Been Awhile

I know, I know, I've really been neglecting my blog. But now that winter will be settling in, days are shorter and I should be on my treadmill, I will be knitting and spinning up a storm. I bought three new skeins of STR lightweight at Rhinebeck and I am on the foot of sock number one. I'm knitting bluebell rib from Charlene Schurch out of "Goody Goody" on size 2 needles for DD whose feet grow daily. I picked an easy rib pattern because of this as well as it'll have alot of stretch. Before long, she'll be up to grown up sizes. This is a 54 st sock! I couldn't resist having her pose on a blocker amongst the fall things being it's November 1.

I have been spinning away and I have completed a grab bag skein for my spinning guild holiday grab bag. (can't show you that one but it came out loverly!) I also got tons of fiber to spin so I'll be busy. I'm spinning some powder blue merino and white bamboo now and it's beautiful. That came from Creatively Dyed.

On the knitting front, I finally finished two UFOs. The pinkaboo blanket and the infamous remind-me-never-to-knit-in-black socks! No pinkaboo picture yet because it has to be blocked for a few weeks now...but, here's the black socks in my pumpkin studio.

I still have hubby's sweater to finish up though, the one that was supposed to be his Rhinebeck sweater for last year. It's oversized and he lost a bit of weight so I'm going to have to make larger than expected seams whenst I do finish this. I didn't like the way the pattern was written. I never seem to get row gauge. The back of the pattern had me knit a certain number of inches and the front referenced rows after the armhole decreases. My pieces didn't line up and now I have to redo the front to make it match the back. Frustrating....

My Knitpicks Harmony needles are the bestest provided that they don't come in anything smaller than a 2. I've consistently had the problem of the join breaking. On one of my 1.5's, the join came off the second time I used the needle and it came off on BOTH ends. I have to call them again. This is also frustrating to me. I'm being converted over to wood and can't have this happen all the time.

I'm still in Rhinebeck glee and can't wait until next year. Only 49 more weeks! I would love to go to MD S&W but that's not going to happen this year. DS is making his Communion that very day so we'll be home. Looks like I'm not going to get to another festival until Rhinebeck 2010. How dreadful.....

Well, time to get things in order for tomorrow and watch the World Series.

Rhinebeck!

After much ado about nothing regarding yesterday's weather, we set out on our trip to Rhinebeck. This year, we left later in the morning and arrived at 1:30. It would've been 1:30; however, DS got carsick. He has such horrible motion sickness and as soon as we got off the exit and went on 9 and 9G, the elevation changed and that did him in. Poor kid. I didn't want to miss Rhinebeck and I didn't want him to be sick but it stinks that it happened less than 3 miles from the fairgrounds. We didn't use Dramamine this time because I didn't want him to be a zombie all day. Now, we know better. Some Dramamine is better than none, I guess. I'll use a tiny dose next car trip and see what happens.

We saw pumpkins in their native habitat.

Anyway, it wasn't as crowded as last year and everyone seemed to be overdressed in coats as opposed to knitted sweaters. The weather was supposed to be rainy, raw and terrible which may've held down the crowds but instead it was about 48-50 all day. Cute sheep, nice leaves.

A Shepard in period attire. I asked him if I could take his picture because he was 'so cute'. He said, "couldn't you say handsome instead?" LOL!

Here's the kids at the end of a long day. Below, the one remaining roving hand dyed by Elizzabetty of Moose Manor Handpaints. You can't tell from the picture but it's called "Chameleon" because it changes color depending on the lighting. It reminds me of the inside of a dark red jellybean, not quite clear but highlights of red.

I saw this big basked of giant bobbins so I took an out of focus picture of it. It was the end of the day and the lighting was bad, sorry. Aren't they interesting? I also tried a Canadian Production Wheel at the The Merlin Tree and the double drive spoiled me. I'd love to have one of them.... Of course, hubby said, "When I spin and we start fighting over your wheel, you can buy that one". Sigh......maybe next year I will put it on my Christmas list and Santa can bring it. We'll see. They're expensive (although not as much as a Lendrum Saxony) and I have a wheel so....

As for the haul, I bought three STR Lightweight, one for each member of my immediate family. Meet Joe Brown, Goody Goody and Raven something. Interesting how even the names suit the person... I'm thinking of making DD Leyburn but I have so many UFOs strewn about. All I do is spin now and I haven't been knitting all that much!

