Hmm...... so the reveal was Sunday

And I am just now getting this up! As Gilly would say.....sorry. Perhaps I need to refresh. I belong to a fiber guild and we had our Holiday Project exchange this past Sunday. I have been keeping this under wraps for quite some time now and I finally can show what I made with the handspun yarn I have been working on for the past few (5 or 6) months.



This was all spun on my spindle I will have you know. So what I made was La La's Simple Shawl (free ravelry download)!


I am really pleased with how it came out and so was Liz. I don't think she took it off the whole afternoon. Which makes me very happy. Here she is modeling it for me:

Here is a nice close up

And why not! Here is still yet another shot on Liz:

Well not only do I make something, I also received something and I must say I have worn this scarf every day since I have received it. It is a hand woven scarf! Noticed we all have the same colors (it was planned that way)

This has to be one of my favorite meetings of the year. You see what everyone has made. I loved each and everything that was made this year. Everyone in the group did a fantastic job. Here is a group shot:

I am not sure why this photo is sideways, but I can't figure out how to make it a landscape right now.

As you can see there were 2 shawls, a shawlette, 3 scarves, a tea cozie, a mobius scarf, a crochet neckwarmer and some fingerless mitts.

How talented are we?

Back to normal...

My brother from California came home for Thanksgiving....
He works at a winery in Napa....
We drank a lot of expensive wine....
Boy was it good....
I am sad that he had to go home....we always have a great time. But now we have to get back to normal (that is until Christmas)

I believe I mentioned that I have been doing a lot of knitting and spinning and spinning and knitting. Here are some of the finished skeins that I have spun up:

The above is superwash merino from Cosmic Fibers Yarn. I love Carrie's stuff. I am spinning this 4 oz top on my golding spindle. It feels like I am crawling along with this fiber, but I am getting a decent fingering/dk weight yarn. No plans on what it will eventually become. This here is about 156 yards.

This next skein is more of a worsted weight yarn. I think I got around 160 yards of it. It is also from the lovely and talented Carrie. I believe the fiber is Corridale? Not sure, but I love me some purple!

I am having fun with the photography of my yarn. I am getting the hang of it!

This Sunday is the big reveal of my mystery project! I can't wait to show the finished object. I am really pleased with how it came out. I hope the recipiant will like it too!

My fastest finished object

The pattern is 198 Yards of Heaven and I must say this is. What a great pattern that uses only one skein of worsted weight yarn. I started this last weekend and finished it up yesterday. By finishing I mean blocking and weaving in the ends. I think the size 8 needles helped.


I am so going to make another one or two, or several of these. How can I not?

I used Berocco Ultra Alpaca and it is divine next to the skin.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hi All! I hope you all are stuffing your faces with turkey! I know I will be.
I am so happy this Thanksgiving as my brother from afar has come home. It is going to be very nice.

I have been busy spinning knitting and knitting and spinning. I will show some finished things very soon! Perhaps even tonight or tomorrow.

Enjoy your holiday!

bad blogger.... bad bad blogger I am

What the heck is wrong with me? I thought I would be blogging MORE not LESS now that I can pretty much do it when I want. Well of course I do have to fight for online time here. There are 2 other people.

So what have I been up to? Well lets see... I believe I only had 3 skeins done for my guild holiday project. Then I got 4 done:

And I am happy to say that now I have all 5 complete:

I was a tad bit nervous. I had a goal though. I wanted to complete the spinning by October (check) and now that leaves me all of November to knit my project. I wish I could show progress shots. But alas I can't. Girls from the guild read this here blog and I don't want to spoil the surprise. But come December, I will definately be showing the finished project.

I have something in mind. But that could change at any second.

Oh and PS - I am not dissing you that leave comments. I don't know how to answer comments from Blogger yet. Your e-mail addresses don't show up when I get an e-mail notification. Some of you I have your e-mail. But I will figure this out to. I like to try and respond to all comments when I can.

Deep Peace is up on Ravelry!

I couldn't take the pressure! I finally figured out how to get this up on Ravelry, thanks to Carrie of Cosmic Fibers! Really I was starting to panic. So I did e-mail some of you the pattern. Now you can just go and grab it on Ravelry. If aren't on Ravelry then I can e-mail you the pattern. But you have to give me your e-mail address. So I can now go to sleep.

Please send me pictures or send me a message on Ravelry your finished ones! I want to see them! Do you realize I don't even have one for myself? This one belongs to the yarn store! I think I need to make one.... don't you?

Good night and thank you for all your interest in the pattern. I need to get started on another one right?

;-)

Deep Peace Pattern

Wow! I turn on the computer today and found like 19 e-mails about the pattern! I felt so warm and fuzzy! I have the pattern!!!!!! YAY!!!

But I need some help. How the heck do I upload the pattern to blogger? It is a PDF format and I can't for the life of me figure it out!

Any computer savvy people out there that can lend me a hand? I want to give you this pattern.

I don't even know how to get it uploaded to Ravelry either. I sent them an e-mail and haven't heard back. If this is going to be a pain, I can e-mail anyone who e-mails me at:

sandawich at hotmail dot com

I am sorry this is taking me so long. Please help!

;-)

In my time of dying.....dyeing?

