Happy Mother's Day

Happy
Mother's Day! My youngest daughter, Sarah, went to a yard sale yesterday and
found these eleven cones of Conshohocken Softball 2.2 for $1 each. What a great
gift. I'm thinking the greenish blue on the right would make a good Wallaby.
I've knitted with it before, but I also think they'd make a great weft for a
blanket. You can't really see from the picture, but the multi cone under the
white one has flecks of navy, blue, red, and green. Anyone ever use this for
weft?

Another cool present I got was from Dan, my oldest son. He gave me this heating
tool, that can be used for woodburning, stencil cutting, even soldering. I have
some designs in mind for my Louet that I wanted to burn and I now can make up
my own quilting stencils.

I'm still playing around with the Jacob. I think because it has so many burrs
(at least that's what I think they are, it looks like tiny little sticks, not
hay or straw) that the best course of action will be to rake it with the dog
rake, then card it on my drum carder. It's really going to be a messy job. Even
after raking out tons of stuff, the carder still got lots out. I'm going to
spin up the first batt tonight and see how it looks washed up before I do anything
else. I like Claudia's
idea of hand carding it and Navaho plying, but I couldn't get it clean enough
to do that. If this doesn't work, I'm just sitting it aside and going on. Life
is too short.

MDSW

I had a great time at MDSW this year. My plan was to pick up a variey of fibers
to stretch my spinning abilities. I also wanted to get a book on needle felting
and some needles. Other than that, I was fair game!

I picked up some dyed Coopworth
locks for some needlefelted tropical fish I want to make from Dyed Dreams.
The woman in the booth was demonstrating knitting right from the locks and was
getting a lot of attention.

Stony Mountain
Fibers had brightly dyed roving
and needle felting supplies.
I also bought some cormo that was pin drafted by Ohio
Valley Natural Fibers. Didn't figure you needed a picture of a coil of white
fiber! After seeing the nice job they did on Stony Mts. cormo, I went over to
talk with Don (?) about the Whitefish Bay corriedale. He explained to me how
the do the pin drafting and the difference between top and roving. I understood
it when he explained the different terms but don't ask me to explain it to you
<g>

At the Carolina
Homespun booth I found some gorgeous Merino/Tussah
Silk and a few ounces each of Silk Rayon Blend, Cultivated Silk, and Soy
Silk/Cashmere Blend. They were all natural colors.

Stopping by The Woolery
yielded 2 oz. of Camel/Silk Top and white Firestar and a deep blue/green/fushia
Metallic Mardigras.

Check out this gorgeous Bombyx top
from Chasing Rainbows Dyeworks. I don't know where I heard it, but someone mentioned
The Drafting Zone for processing. I stopped by their booth and picked up 8 oz.
of a 80 Romney/10 mohair blend
that they processed and dyed themselves. I figured it would be a good indicator
of their work. Somehow a pound of Brown Sheep roving also found its way into
my bag. Well, you know I need something to dye with.

April 21, 2003

Huzzah
- the purchases are rolling in! I got my Alvin
Raymer Super Mini Combs and the raw silk from R&M
today. I just heard from Whitefish
Bay and the fleeces have been shipped. What else did I order last week?
Now to find room for everything before I go to MDSW.

 

If you need an instant gratification project try a blanket in a nice heavy wool.
Even with doubleweave the inches are adding up in no time.

April 20, 2003

I
just love the look of a warp all beamed and taut. I was going to do a random
warp, but I'm just not a random sort of gal, so I counted out what I had and
made a plan. The extra red on the left of the picture will be the two sides.
The fold is on the right. I still have to add the fishing line and weights,
but that will have to wait until tomorrow.

I've got one more day of spring break. I have some little bits of mohair and
bright pieces of wool that I want to blend on the carder tomorrow. I'm in a
fish exchange - based loosely on the fulled fish from knitter's
stash and I want to spin some tropical colors. Check out the fish Carolyn
made for a baby shower - they were the inspiration for the exchange.

Thursday is my annual Asian American Club trip to NYC. This trip puts my nerves
in an uproar every year, but the kids love it so I keep doing it. We have so
many kids in the club that I booked two charter buses, but with world affairs
what they are many parents would not allow their children to go to New York
this year. I had to cancel one of the buses, but now we have three members on
the waiting list. They are predicting chilly, damp weather for Thurday. So what
else is new? No matter when we schedule this trip it rains. Sometimes it's a
cold, bonechilling rain, sometimes warm, but IT ALWAYS RAINS!

MDS$W - Accuweather
is predicting a rainy weekend for Maryland
Sheep and Wool Festival, but I don't mind that :-) It keeps those daytrippers
away and allows the serious fiber folks more space.

posted at 7:30 PM

Not
of whole heck of a lot I can post, but hopefully I'll have pictures tomorrow.
Been spinning up the corriedale, just plied another 8 oz. I'm ready to beam
on another blanket warp. I dyed some of my Bartlett's and then I realized -
or should I say was advised - that I needed to wash the rest of my warp, since
the dyed yarn was much softer and loftier. Did that Friday night, and got the
warp sleyed and threaded last night. I'll probably end up watching some of The
Ten Commandments (wouldn't be Easter without it) and knitting some more on my
Little Dimun.

The kids are all older now, but they insisted on the bunny
cake again this year.

April 16, 2003

I can imagine Mother Nature with this rather maniacal laugh "Ha, they
liked 85 degrees, let's throw them for a loop!" We are struggling to stay
in the 40's, in fact the high of 49 was in the early hours of the morning. But
when I look out my window it still looks like spring. And we could have the
ice storms that people to the west and north of us are getting.

I'm dyeing some of my natural Bartlett yarn for another blanket. I know it
seems repetitive, but I've been really into my spinning lately, and I can't
think of anything else to do (that doesn't require leaving my house to search
out more materials). This will be quick and it has the added bonus of getting
tons of worsted weight wool out of the stash bins. I threw a small sample of
the different colors I had on hand into the dye pot and was pleasantly surprise
by how it turned out. Being a beginner dyer I had heard about overdyeing yarn
but didn't realize how I could use it.

On the left are four of the colors used in previous blankets.
I threw a sample in to a pot with Cushings' Egyptian Red - those are the four
on the right (in the same order). This could be a really easy way to use a bunch
of leftover yarn. Yes, I know, everyone else knew this already, but it's fun
for an old dog like me to learn new tricks.

Pi Shawl

After
reading about Catherine
taking advantage of the good weather to block her shawl, I was reminded
of my poor Pi sitting in a ball. So after a good soak, she's sunning on the
back deck. I've been thinking about the Peacock I made years ago, this lemming
thing is nothing new for me! I gave that one to a friend, but I'm thinking of
making it again with some 3/2 perle cotton I have around.

April 8, 2004

Here's my progress on the Little Dimun and here's my new toy. It's a Howell Skein Winder,
from Woodland Woolworks.
Thanks for the tip, Carolyn.
I got the counter to go with
it too. It came unfinished, but very smooth. I'll probably rub an oil finish
on it next week when I have some time - spring break finally!