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Moving

Not in Real Life

but the blog is heading over to http://fibernerd.blogspot.com/

Cat Bordhi + Cast On Podcast + Caffeine = Inspiration

It's been an interesting day.

When I went to work this morning, I had a killer headache, so I took some medicine. Medicine with about as much caffeine as a cup of coffee.

This was a risk, as I am very sensitive to caffeine. If I eat too many m&m's, I will get a caffeine buzz for a little while, then get tired, restless and be unable to relax.

To help me feel better, and since I'm lucky enough to be able to listen to music at work, I turned on the new episode of Cast On. And Cat Bordhi was the guest. If Cat Bordhi is the mad scientist of knitting design, then Brenda Dayne is the Kung Fu master of podcasting.

With this perfect storm of energizing forces and creative genius, I had quite the rush of designing inspiration at work. A few new design ideas came to me, and I had a couple of break throughs in some of the older ideas I've had bouncing in my head.

I couldn't justify sketching at the office, let alone play with yarn. Believe it or not, I was actively working. Frustrating!

And even if I could have sketched, I don't have an organized way to keep track of these ideas. Even more frustrating!

So I'm starting a design journal.

And yes, I'm talking about designing, which isn't something I've ever really talked about here. Recently I've been almost exclusively using other people's patterns, perhaps playing with yarn choices. But I would like to start designing more of my own projects. They may not necessarily be published, but if they are, I have some ideas, especially for online publishing. Think of a sweater pattern in a worksheet, where you input your gauge and desired dimensions, and customized instructions are automatically calculated. No math or spreadsheet prowess necessary. If you can type in a few numbers, and hit print, you have your very own custom pattern.

Also, I've been making progress on the Ravelympics project.



This is how it looks right now. I'm not going to post every day's progress picture, because they all look pretty similar. They can be seen at my Flickr page

This energy has made me overly optimistic about what I can accomplish this evening. My to do list is ridiculous! I just hope I don't crash.

More Knitting Olympics Progress

It's not yet afghan sized, but it's getting there.

Day 2



Day 3



As you can see, Indy clearly approves.

Ravelympics Day 1

Here are the results of day one of my Ravelympics project.



I didn't take a picture on 8/8/08 because I didn't get home till midnight that night, and I was dead tired. We knitters know how to party.

I've found that, for now, this project is relatively portable. I'm sure once it gets bigger that will change.

Getting Ready for the Knitting Olympics

This year for our anniversary, Nerdy Husband and I decided to get ourselves presents. He got a Playstation 3. I got these



I ordered the swift and ball winder online from Hank's in Gainesville, and on the day it arrived, I walked in to find this.



It was wrapped in Christmas-y gift wrap and came with a very funny card. It just got better. When I unwrapped it, I found a note written on the side from the awesome ladies at the yarn store.



A ball winder and swift. Good thing too, because I had to wind all this.



into this




That's 24 different shades of Cascade 220. What am I going to do with it? I'm basically copying Brouhaha's Curve of Pursuit. It's gorgeous, and my afghan is as much inspired by her work as it from the pattern from Wooly Thoughts.

That being said, no, I'm not going to knit an entire afghan in 17 days. My goals are to knit every day (which I normally don't do) and make an average of 1 square a day, or 17 squares total over the course of the games. I also want to take a picture of my progress every day.

Although I think I may be crazy to knit a worsted weight 100% wool afghan in August in Florida.

Spinning Class

So, I was lucky enough to get a spot in a spinning class at Hank's Yarn. The shop is great, the ladies that own it are great, and Ginger's a great teacher. It's so much fun.

There's this



The Golding Spindle that Ginger was nice enough to let me use. It's amazing, and if I wasn't getting a wheel soon, I'd be investing in one.

It allowed me to make this.



Then, there's the wheel.



This week I'm using the Ashford Traditional. I picked it out because I love the look of the Saxony wheel.

Wheel spinning is easier to do than I expected. I've gotten started with this (the same roving as the spindle).



Which has become this



I also made a few purchases. Going into a yarn store on pay day can be dangerous. But fiber is a lot less expensive than yarn. I seem to have bought them in pairs.

It's Yarn: Nameology

Drumroll please...

I have finally finished Nameology, my Very First Handspun.

After the singles, (see previous posts) I plied.

I made my lazy kate into a tensioned lazy kate with the creative use of a paper clip and some gorilla glue. I put both singles onto separate bobbins and plied away.





(my house isn't really this messy, we've just been cleaning out both of our offices, post on that once our new office is presentable)



I ended up with a very full spindle of two ply.



Isn't it just gorgeous! This picture is probably the truest color.

