ackkkk...bear phobia alert!

More on vacation trip later, but on the front page of the newspaper today...
mauling or MAULING! :P

There is reason that I am not outdoorsy :) I used to be a runner as a teen, I want to be a runner again someday, but I don't want to breath car fumes and I am afraid of bears!

It's all beachy!

Our flight arrived at SeaTac 2 am last Thurs. the 12th. We picked up our bags, taxied to an old family friends' house to pick up camper/truck and drive straight to Ocean Shores on the SW coast of Washington State. I'm sure that there is an emoticon for a very tired person (or 5), but... just use yer imagination and throw in some fine gritty sand for good measure! :)

We then spent 4 lovely days with our parents (my inlaws) who just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. All 6 of their children (including my hubby) and all 18 of their children including one serving in Iraq here on R&R! Every spouse was able to come and one soon to be fiance'. Can you imagine all the fun when you put all the above into 2 large beach houses, add 2 hot tubs, good weather, lots of food, good conversation and tons of love? :) *sigh* On the next to last day many, many other family & friends arrived to help celebrate. All of my MIL's siblings were able to come with their spouses. And each and every one of them was representing a marriage that had celebrated 50+ years!

I did lots of knitting! This is because I knit and talk really well :) I am nearly 1/2 done with a stole from Noro sock yarn (?-I'll explain later) in a flower bud pattern on size 6 needle).

On Sunday eve we said our goodbyes and drove 13 miles up the coast to Pacific Beach State Park where I had vacationed every summer as a child. We rendevous with my sister and her family of 7. There was lots more cousin time in the sand :) not to mention around the bon fire with s'mores and good stories!

After this I snuck back down to Ocean Shores to visit Fusions and do some very luxurious & satisfying shopping. Hi Kelly---> super sweet owner of said luxury destination :)

Well.... now we are back to the metro area and will do out and backs from Auburn to Seattle, letting the kiddos experience the Space Needle, Pike Place Market, Seattle Underground, Pacific Science Center, Puget Sound Ferry ride, Spaghetti Factory Downtown, Sculpture Park, walk Montlake Cut, Ballard Locks to watch boats/ships pass, Greenlake Park, Woodland Park Zoo... and MORE if time allows. I think that I might show them where I went to gradeschool and where their daddy and I got engaged. We'll see. :) I'm tired just looking at the list and knowing that it is only a partial!

knit on!

2-fer-1 today!

I just finished navajo plying my merino/tencel Autumn Sunset singles. I haven't figured out my new camera yet, the pictures should improve as I do :)

with flash


without flash


with flash (again)


Almost perfectly balanced without a wash, only a few booboos and very nice to spin and to ply. I love the sheen of the tencel!

gaaaack the light!

June 3, 2008
Sunrise: 6:31am
Sunset: 10:58pm
Moonrise: 6:54am
Moonset: 12:02am

it's killing me, blinding me, withering my wee eyes, causing a strange dream life, my weeds are taking over the planet with all the extra grow time, roses bud-bloom-fade all in the period of a single day.... and it is only going to get worse, much worse.

June 18 2008
Sunrise: 6:26am
Sunset: 11:08pm
Moonrise: none
Moonset: 5:55am
Full Moon: 7:31am

now this looks as though we'll have 7 1/2 hrs of normal darkness to catch some zzzz's, but that is a trick. "sunset" just means that the sun hits the horizon. the problem is that it doesn't go far enough beyond so it is perpetual dusk and really only "dark," and even that is relative, from about 1-2am.


sleeping when the birdies are still chirping is just. not. right.

sigh...

i am nearly finito with my periwinkle mohair stole. need only to cast off and then apply a knotted fringe, possibly with beading. and i have an entire bobbin spun of very thin singles from the autum sunset tencel/merino blend. spinning it is a dream (see post below, it looks the same, only bobbin much fuller and with thinner singles).

i am packing (and moving) my classroom and it is much more work than i'd planned. of course it is, you always have more stuff than you think. so doing this is very cleansing, an opportunity to organize, purge and better the space.... right? :)

of course it is!

pictures of mohair wonder to follow... soon!

make peace, spin fleece (preferably tencel/merino!)

It must be the daylight...

