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?

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.

Catch up time

I apologize for my long absence. As you know, I went to SAFF (Southeastern Animal Fiber Fair) last weekend.

Much earlier this year, way back in the spring, I decided that if I went to SAFF this year that I would take a class. I've been to SAFF two times previously, but as I only knitted at the time, I actually found it kind of boring. Yes, I said it. Boring. As in I finished seeing what I wanted to see in about 3 hours, and I was done. When Keith and I went back in 2007, we had just put Pixel to sleep several days earlier, and Brownie had died the previous month, so we checked out a day early and headed back home.

Fast forward back to the present. During the past 3 years I've increased my fibery knowledge, and much of that is due to hanging around with Gale. She does things like buy a fleece and process it herself. This means she takes the wool fresh from shearing, cleans it, dyes it, cards or combs it and then spins it. A gal's bound to learn a thing or two hanging around someone who does all that.

I've also started dyeing yarns. This has changed the way I look at other people's yarns and rovings. Part of this is also due to Gale. While she can sometimes exasperate me with all the follow up questions as to why I like a certain handpainted roving (sorry, Gale), her relentless questioning and search has caused me to look at yarns and ask myself the same question. Do I like the color, and is that all I like about it? Is the technique different? Is it something that I might want to try myself? Or is it so labor intensive that I will buy from the master? (There is a woman on etsy who does the most incredible handpainted self-striping yarns. My mind staggers at the work that goes into them. As I've taken classes and dyed yarns myself, I know that if she's asking $47 for her yarn, that she's put way more work than that into it. I want to give the Chicken Goddess a shout out for pointing her out to me.)

Sorry for the long digression. Back to the point is that I looked for a class and found one that I wanted to take. It was with Lynne Vogel, one of the Twisted Sisters. Hmm, famous author and teacher meant the class would fill quite quickly. I decided to become a member of SAFF and get the early sign-up.

SAFF is run by volunteers, so I soon thought that since I'd paid for both Keith and I to be members that we should work a volunteer shift. We'd done it once before, years ago, when I joined the Georgia Mineral Society. We'd had fun working the desk, and I knew we could have some fun at SAFF.

I'm going to admit that SAFF was a blast. I had a great time. Lynne is a fantastic teacher, and I encourage you to take a class from her if you have the opportunity. I consider myself at best an intermediate beginner spinner, and this class taught me some very interesting techniques to try.

As for manning the workshops desk, I have to say that Crystal and Nancie were a delight. They stayed cheerful, which is mostly easy to do as many fiber people are good natured, and when faced with a challenge, did so with ease. I would certainly volunteer again. However, I paid for a booth for SAFF 2011, so I won't be able to volunteer. Crystal has asked if she can still have Keith for a few hours, and I said that we'd give him a say. :)

Near the end of our time working, Nancie said the volunteer for the "How to pick a fleece class" was unable to work. Needless to say, I jumped on that. Robin, the teacher, ended up not using me much at all. I had to bounce a few people who wanted to sit in and hadn't paid, and I got to put my hands on some lovely fleeces. Yes, there was one that I didn't buy, and now I wish I had.

Some friends fared better than I did and purchased blue ribbon winning fleeces before the judging had occurred. I was with Steve when he saw his fleece had won. I can only imagine the rush you would feel when your choice is justified so fully by the judges. Gale had also purchased a fleece, and it too had won a blue ribbon.

That's probably enough about SAFF for one day. I do have some pictures, but my hands are slightly frozen. It got down to 60F in the house last night. I was just running the a/c two or three days ago, and I'm not ready to turn on the heat. Let's not forget that I live in The South, and by this afternoon temps will be back in the upper 70's. In the meantime, I suffer from cold fingers, so I'll end here and go sit in the sun for a few minutes.

Oh! My aching legs!

I've learned two things don't go well together - spinning for the first time in several months and deciding to start Couch to 5K.

That means you'll get shin splints within the very first 2 minutes of walking.

However, the Moonbeams are just gorgeous.

Keith is on staycation this week, so the future holds more physical torture for me. He's doing C25K also, and he's in better shape than I am. He's got a longer stride, so I'm having jog a few steps every here and there just to keep up with him when we're walking.

Our future holds building a shed this week. It's been in pieces in our basement since just before the monsoons started last September. Today will involve gravel, lots of it, for a shed foundation.

Before the day is over, I may be wishing that I was dating House just so I could snag a Vicodin or two. I'll have to settle for Tylenol and a hot soak with Epson salts.

I hope I'll be able to spin that last Moonbeam tonight. I'm looking forward to plying them together and using my lazy Kate for the first time.

ETA: I do have better pictures of the spun Moonbeams. They're still in my camera, so I'll post them later today, Keith willing. (He can be a harsh taskmaster when he's on a mission.) Hey, I'll post pics of the shed too.

