Gravity speaks

I didn’t even drop it from very high…  and I was almost done with the singles for that three-ply yarn I’ve been working on.  Ah, well, I guess that means it’s time for me to jump into the wishlist.  I have now ordered a Bossie (canarywood mini), so we’ll get to see if they’re really little tornadoes.  I just wish I already had it in my itchy fingers.

I haven’t been spinning very much lately, because I’ve sort of been focused on getting some socks done, so it’s kind of ironic that I decided to put a couple of hours into finishing up these singles tonight while I was at the yarn store, hanging out with all of the knitters there.  I was just about to get up and leave when I dropped the spindle.  Argh.

Ah, well.  There are worse things which have happened to me for sure.  And this sort of forced me (please don’t throw me into the briar patch!) into ordering that Bossie, so I guess this is a good thing from a certain point of view.

It’s just… well, this was my first pretty spindle.  I have some sentimental value attached to it just for that, and while I’m fairly sure I could glue it back together, it just won’t be the same.  I think I may glue it back together just so I can have it to look at, but I am fairly sure that its spinning days are over.

Wishlist, the Next Iteration

I would like to obtain some of the following items.  I’ll be socking away my pennies in my personal savings account in order to get them.

(1) One or more of the Tsarina’s excellent sock kits.

(2) I’d like to play with a loom.  Spunky Eclectic has some interesting table-top looms for just a few bucks.

(3) A Golding spindle.  Those ring-weighted spindles look awfully tempting.

(4) A Bosworth spindle.  I just love the way these look and I haven’t ever run into a bad review.

I’ll add to this as time goes by, and maybe even I’ll be able to cross things off the list unless I keep spending all of my money on New Fiber:

I had made it nearly 2 months in between fiber purchases.  That’s, like, a record or something.

More photography

Every now and then I think that I should just carry my camera everywhere with me. Maybe I should.  Here are some more of the better images I’ve caught.

Near our camping spot in Goblin Valley.

Near our camping spot at Little Sahara State Park.

From my trip to Cairo.

From my last trip to Oregon.

Attempt More Photography

I was trying to clean up the website, when I found some photos that reminded me that I used to try to take real photographs.  Here’s a small sample of some of my still-life/landscapes–and I really must try taking some more of these sometime.  I keep seeing a perfect shot from part of Alaric’s paper route, if I’d just remember to take my camera along one of these days…

Colors in spinning and knitting

I’m not the best at looking at fiber and understanding intuitively what a finished object would look like when it’s done. For example, I bought some BFL called “Burning Bush” from Spunky Eclectic which looked like this when I got it.

I don’t know what I expected from this, but I didn’t understand how separate and vibrant these colors would turn out in the singles.

First this:

And then this:

I ended up turning it into a hat for Cambria, since all those pinks made it unsuitable for me to wear.  I’m funny like that.  And this reminds me that I need to get a photo of the hat, since I don’t have one right now.

My color sense is improving, though.  In this yarn, I knew from the beginning that there would be a faux-fair-isle look to part of it, but I had no idea that the banding in the different colors would be so even.

Yes, that’s the infamous k2p2-ribbed sock recipe.  It’s a secret, I tell you, so don’t go spreading it around!

And sometimes I know almost exactly how the color is going to work out.  The fiber that I started spinning over the holidays (as noted in this post) is working out almost exactly as I had planned.

Here’s a shot showing off my lovely malachite spindle (my dreamspindle):

Here’s one showing how the singles are spinning up.  Notice the lovely luster the merino/bamboo blend has.

And here is the ubiquitous penny shot (to give a sense of scale):

I’m feeling much more confident in my ability to spin this stuff up.  I might even venture into the carroty silk one day…

But it is nice that I’m starting to have a sense of what the fiber will look like as I work with it.  Now we’ll see if the plied yarn and finished objects look anything like the vision I have in my head.

A Diet Rich in Fiber

I have been knitting now for about four years, and spinning for a few months.  It turns out that nothing is as calming as spinning, and nothing is quite as satisfying as putting on a newly-completed article of clothing that I have just knit.  On top of all that, putting on something that I both spun and knit is a treat beyond comparison.  I have been spreading that joy a little bit, which was helped when each of the kids indicated to me that they wanted to have spindles for Christmas.

