Westcoast Colours

There's something so appealing about fibre and sunshine. I love the colours! This is the Superwash Merino/Tencel I got from Fibre Fest. I felt like spinning on Saturday and it was too nice a day to spin grey (Ping - yes, that's still a WIP).



Thankful for:
1. The local Art Knapps.
2. Sunny Saturdays.
3. Lots of fibre fun to chose from.

Yay! It's Thursday!

It seems that I have been remiss in updating projects and stash enhancements on Ravelry as well. According to my Ravelry stash, I have 19 different yarns. heh! It just seems like a lot of work to put photos on Flickr. As well, unless you have a paid account with Flickr, you are limited in how many photos you can store.

The last Monkey sock is half done. Just one more repeat & on to the heels. I changed all the purls to knit to make it an easier take-along project. Did I mention it was the Trekking Pro Natura that I'm using? I love this stuff!

Can't wait until my yarn order arrives from Webs so I can start the Spirgyra. I ordered more Trekking. :) Some of the yarn is for the WoW Knitalong - a project to be knitted only when playing WoW. Another great thing about Ravelry...you can do a search on just about anything and you will find other knitters AND there will be a forum set up to discuss your obsessions. Athough, I'm not sure I want to measure how much time I've spent playing computer games by how much knitting I get done! lol!

Thankful for:
1. Tulips are up and looking very spring-like.
2. Twisted By Choice - I really missed you all the last month.
3. Boring days at work - once in a while, it's good to have a quiet boring day.

Shhh! Don't tell!

I haven't finished twisting the fringes and the thread ends are still hanging out and it hasn't been washed yet. I don't care. I wore my scarf anyway today. It was so cold this morning.

Snow? Really?

When I heard that we were expecting snow on the weekend, I was doubtful. It didn't snow on the weekend but it did on Friday. BIG FAT FLUFFY FLAKES OF SNOW! Luckily, it didn't stick. There was nothing on the ground on Saturday.

Jean's Finishing class on Saturday was everything I thought it should be and more! It was fun and tiring at the same time. My brain was so full! Good thing I brought a thermos of coffee with me. I even had enough to share. :)

Now I have no excuse not to seam up my grey cardigan. That's a project for next weekend.

The rest of the weekend was spent gardening in the sunny areas (coz the shady areas were so very cold!)...and playing WoW on the Ravelry guild while knitting my Monkey socks. I was hoping the Trekking I ordered would arrive last Friday so I could start on the Spirogyra gloves for the knitalong.

Warning! Lots of WHINING

/start of WHINE

What can I say? I haven't fallen off the face of the earth (although, falling through space would be relatively peaceful in comparison) it just has been very busy...and stressful lately. I had hoped things would settled down at work with this new position but new things kept popping up. That very reason was what kept me from taking this position years ago. It seemed like the right thing to do this time but I'm having doubts. When work interferres with RL, I'm not happy. Usually, it's busy in the Spring season and I'm hit & miss with fibre functions but this year has been the absolute worse.

/end of WHINE

On to fibre stuff...

I am so looking forward to Jean Wong's workshop tomorrow. All my swatches are finished, labeled and ready to go. There is very little that compares with a full day workshop with other crazy knitters who are equally obsessed with fibre as oneself.

The monkey sock is still plodding along. SOMEONE played with my row counter and I lost my place. It took 4 rows before I noticed and ripped out the offending rows. It looked messy and since I was still so close to the beginning, I ripped it back to the ribbing. I'm knitting these socks in the green Trekking I got from Fibre Fest. It's a wool/bamboo blend and it feels really nice. Knits up nicely too.

I ordered some more of the wool/bamboo Trekking in different colours. One of the colourway reminds me of Murloc scales so I'm going to use it for the WoW knitalong. :)

Finally finished the scarf on the loom. Reason #423 why you shouldn't warp with only silk boucle...it makes really ugly fringes. Now, I just have to weave in the 6 zillion ends and it's done.

Wow! Busy couple of weeks!

It's been crazy here. I thought it would be quiet with the kid off to Europe but it has been very busy. Two weeks goes by so fast. He'll be home tonight. I took the day off to meet him at the airport.