I picked up some gorgeous merino/bamboo from Creatively Dyed, some solid merino (purple and a peachy pink) from a small booth that I forgot the name of. I remember she was in the Catskills though and only had solid roving...and I also got some merino/yak from her which made me very excited. The woman had her mom helping her who didn't really know all that much about this stuff but she was very adorable and helpful. She wrote "Moreno" on my receipt. As in Rita. Gotta love it. I got a bag of yarn from the yarn fairy from Holiday Yarns, too! It's gorgeous sock yarn that I haven't tried yet but has been on my list for quite sometime. (Still, nothing beats Cherry Tree Hill supersock, the ultimate favorite...)

Guess I'll be making socks this winter. When I'm going full tilt, I can knit a pair a week so we'll see how it goes. (On 1.5's or 2's, not on zeros). Half the problem is picking out the pattern and I have yet to make a toe up sock!!!

I did finish the baby blanket (no photo yet and no photo of the haul from Rhinebeck but they're coming) I was working on and I'm going to try and block it tonight or during the week. I also spun 8 oz and made a two ply yarn out of some truly beautiful fiber I got from Copper Moose.

I'm attempting my first shawl out of this stuff so we'll see what happens. I spun it very thinly. Maybe too thinly. (Oh yeah, can never be too thin or too rich applies to people and fiber, right?) It was the most beautiful stuff ever to spin...ahhhhh...Then, I switched to BFL and it felt like ...Brillo.

I'm now spinning my naturally dyed fiber from Dye Day. I finished the black walnut BFL and I'm moving onto the marigold merino. See how I'm all over the place? I think it's because I've been working on some harder patterns and spinning more. I spin when I'm tired because it can be mindless whereas working from a chart and knitting a shawl requires me to use the gray matter.

I have been working on a simple pair of black ribbed socks for DH for like .. months. I'm up to the gussett and I'm going to finish the gusset today because I'm making time for it. Then, I can spin or knit the feet tonight.

Life has just been crazy!

Hope you like my pictures and I will try and post again soon!

Eye Candy Friday - Night Photography Edition

Sunset at the Wantagh Park Gazebo, Wantagh, NY.

Dye Day, Smithtown Heritage Fair

Helloooooooo!!

Gee, it's been awhile. The end of the summer went by so quickly and I was all caught up in the mayhem that goes along with getting the kids back to school and setting the new schedule. My treadmill misses me.

I have done only a minimal amount of knitting on the Secret Sock. Shh!! So much for that.

I have been working on the dreaded black sock alot and I'm about ready to start the heel. I'd best hurry it up because with the daylight getting shorter, it's harder and harder to knit in black. Next thing I knit will most certainly be a LIGHT COLOR. Like this...

Isn't it beautiful? That's a skinny single spun out of that luscious 50% camel down 50% merino we got from Copper Moose. Ah, it's beautiful. Not that easy to spin, it's like spinning dust. The fiber is short and the merino does little to hold it together. I hope I'm putting in enough twist. I only had that with me today and I started a second bobbin. I may put this down and ply this to see how it holds up. I would cry if it fell apart.

Last weekend, we had a dyeing workshop at my Spinning Guild. We dyed yarn the pioneer girl way! Open firepits, dyepots, natural dye. It was a blast. I was imagining witch's cauldrons but it wasn't quite like that. The Guild dyed a ton (ok, a few pounds) of Romney and I brought some of my own fiber to throw in the pots. Here's my BFL black walnut.

It felted a teeny tiny bit but I think that that will be fine when I spin it. I may be spinning this next. We used pokeberries, onionskins, marigolds, black walnuts, tansy, St. John's Wort, goldenrod and some cranberries. It was fun!

Here's our Romney drying on the racks.

A pot of black walnuts about to be cooked up.Onion skins (L) and , if my memory serves me correctly, Hibiscus (R).

I stuck my 4oz of combed top merino in the marigold pot and I'm almost regretting not using the black walnut for that. The black walnut was fabulous! However, I'm happy with the yellow.

Today, we had another event, the Smithtown Heritage Society Fair where we spinners demonstrated and had a great time! I was getting a bit hungry and will bring or make snacks there next year. It was nice to spend a beautiful day under the old trees on the grounds and I was happy to see many children very interested in spinning!

Here's my best boy testing out a drop spindle. Ah, the drum carding demonstration, just lovely. That's a fake sheep, guys!

We all had a great time and discussed our shopping and travel strategy for Rhinebeck. Only 27 more days, you know!

Eye Candy Friday - Hurricane Bill

This was taken at Jones Beach, Wantagh, NY. The waves washed up past the boardwalk, flooding the golf course. Made for no beach and good surfing!

Eye Candy Friday

Hosta
Nice flowers. We're not going to have too many more opportunities to photograph flowers!

Next purchase: Tripod because I can't find mine!