We are at exactly 19 hours of daylight as of today! It makes people manic I tell you. Kids go bonkers, drivers go nuts, motorcycles start doing wheelies down the freeways, dogs want to play fetch and be walked at 10pm, cats are freaking out with the dustbunnies at 3 am... and fiber freaks well they spin and knit like mad :)

My car knitting.... the stuff I do at red lights and traffic jams (please don't try and tell me that you don't do it too, at least I set it down when my foot is on the gas pedal), is a sampler stole out of a blue mohair, my recipe.


And then I am spinning up some superwash merino/tencel blend hand-dyed by Susan. This yummilicious fiber is in the Autumn Sunset colorway, and I just love how the tencel adds that silky feel and shine.

This is the top, and fine singles...


This is about 3 oz spun up thick/thin and 2 ply. There is about 180 yards. I could have spun the singles tighter, but was more focused on trying to get the rhythm of the thick/thin thing. It balanced pretty well, but has not yet been dunked. In natural light.


With a flash.


I have about 4 oz of the top left and am planning to spin it all in fine singles and navajo ply it.



Make peace, spin fleece!

WoW!!!

I have to keep reminding myself that these amazing people are 8th grade graduates! This weekend's (years!) highlight was the graduation of 7 amazing 8th graders from our Waldorf School.

Their individual gift presentations during graduation were a (nothing less than professional) photographic slide show (see www.jangdagallery.com), piano, viola & violin solos of the masters (double jaw dropping amazing WoW!!), personal compositions on piano (again... WoWWW), FreeBird sung and played by graduate playing his own handmade electric guitar (WoW! dang, why didn't I have a lighter to wave?!), a self choreographed modern dance piece!

Wow..... speechless! Well if you can be speechless and gushing at the same time! I just adore these people. These were also students of my specialty classes (woodwork/handwork fiber arts), and friends of my oldest child. I am so grateful to have been able to know and work with them since they were just little tykes. I look forward to being witness to their journey into highschool and adulthood! They are just amazing!!!

Here is a picture of a few of them (the guys) with a few of their buddies enjoying a post grad sunset!



make peace, spin fleece!

Coastal Paradise

Happy Mother's Day... and some eyecandy from yesterday's perfect day.

Sleeping Lady at almost sunset, about 9pm. The sun finally sat at 1030pm.



Snarly Trees on the Coastal Trail. Can't wait for the leaves. They are budding this weekend!



I began spinning up 4 oz of merino/yng mohair from The Spinning Bunny in the Fruit Salad colorway that is being closed out. I tried to thick/thin slubby spin it and was not very successful. It looks muddy and not slubby. It is true what spinners say about it being difficult to spin thick/slubs after having mastered thin singles. :(

Pictures of muddy mess to follow... when I am done grieving!

Rhapsodies in Fiber, my Bohemian Collection...

Ok.... it is obvious that the blog has been seriously neglected. But... this is what I have been up to! :)

This was a very large show, this is just a sampling!

This peice "Tidal Creatures" is a wall sculpture (most of my sculptures are), and is about 24" X 14", and is a combo of wet felt, and needle felt, with embellishments.


"Drew" is about 18" X 14", needle felted wool/silk/silver over a sculpted core. (Sold)


"E=mc2" is a blue eyed Einstein and is needle felted wool over scupted core. He's 14" X 10".


I wish you could see this one better. I rarely.... never until this one, frame felt. But it was thin and I almost threw it away. I loved the color though and so it hung around and someone encouraged me to frame it. I found this gold frame and it just made the picture pop. Now it is one of my favorite peices ever. "Kincaid Trees at Sunset"


Another view, a bit closer...


"Baa Baa Black Sheep," is a large soft scupture. The sheep heads were wet felted from merino, the locks were needle felted on after and the faces then embellished and mounted together. This is large, maybe 2' X 3'


This is "Blonde Bohemian Girl," needle felted wool, with silk/silver over sculpted core. She is 14" X 10"


This is a small sculpture. 5" X 8".... "Polynesian Party Girl," needle felted wool, silk, silver over sculpted core.