A mixed day.

Miss Lily made her third trip to the vet over the past 18 months for her swollen lip today. This time, finally, there was something the vet could see. She has a mass growing in her lower lip. Poor thing had a punch biopsy with the sample being sent to the lab. The vet called me about an hour after we had dropped her off to tell us the news. Keith was able to pick her up about an hour after that. Apparently she needed a whole lot of lap time when she got back home.

I don't know about Keith, but I'll be on those pins and needles until we hear the results of the biopsy. We're hoping for something benign. I'd hate to think that Lily has more hardship in her life. She showed up here as a stray who decided we were where she wanted to live, and she's Keith's baby.

On to fun news. I purchased some bookmarks from Moonwood Farm, who was raising funds for one of her sick alpacas. Purchase of the bookmarks entered me into a drawing to win a prize. Honestly, I didn't for a minute think I'd win anything, so I was flabbergasted to find a notification that I'd won second prize! Woohoo! I'll receive membership in her Moonbeams club. I'll have to oil up the wheel and get a-spinnin'.

As for now, I need to find someplace better to sit. Princess Plumeria is in my lap, looking happily catatonic after kneading on me, but my leg is falling asleep. (She's a big kitty. Not fat, but big. And she's convinced that I can't sit anywhere in the house without her in my lap to hold me to the chair. She's the reason that I'll need hip replacement surgery in the future.)

Happy news from an arborist

Several months ago, you may remember, we had to dig up most of our backyard to have a new drain field installed.

Some of the trees had a lot of their roots damaged and dug up during the installation, and I've been worried about them. I had called the county extension service and spoken to a master gardener volunteer who told me that the roots wouldn't regrow, and I should just have all the trees removed.

I called a tree company that we had used before and been quite happy with what I'd been told at the time, but this time when I got an estimate, it was from one of the salesmen, and he wants to take down nine (9!) trees from the backyard.

Ok, they're not the best trees. They are pine trees and sweet gums, but they form part of the squirrel superhighway from the far reaches of the backyard and all the neighbors' yards to our roof, from which a squirrel can easily reach the birdfeeders via the large ligustrum with only a few feet of cat gauntlet to run. Yeah, I doubt that sentence is grammatically correct, but I'm leaving it as is.

I've been dreading taking down all the trees. Sure, it's expensive. As in OMG! You want me to pay what?! More importantly though, I have memories in those trees. The redheaded woodpeckers that hollowed out a nest cavity in the old dead tree, and finally left after the tree fell. They lived there for several years. It was so cool. We both loved to watch them.

There was the night I knew we'd have to put our husky Ripper to sleep. He was so uncomfortable. He had lost so much weight that I could carry him from outside to his bed inside and back again several times that night. I sat outside with him, listening to him breathing and trying to comfort him while an owl hooted in the trees above us. It was such a sad, difficult night, but there was also the wonder of hearing that owl keeping watch with me.

Then there was one night when we heard an owl very close by making the strangest sounds we'd ever heard an owl make. It sounded like a very happy owl trying to hoot around a mouthful of rodent, and it was almost just outside the window.

I've procrastinated calling other tree services since I was afraid what they would say, but I forced myself to call 2 more yesterday.

The first arborist came today and tramped around my hellishly messy backyard (we've not done anything to it since the drainfield was installed as we've been waiting for any treework to be completed and for the weather to cooperate for longer than 24 hours. It's rained so much that the red clay sticks like crazy to your shoes. But, I digress.) After looking around, quizzing me about when the work was done, he said, none of them look like they need to come down right now. If they were in danger of coming down, we would have seen some dieback, and he didn't see any evidence of that. A couple need to be trimmed, and several need to be checked again in the spring when they start to leaf out again.

That was the best news I've heard in some time. I do have 1 more arborist/tree service coming to take a look, but now I'm actually ready to go do some work in my backyard. It won't be all torn up again, and I'll be able to make some headway back there. It will be a very Zen experience as I go pick up all those rocks that now litter the surface. (Or it may just be utterly maddening.)

To keep this a little fibery, I did ply my singles the other night. The yarn is balanced now, but I don't think it's plied that well. Gale suggested I run it through the wheel again and add more twist to the plying. I'm thinking about it while the yarn rests. I've got to take pictures and post them soon.

As for now, it feels like midnight since it's been dark for hours already. I think bed and a book are calling to me.

Busy day ahead

but I'm already tired.

Last night the spinning urge was too strong to deny. I sat and spun one of Gale's potluck Blueface Leicesters for a couple of hours without much of a break. While I'm a seemingly intelligent person who should know better, watching the colors change and the roving turn into a very lovely single was too hypnotic to stop.

I'm paying for it today. Arms and legs are slightly sore. I'm in dire need of hot bath and massage, but neither is in the very near future.

