Something new (ish)

My spinning is all self taught largely using a combination of You Tube and just doing whatever works. Every so often I might try something slightly new or different or think about getting creative but most all of the time I go back to my standard short draw worsted spinning. Hey if it ain't broke....right?

But recently I decided to be daring and try something different and try my hand at spinning woolen.

In my stash I found a bag of fiber from Zeke the alpaca that had been washed (although while spinning I was getting dirt/dust so it wasn't washed that well I guess) and looked even to have the locks flicked open. I used my old beat up purchased on ebay hand carders to work the fiber into rollags. And then I spun it up.

Random interesting observation: The rollags, logically but still amusingly, take up so much more volume than the raw or the spun fiber. In this picture the pile of fiber on the top left represents about half of the total the rollags on the carders is a quarter and on the bobbin is a quarter.

Spinning woolen/from the rollag was rather different, but enjoyable. It always fascinates me to see just how the fiber really does stick to itself and enable me to pull out foot long strands without breaking the yarn. As I was trying to do this however I did find myself often lacking in consistency. I'm not sure if this is because it is a new technique and I'm not yet skilled enough with it or if its the nature of the long draw back or whatever exactly my hands where doing.

Once spun up the singles did indeed seem to be rather fuzzier although not so much fluffier. Although its worth noting that my regularly spun worsted alpaca yarn also often seems rather fuzzy. While plying the single definately struck me as been more fluffy. It was exciting.

And I was in a bit of a rush so I've not compared it side by side to anything yet but I'd say the final skein now washed and dried does indeed appear to be different than my normal. I'll definitely need to try this again.

Dream Big

Of the things I care about in life fashion/style is pretty far down on the list. My strategy is mostly just to not look too horrible ever. And unless somewhat necessary comfort tends to trump all. However I've been starting to call my jeans and old sweatshirt strategy into question as Bran is stepping up his game and making me look comparatively like quite the slob.

Now I don't want to do anything too crazy and I am still cheap so there's no way I'll be spending much $$ to improve my casual wardrobe. So the logical thing to do I decided was to make myself some comfy sweaters.

Thanks to the magic of Ravelry I fond two super awesome patterns:

Ease by Alicia Plummer

Sweatshirt Sweater by Purl Soho

This sweater used to have 2 arms.

Next up was the yarn. Owing to the aforementioned fact that I am cheap I didn't want to buy yarn for this project. When one is talking sweater quantities and especially if you want good yarn it ain't cheap. So it was off to check the thrift stores for sweaters that I could unravel. Trying to do this in the spring when things are finally starting to warm up and sweaters are not so popular was likely a poor decision. But I did find one sweater deemed appropriate.

Now I was doing all of this shopping just before the next round of Nerd Wars was about to start. Now I am getting to be a rather productive crafter (largely thanks to NW) but a sweater in a month is still pretty crazy. Especially when you consider that this round/month I was already planning to finish another lace weight sweater that has been on the needles plus do a bunch of spinning from raw fiber and at least one other NW project. Oh and finish making a whole blanket for my NW Dissertation.

But I decided to be crazy and go for it anyways (I opted for the Purl Soho pattern, it was free and requires less yarn):

A perfect moment.

Every so often there are moments when it seems the planets have aligned such that everything just feels wonderful and I am content with my place on this earth. It doesn’t happen all that often but always seems magical when it does.

I had one of those moments a few weeks ago back in February...

It was fairly late at night and I was watching a documentary from netflix about Bella Fleck. Fleck is probably the worlds foremost living Banjo player. I first experienced his brand of awesomeness when a DVD of a Bella Fleck and the Flecktones concert was one of my HS band teacher's go to time fillers. His music is incredibly virtuosic entirely eclectic and very weird, I also refer to it as being awesome. The documentary is about a trip he took to Africa to record music with traditional folk musicians. I also happen to love folk music (its actually a bit difficult to find music I don't like). If you have a netflix subscription and don't mind thinking outside of the musical box I would highly recommend it (linkage).

