Some Fools Never Learn

Fleece. Are you one of those people who's ears perk up at the mere sound of the word? Who start to imagine what type of fleece it is? What color, the crimp, is it full of VM or is it pretty much free of hay and other "stuff". Do you wonder if it's long or short, double coated or single? Do you wonder if there "might" be something you can't resist available for sale, and you know you have lots of fiber to last you for months, yet you still go and look? Excuse me, I need to put something in the wash tub.....
Now, what was I saying?? Oh, yeah, ... lets say for instance that you can buy a raffle ticket (for charity) and the prize was a fleece? Well that (it IS for charity) is the icing on the cake now, isn't it? So how many tickets would you buy?
This love of fleece when combined with a love (dare I say passion?) for prepared, colored to perfection, blended, and put in a ready to spin format that certain adored people would give us the opportunity to purchase, leads one to having a LOT of fiber about. *Sigh* I stand before you now and say, "Hi, my name is Barb, and I am a fiber junkie".

My hands feel so soft and smooth right now. Everyone, meet Wingnut. She goes well with this screwball spinner.


On the left top we have Wingnut layed out, looking for felted bits, chunks of VM, second cuts, and other "stuff" that I don't care to spin. This is a very clean fleece as far as hay and other VM goes, but there's lots of lanolin and dust in it. Under that more to the center, Missy is getting her photo taken with Wingnut. She knows she will see more of this wool later. At the bottom in the blue tub we have Wingnut with her second washing - which is more of a rinse. The first washing was with Kookaburra WoolWash. I really like the stuff. Wingnut has got some tips on her wool that need a good soak, so they're going to sit in the water overnight. The heat of the day tomorrow should help them relax too. I'll check it when I come home from work tomorrow. Good thing my wonderful husband, Wayne, gave me a large cabinet for fiber. I did a felting test, she felts. She's very shiny and has fine fibers without tight crimp. I've sent an email to the person "in the know" at Kelsey Creek Farm to see if she can give me the scoop on this sheep. It seems that Wingnut comes to the farm for her haircuts for their Wild and Wooly days events, but she's not a permanent resident there.

I did turn in the sweater to the Monroe Fair (Evergreen State Fair) as well as a few skeins of yarn. We will see how they do. I go in the evening of the 25th to do a spinning demo. I'll check the show hall and see what's going on then.

We did a lot of work outside around our pond this weekend. I'll have to update you on the pond project later this week!

Progress Report

I've been working on the Diamond Fantasy Shawl, though it's been slower than I was hoping for. Work and other happenings have been in the way of my knitting - imagine that!
I'm not knitting tonight because I had a root canal done today, and I'm taking a bit of that pain medication that I almost didn't pick up. You know, when you are numb and feel no pain - you don't think you'll need anything to take the edge off later on? I almost gave into that thought. The doctor was more than willing to do what it took to keep it from hurting - but still said I was a tough one to get the pain gone. We ended up doing progressively different techniques to get the pain down. I've never got a shot in the roof of the mouth before, and he pulled out some shot gizmos that were to use between teeth - I didn't get to see how it worked but it looked weird. Anyway, thankfully, he got it to where it didn't hurt! I think this is the first time I didn't just claw the seat and pray for a quick end to the procedure. So three hours after the surgery I was loosing the numb and feeling the pain. Glad I got a couple pain pills to take the edge off at least for tonight. Doc promised when I go back in a month to get the permanent filling in the crown, that it will be a cake walk compared to today. Whew!
So, here's your reward for hearing about my tooth :-) The shawl.... you probably won't get close ups as it gets bigger - it won't fit in the view finder for long and I'll have to back out :-) Sheila Ernst needles are working perfectly for this project. Double click on the photo and take a closer look at the magic she's done. I am in awe every time I hold them. You have to love Lisa Souza's Olive Tones in Merino Sock! too. Check out how the little bronze bits work into the shawl. You know their links are on my blog - check them out if you haven't already. Yes, we do have fall leaves and bears on our bed sheets LOL! Now you know!

