Fiber Fool

Well, I really know when to sign up for something new - when it is hardest, LOL!

We do not have children. My nephews were old enough when I came on the scene and live three hours away so I’m not much of an aunt figure to them I’m afraid. My last regular babysitting gig just graduated high school a couple of weeks ago and my second to last regular babysitting gig married this last October (funnily to a man who was an incoming freshman in my department in college when I was a junior). So I’ll try my best to imagine myself 17 years ago when I babysat every weekday in the summers.

1. Games! Boardgames, card games and outdoor games like Greenlight, Redlight, Hopscotch or Simon Says, it doesn’t much matter. Though a certain set of neighbor children I’m sure recall our week-long Monopoly games :-) My mom even taught me to turn everyday tasks like picking up toys into games and it works quite well!
2. Arts and Crafts! It could be as simple as coloring, but making pipe cleaner or play dough statues or even a banner for a countdown to the new year (which we accidently pulled down during a commercial rather than the real countdown - oops, thank goodness for tape). Sometimes the messier the better :-)
3. Books! I was even known to carry a kit with me that contained special books that were new to the kids to make my visit more special.
4. Cook and Bake! It is always fun (if a little messy) to stir up some cookie dough or knead some bread with kids. Since cooking and baking are applied science it can be a great opportunity to teach too.

5. Physical Exercise! Sometimes there is nothing better than to get them out into the fresh air and running around. In the summer sprinklers were a huge favorite! In addition to bringing some rosiness to their cheeks, sometimes it wears them out enough for a nap, giving you two activities for the price of one :-D
6. Peek-a-boo! For the little ones sometimes simple is best. Just two years ago I babysat a young toddler and we played peek-a-boo with a blanke for 45 minutes. Now, I wouldn’t normally have chosen to keep it up for that long, but it kept him happy and infectiously giggling so it was little sacrifice to keep going while it was working.
7. Mad-Libs! So, I love activities with kids that promote learning. Mad-Libs are a fantastic way to learn about the parts of language and it often results in large peals of laughter. This was a favorite before bedtime activity for several of the kids I babysat. As they got a bit older we even wrote some of our own. To this day, there are a few phrases originating for Mad-Libs that we still share a chuckle over.
8. Make Believe! Often there is little more stimulating that building a rich make believe world. On one of my summer gigs we built a whole city and creating that city involved many of the above tasks, including crafting with string and glue to create a stamp to cancel postage and baking cookie to sell in the town bakery. I swear we spent the vast majority of the summer in that “town.”
9. Field Trip! Sometimes a change of scenery is all that is required. Going to a new and different park can often be simple enough. But museums, libraries, public pools and zoos are especially great. In the summer free concerts in a park were a favorite.
10 Wiggle Your Ears! This last one is thanks to my uncle Sherm who has been known to quiet a unhappy child behind him in church by wiggling his ears. I don’t possess that ability, but it is magic I tell you! Even on children older than you would expect.

I’ve been working with some really fine fibers lately. I’ve also been doing a fair bit of dishwashing and gardening. Those three do not go together very well. I find my fingertips to be just rough enough to slightly snag. Not only does that degrade the fiber, but it takes away from the enjoyment of working with it. There are a ton of great moisturizers out there, but it can be hard to find one that is usable when you are to be knitting or spinning shortly after application. Even then, the best lotion may not reduce snagging because it doesn’t help remove the rough skin.

I was first turned onto using sugar scrub a few years ago when I was complaining about spinning silk and some of the extruded silk-like fibers. The idea is to mix sugar (I like the grain size of brown sugar) with oil(s) and in some cases citrus juice and rub on your hands, paying particular attention to any rough spots. It isn’t just for hands either. You can use it on your feet, elbows, knees and anywhere else you may need some extra exfoliation help. The sugar exfoliates while the oil rehydrates. If you use lemon juice that also aids in the exfoliation process, just be extra certain you don’t have any small cuts or cracks and do not use before being exposed to the sun.

My new facecloths got me thinking that I hadn’t made any homemade bath products in a while. When I make sugar scrub on the fly in the palm of my hand I tend to end up wasting oil by accidentally over-pouring. So, I decided to treat myself and make some bath products to go with my facecloths. They proved useful for photostyling and are serving me well.

Homemade Sugar Scrub

1 1/4 - 1 1/2 C Brown Sugar (or mix of sugars for a range of grain size)
1/3 C Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1/3 C Jojoba Oil
1/3 C Grape Seed Oil
Essential or Fragrance Oils to Suit

Mix all ingredients together in a wide mouth, resealable container. If using essential oils it is a good idea to let it sit for a day or three to fully blend the scents and distribute themselves evenly through out the mixture.