We had an awful night's sleep last night. Grey and Scooter slept with us, and Grey kept waking up to groom. This woke Keith up, which inevitably woke me also. So when the phone rang at 7:40 am this morning, I was more than a bit groggy. However, there was a cancellation, and our new drainfield will be installed today. That's great news. I think I'll celebrate tonight with a muscle soothing mineral salts bath.

And let's not forget to talk cats. Hopalong apparently went crazy sometime last night. Keith could hear the trap banging around. When I went to check on him this morning, both the food and water dish were totally turned upside down. The newspapers lining the trap are wet, and he's one angry cat. I need to keep him inside for another 12 or so hours, and I'm quite frankly scared to go change his papers. It's going to take both of us. Hopalong was growling and hissing like mad when I checked on him. I know he's going to be one happy cat to be released this evening.

Purple handspun pictures

Fibery goodness postponed

I'm so excited about my spinning. On Friday night I wound my two bobbins of singles onto the niddy noddy, joining the 2 bobbins with a spit splice since one had much more yarn than then other. Then I put it on my swift and wound it into a ball. I wasn't thinking at all. I should have taken a picture of the singles yarn cake, but I just didn't think of it then.

Last night I took the yarn cake out, gave it a couple of squeezes (hey! it was too beautiful not to squeeze), then start plying. I used both ends of the single and plied it all together. It turned out to be almost perfectly balanced when I was finished with it. I do have a photo, but it was taken late last night in a hurry. I was rushing to soak it and set twist before I went to bed. So here's the crappy picture, but I'll take some better ones today or tomorrow. Anyway, this awful picture is after I've taken it off the bobbin right after plying. I amazed myself with the balance of the yarn. I really couldn't believe how good it looked. (I may be a very good knitter, but I'm feel much more like a novice spinner.)

So, better pictures and a longer post in the near future.

In case you're wondering, I have started letting Scooter eat basically whatever he wants. Boy, has his appetite improved. I hit Pet Supermarket yesterday and stocked up on all the Wellness Grainfree canned varieties, and he's so happy eating his food now. Honestly, the others are quite happily eating it too. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the whole gunky ears thing is food related, and now I won't be wrestling cats to clean ears as often. (Or not cleaning as often as I should since sometimes it involves a lot of wriggling and biting, with me being on the receiving end. Luckily, I think my immune system has been acclimated to cat bites. Kind of like those guys who inject themselves with tiny doses of snake venom over the years to become immune to snake bites.)

I'm in a finish project mode. I did finish some gift knitting last night. I can't post a picture since it is a gift, but as soon as it's delivered I'll show it here. I'm nearly finished with the second Spring Forward sock. It's been on hold while the first sock went to Stitches South and Maryland Sheep and Wool. Now that the travelling sock is back, I can finish the second and make sure they match. I'm on the cuff on both Keith's second Wollmeise sock and my second Bearfoot sock, so I'm feeling an urgency to get all these finished before I start new projects. I'm not one of those knitters who has to work on one project at a time, but I'm also uncomfortable having too many works in progress. Finishing some of these up will feel great!

A Scooter decision

Ever since I took Scooter back to the vet a few weeks ago to see if that really was the cancer back in horribleness, I've been wondering about feeding him.

His kidneys aren't in great shape, which happens with very old cats, and the vet I saw that day said that letting him eat whatever he wanted wouldn't take that much time off his life. The vet was trying to dance around the fact that Scooter's life expectancy isn't that long. We don't know how long it will be, and I know they can't make any real predictions, so I didn't ask. What the vet did say was that is was more important for Scooter to eat as older kitties will very quickly lose strength and go downhill rapidly. Unfortunately, I've gotten to experience that with Pixel.

I've found, however, that I've been reluctant to just feed him whatever he wants to eat. I've still been offering him the food specifically formulated for his kidney condition, but he gets bored with it and won't eat it. I realize my reluctance is that I'm still not ready to let him go. Keith has said feed him whatever he wants. A group of cat-owned knitters I've spoken to say to let him eat whatever he wants. I'm still caught between making his last days a happy food feast or having him here with me as long as I possibly can. It's a very difficult transition to make. I decided that I would start cooking homemade cat food again, and even if it's not the best for his kidneys, I know he enjoys it, and I love him enough to do this.

I'm really trying not to cry as I write this.

To end on a happier note, I can't stop thinking about spinning. I've got some more fiber to try now, so in the near future look for my finished purple yarn. I've told myself I must ply it together before using up newer roving.

What I did tonight

Somehow I ended up spinning tonight. You see a single ply of yarn that is fairly consistent with some "designer" (lumpy and not wellspun) areas.

Next, scroll down to see something you really don't want to see wallowing or sleeping on your counters and clean dishes.

Apparently I disturbed her snooze. And yes, all the dishes are either re-washed or sitting in the sink to get washed again.

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