Triple Decker

Well it was a busy day on the deck! I finished plying some Electra Lite, I had a couple small center pull balls of Earth Birth that I plied, and I spun a bobbin of superwash grey top and plied it with the two other bobbins. Whew!

So here's a picture of the yarns in that order. The grey yarn is going to be a sweater for my husband. I know which one it will be now, thanks to Lisa for pointing out a new sweater by the Needle Beetle! It's called Salmon Run Expect to see work in progress on this yarn and eventually the sweater. This is going to be great!

I'm still working on the Diamond Fantasy Shawl. This is a photo taken about four days ago. I'll have to get you another photo soon, it's gotten bigger! In fact this photo only has 4 stitch markers on the shawl. I'm up to six now, which means I've completed a repeated section and I'm working on another since the photo was taken. When it gets wider though, the rows get longer, and it takes me longer to complete a repeated section :-) So if you're knitting up one of these wonderful shawls, the stitch marker count means very little - it's a mental thing.

Weekend Update

Sorry - no images this time, Blogger isn't loading them for me :-( Follow some of the links for some pics!

It was a very busy weekend we just had. Huh? It's Tuesday already! Yes, time flies when you have lots to do. Lets see if I can give you a summary of the events without going on for pages :-)
Friday after work, I went to visit a sick friend. Bubba is his name, and he was feeling poorly for a few days. He's taken his medicine and the vet predicts he will make a good recovery. Bubba is an Eclectus parrot. (He keeps my sister Tina as a pet). After my visit with Bubba, I headed out to the Wool Mill to pickup batts of Romney Lamb fleece. It turned out beautiful and soft. It's a light brown color that I will probably spin as is without dying it. There's enough there for another sweater, so who knows! The trip for the wool was 45 minutes there, and 20 minutes back. It just goes to show how bad traffic is around here, even after 7 at night.

Saturday morning I worked on fixing up my Schacht single treadle spinning wheel, Goldie, to get some shine back on it, and to replace the treadle clips on the treadle. I am going to be selling the wheel and my thoughts are to take it to OFFF and see if I can sell it there. My friend Jen, asked if she could try it out, so I wanted it to be pretty for her. After Jen tries it a few days, it is going to go visit with my other friend, Kim! Kim says she has fiber that wants to be spun and Goldie is looking to spin some fiber. It should be a great match until OFFF. Goldie has been a great wheel for me, but I have found that I really prefer double treadle wheels. Anyway, Goldie and I have had a great relationship and she's done well for me. She spun the yarn that is in my sweater. I know she will be happy for the attention she'll get at Jen and Kim's. She's been sitting like a wall flower in my house since I got my Frickie wheel.

Saturday afternoon I got to go meet my new dentist. We won't drill into that, lets just say that I predict some time in the chair soon. They think they see the root of the problem and are abscessed with drilling to the heart of the issue. Hopefully the balancing of the two pressures - work and ..... well, yeah, the pressures will stay low for awhile so there will be time to take care of all on my schedule. Saturday evening we cooked Salmon on the barbecue for dinner and then I packed my bags and headed to my parents home and spent the night. My husband and son stayed home, so it was a 2 hour drive on my own. I cranked up the radio and got there about 11 at night.

Sunday was a very special day. I gave Stacy the yarn that I had spun and dyed. I put it into balls for her, and it's amazing how the colors look when they are all mixed up in the ball. She was very happy with it, and she showed me some of the baby soakers she has been knitting. She's very talented. I can't wait to see some of it knit up. There was a family picnic over at the river that afternoon. My Mom, my sister Sandy, and I worked in the kitchen putting together fruit salad, cucumber salad, chicken, and coleslaw. There was a nice turn out at the picnic with lots of family I hadn't seen in a long while. As you saw in my earlier post, I broke out the spinning wheel to show Stacy. It was nice to see the kids interest in the wheel, but Rowan stayed and used his hand to help me turn the wheel. We just had to make sure he was on the side where him helping made the wheel turn the right direction :-)

Mom sent home treasures from the garden like fresh onions, zucchini, beets, and turnips. She also sent home fresh freezer jam and raspberries! There were a dozen baby chicks running around with a little banty hen. Little fluff balls that looked like the wind could blow them right over. The drive home was one big traffic jam, but I got home about 9:30.

