oh that's what yarnbarf looks like!

This has been a challenging week for me. We put my niece on a plane headed back for Arkansas yesterday. In the short week since my last post I completely reversed my rather bitchy opinion on her behavior. I LOVE this kid. I didn't want to give her up. Even though it would mean totally re-organizing our lives, changing our (incredibly) selfish spending habits, and otherwise behaving as if there were people besides ourselves on the planet, I would completely welcome this kid into our home. I adore her. The second week of her stay was a lot quieter than the first. I feel like we really got to know her a bit. She opened up. It was beautiful to see. I wanted to hug her every time she smiled, mostly because she's 13, so it doesn't happen that often. I realized that my complaining was the worst sort of silliness because she was really quite considerate and careful as a houseguest. It could have been a LOT worse. I thank her parents for letting her come to visit, her friends for sharing her with us. I know it was a trial for everyone...except us. She can come back any day as far as I'm concerned. Because I was so focused on spending time with her after work, I didn't get as much spinning and knitting done as I normally would. But I do have progress (of sorts) on both the Tour de Fleece and the February Lady. First, the tour: I have one skein done and all I can say is I HATE THIS WOOL. I know, I know, only a bad spinner blames the fiber, but it really wasn't fun to spin at all. I also misjudged grist and spun it too fine to match the rest of the sweater. I was only thinking about stretching the fiber as far as it could go (pun intended) to get extra yardage. BAD idea. It looks terrible. And I had more trouble than I expected with consistency. Normally I'm a pretty consistent spinner. Not with this wool baby. Thick and thin, blobs everywhere, in both the singles and in plying. I swear I spun Witness:
Yeah, I know. I think so too. But the second skein will be better. A bit thicker. And hopefully more consistent. I promise. The first bobbin is almost full. But that brings me to hairpin curve #2 in this little tale of fiber woe: I'm not going to have enough. Yep. I only have maybe a couple of ounces of roving left. I will, if I'm lucky, get another 150 yards or so out of this. I'll finish the Tour, but with a distinct lack of necessary yardage. Not nearly enough for the cardi. Which leaves me with two choices: frog the cardi or make it stripy on the bottom half. I hate both options. I'm praying that Isis, Athena, Amaterasu and Frigg take pity on me and a miracle occurs. Because otherwise it's a trip to the frog pond. And no one likes to see a grown knitter crying into her yarn.
On the knitted object/crazy joiner front, I'm making sloooow progress on February in June. Observe:
I had cast-off the hem and picked up the stitches for the first sleeve while sitting in the airport waiting for her plane to board. Naturally it was the emotion of the moment that made me completely screw up a pattern I've had memorized for weeks. There's nothing like frogging in public to remind you how ridiculous you can look. I was sitting in an uncomfortable airport chair, covered in kelly green yarnbarf, trying not to cry. For the kid, not the sweater. I swear. I finally fixed it and am moving along nicely now. I think I'll have just enough yarn and may actually be done in time for Spain. Also, this will NOT make me look pregnant. I refuse to allow such an injustice. Refuse I say!