On the sugar front I find the brown sugar is just the right size for my exfoliation needs. If you plan to use it mostly on calloused feet you may prefer a larger grain of regular white sugar or even raw sugar. You can also use a mix of sugars like I did with the oils. For the consistency I prefer the key is to have a bit more sugar than oil so you get a nice paste (I started with equal amounts of oil and sugar which is what is photographed, but found I preferred it to be a bit thicker consistency so added an extra 1/2 C later).

I use a blend of oils because they each have a slightly different moisturizing profile. Jojoba oil is much more shelf-stable than many oils so it is always a good choice for something you want to keep around for a while. It also closely matches the profile of our natural oils in the skin. Grapeseed oil is a frequent ingredient in cosmetics, especially those for damaged or stressed skin, as it reportedly controls skin moisturization. The olive oil is also moisturizing (and what I use if I make sugar scrub on the fly in the palm of my hand) but it also less expensive than the jojoba and grapeseed oils so it helps keep the scrub economical.

In my sugar scrub I used a blend of several citrus fragrance oils. Normally I would use essential oils, but I was wanting a mood lifting citrus scent. Citrus essential oils (and their juice as well) can be photosensitizing to your skin. Since you are going to the trouble of using a sugar scrub I imagine you want to take care of your skin so if you will be using the sugar scrub before being in the sun I recommend not using citrus essential oils or their juice in your scrub. In my case I expect to use the scrub in the shower in the morning and I live a mile high in a location with 300+ days of sunshine so I erred on the side of safety. Be sure to check your essential oils to see if they warn about sun exposure if applied to the skin before using them in the scrub.

If you make a scrub I’d love to hear what scents you chose to add!

While I think making a scrub is one of the simplest homemade bath products one can start with, there are plenty of people on Etsy and ArtFire who sell it if you don’t care to make your own.

Yikes! Almost a full month ago now the wonderful Katheryn of Alpacamundo invited me and my camera down to observe the first day of alpaca shearing. I unfortunately had a meeting that afternoon and the start was delayed a bit so I only got to see the first two (most difficult) shearings.

First up was Eduardo (if I’m remembering correctly). He wasn’t too keen on finding out where he was going…

Kathryn explains to her brother in law how to hold Eduardo and keep him calm after his legs were secured to keep them safely out of harms way.

Once everything is secured it is time for the real business… shearing!

Unfortunately the lucious, ultra-fine fiber of Eduardo led to a lot of this…

There were a lot of helpers around, each with their own job to do to aid Kathryn in the shearing…

The following one cracks me up! Little farmers and ranchers in training, learning to lean on the fence and shoot the shit…

And of course I cannot leave out this helper…

…. who was actually penned up once the shearing got under way.

There guys had such personality I couldn’t resist!

Have a great weekend everyone! And check out Fiber Arts Friday at Wisdom Begins to Wonder for more fibery goodness!

Early last week I was nominated by the lovely Rae for the Beautiful Blogger Award. Since I’ve been pretty slackful about posting for the last year or so I am especially honored to have made her list.

Following her lead, I have to list 10 little known facts about myself & then nominate 10 people. I’m in general not fantastic with the unstructured lists like this, but I’ll give it a try (thanks Amanda for the helpful prompts!)…

1). I use spreadsheets nearly everyday. Thank you Dr. Rinehart for your thorough spreadsheet requirements in the radar meteorology courses!
2). I grew up in the same house my father did (he’s only ever moved down the hall and he is over a half century old).
3). My creatively-centered life began with rubberstamping which my mom introduced to me about age 12. She had my sister and I make the gift tags for Christmas presents rather than spend lots of money on the fancy ones at the Hallmark store.
4). There is a fridge in the house dedicated solely to aging cheese (and now a bit of white wine and a few beers as the cheese stock is low) because my DH makes cheese.
5). I actively avoided anything labeled as reality television for a loooong time, but I am now totally addicted to the dance shows - Dancing with the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance thanks to my sister. I’ve only seen 4 or 5 seasons of DWTS and am currently enjoying my 2nd season of SYTYCD.
6). My husband is a vegetarian. I tried it for a year but then was advised by my doctor that it did not suit me (at least the manner in which we were doing it). So, I *love* going home to my parents’ and getting to have home grilled steaks that I’ve seasoned myself or my sister has seasoned. My trips back home should probably include an angioplasty upon departure for Colorado to counter my overindulgence in meat consumption while I’m there.
7). For a while I was not the only gal in my Monday evening group who lived with a vegetarian so a group of us occasionally go out for “Ladies Meat Night.”
8). I now own two dogs whom I love beyond belief and am probably classified as a dog nut. As a child, however, I was scared of most dogs until my mom got her first Seeing Eye Dog who won me over by lying beneath the piano bench whenever I practiced (and being highly trained and well-behaved).
9). Whenever I hear Alone by Heart I’m taken back to a summer spent choreographing what I can only imagine was a horrendous lyrical dance with my cousin. We ruined many other songs of that era for any family members who stood still long enough for us to dance in front of, but Alone is the one that always reminds me of the summer of 1987.
10). I’ve discovered in the last couple years that my sister and I do well taking photo excursions together. I am really looking forward to the two of us returning to the Duluth area sometime in the future to capture it in photos. I have such fond memories of a childhood vacation to that area (1 of only 3 or 4 as it is hard to get way from a dairy farm) where we fell in love with Split Rock Lighthouse and hiked around Gooseberry Falls State Park with Dad.

