More navelgazing

The other day, while getting dressed for work - dress shirt, dress pants, tie, etc, Keith mentioned that he wished his uniform was a pair of shorts, polo shirt and tennis shoes. Who wouldn't wish for that with the high heat and humidity we've been having?

I laughed and said I got to wear my pajamas all day to work.

He said that some people had pride in their appearance.

Touche.

Of course, it doesn't really apply here, does it? I dye yarn and fiber in my kitchen. Why in the world would I get dressed, even in blue jeans, to do that? It's hot and messy, and my ancient, threadbare flannel pajama bottoms and a tank top work just fine.

But his joke got me to thinking. There are more mornings than I care to think about when I do roll out of bed, slap on a pair of jeans, and head out. Do I need to really worry about my appearance if I'm going to Wal-Mart at 8 am to buy more birdseed? The grocery store or post office? Maybe it does.

I do have my excuses. It's been so hot and humid that makeup will slide right off my face. The interior of the car when parked in a lot reaches temperatures that would melt a T-1000 Terminator into a puddle from which it couldn't regenerate, and what will that do to my mascara?

Ok, so I don't want to wear makeup during July in the Deep South. Am I that confident in my own appearance, or am I just lazy?

Lazy. For one thing, a whole face takes some time to apply, and when you're trying to beat the heat, each minute counts.

But what about at other times? Times when I can't beat the heat because it's later in the day?

I think what has happened is that working alone in my dye lair has changed my perspective. When I used to have a "real" job, working outside the home and seeing clients all day long, I did have to put forward a neat appearance, which included makeup.

Now I may go days without seeing anyone other than Keith in real life, and the pets don't mind my old flannel pjs. Why should they? I can stop working for a minute if someone needs laptime, and I don't have to worry about cat or dog hairs all over my legs.

What it has made me realize is that I do need to be more mindful when I'm going out to meet friends. Is my outfit adding unneeded pounds to my butt? A little concealer wouldn't hurt as between the constant lack of sleep and probable allergies I have permanent dark circles. (Actually, they eased up while I was out of town. I'm starting to realize the bad air in Atlanta affects me more that I ever thought.)

And most importantly:

I'll have to start looking into mirrors again. :)

Navelgazing about aging

I recently had a birthday, which I may have mentioned before now, and while it didn't end in a 5 or 0, it's getting awfully close to one of those milestone zeroes. While it's just a number, and it's better than the alternative and whole bunch of other platitudes, it's getting awfully close to one of those big ones that ends with a zero. I'd be lying if I said I'd not been thinking about it and some of the implications.

With that as backstory, we were visiting with a friend, and Keith took lots and lots of pictures, as this friend has beehives, and I've loved bees since I was young. Having my own beehives is one of those fantasies I have, along with the organic farm where everything is perfect and I don't have to ever sweat.

I loaded the pictures onto the computer and found I couldn't look at them. It wasn't me in those pictures! It was my mother!

I've avoided cameras for much of my life. When I was young and thin, I tended to look goofy and gawky. There was a while in college and my young adult life when it seemed I took decent pictures and actually looked good in them, but in my 30's my weight started creeping up, peaking at another number I'd rather never mention, and I started some major camera avoidance. Yes, I later learned some of the weight was due to the hypothyroidism, but knowing that doesn't make me look any better.


Thus, I avoid cameras much as one would avoid the plague. I submitted, most unwillingly, to family photos when there was no way I could possibly escape them. Other than that, few pictures of me exist at this age.

Until now. There they were, a whole helluva lot of them, of me looking at bees. Well, it was supposed to be me, and it sort of looked like me, but the woman really looked like my mom! It was unsettling, to say the least. That's not the worst of it. Keith took so many of them with my back to the camera, which would be unflattering even to Kim Kardashian. Trust me on this.

This is a vanity that I'm pretty sure many other women have faced. We've all heard that saying about telling young men to check out how their future mother in law looks as that's how their wife will look one day. When we're young, we don't think that will ever happen. We know everything we'll ever need to know when we're young, and we know for sure that we'll never look like that. Middle aged and a little too well padded.


