Hiatus

I haven't posted in nearly a month. I'm really no good at this blogging thing.

Don't get too excited... I am only here to advise that blogging will now be put on a hiatus. Some things are happening in my life that I need to take care of - and for now, blogging seems like it's not important enough to be up there. I have finished items, I have formatting to do on here and I have WIPs that I want to share but at the moment I'm not really in a position to be spending time taking pictures and writing posts.

I must sound mysterious and exciting, but really what's going on is the opposite. Well - it'll still be mysterious for most who read this blog, but I can assure you all it's not exciting.

Hopefully within a month I'll be better placed to start posting again. See you soon.

Don't mention the Guild...

So I attended the NSW Knitters' Guild AGM this weekend. Oh boy.

I received a very warm welcome from the incoming Vice-President - I was amazed at how enthusiastic she was about the fact that I was there, and she really made the point that she was glad to see a young person... and how the Guild really wants to attract more young people to join.

That attitude seemed at odds with a lot of things that later transpired.

I got to witness first hand some of the resistance shown by members of the Guild toward changing things to make them more accessible - namely making information available on the web and leveraging the knowledge and skills of existing members who want to help with activities.

Questions were seen as personal attacks. There was no mention made of how members could get involved and help. It seems a sad thing that the Guild has members who can (and want to) help with things like enhancing digital photographs or properly storing and archiving the collection of knitted work, but these people are turned away or dismissed because those in charge want to do it their way.

The incoming Secretary was inaugurated but later resigned the same day - something which I was quite upset about as I know that she had some wonderful ideas for the future of the Guild.

I really wonder how the Guild will go about attracting and keeping new members if they are so resistant to embracing the things that will enable them to do so.

I'm considering trying to get in as Secretary... I am just waiting to try and find out some more about the duties required and I want to see if I can gauge the time I'd have to put in. If all else fails, I'm going for committee next year. there needs to be a serious shift in attitude.

Rain, rain, go away...

Not really, as we do need it. I am trying to use my psychic powers to send it to Victoria though. They could use it given that the bushfires are still burning.

Today was weather of the type that makes me want to cast on some cosy 8 ply socks for wearing around the house. My good old green socks have been keeping my feet warm tonight.

Instead of knitting, I did a tiny little bit of spinning and a whole lot of cooking. I now have a lot of little mini Mixed Bean Burgers in the freezer, ready to be defrosted whenever needed. I also brought out my small (1.5L) slow cooker and made a pasta sauce out of the tomatoes I picked up at the farmer's market last weekend.

It was my first time using a slow cooker, and I was very impressed with the results, as was the other half. The pasta sauce had a much richer flavour than my stovetop ones usually have - but whether that's because of the longer cooking time or the fresh tomatoes I am yet to find out. I do know that the first chance I have I will break out the large slow cooker and make up a big batch of pasta sauce using tinned tomatoes, and then freeze it in portions.

I'm trying to move toward using as few processed and pre-packaged foods as possible, so I need to get organised and start making more foods that I can freeze and keep on hand for later. It's funny how by not buying many convenience foods our grocery bill has dropped enormously. I expected it to stay the same (or possibly increase) because of all of the fresh ingredients I'd have to buy but that's not the case.

I'm now off to pack some lunches to top off this foodie day.

Just when I thought I had enough to do.. and loving thoughts

First off, lots of crossed fingers and toes for all of you who are currently being threatened by the current bush fire fronts out there. I am sending good vibes for the safety of you, your families and your homes!

There's two new things happening with me at the moment - Vintage Grrl and I have have gotten onto the Bento Bandwagon. We are both quite taken with the idea of packing Bento lunches for ourselves and people in our lives. I'm hoping that it helps to improve both mine and the other half's diet as well as saving us some money. I shall have to report back after I start packing these things!

Secondly, as if I didn't have enough artsy-crafty stuff to do.. I've taken to dyeing roving! Here's "Tutti Frutti" - some Polwarth.



I was pretty happy with the way it turned out.

Detox for free

I've been a bad, bad blogger.

Things have been busy lately - craft has been put aside and I am throwing myself into making my lifestyle healthier. (Let's just ignore this weekend... please?)

I've changed my eating habits (again, ignore this weekend. blip), started exercising again and now my body has gone into detox. My face has erupted and my tummy hates me - don't get me started on the fatigued sick feeling either.

I'm hanging on for dear life, knowing that I'll have to go through another week or so of this feeling and then I'll start to feel much better.

Just in time for Big Day Out. If someone knows where I can get a nice, healthy vegan lunch and dinner there, please let me know. I don't have to worry about alcohol because I'm the designated driver.

More dye!

