FINALLY - some time to post!

Oh, boy - have I ever been busy! It's now been almost 2 weeks since I've sat at my wheel; I'm having the shakes from spinning-withdrawal. However, it's been a pretty fruitful 2 weeks of knitting time, so that helps. That was a lousy photo of my mom's scarf - I think I uploaded the wrong one (well, of course I would do something like that), so here's a slightly better one:

While it shows much paler in the photo than in reality, at least the details show up.

- AND! - I finally finished dd's Wedge-Head Tam™ that I 'unvented' last week. I have never seen anything made quite like it on the 'net (or anywhere else for that matter), but that isn't saying much. Until recently, I never knitted anything but socks :-)

It took me forever to shortrow a wedge shape that would actually work with the human head. You should've seen my earlier attempts. ::shudder:: They wouldn't have fit anything recognizable on Earth.

I made this from some of my hand-dyed Merino top (by April of The Gourmet Sheep), which I'd Navajo-plied several weeks ago. I loved the way the colors just melted one into the other. Some colors are very bright and clear, others are more subtly shaded, providing a wonderful foil for the brights which just 'pop'. A simple idiot cord and tassel finished it off just right. Now...if only she'd let me block the durned thing to give it some shape! Darn kid wears it 24/7, practically.

One goes out...and another

comes in. I am a bit discouraged - I admit it. This gets old really fast, people dumping their unwanted animals just any old where - no food, no water, no nothing :-(. I mean, what would be SO hard about taking their unwanted animals to a freakin' shelter, for crying out loud??? Are they afraid of "what people would say" if they used a shelter? That's what they're FOR!

"What people would say" is a whole LOT worse when they find an animal's been dumped! At least the poor animals get fed at a shelter. But they don't get fed when they're in the middle of a freakin' field! Figure it out, you selfish jerks!

I sometimes fantasize about slapping the irresponsible jerks into next week, after having starved them for a couple of weeks, first.... I find myself grinding my teeth into powder...

As well, my poor Meems has been sick as a dog (no pun intended!) almost this whole week with a hideous sinus infection. She rolled out of bed around noon today looking almost human. Her eyes were a bit unfocused, but at least the fever's gone, thanks be to God!

We finally found a Forever Home for our sweet, goofy little Brittany foster girl, Ginger. Yes, she really did lay like that. ALL the time :-) Isn't that a hoot? That denotes GREAT hip sockets, btw - probably no hip problems in later life. But I miss her so much! We all do, and the day's been kind of a bummer all around.

She left early this morning on her long journey to the North, all the way up to Michigan, where she will have 3 other Britts to run and play with. She'll have a 10-acre wooded area and fenced yard to run and play in (lucky little girl!). I can't help but worry about her, though: is she scared because her Family (us!) isn't there anymore? It makes me sick to think she might be scared. We took one of Dave's old t-shirts and rubbed it on ourselves and the other dogs (they miss her, too!), and sent along her big Barbie sleeping blankie (Meem's old comforter) with her and lots of treats and toys. I sure hope she will be happy and not miss us!

ANYWAY...we already have our next foster here. We don't know his name, of course, because his former owner apparently abandoned him up near Salina when the dog proved to be gun shy. Damn all "hunters" who don't know squat about being a REAL hunter! This poor dog had no collar (of course not) and is very thin, though thankfully not skin-and-bones like most of our rescues are.

It looks like the poor young fella was on his own for a good week before a REAL hunter found him, cowering under his truck, terrified of the gun shots. This was a hunter who used to raise his own Brittanys (and still has 5 of them). He took him back home to Andover with him and contacted American Brittany Rescue to let us know he'd found a dumped Britt who needed a home, then fed & watered the poor dog. Kept him overnight until we could get him (thank you, Larry!)

This poor baby is so scared of people, he just cowered and shook when he got here this afternoon. That means only one thing to me: he had to have been beaten and abused by his former "masters". Just give me a rubber hose and 15 minutes alone with him/them in a locked room. That's all I ask. Hell, I'll settle for TEN minutes.

We FINALLY got him to take a bit of turkey this evening (he loved it!), but he still won't look at us - doesn't dare :-(. He lets us pet him, but he just freezes, not responding to our strokes or anything. I could just cry in rage for what was done to him. He's around 2 years of age - this young'un should be silly, bouncing, frisky and into everything. He should be driving me distracted by tearing up everything he sees. That's a normal 2-year old Brittany: just plumb crazy. Not this pretty boy, though. Maybe he'll warm up to us a bit later tonight or tomorrow.

