Customer Creations

Hi, gang! In the last week, I've been contacted by a couple of customers who were kind enough to send me photos of their creations with my yarn or fiber. So exciting! I love love love seeing what people come up with!

Knitted Baby Jacket by Littlepearl on Etsy.
(So adorable! What a lucky baby!)


Felted Hot Pad by Margaret from Dolores.
She felted this from fiber in the Johnny Jump Up colorway. NIFTY!

Felted Tea Cozy by Margaret from Dolores.

Wow. I think I need to felt a french press cozy.
I'm really loving that floral detail!


Thank you, ladies, for sharing your photos with me!

The New Year, Spinning, and Resolutions.

I keep thinking, oh, hey! I need to blog this, or I need to blog that. Because I said I was going to be a better blogger, and my google analytics are making me feel guilty! But, I'm a big damn liar. It's been two weeks or more since I've last blogged, and so there's that resolution shot to hell! Alas, I am ever-hopeful. I like blogging, I just need to be more consistent. Consistency is not my thing.

This print came from Made By Girl. When I saw it, I had to have it, because it states the truth.

Okay, what else was I going to say?

Dudes, I'm so glad the holidays are over. Really, really. It seems that I dislike them more and more each year, and how Scrooge-y of me, but it's the truth. Christmas is kind of obnoxious. I'd skip it altogether if I didn't have a kid I needed to spoil rotten. (That's the fun part, actually.)

Anyway. I am excited about the new year, since 2009 was actually a great year for me. (!) I am feeling really hopeful and happy and I'm in a really great mental space. Let me tell you what, that's been a long time coming. Seriously. The time frame from about 2006-maybe about a month of 2009 can suck it. I would like to forget most of it. I look back through my journals and wince at all the shit that was going on. Frankly, the only really consistently awesome part of my life was my daughter, who was and continues to be my favorite person ever, ever, ever. Her marvelous take on everything never fails to surprise and delight me.

Anyway, to make a long story short (too late!), the three of us are pretty peachy fucking keen right now. I hope my readers can say the same.

Speaking of resolutions, one of mine was to get my ass in gear and learn to spin on the wheel I bought 2 years ago. I tried it out around the time that I bought it, and I could NOT get the hang of it. No comprendo. So, instead, I focused my energies on knitting, especially sock knitting, and that eventually led to dyeing, which led to my starting a business based on my love for fiber arts and color.

This summer, at one of the fiber fests I attended, a friend of mine showed me her technique on the drop spindle and it was like everything clicked for me and from then on, I was drop spindling like a mofo. I took one everywhere, and eventually I became really good at it. I have dozens of hanks of drop spindled yarn. LOTS. I love it. I always will love the zen-ness of the drop spindle, and enjoy the feel of the fiber slipping through my fingers and be amazed at the very simple process by which wool becomes yarn. It's awesome. But now I think I'm ready to master spinning at the wheel, and I felt confident yesterday, when I drug the wheel out of storage, that I would have an easier time spinning than I did the first time I attempted it two years ago.

I was right. All of that drop spindling experience really paid off for me. The process of drafting and letting the spin travel up the fiber was easily apparent to me, and I was spinning tickety boo.

All that yarn spun up in about a minute and a half. It's ridiculous how fast you can go. I'm still getting the hang of things and I need to find the proper chair/height from which to spin, but dayum! So cool! So easy! I think things just went *click* again.

You just can't beat the portability of the spindle. I don't see myself giving up spinning this way. It's so old school and people just love to watch you do it. Instant ice breaker! It's like a gateway drug to the fiber arts. You can hook them young and old. Last week, I made two new converts to the Fiber Madness. Last summer, I taught a little boy to spin at a fiber festival because he was so completely taken by it. He was all, omg, I need to do this now, right now! It was awesome.

Alrighty then. Blog updated. Go, me! Right now, I need to get ready for Stitchers for Pitchers, which is a knitting group that meets monthly in Durango at one of the brew pubs (woot!). Tonight, we're hanging out at Ska Brewing, and there's going to be a benefit for Tony Miely, who lost his hand in an accident a few months ago. Maybe I'll see some of you there!

The last of the Farmer's Market bounty until next year.

The Ignacio Farmer's Market was quite the success, especially for its first year. It was such a great addition to our community. Tay and I are talking about growing a market garden for next year in order to be able to participate in it.

Hand spun yarn drying indoors.

I have been one obsessive drop-spindling mofo lately. I have so much hand spun right now, which completely rocks. I love to knit and spin year-round, but when the weather cools down it becomes something of a seasonal imperative to start churning out hats and mittens and scarves. Warm socks. Blankets. The list goes on. (Also, Anne, if you're reading this, I have your mitts 90% done. I just need to finish the thumbs.)

Ice ring around the sprinkler. We've been trying to give everything one last good soak before we run out of irrigation.