Then I made use of our dining room chair, since I don't have a niddy noddy.



After a resting overnight, I gave it a quick bath in the morning. Then some good whacks against the tub (yarn's version of a shiatsu massage) and hang up to dry.



It's even balanced enough to hang in an open loop! The strands that are out of place here are because it wasn't hung properly.

The end result:



About 26 yards of a very bulky thick and thin yarn.

It won't grow up to be anything. Its sole purpose is to hang out in a vase in the living room, and be pretty.

Catch Up Post: Random Baby Stuff

So, in early spring this year, there was a small baby boom in the people around me. People at work, ladies at the knitting group, and even our neighbors were popping out babies. Must be something in the water.

Of course, these new arrivals mean: baby gifts. I made a few.

First, three different burp cloths. The pattern is the Baby Genius Burp Cloth, from Mason Dixon Knitting. The yarn is various shades of Peaches n Cream. I used size 4 needles to get a really tight fabric. These are very pretty and absorbent.







Next, some booties.

The "Free Baby Mary Jane" pattern by Lucie worked in Lane Cervina Madrid Solid gives these







So cute and interesting construction.

I also used the Jimmy's Baby Bootie Set pattern, and the same yarn, to make these.



Also cute, but in my opinion this yarn has a bit too much definition for the pattern. It looks a little wonky.

And lastly, a Baby Bib o' Love (again from Mason Dixon Knitting, and in Peaches n' Cream).



I paired up these gifts (everyone got two), and got some takeout containers from Micheals.

This set went to Deborah from the knitting group (recipient of Super Secret Project #2) who had a baby around Easter time.



These booties (and the pink burp cloth) went to our neighbor. I don't know what colors they like, so I just went with lots of color.



That table is our dining room table. Can you tell that this was during exam season? I wish I could say it wasn't always covered by study materials and/or my sewing machine.

And, for this last set I had no cute takeout container, but I did have a model help me out.



Don't be too hard on Indy, he was having a bad face day. I only did this because he kept getting into the pictures I was trying to take. clicky

In other news, May 19th was a pretty lucky day for me, I passed my exam! Which is good because that one's done, but bad because I have to start studying for my next one, which is a bitch.

Field Trip: The Local Needle

Last weekend, our knitting group went to the Local Needle.

We were greeted by Joan (the proprietor) in style. She made a sign, and buttons!



The graphic is the group logo made by Kate, one of our members. Joan is so thoughtful and always makes us feel welcome.

And, she has great yarns. As part of my anniversary present (more on that in another post later) I got to splurge a little.

Here's the take:



First, Alpaca with a Twist laceweight Fino, which will probably grow up to be a lace shawl or stole.



Some Wildfoote for some baby booties. I'm interested to work with this yarn.



Dream in Color Smooshy in November Muse.



And least but definitely not least



Pagewood Farms sock weight in Really Red. Besides being the most appropriate color name ever, it is my favorite of the bunch. It was also damn hard to catch the color on a rainy day.



The actual color is somewhere between the two pictures. It's amazing. Amazing enough to convince me to get some color in my life. I bought two skeins to make some fingerless mitts and socks. I'm contemplating getting some worsted weight for the February Lady Sweater.

When Ducks Attack...

No fiber content at all in this post. I apologize for the following long-winded story about duck bullies

My neighborhood has a family of ducks. They're not just any ducks, though. These are some pretty mean ducks. Today, one of them chased our dog.

Indy has a history with ducks.



This is a favorite toy, err, training device, named "Dinner", as in "Indy go get Dinner". It looks like he's hugging, but he's really just waiting to attack.



He's tough on waterfowl.

Chasing ducks is one of his favorite past-times. He stalks them, like a lion on the Serengeti, and then charges. Shih Tzu means "Little Lion", and when Indy hunts you can see how they got that name. We keep him on the leash, and don't let him get close enough to really threaten them.

Our previous apartment had normal, non-scary ducks. Once, a duck flew into his path. Indy lept at it and I thought he was going to bite it, but all he did was to touch it with his nose (his mouth was even closed) as if to say "Tag, You're It". It is definitely a game to him.

Indy also sees it as protecting us when the animals become aggressive. At our old place, a belligerent goose once tried to attack my husband. Even though this goose had a good 10 pounds on Indy, he ran away when the dog charged at him. Because he's a bird, and birds are supposed to be afraid of dogs and people, right?



When the neighborhood was new, there weren't any ducks at all, even though we have a pond. Soon, however, a few ducks wondered in and people started feeding them. Over the months, they've grown used to being fed, and gotten more confident.

Last winter, we noticed they were getting pretty comfy when one wondered up to us while we were grilling.

