electrictree yarns

Oh Edward!

2012-01-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

I finally got started on my Opposite Pole Sweater. I order the yarn a long time ago and it's been sitting here at the store taunting me. I printed the pattern and left it lying on the counter so I would see it constantly as a reminder of what was to come. I forced myself to finish several UFO's (UnFinished Objects), because the number of WIP's (Works in Progress) was getting marginally ridiculous (one of the dangers of being a yarn store owner...). So I finished many things and started and finished many more-Christmas presents mostly. About 5 days ago I cast on the back and started knitting along merrily-a total lie, I had to cast on multiple times and rip back a bunch because while there are no errors in the pattern, it's a little convoluted at times.

It's not really a complicated pattern-although it's definitely not easy, but it does take some concentration. OK, lots of concentration through certain parts of it. Like the part where you are knitting 2 separate charts while knitting garter stitch wedges while attaching it to the back piece.

I really like the construction and I was checking out Joji Locatelli's other designs, I think I like them all! They're fresh and interesting but totally knittable!

So, because I apparently only finished simple projects-all I have left are projects that require a certain amount of concentration that is nearly impossible to give in public, or when Wee Patrick is feeling particularly feisty.

I grabbed Knitting Socks with Handpainted Yarn by Carol Sulcoski with the best intentions, I figured I would knit the socks that Barb Brown contributed to the book since they are fantastic socks, Barb is a cool person, and I have seen the actual sock from the book...on Barb's feet...in the store...

But then I saw these.

As Stephanie Meyer so ineptly put it-I fell hopelessly, and irrevocably in love.

I LOVE handpainted and hand dyed yarns, but I am really particular about what patterns I use them for. Variegated yarns just don't translate into every pattern well. I have learned that just because you love the yarn, the colour and the pattern, doesn't mean that by combining them you will end up with an attractive pattern. If I am knitting something out of my head-like a quick scarf, cowl, hat, etc-and I choose to use a variegated yarn, invariably I choose moss stitch because it breaks up the colours in a pleasing manner. So imagine a whole book of such yarny knitterly genius!

I'll put Barb Brown's Rib Fantasti c Socks on the back burner and hope that she forgives me for being so fickle.

And yes, those are Signature Needle Arts DPN's. Mumsy gave them to me for Christmas!

Dividing by Zero

2011-12-20T15:39:00.000-08:00

Ever seen one of those demotivational posters about dividing by zero?

Yeah, that's what my knitting world is like right now. Like I said in the last blog post, I am knitting the Hitchiker. Don't get me wrong, I am still enjoying this scarf, even if it is 400yds of garter stitch on 3mm needles (Wait! Maybe THAT'S why it's called the hitchiker scarf, it's like the trilogy that never ends...). I was merrily knitting along thinking that I must be past halfway through this lovely ball of knitting when I committed a major knitting faux pas. I pulled out the scale, weighed the yarn and just about flipped my lid when I saw I had 62 grams left. Which meant I was nowhere near the halfway point. Now, I think weighing yarn is a useful tool. It's great when you are knitting a project that requires 2 of something and you are trying to figure out if you have enough-like socks, mittens, or sweater (weighing the yarn to make sure you have enough for 2 sleeves...). But weighing the yarn just because you can't handle not knowing how much more knitting you have? That is a horrible abyss that no knitter should fall into.

That's not even the worst part. I continued knitting my little project for a while-it's hard to tell how long because people come into the store and I have to stop knitting sometimes, but I figured I had maybe another hour of knitting.

I weighed the ball again.

Seriously, either I am in a time paradox or I have the yarn ball of infinity matter.

Do you know where your towel is?

2011-12-17T16:06:00.001-08:00

Christmas is a comin' and the egg nog is in the nog!

Right now (along with a thousand other projects) I am knitting Hitchhiker.

The name of this pattern is referencing the fantastic Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy (in Five parts). This alone is enough to make me want to knit that pattern-the fact that I really like it is a small bonus.
This fantastic little shawl is so simple! I love how hand dyed variegated yarns translate so beautifully into the garter stitch construction. The silly little nubs on the edge of the shawl keep me going-I am a fickle knitter so if there is a mini-goal (like one more nub) than I find I am a much more successful knitter (which is why I like self striping yarns).
I am knitting this in Malabrigo Sock which is a lovely 100% Merino yarn. All the colours in Malabrigo are incredible. I am extremely happy with how the colour is turning out, I noticed on the Rav page that some of the variegated yarn pooled or flashed in a way that I didn't like, I wanted something that knit up the way the sample in orange/red/yellow turned out-so far that is what is happening and I am ecstatic!

See? See how pretty it's turning out! It took me two tiny little repeats to memorize the pattern! The great thing is that if I lose count of where I am, it doesn't really matter if a few of the nubs are farther apart or closer together because it's such an organic looking design!

As usual I am knitting this for myself. I am a selfish knitter. I knit for myself all the time, I love wearing handknits. I do knit for others occasionally, but I find many people don't really have a n appreciation for hand knit items or don't want to take the time to care for them. I often get funny looks from people when they ask me who I am knitting for and I usually say "Me". Apparently the expectation from the general non-knitting public (or muggles as the Yarn Harlot calls them), is that all knitters should be knitting gifts, at all times. Who do you usually knit for?

I'd also like to take a moment to introduce you to Audrey II

Audrey II is the store's amaryllis. He is only 4 weeks old. Crazy, non? 4 weeks old and already has EIGHT flowers! That's why I called him Audrey II, because I would leave work in the evening and come back and he would have grown a centimetre and a half overnight! (Audrey II is the giant plant in Little Shop of Horrors) I really hope he divides and takes over the world!

Curse you infernal machine!!!

2011-11-24T12:50:00.000-08:00

So...my computer died. This is the 3rd time in twelve months and the fourth time since I bought it 2 and a half years ago. The good news is that I purchased the extended warranty (something I always do for computers since I have yet to buy a computer that doesn't end up needing an extended warranty). The further good news is that this is the 4th time this computer has died and there is a "lemon" clause in my warranty. This means that as soon as it's confirmed that the computer is indeed broken, they will give me a shiny brand new one. I'm switching to Mac. I know there are many people that hate Mac's because of their limits and inability to play awesome games, but I need something stable for the business. Something that is not going to need to go into the shop every 3 months.
While my computer was in the shop, I switched to the backup computer. Yes, we have a backup computer. You don't even want to know how many computers we have... But...the back up computer died. I know! Double You Tee Eff, right? The cord no longer charges the battery. Or the battery no longer charges. Either way, it doesn't work.
So...I switched to the backup backup computer. OK-we don't really have a backup backup computer-it's the Ravelry computer for customers in-store. It's slower than molasses and uglier than sin-but it works! Here's hoping that this computer doesn't die-I'd hate to have to bring the backup backup backup computer into the store because it's REALLY slow. Slower than the slower than molasses computer. Like tectonic plates moving and creating new continents slow. Slow like Austin powers running over that guy with a forklift slow. Slower than the slow food movement. REALLY SLOW!
Yeah, we have a lot of computers...it has to do with my brother being in the computer repair/resale business-so I save them all up and periodically give him a big ole box of computers and accessories.
Out of deference to this archaic device that I am currently utilizing, I am not going to post any photos for this blog post (I don't want to be the one to push the poor thing over the edge, neccesitating the use of the backup backup backup computer).
I am going to share my current project with you. It all started as a Family Knit-a-long. My Aunts and the Mom decided to each knit the Bandana Cowl I decided to give it a whirl and knit one on smaller needles for Patrick using Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran and it turned out fantastic! He looks like a little cowboy when he wears it with his plaid shirt.
I knit another one in a navy Diamond Luxury Superwash Aran for my Stepdad's birthday. He can abuse it and throw it in the wash and it should still survive.
I then knit myself one out of Noro Silk Garden.
Today I am knitting another one in Noro for a friend.
I seem to be knitting one a day.
I think I might be obsessed.
I think I'll knit one for my Dad and for my husband since they would be great for wearing while riding a motorcycle (or so my husband tells me, which may have been a rather broad hint).
An important note from knitting this-the author of the pattern claims that it uses approx 100yds. I found it uses way more (probably closer to 120 yds). In order to compensate for this, and because I hate the idea of opening a second ball of yarn for 15-20 yards, I knit each of these from one ball of yarn that was 95-105 yds depending on the yarn. All I did to accomplish this is knit the pattern until I had just enough yarn to do the 6 row garter stitch edge and cast off. I then stopped whatever part of the pattern I was at and started the edge. It's worked really well so far. The knitting police have not showed up to arrest me yet...

Something for everyone

2011-10-28T10:52:00.000-07:00

I missed last weeks post and apparently people were missing it! I didn't realize I had so many avid readers, so I will try to be a little more diligent in the future.

This weeks pattern is the Echo Flower Shawl.

This lovely pattern has been in my Ravelry queue for a very long time and I haven't had a chance to cast it on... ("had a chance"? who am I kidding, I've cast on about 30 different projects since I first put this in my queue...) It's a free pattern with lovely little nupps, it comes in 2 sizes-this is something I lov e since I am not keen on large shawls-I prefer shawlette's, I wear them like a scarf.

I thought I would do something a little different this week and explore a variety of different yarns that this could be knit in. Mainly because I haven't decided what I want yet, but also to show a variety of yarns suitable for different economic situations. At our store we really strive to have a variety of products in a variety of prices ranges-within that scope we really work hard at making sure that all of our products meet a certain quality level so that all fibre artists can make something they can be proud of.

My first choice of yarn is Ancient Arts Fibre Crafts 70% Long Staple Cashmere/30% Silk

This yarn is, without a doubt, the softest most decadent yarn in the store. The colours are deep and rich and the texture of the yarn is unbelievable. If you are planning on knitting something extra special for yourself or a loved one, I definitely recommend this yarn. Dyed in Canada! Cost to knit this project: $75.98 (eep! However, the cost is definitely worth the quality.)

Yarn choice #2 is malabrigo sock

If you've never used malabrigo sock, you are in for a real treat! This yarn is soft and delightful. Malabrigo is well known for their dyeing prowess and this yarn does not disappoint! It is machine washable, which is a bonus. Cost for this project: $25.99

My third choice for this project is Fleece Artist BFL Socks

BFL is a favourite of mine. I love how it is nearly as soft as merino but has more of a shine to it. I find the colours more vibrant in BFL than in merino. This yarn is hand dyed in Canada by an incredible dyer, her colours are incomparable. Cost to knit this project $17.99

All of these yarns are high quality and worth knitting. For the extra special or extra decadent there is the cashmere, for the more economical or everyday wear you can use Fleece Artist. You don't need to sacrifice quality to save money, $17.99 is not too much to pay for a beautiful handmade object that you will enjoy for years to come.

RETREAT!!!

2011-10-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

So I did miss posting last Friday, but I have a good excuse- we were at the first ever electrictree yarns retreat! It was a fantastic time and Barb Brown, as always, was an amazing instructor!
It was a great group of knitters, some people I have met at other retreats, and some new faces!
The following photos are courtesy of my Aunt, who was a retreat attendee and blogger!

What a lovely group of knitters! My stepdaughter Mackenzie took the class along with us and did a wonderful job!

Nothing but knitting, and talking about knitting, and learning about knitting (and eating and shopping!) for a whole weekend!

The end result: a goofy bag (which isn't goofy at all) a slew of new techniques and skills, and some new friends!

The next retreat is in the planning stages right now!

Friday's pattern is Omar's Carpet Socks! I would/am knitting these in Diamond Luxury Superwash Merino DK. I chose this yarn for a couple reasons-it's a good solid yarn and it's economical. 1 pair of knee high socks is going to cost $26 (plus the evil HST!)

I am really loving how much more even my stitches are after taking Barb's class!

The store is going really well. It's been great meeting so many lovely knitterly people! The bad thing is being surrounded by yarn and patterns all day. It has increased my Knitter's ADD exponentially. There's always a reason to start a new project-"Oh, I just need to try out these needles! I can't very well sell needles I've never used!" I am really hoping the novelty will wear off so I can get some focus!

Is it Friday again?

2011-09-30T16:32:00.000-07:00

Wow! What a fast week. How strange to be back in the working world.
This week's pattern is the Crevasse socks. I would knit it in Sea Sock...oh wait...I already AM knitting in Sea Sock!!

I am already finished the leg, turned the heel and have started working the foot.

Seriously...this is my most favouritest sock yarn that I have ever knit with. It's not cheap but I am pretty sure that it's going to feel like my feet are wrapped in hand knit love.

This weekend we are looking forward to redoing our window! Hallowe'en is coming and we have some great ideas for the display! I am hoping that by doing some awesome displays it might give some downtown businesses a "keeping up with the Joneses" attitude and step it up for some downtown displays.

Sometime next week (hopefully) we are getting a whole bunch of new products in! Our first Ashford order will be here! Piles of roving, spinning wheels and knitter's looms! Bolga Baskets will be here soon, they are beautiful Fair Trade baskets from Ghana, I managed to find a supplier that is a better price than some others and is certified Fair Trade.

Nest week will be busy with new stuff! Hooray!

I love Fridays!

2011-09-23T11:23:00.000-07:00

I am really starting to love Fridays. It's blogoriffic!
The week has been fantastic so far-we had a business mixer on Wednesday night and it went really well, many of our neighbour businesses came out to welcome us. It was great fun and full of great conversations!

I taught Wenda from the Downtown and North Shore Echo magazines how to spin and she took to it like a fish to water! She still claims she doesn't want to knit, but I'm pretty sure I can wear her down. After all, spinning is what prompted me to learn how to knit-I had a pile of handspun yarn and realized that I had to find something to do with it.

Thursday we had the Thompson Treadlers come in for the evening. It was a small but fun group and we had some great conversations. I really enjoyed having the chance to sit down and spin for a couple hours!

Today's pattern is the Bonnie Birds Knee highs by Barb Brown. Barb Brown is the wonderful knitter who is teaching at our retreat in a few weeks (there are a few spaces left!)

Dear Barb: Can you forgive me for copyright infringement?

My Mom is actually going to knit these and she has chosen Pace and Ancient Arts Fibre Crafts as her yarns. Mom is wicked at stranded knitting, so I know they will turn out incredible!

On a final note, I have a funny little story to tell about the word getting around about our little yarn store. The story is a little...personal, so I won't tell you who it was, and if you are at all easily offended I suggest you skip this part (and just by writing that you probably want to read right to the bottom now!)

She was in her doctor's office getting her regular physical, which of course included a pap smear. While she was there in dishabille getting every woman's least favourite, but unfortunately necessary chore over with-the Dr. suddenly asked her "So have you heard of the new yarn store?"

Ladies, word is getting out.

Musical things!

2011-09-17T21:27:00.000-07:00

The past two days have been exceptionally musical! Yesterday I was messing around with a miniature harmonica I picked up at the antique store in Barriere. I looked up some videos on youtube and learned a few blues riffs. This morning on my way to work, I stopped in at Lee's Music and picked up a Hohner Marine Band Harmonica, it's a lovely harp with a wood reed. I've been messing around with it all day. Mackenzie and I walked from Riverside Park to the store and I played it the whole way with Mackenzie jamming some made-up blues lyrics. At one point a couple of elderly ladies clapped and insisted I play some more, I laughed and explained I had only been playing for one day and that was all I knew. I know about 5 riffs now and can throw together a credible blues song.
When I got home there was another musical surprise! My husband had bought a piano for me for our anniversary! It's beautiful! I did some research on it, it is a Lenox by Lauter and was made in Newark, NJ. The piano is about 100 years old. Unfortunately, the company no longer exists so it's going to take a little work to get an exact age even with the serial number. It has been refinished on the outside-but they did a nice job. The harp inside is beautiful with hand painted enamel flowers and hand pressed foil. On the inside paneling for the bottom, harp cover (or whatever you call it) and the top, you can still see the maker initials and chalked serial # (the serial is metal stamped on the harp). From the research I have done I would make a guess of slightly Pre-WWI (that's the great thing about sequential serial numbers). It has a beautiful sound and only two of the hammers need to be slightly adjusted. It's been recently refelted. It's fantastic!
I am not much of a piano player, I can read music for it somewhat, but it's a labourious process. I am hoping withe constant access to a piano I can improve my playing.
Include my recent return to guitar playing and I may have a slight decrease in my knitting...however I take lots of time for knitting in the store so I feel no guilt!

Friday Again!

2011-09-16T13:51:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's already Friday! The weather is starting to cool down, which bodes well for yarns sales. I am so excited that it's finally cool enough that I can wear all my hand knits!

Todays Pattern is Olympia by Kristin Spurkland. It's wonderfully asymmetrical and unusual. This one has been in my queue on Ravelry for quite some time. I have a few things on the needles that I HAVE to finish or horrible guilt will overcome me, then I can cast on my next knit which will be this or the Opposite Pole Cardigan *subject to change

Isn't it purdy? It's feminine without being lacey or flowery (not that there's anything wrong with that...)

My in-store choice for this project is Debbie Bliss Angel

This yarn is quite a bit finer than what is recommended. However, somebody knit this project in Rown Kidsilk Haze which is the same weight (honestly the yarn is almost exactly the same, as is Kid-Seta) I love how her project turned out, so I am going to follow her lead and do this in a mohair/silk laceweight.

By the way, most of my links to yarns, patterns, etc, are Ravelry links. If you aren't on Ravelry already, and you are a knitter, your life is horribly empty black hole. Ravelry is the greatest resource on the internet for knitter's and crocheters. You have access to tens of thousands of patterns, virtually every yarn on the planet, and every combination thereof. There are groups and forums for learning, socializing, etc. So go there and join! While you're there, join the electrictree yarns group!

As the Co-owner of a yarn store, Ravelry helps me daily to find yarns and projects for people. If someone comes in and knows the name of a pattern, but can't remember what yarn it uses, and how much-I can look it up immediately and help them pick out something that works. We have a Ravelry computer in-store for customer use.

