Back in 2005 (?) I took spinning lessons. I got a wheel and everything, and started collecting fiber like I collect yarn, which is to say that I amassed a decent amount and variety, stuffed into a bin where it is not used.

Last year, I went to the Bishop Hill Spin-In in Illinois and hauled my little Kiwi wheel along. I spun for several hours straight and thought that I might actually continue this once I got back home. If you look at my wheel today, that same fiber is on it. I did fill a second bobbin and started to ply it, but I just ran into all sorts of problems and stopped in frustration.

Learning my lesson (that’s sarcasm), I went back to the Bishop Hill Spin-In over the weekend. I planned on just knitting and brought along, oh, four projects. I left little Kiwi at home. I think I knit a few repeats on one project and was distracted by a type of spindle spinning that I had not seen before. I bought a spindle, a little bump of roving, and received a quick lesson on how to spin. I was hooked. I spun all day.

This is a Blackfoot spindle. I would say that the technique is closer to spinning with a Navajo spindle than a top or bottom whorl drop spindle, which is probably what sold me. I don’t seem to have the coordination for most drop spindles, and the motion hurts my shoulder. With the Blackfoot spindle, I hold everything closer to me and in a more comfortable position. It’s not exactly a supported spindle, like Navajo, but I do twirl it in my hands rather than letting it spin freely. The spindle looks like a small Navajo spindle, but upside down. It’s a top-whorl, and you store the yarn underneath it, but spin off the top. There’s definitely a learning curve, but I’m really enjoying it so far. And hopefully, this fiber won’t still be on it when I go back to the Spin-In next year. A girl can dream.

Sometimes I think about packing it in and saying so long to this little blog. But it still exists in its little corner of the interwebs and I can’t quite bring myself to pull the plug. And if I’m not going to pull the plug, then I need inject a little life and actually post something. I’m supposed to contribute to a blog at work, too, so I suppose this will be good practice. If only I could talk about knitting on that blog.

Speaking of life, I tend to do my spring cleaning in the fall. There’s something about autumn that makes me want to take stock and organize. It’s probably a throw-back to all those years in school, but autumn is my New Year. I’ve been buying new dishes to replace the set that I bought when we moved back to Indiana a couple of years ago (it seems like much longer and much shorter at the same time) and just didn’t hold up. I’m reorganizing closets and being tough about those things we just don’t need to keep moving with us. I’m pulling the sweaters out from the dark depths of my closet and giving them a good wash. I should probably do the same for my handknit socks. It’s been chilly the last few days and my poor feet have been begging to be covered. Which is saying something, but I live in bare feet.

And speaking of socks, my attention has been scattered of late. I finish one sock and start another, but haven’t completed a pair in quite some time. I have about four singles to turn into pairs, and I started another one last week.

On top of the mittens waiting to be finished, and the sweater that still needs length (and sleeves), and the lace stole that I was so proud of myself for finally starting, and the chickens. Meanwhile, I’m finding all sorts of projects I want to start.right.now.

Anyway, I’m hoping that owning up to these socks will encourage me to finish them. You know, like diets – tell people so they can hold you accountable. I guess this is my single sock diet, helping my WiP pile shrink. We have here, from the outside in, Marlene, Lenore, Hedera, and Ellington. All beautiful, I’m not sure which to finish first. I could follow the first-in, first-out sequence, but I have a feeling I’ll probably reverse it. I adore Ellington and I’m kind of excited about have that pair on my feet. Sigh, decisions decisions. Maybe I’ll let someone else decide for me. What do you think?

I’m still fighting the jet lag slightly (I slept so late this morning – it felt wonderful!), so I’m just going to give you a photo tour of my trip to Victoria last weekend. Oh, did I not tell you I was going? I spent a long weekend there with a couple of good friends. It was a little birthday gift from me to me, with love.

Looking inland from Clover Point, with a kite. The wind was perfect for kites that day.