"Serenity Sister in Greece" is needle felted wool over sculpted core. About 20" X 14"


As I said, this is just a wee sampling! It was great fun, and several large peices sold during the opening so I didn't get to photographing them. What was the most fun, was that I took E=mc2 to the opening as a work in progress, so that viewers could see and feel what fiber sculpture is about. Most people have never seen anything like it so it was fun to share. :)

I hope you enjoy!

shameful blogging...

how can that much time of passed? maybe it is that hands are flying, time is passing unchecked? since oct-21 i have participated in a ticketed auction fundraiser. i had my 7th grade class (which i have for woodwork and handwork at a waldorf school) build a folding room divider frame with brass hinges in woodwork and then for handwork we measured and cut the panels (4 of them), hemmed them, and then batiked them.

we raised $1700 for this! wow! i am so proud of their work!

then i sold myself for a package of 10 one hour private fiber art lessons (of choice), and sold a 10' X 12' room lazuring (google lazure painting to find out what that is). i then ended up lazuring 3X much that space at the clients home. it is gorgeous... i will post pictures when their flooring is installed and i can do a photo shoot.

i have nearly finished my caplet from wrap style. i am using noro kuryeon (which i love so much that i bought 20 skiens of the colorway #207. i changed the pattern a bit. i did a ribbed collar and a rolled i-cord cast off. you can tell that i don't give a hoot about making sure that the next skein is in the correct line up for the colorway.



next on the wip agenda is a project for the holidays. this one is for one of our rescued kitties. she is 3 and was abandoned after her elderly owner died and the relatives put her out. she is extremely shy to the point that she couldn't attend show events for the rescue group. she is skittery, but very loving and adores one of our dogs. she will crawl on her, cuddle up to her, climb into her kennel etc. so i figured why not spin up some of our dog kiska's fur and knit up a kitty blankie? so i blended kiska's undercoat fur with some merino in burgundy tones and added a bit of jewel tone silk and viola! i have so much kiska fur that i think that i will also spin/knit/felt up a kitty bed for her too.





lastly, non fiber related, but inspiring non the less (for fiber art) are sunrises and sunsets. the last few have been spectacular and required photographing! first the sunrise over the chugach range...



and a breath taking sunset!



and this my friends is just too cute to leave unshared... my 8 year old's entry for a t-shirt logo for a local event.



make peace, spin fleece!

embossed leaves finished!

done! my first pair of socks with a "real" pattern. done in cherry tree hill supersock fingering wt yarn, superwash/size 1 addi circ needles.




once i switched to the double circ needle method i had much more fun. i have already cast on for another pair of socks using tofutsies sock yarn: sw wool, soysilk, cotton and chitin (shrimp/crab shell fiber) i am not sure what that fiber is all about. i'll be knitting the "merino lace socks" from interweaves favorite socks book.... and using those addi needles.

my peacock wheel arrived. it is so cute, i love it. i can tell why folks really want those double treadles especially on these small portable wheels though. i am treadling like it is nobody's business to ply on it. i still would rather have a single treadle than a double. pictures later!

make peace, spin fleece!

dreds are coming to a location near you...

i've been growing my hair out for a year and a half, for the sole (or soul if you will) purpose of dredding it. i have always wanted to. being the "good girl" of the family i've never done it. i said to my stylist one day i wanted to do it before i got too old and she said "well you better hurry up." i didn't smack her, but i did start growing it out that day! i am no longer in the mainstream (used to be in healthcare), and i am a full time fiber artist who also teaches handwork (fiber arts) and woodworking to elementary and middle schoolers. i do a lot of felting/fulling... heck why not my hair?!?!?!

i'm gonna do it. my hubby is a little disturbed, not because he hates dreds, but because my hair won't have that silky feeling that it does now. i'm seriously the farthest thing you can get from a bragger, but there are 2 things that even i have to admit. i have great hair, and great boobs. i'll never felt my boobs (cast them maybe, been there done that) but i can felt my hair!

soon!

fibery news...

i have just finished my first patterned sock. i've made tons of plain jane sox, but this is cherry tree hill superwash sock yarn on size 1 & 2 needles. i am doing the embossed leaves socks from interweave's designs.


i did the first one on size 2 crystal palace dpn. i have been a diehard wooden needle fanatic. downright wood snob actually. maybe even a wood needle nazi. but i have to admit that i really don't like using anything smaller than a size 5 in the dpn and have found myself avoiding patterned sox because of it. so i thought to myself, why not try cat bordhi's sox soar on 2 circs. i bought 2 cheap pair of metal circs just to see. it was aweful, the join between needle and cord was horrid. i can actually think of lots of more words to describe how i really felt about using them, but not here! :-P

anyhow... checked out another shop looking to see if i could find some top of the line wooden circs in size 2 and only found one brand that was not recommended by the staff. they talked me into addi needles. i was dubious. i hemmed and hawed and stuck my nose up in the air and talked all about how much i hate the sound and feel of metal. blah blah blah.

they were very nice and just nodded.

they were so very nice that i thought "maybe i should just give them a try".

because my tension is on the loose side, i sized down to size 1 on the addis and bought 2 of them in different colors (one is addi's "lace" needles, which at this point i can't tell what makes them different other than the color).

