October socks

Yes, it is in fact the 20th day of November, so shoot me!

A Wool Gathering....gather'd up some goodies!

yeah, yeah, two posts in one day- but I had a really busy and fun weekend! LD and I rode out to A Wool Gathering fiber festival at Young's Dairy near YellowSprings Ohio. It is the only fiber fest I've found so far that is close enough for a one day trip. And ya'll know I can't leave the pups alone to take a longer-than-one-day trip. So this is my once a year hands on fiber fix.


Llama mammas!















sheepies!








trying to subtly tell Mr Paparrazi that I'm done being photographed!




I got some yummy swag too! Finally got my hands on a card weaving book. I've had the cards for a year now and was chicken to try it. This book is fab, very clear and easy to read instructions. See that blue strap there- I made that within about a hour and a half of sitting down to read the book. Card Weaving is wicked cool. I picked up my pound of lovely merino top from the lovely folks with Ohio Valley Natural Fibers in Sardinia, Ohio. A gorgeous 8oz ball of Romney wool and mohair. The colors are to-die-for. I enjoy doing my own hand dying, but without a carder, I can't make roving as gorgeous as this. It is from a company called White Creek Wool in Deford, Michigan. I also picked up an ounce of dove grey cashmere. That was my last purchase of the day and I've lost the business card of the vendor that I bought it from. Cashmere! I've finally graduated to cashmere! I'm spinning it lace-weight on one of my drop spindles to try and stretch out the spinning love. It is heaven. And hey! I'm wearing my sweater again! see the end of my previous post for sweater details, if your interested.

be nice to the littles, you never know when a big is around the corner.....

Um, Yeah, that is one big bug! Part of the 'Big Bugs' exhibit at our local Innis Woods Metro Park. My previous post showed a lovely smaller specimen that came to visit my garden.







and since I hadn't hassled her smaller cousin, this lovely creature left me alone.......




















LD wasn't quite as lucky!










Sunday was our 7th wedding anniversary, so I thought I'd share a rare posed picture of the two of us.....







and the much more common picture of the two of us being silly. Silly, but very happy, relaxed and very much in love. And lest you think this blog has completely lost all knitting content....I spun the yarn for and knit the sweater that I'm wearing! brown merino with one skein of one strand of silk ply'd with one strand of the same merino. I did this when I realized I would run out of fiber before I got the yardage that I needed. Worked out nicely I think. The sweater pattern is one of the top down women's t-shirt patterns from Fiber Trends.

Visitor in my Lavendar...

I spent about an hour cleaning up the flower beds this morning, deadheading flowers, pulling up poison oak and (my favorite chore ever) trimming the spent lavendar stems. The flowers are all dried and there is nothing left for the bees, so now I get to play. ....and I got an extra bonus today. I was just finishing up trimming stems, wondering how I missed this and that, got a buzz-by from a bee, when I looked up and noticed that I had company.....!

How gorgeous is s/he?! LD and I saw the babies in early spring and I was hoping that at least a couple had hung around.







yes darlin, I am looking at you! Breathtaking!

I sort of understand how the sheep feel.....

.... and all I can say is "ahhhh"! Locks of Love will be receiving 12 inchs of red hair and I couldn't be happier to have it off my head!

Early Summer Garden

Watermelons Lima Beans
the first of the Mr Stripey heirloom tomatos
white patty pan summer squash
cucumber flower

a view from the road

life goes on...

and the garden grows. I'm insanely proud of these cucumbers. We've been eating lettuce, chard and herbs for over a month, but these cukes feel like the first 'real' food. I was also overjoyed to see the zucchinis are coming along brilliantly. I know, I know, in another month or two I won't be able to give them away, but for now I'm just thrilled that everything is growing.
This is a picture of the Lima Bean plants. Can't wait to taste fresh Limas. I've been surprised to find many other lima lovers out there, and to a person, none of us has ever had fresh lima beans, only frozen or, God forbid, canned.
I'm already dreaming about next year and planning how much more of the back yard I can take over. Now if I could just find time to fit in some knitting and spinning!

Princess Abigail

I'll never forget you, sweet girl. Your paw prints are tatoo'd onto my heart. I will love you and miss you for the rest of my life, and I'll always be greatful for the few short years that we had together. With your kindhearted trusting soul, you taught me to trust myself and with your unconditional love and dedication, you taught me to love myself. I'm a better person because of you.


....now if someone could just explain to me how I live the rest of my life without hearing her 'tail thump' on the floor upon waking every morning. Without the opportunity to laugh hysterically as she 'bites' at the other cars on the road (this is a dog that wouldn't intentionally harm anything that wasn't threating her, but put her in the back seat of a car and those other cars better watch out! You had to see it-hysterical! my description cannot do it justice.) Without tripping over constantly her because she insited on sitting directly in front of whichever chair I chose. I have 2 other canine companions- the boys- and I am continually grateful for their company. But I've lost an irreplacable freind. I tell myself that she deserves for me to mourn for her- this painful grief is a small price to pay for the wonderful 9 years she gave me. And that is true. But it sucks.

no time to knit...

Yep. The neighbors thought we had finally gone completely round the bend, rather than just skating the edge like we usually do. 13 cubic yards of dirt... delivered to the front yard.