So much for blogging all the time right? Well sometimes life catches up to you and you have to do other things. Like go to a wonderful concert out of town with your family! Yep, Friday we left town (The husband, the son and me) and drove to Schenectady to see Ian Anderson. Yes, the guy from Jethro Tull. He was AWESOME! He did an accoustic set and yes he did Aqualung (but a totally different version) I think the only bad part of the concert was the lady sitting next to me checking her cell phone for the Yankee game score. Why do people do that at concerts? She paid 50 bucks like me to see the show, but seemed more interested in the game! I gave her a few dirty looks and she got the message but still.... I was very annoyed. So we stayed overnight at a motel with an indoor pool. The son loved that. Had a nice dinner then drove home on Saturday.

Which brings me to the title of this blog post. As we are driving home (it's like a 2 1/2 hour trip) my mind starts to wander about what I am going to do with the rest of the day. So I decide I will dye some fiber and yarn, make lasagna, and apple crisp! Ambitious I know, but I did it all! Phew!
My dyeing was very satisfying. Wanna see? Of course you do!

I know, the picture is kinda crappy and doesn't even do the color justice. Trust me this came out beautiful! I used garnet for the red and peacock for the blue. I also dyed some alpaca fiber and roving, that will be another post. Here is another shot of the yarn. I was going to sell this in my etsy shop but I think I am gonna keep it for myself...

I promised a post about why I am such a geek didn't I? Well hopefully that will be next.

Look at me go!

I'm bloggin' all the time now! Why? Because I can! YAY!!!!!!
(why didn't I get a laptop sooner?)

Any way.... you may remember a while back I started spinning the fiber we received from our guild for our holiday project. We received 5 little bags, 1 oz in each bag, of a different type of fiber. Remember?

This project is due the first weekend of December. I have 3 skeins done and started the forth. I am not nervous, I am not nervous, I am not nervous...... I will get it done, yes. Indeed.

Here is the 3rd skein:

mmmmm.....alpaca (50), merino (30), silk (20) I only got around 133 yards of this. Not worried. I have around 390 yards total for all 3. Plenty!

Here is what I have started next:

Here is what the top looks like:

It's superwash merino/bamboo/nylon. Lovely lovely stuff!

Why not a group shot?

I was wondering why the middle skein always looked fuzzy, then I realized it wasn't the camera! It's the angora. mmmmmm....say it with me now....

A N G O R A

Not to be left out is my last bit to spin:


This my friends is superwash merino and tencel. After that? What to make! I got plans oh yes. Big plans!

Stay tuned to see how much of a BIG GEEK I really am!

Ummm err I need some help

I am making the ever popular Thermis pattern (non-raveler's: it's a cowl) and I am almost done. I decide not to follow the directions on the pattern for the cast off as it will take me FOREVER...

So I decide to just bind off ya know? Well look:


It's way too floppy. This just will not do! I think it would do this even if I had followed the directions.

Here is a shot of the cast on edge:

So What I am thinking is this...I am going to go down 2 needle sizes and see if it tightens it up a bit. Or else this is going to the frog pond. Which will make me very sad. I even bought some nice buttons for this too!

:-(

So any thoughts on how I could fix this would be greatly appreciated.

Over and out.

Deep Peace

What a great day today turned out to be. After a week of rainy, yucky weather....the sun finally came out and I was able to not have to wear a coat!


I also taught my very first knitting class today at a local yarn store. It was a beginning lace class for intermediate knitters. I even designed the project! You know you want to see it right?

The name of this scarf/stole is called Deep Peace. I was on a Ravelry Forum and a gal I chat with came up with the name. This will be free pattern available soon. It will all be explained on the pattern. It came out pretty though! I used 2 skeins of Isager Alpaca 2 which is a lovely 50% Alpaca and 50% wool blend.

I am so proud of the 5 ladies in my class. At first I was a little worried that it was too hard, but they all went home confident that they could do it. Which makes me very happy. I should have taken a picture of all of them! We lost track of time, I didn't want it to end!

Here is another shot for you:

Keep bugging me for this pattern. That way I will get it up sooner!

Ciao!

Same old me, just a different look.

Hi! I am over here now! I am having trouble at home accessing my old blog so I thought I would start fresh. I am going to be changing the banner and all that good stuff as I try and figure out how blogger works. So bear with me. Here is a funny story from yesterday:

So yesterday there was a blood drive at work. In the past I have always chickened out. I just couldn't bring my self to do it. Well yesterday I decided it was time. Plus I got a free lunch at a fancy restaurant out of it. I have done the blood work at the doctor's office before. You fill a couple of tubes of blood. No big deal. Well you have to fill a BAG of blood.

I go through all the steps. Read all the materials. Try to get out of it by saying "Well I did travel to the Virgin Islands on my honeymoon" does that count for being out of the country? Nope! Sigh.... So I go to the cot and I am good! They set me up, the blood is flowing freely. I am doing GREAT! Are we there yet I ask? Almost!!! I filled the bag, then they need more so they can make sure I am disease free and that's when I start to feel a little funny. And I tell them so. I break out in a sweat, I am light headed, my stomach is doing flip flops. They all rush around me with ice, fans and a paper bag for me to breath in. I am not even standing up at this point! Well I get my sea legs bag after about an hour. I dunno, I really don't think I want to do that again. I will if someone close to me needs it, but I did NOT like feeling that way AT ALL. So there you have it. I am still a big chicken!

Oh and another reason I haven't blogged much. RAVELRY SWAP FORUMS! I really need to step away. I am done (right after someone claims my yarn) Then back to regular blogging. I even have some knitting and some pictures to share of the Fingerlakes Fiber Festival I went to. later!