We've been spending most of our free time (time other than working or sleeping) helping my MIL pack & ready to move. Thankfully, my brother-in-law will be in town to help with the actual move tomorrow. Good thing because I wasn't able to get both days off. Given the choice of taking the day off to pick up my son or go help my MIL move, I'll be selfish.

Friday is his 18th birthday. Poor kid might still be too tired to celebrate. Saturday will be Easter dinner at my mom's place. Sunday and Monday will be do nothing days. Really looking forward to those days!

There is very little going on fibre-wise. I started the monkey socks with the Trekking I bought at Fibrefest but have not gotten far with them yet. I have about an inch done on one sock...which is just the ribbing. That's it. Too lazy to wind the yarn into two balls to knit both together.

I think I will make Sunday an all day fibre day.

Thankful for:

1. Mini daffodils in my garden.
2. My sweet violets made it back again this year.
3. Son will be home soon so the dog will stop moping around.

Fibrefest 2008

I laid out all my Fibrefest goodies & realized I don't have a camera. The old one has no juice because the battery pack went to Europe as the back-up battery.

Oh well.

It was a fun day as usual. Lots of gabbing with old friends and made new ones. It's always fun to run into people I haven't seen since last Fibrefest. It was at a new place this year and it was a bit of an adventure finding it. Other than that, it was still fun.

Since there will be no pictures, I'll just list out the stuff:

From Princess Farms:
2 - 100 gms skeins of 60/4 cotton & silk
2 - 100 gms bags of Cria baby alpaca roving in grey (so soft!)
2 - 50 gms handdyed stretched merino roving (you have to see this stuff!)

Misc Venders:
Handdyed superwash merino & tencel roving
220 Cascade wool (for my swatches)
Trekking sock yarn
Dark brown alpaca roving from Sterling Farms
M&K Eco Cotton
Four Harness Huck booklet by Evelyn Neher
1 Schacht slim boat shuttle

The only thing I had on my shopping list this year was to pick up some yarn to do the swatches for the Jean Wong workshop. The rest was just to go & see what was tempting...and there was a lot to be tempted with.

When I got home, dinner was already made.

Then I spent some time on WoW. Usually, I muck around with one of my son's lower level characters but I decided it was time I had my own. I'm Thymeformom on Moonrunner. :D

Time flies

Been busy with family stuff, knitting, and other fibre stuff. I should have taken some pictures first but the camera is being charged up, ready for my son to take to Europe. It's been a whirlwind of activities here trying to decide what he should take and what he would really need. Two weeks and a zillion different stops. That's the kind of trip one takes when one is young and has a lot of energy. Tomorrow, we pack the last minute stuff and he's all set. All the kids are so excited! They've been working hard towards this trip for over a year now. The teachers are great...this is their 6th trip. Over half the kids going are kids he's grown up with. It's so strange to see them as young adults. I still see them as little wee guys running around our backyard.

What am I going to do for the two weeks he's gone?

I think I'm going to play WoW until my eyeballs fall out! :D

Thankful for:
1. My son.
2. His group of good friends.
3. Wonderful teachers at his school who organized this trip.

I love this fleece!

This was all the grunge that was picked from the fleece, pre-washing. No second cuts and VM to speak of. A good fleece.

The fleece was carefully divided up and bagged in mesh lingerie bags. These are great! They're a dollar at the dollar store and are perfect for dyeing and fleece washing. The bags won't last forever but the price is right.

Sunday was a good day for fleece washing - it was warm and sunny. I usually do the first two washing outside because I'm paranoid of the grease clogging up my washing machine. After the initial washes, the rinse/soaks are done in the washing machine with no agitation.

Wet fleece drying on a rack...to accentuate any home decor. I'm just itching to start spinning this.

Thankful for:
1. Fibrefest is two weeks away.
2. I got the Friday off to go to Fibrefest with my friends. Yay!
3. Daffodils and tulips are coming out of the ground.

Perendale/Romey fleece

Canada Post is great! Why? Because they bring me all the neat stuff I ordered. Yesterday, 2.5 kg of smelly Perendale/Romney fleece (plus an assortment of silk fibre as well) arrived for me at work in a little itty bitty box. Good thing the people at Treenway pack well. I can just imagine people coming in my office, wondering about the odor. I love the smell of raw fleece. The best part is opening up the package and have all that fleecey goodness explode out of the box. I did that yesterday but didn't have a chance to look through the fleece until tonight. It was a Guild meeting tonight and if it wasn't for the fact that we had a special speaker, I might have decided to stay home to play.


