My usual luck held out and I didn’t win any Bugga. I will put that money towards other yarn, I suppose (somehow I feel that this will become something even more awesome than Wollmeise someday; perhaps I will buy lots of glorious cashmere roving).
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I saw a yurt at S&W and I thought about you. It was totally felted, and the guy inside was doing a demonstration on wet felting. His stuff was amazing. You can see some of the rugs on the outside of the structure (I can only imagine what it smelled like the next day, in the pouring rain; I don’t envy him the drive back and eventual airing out of said yurt).
It’s all either wet-felted or needle-felted. There’s a rack at back (which you can’t see) that is full of silk scarves onto which he’s needle felted patterns. Aside from the alpaca and the death-metal sheep, this was by far the coolest thing I saw all day.
I am so covetous of this thing. I want a yurt desperately, even though it does not fit with anything I do. This is okay. I don’t really need a yurt, anyhow. But it’s fun to think about (I’d so totally set it up in the front yard, and then would have to shoo out the winos and homeless guys).
And there was one other thing we saw that was awesome, which was the fog in the mountains on the way up and back. It was spectacular. It kind of rolled across the highway and made it hard to see what was in front of you. It was like we’d left Earth and gone to Middle-Earth or Narnia or way up in the mountains of China or somewhere else magical. I tried very hard (and succeeded) not to think about The Mist (ohmygodgiantbugsDONOTWANT).
I am amazed this photo came out so well. I got a video, but can’t find it now. Oh, well. You get the idea.
Just entered the Bugga lottery. I missed it at S&W, but maybe this will see some yarns…
I’m sad not to see the red, though. That was my favorite.
I’ve gotten off my [redacted] and done some work documenting what I’ve been working on.
Okay. So. This weekend was exhausting, as all good vacations are, but I got a lot accomplished. Firstly, because baobh is good at working on fiber-related things, she rubbed off a bit and I was good about working on fiber-related things. There was this pair of socks I’ve been working on off and on for about a year. Sometimes it was because I had another project that took precedence, but mostly it was because they frustrated me. I started them three times, and they were never the right size. I took a stab at them again over the weekend. This time, success!
And some detail:
I’m sure they’ll be better when blocked, but we’ll get there in good time. It’s the interlocking leaves pattern from Knitty a while back, and it moves like lightning. I find that the more challenging a pattern, the faster it goes; I get so bored with the simple stuff that I never finish. This is what happened with the Socks of Eternity. In the beginning, I didn’t know what I was doing, so I got a lot done. However, I moved past that level of skill very quickly and am finding it difficult to motivate myself. Anyway.
Another thing that came out of the weekend was an increase in my confidence with drop spindle spinning. Before, although I have a lovely spindle to work with, I had been spinning to get started, parking the spindle, drafting the fiber as the tension spun out, spinning a bit more, parking, drafting, spinning, etc. This is okay, but very time-consuming. It is also harder to get a consistent product with this method. I don’t know why I never managed to move past this, but I spun a third of a chunk (bump? hank? what do you call that?) of roving using this method, and it exhausted me.
This past weekend, I found a spindle and fell in love with it, mostly because for the first time ever I spun without parking. It was like I had learned to walk or speak another language spontaneously. I could’ve believed I had developed mutant superpowers right then (I’m still holding out hope). So I bought it. I spun a bit with it over the weekend, and was able to make a decent product with average roving (before I’d only ever been able to work with really nice roving).
And then came Tuesday. I sat down for an X-Men marathon (curse you, Wolverine, and your distracting self) and by the end of the day somehow had managed to spin up more than I had in the entire previous four months of spinning. All in the proper way, only parking a couple of times to splice in roving when I dropped the spindle by mistake. The best part? This wasn’t even with the magic spindle! This was with my old spindle! I must have learned something. For visual reference, here’s what I’d spun before:
Not bad for a first try, but lumpy and not a lot to look at. Here’s what I’ve got now:
Still lumpy, but look at all that yarn! And if you’ll notice, the portion in the middle is pretty even! (The roving colorway is Mango Berry, and I’ve misplaced its label at the moment, so I can’t tell you who it’s from).
I have one little bit left still, and I’ll spin it up this weekend. Then it’s on to learning how to Navajo ply, and to figure out what to do with such a small quantity of yarn. An iPod cozy seems appropriate. It’s not enough for much else, I fear.
To drop everything and knit squid. Oh, my.
I mean, when I see these things they’re usually crocheted, but these are knitted! I can knit! I have leftover yarn! I am lazy and will probably just buy one on etsy! Go me!