I'll never look like my 25 year old self again. I know that. That doesn't stop me from fooling myself by avoiding mirrors that I look younger than I am or wondering about plastic surgery in Brazil. I'd probably even bare my neck to a vampire if a bite could stop aging. (Yeah, there is that whole drinking human blood to survive, but I'll worry about that if I get bitten.)


What can I do about it? I can keep avoiding having my picture taken. That's an easy form of self delusion, and I've got some experience. I can get back to the gym, lifting weights, doing cardio and going to yoga. Exercise is a sort of fountain of youth. Not a very fun or easy one, but it does work.

And those pictures of my ass? One of them is going on the fridge so I have to look at it every time I reach in there at mealtime or for a snack.

Moonbeams!

Towards the end of 2009 I received word that I would be the recipient of a prize of 1 round of Moonbeams, a wonderful fiber club from Moonwood Farm.

Moonbeams are amazingly beautiful. They are batts made from alpacas raised in Alabama and other fibers that usually include silk, Angelina, Firestar, rayon of bamboo and milk protein fiber.

They are labor intensive gems for the dyer, but delightful for spinners.

I oohed and ahhed over them every month, but didn't spin them because I just figured I'd really mess them up. After all, I'm a sporadic spinner.

As I've decided to spin along with all the Tour de Fleece spinning without officially taking part of any of the groups on Ravelry, I decided to start spinning my Moonbeams.



This gorgeous purple fiber is the Dark Crystal Moonbeams from August 2010. Each package of Moonbeams comes as 6 mini batts, so I spun 3 on one bobbin and 3 on another so that I could easily ply them together. What you see in these pictures is my two ply yarn that I plied together last night.

I'm afraid my photos don't really do justice to the Mermaid Moonbeams from April 2010.

They look a little grey in the photos, but they have brown, turquoise, blue, and pink in them.

Once again I spun them so that I could make a 2 ply yarn with them. I confess that I spun the second bobbin much too late in the evening last night (spinning it between 9:30 and 11:15, taking a break for a very late dinner about 10), and I discovered that I was alarmingly overtwisting the single. I ended up with some tight little coils in the yarn.
Plying the two together today helped some, but not enough. The yarn itself is overtwisted, but as I keep telling Keith over and over, it's all about practice. I need to keep spinning, and I'll keep improving.

Sure, my Mermaid yarn isn't as nice as the Dark Crystal, but I also understand why it isn't and what I'll need to do next time.

After all, mistakes are an opportunity to learn.

Have a great Sunday (or try to). Here we have 90%+ humidity with temperatures that will be above 90F. I expect some rain this afternoon. Going outside is like stepping into a steambath.

Is it too early to start counting down the days until September 1? I realize that the days will still be hot then, but at least the nights will start to cool down a little. I don't 75F is much of a low, but it makes a great high temperature!

These are the unspun Mermaid batts. Aren't they gorgeous?

More pictures about pooled knitting

I'm thinking that pooled knitting is a lot like turning the heels on socks. You look at the directions and think WTF? However, when you get started they start to make sense.

Of course, that may only be me, but I don't think so.

Anyway, for those of you who need another illustration of this, I started another one as an example to take the guild last night, and I took lots of pictures this time.

The very first picture shows the yarn stretched out and making sure that it will pool the way I need it to.

The second picture shows that after I wound it into a ball, I pulled out several paint repeats and put knitter's safety pins where the rows end/start. You may ask, how did you make them stay? Easy, I put them through the plies of the yarn.

Gladys, who inspired all this, uses a backwards e-loop cast on to get started. I rarely use this cast on, but I did for my samples. I discovered something very interesting when I started swatching, but I didn't take pictures of it at the time.

What I will do is do another cast on and show you my discovery. It's so simple you'll smack yourself on the forehead and say, "Why didn't I think of that?"

In all honesty, I'm sure I'm not the first knitter to notice it either, I just haven't searched around to see where else it might be on the interwebs.