The rocks at Clover Point.  Can you see those mountains in the background? Victoria is just lousy with gorgeous scenery. One of the many reasons why I want to live there. Funny thing about Clover Point – if you go out far enough on the rocks, your cell phone starts to pick up an American signal. No roaming charges!

The tide was out at this beach north of Nanaimo, and we walked forever to get to the water, into a fierce wind. But it so worth it. This was looking out towards the water, and we were about halfway at that point.

We toured the gardens at the Government House. So many gorgeous flowers. Thank goodness for large memory cards – I took way too many pictures (is that possible?).

We visited five yarn stores over the weekend. Five. This yarn store (Knotty by Nature) had this bike out front. Full of awesome, it is.

As per usual, I bought way too much yarn, but like I said – vacation yarn doesn’t count. This is just the Indigo Moon portion. I also got some Malabrigo silky merino and Fleece Artist. But clearly, the Indigo Moon is the star here, so let’s give it the spotlight it deserves.

To wrap up: blue water, blue skies, mountains, wonderful people, lots and lots of yarn. Get your passports and go.

Lately, when it comes to babies, my mind has been turning to embroidered projects. Also sappy, googoo-gaga mush, but let’s focus on the embroidery for now. My friend Christina is expecting a little bundle of joy in August, so I wanted to make something special. To continue the trend, I settled on a project involving stitching: Panels that Christina can frame for her nursery. But what to stitch? Enter one of the most darling set of transfers I have ever seen…

These are from the Kurt Halsey artist series at Sublime Stitching. See? Darling! A sweet little angel to watch over baby and little bees, because baby will be as sweet as honey (what did I tell you? total mush). The bees will also fit in nicely with the rest of the critters in the nursery, including the birdie mobile from Knitty and some knitted fishies, all of which our expectant mommy has lovingly made over the last few months. And the many nature-themed toys I plan on making in the near future. Have I mentioned that I love babies and love to spoil them even more?

Christina, it was such a treat to make these for you. Thanks for letting me be a part of this exciting time. Love you!

I’m not much of a cook, which is to say that I don’t particularly enjoy being in the kitchen for the purpose of making dinner. I like trying new recipes, I like experimenting, but I don’t like utility cooking. Baking is a whole ‘nother story. Even when I create little more than disaster, I enjoy it.

We finally discovered our town’s weekly farmer’s market and many of the produce stalls had loads and loads of strawberries. I’m not really one to buy pounds and pounds to make preserves or purees. If something goes in the freezer, it usually ends up forgotten. I need small amounts to prepare that day, or they get wasted, so I passed them up last weekend. But this week I got to craving strawberry shortcake. I procured my go-to recipe for the shortcake from my mom, picked up a couple of quarts of berries, and got to work. After about a half hour or so, I had the most delicious strawberry shortcake I’ve ever eaten.

My go-to shortcake recipe is very similar to this one; in fact, I think next time I’ll try following that one to see if it improves the texture/flavor any. In past attempts, I used the strawberry shortcake topping that one can get at the supermarket. The kind that resembles a gooey pie filling. This time I decided to make my own (after my mom told me about hers – drool!). I chopped up enough strawberries to give me about two cups and put them in a sauce pan with about a cup of water and a half-cup of sugar and let the whole thing simmer for awhile. Once it started to look a bit more like a sauce than strawberry soup, I added a shot of pomegranate syrup, a splash of Riesling, and some dissolved cornstarch to thicken. The pomegranate syrup and Riesling were spontaneous additions and can certainly be left out.  It made enough for at least two servings of shortcake, and we had a bit left over to freeze until we want more shortcake.  I can think of other ways to make the topping, like pureeing some of the strawberries first, and using that to thicken the sauce. But I didn’t really feel like searching for my blender (do I even have one?) and also I didn’t think of that until just now.

It doesn’t really matter, because the whole thing was sooooo good. Like, shut-up and eat good. In fact, I think I need to bust out that second quart of berries and serve up another bowl.

PS: I’m going to be in DC for a conference next weekend. Any recommendations for food?

