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.

A LESSON LEARNED...

NEVER - but never! - Navajo-ply delicate Merino singles. harrumph.

I'm nearly done plying the Apple Blossom. I sure hope it fits on my one bobbin! I think I'm going to have to swear off using only Merino to spin with, as it just really wants to float apart during plying, even if I use a high twist to spin the singles. It's SO frustrating to have it break during plying, but it's ten times worse if you're Navajo plying - augh! One needs a minimum of 3 hands to fix it, and 4 would be better! When I'm doing this, I make SURE one of the kids is home to help provide the needed extra fingers.

Apologies for the blurry photo of the 2 bobbins. I DO wish I could figure out how to take good closeups!

Apple Blossom - yummy!

Oooooh! - looky what I'm working on: a twice-combed (!), lovely hand-dyed Merino bump from Sunset Fibers I don't have a photo 'up' yet of my work-in-progress, but here is a link to her own photo: (and mine looked just like it!)

Apple Blossom roving is from her "Roving of the Month" Club and is the May offering. It's just gloriously soft, having been combed into 'top' and then re-combed after dyeing! Good Heavens, I've never heard of such a thing, so of course I had to try it out. You know.

Aaaand...I'm spinning this ::gasp!:: worsted! Well, semi-worsted, anyway. I'm using the same technique as with my Cormo: short forward-draw, but allowing the twist to 'snap' into the drafting zone (thus trapping air into the fibers) rather than being more properly smoothed down with the fingers. I'm planning on making this a Navajo-plied sock yarn, so am spinning it fairly thinly (in some spots a bit too thin). I just felt that the particulaly long color-runs would lend themselves to a great looking Navajo-plied yarn - I hope I'm right! We'll see.

A note: my dd took photos, but when we downloaded them...they didn't show up in the folder! Sheesh. Stupid software :-( NOW what do I do??