I love this time of year. The feel of autumn is just so peaceful. The quality of the sunlight is just a little more golden, which seems to bathe even ordinary days in a kind of nostalgic glow. It's hoodie weather, which works for me, since they're my favorite item of clothing next to a comfortable bra. You can stash your phone, keys, and a drop spindle in that front pocket if you don't mind looking a bit bloated.

There's the smell of woodsmoke in the air, which I love. I haven't lit a fire yet, because our house stays pretty warm and I'm holding out for that morning when I just can't stand the cold, which will have to be pretty extreme. I'd like to hold out until November, but we'll see. I'm really used to being cold. We froze our asses off last year in that glorified tent of a trailer and our firewood supply ran out, so we spent a lot of time huddled over space heaters. I woke up one morning and found that my water bottle had fallen to the floor and frozen solid. Taylor and I spent a lot of time at coffee houses, with their seductive combination of central heat and wifi. Now that we've moved home, we have central heat, wifi, and two wood stoves. It's kind of like heaven only with out the clouds and harps and such.

Toothpaste For Dinner Comic

www.toothpastefordinner.com

Coffee of Doom

Coffee.  Sweet, life-giving coffee.  I needed it nownownownow, so I put ice in it.  Naturally, since we are those kind of people, it's a skull ice cube.  Fitting, I think.

I have several projects on the needles, and I'm feeling fairly meh about at least half of them.  I can't help but wonder about my lack of commitment to the yarny goodness.  Is it because I'm a weener or is it because I have trouble committing to anything?  Possibly both.  Anyway, I might feel better if I rip out the Noro scarf I have going.  I'm even contemplating ripping out a sock (!!!) because the yarn is so, so cute and it's some I dyed myself, and it looks like it should be made into something adorable for a baby.  

I have a huge lace scarf going, and at this point it has become a matter of endurance to knit it.  I think I'm going to have to commit myself to completing one pattern repeat a day, every day, in order to finish it.  It will be beautiful, but I'm over it.  

So, here's the game plan for today:  rip out Noro scarf, rip out sock, rewind yarn, do one repeat of endless *&%$@ lace pattern, make dinner, do essential tasks,  take Nyquil*, go back to bed.

*I'm getting sick.  Glands are swolen, throat is icky.  My answer to getting sick is taking vitamin C and going back to bed for 12 hours or so.  (Hello, Nyquil!)  You would not believe how well this works.  I seldomly get past the oh, I'm starting to feel ooky stage.

No Fingers For You!

Fingerless gloves in Noro Big Kureyon.  So much fun to knit, and so easy, too.  I modified a pattern for mittens that I had used before, (see a couple of posts down) and that was that. Simple.  I had so much fun making these, that I made another pair yesterday.  Behold:

More mitts!  These babies are thick and comfy and perfect for bedtime reading in my arctic bedroom.  (No joke, I can see my breath in there at night.)  These are made from Lion Brand Landscapes Yarn, #273 Spring Desert.  I think my sister bought me this yarn, so that makes it some of the first yarn ever in my stash.  I just needed to wait for the right project to come along.

Coraline

Go here:  view the trailer via youtube.

Seriously, ya'll.  If you're a fan of Neil Gaiman or Tim Burton, or anything resembling a dark fairy tale, watch the movie.  Don't walk. RUN.  Run to the theater and ignore your piss-poor 401K, and indulge in the nonsensical.  Is that a word?  I dunno.  If you need a break from reality, go to the movies.  That's what I do.

Also, if you're a knitter, knit some Coraline gloves.  Pattern here.

C'est les shit.   Or, in other words, VERY COOL.  

So, it's Valentine's Day...again.

And we're ignoring it.  Again.  

My husband and I loathe this particular holiday.  The only good thing about V.D. (heh)  is that tomorrow, if we were so inclined, we could run to the Big Box Store and purchase flowers and candy for half price.  No guilt, no foul.

Caveat:  For the non-sentimental Deadwood fans:  Deadwood Valentines, NSFW

We did pass a lovely afternoon hanging out in our favorite coffee shop, Durango Joe's.  I started a fingerless mitt in Big Noro Kureyon there.  I'm adapting it from the mitten pattern in Teach Yourself Visually Knitting.  

Love those Noro colorways.  

What I did last week

I managed to get 415 yards on approx. 4 oz of handpainted roving from here.

Mittens from my own thick/thin handspun.  Extremely warm and lots of fun to knit.

Earflap hat, made from Noro Yoroi.  I don't know the colorway, because I lost the label.  It doesn't matter anyway, because they don' t make Yoroi anymore.  I love this hat!  Super warm and the ear flaps are different colors, which I totally dig.  I modified the pattern from the Kitty Hat in Stitch N Bitch.  Easy peasy and a very quick knit.

Doods...I need a camera that isn't 5 years old.  I dream of digital SLRs.