I've got to arrange for his neutering and chipping, asap. Boy - next week is already looking mighty busy! Forget the Christmas knitting - it ain't gonna happen. No way. *sigh*

I had SO looked forward to some relaxing spinning. But stayed tuned...I'll get back to the wheel soon. I've got about 4 of 8 oz hand-dyed Merino spun up (from April of The Gourmet Sheep). Lovely colors - not really pastel, but not dark, either. It should Navajo-ply up into a beautiful yarn - I hope! Yes, I'll get a photo posted - after the batteries are charged. I swear, those batteries don't hold a charge worth anything! I wish I could afford a plug-in power source for it!

My willpower is so strong...

NOT.

I don't really have any spinning silk (well, none to speak of, neway) and I'm kind of scared of spinning plain, straight silk, so I've mostly avoided getting any. Until today.

Ruth MacGregor, of Spinning Forth - Temptress Extraordinaire and Enabler that she is - has just dyed up a fresh batch of her glorious silks. PLEASE go see her website! Not only does she sell gorgeous hand-dyed silk, but she's also got wonderful articles and videos on How To Do Stuff!

I fell resoundingly from my (pathetically brief) self-imposed Fiber Fast and ordered one of her spinning kits (spindle, her silk-spinning book plus 50 gms silk), and ... um ... several more 50 gm hanks of other colors. I hope Ruth doesn't mind my borrowing these photos 'til I have some of my own (I'll ask her!), but feast your eyes (hey, wipe yer slobber off her pics!) on these...

No, I didn't get ALL the colors. Just...most of them. I'm not saying just how many. Wouldn't want anyone to be jealous. Or anything. Some of these are new colors (I think!) - there are many, many more on her site. All of them glow like cut jewels - all of them. I will try to list the colors later, but I got Stuff To Do Today, so it might take awhile before I get the time to do it.

She told me that 50 grams of wool, as any spinner knows, doesn't go very far (she's right - it doesn't!), but with silk one 50 gm hank would make a hang-to-the-waist scarf.

Wow! I didn't know that, but I should've figured. The problem will be in ME spinning it thinly enough. Well, practice makes perfect, but the thought of barfing this up makes my stomach hurt. We'll see!

Now THIS is more like it!

I am so loving this new yarn I've spun up - it looks EXACTLY the way I'd planned it - for once! I hope the photos show the rich and lovely color changes to this hand dyed Falkland top from Jennifer of Laughing Rat Studios. She called the colorway "Evening". Yes, I know...I get half my fiber from her - I can't help myself! I also just noticed that her Studio does NOT appear in my "Stuff I Can't Quit Buying" list (see sidebar)! So sorry, Jenn! That is now rectified! I guess I thought I'd gotten the link inserted everywhere, but apparently not.

I love how she chooses many different wools to work with, rather than just sticking with one type. I've gotten Merino, Shetland, Falkland & Finn from her (and probably others, as well), which allows me to find out the different characteristics of each type of wool. I find that I LOVE the Falkland for spinning worsted. It's so much like Blue-Faced Leicester (pronounced 'Lester', in case you wanted to know), that it is going to be one of my favorites - I can already tell. BFL is not always easy to find and, sometimes, darned expensive when you do! The Falkland fiber (similar to BFL and Shetland in length) is much longer than Merino, allowing for a more leisurely draft and a looser twist (if that's what you want). I didn't opt for that this time around, but were I spinning for a lace-weight shawl, you bet I'd want that for a nice, drape-y hand.

Isn't this stuff lovely, though? There are so many subtle, varying shades of browns, reds, teals and a bit of green, that I can hardly count them. I divided the top in half lengthwise and spun the first half, but couldn't wait to ply it, so I'm just now spinning the second half, and about 1/3 the way done with it. That is NOT the 'recommended' method for dealing with a project (can lead to very different twists between the plies), but so what... Its MY stuff and I just couldn't wait this time. Here's what it looked like on the bobbin:

Rather than merely hoping to keep the colors together by plying from 2 bobbins (this is always an iffy prospect when dealing with a many-colored top), I chose to spin a rather thin single and then Navajo-ply it. I wanted a worsted weight yarn with lots of twist in the ply - and it looks GREAT, compared to what I usually produce! I'm about 1/3rd the way through the second half of the split top, so maybe I'll be done tomorrow or the next day and can ply it up. I just wish I'd gotten a good 2 lbs (for a man's sweater!), as I'll only end up with around 360 to 380 yards, total. Darn it - not much after all that work, huh? Anyway, I am probably beating my drum a bit too hard, but I sure do like this stuff!