Picture number 4, the blurry one, shows my first attempt at matching up colors and getting gauge. As you can very easily see, gauge was off that time.

I tinked that first row and reknit it, using my cunning discovery, and as you can see in the final picture, I got it right that time.

Full disclosure time. I got it right in two tries on this one because the first one was so (and still is) very fiddly. I think this one will work without needing two different sized needles for gauge.

For the record, this colorway is one I dyed, but this was a test or seconds skein. As you can see in the first picture, the yarn didn't dye very evenly with those dye concentrations. I put it aside, thinking I'd probably overdye it at some point. However, with the vivid colors, I thought it'd make a great, easy to see, example of pooled knitting. I'm pretty sure I'm just going to knit it up to have as a show sample for when someone asks what does "pooling" on the label mean?

It's Friday! Have a great weekend! I'll be back with spinning pictures.

On Klingons and spinning

Yes, reading that you would think I've been drinking or have totally lost my mind.

What actually occurred is we went to dinner with a neighbor, and somehow the conversation veered into religion. Our neighbor said their congregation invited other faiths to come in and talk about their beliefs.

I think that sort of thing is wonderful, because communication is key in any good relationship, and that includes groups as well as individuals.

Yes, I'm getting to it. He mentioned that jihad as we see it in the news isn't really what jihad is. Me, and I'll admit to knowing very little about Islam, said, "That reminds me of a Klingon saying. The greatest battle is the battle within."

Our neighbor said yes, and Keith rolled his eyes because his wife is linking things to Star Trek again.

Anyway, it's the whole battle within that leads to spinning.

I don't spin nearly enough to be really good at it. I'm a sporadic spinner at best as it interferes with knitting time.

However, I've signed up for some spinning classes in August, and I need to improve my skills before I take them. I also need to be able to spend long hours in front of the wheel without my legs falling off.

Thus, I decided to unofficially join Tour de Fleece.

While I don't have mountains of fibers, what I have is more than molehills. I joined a fiber club awhile back, and anytime I've spent some time spinning, I inevitably buy more fiber. It doesn't help that I've got friends who dye incredible stuff.

I kicked off TDF with that black yarn you see with the red, grey, yellow and green flecks. It's name - Resistance Is Futile. Nothing like a Borg inspired yarn for a Star Trek KAL to kick things off!

They were spun and Navajo plied for a self striping yarn.

The two pastel bobbins were actually some fiber I purchased from Three Rivers Farm at the last SAFF. It's a blend of 75% BFL and 25% silk. I'd spun 3 of the 4 ounces, so I spun the last ounce and Navajo plied them to keep the colors separated.

Last night I started on some Moonbeams from Moonwood Farm. Moonbeams are batts from her own alpacas mixed with other fibers such as bamboo, milk protein and the sparkly stuff.

The colorway is Dark Crystal, and as you can see it's an amazing deep purple. (Did the opening for Smoke on the Water pop into your head? I can never say the words "Deep Purple" without hearing that riff playing.)

I'm still spinning too fast and overtwisting my yarn, but even if I only do a little each day, I'll improve.

The best part is it takes less brainpower than knitting does, and after I've been on my feel all day dyeing yarn, I find that I can spin. I can't always knit, but spinning is very meditative.

Pooling knits

Last summer, one of the members of the Atlanta Knitting Guild brought in a scarf she had knitted in which the colors pooled into vertical columns. Can I say amazing and beautiful?

She had read about pooled knitting on Ravelry and found Gladys We, one of the yarn floozies. Gladys has explored using handpainted yarns to their full pooling potential and sharing that knowledge with masochistic knitters everywhere.

Masochistic, you ask? Yes.

I've been working with one of the skeins I dyed. I love the colorway, Mood Ring. I had dyed a skein of Knit Picks Bare, the silk and merino blend, which I had purchased before I had started Fiber Charmer and could get yarn from wholesalers. Besides, I figured I'd keep this for myself as I didn't think that Knit Picks would really be a good source for undyed fiber.

So, some of the knitty gritty about why I think this is good for masochists.

