Found just the perfect addition to my new shawl.

The accessories are so very important a button poorly chosen can make a piece "wonderful" or "why did you choose that?" or even "fugly". I'm always on the hunt for good buttons and good closures and last year I found this wonderful "Closure" by Jul Designs.

I've tried it on different shawls a few times but it did not have the right fit, it's kind of heavy and makes a strong statement. I did not want the closure to take over the shawl. I knew I loved it but did not know how or where to use it. So I put it in a very special spot and forgot about it. All this searching I've been doing looking for things I rediscovered the closure and it's perfect for my "Stash Buster Square Shawl".

Finished Ready to Wear.

$300 dollar socks?

I confess most of the time when I visit blogs I really only look at the pictures. If something catches my eye I may read a few paragraphs. I try and post lots of pictures in this blog because I really don't think people read the stuff I write. Only look at the pictures and maybe read a head line or two.

I sometimes amuse myself with some blogs, a couple of my favorites are the "The Panopticon" by Franklin Habit and of course the Yarnharlot by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee. Both are funny and good writers and great knitters. I was just reading Franklin's latest blog post reminds me of that always puzzling question: "You should sell your knitting" or "If I pay you can you make me one?"

I never know quite what to say either. I usually say that I don't sell my work I only give it away to someone who is a "knit appreciator". Stephanie wrote about "knit appreciators" people who really appreciate the amount of work that went into this garment and the expense of the fiber etc. Like Franklin says below, a pair of socks hand knit $300 dollars. So if I knit a pair of socks for someone they really need to appreciate it.

I kind of know that when people who do not knit are complimenting me when they suggest that I sell my stuff but.......

Franklin's answers:

• "I don't sell my work" sounds snotty (even if you don't mean to be).
  
  
• "You couldn't afford it" sounds presumptuous (because it is).
  
  
• "For a pair of socks like this, at least three hundred bucks" will bring a gasp of disbelief followed by a minor cardiac event. And once the paramedics have left and the spilled drink is mopped up, you have to talk to the innocent victim about fair trade, and the rights of artisans to earn a living wage, and the number of stitches in a sock, and Wal-Mart, and how actually, no, good yarn doesn't cost about a buck a ball.

So far so good

The eat less part is "iffy" but I did not buy anything! (Groceries don't count!) So far so good for my "new years resolution". I heard on the radio that today was the day that people stop doing their new years resolutions. I'm going to write it and tape it on my mirror to remind myself.

Thank goodness I'm not looking for anything at the moment and am very careful to put things in some sort of order so I can find it when I need it. Like my car keys and my purse etc.

Here is a project I'm almost finished with. The "Stash Buster Square Shawl" has turned out well. Originally I was just going to make a little swatch for an example for my upcoming class I'm teaching. Then I just fell in love with it and kept on knitting. My new most favorite project, but I'm fickle.

The edge did not look great and I did not want to sew in all the ends so I solved the problem by sewing a felted edge to give it a finished look. The felted scarf that I cut up and sacrificed happened to be the perfect color match and I have lots of scarfs so I won't miss it.

"Design Your Own Shawl" will be the class.

Buy Less and Eat Less.

I swear I spend half of my life looking for things. I can't remember where I put anything, then I get obsessed with finding it. I know sooner or later it will turn up but I want it now!

I started this sweater last winter and then the weather turned hot so I had to put it down. Knitting a large project resting in my lap made of wool can get uncomfortable when the weather is warm. This is a winter project, although we are pushing 80 degrees here in L.A. but it's a winter 80 so not the same. I need a nice warm wool sweater in case it does get cold so I wanted to finish this project.

It was 80% complete so I set out over the holidays to finish this sweater. Showed my husband and he really liked it and somehow took interest in the project. He would ask me how I was progressing almost daily. Besides feeling like "leave me alone" this is my hobby what do you care, I would give him an update. Sort of like I just have the sleeves to complete then I'm done. Or I made a huge mistake and I'm frogging the sleeves and starting over.

Then I ran out of the red yarn, but I know I had extra skeins of this but where did I stash it? I somehow have collected yarn, not just a couple of bins but many. What was I thinking? Will there be a shortage of yarn? Before you laugh too much about this I am a product of my childhood. We did run out of yarn, there was a war and nice wool was really hard to come by. I know the world is different now intellectually but somehow there is a residual and one never forgets.

