I'm over it

I've had enough of the subzero temps for this winter. It was quite depressing to note the -3 on the car thermometer on my way to work. I am tired of cold hands and feet. The saving grace is the blue, blue sky today. And I heard a cardinal singing when walking to the office from the parking lot this am. Hopefully the bird knows that spring is on the way.

I haven't had the energy for any serious spinning lately so I have been working my way through several shipments of CrossPatch Creations sampler packs from the Bellweather. I love these. They are one ounce samples of various colorways and I can spin them any way I like without worrying about final weight etc. These are pics of my recently completed fourpack. I have another all spun up into singles and waiting to be plyed. I am trying to have a shrinking fiber inventory this year. So far, I have taken in 8 ounces of Merino/tencel from Chameleon Colorworks and have completed these little 1 ounce skeins. Once I ply and wash the others, I will be negative 1 ounce!
Aren't they fun?! I think the black/brown/white will be cuffs for some black mittens/gloves/mitts. I think I have a skein of soft, soft Kimmet Kroft Fibers yarn, or perhaps my black Malabrigo--either will be luscious!

Resolving a crisis of confidence

...or How a good blocking does wonders.

I spend a quiet day at the hospital yesterday and was able to get the stranded part of the Asian-Inspired baby sweater done. It only took about FIVE episodes of the Closer to get through this part of the sweater when I discovered puckering...! Argh.


It is not as visible in this pic as it really appears. I threw it aside, disgusted. Before ripping the whole thing out, I decided to wait until this morning when I could subject it to some serious steam ironing.
Hurray for irons! It looked much better after a little pressing. Enough that I can continue without ripping my hair out.
I have been very frustrated with my knitting these days, perhaps because I am not allowing myself to start new and exciting things, with the exception of the above project. I am trying to get those UFO's done but I am realizing that each is a UFO because it was a problem. With each one, I hit a snag and lost interest in the project. Something about it ruined my ability to see it as a viable finished garment. I may end up frogging more of them then I originally intended. The list in the side bar was culled from all of my UFO's as being the most likely to be completed, but I may find more of them get 'repurposed' then I thought.
Anyway, this project was a roaring success...

Name of Project: Sunrise Scarf

Weave: Plain weave

Warp: Purchased handspun

Weft: Handspun BFL, fiber from the Spunky Eclectic. Worsted spun, 2 ply

Rowan Kidsilk Haze, color Blush

EPI: 12

Width in reed: 10 inches

Finishing: Edged with Herringbone stitch.

Thrown in normal wash cycle, then pressed.

Final Destination: Christmas gift for my mother. She loved it.
And finally, a little handspun I finished before the first of the year. It is a merino/tencel blend from Chameleon Colorworks that I purchased at SOAR 2006. It is navajo-plied to preserve the color changes and I am very happy with it. I don't know the yardage off the top of my head.

Hell week

I am at the end of my third call in the last week. Fortunately, this was a quiet call and we did not a single delivery during the entire 24 hours. The complete opposite of watching the blood flow out of a young woman who did not want to receive blood products. I will never forget the grace and courage with which she and her husband faced the likelihood of her death, just after the birth of their son. Mike writes it off as pure stupidity, bordering on psychosis but I think they have something that many of us strive for but never near. Call it peace, or faith. I don't know, but it was a night I will never forget, and I hope never to repeat!

I am way behind on FOs. Fortunately, there are FOs. I had a big push just before the new year because I wanted to shorten the list of things to finish in the coming year. I want to enter 2010 with no FOs that are older than six months. That seems only fair to the projects that have been languishing in the closet for years.

When my mom visited over Thanksgiving, she fell in love with the yarn I was spinning and I promised a scarf for her for Christmas. The yarn on the left, below, is a 2-ply spun from a Spunky Eclectic club shipment. I think it is BFL. I spun it worsted, to practice that technique, and should have plied it a little more tightly but it ended up working well for this scarf. The warp yarn is on the right, a yarn I purchased on Etsy, I don't recall the seller. I used every last yard of the 200-and-some skein and warped my rigid heddle loom. My handspun, combined with some Rowan Kidsilk Haze, is the weft.

I was so in love with the end result that I could barely part with the scarf. I have enough weft to weave another, if I can find another suitable warp yarn. Ahh, a success!