I dyed this:



It will be a Woodland Shawl... my first lace. (See the previous post for link). I am pretty happy with it. I think it turned out well for food colouring!

I have also dyed this:



More pics once it's reskeined...

2009

I welcomed in the new year with many friends, much alcohol, Buzz and SingStar.

It was great.

Today I am feeling a little sorry for myself. I have been inspired by Vintage Grrl to start a Woodland Shawl, and I need to dye up some yarn to do it.

I'm thinking a gentle variegation. I don't want it to be too colourful, as it will overpower the laciness of the shawl. Blues, maybe?

Boxing Day

Instead of doing a clean out on the house, I went shopping at Spotlight (no crowds, woo!) and Bunnings today.

20% off everything at Spotlight... and I picked up lots and lots of stuff. Including a rolling pin, I realised on Christmas Eve while baking shortbread that I didn't have a rolling pin! Madness!

I have some more yarny goodness, some kitchen things, party decorations, more beading things and fabric!

Now I just have to clean the fabbo sewing machine Knittingand gave me so I can start stitching things up.

Today I made this:



It's swingy, which I like.

I've also tried making wine glass markers... not too sure on those yet. The memory wire is giving me issues... and the 24 gauge wire I have is no good... too malleable.

I also finished a spinning project! No pics yet, this one was a quickie.

Drama and new things

Christmas is nearly over (and what a dramatic one it turned out to be. Not in a good way, either.)

Here's Down the Garden Path, a neck warmer I made for my mother.



Here's something I tried doing this afternoon. Beaded stitch markers... This beading thing is pretty cool!



I'm off to rest. There's going to be a big day of house cleaning and re-organising tomorrow.

Merry Christmas

Yep... it's that time of the year where we eat too much, drink too much and spoil others rotten.

Merry Christmas everyone.

I'm traumatised (or, a comedy of errors)

This morning in the blissful summer light I have this:



(you can click to embiggen all photos)

Close up it looks like this:



~50g of white Polwarth spun into around 67m of yarny goodness... all by myself.

This morning I feel good about the yarn I have made, even though I have this:



Tangled, snarled and ruined single.

Let's just say the plying was less of a dream and more of a nightmare. About a war. It went something like this... (I am seriously not making this up. You think I could make stuff like this up?)

Once upon a time a beginning spinner spun up a heap of Polwarth onto her spindle. Once she had as much spun onto there as she could handle, she decided that it was time to ply. Andean plying had been so much easier in her short length experiments than Navajo, so she decided to take the easy way out. (Mistake #1)

The beginning spinner started winding the single around her hand to create the yarn bracelet used in andean plying. Shortly after starting, the single snapped. The beginning spinner decided this was ok (after swearing a bit), because toward the end of her project she was spinning a bit too fine for the weight of the spindle. She carefully removed the little yarn bracelet and set it aside, starting a new one.

After winding and winding and winding some more the beginning spinner realised that this yarn bracelet idea was not going so well. Her hand had come to resemble the good old "deformed rabbit" that so often makes an appearance during shadow pupptery, and her middle finger was starting to turn an attractive shade of purpley-red. Concerned for the welfare of her hand, the beginning spinner carefully, then desperately tried to remove the yarn bracelet. After some struggling the bracelet came free and the hand started to return to it's normal colouring.

After careful consideration the beginning spinner decided not to return to winding a yarn bracelet. She recalled hearing a method of winding the single into a centre-pull ball and plying from both the inside and the outside. She set off to find her ball winder.

And hunted.

And swore.

And hunted some more... eventually locating the ball winder hiding at the back of the Expedit, buried under balls of acrylic and some handspun lengths. (It was at this point that the beginning spinner should have realised that the handspun lengths were plotting against her.)

The beginning spinner then set up her ball winder on the table with one hand (the other was holding the single and spindle) and set off to wind. Wind she did, with the single flying off the spindle and happily settling (tangle free!) onto the ball winder. Once at the end the beginning spinner let out a sigh of relief, thinking that things might now start going smoothly. (Mistake #2)

Once all the single was wound up and ready, the beginning spinner removed the new-formed yarn cake from the ball winder. As she did so the end caught in the notches came free and lost itself in the middle of the ball. It was at this point that most sane spinners would either start navajo plying from the one free end or would re-spin the ball. Not this beginning spinner. She tried to find the missing end. (Mistake #3)

The ball of yarn coughed up what is commonly known as a yarn barf - a blob of yarn from the centre of the ball - caused by the beginning spinner poking around trying to find the end. Luckily the end was located in this yarn barf and the beginning spinner decided to start plying.