When I arrived home I found a package waiting for me from my friend Sheila Ernst! I dropped everything and see what she sent. It was a pair of glass circular needles! Just the right size for the shawl I'm working on, and oh so pretty! I've been testing out her glass needles for awhile now, but these were just right for the Diamond Fantasy Shawl by Sivia Harding that I'm knitting. I slipped them right in, replacing the Addi Turbo's I was using. I love the points on these glass needles, they get right in under the stitch with ease. What a great weekend.

A Spinner in the Making

What a fabulous weekend! Here's a couple pictures of Rowan, my nephew who is a budding young spinner. He absolutely loved my wheel and it was a pleasure to watch him learning how it works. He is so fun.



I will update the blog later this week with happenings from the weekend. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend as well.

Barb

Port Orford Pullover Finished!

I put the finishing stitches on the Oat Couture, Port Orford Pullover last night. Today has been pretty warm, so I washed and laid out the sweater to dry today, and it is now done!

This is my first large handspun knitted garmet. I am so pleased with how it turned out. The fiber is Blue Faced Leicester that I bought from Lisa Souza. She dyed it in the colorway called Emerald City. I spun it in a three ply yarn, with no special thought to how the colors were plied together. I spun all 2 pounds of fiber up before I started knitting the swatch. I ended up with a good portion of my last skein left over. I thought I was putting 3/4 length sleeves on it, but after washing and laying flat today, it seems the yarn relaxed a bit and I have pretty much normal length sleeves :-) That's okay, I just didn't want sleeves I had to continuously push back. I tend to end up with extra long sleeves. Maybe I learned the secret to getting them just right.

Here's a couple photos. I don't think you will catch me wearing this for a few months yet, but I couldn't resist putting it on to show you. I'm so happy.


Above - The side view
and over here ---------> How big is my love of the Emerald City colorway??? This big!!

Lucky Day

I went out to mow the lawn this afternoon. The weather was perfect and the lawn needed mowing badly. Do you ever feel lucky just to be out mowing the lawn? Well I did. I was mowing away and looked down and found a four leaf clover. Here's a photo of the find :-)

I haven't introduced the birds!

Kiwi is a Quaker Parakeet and she's very talkative and sweet. She's laid a few eggs over the 11 years we've had her. She loves to cluck and say her name. We tried to teach her how to call the cat, but instead of here kitty, kitty, kitty... she says here Kiwi, Kiwi, Kiwi... It's pretty funny.

JoJo is a Jardine's Parrot. He is 7 years old and he's very smart. He learned how to say "fly JoJo!" and put his wings up in the air. He loves to dance to music and will knock on the cage or on the perch when he's excited. He says his name, barks like a dog, and coughs and sneezes whenever anyone around him coughs or sneezes.

Falco is a Congo African Grey Parrot. He is disabled but he doesn't know it. His parents took his toes off while he was being raised in their nest about 6 years ago. They did that to the whole clutch of babies. He gets around just fine since I have large flat corner perches for him in his cage, and he climbs using his beak and feet to get up and down from the bottom of the cage to the corner perches. He's in the mood in this picture. You see he's got his wings all displayed - he's trying to regurgitate something "yummy" for me.... that's love in the bird world. Falco is the big talker of the group. He learned the Fly JoJo from JoJo, and does his own rendition of Fly Falco! (also lifting the wings and bobbing his head). He makes cat noises, calls the dog, says "baaaaad dog!" and other things like "how are you?"