I carry a thousand thoughts and stories in my head, but when I sit down in front of the computer...nothing.
We have been shivering through a breath of Arctic chill over the last few days. Today, it will warm up to a balmy 11 degrees F. We had a blowing light snow last night. The kind of storm that shocks you because it makes the world seem so silent, even in the middle of a busy city at rush hour. Despite the storm and the driving conditions, there were many cars headed towards Target for after-work Christmas shopping.
Christmas always seems to catch me by surprise, and before long, I am so overwhelmed that I decide that there is really no need to decorate the house, or bake Xmas cookies, or... Over the last few years, Mike and I have been trying to establish some traditions for our family, given our hectic work schedules. This year I am not working on Christmas, and only a 1/2 day on Xmas Eve. We are planning a really nice dinner on the Eve, and then gourmet foods from Zingerman's to snack on for Xmas Day.
Gift knitting is coming along quite well. I had planned two sweaters for E, and am on the first sleeve (body is done) of the second sweater. Pictures to come. Back to the knitting for now!

I just came back from an absolutely wonderful weekend in Chicago with my sister and several of her friends. We shopped, ate and drank--all were done to extremes. Although my sister and her friends are not fiber freaks, they were tolerant of my need to knit and to seek out the nearby yarn stores. I managed to hit three shops, picking up several skeins of yarn at each. The 'moment' of the weekend was during dinner at SusiSamba. My sister and her friend were getting a little heated talking about politics, it was getting a little tense. I, in a slightly drunken stooper, decided to pull out my knitting. THis elicited screams of laughter from the other two women at the table who thought I was making a statement about the political converstation. I just wanted to knit, but it ended up breaking the tension and was really quite funny.

With the flights and early morning awakenings, I managed to cruise along on a sweater for E. She chose the yarn and pattern, but I don't think she will expect the FO as a present under the Christmas tree.

This is a pic of the back. The front has lots of bobbles but I did not think those would be comfortable when sitting in a chair so I omitted them from the back. I am almost done with the back. Then there is a wide ribbing at the waist and a large turtle neck. The body is knit side-to-side. It is going quickly, I started it last Thurs and expect the back to be done today.

The other pic is a little dark but it is a closeup of the Florin vest I knit for a friend's son. A quick, easy knit. This was done in Halcyon yarn's Botanica. I want to do one for me, perhaps in Cascade 220.

We ARE a country that can put aside our fears and our prejudices. WOW!
A finished Christmas present. Okay, almost finished. A few ends to weave in and loopy detail to add at one end. This is the Stone City Scarf from the most recent Interweave Crochet. I used Noro Silk Garden Sock, about 1 and 1/4 skeins. It is destined for my friend Doneka. A quick and satisfying project, great for dragging to E's after-school activities.

Today is the long-awaited end to the election season. I've voted, and am so glad to be done with all of this that I really don't care who wins. Two years of campaigning! There ought to be term limits on a campaign!

Time flies between posts, as usual. I've had a lot of fiber fun over the last several months. I spent several days in both Sept and October playing around with natural dyes. I pulled my recipes from various books, mostly relying on Trudy Van Strachen's book and was (mostly) delighted with the results.


These are various skeins of handspun shetland, in various natural colors, that I started throwing into the exhaust baths of various dyes including cochineal, and logwood. I love how many colors you can acheive by varying the mordant or the after-bath. I especially love ammonia dips, probably because I like the whole red-blue-violet spectrum.

These are the mini-skeins of Belle yarn, several dyed with cochineal, one with logwood, and one with weld. I am very happy with the results and am planning to knit these mittens with this yarn.

This very dark picture shows mini- skeins of merino lace-weight yarn dyed with Brazilwood, with a number of different mordants and afterbaths. Each skein is about 200 yds and they look beautiful together. I have no idea what I will do with them. I also managed to spend some time at the Textile Center and carded some of my Shetland-Border Leicester fleece. I spun this beautiful worsted-weight yarn that is soft and spring-y. I can't wait to get back to carding somemore of this fleece so I can really get going with the spinning.

I have been surprisingly productive with knitting and weaving for Christmas presents as well. I am well into my list of projects and may add a few more if this pace continues. I need to get pictures of the WIPs for my next post.