I Am Here

Just not doing anything except academic work. Not unless you count about 15 rows on a sock as being on a fiber roll! As my mind drifts off in class (I know, I'm a teacher, I never said I didn't understand my students) I have a couple weaving projects I'm thinking about. A couple of rag rugs with the tie-dyed fabric I dyed two summers ago and a painted warp for kitchen towels. I'm also working on a plan for placemats and a runner. I finished one paper last night and I'm halfway through the next. With any luck I'll get it done tomorrow and have some time to wind the warp before it's Tuesday and I'm back to school. It's a little hard to paint a warp if it's still on the cone. For that matter, it's a little hard to weave the rugs without ordering the rug warp.

Not all is lost. I have been getting some time during my commute and breaks to listen to my iPod. I'm working my way through Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Songs (someone gave me a dvd with all of the mp3s) but I think I'm getting too anal about this greatest song list. I'm keeping the list on my Zire so that I can rank them and keep my comments. I think I better let that go. I enjoyed Lian Hearn's Across the Nightengale Floor and I'm listening to Grass for His Pillow right now. I downloaded Hadassah: One Night with the King thinking it would be similar to The Red Tent.

My Three Day Vacation

What do you do if you know you only have three days between the end of school and the beginning of your summer classes? Make a list! The last two days were spent doing things in the house and garden. Today I'm going to get projects started so that I can have a little fiber fun in the evenings.

I have the tables and pots ready to go in the garage. There are a few Sabracon projects (as soon as I get the 10/2 cotton warped) and some warps and rovings I want to paint.

This afternoon I'll card up some more of the corrie tweed. I finished the nugget gold plying - next up is the rust. (For those who commented, the rust is just plain Rust right out of Cushings' envelope)

I'm getting close to the toe decreases for the Chutes and Ladders sock. That's going with me to school for knitting breaks. I've got to clean up around the sewing machine before any kimono work.

Thanks to June's suggestions I was able to get a true picture of the nugget gold yarn. I found the smaller tripod stashed in the bowels of a closet. Then I changed the white balance and suppressed the flash.



I still need to play around with the settings to get a true picture of the tweed yarn. Every picture shows it much greener than it really is. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Spinning and Knitting

No weaving. No time or energy the past week or two for planning out the next project or even to begin sewing the kimono. I won't bore you with all of the details, but our school is making drastic reforms and switching to small learning communities. Along with that we are also changing from traditional 47 minute periods to four 88 minute block. It will be an A/B block with four classes each day. All teachers have to change rooms, regardless or whether their room is in the allocated space for their community or not. Mine was, nevertheless I had to pack all of my stuff and move next door! School was officially over for the year Friday, but we have two Flex Days? for next year that we are being requested to serve on Monday and Tuesday. Since this is a public blog I'll stop here.

I finished a pair of socks! Now that might not seem like such an accomplishment to most of you, but I seem to have a problem finishing socks. These Opal socks have been in production since May 2002 when I started them at MDS&W. The first sock I ever started looks exactly the way it does in this picture . To commemorate my accomplishment I immediately started the Chutes and Ladders sock. I thought I liked the variegated yarn but it doesn't really show off the pattern. I have a mushroomy solid that might work well with this.

Spinning seemed to be a way to wind down and relax this week too. I got another batt of my corrie tweed spun up and then, being too tired to stand at the carder, I reached into this eye burning nugget gold and began to spin a heavy two-ply. Originally I was thinking of a jacket, but now I think maybe a blanket or even a rug. I have equal amounts of silver-green and rust. These were straight Cushings Perfection dyes on Marie's lovely Finn/Dorset cross. Could I get any more 70s?

Spinning Report

I carded the first 60g batt on Sunday but didn't get a chance to spin it until this evening.



I seem to be doing a lot of spinning lately. Probably because I can zone out while I'm doing it. Weaving the bright kimono warp was very relaxing, but I haven't had time to sew the kimono or plan a new warp. (Yes, June, the dark band will go along the neck opening of the kimono)

Here's one of the skeins from the recarded Lambspun.



These skeins were softly spun from a merino batt from Bonkers


So soft and spongy - I can't stop squeezing them. I may need to keep them with me for the next few days. Graduation tomorrow afternoon and then another weekend spent in class.

Ack! The Router Went Down

I was able to check my email with my Budget Dialup but didn't try uploading any pictures to the blog. It's amazing how slow a 55K dialup is after having cable modem for a couple of years. And to think my first modem was 300 baud! After a quick run to Best Buy tonight I'm back in business.



This is actually old news now. I finished the warp last night and it looks great after washing. I'm going to try Sara's kimono directions on some old fabric first to make sure I've got it right. Now to find some time.

Ready to Blend

I carded 400 grams of the natural corriedale on the Louet today and then divided all of it into 20 batches.



Each of these are ~20 grams. Then I added 10 grams each of the four colors I dyed last weekend.



Next up - I'll run each batch through the Duncan. Dan (my oldest son) came by for breakfast and was impressed by how soft the samples were. Impressed enough to hint that this might be the yarn for his first handspun sweater. Hmmm. Maybe I could get it done in time of his birthday in November, but do I really want to acknowledge that I will have a son that's thirty years old? I'll give it to him for Christmas!

The Big Fish

I've been spinning white silk, weaving the same brightly colored warp, and knitting a sock. No picture opps there. So why don't you have a look at the fish Josh caught last weekend. Josh is in the sleeveless shirt and orange shorts. The fish was tossed back in after the photos were taken.