During the Week Update

Well, alot has been happening. I'm off from work today, Friday as well as Monday and Tuesday. I was able to head down to the beach today with the kids but I didn't bring my camera. I will over the weekend because we're supposed to have some large swells here on Long Island due to the effects of Hurricane Bill. Today, we were there at low tide. The beach and the parking lot REEKED. The little baby clams were exposed and there were some little baby jellyfish and there were some crabs. There were even some pieces of crabs that were unfortunate enough to have gotten dropped by a seagull. Stinky. In the water, it didn't stink. Waves were breaking far off the shore and we had to walk way out to get to them. Kids loved it. I remember being that age and thinking how cool I was to go in the water with my dad. OK, I was 10 or so before I swam as well as they do now. They're out there IN the waves. Scares me a bit but I am fortunate that they're both becoming good swimmers.

Last night was Spinning Guild meeting. We just spun....and spun. My bobbin broke. :( The little washer came out of the end of it causing it to rattle around and not work correctly. I looked all over for it at home but I think I must've lost it there. Drat. I also was able to pick up some nice lightly smokey gray llama as well as some chocolate llama. Undyed and scrumptious.

Today, Elizzabetty came by with my camel merino. It's BEAUTIFUL and the pictures on the website do not do it justice. As soon as I can stop fondling it, I will photograph it. In the meantime, here are some other pictures to tide you over.

Elizzabetty has been yarn dyeing so I was able to get another 400 and something yards of nice sock yarn. I am nearly decided on the pattern...but it's a secret. We'll refer to it as the pattern Whose-Name-Must-Not-Be-Mentioned so she has no idea what it is. Remember when that Kennedy kid was accused of raping that girl and America watched the Blue Dot on TV? Tee hee hee. This will be fun. She has to be surprised.

Here's the yarn.

Comon, you knew it was green, right? Lovely and subtle color changes.

Have a holly jolly Christmas! A spruce tree and some Christmas crochet potholders!

Some of the several that I have made so far. These are kinda a pain to crochet. They are double thick and the scalloped border is worked through two thicknesses. It takes awhile to get used to and I can't go fast. Putting that border on takes nearly as long as it does to crochet the two sides! It takes a matter of minutes, I crochet fast. I can make these in about 35-40 minutes if I'm on task and going at cruising speed. Most of it is the border. Cute pattern though. I love the peach one.

That's about it. Time for me to head out in my front yard, grab some coffee and watch the sunset.

Eye Candy Friday

These Tiffen filters STINK. See the flare in the center under the sun? I guess it's worth it to spit for better filters and better lenses.

Gotta play with my camera more.

Gotta knit and crochet more. Today: Angel Dishcloth and Placemats.

Getting to Know You, Beloved Crochet Hooks.

Let's face it, my crochet needles have missed me. They've been lying in the basket, at the bottom, screaming for attention. I looked at them the other day. I saw my "Hero" brand size F hook. It was the first one that I got. I remember I was with my mom and my father's stepmother and I was really young, say 5 or so. I learned to crochet with that hook from my mother's mother. Odd that I would start with something so small. I moved up from chain stitch to a doll hat, then a potholder or two. I finished my first couch sized afghan before I turned 10.

Today, I turn a bigger number than that and I'm a pro at crocheting.

So, being I have the Etsy store going in full swing, I've decided to crochet some things for it. I fooled with a few purse patterns and then some Tawashi. These things are so darn cute that I see what the addiction is. You can see them in the Etsy shop window. I'm going to see if I can make up my own patterns for more of them. I've also been making some Christmas ornaments, hot pads and place mats. This leaves very little time for knitting and spinning which I'm starting to miss. Why oh why do I have to work a real job? :( I spun the other night but it's still on the bobbin. More coming!

I've also been playing with my new macro lens and I'm loving it. I'm able to take gorgeous pictures up close and I'm able to do nice portraits. I haven't tried it out on landscapes yet but that's coming this week. I'm just tickled pink!

It's a long story but Amazon pulled through and gave me a nice credit after they messed up my order for this lens so I bought two bead books. Eventually, they'll get here. The shipping from Amazon has been very, very slow lately. They used to use UPS and now they use USPS, which is slow. I don't know why this is..... So, we'll see what I can do with beads. Probably nothing, I'll just look at the pictures.

Well, off to work, let me leave you with a picture from my new lens. My new prep bowls from the pampered chef used to make a pot of sauce.

The end result!

Eye Candy Friday - Macro Lens Edition

Tiny White Flower I Forgot the Name Of....

I finally got a macro lens and I'm learning how to use it. More on this when I give massive Weekend Update.