*cough cough* i love them *cough cough*

they are so different than grandmas old aluminum needles! wow! i am also sold on sox with patterns now. i can totally see doing many other pairs with these needles!

on my size 5 crystal palace circs i have just cast on mystic wool in blue/turquoise for a tam...for the upcoming dreddies!


i personally wouldn't of bought this color, but my 8 year old just crocheted his first hat and wanted to make another and this was the yarn that he picked... but then got sucked into doing something else. you know how sometimes you can just tell that a cause is lost. this is one of those times, so i reclaimed the fiber! the tam is being knit open in a "puffed rib" pattern which is pretty simple. i think that it might be a bit small for me, but no matter, son number 2 will get it if it is.

on another note. tonight was knit night and i met up with a fiber buddy at a local cafe' for chat. my 13 year old came along and while we were all visiting somehow the subject came up of Michael Jackson and how although he is pretty freakish he has had some really awesome works. we were discussing how different things might have gone in his career if he'd of not gone the wayward way that he did when all of the sudden during a longer knitting pattern reading moment my teen said quite calmly and with frankness "how come michael jackson makes his kids wear paper bags on their heads when they go out?"

something about that, not the question exactly, but how she asked it, struck a cord and i laughed until i cried. what a different world she is growing up in than the one i was 13 in. odd isn't it?

spin on!

the countdown!

today my payment for the peacock finally cleared so it should be shipped tomorrow and arrive in about a week! weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

the garden has been put away, the goldfish taken out of the pond, and the studio is waiting for mudding on the plasterboard! winter is almost here :0)

make peace, spin fleece... take a nap!

i'm cheating on mecchia...

i have fallen in love with mecchia... not love at first site it is true, but a steady respectful growing kind of love. so much so that i am finding edammertje has not been what i had hoped for. there is nothing fundamentally wrong with eda. but i've discovered that i really love the wood of mecchia, and the fine turnings, not to mention i love scotch tension vs the bobbin lead drive/tension eda has just like a louet.

so i guess i want eda to find a new home. mecchia is much too big to take anywhere, she is a stictly an at home kind of gal. so i purchased a peacock! i expect to meet the peacock in 2 weeks. my dd has taken up spinning on eda, but if things work out with this new wheel... she'll share this one with me and we'll pass eda on to someone that doesn't desire scotch tension and who will love her for the modern lines and clean functionality that she has!




i also carded up the rest of my stash enhancement from the retreat. this is batch #2 of the handdyed merino that i carded in bamboo. plans are to spin up more lace to light fingering weight.
.

this is me with other ladies of the moon this weekend celebrating what we call "fiesta de la luna" and our daughters moving towards womanhood. fall on the lake was lovely. we found our first snow in town on the drive back in! we walked, cooked, nourished, celebrated, welcomed a new moon daughter, committed, rejoiced, reaffirmed and "walked in beauty"


spin on, knit on!

wow, it is almost like christmas around here...

first... i had a fabulous time at the fall 2007 spinning retreat. this is the culprit who introduced me to spinning! notice her fabulous wheel... she waited 3 1/2 years for her turn to have it made by a gentleman in oregon who is no longer making wheels now.


these are other alaskan spinners and knitters! sure they look harmless, but you should have seen them during the gift exchange!


i should have taken pictues, 49 of about 60 women participated. i came away with 4 skeins of lovely fall colored fingering weight yarn! all that fiber, spinning and knitting supplies in one place, whew... slurp slurp slurp!

this is the latest of what mecchia and i have spun up. i still have to set the twist, but overall it looks good to me. i love mecchia.


and look who arrived today!


last but not least...


