As promised, a picture of my little navajo plyed skein of Border Leicester. That navajo plying is pretty darn cool, I'm definitely going to have to do that again. And the Border Leicester was really greasy for some reason, like it had a whole lot of lanolin still in it, which was actually probably pretty good for my poor chapped hands. Too bad I didn't have enough for a nice little waterproof hat or something. Not quite sure what I'm going to do with it, other than go "ooooh, navajo plying...."

And we also have here my beautiful merino from Grafton Fibers, complete with a nice little skein of singles that's just waiting to have the twist set (I'm waiting until I have another so I can just do two at a time). You can't really tell from the picture, but this batch of M30 (I bought two batts, just to be sure I had enough) has a lot more yellow in it than the last one did (I don't think there was any yellow at all). It's spinning up kind of cool, and I'm amazed how quickly I actually can spin on that drop spindle. Of course, I should be doing lots of other things, but what the heck, right? You can also see the middle of the shawl that I'm making out of the M30 I've spun already (it's the Estonian shawl from the Scarf Style book), I'm pretty tickled with how the turquoise stripe ended up right in the perfect place. There's a detail of the stitches underneath, since it didn't capture very well in the first picture. I was going to do it for the spindlicity shawl contest, but I don't think there's any way I'll have it finished in time, unfortunately. I may have to call it the "Grand Canyon" shawl, since it reminds me of nothing so much as the wonderful sediment striations that you see at the Grand Canyon (or in my case, see pictures of, since I've never actually been to the Grand Canyon).

And in other news, we are still waiting... and waiting.... and waiting.... to hear from Google. Supposedly tomorrow now we'll hear something, though I know I won't be surprised (just extremely frustrated) if tomorrow comes and goes with no new news. I'm ready to start scouting houses in Minneapolis, but we've got to wait, it still might happen with Google, you never know. And in my agitated state, I'm having a very hard time concentrating, so am doing lots of spinning and spindling so that I don't absolutely lose my mind. My studies are suffering, but my fiber has never looked better.

The spinning is going really well, I'm kind of amazed how quickly I'm getting the hang of it. Today I spun up a little baggie of Border Leicester on the spinning wheel, just to see if I could get a thinner single. I had some remarkable success! I did a lot more predrafting than I had been doing, and I think that it made a huge amount of difference. And I'm sure it helped that the Border Leicester was so airy and fluffy, I could really see what I was doing. I got some pretty fine singles out of it, and then tried my hand at navajo plying, which I'm just kind of amazed by. It worked out really well and I now have a skinny little skein of triple plied yarn that's probably just a tad thinner than worsted weight. Aw yeah. I'll put up some pics once the sun comes up again.

My dyeing went... ok... I didn't get the wonderful saturation of color that I got the last time, so I may soak the 4 skeins that were supposed to be my wonderful "spring twilight" colorway and try my hand at it again. Obviously I need to use more Wiltons per cup of water, these came out much more pastel colored (though not really pastel) and as a result the bright green doesn't really pop like it did the last time. Eh, live and learn. I did, however, get some very RED yarn with black cherry KoolAid, and two pinks to pick from from pink lemonade KoolAid and rose Wiltons (someone's ordered a pink baby hat, so I thought I'd play a little bit). My first little bundle of wheel spun yarn came out a wonderful cinnamon-orangy color, very nice. not sure what I'm going to do with just under 50 yards of super bulky, but I guess I'll find something to do with it (skinny scarf maybe?). That's it soaking in some brown Wiltons (looks like ramen noodles on steroids). And that's the finished lovely on the right. Isn't it purdy?

And in non fiber related news, we are STILL waiting to hear back from Google, who I am convinced is out to ruin my mental health by not just telling us that Hakan didn't get the job and allowing us to get on with our lives. I am mentally scouting real estate in Minneapolis, just to prepare myself for the inevitability that we'll be moving there over the summer. Not that that's a bad thing, but wow, it's going to be hard to leave everything behind if this Google job doesn't pan out. Hopefully they'll let us know tomorrow, I may have an ulcer by then, but hopefully it'll only be a small one.