Now for my New Years resolution: Buy less and Eat Less in 2012

On the needles

Sort of like "mindless" knitting. It started out as a little swatch for my upcoming class on design your own shawl class. But I just liked what was developing so I kept on knitting. This is a great project for a "stash buster". For all those little balls of yarn you have left over and don't know what to do with.

When I first started spinning I was not sure how much yarn I would get out of maybe 2 or 3 ounces of fiber. Then making it a 2 ply I would end up with these small amounts of wonderful yarn but did not know what to make.

Here is one solution:

Just as I suspected.

The Rose Parade was just not as exciting as it would have been if it was held on January 1st. I'm just saying and having a bit of a rant. I have since found out why, which this enquiring mind wanted to know. Because if the 1st falls on a Sunday it is not held so the good people could go to church and not be distracted with the parade. "Never on Sunday" protocol was instituted in 1893! I think it's time to change this policy! (If I ruled the world this would certainly change!) I want the Rose Parade on January 1st rain or shine. Of course we all know that it NEVER rains on the Rose Parade so that is why I would put in rain or shine.

According to one of the articles I read

sort of to do with religion, but perhaps not in the way you might first think. It's all very practical and logistical: The policy was put in place"to avoid frightening horses tethered outside local churches and thus interfering with worship services." And, to ensure there's no competition with the National Football League, the Rose Bowl game is also held over to January 2.

I have no idea how the parade looked because I did not watch it. Maybe this would be a good year to go down and look at the floats in person. After the parade they usually display the floats and I've always wanted to go see them and never got around to it. This is sort of on my "bucket list" along with going to get tickets one year and actually go to the Rose Parade. I figure by Wednesday everybody would have gone back to work and too busy to go look at floats so it would not be as crowded. Will let you know how it goes.

Happy New Year....

New Years Day is just not the same without the Rose Parade. Just pretend that they are saying 2012 and 123rd Rose Parade. We all know that once you've seen one you've seen it but it's somehow very comforting and lovely to watch.

Merry Christmas

Thoughts about Classes I want to teach.

First let me say that I love to teach. When I'm passionate about something I love to share what I've discovered and how it's done. I do not have formal teaching credentials but I have teaching experience.

When my son was in elementary school, I helped organize the "computer lab" for the school. Computers were new at that time and most of the teachers were either "scared" of the machine or simply did not have the time or desire to venture into this new media. I have always liked gadgets and love to type so when computers first came into my focus I wanted one. I was lucky enough to get a Macintosh 128k, which is the first Mac Apple put out.

This started my teaching elementary school children. The old how hard could this be? As long as I was one step ahead of the kids I'll be ok. Well it was a crash course in teaching which is no easy feat. Especially in this day and age of Sesame Street and all the other visual and audio stimulation kids get.

It ended up that I taught for 6 years and finally had experience in every grade level. Since then there has been several different subjects I've taught but currently fiber is my passion and I am gearing up to teach a class at my local yarn store. The class will be "Design Your Own Shawl"

I have some of the material semi organized and I kind of have an idea of what and how I want to teach this. So I sat down typing out the lesson and designing some of the graphics of the shawl shapes etc. Then I needed to describe the class in an interesting way so people who do not know me would want to take this class from just reading this clever dazzling description.

Let's see maybe other's have taught this class before and I wanted to see how they described their classes. I googled "design your own shawl". And this was the first hit:

http://bananaknits.blogspot.com/2010/09/design-your-own-shawl.html

But this is exactly why I blog so I can keep track of what I'm knitting and how I go about it. Otherwise if I want to repeat anything I have to "reverse engineer" it. I made this little shawl over a year ago and forgot all about this blog entry. Here we go I will now expand on what I said in that YouTube video because I've now made about ten of those little shawls. Experimenting with dying different color ways, spinning the fibers different ways and then putting together a shawl. Almost all of them with this basic recipe that I describe in the YouTube video.

But most people do not read my blog but just look at the pictures so here are some pictures of the shawls....

This off white natural wool I want to paint, but that is another class I'll be putting together.

The store I will be teaching at is my favorite store in Los Angeles Twist Yarns of Intigue. Time and date will be announced.

One of my favorite things to do is to dye!

A friend of mine called me yesterday and asked what I was doing? I said I was dyeing! To which she answered I'm sorry honey what's the matter? No I said it's wonderful I love to dye! Wrong spelling I'm just playing with wool. Happy to see the instant gratification, being able to create just exactly the color that I want.