While watching I was doing some spinning. The fiber I was working with had been carefully prepared by myself over the few weeks prior. It was from the batch of alpaca I received a few years ago from a friend who has pet alpacas. She gave me five bags full and have been slowly working through it all since. The alpaca whose fiber I was working with that day is Lance. His fleece is a beautiful and varied fawn color made extra special since Lance has since passed away. I had lined up and washed the batch of locks, then flicked each of them open and hackled them into a wonderful ball of fluffy soft roving. It practically spun itself down into a single small enough to become a 2-ply fingering weight yarn.

Being February it was quite cold but I had the awesome space heater that Bran got me and a blanket. And the cherry on top is my crazy cat who takes no mind to my peddling and is perfectly happy to sleep draped across my legs.

Animals for your head

It all started when I was thinking about things that I could make to sell, give as gifts, and/or donate. I wanted fun and cute and good looking without being too time intensive.

Meeting all of these criteria I found anthropomorphic crochet hats with ear flaps. I'm kinda loving them right now. I've been working almost but not really off of patterns as I take the inspiration but then just crochet away (this is the awesome part of crochet, for some reason I'm not comfortable doing this with knitting).

It all started with this Birdy hat that was donated and destined to be for a kid with cancer:

Naturally it only seemed appropriate to move on to a Penguinal hat:

Emboldened by my success I upped the anti with the more involved Sock Monkey Hat. The project was completely addicting and largely completed in one day:

The next weekend I churned out another hat, this time a puppy in just 2 days. Although the speed on that occasion was more because I was with Bran and he mocks the fact that I never seem to complete anything as I am constantly switching between projects (truth, but also largely because I tend to only work on simpler things when I'm with him so more juggling and less FO [finished object(s)] makes sense):

Up next I am totally making an Owl hat, which is actually the idea/pattern that started it all before I wandered off in my own directions. I am rather lacking the the crafting time/focus lately however so progress is slow (and sad). The new goal is to knock it out this weekend.

Also coming soon....an Etsy shop! I decided to branch out this year and along with having stuff at the gift shop have an actual shop online. The challenge is going to be what/how much to keep to ship if needed and what should stay with me to ship if needed.

Nerd Wars Tournament 5

What have I been up to? Well, lots of things. One of those rather time consuming and just as awesome things is Nerd Wars.

The basic premise of Nerd Wars is that you are on a team that centers around some kind of specific Nerdy-subject (sci-fi, science, books, all kinds of things). And over a period of 3 months you craft things to meet challenges which earn your team points.

I joined up with Club 33 which is the Disney team because Disney is awesome, it worked perfectly to build excitement for my trip, and it has so many great ways to connect projects back to the team (bonus points).

Here's what I made:

And one scarf particularly awesome lace scarf that I can't show here because its a gift for someone who may read this.

Today the next tournament started!

Shawl x3

I've been on a bit of a random Shawl kick lately.

I cast on my first ever Shawl on June 20 2011(thank you Ravelry project page). I liked the project but I am far from a monogamous crafter so the Shawl was lost in the bustle of many other projects. It probably didn't help that I was using basically the thinnest yarn ever. By the end each row was incredibly long. However I decided to bring it to the fore and finish the sucker sometime in February or March.

It may be the magic of blocking lace that makes me fall in love with it every time. Overnight my project went from this:

To this:

After a bit of concern about looking too matronly wearing it I've gotten over that as well and have quite enjoyed it on some of these cool spring days.

So fueled by that success I couldn't help but jump on the bandwagon for the Reddit Knit-Along of the Age of Brass and Steele. The pattern was super simple but delightful so I knew it should be a fast project. I found yarn that I was quite happy with at Michaels. It's a cashmere blend so super soft, but from Michaels so still affordable (particularly because I always use at least a 40% off coupon and have gift certificates). The color was was crocuses so I figured that was perfect as well and called the project April Showers.