After much lusting after spinning wheels (and much productive time spent drooling over them on the internet) I now own my very own! Ladies and gents, I introduce you to my very own little Ashford Traveler, circa the mid to late 1970s (my own vintage, btw). Ain't she a beauty? Wonderful Katherine bought her for me (I love ebay so much it hurts), and after a few unsuccessful to get some yarn out of her, we've now become good friends. And there she sits, in the middle of the chaos of my kitchen, like the perfectly lovely gal she is. I don't actually spin right there, I sit on the ottoman (which is ironically full of yarn I have yet to use) in the chaos that is my living room and spin while I listen to reruns on television.
And what did I manage to make with my lovely little Ashford Traveler? you ask. I made some lovely merino and some lovely merino and other soft stuff yarn. Behold it's glory on the left, and a pretty little close-up below that. Three fat little skeins of soft fluffy stuff, plied and happy. I'm thinking they might like to be some fun psychadellic color, and I've got a whole cupboard full of Koolaid and Wiltons just dying to be dye, but I'll decide that when it's lighter out. No clue what I'm going to do with the yarn, since there's not all that much there (and it's probably close to super-bulky weight, since it's my first yarn and all), but maybe when I've got some more I can make a nice bulky hat or something. My mom is dying to play with it, which is probably good, since to me, it looks like nothing so much as those cords that you use to tie back your curtains.
My spindling for the shawl contest is going well, too. I'll have to post a picture of what I've got so far one of these days. I'm using merino from Grafton Fibers in "M30", gorgeous brown with turquoise running through it. The stuff I just got has an awful lot of yellow in it, so we'll have to see how it blends in with the other stuff. Now I'm just waiting on my niddy noddy (finally got a full sized one since those little fatty skeins I was getting off the "traveler's" niddy noddy I already had were getting a little silly) so I can set the twist and get to knitting with the rest of it. No doubt spring will appear as soon as I get it finished and I'll have to wait until next winter to use it, but that's ok, I plan on keeping it for a nice long while!
And, just for fun, a gratutitous picture of my little boy, drooling and looking like a linebacker in a sweater I did not make for him (but isn't it cute anyway?).

Holy cow, how much do I LOVE this merino I got from Grafton Fibers? If I were clever, I'd have some kind of cute "count the ways" kind of poem, but let's just say it rocks. It rocks big time. It practically spins itself and it's GORGEOUS (did i mention that?). My mom just held the wonderful soft batt of it last night, petting it like it was a kitty (and actually, it feels a lot like a kitty, all soft and kinda heavy and nice). I've got high hopes for spinning it all up and turning it into the wonderful Estonian shawl in the Scarf Style book. I wish I had a picture, but my memory card is all full and anyway, I'm having a hard time getting the colors to come up correctly, but it's the beautiful brownish with blue in the picture a few posts down, in the lovely sun-lit box all snuggled up with the blue and green.
And the hats are just knitting themselves, one down, five or six to go (gotta go check my order table). It's just so pretty, got this wonderful sheen to it and so super soft, I hope the recipients like them. The hard part will be deciding which ones to replicate, which dyes worked the best. Oddly, the violet that I liked the best doesn't have any takers yet. Oh well, I guess Oliver will be getting a violet hat!

What you see on the left is the product of my spindling thus far. In the top row you have two skeins of lincoln (a little on on top of a big one), merino single (that is just so pretty, I may leave it as a single), something funky and dyed that my mom gave me for christmas, plyed, and a little test skein from silk caps that I bought from Spinning Bunny off ebay. I'm going to swatch it up and see what it does, I'm very intrigued by it.

This is a dark closeup of the little mini-skein. It was kind of weird working with it, the thicker sections were very reluctant to stay twisted, but I like it a lot all plyed up like it is. I may have to try dyeing some of my own, after seeing how wonderfully it spins up, even looking kind of funny on the caps, I'm pretty confidant of getting something kind of cool out of it. Plus, I've had a few people request hats made out of something other than wool, so I though silk or cotton would be a nice option. I've GOT to get that spinning wheel, it just takes too long to spindle it to make it at all cost effective. But, special request, we shall see. I've got to figure out how to measure my yardage and test the gauge...

And here's my little project, all skeined up. I've really pleased with some of it. We've got Wiltons "garden colors", Wiltons purples and blues, strawberry Kool-Aid, Wiltons violet, Wiltons violet and royal blue, Wiltons violet and sky blue, and Wiltons purples, blues, and green. I'm just tickled to death with the way the purples, blues, and green came out, it looks great all skeined up like that, MUCH better than it looked drying over the shower rod. I listed them online and so far, I've gotten the most response to the strawberry, so I may have to do another few skeins of that. I also had a special request for pink, so I'll have to try that, maybe later on this evening. The Kool-Aid one color dyeing is just so easy, and so incredibly satisfying. Like all the other fiber arts, it's totally addictive.