New Things

2011-09-09T19:38:00.000-07:00

Here's an idea I had to help me publish more regularly. Every Friday I am going to post my favourite pattern of the week, talk about why I like it, and what in-store yarn I would use to knit it.
Today's pattern is the Opposite Pole Cardigan (rav link). I LOVE THIS SWEATER! Obviously I can't knit every pattern I blog about, but this one jumps out and screams "KNIT ME!!!"
Just look at it!

Maybe it doesn't call to you the way it does to me, but I love this sweater!

I love how it has so many interesting elements without being too busy. I love that it's a circle. I love that it has cables. I love the how the short rows look in garter stitch.

I would knit this sweater in Cascade Ecological Wool.

Cascade Ecological Wool is surprisingly soft and springy. It's good for the environment and good for your pocket book. It comes in big 200 gram/478 yard skeins for $19.99 a skein.

This pattern calls for 1400-2000 yards, and one of the great things about it is that it comes in a huge variety of sizes! 30"-60" bust! I absolutely love it when designers try to please as many people as possible.
Another nice thing about the pattern is on the Ravelry page-they have the yarn requirements for the individual sizes available. Often designers just put in a size range and a yardage range so that unless you are the smallest or the largest size, you have no idea what your yardage requirements are going to be unless you buy the pattern. For someone like me, who constantly "shops" for patterns and likes to weigh out a million pros and cons, I love it when I can look at the Rav page, see the yardage for my size, and figure out if the cost of the project is going to be prohibitive before I purchase the pattern.

I love this pattern, I love this yarn!

What a day, what a day, what a mighty good day!

2011-09-07T14:40:00.000-07:00

Our first day as a street level business was a wonderful success! We had 80 delightful people show up and fondle yarn.
After 2 months of intense work and sleepless nights, today has been relaxing and not at all anti-climactic. Business has been steady, but at a rate where we can actually talk to our new customers. My two favourite things that people have been saying to us are "Downtown Kamloops really needed something like this!" and "I was just walking by and saw your store!" Nearly a third of the people that came into the store didn't even know it was our Grand Opening, they just saw a cool yarn store and stopped in!
I was even able to find the time to do a little spinning and knitting on some personal projects during store hours today.
I feel like it's onward and upwards from here!

Tomorrow!

2011-09-05T22:10:00.001-07:00

After months of hard work the store is opening tomorrow. It is full of beautiful skeins and balls of yarn that are beautiful and soft fibres for spinning. There is a comfortable place to sit and knit or spin and enjoy the atmosphere. There are gouramis swimming around in a lovely little fish bowl. We have Sea Monkeys. The room is filled with interesting antiques and vintage items, some for sale and some for show. We have a tea station. We have an interesting variety of local goods. We have chairs with knitted covers and a rug that looks like yarn. We have spinning wheels and vintage sock blockers. There are buttons, shawl pins and stitch markers. There are cable needles, circular needles, and double pointed needles. There is qiviut, mohair, bison and linen. There is Habu, Fleece Artist, Handmaiden, Ancients Arts Fibre Crafts, and Zauberball. You can find silk, merino, cashmere, linen, cotton, soy, bamboo, and alpaca yarns.
In short, it's my favourite yarn store in the whole wide world.

The Rumours are True!!!

2011-07-17T22:03:00.000-07:00

I know I was planning on blogging more, I do remember saying that...but I have this issue with blogging-when something exciting is in the works I stop blogging. I seem to get my brain all wrapped around things and can't think of anything else-so I tend to stop blogging until the timing is appropriate.
Well the time is now!!
electrictree yarns is opening it's retail location on September 6th!!!!! We have a lovely location in Downtown Kamloops at 290 3rd Ave. The rest of July and August will be spent painting and prepping the store, ordering yarn, and setting everything up!
There are no words to describe how incredibly excited we are!

The Socks Talk

2011-05-30T21:24:00.000-07:00

The Socks Talk
My first podcast and I am really excited about it! I spent a long time trying to figure out how to link and feedburn and bladiddy blah blah podcasts to my blog. Then I went to podcast and added a new "blog roll" widget to this blog.
I found the easy way!
Check it out and let me know what you think!!

Innovation

2011-05-30T17:40:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy week at Chez electrictree! New colours have been in development. The dye pots have been crazy busy and are about to get busier!

This is my favourite new colour! It is called "fresh fig" and took 2 weeks to develop with many one of a kinds skeins created along the way! I had the colour in my head and just kept messing around until it all came together. I am quite enamoured of this colour.

Much, much more dyeing is in the forefront! The lovely Caroline Sommerfeld of Ancient Arts Fibre Crafts just made a ginormous order for electrictree yarn! And she's taking it to SOCK SUMMIT!!! I can't even describe how incredibly excited I am!!!! Like 4 exclamation points excited!!!!

I have been developing a new pattern that I am really excited about. It's a colourwork pattern and is based on the Frogger video game! The pattern class for 6 different colours, so it will be available as a pattern for purchase as well as a a kit.

Our new sock yarn is particularly conducive to stranded colourwork!

We have been releasing several patterns under the electrictree brand. They are available on Ravelry. Recently a raveler decided to do the eukaryotes pattern and modified it in a rather ingenious way. She attached it to the Nessie Scarf and the effect is fantastic!

I think it's perfectly suited to the project and I love the yarn choice! It's absolutely thrilling, as a designer, to have my pattern not only knit, but done in such a creative manner! If you get a chance check it out and tell her how wonderful you think it is!

Zee colours, my god zee colours!

2011-05-25T10:01:00.000-07:00

This week has been busy on the dyeing front! (That's dyeing, not dying!)
I've been spending a lot of time developing colours and have a few that I am very happy with. I'ts funny how at first the fact that I was missing some colours was frustrating, later became and excuse to be creative.
Right now I am dyeing lots of fibre for spinning and a whole bunch of yarn. the yarn is for a new special pattern I am developing. I have it all charted out, I jsut have to get the yarn dyed and test knit it! The knew pattern will be....Froggersox! That's right! I love the classic arcade game, and decided to make some fun socks based on the game. I have altered them enough to prevent copyright infringement but still have them be immediately recognizable. The socks will be available as a kit or as a pattern for sale. I think the kits will be the most economical since there are 6 colours in the sock. I think a 6 colour hand dyed sock kit is a wonderful thing! This is one of those times that having a big foot is a good thing! I'll use my yarn amounts as the max amount of yarn (plus a little extra of course) in the kits!
I have 2 new colours that I think turned out really well, and one more in development! Here's a sneak peak at the new shades. (Imagine with more vibrancy since my camera tends to wash things)

I freely admit...

2011-05-18T16:37:00.000-07:00

I freely admit that I have been sucking in the blogging department for the past half year. I take full responsibility. I have a hundred excuses and reasons...but I still take responsibility.
My motto in life seems to be "Bite off more than you can chew!" and while I don't eschew (hyukhyuk) this motto, I sometimes think to myself "Oh crap! I bit off more than I can...chew!" I can't help it, it's just how I roll. Who wouldn't think that being the President of the Kamloops Arts Council, while co-running a business from home, while being in the Sweet Adelines (Barbershop Harmony Chorus and far more work than you might imagine, I assure you!), becoming more involved in the Society for Creative Anachronism , while raising a 16 month old boy and an 11 year girl wouldn't be a big ole slice of cherry pie? To be honest, most of the time I love it. I find that if I crazy overwork myself, I feel a sense of accomplishment. There are 16 million and 52 things I want to learn to do in this life and only a finite amount of time to do them! It might be easier if I was a TV dinner Mom, I could probably save a lot of time if I didn't cook so much. Although I bet my lack of desire for cleaning probably gives me a couple of extra hours a week!
It all came into perspective today when I realized Patrick was sleeping and it was sunny. Which meant I could catch up on my knitting photography for my projects on Ravelry. The joy was palpable, I was prancing around with my kntiting laying it on the ground and snapping pics like a tourist at the Grand Canyon. How life has changed, that a few fleeting moments in the son without my toddlers becomes such an event. I am not complaining, Wee Patrick is the joy of my life, but he has taught me one really, truly important thing - people that put harnesses on their children are not bad people. I used to be so disgusted by it. Now, I truly understand. I have not put a harness on Patrick simply because I am tenacious and I just can't bring myself to making my child into a dog. But I no longer frown upon the people that do, because I know that not everyone is as hellbent stubborn as I am. Thank you Patrick for teaching my tolerance.
Business is zooming along quite prettily. We have confirmation for our first knitting retreat which is going to be an amazing weekend on Saltspring Island with knitting expert Barb Brown. She's one of my favourite people in the knitting world and I could think of no one better for our first retreat! I waslucky enough to share a room with her at the first retreat I ever went to and I find her a joy to be around. Knowledgable, funny, down to earth, and a damn good knitter too! The details will be available soon (as will our website!).
I'm throwing around the idea of podcasting. I am usually a glib individual but am not sure how I will do with out someone to actually talk to, (or mock). I think it would be a lot of fun, but am not sure how I will fit it in since I can't even seem to do regular blog posts. I think I am going to try to commit to weekly blog posts, and if I can do that, then I shall reward myself with podcasting (since apparently I have the attention span of a 5 year old, I figure this strategy might work well.)
Mother is busy right now combing the hell out of bufallo hides and musk ox hides. This means electrictree yarns will soon be carrying bison down and the ever elusive Qiviut. Not only will this help us make money to expand our business, I am reasonably sure that with Qiviut in our inventory I can probably gather a fair number of souls and first borns.
Now it is time to sign off and continue the dinner making. I am trying out my new convection toaster oven. It has a rotisserie so I making a roast and going to cook some taters as well-all in my wee toaster oven-which, by the way, is not overheating my kitchen right now! Yay!

Calorie Free Day!

2011-04-21T07:17:00.000-07:00

I declare today to be calorie free! Today is my birthday and for the past 2 months I have been very conscious and careful of what I eat. I have been exercising lots and drnking lots of water. I have lost 16 pounds. (Although I should mention I have lost 70 since Patrick was born since it`s WAY more impressive). I have earned today and feel no guilt!
Today I am going to have French Toast with syrup and sausaged for breakfast from my favourite restaurant. I am going to spin and knit all day and watch all my favourite movies. This evening after going out for dinner with my family I am going to go to a tattoo show and then go to karaoke.
In short, I am going to act like a spoiled teenager and do all the things that I want to do and not feel guilty about it!
Hooray for today!

Busy Busy Like a Spring Bee!

2011-04-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

Things have been extremely busy at both Chateau electrictree. Mother electrictree has been busy working on some amazing new displays for fibre shows and fantastic new patterns! Our last electrictree pattern is the most popular yet and to date has a gratifying 73 hearts on Ravelry!!! We are just tickled (the actual motion is probably more like jumping up and down, high-fiving, fist-pumping, and yelling "YEAH!").

A few new patterns are in the works such as a sock version of the electrictree winter gloves.

A new shawlette in our delightful earthly yarn will be out soon!

And the very strange eurkaryotes pattern should be out late this week, early next in our fun new 100% soy tape yarn!

The dye pots have been burbling away. We had a huge shipment come in last week of soy tape, baby camel, sock yarn, and mink (yes like mink coats, it is so soft it is amazing!)

Here is a photo of some camel yarn and mink yarn spooning in the sun.

Soon there will be another shipment of our already popular ephemeral, expansive and entwine to dye.
We are expanding our line to include spinning fibre, Merino and BFL hand dyed top will soon be available!
In addition I have been practicing for this month Burlesque show! My stage name is Lizzie Borden (yes, like the turn of the century crazy-lady aze murderer,) this show I am singing I'm Tired by Madeline Kahn from Blazing Saddles. If you've never heard it, it's a hoot! Check it out on youtube here. I've made a few changes to it, like nixing the soldier singers and I don't sing with a Bavarian accent. I considered hamming it up like Madeline Kahn but figured that anyone who hasn't seen the movie might not get that it's a joke and that I don't really suck at singing-I have my pride too y'know.

New Pattern!

2011-04-07T13:48:00.000-07:00

electrictree fingerless winter gloves!

We have a fantastic new pattern available for download via Ravelry. If you aren't already on Ravelry and you indulge in the fibre arts, you really need to join! Over 40,000 patterns are available, of which nearly half are free! You can look at projects and see what kind of yarns other people used with projects and what they have to say about it.
Our new pattern has been up for 3 and a half hours and already has 25 hearts! Hooray!
Check it out here.

Book Review!!!

2011-03-13T13:08:00.000-07:00

Ok...maybe it's not a book review...maybe it's more like a book gush, or an "Ode to Book."
I just purchased Knitting Knee Highs: Sock Styles from Classic to Contemporary by Barb Brown. (Rav link here). It's a beautiful book full of amazing patterns that are fully adaptable to a variety of styles.

Here is my copy of the book lovingly nestled in some of my hand dyed yarn destined for Abbotsford.

Here is the inscription from Barb. See? We're practically BFF's!! I shared a room with Barb at a knitting retreat and she has bionic eyes (no joke here, it's totally awesome...I think she might secretly have lasers in them or something). So of course, I think she's a totally rad person.

I love this book. I had to force myself not to toss my current UFO's out the window and cast on socks. They pattterns are beautiful. They come from a variety of ethnic inspirations and a wide variety of styles. You can do knee-highs, you can knit regular socks, ankle socks, or even leg warmers! The possibilities are endless. I am already planning my first pair!
This morning when I went downstairs to the dye pots in preparation for next weekend I had a list of colourways that I wanted to do. The list was tossed off to the side and I started experimenting with colours especially for me, so I can knit the socks in this book in the colours that I want! I just made a colour way that I think I will call "Barb's Browns." (If Barb will let me that is!).

enduring vines

2011-03-11T17:00:00.001-08:00

enduring vines mittens

by electrictree

Enduring Vines is a snug fitting gauntlet knit in two colours in the Latvian style.

Knit in fingering weight yarn, it will keep little fingers warm on the coldest day.

Yarn: yardage and weight: electrictree extremity – colourway, natural

electrictree extremity – colourway, elrond

Needles: US 0(2. mm) 4 double pointed needles or size needed to get gauge.

Notions: Stitch holder

Gauge: 36 stitches per 4 inches

Size: 2 ¾ inches wide by 8 inches long to fit small child’s hand.

2 Colour Seed stitch:

Knit in 2 colours, A and B

Row 1: *Knit 1 in A, purl 1 in B* repeat to end of row.

Row 2: *Purl 1 in A, kKnit 1 in B* repeat to end of row.

Repeat rows 1 and 2 to desired length.

Mitten:

Using 2 colour cast-on, cast on 48 stitches loosely, onto 3 needles (12, 12, 24).

Knit cuff in 2 colour seed stitch for 1 inch (2.5 cm).

Follow colour chart to row 40 and make opening for thumb as follows.

Row 40: Knit 1, put next 11 stitches on stitch holder. Knit to end of row.

Row 41: Knit 1, cast on 11 stitches. Knit to end of row.

Continue in pattern to row 58.

Row 58: Slip1, k 1, psso, knit next 20 stitches in pattern, k 2 tog. Repeat.

Row 57: Slip1, k 1, psso, knit next 18 stitches in pattern, k 2 tog. Repeat

Continue in this manner, decreasing 4 stitches on every row until 8 stitches remain.

Weave stitches together.

Thumb:

Pick up 11 stitches from stitch holder. Pick up 1 stitch from the mitten. Put on 2 needles.

Pick up 11 cast off stitches. Pick up 1 stitch from the mitten.

Follow chart to row 16.

Decrease and finish in the same manner as the mitten.

Sew in all ends.

Repeat for other hand making sure to put the 11 stitch thumb opening at the beginning of the third needle.

Holy Crazy Woman Batman!

2011-03-09T10:59:00.001-08:00

Normally I save my ranting for my Facebook friends, but I wanted to tell you a little story about a woman I saw this morning. I was driving the stepbrat to school when all of a sudden she said "There is some woman driving and she's using her phone!" For anyone not from this part of the world, last year a law was instituted that makes it illegal to use handheld devices while driving. This makes fantastic sense since you use your hands for driving... I thought it was great that Mackenzie was disugsted by this woman. I'm proud of her for thinking of things like this (although she's 11, so who knows...in 2 years she might think it's "cool!").
I glanced over thinking she's talking on her phone and this woman is texting while driving and her other hand she has a cigarette! Now I am no math whiz, but I am reasonably sure that 2 hands minus one hand for texting, minus one had for smoking equals somewhere in the vicinity of zero.
Man was I mad! She's not only putting her life in danger, she was putting my life in danger and the lives of my kids. About 10 seconds later we were stopped at an intersection side by side. I couldn't resist making sure she knew what I thought. Really, I used to be a lot worse. I used to be much louder and more outspoken (hard to believe, I know.) But I have tried really hard to mellow out with age. However, there are just some things I cannot be quiet about-anything that effects my family's safety is one of those things. I think that if everybody keeps "minding their own business" than we make things like this quasi-socially acceptable. So I honked my horn and when she looked up from her phone, cigarette gracefully grasped between her fingers, her mouth an "O" of surprise-I made a phone to my head gesture while mouthing the word as if she was hard of hearing ("PHO-ONE!"), made an angry face and a full swining hand chopping motion.
I honestly thought she would be angry and rudely gesture back, but apparently I frightened her and she looked completely embarassed and spent the rest of the time very carfeully driving in my blindspot so I couldn't see her.
I only feel slightly guilty that I wonder if I could knit while driving...

Yaaarrrrrnnn!!

2011-03-06T11:23:00.000-08:00

Fibres West is coming up soon! On March 18th and 19th electrictree yarns is going to be there slogging our wares! the house is redolent with acrid scent of fresh dye and dead bugs (what can I say, that's what silk smells like...). I love the masses of yarn that are drying all over the house.