Here is Aurora’s first spinning.  She not only spun it up before I could get a picture of her with it, she also knit it up.  She’s much faster at knitting than I am.  Now we just need to get her some more fiber in this colorway so she can finish her scarf. 

While I was teaching the kids to spin their fiber, I got some out myself for demonstration.  This is the fiber I chose:

It’s a 60/40 merino/bamboo blend, and I really like the luster it shows.  I have split it into thirds, by weight, so it should work out to turn this into three-ply sock yarn.  I have one third of it already spun up, on my Louet spindle, and I need to get the rest done.  I’m thinking I’ll use the malachite spindle, since it’s slightly lighter than the Louet (and the lightest spindle I have.)  Which reminds me–I must put some money down on a Bosworth mini soon.  I’d like a sub-ounce spindle to play with.

In any case, I think that I have discovered that one of the keys to my happiness is how much time I spend working on fiber-related stuff.  I have also discovered that it’s far easier to take a spindle into the family room to watch TV and spin with the kids than it is to drag my wheel all over the place.  Don’t get me wrong… I love my wheel.  But I love my spindles, too, and I’m rediscovering that right now.

Christmas Lectures

Michael Faraday started a tradition of trying to bring science to the masses with his annual Christmas Lectures at the Royal Institution.  In 1980, the Chemistry department at the University of Utah decided to continue this fine tradition.  Two of the professors from the department dress up in period costumes from the 1860s and lecture on some entertaining properties, such as color in chemistry, the chemistry of a burning candle, and (the best part) some explosions.

Thanks to my wife, who got tickets weeks ago, we went as a family last night to watch this.  I think the only one who wasn’t completely entertained was Elenna, who just couldn’t sit still for the whole 75 minutes.  Hopefully, this is something my children will remember as something cool their parents did.

It also made me wish I had paid more attention in Chemistry back when I took it–in that very same room.

Sock yarn sighting

It took me a while, but this is what I wanted to accomplish when I first started spinning.  Next thing I want to accomplish: three-ply sock yarn.  But I’m going to finish the second sock first.

Details: BFL (blue-faced leicester) wool which I bought in the “Nova Scotia” colormash from Spunky Eclectic.  I spun this stuff up on my wheel.  The yarn is two-ply and seems to be about 20 wpi, which is a little on the lean side, but I’m happy with it.

It’s the softest sock I have ever knit.

The Eagle has landed

The Teenaged Man Boy (Alaric) has taken that last step.  It was a big step, which had several parts.  After driving out to the Davis County Courthouse and spending Some Time loading these into two trucks, Alaric borrowed a power washer and tested out cleaning some of these voting signs.

Alaric immediately started washing--mostly so he could play with the powerwasher first.

He got a bunch of the scouts from his troop (plus Nick) to help out.

Look at all the industrious people cleaning signs.

There was also quite a bit of repair work going on.

And, in the end, a shiny field of cleaned and repaired voter signs.  Election Day is coming up!

There are around 120 signs.

My job was mostly in moving signs in and out of the trucks.  I learned to wear work gloves, since those signs are real finger-pinchers.  Youch!

In any case, after helping drive them all back out the the courthouse Friday morning, Alaric should now be completely done with the requirements to get his Eagle.  I’m relieved and proud.

More spinning and a dash of knitting

So, staying up later than I should and grabbing as much spare time during the day as I dared, I finally finished spinning up the singles from that first ball of silver Corriedale top.  I hurried to ply it into a two-ply yarn, because “Don’t Postpone Joy” has become a bit of a mantra in my life lately.  Yes, there are some kinks (ha!) to work out in my plying technique, and it might also help if I’d had a better kate system than a couple of empty toilet paper rolls in a cardboard box, but it’s my first yarn, first true yarn.

So, here’s what you might end up with if you keep up on spinning that first top:

I’ve also started spinning with the merino and the spindle that the Tsarina sent to me.  I realized today that something must have clicked because I’m suddenly spinning far finer singles than I was just a few days ago.  I do wonder if it might also have something to do with the difference between merino and corriedale fiber.  In any case, here’s my current project.  Notice the double-thick singles visible at the right-hand side; those are from a few days ago.

I really like how the blended fiber brings out the base color even though the accent colors aren't more than a small percentage of the total yarn.

I’ve also got some small girls in this house who are interested.  I probably need to order a number of spindles and some fiber for them to learn with.  Elenna is already playing with some fiber here:

Yes, that's a banana sticker on her head.