over the holidays

For me the holiday madness is over! Yay!! And I am over it! No more mad dash to knit gifts. I am still working on the same weaving project, that could take me a bit of time to finish. But that was not on the 'it must be done before Christmas' agenda.

So for the first Christmas in the mountains it was great!! My son and I went to my elderly cousins home on Christmas Eve. It was good to spend time with family. Christmas day was low key. I dvr all episodes of Doctor Who and thankfully they (BBCA) had a week long Doctor Who marathon to add to my dvr! I got to stay in my jammies, eat junk food all day and watch about 20 hours of Doctor Who!!

What could be better? Playing with fiber and 20 hours of Doctor Who!

I did start on another Rikke hat, for myself, which is almost done as of today. This one I made a bit smaller.

This is the first one.

I also painted with fiber, making rolags has become a favorite pastime. I find the process very soothing and exciting at the same time.  I like the creative process and the seeming randomness of design. Very appealing to the nonconformist in me. These happen to be rolags for art yarn.
If you have never seen one before, this is a blending board. It is my artists color pallet. And like paint, the fibers cannot be un-blended once they have been blended.
I'll share that story with you sometime.

I started out with a few lashings of a merino blend roving (the aqua). Then added some SoftSilk which is some shredded up sari silk. Some purple stuff ( stuff because I don't remember what animal it came from) that I dyed myself, and them some random hand dyed green and yellow curly locks for some added texture and contrast.

Then I take my two dowel rods, and starting at the bottom I place the fiber layer between the rods, gently draft and roll until I have rolled half of the fiber off of the giant doggy brush as my son calls it.  Then I repeat the process for the next half. Two for one :)

I have been participating in the Journey to the Golden Fleece  since February, if you are not familiar it is a fiber spinning creativity course, and really a journey of self discovery.  (More information can be found at Fiberygoodness). I have learned a lot of different techniques, fiber preparations, and in general have reached out more to my creative side.

These I made for my Module Six yarn. I am afraid with the moving of across several states, I got a little bit behind ( Suzy and Arlene just sent out Module Eight-yikes!).  I have some journaling for 6 to do ( and frankly that is not my strong suit) And of course I would rather have spun them on my Aura wheel...but sadly I am still waiting. :-/

Now that the Christmas knitting madness is over I can get caught up on my modules. I so don't want to miss my graduation.  

Oh and I thought I would share with you this, only one out of four of my mother's Christmas Catus' bloomed. It happens to be the one next to the salt lamp. Who knew.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, or what ever holiday you celebrate.

happy fibering xxoo

weaving on

It's been a busy week. Christmas is closing in and, yes I did make one more hat! OMG I am so over it now...everyone has a flippin' new one now!

And somehow it got wrapped and shipped without a picture of it...what-ever.

I have also been weaving. I have been commissioned to weave a poncho. Specific colors. Brown and black.

I have the first piece woven, or more specifically I have the practice piece woven. She wants it more black than brown so I will have to re-think it abit.

The thing about commission pieces is that it puts a lot of undue pressure on me, so I generally don't do them. Usually I make what I like, and hopefully someone else likes it too. Otherwise, it becomes too much like work. This is a special case however. It will be my first woven sale! 

This will also be my first garment.

eek!

I have been working on the Westknits KAL 2014 which I started while I was in Sarasota. I have 

been stuck on clue 2 for some time now. Brioche has been kicking my butt! I practiced, thought I got it...then I had to rip it out, like 3 times now I think. 

This time I think I have it. Of course most people are already done with theirs so the cat is out of the bag and it is no longer a mystery.

But as long as I don't lose my place I should be golden! 

A woman I went to school with recently contacted me on FB. She made a comment to me about how she loved how I stayed true to myself.

I have been mulling that over now for a week or so. Did I?? I not really sure.  I think she remembers me much differently from high school than I remember myself, I always thought of myself as a introverted dippy little artsy hippie back then. Ok so maybe I am a little bit artsy hippie dippy now too.

I'm not sure if I really stayed true to myself, or if I just found my way back :) either way, it made me feel pretty good.

as my son would say - don't knit yourself into a circle. ;)

just one more

Before I took up blogging again, I gave careful consideration on picking up where I left off here, albeit two years ago, or starting from scratch. 

You see my choice. It seemed like a waste since I already had my stuff here. It is hard work doing all those little side bars and links and what nots. So I here I am, I hope you enjoy it. 


