Doin' It In The Park

Well we did do it in the park….Spinning that is, get your minds out of the gutter. Anyway, yesterday was the second annual Spin Out hosted by the lovely Cara and boy was she glowing. I tried to snag a picture of her and Jenny but I was a little late whipping out my camera and the moment was gone :-( I had a ball and of course I lugged along my Victoria. I also lugged along my SO and DS so you could say that we had a sort of family day except for the fact that I ignored them the whole time we were there.

I was really sidetracked so I didn’t take as many pictures as I wanted to. I meant to take a picture of the wonderful fiber Anne was spinning but I totally forgot. Believe me it was gawjus. Also I’m horrible with names so there will not be a lot of commentary. Excuses, excuses I know, I got loads of em.

I got Annie to try out my wheel. Think she'll let me have a go at her loom?
I told Tawana I wanted a picture of her baby bump, I guess my camera took it literally.
The New York Spin City Meetup represented.

And so did Sit n Knit New York.(by the way, thats Penelope on the right and she doesn't have a stash, well not a real one like you and I, yeah I know tell me about it!)We had a hitchiker present. I'm debating getting one. Who am I kidding, I've already made up my mind, you'll see me lugging one of those around at Rhinebeck.

Little girls were put to work carding wool. Why else would you bring the kids along?
Look at that kewl hat! And what makes her even kewler was that she was spinning straight up lace angora (ooooo ahhhhh)
See! perfect, no?
Spinning demo in progress.

See Sandra Spin!

I’ll save the actual knitting content for my next post, but I have been super busy on that front. Til next time.

Days Gone By

Hey there, long time, no blog. Remember when you were a kid and you would get all excited about the first day of school. You had that giddy feeling of anew, new notebooks, new pens, new clothes, new backpacks, everything was new and it made you excited for the school year ahead of you. Usually the newness wore off after a couple of weeks and you were back into the homework rut but I say all of this to try and describe my feelings towards this blog. I haven’t been the most regular at posting and I would like change that so I treated myself to a blog makeover. I’m hoping the newness of it all will help inspire me to update this space more often. In case you’re wondering I have the lovely Missa of MoonArts Web Design to thank. I think they did a wonderful job and I’m so excited about my “new beginning”. And I gotsa button for you guys to steal (yay).

You’re probably wondering what I’ve been up to in these past weeks, well I can tell you that it aint sock knitting believe it or not. I know that the Summer of Socks ends today but I just wasn’t feeling in a sock mood this summer. I think I have an a-long commitment anxiety or something because once the a-long gets started I’m fine but I slowly start to loose steam until I’m just not that into it anymore. I think if I hadn’t joined summer of socks I probably would have knitted more that my lonely 3 pairs. Now I seem to be into bigger projects.

This is a Bog Jacket that I started for my son. The pattern is by Elizabeth Zimmerman and it can be found in her Knitting Around book but I’m sure all you Knittanistas already knew that. I totally plan on doing all the bells and whistles like shoulder shaping, phoney seams, and all that jazz but I’m afraid that it may be too small for my little man. I’m choosing to ignore this minor oversight until all the knitting is done. In case you’re wondering, I’m quite fine living with my knitters denial, it helps me cope. I’m trying to use up my acrylic so I just dug in the stash and saw that I had 4 skeins of Caron Natura in chocolate brown that I could use. I’m not sure what colors I’m using for the top but I know I want off white and maybe orange or tan. We’ll see how it turns out.

I know I have this tendency to write a lot when I’ve been gone a while so I’ll try not to bore you guys too much.

I’ve actually been crocheting also. Remember the charity group that I knit with at my job? Well I had this great idea that if everyone in the group donated a couple of granny squares, then we would have enough for a blanket to donate to Warm Up America. Well I got 54 squares but guess who has the great job of crocheting them all together? That’s right, the same person with the bright idea. So far I’ve done about half the blanket and it’s a pretty daunting task. Only because the gauges are as varied as the people who made them so they’re not all the same size. Plus they were not all made with the same pattern so it can be difficult to get them to match up correctly. I’m pushing through it and hopefully I’ll have it done by next week. I’m planning on giving pictures of the blanket to all that participated as a sort of thank you card.

