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?).