Morning Surf Scarf

is about 1/4th done! I got the pattern from the Summer '08 Spin-Off magazine. The designer is Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer of Heart Strings Fiber Arts. I didn't realize it, but she offers the same pattern for free if you sign up for her HeartStrings Knitterly News email newsletter! She has GREAT patterns! One day...I will own them all. LOL Anyway, here's my progress so far, fuzzy shots and all:










I started it last night, using sz 7's, but decided I wanted a slightly tighter knit, so frogged and went down to a six. Went to bed late and was awakened at 2:50 a.m. by *someone* dinging the doorbell! Scared the dickens out of dd and I, while the MENFOLK snored their oblivious heads off. I made hubby get out of bed and "do something!" We figure it was probably some real jerk teenagers who live in the area. Little nerd-heads.

Making progress...slowly

Hey, Jenn! I am really liking this Finn! The colors are soooo nice and this is going to be one soft yarn, I can tell. I'm spinning it semi-worsted, using a long forward draw and just letting the twist 'snap' into the drafting zone. Fluffy stuff, indeed! I'm not even trying to spin terribly evenly and I'm trying my best to get thicker-than-normal singles so I might end up with a worsted weight yarn this time. Maybe.

I'll keep you posted on my progress, hopefully with decent pictures. My camera is so high-tech, even the kids have trouble with it; so you can imagine how hopeless I am with it. I can turn it on and point it at something. I can use the close-up zoom lens thingie. That's it. Oh, and connect the funky cord to download the pics. That is ALL.

I am freaking hopeless

I need a Keeper. I really do. My poor dd does her best (which is a really most excellent 'best') to fulfil my needs for a Personal Secretary. But not even she can keep track of all my fiber; bless her for continuing to try. It's a wonder she isn't emotionally damaged from keeping track of her mother and all her junk. I've got fiber stuck EVERYWHERE in this house. It more resembles a jumble sale/barn/storage unit than a home, thanks to my Fiber Habit.

I found the missing fiber...top...roving...whatever...(from the previous post), late last night. Only to discover that some much-loved hand-dyed Finn top was now missing! I nearly had a heart-attack over that one. It was very precious to me, not only because it is gloriously soft and JUST the colors I wanted, but also because Jennifer of Laughing Rat Studios dyed it up. She does lovely work and her fibers are always easy to work with - and she's a such a sweet lady, to boot. I finally found the precious stuff after a frantic search up and downstairs a few times, yanking open drawers, doors, boxes and bags located in about 5 or 6 places ::pant! puff!::

Poor Jennifer - she about had a heart attack, too, as I'd written her a bit earlier (before my 2 mad hunting rampages through the house), asking the poor girl if she'd ever sent the stuff to me! You can have no idea how awful/bad/stupid & horrible I felt, having caused such heart burnings for this lady. She's had enough troubles lately as it is, and here I was causing even more :-(. My stomach still hurts thinking about what I put her through. Thank goodness it was relatively brief, lasting only about 20 minutes.

Fortunately for us both, my 2nd 'mad rampage' had the happy result of my finding the beautiful Finn top. Wanna know WHERE I found it??? Well, remember my freak-out over the itty-bitty moth? Where I used my Food Saver to vacuum bag lots 'n' lots of fiber? Yeah. In that pile. It was the very first thing I'd bagged. On the bottom of the pile. In my bedroom closet. Plain sight.

I can't believe God ever trusted me enough to give me 2 precious children - it's a wonder I haven't mislaid them as well, the poor loves. But my saga doesn't end here...oh, no...it gets better (and isn't that just thrilling?).

This morning I lost my new blue Salish locks I just got in the mail from Dori Ann! GAH!!! Somebody help me! Put me in a round rubber room with just my fiber and wheel - I'll be FINE! I promise! Can't lose anything in a round room, right???

Yes, I found the Salish. Finally. Don't ask. I'm not telling.

What a STUPID start to the day. Even though it began last night. The question I can hardly bear to ask myself is: "What else is 'missing' that I don't yet realize?"

