The feats and foibles of a fiber fanatic.
4/19/2006
I’m gona drag out my birthday as long as possible, LOL! No, I’m only kidding!
On Friday I took mom down to the annual sale at Woolen Treasures to fortify her needle inventory. She knits *very* tight because that is how she feels like she has control of her knitting tension since she can’t see it. So we got her nearly every needle over the size of 8 in a 32″ length. Well, we stopped at 11 or 13 I think. But they had been low on needles when I had stopped in the first day of the sale. While there I vascillated on picking up one of the felted Calla Lily kits from Pick Up Sticks. Calla Lilies are my absolute favorite flower and I carried 6 with just a touch of ivy for my wedding bouquet. I decided against a kit though. I am sort of curious whether the large arrangement kits contain slightly different flower directions so you get a more natural looking arrangement or if you just get more of the supplies. If it is just more supplies I may cave at some point yet and get the single kit so I have the directions and can then make my own arrangement of them. But, we’ll see.
I did end up getting one (~875 yd) hank for Fino by Alpaca with a Twist (Color 1002, Twilight). It’s 70/30 Alpaca/Silk and has a very lovely hand. I *think* I’ve broke through my stumbling block on triangular shawls so I think this will grow up into something like that though I do not have a specific pattern in mind just yet. Then again, the color would be great for Susan‘s Mountain Stream scarf. Who knows what it will grow up to be! Choosing the color was a bit hard. The previous weekend Sansablog and Snow had tried to force upon me a lovely rose-like color, but since mom was buying for my birthday I decided to the describe the colors for her and let her choose. She decided the blue would look nice with my eyes.
On Saturday after a yummy breakfast and many phone calls from family back in the midwest we headed to Boulder a little early and I did some more birthday shopping at Shuttles. Mom got me the Inspired Cable Knits book as well as a couple more balls of Dale Baby Ull. I swear I drool everytime I open this book. The best part is that even though I’m a big girl I could make most of the patterns in here for myself without having to extrapolate the pattern. And I love the inspiration photos too. It is just gorgeous!
My sister sent cash with my mom for my birthday knowing that we’d be doing some shopping. She also sent directions that it has to be for something completely fun and frivolous and not practical. So, with her money and that sent out by Grandma Schueler (which I guess technically I am not supposed to get any longer because I’m married) I finally picked up a Weavette (4″ square) and the pattern book. I’ve been thinking for a long time it would be a nice way to use up little left overs of my handspun and then Spin-Off had that article this winter on the flowers made from the squares. I haven’t tried the loom yet. Reading the directions had my head spinning. But I’m sure it is just like knitting patterns used to be for me and if I just sit down and take it line by line it’ll make much more sense.
At the tea most of the crafty people in attendance not only bought themselves a somewhat expensive high tea, but also brought gifts! I was floored. Since I was asking people to drive an hour and spend $20 each on tea I was not expecting gifts. I of course mentioned what Sansablog and Snow got me yesterday. That was given to me on Monday evening so that they would both be there when I opened it since Snow needed to stay home and do the usual Easter weekend activities. But Ashley gave me Knitting Over the Edge. I haven’t looked too closely at it yet, but I’m quite excited by it. I have the first one and often find it a source for inspiration. Then Robin, a writing friend of DH, GF of a good friend and another binder of books gave me Envelopes. It is a book of postcards and envelopes that made their way through the Royal Mail even though they were addressed in a wide variety of puzzles. I can’t wait to curl up in my chair with that one! It sounds like a lot of fun!
I think this one floored me the most. It is 8 oz of Suri Alpaca Roving from Hannah. Firstly, I haven’t tried Suri Alpaca yet and I’ve heard it is quite nice to spin with. Secondly, Hannah is not a spinner (yet, I think she had this fall sometime expressed an interest in learning though). Thirdly, it is from one of the local Alpaca farms and I expect Hannah had to put forth a bit of effort to get it for me. I’m excited about this one, but I’ve got some of my hand dyed BFL on the wheel at the moment. Though it shouldn’t be too much longer…
I do have to give some kudos to DH who sometimes is lacking in the gift giving department. He got me this gorgeous necklace with two semi-oblog (not tear drop and not round, but ever so slightly oval) pearls on lariats (?). I had drooled over it in a local jeweler’s window in old town one evening a few weeks ago. Then about a week before my birthday we walked past again and I made a comment that it was still in the window. Well, it was awaiting my opening the morning of my birthday. I couldn’t get a nice picture of it, but you can see glimpses of it in the photos from the tea (probably best on this one, though only one pearl is showing). The pearls match the earrings I had made for our wedding so the necklace is even that much more special.