1. There's swatching. Lots and lots of swatching. When I'm working at the LYS, I advise people to swatch. You can learn a lot from swatching. That said, I rarely swatch. I knit a lot of toe up, plain stockinette socks, and I never swatch for those. I know there are times when I should swatch, and I have done it, but I've also discovered, as Yarn Harlot herself has mentioned, that swatches lie.

With pooled knitting, you have to swatch. There is no way around it. Swatch and rip, swatch and rip, swatch and rip, eye the bourbon and switch to spinning.

Actually, that's the only reason I think it's good for masochists. Once you get past that, get your gauge and your needles, it's smooth sailing.

Well, I assume it is once you get all that. What I've discovered is that this skein, wound by Knit Picks mill, is shorter than the skeins I wind. I'm talking about a smaller circumference and not the yardage of the skein. I've been getting 37 -38 stitches as my magic number, but when I start knitting, my colors travel. I can correct that by examining every single row and then determining if I need to switch needle sizes yet again.

Honestly, that's way too much work for me. This one is getting frogged, and this yarn that I bought and dyed for myself is going back into the bin. I'll see what I've got in inventory and start again.

I hope that you have a happy 4th! I won't be working on pooled knits today, so I plan to enjoy mine!

Hah! You've heard this before

But I'm really going to make an effort to blog regularly again. I used to blog at least every Sunday morning. Remember those days?

Now I've been using Sunday mornings to update Fiber Charmer's etsy shop. I don't always succeed, as I think I updated sometime Sunday afternoon.

While I know running your own business takes a lot of time, I didn't realize just how much time it does consume. Add to that a kitty with idiopathic cystitis and multiple trips to the vet, and the time zips by before you know it.

I think earlier this year I mentioned my going gluten-free because gluten aggravates Hashimoto's. All went pretty well until Maryland Sheep and Wool. I started eating bread again. Yummy, delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I'm not being facetious. Try giving them up and see just how wonderful they taste when you start eating them again. A few weeks later, I was at the Carolina Fiber Fest, eating sandwiches again. I was thinking, hmm, I don't feel any different.

It was too early. I've been feeling so tired all the time, and I know it's the gluten. I've got to start all over again to clear it all out of my system. That sucks, because I feel tired all the time now. However, I also know that I can do it (again), and that I'll feel energetic, like a "normal" person.

Anyway, I'll end here. I might get too whiny, and really, who wants to read that? Look for me next Sunday, if not before, and I'll get back on track with Sunday pictures again.

Wow, time goes by so quickly!

I'm sorry for the lack of blogging. I knew it had been awhile, but I didn't realize it had been so long.

I've been busy, and I foresee getting busier in the near future.

I'm on the board of the Atlanta Knitting Guild, and I didn't realize just how much work there is in volunteering. I said that to Keith, and he said that's why it's called volunteer work, not volunteer fun.

Hmm.

One of the things that has bothered me most about being an adult is why do work and fun seem to be so mutually exclusive? Isn't there a way to meld them together?

And despite the work, I've actually been enjoying what I've been doing for the AKG. In fact, this upcoming Friday night, there will be a Stitch and Bitch at the American Craft Council show, and I've put in a fair amount of work with the local stores to get sponsors for it. We'll be teaching brand spanking new knitters some of the basics. It's from 5-8, March 11. Admission to the show is only $5 after 5. If you bring your knitting, you can get in for free.

Yvonne Monet of Dave-FM will be joining us too. I think that it's going to be a lot of fun.

I've also been working on Fiber Charmer. Just a day or two ago I realized just how little time I have before Stitches South. I think I'm about to panic! I've got so much yarn to skein and dye, and so little time! I foresee not doing much of anything that isn't fiber related for the next little bit. First Stitches, then Maryland Sheep and Wool where I'm working for Gale, then Carolina Fiber Fest. I need to turn into a dyeing machine and get some more product stockpiled. I had considered being lazy today, but I see that's not possible.