Art, Lies and Truth-or what I did this weekend

“Art is a lie that makes us realize truth.”-Pablo Picasso

While I'm not a huge Picasso fan, I definitely appreciate his vision. Making us see things from different perspectives is necessary. Forcing us to see several perspectives at once: genius. I do not find this particular brand of genius aesthetically pleasing, but since when are aesthetics a prerequisite here? I mention this for several reasons. First, our house guest. We have a young visitor with us for the next couple of weeks. This weekend we took her to see some of the "highlights" of our region. Among them: the new silver show at Winterthur, the Philadelphia Zoo, and Dolphin watching at Cape May, NJ. She is 13 going on 25 and thinks she is brazilliant in all things. In some areas I don't disagree. The kid's damn skippy smart. But she's also a nascent teenager and prone to those fits and starts of teenage angst that (I'm quite sure) make otherwise well-balanced, sane parents everywhere want to rip their hair out and throw things. I spent hours and hours touring her all over Winterthur, inside and out, trying to show her why I do what I do and why I think it deserves the years of my life I have devoted to it. What was her response: "kewel, but I liked the Enchanted Woods best. "Now, don't get me wrong, when I was 13 I would have said exactly the same thing. exactly. I would have resented all attempts to push me out of my carefully chosen and well-polished shell. At least something connected, right? But it made me want to scream. She went through the silver exhibit and the period rooms so fast it made my head spin. meh. But she saw the magic in the woods, so I really can't argue too much. It's all in your point of view. We went to the zoo, spent umpty-ump dollars to wander around and peer through cages at poor, pacing creatures who deserve so much more than flash bulbs exploding in their sensitive faces, saw gorgeous birds, pro-simians, frolicking river otters, and what does she like best? the vampire bats feeding. yep. teenage angst in bucket loads. In all fairness, the bats were pretty cool. I can't post my pics here because I didn't get permission from the zoo to do so, but I did get a fabulous shot of a bat, snout raised from it's petrie dish of blood, baring its wee fangs at me. I won't even discuss the day at Cape May because I'm already sick of myself whining about this. I LOVE this kid. She's creative, smart, funny and full of it. I'm so happy she's out here with us for awhile, but is it so very much to ask for just one little "thank you?" My rational self is now screaming "but the look on her face IS that thank you, you idiot!" and rational self is right. It is. We had a great fourth of july weekend, watched dolphins peer up at us from a steel grey ocean as pale poufs of jellyfish burbled by, sat in the evenmist as the sky flamed orange, gold and green, and gorged on pizza while playing Harry Potter trivia. I hope you and yours had half as much fun. Alter the gaze, bend your mind, accept and enjoy; these were my mantras this weekend. Thanks Picasso! Oh, and there was spinning: my first day of the Tour de Fleece. Sorry about the graininess, I'm blogging at midnight. Hard to get natural light at this time of day. *snorg* I have no idea what the wpi is on this. I spun it long draw and was gauging it by feel. Alden Amos would be so very mad at me. I'm not sure it will match what I already have. I sure hope so. From what I remember about this fiber (I really need to start keeping a spinning journal..oh, wait, that's why I started the blog. right.) it fluffs a great deal with a good whacking. Half a bobbin that reminded me why I put this roving down again and again. My hands hurt. Merino shouldn't make yer paws ache, my friends. But I'm reasonably pleased with the consistency. Reasonably. I really wish I could go to SOAR this autumn and take Abby Franquemont's workshop. *drool* That woman is a master. Just looking at her yarn makes me want to weep. Especially when I then examine what's sitting on my own bobbin. I'll try to re-orient my thinking: this is inspiration! Soak in the genius. Soak it I say! In this case, I think her yarn begs to differ with Picasso. Silk that fine is truth and art, my dear woolly friends. There's simply no way to hide a lie in good spinning. At least not that I've been able to find. And now, sweet readers, good night.

Tour de Fleece 2008

In lieu of posting knitting progress, I give you my Tour de Fleece 2008 challenge: finishing the spinning (and maybe the knitting) of my top-down raglan cardi. The wool is 100% mernio in heathered brown. 2-ply worsted-weight. Easy spinning but here's the challenge: the prep on this fiber wasn't that great, so I'm constantly having to stop, pick out vm, etc. I don't enjoy spinning this wool, even though I pre-draft. But I love the finished yarn and I want to wear this sweater! So I'm using this opportunity to make myself finish, rather than spinning fun things like the silk/merino blend from Louet for my elm leaf smoke ring (pattern later).
So here's the cardi as she now stands:
And here's the remaining wool, ready to be spun:
Is that not the most unappealing pile of...wool (yes, we'll call it that for now)...that you've ever seen? But it really does make pretty yarn, I promise.
I WILL wear that yellow jersey!

Tejiendo en algodon....muy diferente

Hola compañeros de lana! Estoy tejiendo para mi viaje a España. Salimos en menos de un mes. Necesito mis cardigans de algodón completamente finito y ahora tengo menos de treinta por ciento en cada uno. Que lastima!
Pero, mira, soy un "joiner" porque esto tejiendo la February Lady y me encanta este patrón!
Hilo: Valley Yarns Noho in Teal Green
Aguja: Addi Turbo 36" size 7
Patron: February Lady Sweater by flintknits

Y mis zoknis son casi media completo:
Esto es mi merino hilo y tinto de mano.

Y ahora en ingles. So I've been thinking a lot about blogging, writing, sharing my work. This all began with an innocent conversation over, what else, knitting. A friend and I were discussing the pros and cons of knit-alongs. They can be quite useful, especially if you run into problems, are trying new mods or yarn substitutions, etc. but they also foster competition, envy, and a host of other very unknitterly behavior. So where do blogs fit into this? Are these an attempt to connect with a wider knitting community, to share our work in hopes that we increase awareness of handcrafts everywhere, that we return knitting to its rightful position in the handcraft pantheon; or are we vain creatures, measuring our worth by the number of site hits, comments left, links created? Are we trying to fan the flames of our own popularity? Am I really that shallow? And then I realized that while I do appreciate the visitors and friends who leave kind remarks, I'm really doing this to forge connections, to track my own progress as a crafter, and to try out new ideas in an admittedly tiny public forum. I am doing this for myself. But I sincerely hope that others may join me on this journey. Clearly I'm no yarnharlot, I know I don't have the wit of a franklin, but I don't want to be them. I may not be prolific, I may not have mad yarn skillz, but I love all things fiber and certainly enjoy discussing them ad nauseum. I want to make a little leafy home for myself in this electronic jungle. Please pull up a tree stump, open your knitting bag, grab a cuppa and settle in. I'd love to chat!

make with the wool already!