Unfortunately it came out very much more stripey that I was hoping for which was disappointing. But lo and behold when I wear it everything blends together and gives me the look I was hoping for. Yay.

Now before starting the KAL I was unsure of what yarn to use and considered spinning up Kiwi's fleece as I thought it would be perfect for the pattern. However common sense prevailed when I figured given the month timeline maybe starting from raw wool was not the smartest.

But when I found that it was only a week into April and I had finished half of the knitting already. Plus it was a long Easter weekend made awesome by the fact that I opted not to drive home to my parents but instead enjoy some free time in my own home. So I figured I'd give the spinning a try.

After prepping it into roving on my hackle Kiwi's fleece spun so easily and perfectly into a wonderful DKish single it felt nearly like a miracle. Being a single it was of course twisty but I washed it "thwacked it" as I'd seen suggested. And hung it to dry under the tension of a spray bottle. The resulting yarn did have a bit of twist to it but for the most part seemed to be pretty stable.

So I quickly knit up a little sample and lo and behold there were some places where I could see the stitches starting to lean but for the most part it was smooth sailing. And the color and texture were just wonderful.

I proceed with much sorting, washing, flicking, hackling, spinning, winding, washing, drying, winding, and knitting. And in the end had this wonderful shawl.

Its impossible to really capture the colors of it as they seem to change even every time I look at it. But I'd say they speak mostly as gray to me with hints of brown at times. The single adds so much character to the knitting that I am now certain I'll be doing a good bit more of this type of spinning.

Hooray for new things!

I think I have too many things to do.

As is too often the case I have one again neglected to post anything here for quite some time. Fail. The past few months have felt just insanely busy. Tis the season!

First and foremost work really really gets in the way of all of the things I really want to do. And to make matters worse my work doesn't stop at 40 hours a week. Every time we have a concert or special event there goes any "free time". The spring is definitely the worst. And just looking at the calendar May is the most ridiculous month. Between April 30 and May 25 the only non-work day is the 12th. Ouch. Although I do plan on taking a few other days off. Now if I could just get someone to do my job when I'm not in the office things would be rather more dandy.

So it whatever time is left to me I have all of the following things to do:

• House work: The cat is not pulling his weight around the house and I have to do it all. The little jerk.
• Yard work:  I think I had to start mowing a full month earlier with the weather so warm. And I've expanded my veggie garden. Here's hoping I keep more than just cucumbers alive this time.
• Friends: After years of being largely, but not entirely, anti-social it seems that I've recently managed to re-connect much more with some old friends. And I've even found new ones - whoa.
• Band: The music is kinda bad all too often, but I could never give up playing so i'm glad for the outlet.
• Video games: Bran got me hooked on World of Warcraft and now he's dragging me into Diablo as well. I try not to admit it but they can be fun. I just wish they took less time and or I could knit and play!
• Biking: Exercise is healthy and can even be fun, I should do more of it.
• Photography: My photos really are getting better I think. But as with all learning/improvement more time is always a sure way to better results.
• Reading: I really don't know how I did it but as a youth I would fly through books sometimes to the tune of multiple books in a week. I've been doing a bit more lately but sometimes it feels like I'm just slogging through them. And the library deadlines come up so quickly!
• Knitting/Crochet: Aside from the perpetual desire to be working on dozens of projects of my own I even have the opportunity right now to work on growing a bit of my own crafty business. Maybe I should learn lever knitting or whatever the supposed current fastest knitting method may be.
• Spinning: I am totally getting better at spinning. Latest discover is an awesome DKish single. Knit up so wonderfully.
• Other Crafts: My awesome sewing machine is practically begging me to use it more often. And wouldn't it be wonderful to work at sketching/doodling/zentangling. Oh and what about the sweatshirt that I've wanted to paint for myself for over a year.
• Relax: Eh, overrated!