Sorry about the picture quality, I no longer have a good camera and now have to take stills from my camcorder until I can find a replacement.

We have expanded our line. We have merino/nylon sock (extremity), merino/silk fingering (ephemeral), superwash worsted (expansive), silk noil light fingering (earthly), and silk laceweight (exquisite.) We will also have a variety of fantastic accessories, bamboo lazy kates, raw fibre (shetland, mohair, angora, and hopefully quiviut!).

We are really excited about this event, it's our 3rd fibre fest, but it's our first major one. We are one of over 30 booths. This will be the largest one I have ever been too! The hardest part will be not splurging on ridiculous amounts of yarn and fibre!

electrictree bobble shawlette

2011-02-24T07:27:00.000-08:00

This delightful little pattern is a fun way to use up one of those small skeins of laceweight, but still have a fantastic finished product. This shawlette is made with 1 skein of electrictree entwine (100% merino laceweight). The delightful little bobble add a little pizzazz to a simple and easy design!

electrictree bobble shawlette

1 skein electrictree entwine (440 yds/merino laceweight)

Colourway: quoth the raven

4.5 mm. needles. I used 24” circulars

cable needle

Definitions

C4F: slip 2 stitches onto cable needle. Hold in front. Knit 2 stitches from main needle. K2 stitches from cable needle.

Cable pattern:

Row 1: *K4, P5, repeat. to center stitch, yo, k1, yo. K4, P4 to end of row.

Row 2: *P 4, K5 repeat to end.

Row 3: *C4F. P5*,repeat to center stitch, yo, k1, yo. *C4F. P5* repeat to end.

Cast on 3 sts.

Rows 1 – 6: Knit

Row 7: Pick up and knit 3 sts from side edge and 3 sts from

cast on edge. 9 sts.

Row 8 (WS): K3, p3, k3.

Row 9 (RS): K3, yo, k1, yo, k1 yo, k1, yo, k3. 13 sts.

Row 10 and all alternate rows: K3, p to last 3 sts, k3.

Row 11: K3, yo, k3, yo, k1 (center stitch), yo, k3, yo, k3. 17 sts.

Row 12 and all alternate rows: K3, yo, knit to center stitch, yo, k1, yo, k to last three sts, yo, k3.

Repeat rows 9 and 11 until there are .

Set up Cable: Maintain garter stitch edge and increases.

Row 1: K3, yo, *K4, increase 1 purlwise in next stitch by picking up stitch from previous row. P4* repeat to center stitch, yo, K1, yo, *K4, increase 1 purlwise in next stitch, P4* repeat to end of row, yo, k3.

Continue in cable pattern until 3 complete patterns have been completed.

To begin the bobbles, make a bobble of the first 4 stitches on your needle. Cast off stitches until you get to the first cable stitches.

At the center: cast off stitches that are not cable stitches.

Bobbles Pattern:

Row 1: K4.

Row 2: P4.

Row 3: C4F.

Row 4: P4.

Rows 5-8: Repeat rows 1-4.

Row 9: *Inc 1 by knitting in the front and back of stitch, K1* 4 times

Row 10: P

Row 11: Inc 1 in next stitch, K8, Inc 1 in last stitch. (10 stitches.

Rows 12-18: Stocking stitch- K1 row, P1 row.

Break yarn, Thread through the 10 stitches. Pull tight and secure with a knot. Sew the bobble together halfway. Roll some fibre into a ball and stuff the bobble. Finish sewing the bobble sides together.

Attach yarn to stitches on needle. Cast off 5 purl stitches. Make another bobble with the next 4 cable stitches. Continue until the entire bottom of the shawlette is bobbled.

Weave in ends.

Block.

Love.

Ummm...I can't handle this...

2011-02-23T18:23:00.000-08:00

Seriously...the Yarn Harlot just made my life extremely difficult. I was reading a recent post where she explains her weakness for a kit. This is often the case in her blogging, and while I often like the kits/patterns she chooses, I am rarely enamored of them. This time it's different. This time I saw the link and just about fainted in my seat. Then I made a huge mistake. A mistake I will forever regret. I started browsing through the rest of the kits on the website.
I am already a huge fan of habu, but now I am a fanatic. I feel horribly empty inside because I don't have one of these kits.
This is ridiculously greedy. For more reasons than the obvious. the fabulous lady from Long Dog Yarns is moving to Vancouver and she gave me 4 bags of yarn and fibre. And it's beautiful stuff, it's not all the crap that nobody wants-there's some really fantastic stuff! I am knitting a sweater with some of the Noro sock that she gave me. There's a whole giant garbage bag of hand dyed merinoX roving. It's her own dyeing and I absolutely LOVE the colours.
So really-I have enough yarn to clothe me, my family, and 3 generations of descendants through the apocalypse and all I can think is that if I don't get my hands on a habu kit I might actually die.
It's a cruel world...

A time for change

2011-02-15T07:43:00.000-08:00

There's a lot going on at our house right now. My youngest stepmonster has moved in with us Monday to Friday. It's a good move and one we have been working towards for many years. But it's still a change and we are still settling in and pushing boundaries. Patrick is very excited to have his big sister around so much.
Patrick has been growing like a weed, despite my best efforts to deprive him of sustenance thereby ensuring a small and docile child. He's mostly eating the same foods as the rest of us now and we only resort to baby food when we eat unhealthy (like fast food). He says "Dada", "Mama", and "Banana". He can wave goodbye and loves clapping his hands.
There's a lot of good yarniness going on at my house. I have been doing a lot of dyeing in preparation for Fibres West
.
I just dropped off our first whole sale order to Twist of Fate. Our yarn line now has Merino/Nylon Sock, Merino Laceweight, Superwash worsted weight, Silk laceweight, and Silk Noil fingering weight. We are also going to have Shetland roving, angora fibre and Qiviut!! For those not in the know Qiviut is the soft underfibre from the Musk Ox. It is one of the softest and most decadent fibres in the world. It's expensive and rare so we're pretty excited to have it! Fibres West is at the Abbostford Ag-Rec centre on March 18th-19ty

And everything in between

2010-11-09T10:58:00.000-08:00

Blog posts have been few and far between, the combination of travel, starting new business, and dealing with a crawling baby leave little time for things like blogging. A lot has been going on, so as usual when I have a lot to talk about I am going to do a photo montage.

First imagine a photo of us at the Cowichan Fleece and Fibre Expo and tonnes of people shopping and buying our yarns and us almost selling out of everything and me with an annoyed look on my face because I forgot to bring my camera but happy because we sold so much.

I finished Tiny's sweater! It looks really good and is really warm, and is really scratchy!

Patrick styled his own hair with boogers.

Patrick and I went to Saltspring for Mom's birthday.

Tiny and Mackenzie carved a most excellent pumpkin/s

Tiny and I went out for Hallowe'en and saw Larry who we don't get to see to often. He seemed to be doing really well even if he was rather irreverently dressed as a 6'7" Jesus with a sock belt. I paid him $5 to sing "Knocking on Heaven's Door."

We got home from our fun evening out to find that our babysitter had her sleeve stuck in her braces.

9 days ago Patrick learned to crawl (he went from 0 to across the room in about 2.2 seconds), 5 days ago he learned to pull himself up and stand, yesterday he learned to let go and stand on his own. ...I'm not ready for this...

Our business bought a Pat Green Carder with roving attachment. This is a huge deal! Onward and upward I say!!!

The people we bought the carder from had kittens. After seeing them I couldn't resist and took one home. He is a Himalayan X and a polydactyl!! (To be honest, if he hadn't been a polydactyl we probably wouldn't have taken him home). His name is Ozymandias and 24 hours in our house he is right at home.

Dyeing

2010-09-16T08:21:00.001-07:00

Lately. my life has been filled with colour! I have been dyeing yarn for my and Mom's electrictree endeavour! I am really enjoying experimenting with colour and creating what I planned or being pleasantly surprised with a colour combination! Right now I am trying to pick what colour to knit for a sample.

I have been trying to make sure I dye colours that might not be my favourite (as well as coolours I love of course!) so that there is something to appeal to a broader range of tastes.
I have also joined a chorus group! It's so much fun! Tuesday was the first night I went, it's a four part harmony barbershop style singing group and apparently I sing lead or bass (which all the bass singers were ridiculously excited about.) The first song we are learning is Little St. Nick by the Beachboys (which of course means we'll also be able to sing Little Deuce Coupe) The regular members were rather excited about how ridiculously excited I was to be singing with them!
This Friday (tomorrow, egads!) I am going to be singing the National Anthems at the Storm Hockey game. The Canadian National Anthem is no big deal I have done it lots, but I have only sang the American one once, and it's a hard weird song to sing (I have a hard time remembering the lyrics because most of the time they don't make sense...) I'll have my cue card with me jus tin case!

Neglect

2010-09-06T12:53:00.000-07:00

I have been rather neglectful of my blog lately. Things have been really busy lately and I have found that I prefer doing things rather than write about them when my time is strapped.
The busyness has not been a bad thing, some of it has been lots of fun. I have recently begun playing guitar again and so practicing has taken up a fair amount of time. This guitar playing differs significantly from the playing I did as a teen. I am lot less self conscious and less worried about playing it exactly as the original artist did. Consequently while my skill level is lower, I think that I am a better player. I sing now too, which I never did before. I hav ebeen having lots of fun finding songs to play and sing and I got to play at the Bizarre Bazaar (a local artisan market) which was a great experience.
I have been doing a lot of yarn dyeing and am exciting to be doing some work with my Mom on that score. We will be debuting our yarn products at the Summerland Fibre Festival on October 9th! I am really looking forward to the work and slowly expanding our business into a yarn empire!
Patrick has ...expanded... he's much larger, weird how that happens... he can sit up on his own, roll over front to back and back to front, popped his first tooth and will be doing the second and hour now. He charms every person he meets. Right now he is in the Jolly Jumper jumping on Mackenzie's head...
Mackenzie goes back to school tomorrow and we had a good time shopping for school clothes. We went to Winners and got some great deals on some "fancy pants" (my name for trendy jeans). I spent the morning hemming jeans and steampunking a shirt for her. She gets her haircut this afternoon and is excited to be going back to school with "the best wardrobe ever."
My next post will be all about yarn!!! I should be getting a yarn order in this week for dyeing!

Reverb

2010-07-26T19:32:00.000-07:00

I recently got working on my Reverbnation account. Reverbnation is a place where musicians and fans can share music. Lately I have been working on my guitar playing. after several years of not playing at all they are severely weak. I have added 2 songsto my reverbnation account and while they are basically first takes and the guitar playing is...crappy, the response has been good and I am #10 in the Kamloops local Rock charts (out of about 30 musicians).
So check it out here and if you like it become a fan! Hopefully I can add more stuff soon!

Kitty Wool

2010-06-30T17:40:00.000-07:00

Today I washed a fleece...apparently for my cat...

Can you see her?

How about now?

Fuzzy Boots

2010-06-22T10:39:00.000-07:00

I am making fuzzy boots. It's kind of fun because I had no plan to make fuzzy boots in the first place, but that's where I ended up. I had this idea that I would make myself some felted boots for my SCA garb (the SCA is a medieval re-enactment group). Leather would be more authentic but felted botos doesn't require me to learn a new skill set. I thought they would be a smooth felt, not ridiculous looking mukluks...
I contemplated several different techniques and options, perused the internet for hours looking for a good pattern to no avail. Eventually I decided to design my own. Next came choosing the yarn. The idea is that I wanted to make a pair of thick durable boots. Eventually I choose a six strand "yarn" simialr to White Bufallo. With giant needles that looked like they were more appropriate for staking vampires I knit a giant sock. I mean GIANT. So big, that I could wear it as a toque. I felted it in the washer which was great fun because it looked like there was a giant wet Wookie in the washer. Unfortunately, I didn't get any photos of the process which was great fun.

All in all, it was a fun project and very quick, which is great because knitting time is few and far between right now! (I don't even have time to write this post!)

Photo Montage

2010-05-10T09:05:00.000-07:00

A picture says a thousand words right? This weekend Patrick and I headed down for a trip to Saltspring. It's always a good time and getaway. Saltspring is where I lived until I was in grade 12 and I tend to go back every couple of months for a visit.

Patrick travelled well

He was very happy to see the grandparents.

One of my favourite things about going down there is the food...

Fresh fresh fresh eggs, freshly plucked that morning and eaten right away...yummm unborn chickens...

Goatmeal crisp with fresh goatmilk!

Whenever I go down there is always some kind of fibre preparation! This time we were trying out Border Cheviot fleece which was mostly horrible, but I found a small pîece that wasn`t too bad.

Springtime is always great on the mountain because there are always chicks and lambs about.

I will try to remember to get a pic of the lambs in the next post.

No trip to Saltspring is complete without a giant cloud of poisonous gas created by Tim (my brother, and no joke, it really was poisonous gas...)

There was lots of sunshine

Mom always finds awesome dead things for me

A raven skull, the top of a chicken skull, and a racoon skull complete with mandible.

Saltspring is awesome!

Retreat!!!!!

2010-04-25T17:10:00.001-07:00

This weekend Patrick and I went to the Twist of Fate Retreat at Sun Peaks! Sivia Harding instructed us on beaded lace. It was a blast! My aunt was also there so it was a nice visit. She brought me some yarn, it's my first skein of Socks that Rocks and I might sleep with it under my pillow I love it so much.

My aunt has been knitting for quite a bit longer than me so by giving me yarn I think that makes her kind of like a drug pusher...

Sun Peaks is a small ski village, and there aren't even a dozen shops there but my aunt and I somehow managed to find yarn! There was a clothing store that had a couple baskets in the corner.

I bought a skein more for the principle of the thing rather than from any real need or desire.

The pattern we knitted is called the Ophidian Shawlette and it's a lovely little garment knit in soft fingering weight yarn. Picking out our yarn and beads was enjoyable and there was much covetting going on after choices were made. There's nothing like hanging out with other knitters to reassure me that my knitting obsession is not totally insane! It makes me wonder if crazy people don't feel crazy in the nuthouse!

Unfortunately I was so obsessed with the actual knitting, I didn't take any photos until the last hour of the retreat...

So just imagine people more peppy and excited and that's what the retreat was really like...

In addition to the Ophidian Shawlette, Sivia also showed us her stash of beads and I couldn't help but think that beads are so tiny and a bead stash must not be as guilt inducing as a yarn or fibre stash! We also learned some new cast-off techniques and blocking.

The whole weekend was yarn-knit-bead gluttony and I loved it! Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory was across the street from the hotel which really helped with weekend enjoyment.

During Sivia's blocking demonstration my knitting (in the orange) got a little fresh with some other people's projects.

The first thing I did when I got home was take a whole bunch of pictures of my knitting, this is something my friend Kirsten calls Yarnography (...kind of like pornography...only with yarn...)

See the pretty beads? They were clear with a copper coloured lining, but showed up all warm golden when introduced to the knitting.

I took pictures inside and outside but unfortunatrely my cheap little camera couldn't do the colour of the yarn justice.

It was a wonderful time and Sivia is a great person who really has a knack for teaching!

A great week!

2010-04-23T11:47:00.000-07:00

Today has been an absolutely fantabulous week!! It was my birthday on wednesday, which was low-key but still very nice! Tiny got me the coolest present ever!
Next week I start fight practices so I need a helm! I am super excited! It's going to be painful, difficult, possible horrible, and totally AWESOME!

Patrick is getting better at tummy time.

Like his little tattoo? We went to a tattoo show last night and Patrick was sporting his own very badass tattoo.

He doesn't get as much tummy time as he should because he hates it. He almost always gets really mad. He's a big baby with a big honking head so he often spends a large part of "tummy time" face down yelling at the ground. It's almost as funny as when he gets mad at his hiccups. He's getting better at it, and I am determined to make him do it more because I realized he was going to be walking before he could crawl. The kid has crazy strong legs and can stand just fine for a few seconds as long as you balance him. So I am encouraging him to crawl because you're supposed to crawl before you can walk...that reminds me of my little brother who never did learn to crawl-he used to drag himself around with his incredibly strong arms with his legs limply trailing behind him, like a naga.

I have been kntting the February Lady sweater...again. The first attempt was with a lovely red wool, but I somehow majorly screwed up the increases and it was really wonky. I also didn't like that particular yarn in garter stitch, the fabric was not pleasing to me. So this time I am knitting it in a linen/cotton blend. This yarn I had used on another project and it was horrible. It was stocking stitch and every little difference in tension showed up, it was very unforgiving. Luckily this yarn turned out awesome for this project. I figured since I now have several hand knit sweaters in wool, linen/cotton would be a nice alternative-something comfortable and non-scrathcy that I can throw over a tank top on a summer evening. The colour is also ideal for my wardrobe of black, brown and green.

This weekend I am super excited to be going to my second knitting retreat. The first one was so cool, if this one is even half as fun I'll be really happy. My aunt is also going, so I'll get to hang out and knit with her! The retreat is up at Sun Peaks ski resort and last night I realized I didn't have any hats that fit Patrick anymore so I whipped up this little number in leftover Malabrigo Worsted Merino.

I made up the pattern, I like how it spirals.

So I am off to learn beaded lace knitting with Sivia Harding! Wahoo!

You know you did good when...

2010-04-10T21:42:00.000-07:00

You know you did good when you tell people you made your sweater and they don't believe you.
I am loving my luminen sweater. I love how it looks and feels, I love wearing it. I know it's going to pill like a crazy mofo and I have already forgiven it for it's future transgressions because I love it and it loves me. Do you know how I know it loves me? Because it makes me look good when I wear it and that baby is true, true love.