We needed it! We really did. Both the front and back yards were horribly pitted and bumpy. Both needed to be 'filled in' in spots.














Some 'spots' being rather larger than others!














And I needed enough dirt to fill in a raised garden bed. I'm very excited about my first garden here at the house. I only planted what I thought LD and I would really enjoy eating, I can't even tell you how excited we are about trying fresh lima beans. I've loved limas my whole life but I don't think I've ever tasted a fresh one. We also have zucchini, cucumbers, Brandywine and Mr Stripey heirloom tomatoes, watermelon, brussell sprouts, white scallop squash, radishes, mixed lettuces, swiss chard and various herbs. Fairly safe and slightly predictable, but this is our first year. I honesly thought about putting in a row of flax, try my hand at growing, processing and spinning up my own linen yarn. Thank goodness I came to my senses on that one- I barely have time to pick up my knitting needles these days. Maybe next year!

Pre planting:


















All planted in, watered, mulched and ready to grow!

no you didn't-

Oh, but I did. I knit LD a pair of motorcycle gloves! And he likes them. I kind of like them too. I tweaked the "Knucks" pattern from Knitty.com just a tiny bit. I added a few vertical rows of purl stitches on the hand part, kinda looks like stitched seams.

Knitting motorcycle wear......makes me giggle every time I think about it!

I've also been spinning away on my Minstrel spinning wheel. I'm so happy with the double drive, I find I have much more control over the amount of twist and speed of uptake- I can actually get the size/type of yarn I want rather than going with what the wheel wants to do. A Kiwi is a wonderful first wheel, but you really can outgrow it's capabilities.

I have no idea what the yardage is, but I love the color, and it is Rambouilette wool, very soft and fluffy. No idea what it will become, but I'm sure it will be lovely.

I've been knitting also! Still working on a "corset tee" by Annie Modisett, I'm about 2/3 done with the miles and miles of k2p2 that makes up the body. I'm going to try to add sleeves of my own design, and I think with sleeve I might actually wear this sweater in public. The yarn is a cotton/silk blend, loverly stuff. Between k2p2's, I made this cotton "Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Sweater" from Mason-Dixon Knitting by Gardiner & Shayne and superwash wool baby socks for a new baby on the way for a lovely woman at work. She has a 2 year old daughter, equally lovely, and I made Miss E a pair of socks as well. I'm planning on making myself a pair of argyle socks using the same yarn/colors. Love the pink and green!

And finally, I've been drop spindling some handcombed Rambouilette/Alpaca blend, having scoured the wool and washed the Alpaca myself. I love the idea of doing the whole process from raw fiber to finished item- just really love the idea of it.......but the reality is that it just takes too durn long! I have nothing but awe and admiration for the hundred of generations of folk who had no choice but to shear, wash, card or comb and spin their fibers. I'm just not planning on losing my link to KnitPicks.com any time soon. Too many projects, too little time!

and sometimes, I knit...

hand spun, hand dyed corriedale. Motified version of Gentleman's Sock in Railway Stitch from 'Knitting Vintage Socks' by Nancy Bush. LD is particulary fond of these socks, to the point of showing them off to friends. seriously!

You never call, you never write......

sorry.
Let me explain.
First of all, I am a complete, self admitted inconstant blogger. My life has 2 phases, either NOTHING is going on and I'm swallowed up in depression and self pity and, well, who in the world would want to read anything that someone in that conditions would write!? The other phase is when EVERYTHING happens at once and though I have a billion things I'd like to blog about, well, I'm so durn busy that I think about blogging, want to blog, but can't pull myself away from whatever else is going on. Occasionally I have actually even forgotten that I have a blog.
I've seriously kicked around the idea of only posting pictures and not even making an attempt to be witty (hey, I said "attempt", I didn't say I was sucessful!) and I really think I may start doing that. So here are the first two pics, and anyone who know either myself or LD will at once understand why I haven't posted recently:




and:

Your IQ Is 105

Your Logical Intelligence is Below Average Your Verbal Intelligence is Genius Your Mathematical Intelligence is Above Average Your General Knowledge is Above Average

A Quick and Dirty IQ Test

hee hee hee..... I just love these blogger tests. They are like crack to me. I tend to 'test' well, and sometime have to fight myself to actually answer the test honestly rather than pick what I know is the 'right' answer. This one surprised me a bit. I expected math to be horrid- obviously I stumbled on the correct answers for the math questions, and I've never been mislabeled as a genius in anything, but the thing that cracks me up and keeps me coming back for more are answers like- logical intelligence: below normal -that is just too funny. Even more so because I don't really know what 'logical intelligence' means! ......'scuse me while I go peruse a dictionary!

First FO of 2007

Handspun silk, slightly altered "Christmas Angel" pattern from the 2006 Daily Knitting calendar. I'm going to continue to tweak this pattern to see if I can make her look more like a fairy. The head is a needle felted bead, I think on my next try I'll add a couple of pointy ears and make the skirt less bell shaped. I have just enough silk yarn left for one more. After being left alone all night on New Years Eve (the dogs were only alone over night- the same amount of time they are on their own Monday thru Friday during the day!) this is how Bailey and I spent most of our New Years Day. The little prince looks so happy/relived/comfy I just want to make a sandwich out of him and eat him up!