Adventures in Dyeing!!!

I wanted to use Kool Aid to dye some yarn for my niece's baby. I went to the wonderful group of friends I have online to see if my idea on using the heat/sun of the day to dye with Kool Aid would work. As usual, my friends came through with ideas and suggestions that were very helpful. What a supportive group! The only flaw in my plan was that that today the heat wave was not in sight and there would be no sun to heat the black plastic to set my dye.

Undaunted, I turned to another source of heat, which would hold the yarn in a somewhat flat and fixed position so the colors would not blend as much when being heated. The outdoor gas barbecue seemed the perfect solution. Here are the photos and some descriptions of the process.

Soak & vinegar: I soaked the approx. 1 pound of spun yarn in a bucket of cool water, with about a cup of white vinegar in the water. I soaked the yarn for about 3 hours. I finally found a use for the ash tray we've had kicking about the deck! It made a great weight for the yarn in the water.

Protect Furniture: I put down a black plastic bag and arranged the skeins on the plastic so I could work on all three skeins at once. Two skeins are the same size, the third is smaller. There is a fourth on the left side that is just odds and ends off my bobbins. The skeins were very slightly squeezed coming out of the soak bucket, but not wrung out. I wanted them to be soppy wet and they needed to still have the vinegar content in them.

Apply Dye: I opened packets of Kool Aid and poured them over the wet skeins. I used 20 packets of Kool Aid to start, but ended up using 23 total. I had Lemon Aid, Cherry, Lemon-Lime, Watermellon-Strawberry, Artic Apple, Black Cherry, Grape, and Berry Blast. I sprinkled them directly on the wet yarn. Then I put some foil over the top and squished the yarn down to move some of the dye throughout the lower parts of the yarn.

Heat: I then slid the colored yarn onto some foil on the barbecue. I did get the colors mixed a little doing this. Had I thought ahead, I could have done the coloring on the foil on a cutting board or a cookie sheet and slid it onto the barbecue from there. I covered the fiber with more foil.

I turned the barbecue on low - all four burners, closed the lid and waited for 10 minutes. Then I turned it off and let it sit for about 15 minutes before I checked the yarn.

Check Progress: I checked the yarn, and it looked good as far as taking up the dye. However there were more white spots than I wanted. So I added 3 more packets of Lemon Aid color to the bare spots, sprinkled some water over the added Kool Aid, covered again, and heated for about 3 minutes then turned off the barbecue and let it sit about 30 minutes.

Cool & Rinse: I felt the yarn was cool enough for rinsing, so I put it in a bucket of clear water. There was a little yellow run off from the corners of the foil that had yellow that didn't touch the yarn. All of the dye on the yarn was absorbed into the yarn. The Artic Apple has a white cast to the Kool Aid drink (my son insisted we make some to "use") and I don't think I'd recommend the Artic Apple for dying. The water had a white milky cast to it for the rinse.

Enjoy: Here are the drying skeins of dyed yarn!

Back from the Beach!

We spent a few days at Grays Harbor State Park camping this week. It was a lot of fun and boy was the weather nice! Stacy I have some yarn for you! But it's not dyed yet.... that will happen shortly. I've got about 6 more ounces of Corridale Cross top to spin for you before that happens. Here's a photo of the three ply yarn that is done so far. It's very soft and I think it will work fine for your knitted baby soakers. It will felt! So you can decide if you want to knit it big and felt it for your baby, or if you want to hand wash it so it won't felt. I'm just tickled to get to spin it for you. Um, right now it may smell a little like camp fire smoke, but I didn't take it with me when we were crabbing, so it won't smell like crab bait :-)

