Knit & Nosh

2 things blocked

Heart To Heart Beaded Scarf is finished.

I came out beautifully.  This is for Grandma.  I planned it asa holiday gift, but I may give it to her early.  We will see each other at a wedding in October, and if she needs a little accessory, I will whip it out.

Now that the scarf project is finished I do not have anything big on the needles.  Today's knitting consisted of Chair Booties.  I invented Chair Booties a few years ago to help protect the wood floors from the constantly moving chairs.  After many hours of dedicated service I find that most of them have holes, so the replacement begins.  I can make 4 in the time it takes to watch a movie.  As I do not watch a lot of movies, I am not sure how quickly I finish enough for four dining room and two living room chairs.

Saturday I met with my writer's group.  While I considered myself slow, possibly stalled, they pronounced me blocked.  I am working hard to remedy this issue.  There has been a wee bit of progress, nothing to boast about.

Next up?  Spinning.  One failure, one success.

beads, coochy & handspun - island style

I was actually able to knit a couple of repeats on the Heart – to – Heart scarf at Knit Night.

I still love it, and now that I am decreasing it should fly right off the needles.

Remember Coochy?    Well, as it turns out, the 450 yards of Zen Garden was not enough.  I had to finish off the second toe with another yarn.  Argh. 

[pretend there is a nice photo of Coochy here.  Husband must be weraing them.]

A weekend of mindless car/ferry line knitting meant I made an amazing amount of progress on the handpun sock.  

The first sock is practically finished.  I managed to over ply the yarn, so it has lost a lot of its elasticity.  I love the color so much I do not care.

I am suppose to be doing a Harbour LightsKAL, but have not been able to find the perfect yarn.  This weekend is booked, but I may be able to get out next weekend and revisit Weaving Works.  If I do not find the right yarn, than I will consider it a sign and move on to something else. 

Sunday I am taking a Cookie A design class.  Not sure why, but I am sure it will be enjoyable.  A friend and I signed up together and a few hours spent knitting can only be a good thing.

Lopez Island was lovely.  We will be going back again and again.  Husband and I both agree that we could be island people.  Lopez satisfies his desire for a more rural setting and my need to be next to the water.  Much research needs to be done. 

smooshy

Am I the only person on the planet who does not love Smooshy as sock yarn?  I have knit three, count 'em, three pair of Smooshy socks and they have all developed holes within 60 days.  Never, ever, knitting Smooshy into socks again.  Ever.

mini vacation #2

We have decided to get out of town for a long weekend and are heading over to Lopez Island.  We have never been there.  Is there anything we should not miss?

As for knitting, I will be taking the Beaded Scarf and a ball of handspun that will become socks.  If Coochy is not done tonight I will bring them along too.

Nothing like a weekend away to relax the spirit.

i'm not the only one

For those of you who left comments about spinning and drinking, I have one thing to show you. 

See, its not just me.  A drink holder for those days when reaching over to your side table, or all the way down to the floor, is a little too worky.

While the link is for the holder that fits my wheel, they have one for your wheel too.  As soon as it comes with a pool boy named Juan to keep the holder filled, I will buy one.

not cauchy

Last night I was flipping through Cookie A's book, looking for a cable ratio, when I saw Cauchy.  It looked strange to me.  I looked again, "Why is it different?"  I looked up the chart and must have stared at it for 5 minutes before I realized where I went wrong.  I thought I was knitting Cauchy, but I am not.  The socks I am knitting will now be known as Coochy.

I have a Guild meeting tonight and realized that I cast on for Coochy one month ago.  One Month!!!  I have never in my whole life spent one month on a pair of socks.  Even Husband's ginormous socks are a two weekend affair.  The worst part?  I am only about 4 inches into the leg of the second sock.  I am not sure what I have been doing, but it is clearly not knitting.

Tour de Fleece training has come to a halt.  I have sustained an off field injury, and will need a couple of days before I am able to bend my knee enough to sit at the wheel.

Maybe I should spend some time with the sock?

training without sweating

I think the first time I heard mention of Tour de Fleece was two years ago.  In one ear, out the other.  It hit my radar again last year and I filed the idea away.  This year and I am eager to begin.  Of course there is a Rav group.

Before any big sporting event you need to train.  My training looks something like this.

This is Wendsleydale from Dragon Fibers.

The colorway is Violet Shades and I have four ounces to play with.  This is my first time with this particular fiber.  The plan is for it to become a 3-play sock yarn.  I purchased this roving with a specific recipient in mind.  Someone who loves purple and knitting socks.  I am surprised by the amount of blue in the fiber, so it remains to be seen if this yarn will be gifted to my purple friend or someone else.  I do have a certain someone else in mind, I do not know if she knits socks.  Anyway, I split the braid into threes, did a bit of pre-drafting and sat down to spin.  Oh, first I mixed myself a drink to accompany the spinning.