In other parts of my life, I've been thinking that I/we need to grow more of our own food. Gas prices are only going to make grocery shopping even more painful, so I thought about what do we really eat. Yes, last year's cucumber canning experiment led to way too many cucumbers going into the compost pile. I sat down with some seed catalogs and spent some time mentally reviewing what I buy week after week. This year lettuce is on the top of the list. Tomatoes, carrots, celery, these are veggies we eat all the time.

I just had Arborguard come out and trim an oak tree that was shading about the only part of the yard that's suitable for gardening. Limbs were also growing onto our power lines, so now the lights won't flicker when it's windy. I've got to figure out when I can schedule double digging new garden beds into all the dye time I need to do in the next few weeks. I don't want to wait too late to get the garden going. Gas prices here are anywhere from $3.32 - $3.69 for regular! $5 for a head of California grown organic lettuce can't be too far behind. It's a much better plan to grow my own lettuce, right?

I think I've hit the highlights. If you're a knitter who is reading this, think about joining the Atlanta Knitting Guild. When I originally joined the guild, I did so in order to increase my knowledge of knitting. Now that I'm in charge of the programs, I certainly see the challenge of booking interesting people, but I also see an opportunity to bring my desire for more knitting knowledge into a reality. I think the past couple of years have had more of the programming that I enjoy, and I'm hoping that I can continue to keep the programs entertaining as well as educational. Anyway, what I wanted to say is that while the Internet and YouTube can provide all sorts of supplementary knitting help, there is nothing like taking a class in real life. The little tidbits of information that you pick up from the accumulated knowledge of the teacher and the other students will give you aha moments that you can't get from watch videos. I'm excited about some of the program ideas that have come my way, as well as some great workshop suggestions too.

We'll have Karin Skacel joining us in June, and we've got an exciting teacher planned for this fall. (No spoilers, but I will mention that she has a pattern in the winter issue of Knitters Magazine, which unfortunately is not on their website yet.)

Hopefully I'll be able to update again soon!

Shopping for a cause

A new thrift store has opened in Avondale Estates! If you're local, and you've been to Avondale Estates, you know it has several thrift and consignment stores already. As I love shopping at thrift stores, I was quite happy to have a new one open there, especially since it has a totally awesome goal.

Second Life benefits animals shelters. Local animal shelters, including my absolute favorite, Lifeline Animal Project. I've sung the praises of Lifeline more than one time here on my blog, so I won't bore you with that again. What I will say is that if you need some gently worn brand name clothing, you may want to check out Second Life. If you have some items to donate, they are a not-for-profit, so you can get a receipt for tax deductions.

Stepping off soapbox now.

Yesterday was the first day I'd left the house since last Sunday. I'm not sure, only because who really pays attention, but I may not have left the house since the Friday before that Sunday. I got prepared for being snowed in, truly thinking that we'd be able to get out sometime on Wednesday. Ha! I was very foolish. The snow persisted as did the cold temperatures, and while the DOT cleared the highways (finally), many of the surface streets in our area got some sanding or nothing at all. The major one got sanded (some), while those on residential streets that lead nowhere were SOL.

It really got me to thinking about how dependent on government people are to take care of them. I got outside and cleared the road in front of my house. One of my neighbors came outside and helped. Honestly, I didn't want people sliding in the ice and into our mailbox or cars. I even cleared out part of an area for a neighbor to park. It wasn't that heinous a job, and I got to thinking that if everyone went outside and did a little bit how quickly things could have returned to normal. Apparently, with the exception of the one neighbor, I'm the only one who thinks like that.

Anyway, I got out and ran a couple of errands yesterday. None of them involved going to a grocery store until last night's beer run, but I did drive by a few. Earlier in the day you couldn't pay me enough to join in that madness! The Farmer's Market had a line of cars waiting to get into the parking lot. I think I can wait another day or two to restock!

The one thing I can't wait to get is a new dryer. Ours died several weeks ago, and last Sunday I spent some quality time sitting at a laundromat drying wet clothes. Tomorrow we'll go buy one, and then I'll spend way too much time getting the laundry caught back up. Something about saying all that makes me feel like a 1950's housewife! Heck, it's been way too cold to even think about a clothesline! The clothes would freeze out there.