Not sure if I can fit this all back in the box.

The washed sample came out really nice and fluffy. No plans for the fleece yet except wash it this weekend.

I love the colour but that's going to be a lot of grey wool. I might dye some of it. That's what I love about raw fleece...unlimited potential. You can change something at any stage of preparation and that will change your final product.

Thankful for:
1. Kindness of strangers - a very nice bunch of people let me in the line up ahead of them at Costco. The amazing thing was that it was three different groups of shoppers...each with a very full buggy.
2. The person who left a box of Ferrero Roche on my desk. :) Chocolate is always appreciated.
3. Snowdrops in the front garden have started to open.

I'm so ready for Spring!

It's snowing again. It's not supposed to happen here. I can't believe I was actually wishing for rain. Enough already!

These past three weeks have been just a blur to me. Life at work is always insane at this time of the year. Made worse by the fact that now it's my department and I feel, well, a bit more responsible for things. I have to remember to take deep breaths and fondle more fibrey stuff.

The poor old grey cardigan is still languishing in the knitting bag. I looked at the cabled shoulders yesterday and just couldn't find the energy to work on it. But I did find the energy to start a new sweater...Bianca's Jacket from Interweave Knits - Fall 2006. This is a pattern that's tailored-made for knitting in one piece.

On the loom, I have some silk boucle as the warp. In hindsight, I probably should have used the boucle as an interest yarn - as Rusty suggested, rather than for the whole warp. (Next time, I'll email you first.) It did seemed like a good idea at the time. Another reason not to do things when you're tired.

No luck in finding my missing charts for the shawl. I have the swatch sample so I guess I can rechart the pattern from that. Not looking forward to this at all.

Warping Board

We made a warping board last weekend. Ok...hubby cut, drilled, and hammered while I did the measurements and supervised. :D

I got the free plan & instructions from allfiberarts.com. We had to make a few modifications because we couldn't find the right size oak boards. The plans and instructions were easy to follow even for us un-handy types. The board works well. It still could use another light sanding and one more coat of finishing though.

Now I can wind longer warps for yarn painting too! :)

I still haven't found my charts yet. Unfortunately, they were my own. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I left them at work.

July 14/13 - Edited to add: the measurements between the pegs on the long side is 10" from centre to centre of the pegs. The measurements between the pegs on the shorter side is 4" from centre to centre.  It looks like All Fibre has updated their plans to show the measurements better. After all these years, I still use my warping board. Not just for weaving but handy for winding out long lengths of anything.

Drat! Drat! Drat again!

I can't find my charts for my shawl. This is serious because it was my one and only copy. I did this up on the computer before things went haywire and we lost everything last year. It was backed up on the external but that went weird too and lost everything there.

I've looked everywhere in the house. I think it might have fallen out of my bag on the train. Crap! It took me so long to work out that design.

It's a snow day here!

After two attempts to get in to work, I did the smart thing and phoned in to say I'm not going in today. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at things) I can do some of the work from home and there's nothing urgent that can't wait until tomorrow.

Finished & washed!!!

Finished measurements are 19"x96". Originally, I was thinking of making this into cushion covers but it's a nice snuggly wrap. It's long enough to wrap around me a few times. Perfect for a day like today.

Thankful for:
1. Being able to stay home today.
2. Family was able to stay home today.
3. Computer & internet so I can do stuff at home without getting behind.

Snow Queen

This is my last Ice Queen and I'm keeping this one. This is #5. It seemed appropriate to photograph her in the snow. Not sure what's up with the weather but I think we had more snow days this season so far than any I remembered.

Apparently, the gifted Ice Queens were well recieved. I'm glad. I think the last minute decisions to switch from socks/mittens was a good one. I might make one more Ice Queen as one of the mitten recipients has been eyeing my Ice Queen.

Psst! Angela, stop by & say hi!

Thankful for:
1. My dutch oven.
2. Hot chocolate with a spicy kick.
3. Warm fuzzy slippers.

What to do?

What to knit when you have stuff to knit but nothing you want to knit? And all you want to do is start another knitting project when you have stuff you should knit?