Patrick had a bad couple of days...oh wait I digress...I had a bad couple days while Patrick was merely grumpy. His grumpiness was the simple product of his refusal to nap during the day and he subesquently got grumpier and grumpier as the day progressed.
He totally made up for a bad couple of days with today though. We went to a really awesome wedding and he was exceptionally well behaved and charming the whole time. So I think he was saving it all up for today and I am totally OK with that.
The wedding was for friends of ours who have been together for quite awhile. Gord and Dawn have 6 kids, 4 of them together, so it's about darn time they got married! Just kidding, I don't care if they live in sin, sinning is fun! I am happy they got married because it's something that Dawn has been wanting and she's a nice lady and deserves to be happy.
The best part of the wedding was that it was held on a ball field.

I thought that was pretty fun. Tiny liked it because he could have a beer during the ceremony. My favourite part was they were so far away we couldn't hear them and they couldn't hear us so we all just chatted until the very end and then we cheered. We didn't have to listen to all that wedding mumbo jumbo.
I dressed Patrick in a special outfit for the occasion.

I also took some photos of my friends daughter who didn't want her photo taken but I think they turned out cool and kinda artsy.

Lately I have been eating a lot of homemade smoothies. Like everyday. Sometimes twice a day. I have figured out how to make super duper delicious (pronounced delish-ee-ous) smoothies that taste like my favourite smoothies at booster juice except at a quarter of the price. I made so many smoothies I actually broke my blender. I somehow managed to crack the base. Luckily Tiny went and bought a brand shiny new one the next day!

(haha see how I trick myself into thinking I bought a really expensive booster juice smoothie by using my reusable booster juice cup for a home made smoothie?)

I get close to my full daily serving of fruits (and veggies since according to those Canada Food Peoples they're pretty much the same thing-I guess they never tried a green pepper pie) in one single smoothie. I buy bags of frozen fruits, sometimes I have 3 or 4 different kinds in the freezer. I thought I would share my smoothie recipe with you since it's so insanely delicious. Put the ingredients in the blender in the order I give for easier blending.

1 cup of juice-I prefer BomDia an acai blend but I'll use any kind of juice
1 scoop of vanilla protein powder (turn on the blender for a second to mix the powder and the juice or you'll end up with gooey chunks of...well...goo...)
1 banana
1 cup of frozen fruit
3 big tablespoons of yogurt (I use vanilla activia)
Blend until deliciously smooth.

I highly recommend the protein powder and yogurt in your smoothie because it helps to fill you up and is especially good if you work out or do physical labour. Plus it makes the smoothie creamy and delicious!

To finish my slightly ADD post I leave you with a picture I took on the walk Patrick and I went on yesterday.
I am thankful that these people left there irrigation system on so I could take this beautiful photo, and I am only a little sorry that while I was taking it I could hear the pssshht sound of an irrigation system that was broken from freezing.

Somethings Afoot

2010-04-07T13:50:00.000-07:00

Recently I have learned that Patrick has thrush. Thrush isn't a particularly serious affliction but it can make life difficult. It is possible that thrush has been at the root of all our problems with nursing. I just wish it could have been dealt with weeks ago, Patrick is exclusively nursed and having major diffiulties with nursing at times has taken over our lives and can take some of the joy out of new parenthood. I had been to the breastfeeding clinic three times, the first 2 times were great, I dealt with helpful, caring nurses who helped both of us while being so reassuring at a time when I felt a whole lot of despair and hopelessness. The last time I went the nurse was not reassuring or helpful at all. She was either having a bad day or didn't like me personally. She told me there was nothing she could do for the pain and she had absolutely no suggestions on how to help (that is actually how she phrased it "I don't know what to do, I haven't even written anything on your file.) She told me that because Patrick was gaining weight everything was fine. (Because weeping uncontrollably from extreme pain and having to express 50% of the time is "fine") A month later I find out it's likely that we've had thrush all along. I don't fault her for not knowing what was wrong but I do wish she had at the very least recommended a doctor visit.

One of the solutions is a simple one and inexpensive. Gentian Violet. It's over the counter and about $6. The doctor had prescribed an ointment for me but Patrick hated the taste and refused to nurse (while screaming). Gentian Violet seems to be working...

Although it's a little difficult to take him seriously when he looks like that, I now have a bad habit of laughing when he cries...cause really...look at him!

I finally finished the Luminen Sweater. It is the greatest thing I have ever knitted. I have knit other things that looked better, but not other things that looked better on me! I still have to buy the clasps and sew them on but it's finished blocking and looks amazing!

Hey look...there are my toes...

I have also been knitting the Sleepy Hollow socks. Yarn Harlot knit them and I thought they were so cool that I bought the pattern right away. I bought some yarn that I thought was ideal but when I cast on and knit one repeat the pattern was totally obscured by the yarn variegations. I immediately frogged and switched to some Noro Silk Garden Sock I picked up in Duncan and it looks awesome!

Even better the first sock finished at the exact point to start the second one so it matches! I modified the sock so that the pattern doesn't stop mid leaf-I hate it when patterns do that! So the last 2 leaves go down the toe while I am doing the decreases, they look all pretty and stuff.

Oh and I also figured out a way to take pictures of my own feet that doesn't look gimpy!

Last weekend we went to Saltspring for Easter. It was a great trip and Patrick travelled really well. While we were there Mom, Mackenzie, Patrick and I went on a yarn crawl in Duncan and Victoria (I also ended up going to the yarn store on Saltspring). It was so much fun and I went to the Beehive Wool Shop in Victoria for the first time. I was literally giddy with excitement. Beehive yarns is such a great store with so many amazing yarns. I actually hyperventilated while I was there and eventually we had to leave because I couldn't handle the extreme yarniness of it all. I picked up some great stuff on my trip-Fleece Artist fibres and a discontinued Noro from the Loom in Duncan, Mirasol Merino Sock (in an awesome sunflower looking colourway) Habu silk and Noro Silk Garden Sock from Beehive in Victoria, and Mini Mochi and Noro Silk Garden Sock from Stitches on Saltspring. I went on a bit of a sock rampage...I couldn't control myself!

I am really looking forward to my next project! I have no idea what it is and for some reason that completely excites me! It could be anything! Another pair of socks! Another sweater! Something lacy! The possibilities are endless!

It's all coming together

2010-03-16T15:32:00.000-07:00

Things are finally coming together on the fibre front. I actually finished a project!
I love the rainbowiness of this shawl...even though I don't wear rainbows...I am not sure what i am going to do with this shawl, I have an image of it in my head looking good wrapped around my neck while I am wearing a jean jacket...except I don't own a jean jacket.

I have been working rather diligently on "the" sweater. I am hoping to be finished in under a week. I have a really crappy picture of it to show you-

Patrick has slept long enough today for me to take on my latest planned etsy project

So far my etsy store has deal almost exclusively in handspun yarn but I am experimenting on expanding (and alliterations it seems). I am now going ot be including some spinnign supplies. Welcome electricbats!
\
I am going to do 2 lines of batts, premium electricbatts and econoelectricbatts. I am doing the econoelectricbatts because I want to make sure that I have something that is affordable for everyone. I am also adding an art yarn kit with all kinds of yummy fibres and ribbons if it sells, I'll do more. Eventually I'd like to do an art yarn kit of the month club (there are already a bajillion batt of the month club so why not something different?)

On top of all that I have been getting lots of work done on the research front. All with a minimal amount of sleep!

It feels good to be productive!

Rainbows and Dead Squirrels

2010-03-14T11:16:00.000-07:00

So I found the sleeve...well I didn't really find it, I went to the pub for Karaoke and the waitress gave it to me, I guess it had fallen out of my bag-it's a good thing they know me as "the lady that knits" or it could have been lost forever! I haven't returned to knitting the sweater yet because I am just finishing up my replacement-for-lost-sleeve knitting, a rainbow shawl that I will never wear. I don't wear rainbows. But I thought the pattern was cool and I thought it would look cool with the yarn! I'll knit it another time with a blood red Starry and then there might be a possibility that I would wear it.

It looks nifty, no?

The other day Patrick and I went for a walk and had a fabulous find.
A dead squirrel!! Unfortunately I did not have a plastic bag so I couldn't tak it home with me. I was very dissapointed. I was telling this to a couple people I know and they looked at me like I was crazy. Apparently "normal" people don't take dead things home with them. I have a fantastic animal bone collection that includes whale, seal, racoon, deer, coyote and other interesting animals- I really would have love to include a squirrel to my collection-just pop him in the back yard to be exposed to the elements for half a year or so and voila! Squirrel skeleton!

Patrick is growing at a frightening rate and is stretching his 0-3 months clothes to their limits. Since he is only 7 weeks old and was only 6 pounds 3 oz when he was born, this is rather alarming. I keep expecting to find him in the morning grown out of his skin like a snake or something.

My Aunt knit him a fantastic little snow suit and he look adorable in it! He gets lots of compliments when he wears it. It's very soft and as yet it's the only clothing he's actually professed an interest in, he likes the soft fuzzy wool against his skin!

The best laid plans and all that...

2010-03-06T12:29:00.000-08:00

I had this rather triumphant plan for my retunr to blogging. I have been working on the Luminen Sweater by Mairi Munonen for a while now and yesterday should have heralded the connection of the sleeves to the body of the sweater. Now when I say should, it's pretty obvious that this monumental connection did not actually happen. There are a billion things that can cause even the best laid knitting goals to become waylaid-the most common one being the difficulty in estimating rate of knitting vs. time able to knit. This roadblock I have hit is a completely new one and especially frustrating in that there is only one solution to the problem and that solution does not seem to be immediately forthcoming...I lost a sleeve. Yes, that's right...I lost a $(&%#ing sleeve. How does this happen! I have been keeping this one project in on place-an enclosed place even-a cloth bag. 4 days ago both sleeves were in the bag. Yesterday one sleeve was in the bag. This totally fits with my current theory that I ahve "helpful" Brownies in my house causing mischief (including turnin the downstairs TV on and bring skeins of yarn halfway up the stairs and leaving them there.) How does one remedy such a ridiculous situation? One could either find the damn sleeve, or knit a new one. Since I am reasonably sure that I have exactly the amount of yarn I need to finish the project with absolutely no extras (this is not because I didn't plan well, this is because Malabrigo only does so much yarn per dyelot). So my only option is to find the sleeve (oh wait...i could totally knit a vest...yeah...)
So triumphant pictures and no sweater knitting.
Last night I cast on Gail in Mini Mochi...and felt guilty pleasure in knitting something besides and interminable XL long sleeve, long bodied, hooded sweater...

Now it's really been awhile...

2010-02-04T11:27:00.000-08:00

My blogging has been like my knitting lately...nonexistent...
I have a really good reason this time!

Welcome Patrick Brendan Court
January 21st 2010
6 lbs 3oz

Patrick is (mostly) a joy to have around. He's a very calm and happy baby. even when he fusses he (so far) has a good reason. He sleeps well at night (except for the occasional sleepless night). Yes I know I have a lot of brackets with adjustments to my statements...but if he was quiet, calm, and non fussy all the time, he would be freakishly lethargic.

Our hospital stay was a long one (5 days) due to minor complications on both our parts, but we have been home for a week and a half and are settling in well.

I haven't been knitting or spinning much at all. I got half a stranded mitten done, and half a bobbin of blue merino/silk done in the past week and a half. I am having minor difficulties with my wrist due to the placement of the IV (not the fault of the nurse, apparently the fault of my curvy, bendy veins). I also find I am able ot sit and do nothing. This is new to me. I can sit and not make things or do things...I can sit and watch TV and ONLY TV. It's weird. I'm not even that tired. It's like I subconsciously believe I have created my quota for awhile and am relaxing. Granted it's not all relaxing with a newborn, there is lots of feeding and diaper changing and laundry and tidying up and holding baby...feeding can take up a huge chunk of time...he eats 2-3 times more than the average baby his age (and he was preterm!) which makes for long feeding times, but I am not complaining because apparently he is sucking the life force out of me...in a totally good way-I'm shedding pregnancy weight like water!

Hopefully I will get my crafting/knitting/spinning bug back soon, there's all kinds of baby stuff I could make...

It's been a while

2010-01-18T17:45:00.000-08:00

Distractions have been keeping me from blogging lately. Obsessive knitting and a trip out of town have been filling my time.

Last weekend Tiny, Mackenzie and I took a trip down to the coast. This was Mackenzie's Christmas present: a trip to Saltspring, a day in Vancouver and a Canucks game. Kenzie is an avid hockey fan, loves visiting her Froggy, Grandpa Abraham and Uncle Tim, and had never been to Vancouver before. We had a blast. The original plan was to go to Science World, but when we arrived there was a paper sign stating that it was closed for a private event. We went to the Vancouver Aquarium instead.

The Vancouver Aquarium is hugely changed from the last time I was there (probably about 15 years ago). The change is for the better. The animal habitats are much larger and more natural looking than they were before. It is greatly expanded. The BC Coast section is incredible, it makes the undersea world of our province look incredibly mysterious and exotic.

My favourite section was the jellyfish!

I was pleasantly surprised at how good a photo my crappy little camera took!

Kenzie found some kindred spirits at the aquarium...

We got put on the giant TV at GM Place which was pretty exciting (click to embiggen)

I am now knitting the ultimate project...the Luminen Jacket is one I have been thinking about knitting for a few months now. A month ago I bought the yarn neccessary for the project. Some incredibly soft Malabrigo Merino Worsted in a fabulous colourway called Red Mahogany. The yarn is actually a little bit of a heavy weight for this project (despite "Worsted" being in the actual name for the yarn it is an Aran weight yarn). So I dropped a size and am using a larger needle (4.5mm instead of 4mm) mathematically the gauge worked out that it should be the right size a month or 2 post baby (a good goal for after the baby is born! I have to fit that sweater!!). I have already modified it a bit, I really did not like the sleeves so I knit a cabled cuff and picked up the stitches ont he edge and started the sleeve from there. I think it will fit wiht the overall design of the sweater better (hehe sweater better). I also plan on NOT doing all those snowflakes. Mairi Muinonen is one of my favourite designers EVER but she often has at least one design element in a project that really doesn't appeal to me. I could have lived with the sleeves...but definitely not the snowflakes...so I won't be doing them-this means using less yarn (and my yarn overage is a little tight) and I won't have to sew them on (I HATE SEWING).

I love this sweater so far. I love how it looks. I especially love the construction of it. The cabling above the pocket is GENIUS!! I find the whole construction of it intriguing and interesting. Mairi Muinonen is brilliant! (Hopefully I will continue to enjoy this sweater towards the ends as much as I do now!)

Genius!!!

2010-01-06T18:31:00.001-08:00

I just had to show the finished product...these socks made me feel like a GENIUS!

The benefits to Pregnancy Insomnia

2010-01-05T14:13:00.001-08:00

Yes...some good can come of it!

These pictures are pre-blocking so they will look even better soon!

I learned that it's really difficult to take pictures of your own arms!

These gloves knit so fast and were a lot of fun to do! My first attempt at gloves! I love them and this first one took just over a day to knit!

Speedy Gonzalez

2010-01-04T20:21:00.000-08:00

I finished the other Tree of Life sock and am waiting for one of my yarn needles to magically appear so I can weave in the ends and block it! They look fantastic and were a fun knit! Even better I used Dream In Colour Starry (Rav link here) which is a fantabulous yarn that is squishy and soft, easy to knit and from the States so the skeins are 113gms...I used 51 gms of the black and 46gms of the green. Tree of Life socks fit fairly high up the leg, so I enough for another pair of largish two-colour socks, or mittens or maybe 2 pairs of solid socks. Dream in Colour is not cheap but if I can get 2 or 3 projects out of 2 skeins I will definitely get my moneys worth!!

In continuing with my Dream in Colour obsession (and my obstinate insistence on using the Canadian spelling for a proper noun) I am now knitting the Farinelli gloves by Ysolda Teague. Ysolda is one of my favourite designers. I am knitting a shorter verison of the gloves and I am going to make them "fingerless"-but rather than make them like "fingerless mittens" (aka handless mitts) I am going to make them like hobo gloves with the tips of the fingers bare. I can't stand wearing full gloves or mittens so I figured I should make something I would actually wear. I have never knit gloves before so I am looking forward to learning (and possibly swearing).
I started these this morning and have finished the arm already!

I couldn't do this post with out adding this pic of Tiny with Fingers (Tiny is the person, fingers is the cat)

Out with the old and in with the new!

2009-12-30T12:31:00.000-08:00

The Tree of Life socks are coming along well.

I don't particularly like the heel gussets,

if I were to do these socks again I would do "normal" gussets since I don't have feet shaped like high heels. But otherwise I love these socks and I love the pattern! 1 sock down, 1 to go!!!

We got some new furniture so things were a bit hectic with getting rid of old furniture and bringin in new stuff and generally shifting things around. Luckily a friend's son is moving out on his own so we were able to easily get rid of some furniture that way. Having three households worth of furniture (our old stuff, our new stuff and Tiny's brother's stuff) would have been a bit excessive! So now we have almost all new furniture and almost all "good" stuff! I was so happy to find furniture in a colour I (we) liked and a fabric I don't hate. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to find furniture that is not microfibre, leather, or faux leather that cost less than 5 grand? I hate leather, it's cold, uncomfortable, and sticks to your skin. I don't like the way microfibre looks and I think it always looks kind of dirty and dusty. Finding this couch and loveseat set was a huge big deal!

I love the new furniture and the cats are under the impression that we bought it just for them.

I don't think they understand that they aren't actually humans...