This is one of the benefits and perhaps one of the main reasons I started spinning my own yarn. Being able to dye any color and spin any weight just added a whole new dimension to the process. Often I would have an idea for a project but would have to search around for just that exact color, weight and fiber that I had in mind. Sometimes it would take me a couple of years to locate just the right material for the project I had in mind.

I would walk into a yarn store and at first glance it looked like a huge array of yarns. Wool, silk, mohair some man made materials in all hues imaginable. But just not the the brownish sport weight soft wool that I was looking for. Well now I can do just that! For example I have this brown outfit that I love and it fits and looks halfway decent on me but I wanted a little shawl for the cooler days. For the summer I made a cotton moebius that I beaded on the edges.

Perfect, very happy for summer but for winter I wanted something made out of wool and a bit warmer. But to find just that color and just that weight & texture was a hunt. Not any more! I have added new skills and am able to dye the wool the colors I want and spin it to the exact weight I like. In this case I was looking for "sport" weight which is a kind of difficult find in yarn stores.

When I first pulled this roving out of the dye pot it really looked like a hot mess but to my surprise the colors are blending nicely and it's knitting up lovely. Fun Fun Fun.

*BTW I'm not too keen on "matchy, matchy" but I do like harmony and colors that like each other.

**Of course I write this blog for my own amusement but once in a while I do hear remarks about what I write. I do enjoy keeping track of my projects and feedback once in a while.

My hand hurts!

Darn it why do we have to get old and worn out? My poor thumb has too many miles on it. So I am limited in which craft I can work on. Knitting not so good, spinning not so good, chrochet maybe, plying yarn maybe and beading ok. Curious how I can crochet but not knit and I can sew but not spin. Different muscles used. So this is what I made.....

Brown Beaded Bowl

Used some of my handspun not so soft "shetland" wool, which is perfect for this job. Then I used glass beads around the edges. Turned out nice, I may even keep this or maybe not Christmas is so close it may be a present for a friend.

Some days you're hot and some days you're not!

There are days when things just fall into place like a dream but then there are days when I just can't do anything right. I'm sure everyone is like this but it's so terribly frustrating when you do not have any control over it. It could be the moon or the stars or the energy in the air or who the heck knows what but it is what it is.

I've been dying wool and lately next to spinning wool my other most favorite thing to do is to dye wool. Today is not a good color day! I don't even feel like taking any pictures of the awful colors I am putting together. Why am I choosing these awful colors? I'm trying but the brown is "shi....ttie" the purple is "spottie" none of the colors like each other and I don't like any of them at all. Best pack it up and leave it for another day.

Part of what fascinates me is the transformation that takes place from what the color looks like in the un-spun fiber to the spun fiber. Then another transformation occurs when two single strands are plied together. And then another change occurs when knitted.

Here is a success story: "Swirly Dickey"

How much yarn will 4 oz of roving make?

This is the number one question I get asked about spinning from non-spinners. And I may add it was my number one question also before I had some experience with this spinning thing. I bought 4 oz of fiber at NW Handspun Yarns in Bellingham, WA. A wonderful yarn store owned by my friend Meg Jobe. Meg has a great collection of spinning & knitting supplies and is very knowledgeable about spinning and fibers. I loved the shop and sat upstairs knitting with some good friends.

But how much yarn will 4 oz of fiber yield?

I would say it's a DK weight two ply that I am most comfortable spinning and it yielded 285 yards of yarn. Now to decide what to make? I will probably use it as an accent color because it has some wonderful shiny stuff in it.

Fiber Retreat

My friend Leslie and I went on a road trip here are some pictures of our fiber & food adventures. We did not buy anything because the prices in Canada were sky hi but we dazzled our eyes with all the pretty.

The view from our hotel! Spectacular! Thank you Leslie, it was a great choice. We checked in with all our luggage (we do not travel light). There is a lot of paraphernalia involved with knitting and spinning. The projects the needles the spinning wheels the fiber etc. Usually packing my clothes is not a problem but figuring out what project to take on the road gets to be involved.

I need a small project to knit while waiting at the airport and on the airplane and of course a back up project. Yes the back up project in case I get tired of the one I chose or something happens to it. Ok I admit it I'm a bit obsessed with all this but bear with me. Then the spinning wheel, what bag to put it in what fiber to spin and all the wires, batteries etc. It was no small feat getting all this stuff through security. But I made it and by the way my Zuca bag I chose was just perfect for this, it actually fit in the over head and I had a place to sit while waiting at the airport.

We visited two yarn stores: "Knotty by Nature" ~Fibre Arts~ and "The Beehive Wool Shop" both very nice but expensive.