Some of our neighbors encourage us to let Indy chase the ducks, in hopes that they would leave.



When the ducks first showed up, Indy would chase them into the water, they would run away, and come back again probably in a few minutes.

Then, some babies were born. They are obviously off limits, as we don't want to scare or hurt any of the cute ducklings, and mamma ducks are supposed to be aggressive. So we kept Indy away from them until they were grown up.

Now the ducks are pretty much full grown, and for the past month or so, Indy's been allowed to chase them. But they've learned.



They know that while he may come running at them from across the street, he's not going to get within a couple of feet of him. So they ignore him. Yesterday, I decided to test how brave these ducks were. I ran at them, and stopped a bit closer than we let Indy get. And they ignored me!

So today, when we went walking I took the camera, hoping to get a shot of the ducks and Indy trying to chase them. Indy was a few feet away from the ducks, when one of them charged him! We had to pull him away!

The funny thing is, he's so submissive, if a duck attacked him, he'd probably lay down and take it.

So Indy's duck chasing days are over, for the time being. Luckily he has stopped wanting to chase them as much, because where's the fun in chasing something that doesn't run.

I know violent gangs could ruin neighborhoods, but I never imagined we'd have a gang of ducks terrorize our dog.

Worldwide Knit-in-Public Day and The Celtic Tote

Last Saturday was Worldwide Knit In Public day, and to celebrate, our group went to an event planned by a few LYS's: A Stitch in Time, The Local Needle, and Fran's Knitting Boutique.

It was a great time. There were at least 35-sih people. I got to meet some new people and see some faces I hadn't seen in a while.

Unfortunately I had camnesia (and only took a few very poor shots) and didn't do nearly enough mingling, because I was too busy working on Arrgyle socks for Nerdy Husband.


Just in time for Knit in Public day, I finished my Celtic Tote.



Pattern: Celtic Tote, Interweave Knits
Yarn: Lamb's Pride Worsted in Wild Oak (embroidery in Sable)

I was such a good little knitter, I not only made a swatch, I made an extensive one to make sure I liked the decreases and increases, and to practice needle felting on the embroidery.



And I even felted the swatches (no pictures of that, you'll have to trust me).

Here's the completed bag before felting.



I used half a skein of Sable to do the embroidery, (thanks Brenda) and needle felted the yarn down. Instead of using a brush to support it while needlefelting, I used a pillow form. When I tried using the brush on my swatch, it caught on the fuzzier fibers and made a huge mess. See, those swatch things are useful.

The mesh in the bottom wasn't really that wonky, that's just how it was hanging.

And then I felted it.



Somehow, during that felting, the mesh in the enclosed pouch managed to double itself over. And the bag overfelted a little, so the pouch was too small for the mesh. It was a pain to work it out.

When I finally got the mesh as flat as I could, it was clear that the mesh and the bottom of the bag were bent. Since the only way I could get it out would be to cut the purse, and that didn't appeal to me, I had to find a way to straighten it.

What I came up with was a bit strange, even for me.



Behold the Leaning Tower of Totebag.

I figured that I needed to put weight on the bottom of the purse to flatten out the bottom, but didn't want to put weight on the handles, but still wanted them to dry in a sort of natural position. So I hung the purse on a doorknob and got enough random things to reach from the floor to the bottom of the purse (a bucket, our new phonebook still in the plastic bag, and the box from our Wii Fit). Then I raided our pantry for cans (for weight) and plastic bags (for shape), and stuffed it to the shape I wanted.

I then turned down our dehumidifier, said a prayer to the Fiber Gods, and went to bed.

It worked out reasonably well, with the exception that the bottom didn't really dry well, not being exposed to air and all. Putting a towel under the purse would have helped, but the inside would have still been wet. The basic shape of the bag was right after drying in the tower overnight, so I stuck it on a hanger and let it dry naturally, turning it inside out a few times a day.

The other problem was the fuzz. It took over the purse, and then became aggressive. Some of it tried to escape in the form of pills that came completely off the purse while felting.



Some of it even tried to eat me.



This is probably what happened to Cousin It and Chewbacca.

I had limited time to find a sweater stone before WW KIP day, and the best I could come up with was one of those shavers. It had absolutely no effect on the swatch (handy little thing) and I think I killed the motor trying.

The purse was still wet and fuzzy and unlined when I went to the event, but I was happy as anything it was there.

It's not quite as fuzzy as it seems in the closeups, but it's close.

A few days after the event, I stayed up till 11:30 lining it.



It brought back memories of sewing with my mom, who always seemed to be sewing late at night. It makes sense; with several munchkins running around and a full time job, she had her hands quite full. That woman taught me a lot about balance.