This year definitely goes down as one of the very best adult birthdays ever! The only way it could have been any better would have been if my sister and dad had been here. It was filled with fun, laughter, great food, and wonderful people. As Hannah put it when she RSVP’d, 30th birthdays should be celebrated in style and I think mine surely was!
4/18/2006
I was going to start out with the gifts that arrived first, but I just realized as I was uploading photos that I didn’t get a photo of the first gift that arrived, which was all those great fiber samples that Cathy brought to SnB last week. I’m feeling rather exhausted after the pre-dawn drive to the airport this morning so I’m going to beg off of showing you a photo of those. Plus, I figure you’ll get to see them once I’ve spun them up… But, a lack of picture by no means is due to a lack of enjoying and appreciating the gift, okay??? Okay!
On Thursday afternoon I had a suprise doorbell ring and the slightly protective and extra sensitive due to another dog sleeping in her house Emma gave alert. I was surprised as I wasn’t expecting anything that I knew of. Imagine my surprise when I looked at the postmark and it read Utah! The wonderful and generous Margene sent me a birthday package!
A wonderful colorway of Opal which I haven’t seen before, but are perfect colors for me! I have an army of t-shirts that will go well with those socks and jeans! Those adorable candies are from a Salt Lake City candy shop and are those creamy mint candies - yum! That stick-like thing on the right, is a great smelling cuticle stick from her sister who makes bath products. It was perfect timing because I was just bemoaning my need to get my fingers out of winter mode so I can spin up some of the silk hankies in my fiber stash without snagging the silk and a couple days of use has me almost ready. The scent is lemon lavender which is perfect as I love anything with a citrus element!
Okay, I’m somewhat out of order here, but that bigger lime green bag in this photo was one of my gifts from my mom and it was the first one she bought for me upon arriving; the rest of the items in the photo are the latest gifts to be recieved. Thursday morning we were lounging in the living room talking away and knitting and mom was going on about how she wanted a flat bottomed bag that would stand up. She was explaining how she has been knitting out of a paper grocery sack, but would like something a little longer lasting and better looking. I jumped to my feet and said, “I have the perfect bag for you!” And we jumped in my car and headed to this great local outdoor store, Jax, and mom bought two for herself, the Small and the XSmall version and she got me the Small.
A few weeks ago Sansablog had shown off her bag to us at SnB and at least Snow and I fell in love. There are pockets of varying sizes around the entire inside and the tote bag will zip shut, but has a double zipper so if you need to say keep cats out of your knitting you can just mostly make the zippers meet. One of my favorite “features” is the absence of *any* velcro! It is just the zipper for the top and that is the only yarn-catching thing on the whole bag! There is even a loop with a clip for keeping keys relatively easy to find. I also find the pockets on the sides on the inside of the bag are perfect for water bottles, travel coffee mugs, or single balls of yarn.
Well, I had been so excited about it that Sansablog and Snow got together and bought me one too! LOL! They chose the other green, Mist, for me. I had been thinking I really liked the size of Mom’s smaller one and given my penchant for accessory and small project knitting I was really starting to think I needed that size too. So, I went and exchanged the second green bag for a smaller one (in Marine) and then with the left over $10 I added in a “Half Cube” from Eagle Creek that has stripes in both the lime and the marine. I figure I can fit a sock project in it and then theoretically it can go in either Moutainsmith bag along with another project and I won’t have to worry about yarns from multiple projects getting tangled!
I’m realizing this has gotten to be a relatively lengthy post as it is so I think I shall sign off for now and perhaps go take a nap… I’ll leave you with a glimpse inside of the lime bag complete with mom’s feather and fan afghan that I need to weave ends into and send off to a friend of hers. I’ll revist mom’s afghan at a later date when I’ve completed the finishing work on it.
4/10/2006
Seraphim is coming along, though not a lot of progress was made on it over the weekend. I needed to slow my pace as I got an e-mail from Brown Sheep (2 weeks after writing them) and they are sending two more balls from the same seconds dye lot so I didn’t want to hit the end of
ball 4 before the other two balls arrived. Fortunately, I’ll be heading to Boulder next Saturday and can return the other two I purchased at Shuttles a week ago. I’m also having to pace myself as for some reason or another spring and fall weather patterns tend to make me a bit more likely to develop tendonitis. I don’t have an actual flare, but I need to be sure to take a good break at the completion of a row now that it is over 400 sts in width. I have less than 30 rows to go, so I figure roughly 12 more hours or so as long as I knit my design rows without too many errors.