Snowpocalypse 2011

Yes, that's what our clever newspeople have dubbed this snow and ice event. (Too bad sarcasm doesn't translate well to the written word.)

So, for your amusement at our discomfort, here are some pictures.

The street is on the morning of Day 4 of being iced in.








A close-up of the ice on my butterfly bush.


















The doghouses showing how deep the snow is. Sassy was and has been inside the house with us the whole time. The snow and ice has freaked her out. I had to shovel a path to a mulched area so she could do her business.







The ruler shows the snow depth to be almost 5".












This is a picture from Sunday night when it all started.



We haven't had mail delivery or trash pick up all week. I hear the grocery stores are running low on supplies. This has been a good trial run in preparing for the Zombie Apocalypse!

eta: I keep editting this dang post, and blogger keeps moving my stuff around so the captions don't match the pictures. After 4 attempts to line them up, I'm quitting!

Hello 2011!

This past month zipped by so quickly. Part of that was because I got my annual cold/flu thing and spent part of the month napping, coughing or thinking about napping while the virus worked its magic. As for the other part, I quite honestly don't know where it went. We don't do much for the holidays, so that's not what ate up the time.

Anyway, 2010 was a year full of firsts for me. I started Fiber Charmer. I became a board member of the Atlanta Knitting Guild. I volunteered for both SAFF and SEFAA and had a good time volunteering. I learned how to can and canned a lot of relish from the cucumbers that we great. I learned that I had too many cucumber and tomato plants.

I'm not one for making New Year's Resolutions. It's so easy to think of all those things I want to change and then not do a one of them. I had a bit of madness, perhaps it was last year, and posted some resolutions.

So, these aren't really resolutions. They're tweaks to plans I already have.

I'm going to be a better vegetable gardener. With gas prices predicted to rise to $4 a gallon this year, grocery costs will be rising too. I've been making an effort to buy more locally grown produce, and in conjunction with this effort, I'm planning to be more effective with the foodstuffs that I grow here. Last year our beans died on the vine. The bean plants both mildewed and dried to a crisp with the extreme heat and humidity we had. While I still have some of that packet of seeds, I'll plant them earlier this year and see if I can beat some of those problems. The carrots never did much of anything, nor did the radishes. The cucumbers and tomatoes went totally crazy, growing over anything in their way and producing massive amounts of veggies.

Very soon, after the freak snows and the remaining remnants of the cold go away, I'll double dig another garden bed and get started earlier this year. I've been thinking about what I buy, and if I only grow lettuce, tomatoes, and some squashes, I'll be able to take a decent slice out of our grocery bill. Heck, if the county would let me have 3 chickens I wouldn't have to buy organic eggs anymore either. However, I know that's not going to happen.

Also in 2011 I'm going to learn how to pill a cat by myself. Right now it takes two of us to pill a cat, and I've been thinking that I should be able to handle 10-15 pounds of biting, hissing, angry kitty myself. I guess my plan of attack here is to learn how to quickly roll kitty burritos using groggy snoozy cats, a large towels and massive amounts of cat treats until they decide it's not so bad, at which point I can substitute whatever Rx they need for the treats. I figure I'm already scarred enough that what's one or two more scars, and as long as I don't need stitches, I'll be ok.

I'm sure there are others I need to be thinking about. The usual lose weight, exercise more one. The not letting my roots get so bad that I look like a redheaded skunk with the grey streak. That's one of the many things I'd love to get stem cells for. I want the hair I had as a child back. Thick, wavy and red instead of not as thick and mouse brown/grey with memories of red. OK, yes, I want stem cells to rejuvenate my skin, burn fat, and give me more energy that I could possibly need, but I guess my chances of that happening are about as good as winning one of the $300M+ lotteries!

I see I digress. The first seed catalogs have arrived in today's mail, so I'll be dreaming of fresh baby lettuce while watching the snow this weekend.

Belated Happy New Years!