After feeling up all this wool we got hungry and went across the street to a Korean restaurant and the food was delicious. Then a stroll through China town, after which back to the hotel with some spinning relaxation.

Victoria, BC Canada

As time permits I will post more (maybe).

Whirling like a Dervish Dancer

It was my son's birthday and I decided to buy him a new telephone, because his old phone met an unfortunate death. I wanted to surprise him so I went to the AT&T store as painful as that is but after all it's my boy and it's his birthday. I looked around and now it was time to take a look at my family account.

Can I see a photo id? Says the young lady who was helping me. Sure I say I got lots of those right here, oh my God my id pouch is missing! My heart sinks, WHAT? WHERE COULD IT BE? OMG. What do I do? Where do I look. Do I just call the credit card company right now? I can't remember when I used it last? Did I change wallets and forgot? No it's the same wallet.....

Excuse me young lady I got to go now. I ran to my car and high tailed it back to the house arriving slightly crazed. I ran in the house and started looking and throwing things my somewhat neat desk with piles of paper here and there are being tossed around like a salad. I am in a total panic. At which point my husband walks in and asks what I'm doing.

NOTHING! I say. Oh you are up to something you look like a Dervish Dancer.

NOTHING! I say again.

Then I finally figure that I will have to tell him this dilemma sooner or later so I confess and tell him that I have misplaced (surely not lost) my driver's license, my credit card and several other important cards from my wallet. To which he answers me with "Where did you have it last?"

WHERE DID I HAVE IT LAST? If I knew where I had it last it would not be lost!

"Let me see your wallet"

WHAT FOR? TO SEE IT EMPTY?

I realize that he is just trying to help but this is not helping. By now I am beyond upset, I am quite ready to have a total melt down.

Then I spot this little pouch on a love seat in the dining room. I sometimes throw my purse there or a sweater I've taken off and not put away etc. And slowly it's coming back to me now. I went on a bike ride and my husband insisted that I take my id with me. I had a business card with emergency info on it and a couple of dollars but he insisted that I had all my id with me. Ok I did and then I forgot.

What a relief to find my id. by then I was totally exhausted and put myself to bed. Never mind that it was only 7 pm. But all is well that ends well.

Twins or Cousins?

They are not identical twins that I know! First I thought I would strive for fraternal twins but maybe they turned out to be just cousins. You see I was using up small little balls of yarn for a class I took up at the Sock Summit.

The class was

Knitted Tessellation: Playful and Powerful Patterns in Practice

The teacher: Franklin Habit

When I first read the class description it sounded really exciting and it was a great class. I loved Franklin and he was organized and well informed. Over all a good class.

A hands-on introduction to the creation of tessellations: motifs that interlock without gaps or overlaps. Tessellations are as old and pervasive as design itself; they can be found in some of the most ancient examples of human craft, and were famously used in the modern era by the artist M.C. Escher. In this class, we will discuss the theories behind tessellating, and put into practice the basic techniques for creating tessellated patterns in hand-knitted fabrics.

There was homework:

Yarn: Sock- or fingering-weight yarns in solid or semi-solid colors. Two balls in highly contrasting colors if you wish to work in stranded colorwork; one ball if you choose to work in knit/purl texture patterns. (If the latter, white or a light solid color is preferred.) Needles: Any size appropriate to the yarn(s) selected–either double-pointed or circular according to your sock knitting preference. Notions: Stitch markers (8), scissors, notebook, pencils (not pens) and erasers for sketching and charting.

Homework:

Using the sock knitting method of your choice, CO 64 stitches (using main color, if you choose to knit your class project in stranded colorwork) and work in k2, p2 ribbing for 1.5 inches. Do not cast off. And get a good night’s sleep.

Because I'm a good student I did as I was instructed and knit 64 stitch rib for 1.5".

When I got home I decided that I liked the idea and maybe had enough yarn to finish a sock. I had a tiny ball of Koigu and a tiny ball of hand spun that I did in Judith McKenzie's class the day before.

The Gentle Art of Spinning Socks

The only thing better than a handknit sock is one made from your own handspun. This class is all about spinning a sock yarn that will make a pair of socks that will last longer than it took to spin and knit them. It will help you decide what type of fiber to choose, how to prepare it, and how to spin it to make radiantly beautiful socks that will be a pleasure to make and a joy to wear.

After I completed the first sock I really liked how it looked so I reverse engineered it so it's kind of similar but not quite the identical twin.