A friend at work asked if I knit all the time. She heard me talking about having my husband drive so I could knit, and was amazed that I knit in the car, and in restaurants, etc. Well we went crabbing at Westport and this photo may answer some of her questions! It's not that I'm a knitaholic, no, it's just that I like to be "doing" something while I wait. Waiting for crabs, well that's pretty much as waiting as it gets. It was a blast! We caught lots of little rock crabs, and dungeness crabs. None were keepers, but that didn't make it less fun to pull up the line or net and see what was there. Now this photo really looks like I was just sitting and my Dad in the background is doing all the work, but my job as a the chair anchor is not to be poo'd. We had gusts of wind blow our chairs right into the harbor and so I was sitting with my feet on the bottom rung of Dad's and my Husband's chairs. A very important job indeed.

Anyway, I got a lot done on my Gathered Garter Shawl by Sandra Hicks (Knit One crochet Too pattern). I'm working it in a special request of St. Valentines colorway that Lisa Souza did for me. I had her add some white spots in it and I've dubbed it "Fire and Ice" since she did it special for me - I can get away calling it what I want :-) I'm getting some Little Devil colorway for the ruffle at the bottom. I think it will look fabulous with the red rose button Sheila Ernst did for me. I put her up to making something called "Midnight Romance" in a button. It's a red rose with a dark blue background and some stars.... I'll show you the whole effect when it's done. Right now I'm working on miles of garter stitch. It's a good thing my friends have told me that a lot of beautiful, practical, going to be worn, knitting has miles of boring knitting in it. This has plenty of that!

Just so you know we had fun besides of the fibery sort - here's a glamour shot of my Mom, my Sister, and my beautiful feet! LOL! We girls - we know how to have fun camping! My Sister's kite is a beauty, so I have to show you that! And we have our dog corral photo, where the dogs spent very little time. They had a fun trip too.

Dutch Oven Cooking

We bought our first Dutch Oven for camping last week. We gave it a trial run with Swedish Meat balls and some steak cut french fries. It turned out pretty good. It gives me hope that I can become a good cook with this heavy metal pot. We found some recipes that sound pretty great as well.

I've been making stitch markers lately and I caught one in action the other day. This is one of Sheila Ernst's beads helping me with a shorty sock I'm knitting. I should have this pair of socks done in the next couple days. I can hardly wait to wear them! They feel really nice and thick. I'm knitting them on size zero 12" circulars. I got some new wire for making markers and I think I'll play around with it and see if I can come up with another style of marker. There's sure a lot of interest in beads, and there are lots of supplies and information available right now. It's fun to try a few new techniques to see what happens. I'll get some photos up if I get something done up to show and tell this next week.

I'm still spinning some Corridale Cross for Stacy, one of my Nieces. It's going to be so pretty and soft. I've almost got one bobbin full, and I need two more before I start to ply. I'm going to color it with Koolaid dying. A friend suggested I do a rainbow effect and let some of the colors blend together where they meet so it gives even more color variations. It sounds like a fun project. I have Cherry, Lemon Aid, and Lime flavors. I think there's some grape and blue raspberry too. Hopefully I've got some orange around too. It's amazing what colors you can find in your local supermarket! I am sure there are lots of great instructions for doing this on the internet already, so I won't give the directions here unless you need/want me to. However, I'm getting ahead of myself! First I want to spin the wool into yarn, and then dye it. Many times I dye the wool and then spin it, but this time I'm going the opposite route. Just to shake things up!

Tune in next week for "Adventures in Dying!"

Day on the Deck

Today was beautiful so I moved outside on the deck with my spinning and beading. I was amazed how much spinning I got finished up. There's some mohair/wool blend who's color is called Silver. It is some fiber I picked up at the Black Sheep Gathering from Bear Dog Yarns, from the Schildt Ranch. There's 12 ounces of it spun up, washed, and dried in a worsted weight yarn (2 ply). The other yarn is some of the blend of fibers I got back from the processor's. I spun it as rustic as I dared - trying for lumpy and fuzzy bits. It's going to be for a rug and/or weaving depending on how much I end up with. It's really fun to spin in this carefree fashion, and the yarn turned out cool looking. I'll need to dye it before I knit it, so I'll probably be letting you know how that goes. Don't worry Stacy, I'm cleaning off my bobbins for your yarn! Promise! I've got a pound of wonderful soft white Corridale Cross that's got your name on it.