My first impression is that this sheep breed is probably related to Icelandic.  I will take the time to look it up later.  The fiber is a little rough and LONG.  I mean really long.  At first spin I was shocked by how long a draw it needed.  Longest I have ever worked with.  Once I got a feel for the long draw I relaxed and enjoyed the fiber.  While it is easy to spin thin, I think the fiber is probably very well suited to a thicker yarn.  It would make a wonderful light and well insulated worsted yarn.

Second impression is that this fiber has to be pre-drafted.  I split the fiber into thin strips before pre-drafting.  The yarn spins up so fast that there is no time for pulling and tugging while the wheel is spinning. 

Third  impression is that this is the fastest  3-ply sock yarn I have ever spun.  I spun the 1.3 ounces that I had pre-drafted in less time than it took me to finish my Screwdriver.  I am a bit of a lush, so this is a big deal.

I prepared the next section while finishing my cocktail.   I can’t wait to see what it will look like in the end.

 

seriously?

Where have the past few days gone?  It's Wednesday?  Really?

Very little knitting has happened over the past few days.  I have had my hands in the dirt.  A couple of the blogs that I regularly read have been showing the most beautiful garden pictures.  Pictures of gardens that are down right spectacular and made possible by an actual, real person.  My yard is an experiment in Darwinism.  It is strictly survival of the fittest around here.

Five years ago, right after we bought the house, we spent a lot of time and energy pulling out the overgrown shrubs.  There was even a finger broken by an evil holly tree.  We had the last laugh when we burned the last of the logs from that holly tree last summer.  Anyway, after the yanking out of the ugly stuff, a flurry of planting began.  Beautiful flowers and plants.  I quickly learned just how much space I was able to care for and which plants were hardy enough to withstand my care.  Or lack of care, as the case may be.

About three years ago I finally figured out what plants were strong enough to live and how big a space I was able to water and weed.  For the past three years the front flower bed has looked pretty good and the deck pots are spectacular.  So this year I was feeling a little cocky and decided to branch out (ha!) a bit.  This year, for the very first time I started plants from seeds.

This tray holds three varieties of sunflowers.  The big ones in front are Mammoth Sunflowers that grow to 12 feet.  I plan to ring the yard with them.

I have also grown food.

This year I planted two kinds of peas, onions, garlic, tomatoes, peppers, green beans, lettuce, beets, carrots, zucchini, pumpkins, chard and corn.   Look, they grew!!!  In fact everything has grown.  It seems we have a critter that finds the green beans quite tasty.  The first shoots have been eaten and I replanted a second crop, but I am not going to hold my breath.  So far this small scale experiment has me very excited and I plan to do much more next year.

Finally, last weekend I learned that this is a Lupine.

This little guy has been in a pot full of sand for three years and this is the first year he has bloomed.  Now that I know he/she is a Lupine and that they can grow to be quite large, this blooming will be rewarded by freedom.  I will move it to a permanent spot in the ground this fall.

For you real gardeners out there, this is not much much.  For me?  It is transforming.

 

do you see what i see?

One of these things is not like the other.

Can you see it?  What about now?

There it is, 1 1/2 repeats back.  I purled for a bit when I should have knit.  How did I do that?  Why did I not see it sooner?  Those questions do not really need to be answered.  Tomorrow is for ripping. Oh, so, delicate ripping.

read any good books lately?

Last night I cleaned up all of my Ravelry groups.  I find that I am not very loyal when it comes to these groups.  If I am working an Anne Hanson pattern I will join the Knitspot group.  When I am done, I “leave” the group. The next time I cast on an Anne Hanson pattern, I will probably rejoin.  Am I the only one who does this?  Yes, I keep my core groups, the ones I love day in and day out, but being a member of every group that matches my interests, seems impractical.  I am no psychologist, but that last statement may have something to do with my lack of stash issue.

Last week there was spinning.  This is a Well Heeled Sock Batt from Dragon Fibers.

350ish yards of 3-ply sock yarn.

 

Foresty green and brown with a bit of white bamboo.  This batt is made of merino/silk/bamboo/nylon.  I have made socks from one of these batts before and they are my very favorite socks.  She has a couple of batts in her etsy shop right now.  I HIGHLY recommend them.

There may be issues with Cauchy.

I am at the beginning of the toe.  As you can see, I stopped working the stitch pattern.  Why?  When I put my hand in the sock leg, it is not smooth. 

I am very worried that the bumpiness will be irritating, so I switched to stockinette for the main foot portion.  This evening I tried the sock on Husband to measure for the toe.  The stitch pattern is not very stretchy and it was a tug to get them over his heel.  Yes, he has large feet.  I am going to press on and finish the toe, at the same time I am preparing myself to rip out the whole sock and try something else.

I am in need of a good book.  There are no ARC’s on the bedside table (thank you publishing industry downturn) and last night I found myself flipping through a cookbook out of desperation.  A historical mystery perhaps?