Annual Trek

It was absolutely exhausting but fun! Every year, my sister and I grab our kids and head out for the day. Part of the fun is that we just never know where we'll end up at any point.

It was a trip to Vancouver on the Westcoast Express, Aquarium, lunch, more Aquarium, shopping on Robson, Chapters, Granville Island - Opus, Maiwa, etc...the full deal, Hon's for dinner, and finishing up with a trip to Michaels. Keep in mind that we either walked or took the bus. Yeah, it was exhausting! My feet are still hurting right now.

What amazed me was after all that, I came home with only 1 little wooden stamp from Maiwa and a little tube of glitter from Michaels. Oh, there were brownies and banana breads and other goodies consumed along the way but stuff-wise? This is it.

Kauni Goodness!

I met up with Shelly from Fun Knits Yarn Shop today and picked up the wool for the Kauni cardigan. We had a nice visit and she showed me her Kauni cardigan in its final stages...casting off the body and just about to steek. Yikes!

According to the pattern, I should be good with 3 balls but I got 5 just in case. Nothing worse than running out of wool. If I have leftovers, I can make a hat or scarf or mitts. The great thing about this wool is that it doesn't matter what the colours are. All the colours repeat themselves. As long as you start one ball on a different colour repeat from the other ball, you're ok. Fair Isle effect without the zillions of ends to darn in at the end.

I am not going to start this until I've done at least 10" of the cardigan. And I'm waiting for my new needles to arrive.

Yup.

Edited to add:

The silk noil nicely plyed...

I could just kick myself!

A while ago, I got an invite to join Ravelry. I didn't know what Ravelry was and never got around to checking it out. I've heard of people talking about it but thought I really didn't have time to join another on-line community. The knitting buddy who sent me the invite finally convinced me to go check it out. Now I'm on the waiting list with 15126 people ahead of me.

Poo!

Computer is fixed!

This is why it's good to have a teenage kid! Tell him that it may take weeks before you'll have time to look into the computer problem and he will fix it out of desperation. Heh!

This is the silk I'm hoping to spin up for the Mystery Stole but I'm not sure if I want something varigated for the stole. I have some plain white laceweight merino that I was thinking of using instead.


I've knitted another 10 rows since this picture was taken. I'm not sure why I'm not all that interested in this sweater right now. Usually I'm all over cables. This is the Merino/Alpaca from Sweaterkit.com

Something is missing...

...from my computer. Some kind of drive is missing from our computer and it's not working again. Weird because it was working fine and suddenly, it's not working. Somehow, a drive has up and ran off. yeah.

So that means it's back to the laptop. I've been busy taking pictures of stuff to post but can't now. I guess I'll have to break down and load the photo program on the laptop now.

Anyhoo...I'm on vacation for 3 weeks. Any day I'm not at work is a good day. Small talk at the office always have people asking each other what are they doing on their vacations. It's hard to explain to people my plans for the 3 weeks.

1. Finish spinning the yarn for the Mystery stole so I can start knitting before the end of the summer.

2. Ply the 2 bobbins of silk noil that took forever to spin.

3. Finish carding the indigo dyed wool into batts. I'm not optimistic enough to add spinning this as well.

4. Pick up the Kauni yarn for my Kauni cardigan. I couldn't help myself.

5. A miniature rug to finish.

6. Make the ice cube ornaments.

7. Make more soap.

8. Make brownies.

9. Force myself to knit the cable cardigan some more - hopefully finish the back and start the front. Considering that I'm only knitting 1 or 2 rows every couple of days, this could really take years!

10. Finish at least one pattern repeat on the Orenburg shawl so I can see if I like it enough to continue.

11. Annual Trek - not sure where we're going this year. The kids are getting tired of Science World. This is our 8th Annual Trek.

12. Make an appointment to get my eyes checked.

13. Go see the Modern Masters exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

14. Spend a day at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC. I love that place!

15. Sign up for a weaving class at Place des Art. Yes, that's right. I've gone over to the dark side. Considering the gals I've been hanging out with, it was just a matter of time.

Computers are evil...

...but necessary.

*sigh*

We got a new motherboard. It's much faster and the graphics are much clearer and cooler, according to my son. But we (I) have to reconfigure all our email accounts again. I voted to not bother and just read our emails from the host website. It wasn't a big hit with the rest of the family. So we (I) have to find time to call up the provider and get all the necessary gobblygook from them. I also have to re-load the program for my camera so I can upload pictures. I have to find the disk first.

I've been spinning some tussah that I dyed a few weeks ago for the Mystery Stole #3. At the rate I'm going, it will be winter before I get to the knitting part. I think we're at clue #5 or something and I haven't even started.

Michael's is having a sale on Paton's Classic Merino this week! The down side is that the wool is shipped in 4 balls dye lots. Instead of worrying about matching dye lots, I just bought a whole bunch of different colours. I could either knit a colourful sweater or a bunch of different coloured hats. It's all good.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

WOW!!