Hey all, so I finally finished something. And the superwash wool became even prettier....I give you first the unintentional rip-off of Wing o the moth:

This was previously, as you may remember, the rather unfortunate charcoal briquette version of an otherwise lovely stole called Lady Eleanor. I think the yarn is much happier this way.
And witness! My verdant zokni meet the giant frog of green:

After they were done playing with frog, the zokni decided to meet squirrel:
Don't they look like they want to take over the world, dwarfing mighty squirrel as they appear to do? I lurves these socks, I do. They are squishy, they are cozy, they are yummy, yes they are my precious. Can you tell I'm actually pretty happy with the spinning and the dyeing? Not too shabby I think. Enough now, just a taste to whet the appetite. I don't want you gorging yourselves, after all. Never fear, I'm slowly working on the purple sweater of much yumminess. Pix of that later.

A New Obsession...brace yourself

And now that I have your attention....It's not knitting. I am utterly captivated by a writer: Elizabeth Bear. Go here (which is her official page), explore, you won't be sorry. I just finished New Amsterdam and I still haven't recovered. I grabbed it completely by chance off the library shelves. Little did I know what awaited me behind that cover. I'm trying not to let this new interest interfere with my diss, just as knitting isn't interfering with it. Ah the pecadillo of conscience, how I wish to smite thee.

Bad Zoot, Naughty Zoot and some startitis is catching

So I'm a really naughty blogger. I've been so busy trying to get ready for the summer-cotton knits y'all, I'm just saying-that I haven't had time to blog. Really. Between trying to get ready for a class that didn't fill and had to be canceled, finishing my article re-writes, getting ready for Spain, and spinning a bit...well, you see how blogging kinda fell down and hurt itself. But here I am. By the way, Mom lurved her stole and apparently wore it everywhere when she went to visit my FABULOUS sister. So, here are some of the many many things I've been up to recently:

The Cap Shawl, in Victorian Lace Today, in laceweight merino, needles: Addi Turbo Lace #2:
My version of the Wing O' The Moth Stole. I was trying to make up my own lace pattern that looked like autumn leaves and ended up mimicking (entirely unintentionally) Anne's fine pattern. There are some differences, she uses fir cone, I used fern; she placed a double reverse stockinette between the rose leaves, I put a yo/k2tog there; and I will probably do a slightly different edging. But other than that they are really really similar. Eerily so. But I think I have achieved my desired look. Yarn: Zitron Trekking Handart in Feuerland 501, 2 skeins. It blew my mind all skeined up. I originally bought it for a Lady Eleanor, but didn't like it at all, so I frogged and did this instead:

I'm starting a cotton sweater for Spain, using yet again the Cosmicpluto top down raglan cardi. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this pattern, but I'm going to do a knitted-on button band for added strength on the collar. It tends to sag too much for my taste otherwise. Yarn: Valley Yarns Noho cotton flake in Iris. This is an interesting yarn to knit with, it's thick-and-thin mercerized cotton that's giving me both nubs and sheen. I really like it. Size 2 needles.


I finished a really quick 2 skein sock yarn shawlette in Plymouth Happy Feet that I love, but it's too small. I need to add a border, but I don't have any more yarn. Thoughts??

And there's spinning:
Merino superwash 2 ply sockweight, approx. 160 yards. This was my second attempt at a sockweight yarn (who could forget the yarn of much fugliness?) I'm much happier with this. I plan to spin up a second skein and then dye them together....for, wait for it, a pair of socks!!!! maybe these: Vinnland by Becca Compton at the AntiCraft. I've had this pattern queued for months. Some of their work frankly scares me and some of it is so fantastic I want to squee.
So there's my update and I'm sticking to it. We're headed to Connecticut to visit friends for part of Memorial Day, so I won't get nearly as much work done as I want to, but on the other hand I get beer, burgers and spinning. It's a trade-off with which I can live. Have a fantastic Memorial Day--don't forget that it was instituted as a day of remembrance for Civil War veterans. I highly recommend David Blight's fantastic 2001 book from Harvard University Press, Race and Reunion if you're interested. Stop a minute, remember, give thanks.

Besos a todos y toma una cerveza para mi este fin de semana!