In spinning news, here’s the finished yarn from my last post

Crown Mountain Farms Superwash Merino Roving

Happy Together Colorway

Approx 4.5 Ounces, 414 yards, 18wpi

Method: Short Forward Draw, 2ply

I love this yarn and I’m waiting until I find the perfect pattern to cast on for a pair of socks of course.

I also spun up half of the fiber I received in my last spinning swap. A while ago I started a swap on swap-bot for hand dyed roving dyed to resemble a flower. My partner Jennifer sent me the most gawjus merino/silk blend roving inspired by pink gerbera daisies. I think she got the colors spot on and I split the roving in half and spun one half up. I loved the colors so I decided to Navajo ply it and it turned out around a lace weight. I think this yarn wants to be an airy lace scarf of some sort so I’m on the hunt for any patterns. I’ll post this one properly with stats and all once I’m done spinning it.

In other knitting news, I’m still plugging away on my first sweater that I’ve been working on since January. I’m trying to have it ready for Rhinebeck but I’m not keeping my fingers crossed. I’m not stressing it because I know I’ll have a good time regardless of how I’m dressed. Just to recap, I’ve finished the back and one sleeve and I am currently working on the left front. The pattern stated that you should knit the cable band that goes around the fronts of the sweater separately but somehow I don’t picture my self knitting a 40”+ cable strip then sewing it to the sides.

I think that’s all for now. Hopefully I’ll catch some of you NY spinners at the Spin-Out next Saturday. I’ll be the one with the Louet Victoria and the Afro so don’t forget to say “Hi”.

Happy Crafting

p.s. Is it just me or did anyone else absolutely fall head over heels in love with Tim Gunns new show on Bravo? I’m ready to throw all the clothes in my closet out and shop for new ones. Undergarments includedJ

Remarkable Feats in Spinning

Favorite Quote from the TV Show Martin:

If I say a duck could pull a truck, then shut up and hook the sucka up!

-Jerome

That quote loosely translates to “If I tell you something to be true, then take my word for it”.

I accomplished my own remarkable feat this evening that I had to come out of blog hibernation to share it. Drum roll please………I SPUN 4 OUNCES OF FIBER ALL ON ONE SINGLE LOUET BOBBIN!(and the crowd goes wild, yaay!) It may not seem like anything out of the ordinary to the mere mortal but this is a great accomplishment for me. I spun the singles on one bobbin, then wound it into a center pull ball. I then took an extra step and wound the two ends together into a two ply ball (using an empty tp roll). Tonight I plied it and I was so determined to get this whole thing onto one bobbin so I wouldn’t have to split up the skein. Well I'll let the picture speak for itself.

I haven’t taken any stats as of yet but this is the fiber I started spinning at the sistahfriends knitta-que. I started out with 4 ounces of Crown Mountain Farms Superwash Merino roving in the Happy Together colorway. I’ll have more details once it’s had a good washing. As you can see it’s roughly 20 w.p.i (sock yarn, woo hoo!) but that will slightly change once it’s gone for a dunk .

Since I’m already blogging, here’s my last FO.

I made these socks with yarn I won on Nikki’s blog. The yarn is Elann Esprit which is a cotton and elastic mix. I believe it’s comparable to Cascade Fixation but I may be mistaken. I used the seeded rib pattern from the Second Sensational Knitted Socks Book, toe up of course. I fittingly call them my Pink Zebra socks. Dare I say that the color pink is really starting to grow on me (I’ll deny I ever said that later). I think this marks my second pair of socks knit for the Summer of Socks. See, I not only slack on blogging but on sock knitting also, I'm well rounded that way.

Well I’m off to catch Tim Gunns' new show but I couldn’t resist tooting my own horn if you know what I mean.

Happy Spinning!