Distractions

2009-12-27T11:49:00.001-08:00

So...I started knitting non-craft show, non-Tiny Sweater stuff...
I am knitting a pair of worsted weight socks in a very bright green and black variegated yarn for a co-worker of Tiny's...he has size 11W feet...meh...but then I got distracted by the February Lady Sweater and I knit that for a while in a beautiful rich red-red. I almost finshed the raglan increases by the second day..but on Christmas Eve I picked up another skein of Starry (this totals 3) to go with the Black Pearl Starry I already have slated for the Tree of Life Socks. This sat in the basket for a full day before I had to cast them on...Christmas day evening I cast them on and started knitting away. I am trying out a 9" Hiya Hiya circular for this project. I love DPN's and I generally don't ahve any problems with tension with stranded knitting except at the bridges between DPN's. The circular was HORRIBLE for the first 3 rows...and all of a sudden SHAZZAM! It started working so quickly and easily. I love it! Except for having to use a stitch marker-that's really annoying. My tension is better, my knitting is faster. And the yarn is truly wonderful. After knitting Tiny's sweater in a scratchy icelandic yarn and all the other not buttery soft yarns I have been using-this yarn is almost innappropriate feeling on my hands, it's soft and squishy and yummy.

I LOVE THESE SOCKS!

Finished...ish

2009-12-23T19:04:00.000-08:00

So I cast of Tiny's Sweater today. I was about to weave in the ends and block it when I thought I should get him to try it on...especially since it's a sweater I designed and not from a pattern. Now before you think the worst, don't worry-it fit him fine and looked really good...except for the neck. The neck is HORRIBLE. It...doesn't work...I can't describe it...I don't want to think about it...
I drop kicked it across the room. I'm not even saying that for blog amusement-I actually drop kicked the sweater...
So now I have to pick out the cast-off and rip back the neck and find a new neck strategy. I am going to sift through a bunch of patterns until I find one that seems right...later...not now...sometime in the future...only God knows when...

Obviously I don't have time for blogging...

2009-12-22T22:18:00.000-08:00

This is what I have been doing...

It's obvious I don't have time for blogging...I have a goal to finish it tomorrow...

I don't know what came over me...

2009-12-21T11:31:00.000-08:00

Something happened. I couldn't handle it anymore. I wasn't feeling festive. Christmas was 5 days away, and I lost my everloving mind. I went on a baking rampage...
I baked 3 types of shortbread-1 plain, 1 with jam, and 1 with chocolate. I made diabetic friendly butter tarts. I made diabetic unfriendly butter tarts. I made mincemeat tarts-the mincemeat was made from scratch. I spent 4 and a half hours making delicious smelling goodies. I baked so much I hurt my back. I ended up with something like 10 dozen goodies. (I'm eating a butter tart right now). I downloaded a whole whack of Christmas songs and listened to them all day. I wrapped christmas presents. I didn't knit all day. I was generally insanely festive.
Now I have a billion cookies and tarts and nothing to do with them but EAT them! I am not going t0o any Christmas parties or family events. I made a vow not to do the general cookie give away this year because people were taking that for granted.
So now I get to spend the few days before Christmas stuffing my face and knitting...actually...now that I type it out...it doesn't sound that bad...

Call Me Ishmael

2009-12-18T15:13:00.000-08:00

Tiny's sweater has become my great white whale...
I have been kntiting it since September, and designing it since...time immemorial. I seem to have some kind of subconscious block in connection with it. There are always other projects I need to work on. Last week I decided to sit down and slog away at it until it is finished.
Slogging is an excellent word...I finished knitting it to the point where I can justify starting work on the sleeves. I almost faltered at this point, but yea verily, fate swung her fickle locks and threw me a curve ball...I made myself a secret deal that when I finished one sleeve I could cast on a sweater for myself, and maybe start knitting some thick wooly socks for my husband's coworker...I was just about ready to sneak off and start knitting something else, when upon review of the patterns I realized that everything used the same size needles! Curses!!! Foiled again!! I can be a pretty fickle knitter but even I can't justify pulling needles from a project that I promised myself I would finish sometime this century to start other projects.
So here I am knitting away at Tiny's Sweater-which isn't so Tiny-I am going to have to find some truly triumphant music for the completion of this garment. Maybe even throw a party. I'll invite a whole bunch of people over, cook lots of food to warm up the kitchen, turn the thermostat on as high as it will go, and then make him wear the sweater all damn night...yeah...that will make me feel better...

Matchy Matchy

2009-12-12T22:35:00.000-08:00

This was the big weekend of the Craft Fair. I did really well and had a goo dtime. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo until the end of the 1st day, so I don't have a photo of the table before selling a whole bunch of stuff!

I also picked up a few items at the craft Fair, and I had to work some serious willpower not to spend all the money I had made! Mackenzie helped out quite a bit and earned herself enough money to buy her Dad a Christmas present. She was super excited about having earned the moeny herself!
I bought a few pottery items. In the past few years I have developed a love of pottery. I wasn't keen on it for much of my life because I grew up in a place where it was pretty much shoved down my throat-that's not a reflection of my younger homelife but of our geographic location...
But in Kamloops I have discovered a potter who I admire greatly both as an artist and as a person. She is my favourite local artist, and that's saying something considering how many artists I get exposed to as the President of the Kamloops Arts Council. She is a truly talented potter and an incredible painter. I can't afford her paintings, so I buy her pottery-which she seriously underprices! It would cost me more to buy a nice serving bowl at Winners/Homesense than to buy a handthrown serving bowl from her. I have been getting her pieces through various means for just over a year now-commision, silent auction, purchase, trade and gift. I now have quite a nice set of matchy matchy local pottery and I am in love with it!!

I also have purchased a couple pieces by other potters that are not matchy but coordinate. I will continue to get more because I love it, it's functional, and durable!! (and within my price range!)

As previously promised I am throwing in a picture of the rabbit:

see that crooked ear? It's like that all the time and is way too cute. We've been having some adjustment difficulties and some minor health problems, but things seem to be settling in. She is such a nice bunny, very friendly and affectionate. She likes to pick up her brush and throw it at me- a good way to let me know it's brushing time! She got renamed completely by accident. I call her Bunny-wei, they yelled "bunny-wei!" in the Stargate movie a lot and it just kinda stuck.

Tiny decorated the Christmas tree this year. This was a big deal since he always leaves the tree decorating up to me. But last year, right after Christmas, he received some Maple Leaf ornaments as a gift and at some point her decided we had to have a Maple Leaf themed tree. It turned out really well! And next year I get a Coca Cola tree!!

Mackenzie has been kitting and getting quite good. The improvement in herfirst project from beginning to end is very cool to see. She is getting quick and confident and is now a faster knttier than some adult non-novie knitters I have met! She is on Ravelry. It`s nice to spread the disease....

so...

2009-12-10T15:16:00.001-08:00

I know I haven't blogged much lately, but here's my inventory for the craft show this weekend...

7 pairs fingerless mitts
7 hats
2 pairs thrummed mittens
2 pairs mittens made with handspun
7 scarves
6 baby hats
6 pairs of booties
1 pair socks
1 sweater
30 skeins handspun
8 dozen custom glass pins.

It's like some kind of demented knitting Christmas song. But this is the final count. Keep in mind that on top of making all this there is labelling it all and doing the display.
I will have photos out after the weekend to show it off all together. None of it is pastel, and none of it is acrylic-which I think makes it pretty unique in the craft show world.

Now I have to finish the rick socks and Tiny's sweater...and maybe a green pair of socks-hopefully all before christmas. I have this insane dream where I actually get to knit something for myself. I have a plan...I am going to knit the February lady sweater. I have been procrastinating on it, because EVERYBODY has knit it. I mean EVERYONE. It wouldn't surprise me if my husband secretly knit it at some point (OK that would actually surprise the hell out of me, but you get my point) but I can't let that prevent me from knitting a pattern I really like. I mean, I am not going to stop wearing jeans simply because EVERYBODY is wearing them, that would just be silly...and I wouldn't have any pants to wear, so it would be impractical as well...and cold...and embarassing.
I am going to knit it in RED. I have this fantastic brilliant ruby red yarn sititng in my stash-there's enough of it to knit the February lady and I am going to do it.
...after...the rick socks...tiny's sweater...and maybe some green socks...

Slograt

2009-12-04T12:06:00.001-08:00

when a person makes a comment on this and most other blogspot accounts, there is a word verification box to prevent spam and automated comments. I absolutely LOVE the word verification words. They aren't real words but combinations that are fantastic! I wonder if there is a word generator or if there is a committee of people whose job is to come up with the word verification combination! Wouldn't that be a fantastic job!
I often laugh at these words. The latest one was "slograt" isn't that fantastically science fiction? Something from Star Wars or maybe the Elder Scrolls video games.
I'd like to suggest that anyone making comments also mention their word verification word if they are so inclined and if the word is interesting. Maybe include a possible definition?

Twitter Went Crazy

2009-12-02T13:22:00.000-08:00

Hi all
I have no idea what happend with my Twitter updates on the blog. My actual Twitter is fine and nobody seems to have hacked it, I think it might be a glitch with the application. I am having trouble finding another Twitter application that works, I keep getting error messages. In the meantime I will have no Twitter updates on my blgo until it's all worked...so it wasn't me talking about NASA, sore Lats, etc. I'm really not that interesting...

Happy December!

2009-12-01T11:05:00.000-08:00

Wow, December already! I am doing a the Christmas at the Courthouse craft fair on Dec. 11 and 12th at the Old Courthouse in Kamloops and looking forward to it...I am trying not to get my hopes up because I haven't had much luck with sales at craft fairs, but I think I have some really fantastic items that people will want, so really it's all a matter of how many people actually go to the craft fair.
Today I came up with a list of what I have I already knit and what, ideally, I would like to knit before the 11th.

I have knit:
7 pairs of fingerless mitts
1 pair thrummed mittens
1 pair regular mittens
7 adult hats
1 scarf
4.5 pairs of baby booties
2 baby hats
1 pair socks
1 sweater

I will also have my handspun yarn available

I would like to knit before the 11th
1 pair thrummed mittens
2.5 pairs baby booties
3 baby hats
1 pair socks
1 pair regular mittens

Everything after that is gravy. I think this would be a very respectable inventory. I estimate it will take me about 8 days to knit what's left if I don't get distracted. This is very difficult because I have a bunch of things I want to finish up...liket he Pretty Thing, the other Rick Sock and Tiny's Sweater. I also got the Enchanted Sole and would like to knit something from there for myself. i am seriously jonesing for some selfknitting. After all the work I have done on kntiting for the craft fair I plan on knitting on one of my WIP's at the Craft show and maybe actually getting something fun finished.

I have managed to work out a system where I can scan photos for work while doing a little bit of knitting, but I can't do it too much or I start feeling seriously ADD...

Yesterday I met a Knitter

2009-11-25T08:15:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I met a Knitter. That's Knitter with a capital "K". Her name is Kristina (I don't know if her name starts with a "K" or a "Ch", but the "K" seems fitting.
She came into the yarn store asking for advice on her current project. It was her second project ever and she was knitting a lovely hat for her boyfriend for skiing. She told me she thought it looked a "little big". I agreed it looked plenty big, far too big for a hat. She sighed and agreed and asked what she could turn it into instead of a hat. This blew me away. she didn't get upset. She didn't start frogging, she wanted to know what her wip (work-in-progress) could become instead of what it originally had been slated to be. I looked at it and came up with a couple ideas-a capelet perhaps? She liked that idea and mentioned that she had some young nieces and nephews. I suggested she could cast it off and sew an elastic around the top and make a cute little wool skirt. She liked this idea too. I then suggested we put it it on a larger needle to see how big it really was. I told her this was very advanced knitting and she was already into her designing phase of knitting-very impressive. The project was scrinched onto a 12 inch circular and looked like a giant hair scrunchy. I grabbed a 60" needled and started transferring stitches. We ended up with this

If you look closely you can see the stitches are kind of scrunched on the 60" needle. That means the project has to be at least 70 inches, possibly 80.
There are no words to describe how much this amused me. I was no longer able to be understanding and sensitive and I started laughing so hard I thought I was going to hurt myself...
Kristina took this all in good stead. She laughed too. After wiping the tears from my eyes I made the only suggestion I could thing of. "It's a circular scarf." She really liked the idea and she was excited that she had knit a scarf for herself. "Perfect for skiing!" she said. She also said when she was done casting off she would pick up another skein of yarn to retry knitting a hat for her boyfriend.
The reason why her scarf was so big was she had cast on 96 stitches, which was a perfectly reasonable amount. But she had just learned how to purl, so every time she switched from purl to knit stitches and vice versa on the ribbing she did a yarn over. On top of that her gauge was really loose (unusual in a novice and I think it points to her being a fantastic knitter in the future) she ended up with 312 sts knit in a really loose gauge on 5.5 mm ndls.
Kristina also told me that she was going to measure her stitches and see how many stitches she should actually cast on to make a normal sized hat. I thought that was AWESOME. She immediately understood a basic concept of designing with her second project knitting ever. This woman is destined to become a great knitter!
As she was leaving I told her "You know, people are going to stop you and ask you where you got that scarf because it's going to look fantastic and you can say 'Thank you, I designed it myself." She laughed and looked a littl e sheepish and said, "You know what's really funny? I'm a graphic designer..."

"I Only Knit Dishcloths"

2009-11-23T17:57:00.001-08:00

I was at a couple craft fairs this weekend and bought some really neat-o stuff. I got a couple super delicious homemade candy canes from a heavily tattooed, super cheerful dude. I got a copyright infringed handstitch Jack the Pumpkin King Christmas ornament, and a really awesome gift that I have been planning on buying for 2 years and finally got around to getting.
I saw a lady selling...well I can't remember what, it wasn't particularly memorable-it was something crafty and christmassy. She was knitting. I looked at her display and her knitting and I said "You knit at a craft show but you don't sell knitted goods?" and she laughed and said "Oh I only knit dishcloths." I think the look on my face said it all because she immediately added "They are all I know how to knit, I don't know how to do anything else." I laughed and said "If you can knit a dish cloth you can knit anything!!!" She didn't believe me. I said "No really! You can do a knit stitch, you can increase and decrease-all you have to do is learn a purl stitch and you can knit a whoel sweater!" I then expounded on the delights of learnign to knit in the modern age with access to the internet. I think I may have come across as a bit of a fanatic. But I just wanted to make her understand. She is knitting, she is increasing and decreasing (most dishcloths are knit corner to corner), she is knitting with cotton (which is one of the more annoying and least forgiving fibres to knit with). She is comfortable knitting while doing other things (extreme beginners have a singular focus on knitting-they can't really do anything else at the same time). She is knitting in public (a sure sign of a convert). She can knit ANYTHING.
I told her about ravelry. I showed her the knitting I had in my purse (a mitten).
I don't know if she will listen to me. She might go home and throw her knitting in the garbage and tell her family that knitting is for crazy people...but she seemed receptive and she seemed really interested in teh idea of knitting other things. I hope I was able to influence her to join us...
I have taught 2 people how to knit and constantly encourage other people to try and learn or to try and learn more. I encourage everyone out there to teach others how to knit. we could be like Amway, (or JW's) only without the weird vitamins and awkward "cold calls."

It's HERE!!!

2009-11-20T14:52:00.000-08:00

Here it is!!! This is my first written pattern design! I love these little booties and I think they would make the perfect gift!

Please send me any ideas, criticisms, etc to me through ravelry where my username is electrictree. Feel free to message me with your email address for a .pdf version.

Flynn Booties

These delightful little booties are knit with sock style architecture and a special pointy little toe, Flynn’s are a super quick knit!! These little gems have a seed stitch cuff with curled little toes. They can be whatever you want them to be: Pixie, Robin Hood, Elvish, ad on infinitum! These would also make fantastic Christmas tree ornaments!
This is an excellent beginner sock for those who have always wanted to delve into the mysteries of sock knitting. For a fantastical tutorial on sock knitting I recommend Silver’s Sock Class. (http://www.cometosilver.com/socks/) That’s where I learned to knit socks!!
I knit these booties with Lang Silk Dream and the texture was marvellous. While it may not be practical to knit baby items with a handwash only yarn, booties are small and easy to wash. If you make them as a gift, make sure you include washing instructions, or use any worsted-aran weight in a washing friendly fibre.
Size
Newborn 0-3 months
Materials
• 1 Skein Lang Silk Dream (50% Silk, 50% Merino; 98 yds per 50 grm skein) Note-1 skein will easily make 2 maybe even three pairs of booties. Make extra pairs or use the rest for a little hat!
• Double pointed needles Size US 8/5mm
• Tapestry Needles
Gauge
About 20 sts to 4 inchesé10cm: gauge is not critical to these, but it will affect the finished size of the booties.
Abbreviations
k knit
p purl
k2tog knit 2 stitches together
p2tog purl 2 stitches together
ssk slip, slip, knit 2 stitches together
sl slip stitch

Directions
Cuff
Cast on 24 st onto 1 needle.
Work cuff in seed stitch
Row 1: Ssk, *k1, p1* to last 2 sts, k2tog, turn work- 22 sts remain
Row 2: *k1, p1* turn work
Row 3: Ssk, *p1, k1* to last 3 sts, k1, k2tog, turn work- 20 sts remain
Row 4: K1, *k1, p1* to last st, k1
Row 5: Repeat row 1- 18 sts remain
Row 6: *k1, p1*
Leg
Divide sts over 3 needles-6 sts each needle.
Join for knitting in the round, a marker is unnecessary if you use the split in the cuff as an indicator for the beginning of the round
Knit in stocking stitch (knitting every stitch) for 5cm- about 12 rows.
Heel
Setup- k 14. Arrange next 9 sts on to 1 ndl for heel flap. place remaining 9 sts on 2 needles on hold until heel is finished-this is a good time to double check that your heel flap lines up with the split in the top of the cuff.
Row 1: Sl 1, k8, turn work-
Row 2: sl1, p8, turn work
Row 3: sl 1, k8, turn work
Row 4: Repeat row 2
Row 5: Repeat row 1
Row 6: Repeat row 2
Turn Heel:
Row 1: Sl1, k4, k2tog, k1, turn work- 8 sts remain
Row 2: Sl1, p2, p2tog, p1, turn work- 7 sts remain
Row 3: Sl1, k3, k2tog, turn work- 6 sts remain
Row 4: Sl1, p3, p2tog, turn work-5 sts remain
Row 5: Sl1, k5
Gusset
Arrange the 9 sts on hold for top of foot onto one needle
Set up round: Pick up 4 sts on side of heel flap. K9 sts on top of foot, pick up 4 sts on other side of heel flap, k2. Take last 3 sts on ndl and slip to next ndl.
Rather than use markers on such a small project the bootie is divided into 3 needles. Ndl 1 is the beginning of the round, Ndl 2 the top of the foot, and Ndl 3 the end of the round. At this point there should be 7 sts on Ndl 1, 9 sts on Ndl 2, and 6 sts on Ndl 3 for a total of 22 sts in the round.
Round 1: Ndl 1- k4, k2tog, k1. Ndl 2- k9. Ndl 3- k1, ssk, k3. 20 sts remain
Round 2: K all sts on all Ndls
Round 3: Ndl 1- k3, k2tog, k1. Ndl 2- k9. Ndl 3- k1, ssk, k2. 18 sts remain
Foot
Knit in stocking stitch for 3 cm-about 8 rows
Toe
Round 1: Ndl 1- k5. Ndl 2- ssk, k5, k2tog. Ndl 3- k4. 16 sts remain
Round 2: Ndl 1- k5. Ndl 2- ssk, k3, k2tog. Ndl 3-k4. 14 sts remain
Round 3: Ndl 1- k5. Ndl 2- ssk, k1, k2tog. Ndl 3- ssk, k2. 11 sts remain
Round 4: Ndl 1-k3, k2tog. Ndl 2- k3. Ndl 3- ssk, k1. 9 sts remain
Round 5: Ndl 1-k2, k2tog. Ndl 2- k3. Ndl 3- ssk. 7 sts remain
Round 6: Ndl 1- k1, k2tog. Ndl 2- k3. 6 sts remain
Place the 3 remainin sts from Ndls 1 and 3 onto one needlem there should be 3 sts left on Ndle 2.
Row 1: sl 1, k2
Row 3: sl 1, p2. Ndl 2- k3
Finishing
Cut end. Thread yarn through remain 6 sts. Weave in ends. Block

Wait for it...