In addition to not posting terribly regularly here I have not been reading very regularly either. It often comes down to whether I want to create new designs or read and comment on all the wonderful blogs out there. So, I read when I’m stuck on a design or in a phase of needing to take things in rather than output. Because of my irregular blog reading patterns I have no idea who has been nominated or not. But I’ll share ten blogs I’ve discovered relatively recently and am enjoying (maybe a few long time favorites will sneak in too) because that is part of what this award is all about - discovering new and interesting blogs in addition to discovering new things about bloggers. To the owners of those blogs - no pressure to participate, do so only if you wish!

1). Molly at Remedial Eating - only just discovered her in the past week after she commented on my grapefruit sorbet post, but she has lovely photography, lots of recipes and some reflections on family life.
2). Balkan Style - another very new discovery, I think through browsing Tastespotting, but I’m not sure. Again there are quite a few cooking/recipe posts, but as a whole it seems a lot about living a creative life and includes knitting and sewing (and amazing cake creations) too.
3). Gail aka Neuroknitter at We Heart Yarn - another discovery through commenting on one of my posts back in November I believe. This is a knitting-centered blog, but with lots of great photography of both knitted and non-knitted things.
4). Maya at Springtree Road - she is a handspinner, knitter, photographer and mom so of course her blog has lovely pictures! I first met Maya through Twitter, before she took up spinning and before her Etsy shop and website shop!
5). Tara at Tea and Cookies - I’m not certain where or even when I first ran into this blog, but it is a fun food blog I do not see referenced as much as a few of my other favorite food blogs that I won’t mention because you have probably already heard of them.
6). Rachael at Coconut & Lime - this is another food blog that I don’t see referenced as often as some others and I have actually been reading/browsing/surfing this one for several years.
7). Alicia at Bloom, Grow, Love - this is probably foremost a photography blog, so the pictures are great (some with a vintage patina to them) and often tell the majority of the story with little words, family and gardening are common themes right now. I think I first stumbled upon this one six months ago or so, but I don’t recall how I found it.
8). Pickles - I think I stumbled upon this blog via my blog stats maybe a year ago or so. Again, beautiful pictures and a wonderful Scandinavian point of view (no surprise that that appeals to me is there?) with bilingual posts!
9). Digital Photography School - I’m listing this one because it is a great resource for learning about photography no matter the level you are at or the equipment you do or do not have. The posts are contributed from a large variety of photographers, many of whom are paid professionals. If you are looking to improve your photography this a a wonderful place to start!
10). Heather at Heather Lilly - the blog portion (both photography and personal) of the site is currently down, but Heather found me on Twitter a few weeks ago. She is an area wedding and portrait photographer who also blogs not only about photography and food, but the handmade movement as well. Shortly after she started following me we both made homemade bath salts within 12 hours of each other. I knew then I needed to keep my eye on her :-)

I hope you enjoy the links! And please, feel free to share even more suggestions with me, or leave the link to your post if you were nominated for the award!

I decided to take the plunge and sign up with the wonderful Carole to participate in 10 on Tuesday over the weekend. Seems kind of fitting that the first topic I participate in is why to participate!

10. A chance for me to share things about myself I might not otherwise think to share.
9. The ability for those of you whom I haven’t met in real life to learn a bit more about me.
8. Getting a topic each week I can think in depth about.
7. Getting to share my favorites on a wide variety of topics.
6. Getting to know those who also participate more than I would have otherwise.
5. Learning about sure to be new favorites in a wide variety of topics from others.
4. Ever notice how having to create something on a theme or with a specific tool can be really freeing because it narrows your options? That is what 10 on Tuesday does to blog posts, it narrows your options making it easier to post (at least I’m hoping that is the case)!
3. Blog content that doesn’t involve breaking contracts and showing design work in progress!
2. Blog content that doesn’t involve breaking contracts and showing design work in progress!
1. Blog content that doesn’t involve breaking contracts and showing design work in progress!

Okay, so I cheated a bit :-) Shoot me! It is a bit hard to create such a list when this is my first week participating.