i took this picture last week, there is so much more snow in just the last few days. so we hurried and did fall clean up on the gardens, and now we are almost ready, ready as you can be for the winter to arrive when you haven't yet got enough of summer!

make peace, spin fleece!

plying navajo style...

i got home today and decided to spin up the remainder of the split roving. i have 4 oz of this sw blueberry patch merino/tencel from susan and i am using 2oz for this spin. i split it in 1/2 and then divided to predraft. from there i lost track so there was really no real rhythm. i'd divided down to about pencil roving size, but forgot to keep track of the color sequence. i was concentrating on spinning about lace to fingering weight and trying to not overspin. when i plyed it i relearned the rule about overplying a bit because it unspins a bit during plying. that was a pia.

i love the colors, and am getting better at plying.

i ended up with 2 small skeins, about 50 yards each
what i learned: overply singles that will be plyed!



next on my agenda: i am planning on felting winter boots in the norwegian lobben style. i need to felt some fabric, quilt it to a lining, make a pattern, cut it out, sew it together and apply a sole. i have been wanting to do this for years, and now am going to do it with my 7th grade class!

4 days to the spinning retreat!

make peace, spin fleece!

weeeeeee!!!!

today i cast on for a pair of lightly felted mittens using my newly spun border leicester woolen single ply. i'm using size 6 needles and a basic 36 st pattern in my head. my flash is out of control.



tonight i decided to go for the luxury and reached into the stash and pulled out this treasure from Susan! it is a yummy superwash merino/tencel roving. i really want to roll around on it, it is soooo0000000 soft!



henry likes it.... he thinks that it is shiney and very luxurious.



i'm not sure, but i think that this is lace weight... i'm lazy remember, someday i'll figure out how to measure.



last but not least from my lovely day... my sweet viola player



make peace, spin fleece!

meet mecchia

the rest of her finally came today. it wasn't really head over heels love at first site, but we're getting to know each other, and i like her alot. i can tell she isn't a perfect first love, but maybe the love will grow and deepen as we become more aquainted. assembly took me quite awhile as i have only had personal hands on contact with simples such as the louets and ashford kiwis. but i think i have all of her parts in the right places. i am a lazy spinner, much as i am a lazy knitter. i like it all mindless. now, i have been knitting (and other fiber work) for over 30 years, beginning as a very small child. but spinning is something rather new to me. 5 years max, and most of that on drop spindles. i get to attend my second spinning retreat next weekend! i am sooooo excited (picture squealing and jumping up and down) fall in alaska, spinning (or knitting/felting) to my hearts content with no children or cooking, and a white elephant gift exchange with other fiber enthusiasts as excited opening gifts of fiber as new brides are opening lingerie!

meet mecchia, getting settled at my house



i spun up some border leicester
what i learned: second cuts make a cut difference in the outcome (or work in processing) of your spinning!



now i know that i said that it wasn't head over heels love... i can tell you right now, i was thrilled to think that she was coming with 5 bobbins. this is the problem with having an internet affair. when reality arrives... i see that the bobbins are actually mini bobbins. "tweensie" as my son would say. they are also not the quick change variety.

this might responsible for the giddy and irresponsible action i took today in purchasing this:



check out her bobbins! i am giddy like a guy checking out boobs!
we meet in person in 2 1/2 weeks. after the retreat, but oh well. tomorrow i start making some mittens with my handspun leicester.

speaking of the leicester. i have (until today) happily gone without really knowing what the significance of second cuts are. this fleece, while well scoured, and in good health.... has horrible second cuts. being the lazy spinner i am, there are small blobs of these second cuts all over my skein. i spun a worsted weight thick/thin homespun, single ply woolen style. i tried to spin long draw... i didn't really succeed being that it was still a wee bit sticky with lanolin, and i am a lazy carder, but oh well, we had fun... and chocolate chip cookies with bailey's on the side.

what's worse?

question: what could be worse than waiting for your spinning wheel to arrive from nz?

having only 1 of 2 boxes arrive from nz.

whaaaaa!

coat of color anyone?

while surfing blogs one day i found this coat and was in a hurry so i didn't write anything down. i saved the pic to remind myself to go back there to buy the pattern. but durn-it-anyway all i can remember is that it was $36, but can't remember where!?? arghhhhh if anyone knows, could you purdy please send me the addy? areyoufunkyenough at yahoo dot com.