2009-11-18T19:03:00.000-08:00

I just desinged the coolest baby booties!! I think they are fantastic. Sometime tomorrow or the next day I am going to post the pattern on my blog. They are Peter Pan/Pixie/Robin Hood Booties. They knit SUPER fast-maybe an hour a bootie (at most). This will be my first foray into pattern writing for others, so I would love it if people could take a couple hours out of their day and knit them, and then give me some constructive feedback on my pattern writing.
Of course, if you want to just tell me how absolutely freaking awesome I am...that's OK too...
Feeling the suspense yet??

New Robe

2009-11-08T10:06:00.001-08:00

I got a new robe yesterday. There are no words ot describe how I feel about this piece of clothing. It's a little ridiculous. Not long ago I came to the realization that I have never owned a brand new robe bought just for me. Every single robe I have ever owned has been given to me by my Mom, who often has a rather large robe wardrobe. They are usually new-but given the fact that she is 3 or 4 inches shorter than me, they don't always fit right. I also wear them until they die. I think I hav eonly owned 2 or 3 robes in my life. I remember the one I had through teenagedom into early adulthood ended up looking like the shroud of Turin. I wore it until it caught on something and ripped in half. I wore it so long that while it was originally terry cloth the part that could be classified as "terry" had fallen off and the cloth had fallen into the category of "flannel".
I have been aware of my robe wearing patterns for a while now but hadn't replaced the one I had until yesterday. Partially because it's a very good robe (short in the arms, and body and not wide enough but good quality nonetheless) but also because I am 5'10" so "O/S" robes don't fit that great. Because apparently all women are small. I have shopped through the mens section and been lured by giant robes, but then I get stubborn. I don't want a brown robe...
Yesterday I found my robe and fell in love with it. I was walking down the aisle in the store and I saw a brillian flash of red...I reached out to touch it and it was love...it's the softest thing I have ever felt. It's red. It's incredibly inexpensive. It comes in various sizes including XL. I was sold.
Right now I am blogging in my RED robe bought just for me. I am going to knit in it. I am going to spin in it. I am going to eat my lunch while wearing it. I hope that someone knocks on the door so I can answer it wearing it. Maybe I will do some yard work while wearing it.

Rick can be SO annoying...

2009-11-05T09:09:00.000-08:00

Lately I have been fairly productive with my knitting. I have finished several small objects, as you can see from previous posts, and finally got back to work on the skull socks. I am not 100% happy with the design and I have a lot of tweaking to do, but they turned out all right.

I have finally got back to work on Tiny's sweater. I had to take a rather long hiatus for the sake of my hands. It was become extremely painful to knit it. I think a lot of it has to do with my refusal to use a cable needle. I knit contintental so it's really easy to slip the stitches off the needle and hold them with my right thumb and index finger while purling/knitting the next stitches and then slipping them back onto the left needle. This method is infinitely faster for me and saves me the hunt for the cable needle. But with this particular project, the knitting is very tight and the yarn is very inflexible so it requires a stronger grip on the slipped stitches, which consequently requires a stronger grip on the needles. I have found a decent balance that involves me relaxing my grip a little bit and only knitting 4 rows at a time (which ends up pretty close to and inch so that's not so bad) so progress is WAY slower than I am used to, but it's moving along instead of sitting on the edge of the couch looking accusatory.

The front is on the top. I still think the back looks like it is from a Klingon...

Turkey has been not at all supportive, nor impressed with my knitting endeavours.

I have also cast on the rick socks by cookie a. I am a huge fan of cookie a and I LOVE her sock patterns. I think they are beautiful and interesting, and unlike any other socks I have ever seen. I HATE knitting them. I bought the twisted flower pattern eons ago (they look like something the Loth Lorien elves would wear) and tried knitting it a couple times and was incredibly frustrated with it, after a few full froggings I gave up. I don't mind the occasional frog (such a lie, I HATE frogging) but having to frog the whole thing back to nothing multiple times is more than my delicate psyche can bear.
I bought cookie a's sock innovation this spring and I love the book. It's a fantastic combination of patterns and techniques and goes through some really great techniques for designing your own socks. I tried the rick pattern a few times...multiple frogs...guess what happened? I put the whole thing away for about 8 months. I didn't try any more of her patterns, I was too disheartened by the fact that I hated knitting things that I loved.
The other day I picked up the book again. I purchased a nice simple solid yarn and set about casting on rick socks...again. The level of frustration is not much lower but my knowledge of knitting has increased exponentially since the spring. I am now capable of knitting from complex charts. I can read my knitting in a way that I couldn't before-now rather than blindly follow charts and instructions I can watch what I am knitting to see if it is correct as I go (not infallible by any means, but a huge improvement). The socks still drive me mad.
I have figured out a few reasons for this. I didn't read the other projects on rick before I cast on. I shall do that from now on for ALL of cookie a's patterns. The first thing that was messed was that it says to cast on 60 sts, but most people need 72 (it's a 12 st repeat). This is not because of errors in gauge, this is because the socks were designed to be REALLY skinny. So skinny that 98.2% of the populaiton probably can't wear them. There were people that persevered with 60 sts and a stretchy yarn and ended up with socks that look terrible and distorted (like wattching 4:9 on a 16:9 TV) I got the ribbing done and 4 repeats of the pattern and realized they were WAY to small so ripped them back (there were quite a few mistakes as well).
I also learned that you need to use yarn that is amazingly unsplitty with cookie a patterns. There are a lot of stitches that aren't that easy so non-splitty yarn is a must (like ssk, or ktbl right next to purl sts...blech).
Another great thing I learned about cookie a patterns is they are not conducive to continental knitters. I thought it was just that I sucked, but it's the order of the sts and the ssk's next to yarn overs and ktbl's knext to purls that make me want to shred the knitting and then curl into a ball and suck my humb while weeping softly in the corner. After some serious thought I realized this pattern would be MUCH easier if i was a yarn thrower. This is one of the only times I will say something like this. In general continental is way faster and way easier (Elizabeth Zimmerman said so, and I believe her.) I even read in a few posts about rick that the left sock is way easier than the right sock for continental knitters (yes I am knitting a sock with different patterns on the left and right...le sigh).
And last but not least, switching the ssk's for sl1, k1, psso's is WAY easier and makes for better tension (for me)
...I also suspect that knitting with one of those tiny circular needles rather than dpn's might make for more even tension because there are yo's at the ends of the repeats, which means there are yo's at the very ends of your needles.
So after this in depth analysis of these socks, I am not trying to say the socks are bad, or the patterning is bad, or that cookie a is a sadistic designer. I still think her socks are incredible and I still LOVE the designs. They make you think and figure things out. So if they are approached in that manner, they are fabuluous. I would not reccomend them to anyone that wasn't an experienced knitter-I want to keep my knitterly friends, not have them egging my house screaming obscenities about 87 row, 88 sts repeat charts....

Tea Things

2009-10-31T06:44:00.000-07:00

So the madder was fun, and it produced a beautiful brick orange, but it wasnt' the colour I was hoping for so more experimentation is in order (I want RED!!!). We dyed a bunch of roving as well as a skein of 100% cashmere slated for The Pretty Thing
I have developed a tea obsession. Mom and I went to Foxglove (a garden store on Saltspring) and bought a couple of tea bushes, which caused a exploration into the mechanics of tea making (Wikipedia is the greatest website on earth!) I learned a whole bunch of cool things about tea, like how it is processed and that Black, Green, White and Gun Powder tea are all tea from the camelliea sinensis plant but processed differently. This caused me to go to the local tea store and buy some fancy black tea, because I have had good tea before, but never had REALLY good tea. I bought some estate (estate means it's all from one place and not blended from a variety sources) TGF-OP1 Darjeeling. TGF-OP stands for Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe, the 1 means it was 1st flush, or the first harvest of the very first buds. There are MANY acronyms to denote the quality of tea and this is one of the higher ones (although 2 or 3 levels down from the highest, that's pretty good considering there are about 20 levels of quality in tea, tea bags like Lipton or Tetley are just about lowest level of quality you can get by the way).
It was the most amazing tea I have ever had in my entire LIFE. It didn't have that bitter taste that most black teas have and it was juicy and delicious. It was so good that the next day I went back to the tea store and bought a bag of Assam tea and 2 bags of White Tea. I didn't get any green since I am not a huge fan of green to start with.
White tea is the fanciest of teas, and I bought the fanciest of the white teas (pretty fancy shmancy eh?) it cost a bundle but I wanted to try it. It's called Dove Silver Needles. This tea is picked from the first buds only from the very ends of the first leaves of the tea bush. There is only a 2 day window in which to pick this type of tea before it gets too old. The tea leaves are procesed minimally and don't got through the fermentation process that black teas go through. Most tea looks like little black sticks but this tea looks like fuzzy white tea leaves. It is the best tasting beverage I have ever had in my entire life. I can't even describe except that it's incredible. It's expensive as hell, but the really good, expensive tea leaves can be brewed multiple times and often don't come into their flavouring until the 3 brewing. White tea can be brewed a max of 4 times (the 4th time isn't that grea tbut passable), black tea can be brew 5 times. So at $16.50 a 25gm bag really good white tea seems insanely expensive for dried leaves. But at less than 2 gms of leaves per cup of tea and 3 brewings per, it ends up costing 46cents a cup of tea. That's not bad for the best beverage on earth. Really good blakc tea costs less than 25 cents a cup.
Plus you feel super cultured and foofty woofty when drinking expensive tea, and you can't put a price on that.

What'sa Madder You?

2009-10-26T21:03:00.000-07:00

The past few days have been filled with fibrey goodness!!! I have knit 3 hats in as many days. 1 luvverly merino red random cable hat (not that's not the name of it, I really just did random cables as I went). One Silver Thaw Noro Hat-plain stocking stitch. And one Noro Kujaku Hat that I did short rows for the front of the brim and it's really quite flattering.
(You can click on photos to embiggen)

Oh and I also knit a baby sweater with a hood a few days ago-it took me a full 4 and a half hours to knit and that includes the designing of the pattern and ripping back and reknitting 3 inches...I love big yarn. It's my first finished baby project-I think I have gotten over the whole jinxing thing...try to ignore the giant ball of sari silk...it was a moment of weakness.

My Mom and I have been dyeing with Madder root this evening and it's terribly fun. Mom grows Madder in her garden (incidently my tarantula is named Rose Madder because she is a rose hair tarantula, after my favourite Stephen King Novel of the same name, but I digress...) Madder is purported to make an incredible red and has been used for thousands of years (madder dyed cloth has been found in King Tutankhamun's tomb). I spent a lot of time on the internet trying find out how one is supposed to dye Madder root and discovered that everyone has a different way of doing it and they all think that everyone else doesn't know the proper way.
Working under the theory that ancient peoples doing dyeing might not always used proper scales and measuring techniques (although I am sure that master dyer in some ancient advanced civilizations did use controlled techniques, I doubt the layperson bothered.) I came up with a recipe that was fast and easy.
Step one, we dried the roots on the stove-we then discovered that we didn't need to dry the roots and added fresh roots to the pile.

Step two-chop the roots into little itty bitty pieces. This was annoying with dried roots and hard on the wrists, but incredibly easy with the fresh ones. It occured to me that all the recipes used dried roots because the majority of people don't have fresh ones available. We ended up with the equivalent to 1 oz of dried root.

We added the chopped roots to a pot of hot, but not boiling, water. More than one person said that boiling it can turn the dye brown. We'll have to try boiling it on purpose sometime to see what shade of brown-wouldn't it be wonderful to get a rich mahogany?
Below is a picture of the pot of water immediately after the roots are added. Literally, I added the roots, picked up the camera and took a picture. Look how red it is!!!

We then crushed 30gms of calcium carbonate (aka Tums) and added it to the root bath. The calcium carbonate ensures you get a true red rather than an orange red. It also imparts a nice minty flavour. Below is the dye bath with Tums.

Next step (and I didn't get a picture) was to mordant the wool. We did this by adding 50 gms of alum (maybe 2 tbsp)and 1 tsp of cream of tartar (both avaiable in the grocery store in the pickling section-you can sometimes find alum at the pharmacy) to a pot of warm water, stirred until it was dissolved and added 75gms of superwash wool top and a skein of homespun shetland (maybe 75gms)

After the wool had been in the mordant for half an hour and the dye bath had been cooking for about an hour and half (at very low heat on the woodstove, perhaps the equivalent to low on a slowcooker) I could handle the suspense no more and took a sliver of rinsed, mordanted wool and added it to the dye bath for half and hour and ended up with this gem.

The colour is amazing and the camera adds more of an orangey tone than is actually there. I would describe it as raspberry.

It's beautiful!!!

So unable to handle it any longer I rinsed the mordanted wool while mom strained the dye bath (no spinner wants to pick out a billion bits of wood and bark while spinning) and tossed in the wool.

This was a little anticlimactic as we had prepared enough dyebbath for 75gms of fibre and on a whim added the Shetland.

The result so far seems to be a variegated coral-yellow colour with little difference to the shetland. We'll leave it over night so it sucks up as much of the dye as possible and see what the resultant colour is. Meanwhile, there is a whole 'nother pot of madder root (even more than the first batch) sitting on the warm stove waiting for tomorrow.

So far the experriment has been SUPER succesful. The only thing keeping the wool from being a rich raspberry is the volume of wool versus dye. It was super easy to do and with enough root will produce colours as bright as commerical dyes.

By the way you don't need to use heat at all with madder. You can soak the roots for 24 hours and mordant overnight or for a few hours, and then have it sit in the dye bath until the dye is exhausted and you have the colour you choose. This method makes a dye product (protein fibres only) in a couple of hours-I'm impatient.

Later this week, dyeing with walnut shells and possibly making ramie from nettles.

Right Here, Right Now

2009-10-22T15:31:00.000-07:00

I am scanning photos, renaming files, eating soup, drinking pop, listening to music, reading blogs, and posting on this blog...all at the same time.
That's why I like knitting it's simple.

Where did the monotony go?

2009-10-21T17:33:00.000-07:00

Ever notice how distractions equal your threshold of distractedness? For example, if you knit a gigantic king size garter stitch coverlet (I am not exactly sure what a coverlet is but it sounds rather large) and you had nothing but 6 billion stitches of insane monotonous knit stitches(...I mean 1 stitch for every human being on the planet...that would make me consider committing genocide...) than nobody will speak to you for days. The phone will not ring. The people in your house will content themselves with non-communication, the cats won't meow at you when they are hungry and there will be nothing on TV.
On the flipside, if you try to do something that requires even a modicum of attention span, like oh say...working at home-everybody wants to be around you. The phone will ring (don't worry it's not for you, that would be a pleasant distraction, but you will have to stop working to give the phone to someone else). Some kid outside will slapshot a puck at your house so that it sounds like a truck drove into your home. The neighbours, after 4 months of blessed silence will decide to play really loud music (loud enough that I know they were playing Aerosmith's version of Come Together, an altogether laudable music choice but definitely distracting). Someone will ask to borrow money and then attempt to make small talk ("What are you doing?" 1 guess as to how difficult it is not to answer "Apparently working so I can earn enough money to lend you some..."). That person will probably come back later asking questions that they could discover the answers for themselves if they cared to. Although I will admit that my bitterness over the multiple distractions have made me a little intolerant of inane conversation.
I find myself in a rather hypocritical mood, at this point I am not really pleased with the fact that things have to balance out.
On the bright side, I did manage to knit a baby sweater. My first completed baby project!! I have been waffling around finishing baby stuff (I still have a baby kimono that needs to be steeked and has been waiting since August). It just feels like jinxing. But yesterday at the yarn store I realized that I could probably knit a baby sweater in super bulky yarn in 4 hours or less and hot damn! I was off to the races!!!!
I knit a design-as-you-go hooded baby cardigan in a lovely olive green merino yarn (Fleece Artist, Big Merino). Less than 4 hours and it has a hood!
I like how it turned out so much that I may write the design down and put it on Ravelry (OK that's a wee bit ambitious I admit, but it could happen...really).
It's a rather therapeutic little sweater even after it's finished. I wanted to gnaw my way through the drywall and shove my head through and scream at my neighbours to turn down the music. and then I looked a the sweater and thought "Oh look at the baby sweater!"
so easy to anger...so easy to please...a woman of extremes I am.