Given that the tricksy single was now all over the place, it wasn't long before the beginning spinner wound (ha!) up with single wound upon itself, it's neighbouring strand and all combinations in between. Plying came to a standstill as the single would not come free. The beginning spinner began to untangle.

The beginning spinner learnt the first frustration with trying to untangle single - as soon as it's not taut it winds itself up. In an attempt to keep the single taut during the untangling process the beginning spinner would hook it around handy body parts... her head, her fingers, her toes, her elbow and occasionally a combination of all of these. The thought crossed the beginning spinner's mind more than once of how apt the scene would be for a LOLme with a caption of something along the lines of "ur doin it rong" or "hoomin learns playing wif yarn not as easy liek cat makes it seem".

The beginning spinner bravely fought the tangle, getting some more single free and plying it up, then untangling again until disaster struck...

One strand of single broke.

Swearing and sighing the beginning spinner knotted the singles on the spindle, then continued untangling until enough single was released and the tangle seemed solved. (ha!) Taking a deep breath, she started plying again, knotting the new lengths of single to the old one.

Sonner rather than later she was greeted with a new tangle. She repeated the LOLscene untangling/desnarling only to break the single again. Tying another knot, she plyed some more...

And found the process repeating itself. Rather than re-iterating the same part of the story, I will tell you that the beginning spinner had to detangle/desnarl and deal with broken single several times. The lovely skein of yarn shown above has several knots through it from rescuing broken single. Sometimes a piece of single had to be cut out... causing the beginning spinner some sadness at losing what would be extra length.

Many hours after beginning the plying, the beginning spinner finally detangled the last part of yarn, plied it and sighed. Then she drank vodka to steady her nerves.

I'm already dreading the next lot of plying I have to do. Please send vodka. And plying lessons.

Not already...

So Christmas is next week.

NEXT. WEEK.

I am not ready. Once again, Christmas has snuck up on me and I haven't done anything yet. Well, that's a lie. I have done some partial Christmas shopping.... but still.

Excuse me while I run away and try to figure things out.

What will you be...? You haven't told me yet.

You're Polwarth, you're deliciously soft and a joy to spin... and there isn't a huge amount of you.

Please whisper what you want to be when you are finished!

Lookit what I did!

Yep. That's knittable yarn, that is.

Time to start spinning proper amounts now.

I also made this candy cane a while ago.. the blue merino needs to be re-carded. It's a bit too sticky.

I'm with the DJ

The other half is playing the Big Day Out next year.

I'll be in the Boiler Room going off. Hah.

Pictures of the yarn

This is what I was so crazily excited about earlier today



The yellow yarn on the bottom is commercial 8 ply yarn.

It's been a bad day. Tomorrow is looking no better so far.

Squee!

So I did a little spinning before bed last night (on the drop spindle, I'm not good enough to use a wheel yet... and she needs to be taken apart, cleaned and polished.)

It's clicking. I spun a yarn that's closer to a worsted weight rather than a big chunky yarn. There's still thick and thin spots but it's getting there. I'm so ridiculously excited that I managed to spin something that wasn't huge and chunky. (Hence the morning post.) I'm also parking and drafting with ease, even if i still seem to get a bit of a fibrey mess left rather than nice neat roving.

I'll post a pic some time tonight after I get to take one.

Spin Spin Sugar

Isn't she beautiful?



She still doesn't have a name.

She's an Ashford Elizabeth 2.. currently set up for Scotch tension.

Recent finished projects

I have gotten some knitting done recently and I've finished the chequerboard scarf!



I finished the other half's socks



and have made more progress on the socks of dooooooom.



I may have also bought a spinning wheel on Sunday. Oops. She has no name yet. Frontrunners are Penelope and Aurora.

Yarny Goodness

I've been a busy bee for the past couple of days...

Vintagegrrl has been an enabler and encouraged me to try hand dyeing... and spinning. I have started both and here are the results so far:



Hand dyed yarn - Cleckheaton Country 8 ply, dyed with Queen Rose Pink and Blue food colouring. The pink is really deep and looks almost red. Next time I think I'd tone down the pink to make it pinkier.

Now... *Drumroll* time for the handspun! I have an Ashford drop spindle (and maybe an Ashford spinning wheel as of tomorrow), and I have a few little pieces of handspun to show off.



First handspun... a short piece because I learnt on this one, then finished it off so I could put a notch in the spindle and beeswax it. It's a plain white Polwarth fibre.



My third piece of handspun. (The second piece went into a top secret project... more on that later!)



My first blue handspun - this one is a merino. The colour is absolutely stunning... a royal blue bordering on purple.

I am loving spinning. It's like I did this in a past life... it just seems like second nature to me.