I have spent the better part of the weekend trying to get the rest of my "Emergency Christmas Knitting" finished. So it comes down to this. If make for one, I have to make for all or somebody will get their feelers hurt. Well pooh, my little fingers hurt!

Since all of the hats are easy stockinette, I decided today it was a good time to practice continental knitting. Even though it is awkward for me I think eventually it will make it faster. If I can stick with it.

So far today I have practiced on two hats. Hopefully it will become more natural to me. It has been on my learn-to-do list for many years.

But right now...my left hand aches as much as my right!

I don't know about you guys, but I really like the yarn from Hobby Lobby. Not that I have a huge choice here in the sticks, but Yarn Bee Effortless is so soft and mushy and makes two hats from 1 skein most of time. It as 20% alpaca so it makes it nice and warm.
My girls really enjoy that lemme tell ya, especially as they live in Wisconsin. The other plus is that I know they won't wash them with care so my efforts won't be wasted.

and here is one more.

And every time I think, yay this is the last one...I think of one more boy in the family that needs one.
It always seems to be just one more.


I managed to squeeze in a cheater loaf of bread today too!

And little Brodie did this all day!

happy knitting xo

finally getting my spin on!

but first, lemme take a selfie...

So since moving, things have been, well a bit chaotic scattered.

Here is brief synopsis, Johnny (son) and I moved one and a half houses. He says I have a lot of crap, as did my friend Rick who loaded the truck.  So I drove a 26 foot truck, because apparently I do have a lot of crap, pulled a trailer with Johnny's car behind it (packed to the gills) while he drove my truck (also packed to the gills), from Sarasota, Fl to the Smokies Tn. I was feeling pre-ty BA by the time we got here.

A brief two and half weeks later I drove back to Sarasota, Fl to attend a weekend workshop on photography with Sara Norine, which was soooo worth it! I truly did intend only to stay 4 days (Florida Power and Light needed to do the blah blah blah to the blah blah blah - what-ever) so that was the extra day. Then tragedy struck, I had an accident and was STUCK IN FLORIDA for 10 DAYS!

You don't even want to see this...BAMM!

We just don't look at this side :(

Moving on.
Finally I get home and I have one day to race through the house unpacking (because I really do have a lot of crap and I am a mad woman) make the house look presentable so that we can leave the very next morning at the crack of dawn (earlier even) to go to Chicago for Thanksgiving with my family. Made it! Loads of fun! Glad we did it!

So finally we are now home and pretty much settled, sort of. Enough for me to start to get my spin on.

I took a blue/pink/purpley art batt by Batts in the Belfry fluffed it up -hand picking- with some raw alpaca, and some camel and maybe a little cormo -it was just whatever I could drag out of the space bags in the work shed (hehe I have a work shed ).

And got my spin on!

                           

I also managed to squeeze in a couple of emergency Christmas gift hats this week. And by a couple I really mean four...so far. 

Boys...

skull cap and watch cap

slouch

And girl. Somebody had to put in a special order...

alliecat

Phew... I am making myself tired just reliving all that again. (drivers butt...big time)

I think I have only one more to do. Sarah and Raine have soooo many they just are not getting new ones this year! Saw-ry.

Finally... some small measure of control back in my life.

A long long time ago...

Once upon a time, in a land far away and a very very long time ago, I was a blogger. I crafted, I lived and I blogged.

Then life changed.

I moved to a hotter warmer land, where I was uncomfortable most of the time and not very creative, and frankly not very happy. I tried and tried, but the words just didn't come, so I quit blogging.

Pause break.... ermmm, for several years. In the meantime I met some new friends, one in particular  (Debra) who helped me find my creative place in this hot warm land.  She introduced me to a new group of friends to play with.

and a new fibery addiction!

She also introduced me to this new friend. My Louet S17.

 And this new friend my brandy new Saori sx60h loom. I love them both! And anxiously awaiting my Majacraft Aura (one must need a lot of patience when ordering one) which will hopefully make it's appearance by the end of this year.

I have since moved, again  to go a new land in a higher elevation and cooler temperatures. Yet not theose frozen temps of that land of long ago.

They have seasons here. And some cold days, like today for example, was not a flip flop day.

The words seem to be coming now, and hopefully soon I will have some more words and of my creative endeavors to share with you here. 

Here's a little sneak peak - ;)