Ahhh... the beads. Sheila is amazing! I kept finding my favorite one, until I did the next one which became my favorite. I ended up making 2 dozen of my favorites :-) Here's a picture of my tools and setup.

I'm on sock #2 of some ankle length socks I'm knitting right now. I'm doing the heel, so just about to make that turn and race for the toe. I'm looking forward to wearing these. I needed some dark colored socks - and these are black, dark green, and brown. Very good colors for my work shoes. Sorry no photo of these, but I'm sure you'll see them pretty soon when they are completed.

In the better late than never category, I finally planted the dahlias that Mom gave me! They have been in my garage in the window for a while. They were looking so sad that I hadn't planted them yet, so today they got their wish. I cleaned out the plastic whisky barrel tubs and found that last year's dahlias had been trying to come back in one of the tubs. The darn slugs were eating them down! So I added fertilizer to the soil and got it all worked in. Planted two plants per pot and watered them in well. Tomato cages are in the planters to help keep the dahlias from falling over. The system worked really well last year, but I planted three plants per planter, which was pretty crowded. So today was wonderful, even though I ended up with a pretty decent sunburn, I feel like I got a lot of neat things done. I will sleep well tonight :-)

Walk Photos

My husband, Missy and I went for a walk today. Here's some photos of the flowers and critters we found along the trail. Enjoy!



Here's some plants in our front yard. The white one is very lacy and smells sweet. I don't know what it is called. The blue hydrangea takes up the whole front flowerbed. It's always a nice shade of blue.

Sky Drama Plied

The Sky Drama fiber is officially yarn! Forgive the disheveled state of the skein, I used a small knitty noddy (a form that you wrap yarn around to make a skein) and so the skein itself is hard to really show off. There are 8 ounces all in one skein! There's a lot of yarn here. When it's thoroughly dried (it's a wee bit damp still) I'll use the yarn meter to see how many feet/yards I have here. Anyway, I'm very pleased with how it turned out. Lisa Souza dyed the fiber, and Sheila Ernst had it with her for sale when she was at the Seattle Fiber Expo. So through some of my favorite people, I came to have this wonderful fiber to spin. Once I know my yardage I can make the final decision on what I'm going to knit with this beautiful yarn.

Well today is a rare day indeed. First of all I had the day off from work (I took a vacation day) and I was honored to be sought out for some attention from Emma, our cat. She really prefers the men of this house, but today she lowered her standards and came and wanted me to pet her. I have evidence of her actually being held of her own free will, but she didn't like the flash.

I was outside spinning this morning and it started to rain. I adjusted the picnic table umbrella and tried to continue spinning. It worked for quite awhile, but then the rain came harder and I came inside with my wheel. Sure wish we had a covered deck. The lighting is so nice outside. I can hear the birds and the rain was fun until my wheel started getting splashed. Hopefully someday when we build our home in the country, we'll have a covered porch area where I can spin.

Tomorrow is my last day off and then I have to go back to work on Friday. I think I'll try and see the Pirates movie tomorrow. I have some spinning I'm looking forward to doing for my niece - she's wanting to knit soakers for her expected baby. I've got lots of wool about, so this is a win/win for me!

Out to Ply

I had to work today, but I got some free time too! My mission was to finish spinning the singles of Lisa Souza's Sky Drama fiber in a 50/50 Merino/Silk blend. I've been spinning it off and on for some time, and today felt like the day to get to the plying. It was a beautiful day so I took my wheel outside and spun for a few hours. I actually got the last of the fiber spun, and I am now in the plying phase.
For those who are not spinners, when you spin wool (or fibers) into yarn you spin a single strand of fiber. Then most of the time (for me) you take two or more of those singles and ply them together into a 2-ply, 3-ply, 4-ply, etc. yarn. I sort of like the 3-ply variety most of the time, but with this Merino/Silk I'm making a 2-ply yarn.