Viva Canada!!!

2009-10-19T20:31:00.000-07:00

I never thought I would say this, but I love a reality show. I have been avidly watching Battle of the Blades and thinks it's the greatest reality show ever. How can you get more Canadian than combining Hockey Players with Figure Skaters? Of a fan of both sports, I think it's a brilliant idea. The fact that they are skating for charity helps me justify my enjoyment of it.
For those of you that don't watch the program 8 retired NHL players have been partnered with 8 figure skaters, and they have to learn how to do pairs skating with all the crazy lifts and presses. It's fantastic because almost all the hockey players are gigantic (except for Domi of course) and all the figure skaters are tiny. I love watching the big manly men let loose and try to be graceful, it's fantastic!!
I don't always agree with how the voting goes, and I am very glad that the final say goes to the judges. It's pretty obvious that a lot of people vote for their favourite hockey players rather than the better skaters. I think the best pair is Isabelle and Stephane, but Battle of the Blades is not being played in Quebec, so they have been on the chopping block 2 out of 3 weeks. Because of this, last night I pulled out my computer and voted for them a bunch of times. I don't think I have ever voted for a TV thing before but I had put aside my ethics for the sake of the better skaters.
Battle of the Blades? The perfect example of how Canadian Culture can shine through our immersion in Americana!!

Giving Thanks (a blog title like a million othe blog titles in Canada today...)

2009-10-11T10:34:00.000-07:00

I love to knit. I love to spin. I used to hate knitting, but loved spinning. Eventually I got to the point where I realized that I was going to have to do something with all the yarn I had spun and I begrudgingly sat down to knit.
Knitting used to be a chore for me. I am left handed and couldn't quite get the hang of "american" style knitting. Forget about learning to crochet, there are fewer instructions for left handed crochet than for knitting. I created a modified knitting technique, that was very strange looking but worked very well for me, but it wasn't good enough. At my fastest I still considered myself to slow. So after learning a bit more about knitting from other knitters I decided to try to knit continental. It took a while to learn and my hands hurt a LOT but I learned quickly because I already knew how to knit, I was just learning a new technique.
Today is a great day because it is know 10:40AM and I have already taught my youngest stepdaughter how to knit. She has knit about 8 rows of a potential scarf- although I think it may end up being a cowl, much more stylish and faster to knit. She is 9 years old and she can spin and knit!!
Knitting for me is like meditating, it gives me something tangible to focus on while at the same time creating something. I love making things. I think it's the greatest thing in the world to be able to pass that joy onto someone else! Especially now that I have another knitting friend to hang out with (she is already talking about goign on ravelry and knitting patterns.)
Take heed my friends, I have converted yet another disciple to our following!! MUWAHAHAHAHAH!!!

addendum

2009-10-09T19:25:00.000-07:00

My husband pointed out to me that reading about knitting is also not knitting...
I think I married the right man...

I Only Knit Tiny`s Sweater

2009-10-09T14:08:00.000-07:00

Fall is here, and I must say I have never been so excited by the season! I have always enjoyed fall, I love the crisp air and how everything manages to smell clean and delicious, even in the city. But this fall in particular I am excited about. This fall I am a fully addicted knitter and spinner and I am nesting. What a perfect combination for the season. Lately I have been knitting a lot, spinning often and gotten back into dying now that it's not so hot that the dye pot turns my house into a vinegary sauna.
Tiny's sweater is coming along slowly. I knit the first ball of yarn in one day and that was a huge mistake. The yarn I am using is called Samband. It is a discontinued Icelandic Lopi. It is incredibly inflexible for a few reasons a) it is single ply so it doesn't have the boing of a 2ply. 2) It is Icelandic wool that hasn't been dehaired so the hair holds it together more than straight fleece does (think mohair). iii) This wool is at least 3o yrs old. Stored very well, but despite that it is very, very dry-which obviously lends nothing to the elasticity of the yarn. Add into that that I am knitting it at a firm gauge and it has cables...well that spells pain. The 2 subsequent balls of yarn have taken nearly a week each to knit. I can't do more than 4 or 5 rows at a time because it hurts.
Now I had vowed that I would knit NOTHING else until I was done this sweater. This is not an entirely unreasonable goal for me, I have knit other sweaters to the exclusion of all else. So while I was knitting only Tiny's sweater...I was knitting very little because I could only knit 10-15 rows day at most, and that was all I knit. That drove me pretty batty for awhile until I realized that spinning is not knitting. (C'mon...it's SO not cheating...) so I did a bunch of spinning. Then I realized that dying is also not spinning, so I did a bunch of that too. Soon I was nearly in the full throes of fibre induced euphoria, and still not knitting very much. it was great for a few days, until I got to the point where I realized that i was significantly increasing my yarn stash (good) but not decreasing my stash at all because I wasn't really knitting (bad..ish).
I knit an alpaca scarf out of roving. That doesn't really count, because it only took an hour and a half to knit, and everybody know that if you don't reach that critical threshold of several hours, it`s not really knitting.
Than I knit a pair of mittens. This also didn`t count because I knit it out of handspun that I specifically spun for mittens and I was experimenting with mitten design- i am trying to design a better fitting mitten both in the the thumb and the top of the hand. It`s going very well so far. It fits my hand fabulously...although apparently not everyone has hands shaped like mine...
Right now I am knitting a hat from some red and plum colour Blue Faced Leicester wool that is plyed with sky blue bamboo. this also doesn`t count because I am knitting it to donate as a door prize for the Kamloops Arts Council AGM on Tuesday.
So really...
I have only knit Tiny`s Sweater...

I don't need a picture to say a thousand words...

2009-09-30T17:38:00.000-07:00

I keep putting of blogging because of a lack of photos. I could blame this lack of photos on a lack of camera, but that would be a lie…really it’s sheer laziness. I seem to believe that I can’t blog without photos, like my writing isn’t enough for my readers. I have lots of interesting things to talk about with very few photos, hopefully I can be descriptive enough to be interesting.
I went to the Fall Fair on Saltspring Island a couple of weekends ago, it’s something I try to go to every year. The Fall Fair is like a mini reunion, I get to see a lot of old friends and enjoy a fantastic event. My Mom is the poultry coordinator, so I spend a lot of time with chickens volunteering. The past couple of years I have assisted the judging of the poultry, I think it is possible that I now know more about chickens than a person who doesn’t actually own a chicken should…I also attended a breeding seminar so I could learn how to breed my non-existent chickens. However, 0+0=0, so I still have no chickens.
I entered a lot of things at the Fair, I entered a whole bunch of spun yarn and a sweater. Mom entered some yarn, sheep and chickens, and Mackenzie entered yarn. We all did very well and when we gathered all of our ribbons I discovered we had 30 ribbons, 3 rosettes, and 2 trophies, which was a pretty darn good haul! Mom’s cockerel got best chicken, which was awesome because it was a record year for entries!
Another great thing occurred at the fair. I met a lovely lady by the name of Alinka who had an angora rabbit she no longer wanted. This lovely bunny included a crapload of rabbit feed (I say crapload because honestly…that’s what rabbit feed turns into…) a beautiful hutch and all the accessories needed for a happy bunny. She is a delightful bunny but I am unsure of her parentage (which I don’t hold against her) I think she is a cross because her fur is not that long. She might be part Satin or French because she has no fluffy stuff on her ears or face…she could be a French and the lack of fluffy on face and ears is the result of crossbreeding. Either way she is delightful, her name is Liela-which I was sorely tempted to change because I had a boss named Liela who was HORRIBLE-but I can’t seem to make anything else work. I often call her Bunny-wei, which is what all the “Egyptians” in Stargate were yelling all the time. She is a fantastic smokey colour, mostly grey with just a hint of brown. And she is so incredible docile and polite. She likes crackers. The cats are undecided about her. Chase brought in a baby mouse and played with it and ate it in front of the rabbit. I think it may be a warning…
In terms of knitting, I have burned through a couple projects. I knit the Louisa hat and it turned out great (I gave it to Alinka). I designed a hat pattern that I test knit and need to tinker with a bit and get test knitters for-it’s a fair isleish style pattern of a dragon/phoenix. It looks really cool and is knit from a neutral colour and Noro.
I finally started knitting Tiny’s sweater. It took me 1 day to burn through the first ball of yarn and has taken me 5 days to get through the second!!! The yarn is…not stretchy…it makes my hands ouchy. Because of this I keep looking at other patterns and get to the point where I am pulling yarn and needles out of my stash and then have to throw them on the floor while yelling ”BAD CAROLINE!” I know because of the difficulty with knitting this yarn (an incredibly inflexible Icelandic Lopi) if I stop knitting this sweater, I will never start it again. I will say that I particularly enjoy the cabling in the back because it looks like a Klingon’s back. This sweater is a circular knit cable sweater with raglan sleeves. If it turns out well perhaps I will write the pattern down and have it on etsy. I may need test knitters!!!

Time after time

2009-09-03T14:12:00.001-07:00

Lately I have been having a hard time keeping up with blog posts. I have been finding the process a little frustrating-it is so slow to add photos even with my brand new speedy computer that I have a hard time gettting th emotivation to do new posts, and I prefer posts with photos.
I have also been very busy, already spending a lot of time on my computer so adding the time do blog posts is not a high priority. *postscriptum-the layout of this post is a little messed, another frustration with posting...
I have also noticed that the internet has become an outlet for less than happy thought for a lot of the people that I know. It's great that poeple are finding a way to share and I am glad that the internet can be used as a form of therapy but it seems to have the opposite effect on me, I read about everybody else's problems (especially on facebook) and it makes me not want to share. I think maybe people are trying to reach out in a way that is not as intimidating as walking up to a friend and saying "Hey, I have a problem..." and I totally understand that, what I don`t understand is fishing for sympathy and lolling in misery (actually that`s a lie, I understand it only too well and I know how unhealthy it is). I guess I am being slightly hypocritical by complaining about stuff on the internet myself. But I think a lot of misunderstanding is fostered by communication through the internet where inflections and facial expressions are missing. Nothing beats good old fashioned face to face, human interaction.

Our vacation finished well. It ended at just the right time, when we were ready to go home. We saw a lot of really great things and went to some fantastic places. One of the best parts was when we were walking down the street near the gay village in Toronto and 2 guys in bondage gear (seariously, one dude was wearing a leather g-string) were eyeballing Tiny like he was a tasty pastry.

The cats were really happy to see us when we got home.

I have had some pretty severe startitis in the knitting department. I have started many projects but haven't managed to finish anything. Not really sure why. I think maybe it's just that I have way too much yarn available in my stash (is that even possible?)

I just got some Fleece Artist special for an amazing price in an incredible colourway. It seems to be spurring me into a knitting marathon that will hopefully clear up my startitis.

It is Fleece Artist Angel hair and Merino 2.6. It was an great deal, the Angel Hair was basically free. I am knitting a cardigan. The top is the angel hair and the bottom will be the merino. The collar is also going to be merino, I think it will help to hold the shape of the top better. It`s a super quick knit. I am using the Mr. Greenjeans as a guide for the stitch numbers but the rest I am making up as I go. I am doing one thing very different fro how I have done sweaters before and that is, although it is top down, I am knitting the sleeves before the body. This, I think, is a better way to knit wiht a limited supply of yarn. I can weigh how much yarn I have before starting the first sleeve and figure out how long I want to make the sleeve before going on to the next on ebased on the amount of yarn I have left on the ball. I think that would be a great project, to write a book or pamphlet that is a stashbusting guide with basic patterns and ideas on how to make the most of what you have (there`s nothing worse than knitting a patterna nd getting to the ned to find you don`t have enough yarn!!)

Hopefully I will finish the sweater and continue to post!!!!

Ready to be Inundated? Dead Dolphin and more...

2009-08-07T16:56:00.000-07:00

This blog is mostly photos...we are having a fantastic time and are in Newfoundland right now. I'll just make a comment for each of the photos because if I write like I usually do it will take WAY too long to go through this blog.
Below is the new friend I made at Lake Erie. I thought he was pretty. (no this is not the dolphin...just you wait...)
We went to the Welland Canal where there was a festival, this was the most memorable part of it...
The best part about Quebec was the food and drink. Tiny got a Cheeseburger Geant and it was...well...Geant...

Tiny and I also really enjoyed the beverages in Quebec...

Yes you can get pop in glass bottles still!

We took a trip to a Highland Village in Nova Scotia where that was really cool. everybody welcomed you in Gaelic. I got about 6 blackfly bites which I thought was kinda nifty...but now a few days later with them still horribly swollen and itchy I find it HORRIBLE. The novelty definitely wore off before the itchiness....

I saw MANY, MANY Spinning Wheels

This next one is so simple I think I might try to make one...

This is the pig who really loved head scritches.

The Ferry to Newfoundland was HORRENDOUS. So bad that I now think BCFerries is the pinnacle of transportation hospitality (yes THAT bad) I won't go into details, but I think their Customer Relations Manager will find the letter I sent her interesting...

This is without a doubt the best fish and chips I have ever had in my ENTIRE life. We got it at a Fish and Chip van (of course) in a place called Sandy Cove. It was halibut and amazing... We stopped on the side of the road to way to St. Anthony and had to cross a...field...expanse...area...covered in low lying evergreens and billions of these berries.

To get to this:

Amazing, eh?

Tiny was pretty excited about the beaver wood her found on the beach.

And then we found this...

Yes my friends that is one dead dolphin, we were downwind when we came upon it so we were very surprised when we stumbled upon the mostly skeletonized creature. Needless to say I was absolutely thrilled and took multiple photos...
I know, I have a rather unnatural fixation with dead things, but a dead dolphin is FREAKING COOL!!!

There were pretty snails.

And LOTS of rocks.

Eventually we finished driving and ended up here: St. Anthony's. Look it up on the map, I am pretty sure we are closer to England than Kamloops right now!

And that's all I have so far, well not even close, but there is only so much time I am willing to spend on the computer during my vacation!

Tomorrow we go to L'Anse Aux Meadows to the Viking Settlement!!!

Kamloops to Penticton to Kelowna to Calgary

2009-08-01T21:57:00.000-07:00

So here I am at the Calgary Airport blogging away, it's 11pm local time and I have 2 hours until my connecting flight to Toronto, Tiny is blissfully playing Southpark Pinball.

This morning we got up early to drive to Penticton for Tyson and Nicole's Wedding. Tyson is a very dear friend of ours who moved to China nearly 6 years ago. This is the first time we have seen him since the move and the first time we met Nicole. It was a very nice wedding and we had a great time. They did two outfits, western and chinese which was pretty neat.

I like Nicole very mich, they did this neat thing where you wrote down a question for either Tyson or Nicole and they answered the questions for everybody over the microphone. I asked Nicole if she liked He-Man as much as Tyson and if not, did she pretend to? She answered "who is He-Man? I've only heard of She-Ra, and that's how I knew they were meant to be together.

We flew from Kelowna to Calgary and this was the view from the plan. I tried to get a good photo but plan we too bouncy, so I tried video and it turned out OK.

HOLY CRAP THAT'S A BIG ASS FIRE! Even the air inside the plane was super smokey.

When we got above the clouds this was the view.

Looks like an Air Canada Commercial, eh?

On the Blog Again

2009-07-31T18:01:00.000-07:00

Finally! A post...I kept waiting to get my new camera before posting and waiting for photos to be sent to me from other peoples cameras and I realized if I kept this up I would never blog again!
Tomorrow Tiny and I are leaving on our cross country journey. Our plans have changed significiantly...early tomorrow we are getting up and going to a wedding in Penticton, we are very excited about this because our friend moved to China 6 years ago and this is the first time we have seen him since he moved!!!! We were planning on driving from Penticton across the country...we changed our minds and decided to fly out from Kelowna tomorrow night to Toronto and rent a car. It actually ends up being close to the same cost as driving and we get an extra week to travel around the maritimes!!!
The only bad thing about this change is that my knitting plans have changed drastically! There is no way I can bring Tiny's sweater, it is 20 balls of Lopi weight wool and would need it's own suitcase. So now I am bringing socks and lace knitting. I was really excited about knitting the sweater, but this way we can spend more time being tourists and less time rushing.
We plan on going to L'Anse Aux Meadows which is going to be thrilling and amazing! Upper Canada Village which we both went to as youngsters and are looking forward to again (I remember they had really good cheese). We plan on spending time in Quebec city, and I would realyl like to see the Bay of Fundy again!
I am bringing my computer so hopefully I will blog at some point on the trip! I will be buying camera batteries today!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

2009-07-02T21:05:00.000-07:00

So I knwo I haven't been blogging much lately and I bet I lost some readers due to lack of posting. I have been crazy busy (one day off from work in 18).
Tomorrow is a big day. Tomorrow is my last day of work with my current employer. I am moving on to bigger and better things. The kind of things that will help make my life happier. The past 2 weeks at work has been particularly stressful what with working so much and my boss being extremely resentful of my leaving. I feel no guilt that I am planning on leaving, I gave 2 weeks notice and I have a good reason. By being so bitter she is merely reaffirming my choice to leave and ensuring that I will never return.
I have been sick that past few days which has been extremely difficult, I am already over tired and spent, as well as emotionally drained. Yesterday I was working the Kamloops Arts Council booth at Art in the Park. I also sang in the Canada Day Idol competition. I am proud to say that I made the top ten out of 34 singers, however with my extreme cold my voice totally crapped out in the semi-finals. My voice cracked a few times and I knew I wasn't going any further. There were some really fantastic singers and it was great to hear them all!
Last weekend I went to my first SCA event (where I was a vendor). For those that don't know the Society for Creative Anachronism is a society for recreating the middle ages. It was fantastic fun hanging out with people dressed up in medieval clothing and calling them by their "persona" names. My SCA name is Grainne Donnghal. I met some super cool people and learned some neat stuff. I bought an absolutely beautiful "nailbinding" (pronounced nahlbinding) needle that is hand carved form bone and learned how to needle felt. I also saw the coolest drinking game on the PLANET. I don't drink but next time I go to an vent I am going to get a "designated drinker" and play. How it works is you face off against another opponent and each of you has a ten foot long metal tipped spear. The game is played at night by torch light so visibility is limited. You take a can of beer, shake the hell out of it and lob it at your opponent who then tries to "spear the beer" if you pierce the beer you then have to shotgun what's left in the can (unless it's a clean kill in which case there is no beer left) if it is neither pierced nor kill the beer you pick it up, reshake it and toss it back at your opponent. It was SO much fun to watch!
So that's what's been going on in my busy life, in between this I have managed to get a new tattoo (a voodoo doll drawn by my 9 yr old stepdaughter), write the newsletter for the Arts Council, do a little bit of knitting and spinning, and give a 14 yr old guitar lessons.
I cannot wait for this weekend!
FREEEEDDDOOOOMMM!!!

