Valentine's Day Sale

I have decided to have a sale from now until Valentine's Day at my artfire studio.  All books, fiber and fabric will be 20% off.  Treat yourself or loved one. You can get a book on something you were always interested in trying, or improve your current skills.  Spin some beautiful yarn, or start a quilt!

Please take a look at WBKDesigns

January Randomness

It is 2011, I am still in shock.  By June 2012 I will be an empty nester, as much as I thought I would look forward to the freedom, I don't think I will like it very much.  Have I ever said I have the best sons in the world and I am so very proud of them!!

The one thing I knit for Christmas was for my youngest son.  He came to me at the beginning of December and said his hands were cold.  I jumped at the opportunity to knit for him.  Trying to be all casual I asked him if he would like some gloves.  He did but he wanted his fingers free.  I quickly pulled up Ravelry and with the lightning speed of a regular user, I had fingerless gloves for men pulled up.  As we scrolled down, he quickly picked cigar with mods, but he just had to have the same yarn, knitpicks Wool of the Andes. Two weeks later I had the yarn, with two weeks to go, I started to knit, hoping my hand would be ok.  His mods included only 2" of ribbing on the wrist.  We picked the large size based on his hand width.  he wanted all the fingers to end at the first knuckle.  As I started to knit the hand and have him try it on, we did other mods. On the second set of increases I used the medium size, on the thumb I allowed all the stitches for the large size.  We skipped the strips, of course he wanted all black, he is 16. I knit the rounds for the small, all fingers I allowed the medium size.  I liked the way they came out, he is very happy and I finished the knitting on Christmas eve!

My only complaint was with the yarn.  I was surprised at how much it shed.  I probably noticed it more because it was black.

This caused me to spend some time on google looking up information about mills.  Interestingly most of what I found was about mills in the US that have closed.  I found that they used Sulfuric Acid to remove debris and neutralized this with baking soda before dumping it in ponds.  I also found they soaked yarn in a chemical with the dyes.  The land of these mills was toxic and have required clean up.  This concerns me as a knitter, as someone who is chemical sensitive and for our environment.  Especially so when so many yarns are made overseas and we don't know what they are using or how they are dealing with the waste. 

Last but not least, I finally took the time to develop my Artfire Studio  you can go there and read my blog about my New Years Resolutions.    What have you resolved to do this year?

Ok this is really last, I also treated myself to a gazing with Braco  I owe my Step mom lots of gratitude, she told me about him and we went together.  I am sure this is not for everyone.  All I can say, it was the best gift I have given myself in a long time, words can not adequately describe the experience.

Catching up

In August, my mother came to visit. We had a wonderful time. We went to the coast and visited the Latimer Quilt and Textile Museum. It was a lovely day and we had lunch on the water. Mom was in search of the Boutique knits book, because she wanted to make the Side Slip Cloche Our travels took us to Knit Purl in downtown Portland where she purchased yarn for both of us to make the hat. More about this later...

September brought rain, fall leaves and my son back in school, while I started the job of packing up our house to move. I needed a break from my MSP so I did something for fun. I made these batts from a dyed roving of merino, bamboo and nylon. I threw in some brown Shetland roving and a chunky bits of soy silk top. Into the drum carder it went for one pass.

I made 4 one ounce batts and spun them into a thick and thin single.

Then I went back to packing, cleaning and moving.  As some of you know I over did it and hurt myself. My upper back inflamed, my left arm spasmed and my carpal tunnel flared.  Many weeks of doing very little and getting acupuncture.  To be followed by a whooper of a fibromyalgia flair that sent me to bed for days.  I admit I was grumpy and not fun to be around.  Thank goodness for comcast and a dvr, recording shows and watching TV was one of my only past times.  Recently I was able to pick up the needles again and started working on a sweater I started in February. 

I thought I would do a little book review here. Knits to fit and flatter by Jane Ellison is a lovely book. It is laid out well, with easy to follow instructions and ideas you can use to change the pattern.  She offers tips on how to customize the knits so they fit your body.  This is my current favorite knitting book. I highly recommend it.  I had wanted a basic cardigan and the twice as nice cardigan has been easy to knit.  The yarn I am using is Woo Bu by Blue Moon Fiber Arts. In the colorway  Oregon Red Clover Honey  I love this yarn.  It is a dream to knit. I love the feel of the fabric it makes and the slight shimmer the bamboo offers. I had purchased 2 skeins in January.  The pattern says I need about 200 more yards for the medium size.  Stubborn I am, I am knitting away.  I made the back and one sleeve out of one skein.  I have completed the second sleeve from the second skein, weighing everything as I go.  My calculations say I will have enough for the two front sections, but just in case I do not, I have a plan.  I'll keep you up to date.

If your wondering about this picture, it was not random. Hell child, oh I mean my darling kitty Leonardo da Vinci, or Leo as we call him, was laying all over my sweater and book as I was trying to take pictures.  I prefer to call him fur ball because when he is done torturing me, he gets up all casual like and as he walks away he swishes his fluffy angora tail from side to side.

Texture

We have textured skeins we have to do, one with silk and one with mohair. Yesterday after assembling my color wheel I felt the need for something fun. So I decided I would use some Merino blended top, cultivated silk noil and sari silk fibers to create my skein. I weighed, and hand carded and weighed again to do the math and get percentages.

I hand carded rolags

I spun woollen singles, and made a two plies.

I love the way the yarn came out after it was finished. It is springy, fluffly and oh so soft! Another skein in Level 2 complete!

Blending Colors

In Level 2 we learn to do color percentages, math, blah! We learn how measuring out and recording helps us to reproduce colors. So blending for a color wheel with colored top is in our homework. I enjoyed this process. I found out after blending with hand cards, hand combs and a drum carder, that I prefer using my drum carder. I felt the drum carder produced a much more even blend. I learned that no matter how many times I put the fiber through the carder, it would only blend so much. It is really about how the light reflects off each color used, creating the illusion of the new color. Although I went for a tradional color wheel presentation, I got my colors backwards, opps!

Level 2 MSP

So Heather here is the picture I promised. This is most of what I have done so far. I think I will spend some time mounting and labeling. I made some labels today based on what we were asked to include. I also think this weekend I will work on combing/blending my fibers for the final project. Saturday my husband is working, so I thought I had time to work on Level 2, but my son just came to me with requests. Sunday we are going to a Lavender Festival. So it is possible for you to gain a bit of a lead on me, just remember the tortoise, grins!

For those of you who don't know what I am talking about, this is my homework for Level 2 of the Olds Master Spinner Program. Last week I attended Fibre Week and took Level 3. One of my class mates is Heather who is also working on her Level 2. I proposed a friendly competition to get Level 2 and 3 done on a timely bases. Heather has decided finishing Level 2 by the end of July is a good goal, so I am desperately trying to keep up, lol!

Oh Canada!

The end of June Me and the Mini packed full of my spinning tools left Portland headed for Olds Alberta. I drove through Washington, Idaho and British Columbia before entering Alberta and heading north to the Olds for the Master Spinner Program. Below are just a few of the pictures I took along the way. I wish they included a picture of the Canola fields in bloom. Miles of yellow flowers with hugh wind tubines scattered through out and the Rocky Mountains in the back ground, it was 8 am and the skies were blue with clouds. It was so breath taking it still makes my eyes well up with tears when I think of it.