Anyhoo - here's a pic I'm posting of the two "lost" fibers. I figure I ought to have the pics just in case these things (bite my tongue!) get lost for real. At least I'll have proof that I HAD them. Once upon a time.
Look how LONG those Salish locks are! They're about 7" inches long, but the fiber itself is SO fluffy and soft. I have no idea how I'm going to spin these up, let alone combine them with the Finn top, but I would LOVE to have a 3-ply yarn composed of 2 plies of the Finn and a single ply of the Salish. Thing is...the Finn is, like, majorly short-stapled. That means it will have to have a very tight twist just to convince it to be yarn, but the Salish will have to have a very low twist to keep it from turning into steel cable. I have NO idea what the plied result will be. Probably horrible, as most of my experiments are. I really hate sampling the Salish because I have less than 4 oz, but I've got to do it or I'll end up with yet another It's-Not-Supposed-To-Look-Like-This! yarn.

Cormo...to die for!

I've just finished plying up my 2 bobbins loaded with Cormo (Corriedale x Merino registered cross). It turned out so beautiful that I used its photo for my blog header.

I've now got over 1000 yards of sock-weight yarn (fingering weight) and it is glorious, gorgeous, squooshy stuff! It's in one, continuously-spun length - no breaks, no weak spots, even! I'm half-hoping nobody buys it so I can keep it and knit me some fab socks from it (like I don't have enough socks already?!). A whine: it's just that that's all I had of the Cormo - 8 oz of pin-drafted roving - and I didn't save any for myself (which was *really* stupid!). My dd, who is learning to use a hand spindle, swiped the last 3 feet of the roving, so I don't even have any left-overs! I'm already experiencing Cormo Withdrawal... This is terrible.

Spinning Cormo is a HUGE treat, whether using a wheel or the hand-spindle. This heavenly stuff is SO incredibly soft, it feels like a Summer cloud. At times, I would have to look at my hands to make sure I was touching the stuff - wow. The fiber is long enough that the spinner doesn't have any problem spinning worsted, which is the method I used in this skein. Actually, while I did use the worsted, short forward-draw method, I allowed the twist to 'snap' into the drafted length rather than smoothing it down with my fingers. I wanted to see 'what would happen', hoping that the resulting yarn would have the strength of a worsted, but the loft of a woolen. It worked more beautifully than I thought it would - hurray!

I am so pleased that I took a chance to try 'something new' to me in the way of fibers. Thank you, Sue, for being a Cormo breeder and bringing this glorious fleece to fiber-starved spinners everywhere! :-)

WHERE TO GET THIS MYSTICAL, MAGICAL STUFF: This pin-drafted Cormo (plus some fleece later on) came from Sue Reuser at Cormo Sheep and Wool Farm - and NEXT time I order the roving, the stuff is mine...all mine! The shipping from Cormo Sheep and Wool farm is very fast and reliable, so the waiting time is very short.
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Spring Flowers - handspun Sweet-Grass Targhee

I purchased the undyed Sweet Grass Targhee roving this January from Paradise Fibers, just out of curiosity - and 'cuz it was on sale :-). I didn't get around to finishing the 2nd bobbin 'til March...I think. This purchase was truly Providential, as the fiber turned out to be soft enough to use next to the skin (for most people, anyway), SUPER easy to spin (esp. compared to Merino), very lofty and light. It takes up dye beautifully and evenly, always supposing the dyer knows what she's doing... I don't much enjoy dyeing fibers (I just hate cleaning up my messes), but most of all...I have almost no space in which to do it. It's NO fun dyeing up fibers in my tiny, no-counter-space kitchen! I have to spread out the sheets of newspaper and plastic wrap down the length of my kitchen floor, leaving myself little room to squat and apply the dye - NOT an amusing diversion, I assure you.





Anyway, what I got out of the Targhee was about 597 yards of 2-ply, somewhere between sock and sport weight. If I sell it, though, I will probably only list it as about 520 yards, as the fulling process seemed to greatly shorten the skein (darn it!).



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Desert Twilight - handspun Merino

I purchased this dyed Merino roving from a seller at our local Fiber Festival. Usually, I work with naturally-colored fleeces and rovings, but Spring was finally in the air and I so much wanted some color to spin! I spun it straight from the roving, more thickly than normal. I decided I wanted a heavier yarn to make a really colorful something-or-other that didn't require skinny yarn!

The top skein is 239 yards and the bottom is 225. It is a 2-ply, 100% Merino yarn, spun worsted for strength, but fulled to bring out the 'fluffiness'.