Ah, Ishbel. Hot off the needles and I already want to start another one.  I heart it.

Pattern: Ishbel by Ysolda (Rav project link)
Yarn: Knitting Notions Classic Merino Superwash Sock
Needle: US6 / 4.0 mm

I knit the large size ‘body’ with the small size lace portion. Other than that, I made no modifications. It was a really enjoyable little knit and a nice introduction to lace knitting of this size. I’ve knit tons of lace in sock form, but this was my first shawl project. I sense an addiction forming.

The yarn. How I love this yarn. I previously used Knitting Notions for the Persephone socks and I knew when I purchased this at the Fiber Event last month that it was destined for Ishbel. It has such a beautiful sheen and twist and the color. Oh that color! The yarn bloomed nicely during blocking. The shawlette is soft, light and has a nice drape. I would like to wear it everyday, please.

I can’t say the same for Emmie. She seems very concerned that I have discovered a new game to play with her: dress-up.

So, life continues to hurl itself my way. But look! I have a new sweater!

Pattern: Tangled Yoke | project link

I pretty much knit this to pattern, even to the point of using the recommended yarn (which I never do). I’ve been learning through extensive research (aka shopping) that I’d been aiming for the wrong size in cardigans. I tended to err on the side of positive ease, and I personally feel that this is not that great a look for me.  So this time I knit a smaller size, and golly, I think I got it. It’s just the right length, has just the right amount of ease after a good steam blocking, and I can even wear a full shirt under it with out the sleeves cutting off my circulation.  I basically have my new favorite sweater.  Move over light blue Eddie Bauer raglan cardigan, you’ve been replaced.

I had some, erm, fun with the cable. I think I knit several rows several times due to mistakes.  I think it had something to do with the mirroring, because normally cables do not perplex me so.  Maybe also because the cable is set against a knit background, as opposed to a purl one. I had a harder time “seeing” the cables and where they were going. But we got through it and zoomed through the rest of the sweater before arriving at button band hell.  It’s not the pattern, it’s me. I hate button bands.  I know, but I love cardigans, it’s a conundrum.

I’m not a huge fan of the collar, but again, I think that’s me not doing a very good job of picking up stitches and being a little too aggressive with the 3-needle bind off.  I was able to steam out some of the gathering, and what’s left looks intentional. It seems to wear ok, so I’m not very concerned about it.

Here’s an interesting observation: the Urban Aran was knit with heavy worsted yarn on US10.5 needles and it took me about 12 months; ditto for the Tilted Duster.  At that rate, I just about gave up knitting sweaters.  But I knit the Tangled Yoke with sport/dk yarn and US5 needles and it took me just over 4 months. But I think I know what the deal is. I had been watching a lot of Rescue Me on dvd (still am), as well as spending a goodish bit of time catching up on my stories on the weekends (ditto, except most of the shows are on summer hiatus). And what did I have in my hands the whole time? This sweater (now, an Ishbel). See? Tv is good for you, kids.

It’s Fiber Event time again, and this year I packed the car up with Elli and her friend Deb and we spent a lovely, sunny day in Greencastle, IN, amongst the wool and bunnies and yarn and what not.  We each went with a game plan (mine = don’t buy a bunny) and pretty much stuck to that, I would say.  I knew I was going to stop at the Knitting Notions booth because I love her sock yarns and it’s turning into sort of a tradition for me to buy something from her every time I go to a yarny event.  Other than that, I was trying to stick to roving and/or things I couldn’t get a hold of very easily otherwise.  I was very tempted by the boat load of Casbah I saw at one booth, but I resisted.  Repeat for the Briar Rose everything.  So, I only got what you see above.  From top left, clockwise: two bumps (4 oz) of shetland, Knitting Notions Classic Merino Supersock in Lichen, a 50g bump of shetland/cashmere/silk blend, and Knitting Notions CMS in Redwood.  I also got a little something for my mom, but that’s a surprise for her, so no photos. I left the Event well under my budget, so it was either a huge success or a huge failure, depending on how you look at it.  Considering I’ve barely touched the stuff from previous years (that’s right, years), I consider it a success.