My meeting with my advisor went amazingly well. She added a few books to my lists, but was so understanding of the difficulties you encounter having a youngster in daycare bringing home all those germs. And my other committee members were also pretty pleased with my lists, so I may just get these exams taken before my hair goes entirely gray (if the exams don't make that happen!).

So I decided to swallow my fear (of what?) and do some KoolAid and Wiltons dyeing. The Joann's over in the Waterworks is going out of business, so I stocked up on Wiltons and undyed wool (seriously, like $3.50 a skein, what a steal!). I decided to start with the Wiltons and do half my skeins (I bought 14). My first little beauty didn't come out as anticipated, but it's ok. The microwaving method DID NOT work for me (plastic wrap popped in the microwave and I had Wiltons everywhere, made a pretty paper towel, though). Steaming on the stove seems to have worked a bit better, but I wasn't as good at getting the color all the way through, so it's a little funny looking with those white patches in there. I was blown away by the violet, though. I'd been hearing about how it "splits" and I love it! my attempt to dye the skeins all wrapped up didn't come out as well, but I overdyed them with sky blue and royal blue, and oddly they came out the same color.
So, from left to right hanging over the shower rod, we've got all Wilton's, except for the red/pink one in the middle, which is strawberry KoolAid. The second from the right is Wilton's violet, and I LOVE the way it split. the two blue and purple ones on the left are violet and sky blue, on the left, and violet and royal blue, on the right. Funny, they look the same in that picture... I'll have to upload another one once they're all skeined up and dry. The one to the right of the KoolAid one is my first attempt, the one that exploded in the microwave. Damn thing was impossible to wash clear, it's still dripping yellow!
Eh, what can you do, right? I've got a nice batt of merino and mohair that my mom got me for Christmas that's just beggint to be dyed, and I just can't decide what to do with it. Maybe I'll try painting with KoolAid next, since I'm pretty tickled with that red/pink one. These are all destined to be hats. Maybe I can sell them as "designer originals" or something!

A brand new blog for a brand new year. I'm returning back to school this week and Oliver started daycare this past week, so there's lots of change in the air for everyone.

In the spirit of learning new things, I learned how to spin with a drop spindle over Christmas. Katherine came over, spindles and fibers in hand, and we spent a lovely few hours while Oliver napped. My crash course in spindling was incredibly useful and I now have a few fat little skeins of my very own yarn to show for it.
That's my first one, over on the left, spun, plied, and prettily twisted in that way I'm so impressed with. No clue what I'm going to do with it, or any of the others I've got, but they sure are cool.

In fact, this spindling is so darn addictive, I may be tempted to throw my money into fibers and spindles, as opposed to baby carriers (much to Oliver's dismay, I'm sure!). I've alreayd bought myself a new turkish drop spindle (from The Bellweather, absolutely beautiful and came smelling of pitchoulli and incense) and entirely too much beautiful fiber for someone who is supposed to be studying for exams or sewing baby hats for sale. Of course, I tell myself that it's all in the name of the future business plan, that if I'm going to be selling my own stuff, I might as well learn how to spin it and dye it, and then knit it, and have something really unique and wonderful for the money.


The fabulous fibers on the right came from Grafton Fibers and they are just so soft and amazng in person, I'm absolutely terrified to spin with them. I have a few oz of silk caps, too, that I'm sure shrink with fear at the thought of being touched by my ragged cuticles, so I'm working on getting them cleaned up before I play. I'm doing some plain white at the moment so that I can play with dyeing (my cupboard is stocked with Kool Aid and soon, hopefully, with Wilton's Cake Dye as well).

And the little business is really taking off. Lots of requests for my pretty little hats. I've named the Noro colors that I'm using, since "159" isn't a very exciting name for the beautiful blend of purple, green, aqua, and red used in Bubby's hat. "Oliver" is much more descriptive of a name!

And isn't he cute in it? He looks a little turtle-ish in that picture, I must say, lower lip disappearing and all. But wow, that noro just knocks my socks off. I tried making myself a sweater out of that same colorway, but it just doesn't do it for me and it's bound for the pond so that I can turn it into still more hats (a girl's gotta eat, right?).