Mom’s yarn for her Seraphim has arrived! We first placed an order for some purple Jawoll, but they were out of stock so we called to find out what other options they had in stock in a pretty purple or a rose color. We ended up going with the slightly more expensive, but still superwash, Soft Touch Heather from Shelridge Farms in the color crocus. It is unbelieveable gorgeous and super soft! We ordered 6 hanks. 4 should theoretically do it and I’m hoping it does as any leftovers mom has I’ll get and I can make socks from them. Although, I’m thinking I might not be able to hold off on knitting socks from this, I may end up folding and ordering some of this yarn for myself in another color…
The heathering isn’t the deepest heathering I’ve seen. It appears to be just a magenta sort of color mixed in with the main blue-violet color, but it still is pretty and I think it’ll make a wonderful shawl for Grandma!
This Saturday also marked the beginning of the anniversary sales at Woolen Treasures so a few of us headed down there for lunch and yarn shopping. I was restrained and came home only with some needles and notions. The needles were pretty picked over when we got there, but supposedly a new shipment will be in before the end of the week. So I’m sure my mom and I will head down there at some point once she gets here. She said she’s taking me shopping for my birthday so I figure I can get yarn when I go down with her if I’m so inclined. I’m seriously thinking about picking out something to knit Calla. The largest size might be a titch too small, but it’ll be close. And, even though my weight has stayed roughly the same since January or so things have been shifting around and becoming more toned so the sizing on that may not be quite as far off as I think as I haven’t measured too recently.
3/17/2006
Okay for those of you who didn’t know where yesterday’s map had us heading, a few of us gals from our SnB group took a road trip to Brown Sheep in Nebraska. Above you can see some of the highlights (more here).
It was one of the best road trips I’ve had. Ashley had the foresight to choose only music with female vocals for the ride and we just bounced along the Interstates and Highways to the Scottsbluff area of Nebraska. It was a much easier and shorter drive than expected. Mapquest gave us an estimate of about 2.75 hours, but we’re prettty sure it is easily done within 2.5 hours with no dangers of a speeding ticket (if you don’t take a bathroom break). We ate at a great greasy spoon called (I’m not kidding here) The Whistle Stop Cafe. It was in an old train depot and they even had a caboose outside. The food was fantastic (in a fat-laden sort of way, you know, sinful)! The onion rings were even battered rather than breaded! Yum!
While I mention Mapquest, I should make a note that their directions are not correct. They forgot a turn and an additional leg in the directions. In order to stay on 92 you do take a left as the directions indicate, but when you get to a 4-way stop you need to take a right and continue what I think is ~2 miles (though keep in mind I wasn’t the one driving). There is a school on the right hand side and if you turn left you’ll see the Brown Sheep sign.
It was wonderful to tour the facilities. We even got to meet Harlan Brown the man who started it all when a packing plant near by shut down. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take photos in the mill. I’m quite sad as there are hundreds of photos I took in my head of really great artsy yet industrial shots. If you have the chance to be in this area of the country I’d highly recommend taking that side trip. Though do call ahead as they don’t keep a regular schedule for tours.
Despite great temptation I managed to be good and stayed well within my budget I had set for myself. I even came away more or less with what I had planned on - lots of fiber, yarn for a Wobbly Circles tote from the current IK, some undyed yarn, and yarn for Mim’s Seraphim (though I misremembered the weight so I’ll have to rethink what I use that yarn for and choose some other yarn for her shawl). I came in well under $100 (my budget)! Ashely and MC did great too and did a lot of buying of yarn for gifts.
Two of the bags in the photo above are roving. They just take you into the mill and you can pull what you want out of huge boxes of mill ends of the roving and you pay by the pound. There was a box of natural roving (which I really should have gotten some of for playing with dyeing roving, but it isn’t that far of a drive so next time), a box of dyed regular roving (from the heathered yarns) and a box of dyed superwash roving (from the heathered superwash yarns). The two natural colors in the roving bags are regular roving and the bright colors are superwash. Notice that bright yellow? I wasn’t going to take any of that and then I thought about how next month’s Project Spectrum colors are yellow and orange so I put some in. I haven’t taken and weighed stuff yet so I don’t know how much of what I got, but I suspect the yellow will be enough for some fingerless gloves or something maybe. I think these are also from the new colors of yarns they will be releasing in June. We got to see those rovings go into the spinner and I think these are from those colors, just not blended as much yet.
The third bag has the yarns. I chose a lighter almost slate blue for the main body of the tote with accents of a warm and a cool pink, a medium lavender, and a deep plum. I suspect there will be a fair amount of each of those colors left over so I’ll probably make some charity colorwork hats with whatever remains.
I’ll have a bit more about the road trip next week.
3/15/2006
I’ll be back on Friday!