Seriously, though, they’re awesome. There’s a whole flickr set, plus a link to the etsy place where you can buy them (go buy them – I am passing on some of this compulsion!)
But it is Wednesday, which is good, I guess.
I think I was supposed to be resting over the weekend, but I’m exhausted today. It can’t be from yesterday; I only watched movies, did some spinning, and then taught my weekly class.
Yet today I am afraid I’m going to fall asleep any moment. I took some Dramamine last night, as I’ve been having sleeping problems, but I think it’s made me groggy. And I still can’t stop thinking about Hugh Jackman. I feel like I’m 16 again.
This photo pretty much sums up the whole weekend:
A bunch of wackos in New Rocks, and then normal people with sheep doing their thing. Yep.
The sheep were pretty awesome. There was one with four horns, several giant ones being wrangled by some not so large girls, and one that growled like the most bad-ass black metal singer. Daven growled at that one. He did a pretty decent impersonation, minus the big, weird purple tongue (on the sheep, not on Daven). We met up with Dave and his lady (who is pretty neat), and ate lots of carnival-type food. I felt a little guilty eating lamb at a sheep festival, but only a little.
And we also discovered that llamas are (1) just as mean as we thought, and (2) the distant cousins of tauntauns, or at least they sound the same. We looked at cute alpacas
(who knew?) and bought fiber-related things. I bought some natural-dyed wool, which although scratchy, is spinning up pretty nicely. I owe this in large part to the high-whorl spindle I bought, which is much easier for me to use than my other spindle. So easy, in fact, that I picked it up, spun with it a little, and bought it on the spot. Impulsive? Me? No. I also did not buy two skeins of awesome sock yarn on impulse, either.
Daven was popular and helpful:
And there was a yurt! (It was felted):
Here are all the purchases (sorry for the low quality; the flash on my camera is utterly uncooperative):
On Sunday evening I went to visit the parents-in-law, and got some cheap movies at the opening of a store that the brother-in-law has been working at. Afterward we went into downtown Baltimore and ate dinner at a lovely Afghani restaurant
On the way up and back, Jennie and I talked about stuff to such and extent that a book on tape was unnecessary. I’m a little farther with my novel than I was, and it apparently doesn’t suck.
Today I’m watching all of the X-Men movies over again. We saw Wolverine on Sunday, and I needed some more. Funny – I never did like Wolverine much before Hugh Jackman played him. I can’t imagine why.
Because if I didn’t, I’d still probably be friends with her, but we have so much more in common this way. She’s learning viking wire knitting (sort of – more like wire weaving – it’s hard to explain).
When we arrived at her house last night, she nearly immediately removed her shoe and sock so she could show me the sock she knitted, and we both agreed that it’s a very sexy sock (no really, it is).
I am having difficulty concentrating at the moment. I keep thinking about these:
[is from here]
Yep, sheep.
I love the wooly, lanolin-scented things. Why? Because sheep = yarn. And I love yarn. I love it best in cashmere, but a good blackfaced leicester will do. And this weekend, I’m going to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, which might amount to nerdvana for me – sheep, yarn, going to see Wolverine, and also crabs (I hope to eat me some crabs), plus maybe Star Trek.
(Which is to say that I might be rather quiet until Tuesday, unless I happen upon a computer before then).
Oh! And some of these:
[angora rabbit photo from here]
and these
[angora goat, photo from here]
and also these:
[happy alpaca from here]
I have never been so excited to see farm animals before (even if sheep/goats’ eyeballs creep me out in a cthulhu sort of way)!
I had been thinking in the car this morning and realized that all the break-ins have had a common thread: Maglite flashlights.
Allow me to back up and explain.
A couple of years ago, like an idiot I left a door unlocked on my car, which was parked on the street (at the time, we were living in a house bereft of driveway). In the morning, someone had opened it up, gone through things, and then run off. Nothing important was stolen, but the person in question stole a pair of $5 sunglasses and a Mini-Maglite flashlight out of the glove compartment.
A week and a half ago, when other people broke into our house, again things were rifled through, and this time nothing was stolen except for a costume piece and a regular-sized Maglite flashlight.
I wonder what’s so special about Maglites… I mean, they’re not particularly rare, they’re not particularly expensive, and aside from the big one (which you could use to club somebody with), they’re not much good aside from being decent flashlights. So why would somebody steal that and leave both TVs?
I am perplexed.
knitters = angry mob 