There is a photo of the Level Winder (my newest spinning tool) on my wheel above. The round eye moves back and forth like a fishing reel winder. The wheel is made by Curt Fricke. I paid a little more to have a round orifice where the yarn or single enters to be spun. Both the Level Winder and the Fricke wheel come with a triangle orifice called a delta orifice. I like the round one better, so I upgraded.

Check out the difference between the two bobbins of singles that are on the lazy kate (a holder that keeps them still while you ply). The one that is a plastic bobbin is done without a Level Winder. The wooden one is done with a Level Winder.

Missy helped me outside today. She found a hotdog bun we threw over to the wild birds (moments after it was tossed) and here's a photo of her carrying it about worried about where she is going to stash her prize. I took a photo where she was hiding it, just in case she forgets later.

Today was Uncle Clarence's birthday party and I had to miss it. I'm really sad I couldn't be there. He's a very special Uncle and I really love him a lot. I hope he had a wonderful birthday party. Sounds like it was going to be outside, so I'm sure he had lovely weather and a great turnout for it. He has always loved horses, and so have I. He sure has made some powerful memories of horseback rides and how to tell a great story. He's still tells wonderful stories in his own special way. He is such a big part of the community where he lives and takes time to support the kids in the community by going to many of their games and cheering them on. His kids and grand kids have long since graduated, he goes because he cares about the community and supports the youth programs where kids learn teamwork and leadership. What a great Uncle!

Below is a quick shot of the Diamond Fantasy Shawl I started knitting with a group of friends. The yarn is some of Lisa Souza's called Olive Tones in Sock!. I've got a long ways to go yet, but this is an example of how the beads look with the yarn.

To Blog or Not to Blog

Well I've had this blog for awhile and never really done much with it. I've thought about blogging and then I've thought about not blogging. As you can see being indecisive is it's own decision, thus no blog entries. I've had the blog but have not used it. Well perhaps I will try the other side of blogging for awhile and see how it goes.

If you have all your photos organized and put where they belong, well..... you are an amazing being or else you don't take enough photos! Anyway, here's some of my photos for you.

Chickens at the folks 2005, Shetlands & Sam at OFFF 2005 , Olive Tones Sock! from Lisa Souza, going to be a Diamond Fantasy Shawl

So, the weekend is here and so am I. This is always a good thing. However the weekend will be shorter than usual for me, I am going in to work on Sunday. Going to learn more about my job and what I need to know for a new position coming up. I'm pretty excited about it, so going in will be fun since it's going to lead to more learning and knowledge overall.

I spin wool into yarn (sometimes into knots) and I knit with it (the yarn that is). I have a good quantity of wool that is going to need spun when it comes back from the cleaners! Okay - wool processors - where they wash the sheeps fleece clean, comb it or card it to straighten it into a uniform group of wool fibers, and get it ready to be spun. I can do that myself, except it takes a lot of doing and the fun is in the spinning and knitting in my book. I still have all the equipment to do the cleaning and combing, and I do that to smaller fleeces or to blend different types of fibers such as different sheep wools have different textures, or different animals fibers (goats, bunnies, dogs, plants, silk, alpaca, etc) can be blended together. Then there is the options for coloring that fiber too! There is an endless amount of possibilities when you spin your own :-)

Okay, there's a blog for the "other" side of the fence on if I should blog or not. I'll post this and see how it feels :-)

Thought of the day - Life is to short to be cranky for long.

PS: Hannah doesn't say "Hi" she says "Preeeeeetttttttyyyyy Birrrrrrrrrd" and she's right!