Photoless

2009-06-20T12:22:00.001-07:00

So my husband pointed out to me that I had not done a post in a while. This happens every time I kill the batteries on my camera. The camera shuts off automatically except when it is plugged in to the USB port. So about 50% of the time when I am uploading my pics, I kill the battery.
I resist posting when I have no photos, but this time I am going to break tradition because I don't foresee myself getting around to getting batteries anytime soon.
So...did I start knitting Tiny's Sweater? No. The whole plan is for it to be designed in time for our trip across Canada. I plan on taking about 3ish projects with me on the trip. The Tiny Sweater, something else (perhaps a horribly complicated lace shawl?) and socks/mitts which only count as one project even though I will probably do more than one pair. Our trip is going to take up most of August so that's a lot of knitting time!
My current projects are the Lady of the Lake Sweater in "Ruby" I special ordered it in that colourway. It's the most amazing shades of red.
I am also knitting the Triinu scarf (rav link) from Knitted Lace of Estonia. I am usually a hater of charted lace, but Estonian Lace makes sense. The charts are easy to follow and pattern in such a way that eventually you don't really need to chart because you know what happens next from looking at what you have already knit! It's very intuitive and I love it. I think it works this way because up until this century most Estonian Lace patterns were not written down and families had samplers of stitch patterns to use as guides. I am developing a somewhat unhealthy obsession with nupps (apparently prounounced to rhyme with soup, but I can't quite bring myself to say "noup"). A nupp is where you knit and yarn over several times into one stitch increasing it by 5-9 stitches. The next row you purl all those stitches into one so it doesn't really increase. It makes a lovely little blob and everytime I make one I feel like a freaking knitting genius!
So that's whats been going on in my knitting life...for all you people that missed me oh so much.

reCHARGE!

2009-06-09T22:53:00.000-07:00

There is something about knitting, when I get it right, that makes me feel like a freakin' genius!
Seriously...it's the greatest feeling. Conversely getting it wrong makes me feel like a dumbass...but I digress.
I have been in a constant state of working/volunteering for several days now. Lack of sleep is making me stupid and tired. I am too tired to cast on anything and I am between projects.
I should have gone to bed but instead I did this:

Apparently I am absolutely insane despite the fact that I failed math three times in highschool I decided doing the maths for Tiny's sweater would be relaxing.

A little background on the Tiny Sweater. My husband decided that if I knit him a really complicated time-consuming black-hole-of-knitting sweater he would wear it. Basically he wants a sweater with cables. Not that cables are difficult, but they certainly aren't as fast as stocking stitch when you are doing mixed cables. I received 20 balls of beautiful icelandic wool as a gift. Which was fantastic because my husband is by no means a small man (we measured his chest to day, it's 53") and the idea of purchasing enough yarn to cover him made me feel faint. I started seriously looking at the "you are guaranteed for a loan" admail...I figured if I got decent yarn at a decent price the sweater would cost at least $150. So this gift of yarn was heaven sent.

I then could not find a single sweater that I could imagine him wearing. I surfed and surfed. I showed him a couple patterns with no interest on his part. I then decided (on the advice of the lovely Barb Brown) to do a "vanilla sweater" and add cables. So it took me a surprisingly long time to find a plain sweater for a man that was the right dimensions. I decided if I was going to the trouble of knitting this sweater I would do it in a style I like which means raglan seamless construction.

After much searching I found the perfect vanilla sweater, I then sat down with Tiny and perused a cable book with him. He was very obliging despite his lack of interest in looking at knitting books (after all the sweater is for him). He picked several, I actually made him pick more than I needed so I could have some design leeway.

Today I was too tired to knit so I sat down with some books and started to math things out. The yarn I am using is far heavier than what is called for in the pattern, so I started with that. I also want the ribbing to match the cable, this was the hard part...I also am doing way more cable on the front so the back actually has less stitches than the front to compensate (damn I hope that works...) It took me over an hour to figure out the math and the ribbing and I am proud to say I have written the first row to the first pattern I have ever written!

Here it is!
Cast on 108 stitches and join for knitting in round, pm at beginning of round.
Row1" *k2, p2* 4 times, pm, p1, k4, p8, k4, p1, pm, p2, k2, p2, k1, pm, p3, k4, p4, k4, p4, k4, p3, pm, k2, p2, k2, p1, pm, p1, k4, p8, k4, p1, pm, *p2, k2* 4 times, pm, *p2, k2* 8 times, p2, pm, p1, k9, p12, k9, p1, pm, *p2, k2* 8 times, p2.

Dudes, I lined up the ribbing on the first try.
Yeah...I'm awesome...You know...aside from the part where I have been working on this sweater for months and haven't cast on yet...

Oh by the way, I am going to knit this sweater with these...
Jealous?

Zombie Burn

2009-06-05T00:46:00.000-07:00

Warning! This post is kind of gross!

So my sunburn blistered today...I got burnt on Saturday and it blistered today. It's really gross...no you don't understand REALLY gross. I am not squeamish in any way, I have poked livers heavily affected with cirrhosis in the morgue. I have eaten muktuk. I have plucked chickens and killed and gutted fish. I used to eat catfood and match stick heads (when I was 5 or 6 years old, not recently psshh that'd be gross). I have helped pull a breach calf outta it's momma. I think dead animals are "interesting". But this sunburn is...well it's GROSS.
It blistered and was oozing which I didn't think was tha gross although it did sting. But I was sitting in front of my computer wondering what that SMELL was. It smelled revolting, like death or infection. I can only describe it as what I imagine zombies would smell like...I looked around checked my feet (seriously it's sandal season it's entirely possible that my feet smell like death.)
When I realized the smell was me, well then I got completely grossed out.
I wonder if I have ebola, or maybe necortizing fasciitis...or maybe I am slowly turning into a zombie and this is just the first step of my "death". I guess if I stop blogging you'll know that I have departed for a life of (or death of) eating human brains and groaning uncontrollably.
I might actually start liking the song "Thriller"
It's times like this that I really miss Herman the Spider. I feel like we have a lot in common now...

Ouch

2009-06-02T09:31:00.000-07:00

I got sunburnt this weekend...I mean REALLY sunburnt. My face isn't too bad, it's my shoulders and upper chest (the part that's covered in clothes). My husband had a ball game this weekend and I watched his game while sitting in the sun industriously knitting away. It was a double header and when we wandered over to the beer gardens I had to endure the quick double glances and winces from passersby. Not to mention all the "I thought you were Native..." comments.
Seriously it's been 4 days since I got burnt and I am still super ouchy. The only good thing about it is I got Knitter's Tan. Because I was sitting in my chair with my arms bent knitting, the crooks of my inner elbows are still white. It looks kind of stupid but I am trying to treat it like a badge of honour.
The tank top I am knitting is too big, of course. I have to stop thinking that I am gigantically huge. I couldn't bring myself to frog nearly two weeks of non-stop knitting. Plus it's linen/cotton and kinda splitty the first time around, I imagine it would me much worse the second time. I am going to finish it and wear it anyways. I'll just pretend it's supposed to be all loose and flowy. The irritating thing is I have add 3 inches to it and it is JUST long enough. The pattern increases in width but not in length, how silly is that? Luckily I noticed this and acted accordingly.
I am desperately resisting the call of other projects...

This is what I learned today...

2009-05-31T00:50:00.000-07:00

Today I learned how to do this...
I learned how to use a quill spindle. I also learned how to do long draw so that I could use the quill spindle properly. Seriously, I feel like some kind of spinning super hero right now. I've read about long draw but the idea of drafting fibre with only one hand seemed crazy to me. Every time I tried I would end up with a horrible mat of fibre that was useless so I gave up. Friday I got the quil spindle so I had to learn. It's totally possible to use the quill spindle without using long draw but what would be the point? Aside from it making a nifty sound it's not really efficient to use a worsted method of spinning with a quill spindle.
The instructions that came with the spindle were not great so I looked up a video on youtube and watch about 20 seconds of footage and then gave the spindle a whirl (hehe) I surpirsed myself by being able to almost immediately do long draw, there were some snags at the start (pun intended) but after a total of 20 minutes of effort I consider myself introduced to the mysteries of long draw. I am not saying I am consistent or that the yarn is saleworthy, but I can do it and damn it looks cool when I do! I am going to be demonstrating spinning at the Courthouse sometime this summer and I think I will do the quill spindle, since it's not nearly as common.
Seriously...I feel like a spinning genius...

Hooray!

2009-05-29T09:57:00.000-07:00

Hooray! I had my first Etsy Store sale. I sold 2 skeins to a weaving couple in California! I swear it was the most exciting $30 I have ever made! I couldn't sleep that night I was so excited about shipping it! I hope they love it!
I got some amazing blue faced leicester handdyed roving from Twist of Fate Yarns. I love the colour so I bought 200gms of it and am spinning it with my jumbo flyer on the ashford tradional. It's not a particularly thick single but I have no intention of plying it so I don't want the twist to tight, I also wanted to spin the whole 200gms into one nice long skein. The plan for this yarn is to spin into a single ply of considerable length so that there is enough yarn for a decent size project at a reasonable price.

I actually got up early this morning so I could watch Red Dwarf and finish spinning this yarn...I'm such a nerd...

The Albatross has landed

2009-05-25T01:00:00.000-07:00

I finally finished the Kilosweater...the damn thing has been hanging over my head for nearly 4 months. I started this sweater at the beginning of February and have had half of one sleeve to knit for nearly 3 months. It's handspun merino silk. I finished the back, both front pieces, one sleeve and had just cast on the second sleeve when I couldn't wait any longer and decided to sew it together to see how it fit. It didn't. It's much too large. This was incredibly frustrating because I "got gauge" I triple checked afer realizing it was way too big for me and yup...the gauge matches the pattern. So rather than rip out 6 million miles of yarn I decided to finish it up and give it to a friend of mine.
And then I procrastinated.
After that I procrastinated.
Recently I was procrastinating over it...
Today at about 8:30PM I was about to start spinning a lovely bobbin of romney and I said "F%$#! it!" I picked up the last ball of yarn and finished the last sleeve, wove in a bajillion ends and sewed the damn thing together.
Now I have this:This thing weights 1.15 Kilograms. I think it weighs about 15-20 pounds when it's wet (no joke), I pray that Angee does not fall into the water when wearing this sweater, the guilt would kill me...
Thank god it's over...

I have been doing a LOT of spinning and dyeing lately. I am trying to stock up my etsy shop I also found some time to do some spinning for myself. I got some Blue Face Leicester roving from Twist of Fate and it's the most incredible colourway, I came up with the name "Japanese Plum" for it.
These are picures of the singles, I have navajo plyed it to preserve the colour gradations. I think I am going to knit a plain sweater with it to show off the colourss

Also, I just noticed that Herman the Spider is gone...R.I.P. Herman.

I'm Dyeing

2009-05-14T17:06:00.000-07:00

Today I only had to work a couple of hours so I came home and dyed sock yarn. I got a whole bunch of sock yarn at Michaels for an insanely low clearance price, which I skeined and am now dyeing for my etsy store. My first attempt turned out pretty cool, but the batteries on my camera died, so I couldn't take a photo. I tried scanning the yarn on my scanner and I ended up with some horror movie yarn...seriously it looks like it's going to break through some kind of tarry film and take over...
The photo doesn't do the colours justice, so hopefully I will remember to get some batteries for my camera so I can add the stuff to my store. I also dyed some yellow and orange, and I am going to call that one Jonquille, and I dyed one this great purpley red which will be called Blackberry Subway Jam. I don't know what to call this green and purple one...B Movie?
I also died some romney roving and it turned out light purple and pink, I haven't decided if I am going to spin it and sell the yarn, sell the roving, give it away...it's pretty neat colours, although I am going to have to dye some more of the romney in something that is not pink...

Chlorpotential

2009-05-11T16:15:00.000-07:00

So today I planted my outdoor kitty litter box...I mean garden, I planted my garden...OK, I have to be honest here...I planted 1/2 my garden...the other half I am sure will happen at some later date.
I am starting my 2 year noplant plan. This doesn't mean that in 2 years I won't have plants, this means that in 2 years I will only have to plant stuff if I want to. I am planting a corridor of perennials down the centre of my garden with annuals on the border. Next year I will fill in the border with perrenials. I could do it all this year, but that would be rather cost prohibitive since perrenials cost more than annuals...
So today I cleaned up the silver wispy perrenial (whose name escapes me...) and planted a rasberry cane that I bought at the Farmer's Market, Hostas, a hibiscus of indeterminate flower colour (one tag claims multicolour, the other white...) and strawberries for my perrenials. I also planted a border of marigolds. Now I m not a huge fan of marigolds, I don't lie they smell and I am unimpressed by the orange and yellow blooms, but they are cheap, cheap cheap. So I lay my preferences aside in the interests of being economically minded (cheap) and try to pick ones that have blooms with at least a little bit of red on them. I also am hoping that their malodorous blooms will my feline friends from using my garden as their latrine.
After I finished my planting I proudly took a picture of my lovely little garden for my blog. But when I looked at the picture I took I realized my garden isn't lovely at all (although I will admit it is little)
This is what I saw when I looked at the picture...

And I realized that when I was done and proudly looking at what I thought was my fantastic garden, I was look at what my garden will look like in the future, not what it looks like now. I can see where it's going. And if everything does not wither and die, I know it will look amazing...so if I post a picture in 2 months you'll know it turned out great. If I never mention anything again, you'll know everything died and there is a mini desert in my front yard...

I have been spinning a lot lately. While I was on Saltspring I focussed almost exclusively on knitting so now I am going overload on spinning and trying to fill up my Etsy Store with stock. I have been having fun and doing creative things, and trying to make yarn that may not appeal to me, but other people will love, like this...
Seriously...the pinkness of it makes me feel a little ill...OK a lot ill. But it's not just about me...it's about the customer.

I also made a yarn that I am extremely proud of, I think it's elegant, classy and beautiful.
It's a natural cream alpaca single plyed with rhodonite handbeaded silver thread. I knew it was going to look amazing but when I finished it I was ecstatic. I love the tiny glimmer of sivler that adds shine without being disco tacky. I can just imagine the beautiful item this could be knit into...
But now I must depart from my garden and spinning, I shall be finished my fair isle socks tonight!

F!*%$in' Rabbit

2009-05-06T19:38:00.000-07:00

So the first thing I saw this morning was this...
So I ate the F!*%$in' thing...

I dyed some romney roving with kool-aid and it turned out pretty awesome.
It's coral, pink and purple. It should spin up pretty vibrant. Kool-Aid, Vinegar, Water and a Slowcooker.

We have been spending a lot of time with lambs. Frieda had triplets and is only willing to look after one so the other two are int he house getting bottle fed.
Their names are Oliver and Dodger. There was some worry with Oliver at first because he had to be forcefed, but Dodger is a voracious little bugger. You can stuff him full and he will be unable to drink anymore and he will still suck on your arm while you are feeding his brother.

I finished knitting the Birthday Yarn socks. They are super comfy and smooth, they are light enough I might be able to wear them in the summer.
I also finished one fair isle sock.
This is my first solo Fair Isle project and I am pretty happy with how it's turned out. I think I might do the second one in negative...

A Post a Day

2009-05-04T17:25:00.000-07:00

Why Yes, I am posting 2 days in a row!! There is a lot going on here and I have the time to do so...
First of all, this is what I woke up to this morning...
OK now you have to go and read the post from yesterday to understand just how creepy that chocolate bunny really is...

I also wanted to point out that Tim's cat is a freaking weirdo...she was sleeping in this cage today...I have no idea why...In Duncan I bought a couple skeins of Fleece Artist. This is Scotiasilk, it's a Worsted Weight, I have 2 skeins totalling 400ydsI also got this skein of "Leba' which is DK weight and 65% kid mohair, 20% wool and 15% nylon in the most incredible jewel tones of green and blue
I also bought 200 grams of brown Llama fibre, which in retrospect seems rather silly, but how was I to know that the future would bring this?A friend of my Mom's GAVE this to me!
A couple pounds of unwashed beautiful reddish brown alpaca

Nearly 2 pounds of amazing Shetland/Alpaca batts

And over 2 pounds of lovely soft white Romney roving
And in between all the yarn gluttony and fondling I did manage to get some knitting doneI anticipate finishing these tonightish (or maybe tomorrow)
I have no idea what to do next...I keep getting flustered and my heart starts pumping to hard when I start thinking about all this yarn and fibre...