Doing all those Ice Queens have put me in a lace knitting mood. I've started my new shawl in Harmony but it's too finicky to be a mindless knitting project.



Boy! Lace in progress is really ugly stuff!

Warning: Bright Colours!

Really didn't do much, kniting-wise. I just made another ear for the Sock Monkey and sewed that on. Now all I have to do is knit another ear & he's done. Not sure why I keep procrastinating on this. Poor monkey.

I've been working on the weaving off & on today.

I really like the gradual colour changes of the Kauni wool. You can see the little mistake when someone was talking to me as I was weaving. I'm not at that point where I can talk and weave at the same time. I thought about un-weaving to fix that but the thought of picking out all that was just too daunting. I had to un-weave 3 rows and that almost killed me. I was thinking of repeating that "mistake" and call it a design feature. :D



I have the yarn wounded on the bobbins in the order it came off the ball. This way, I can try & keep the colour sequence and have the colours gradually fade from one to the next. The bag was the inspiration for the pattern. I couldn't figure out how to to do the the horizontal stripes between the diamonds so I kept it simple.



Thankful for:
1. I'm thankful my family is whole and intact.
2. Wool comforters.
3. My sister.

Too lazy for pictures

My other balls of Jojoland Harmony arrived in the mail yesterday. The little express envelope was so packed, it was like a tube. When I opened it up, 4 balls of Harmony exploded out of the bag. Call me weird but that was so cool!

What have I been up to?

I'm redoing the warp on my loom. After doing a few inches, I decided that the Kauni would be much nicer in a rosepath weave. So I cut off the sample bit and redoing everything. I can't wait to see how the colour changes will work out on this pattern.

On the wheel is Ping in progress still. It seems like I'm spinning and spinning and there's no end in sight. The bag of fibre doesn't seem to be getting smaller. Once in a while, I switch bobbins and spin some silk that I dyed last summer.

I still have to put my grey cable cardie together but first, I want to reknit the shoulders. I didn't like the shaping. That was part of the things I wanted to do over the Christmas holidays. I think the best thing to do is to set aside a weekend and get it done.

There's talk on Ravelry that we might be able to catalogue our fibre and other non-knitting work soon. I've been looking at my stash and wondering how much of it I should divulge on Ravelry. I'm slightly embarrassed by the sheer quantity of yarn and fibre I have. Not to mention, there's only so much space in a free Flickr account. And the work it takes to photograph EVERYTHING.

Thankful for:
1. Seat belts.
2. Things are going well at work (touch wood).
3. Just a feeling that I'm truly blessed (touch wood again).

Placemats are finished...

...sort of...

I've finished weaving them and have taken them off the loom. I still haven't decided if they will be used as placemats or made into a bag. I'm leaning towards a bag. The placemats are really kind of ugly. The edges are uneven and there are missed threads on the back that I didn't noticed until I passed the point of no return. With knitting, if you made a mistake, you can rip back or drop stitches and reknit to fix things. Can you do that with weaving?

Still, it was fun and I did learn a lot.

I went to Place des Arts to wind another warp but didn't bring enough yarn. I have to go back on Saturday & finish. Don't ask what I'm making next because I'm not sure myself. I just wanted to weave something the whole width of the loom just to see what it will look like. And I wanted to use the reed I cleaned up. The Kauni wool I'm using will be perfect for this. If I don't like it, I can felt it and make another bag.

WOW!!

I looked up Jojoland Harmony on Ravelry to find out more on this yarn since I've never used it before. There were some really beautiful shawls knitted with this yarn. The colours were soft and I love the way it gently fades from colour to colour. I was lamenting last night that I couldn't decide whether to use the Jojoland Harmony to weave something or knit a lacy something. Hubby's response was why don't I phone the store and ask them to put away a couple more balls and I can do both.

Done!

"I'm just going to look"

Famous last words.
My husband always reply with "sure you are.."



Don't they look like delicious woolly apples? 5 balls of Jojoland's Harmony - 800m @ 50g of beautiful laceweight. They should be shown off in a fruit basket, I think.

Thankful for:
1. A hubby who encourages me to buy yarn - a keeper.
2. A hubby who drives me to faraway yarn places.
3. A hubby who makes pit stops at unexpected yarn places.