, even only a little thing like some stitchmarkers?

*In the 21 days I knew about the Tour de Fleece, I spun nearly 3km of yarn, or well over 7km if you include the original singles. I am …

I just cancelled the accommodation and travel to Sock Summit.

I now have a bad case of leaky eyes. Sniffle!

Here's the results of today's spinning:



anon!

G'day all!

Today was the Challenge Day in the Tour de Fleece.


Just after 9am, I grabbed my trusty wheel and some pre-drafted Miss Babs merino/bamboo in Watermelon. I thought it was 6 oz but it was only 4. Ah well, not quite as challenging then but still more than I've spun in a day for aaaaaaages.


By midday we were going pretty well (after some happy distraction looking up facial wounds in WWI - it was my Pop's deathiversary today and he had had a facial wound). We were outside and spinning like a demon in the dappled sun under the birch trees. It was only about 22C/low 70s. Very pleasant.



At 2pm I started on the second bobbin.





It was all spun up a little after 6pm and ready to ply.


I had to unply the first 50m of two ply yarn - it was horrid! This yarn wanted to be navajo or chain plied. So I complied with its plying decision!


I ended up with 240m of DK/8ply or so weight yarn


and a little 36m skein of coiled cuteness. I was all done by 9:15pm. It took me roughly 8 hours …

G'day all!

I have run up against a dilemma. A dilemma of Rather Large Proportions.

Over the next two months, we want to go to Sock Summit, Europe and Australia. Australia is non-negotiable. Europe is non-negotiable for DH.

We have a certain amount of income. That income, generated by my DH's work, can either take us up to Portland to Sock Summit for a rather long weekend of SS and sight-seeing (the SS and SS Portland trip) or I can go to Europe with DH.

This is my dilemma:
I either give up on going to the Sock Summit
or
I don't go to Europe with DH.

This might be my one and only, last chance to go to the Sock Summit. If I lived overseas, I would not fly all the way to the US to go to the Sock Summit. I've never been to Europe and DH has long promised to take me.

An alternative would be if some magic fairy waved her/his/its magic wand and conjured me up a job for a few weeks (minus the sock summit long weekend of course!). Or if I wrote up the patterns and hundreds magica…

G'day all!

Just a quick one. I can't type (I kid you not, every second letter I have to go back and correct). I'm still spinning madly, knitting a bit but doing LOTS of spinning.

Spinning is good when it is hot. Others would disagree but it is cooler than having a lump of knitting sitting on your lap. My current socks are trying to kick my butt but I am exerting my will upon them. I am even knitting them two at a time! No pics - they are too hard to get a shot of at night.

But no such missing out for the spinning! I have the camera sorted for some colours and shots under CFLs, and this is the result:



420m of a nice fingering weight 3 ply merino superwash yarn for socks. Crown Mountain Farm roving in Peggy Sue. It used to look like that.


Okey dokey. It's been a loooong weekend, even though it was only two days. Summer has hit with a vengeance and we've even been using the air con! I even drove the car yesterday rather than take the bus (last bus I was on had …

G'day all!

My back 'ome friends are having an interesting discussion on shyness. Turns out a number of us are shy. I'm shy sometimes. I get even shyer when I get a case of the guilts for not replying to your lovely comments! Then I get stressed cos I am guilty cos I have not pulled my finger out of my butt and so it goes around.*

Speaking of going around, I've been spinning madly for the Tour de Fleece.

So far we have:

sport weight superwash BFL with sparkly nylon from Spunky Eclectic, enough to make a pair of socks.


A hank of fingering weight superwash merino in Peggy Sue from Crown Mountain Farms, enough to make a very long sock or two very short ones (for me) with plenty more spinning to do from the pencil roving.


A hank of Dragon Breath from the Lavender Sheep. I had two plies of this but when I plied them against each other, they were yucky. Awful. Worsted yarn barf. So I unplied the WHOLE LOT and navajo/chain plied them. Much better! Oh and the odd thing? As…

G'day all!

Today I finished the blocking, tidied the ends and handed over the Faroese Shawl (rav link) for my LYS. I am so glad to see it gone. Not that it was hard to knit or anything or any sort of a problem - come on I was knitting with cashmere! Reclaimed, less guilt making cashmere. No it was just it had been about for Long Enough and I needed to move on and start something else. Or just spin madly for the Tour de Fleece.

I guess you'd like some pics, eh?

Before blocking


(can't believe that I took a pic almost a month ago that basically shows the very same image only half as long!)

During blocking - blasted hard to block cos of the shoulder shaping, so only the back is being blocked here



(and now a front)

the shoulder shaping that lets it do this


and this

(Stunning self portraits, eh? That grin is one of relief, a) because it is finished and b) because I didn't have to drink another litre of water and hang on until I was busting. TMI? Want more? Did you know they …

G'day all!

What a fun week so far! In more than the usual sense of the word.

I've finished a couple of things, I've had a pap smear (and now have to have a pelvic ultrasound, a mammogram and blood tests - have to check up on previously diagnosed fibroids, mammogram screening starts at age 40 here and I haven't had bloods done since umm years ago when I had no exercise tolerance and then found out that I had been accidentally eating stuff with milk powder in it), I've got more things to make, DH woke up today all dizzy and I had to make him breakfast and look after him (you might think breakfast would be a no go but he was hungry), it is STINKING HOT today - it has cracked the old ton in Campbell and I was out on the bike doing the shopping.... Anyway the new doctor is a heap better than the other one and didn't do the revolving door trick with me. I cracked funnies all the way through cos the alternative was to clock him and run out the door in a backless gown…

G'day all!

I just finished the shop shawl!

YAY!

Then I looked at it and realised that for some UNKNOWN reason I had not actually done the pattern right on the last edging repeat. Thank god it was on the last one and not the first! Alas I also cut the thread and have to splice more yarn in.

Argh.

Kill me now.

LOL

anon!

G'day all!

I am running a little behind on the PSC for this month. I didn't do one last month - I had plenty to finish off! ANd I am still tweaking this pattern. I should just get over myself and publish it! Ahem!

So, without further ado, I give you

The loaded jeep:


And the lucky winner!


Yep, one of last year's Blue Moon Fiberarts sock club offerings. Excuse the whacky colour - my camera (and every camera I've had) hates these lovely purple colours.


All wound up and ready to go! I just have to find some spare sock needles. I think I've only got one sock on the needles so where did the rest of them run off to? I'd be very happy if they were breeding instead of fleeing but umm well....

In four day old Tour de Fleece news, I spun up and plied with silk and beads the remaining April offering from Tactile's fiber club.


It can now join the pure weld dyed yarn and the single of weld plied with the single of weld/indigo and umm starts with q.


The practice quilt is…