And what is a Fiber Event without snuggly aminals? These two were so sweet, even if they preferred we stop talking to them like babies, stop taking their pictures, and stop making up lyrics to the song the brown one was humming.

I made these onesies for a friend at work who is having a baby soon. Such fun! Onesies are so wee and adorable, I could stitch a million of them.  Anyway, what made this a particularly satisfying project was that I got to dabble in some design.  I had a hard time finding images of what I wanted, let alone transfers. So I got out my sketchbook and pencils and came up with these.  This is my “sitting animals” series.  It started with the elephant (that’s a ball on its schnoot, in case it’s a little distorted here), and then the hippo and giraffe.

My favorite is the giraffe, probably because it has the most detail.  More detail = more fun with color! But it also took the longest to make. I had to leave off a couple of spots and not fill in some of the others because I didn’t allow myself enough time to finish.  The hippo was modeled after one of Emmie’s squeaky toys.  She was so mad when I took it from her to sketch.  She just sat there “supervising” and glaring at me and her hippo and sort of huffing and puffing until I was done.  She does not know what “share” means, obviously.  I adore the elephant too, but I might go back and redesign it to make it match the others in style.  My original thought was to do a series of sitting elephants – one with a ball, another with roller skates or something. But I couldn’t quite settle on a sketch that I liked (and also, I apparently can’t draw roller skates to save my life). And so the sitting animals were born.

Working on the onesies was a challenge.  I read ahead that onesies (and t-shirts and stretchy materials in general) need to be stabilized, so I picked up some stabilizer at the fabric store. The iron-on, peel-off variety, to be exact.  Worked like a charm, although it was still very stretchy on the hoop. The elephant’s ball looked like a ball on the hoop, but then settled into an egg shape when I took it off the hoop.  Must remember this for next time. I also wanted to do a heavy outlining, but the fabric wasn’t having it, so I had to split the floss into 3-ply sections.  Once I was done, I backed the stitched sections with some light interfacing, so as the little floss ends/knots/etc., wouldn’t irritate baby’s skin.

I love these little guys.  I need some more babies to stitch for. Like now.

Have you met my new bff?

Pattern: Persephone’s Socks by Lori Law/Oceanwind Knits (Rav project link)
Yarn: Knitting Notions Classic Merino Supersock in Dark Rose
Needle: US1 / 2.25mm dpn
Start to Finish: end of November to mid-February, with a goodish break in between socks.
Modifications: I made no modifications except to fudge picking up stitches for the gusset so that I wouldn’t have to break the yarn as the pattern instructs. I’m kinda clumsy when it comes to joining in new yarn, and I figured the last place I wanted to be doing this was around the heel, where I’m placing a huge amount of stress on the sock. I can’t exactly tell you what I did because like I said, I fudged it. But it worked. I think it had something to do with redefining the beginning of the round and working accordingly. And yay! Fewer ends to weave. Win win.

I am so smitten with these socks. I can’t believe it took me so long to finish the pair, because omg love! The pattern is just wonderful. I love the purl gusset. I adore the arch shaping – no sock traveling going on here. And the way the arch shaping continues to the top of the foot, it adds such an interesting visual element to the overall construction of the sock.

But the real star here? That yarn. That gorgeous Dark Rose merino from Knitting Notions. I’ve already said this is my perfect red (and the color is a bit more accurate in those photos). It’s still true. I want an entire wardrobe of this perfect red. Anyway, the base yarn is a little overspun, but overall the yarn has a nice sproing to it and seems to prefer more intense stitch patterns.  The first pattern I tried with it, the lace didn’t stand out enough. I think it really needs something to do in order to shine. I have two more hanks of this sock yarn (one in a lovely aubergine and another in a gorgeous green apple), so be expecting socks with twisted stitches, cables, or strong lace, you know, eventually.