JK Rowling outdid herself on this book!

Bad news - Good news

Bad news - my computer died last week. It's the motherboard and it's completely fried. We had just bought a larger external hard drive to back up stuff but hadn't done it yet.

Good news - the mother board will be replace with a faster better one and it's done by my cousin (cheap but reliable). We're not sure if everything will be intact until the new board goes in.

...fun stuff...

I finally sew the buttons and button holes on my green cardigan. I'm using the good ol' standby - shell buttons. I'm still thinking of re-knitting the collar and shortening the sleeves. It's not hard to do...just need time.

One more day (ok, 2 days) to the new Harry Potter book. We're going to head over to Chapters Friday night to eat their cookies and treats and line up for midnight. We didn't do that for the other books but this is the LAST BOOK! I heard that someone scanned the book and posted it online. I'm not even tempted to go look. It's not the same reading it off the computer.

Marvellous weekend of dyeing

I had the most marvellous weekend of fibre and dyeing.

Saturday was the Twisted By Choice Dye Day. We worked with Procion H and silk. The colours came out brilliant. I've never used Procion H before and bought the starter kit last year. This was a good opportunity to play with something new. The process was quick and easy. I like the fact the colours are in liquid and it took very little prep time. The skeins are drying right now and we're going to get together again on Wed to do the steaming. Silly me forgot my camera but I took a couple of pictures with Teal's camera.

Sunday morning was a short trip to Granville Island. One of the few rare times that I'm there and not pick up any silk fibre from the Weaving Studio. I did pick up another kit of Procion H plus a few extra colours to play with. The rest of the afternoon was spent mixing colours, re-skeining some of the silk floss to prepare them for dyeing, and working on my swatch for the Mystery Stole #3.

Something about mucking about with all that fibre makes me very happy. And now I sit here at work, thinking of all my fun stuff at home. It's going to be a long Monday.

P.S. Tammy...punch needle embroidery is really fun. Really fast too. Costco in Burnaby has a kit with three patterns, floss, & needle for $10.00. :D

Kwik-E-Mart Madness

We couldn't help ourselves. They transformed one of the local 7-Eleven stores into the Simpson's Kwik-E-Mart and we had to go see. It was so crowded there! I think every kid within the area was there buying Squishies and do-nuts.

More reasons to love needlepunch embroidery!

It's smaller than rug hooking. Talk about instant gratification! Compare to knitting a sweater, it takes no time at all. It's something you can do in the summer when it's too hot to knit and certaintly too hot to rug hook. Ok, it wasn't that hot today but I'm anticpating that it will be a very hot summer. And rug hooking patterns in minature works well for needlepunch embroidery.

The finished size for this project is 3.5" square. No sweaty hands. No heavy wool fabric or scratchy burlap draped over you. In this piece, I tried playing with different loop lengths to get the watermelon and the heart to "pop" out more. The ouline was done on the lowest setting to create a bit of shadow between the main objects and the background.

I tried the technique here on the snowman one the left but not sure the results was what I wanted.

The snowman on the right was done increasing the loops each row going towards the inside, making the body rounded. It was much better but you can't really tell from the picture.

Happy Canada Day!

I have lots of reason to say I'm proud to be a Canadian and I wrote and rewrote a post about today but nothing sounded right. I think it would take me a lifetime to go through all my reasons...my lifetime, to be exact.

So...Happy Canada Day, everyone. I'm going to sit on my deck and think of what it means to be Canadian for my family.

Cheers!

Needlepunch Embroidery needles

Ok, keep in mind that the following are just my opinions on different punch needles. I'm in no way an expert on needle punch embroidery.

The first needle is the inexpensive needle from Dimensions at Michaels. I purchased the kit & needle separately but I just found out recently that Costco has a kit containing 3 patterns, floss, & needle for half the price I paid for just the kit. The needle was comfortable to use - it has a rubber grip - but the needle had a small burr on the tip. I sanded that off with fine sandpaper and it worked better but still catches slightly. I like the clear body of the needle so you can see how much floss you have left. The down side is you can't change the needle and it only comes in one size - 3 strand. You can't change the length of the loops as well.

The second needles are the Igolochkoy needles. The needles are smooth and goes into different fabrics nicely. Easy to make small even stitches and loops. Definitely a quality needle. The needles can be replaced easily if needed. It comes in 1-, 3-, & 6-strand needles. The loops can be adjusted but you have to cut the plastic sleeve to adjust the lengths. Not hard to do but finicky as you have to measure and cut the sleeves. Another thing is that if the sleeves didn't fit snug, it slides down as you're punching and that will change the lengths of your loops. The needles are small and were good for precise details but not comfortable to use for filling in large areas. It was hurting my hand after a while.

The third needle is the Cameo needle. The point is nice and sharp. The needles can be replaced and you can get different size needles like the Igolochkoy needles. The body of the holder is pen shaped, like the Dimension needle. Unlike the Dimension and the Igolochkoy needle, you can adjust the length of the loops easily with a slight twist. No little sleeves to cut and adjust. I can use this needle as long as I want without my wrist hurting. The downside is that you can't see inside so it's hard to tell how much floss you have left.

Oh Phooey!

I was not one of the fortunate few that got into the Maiwa workshop of her choice today. Not even second choice. Barely made it to the wait list. Bah! I was all set with my usual routine but at 9:55, I was called away from my desk and did not get back until almost 10:30. By then, it was too late. The phone lines were jammed for hours and I didn't get through until close to 2pm. Way too late. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that someone will pull out.

Things to do on the first day of Summer...

Photos curtesy of my son...dog helped.

Knitters are wonderful people!

There are so many wonderful knitters out there. I'm not just talking about knitter who knit beautifully but knitters who are caring and kind.

Check out the Rebuilding Greensburg project!

Fuzzy goodness

It's Saturday and I had to go into work today. There was an orientation for the new staff...all 125 of them. My bit only takes 20 minutes but I dreaded it since I hate speaking in front of a large crowd. To make myself feel better, I stopped off at Shan's Needleworks in New Westminster on the way home. I think this store is fast becoming my favourite LYS. That's really saying a lot considering there are a number of good LYS nearby.

A month ago, I picked up some Merino/Alpaca from Shan's and it was so wonderful to work with! The label just say Merino/Alpaca Super Soft Yarn. They're based in Ontario. Anyway, the yarn knited up really nicely. I made a little teddy bear for a friend's baby shower. It was really hard to give that away. Sorry, no pics...didn't have time. It was one of those times when you procrastinated and had to knit like crazy all night long to finish it for the next day. I seem to do my best work that way.

Since then, I've been thinking how wonderful this yarn would be as a cardigan. The most the store had was 10 balls of any dye lot. Deep down I knew it wasn't enough for a sweater but I managed to convinced myself otherwise. I'm good at that. I bought all 10 balls of the very soft blue/grey merino/alpaca. I got home and my brain cleared. The total yardage is 1100. It's not even close...not for a cable sweater. I think this might become a snuggly shawl or something like the EZ Rib Warmers.

Merino & Alpaca in all its fuzzy goodness.

7 Random facts about me...

1. I remembered watching Kennedy's funeral on TV when I was two years old. We were still living in Hong Kong at that time. I remembered my parents waking me up in the middle of the night to go to my grandparent's house.

2. Caffine doesn't seem to affect me. I can have a cup of coffee right before going to bed and will sleep soundly.

3. I don't like price labels on my can goods. I peel them off before putting the groceries away.

4. I always wash new clothes before wearing.

5. I'm right-handed but play a lot of sports left-handed, thanks to my brother.

6. I love to read. When I was 8, I decided to read every single book in the school library. Fortunately, it was a small school library. I started at one end of the room and went through the shelves systematically. I probably missed a few books here & there but for the most part, I did read everything I could...including encylopedias.

7. I've never watched a football game. This fact is amazing considering that I work for a major football arena. The most I've seen is the last 5 minutes of a Grey Cup game.

Recycled bag

Look what you can do with 12" of leftover pant legs! The material was cut off from the pants I hemmed up last week. Ok...I "hemmed" them up to capri length so there was a LOT of material removed. Enough to make a bag to show off my needlepunch sheep. Even the strap is recycled. It's the drawstring from the waist band. There's still a bit of material left that I was thinking of making a little change purse.

It would have been such a waste not to use the leftover material.

Sunny Sunday

Everything is growing and loving this early summer heat. According to the Weather Net site, the hottest it got today around here was 26 deg C but the "feels like" temp was 32. Too hot for this time of the year. I'm actually looking forward to a bit of rain this coming week. The garden will be happy.

Things are growing well, with the exception of the tomato plants. Not sure what happened this year. The plants are a little on the small side but we transplanted them anyway. We still have 6 left - 3 hanging cherry tomatoes and 3 zebra tomatoes - that need a good home.

St. Johnswort is one of my favourite herbal plant. To others, it's an invasive weed that causes more harm than good. The little black spots are not bugs but pores filled with oil. Thus the name, Hypericum Perforatum. This particular strain is grown for its high yeild in this oil.

When it starts to flower, I'll harvest the flowers and leaves for the oil. It will be used for skin ointments for bruises & scratches. The oil itself is wonderful for any skin irritations. I've heard that it's a good dye plant as well but I've never dyed with this.

Not much knitting and spinning was accomplished this weekend. Everything stuck to my sweaty hands. This morning we stopped by the local Farmer's market for fresh veggies. There was someone selling homespun yarn. Not bad stuff. She's mostly self-taught from the internet. She was interested in the local spinning community so I told her all about the classes at Place des Art and the Coquitlam Weavers & Spinners guild. Heh!