mitts for spring

This spring seems to have taken a long time to come. Actually, I think that I always expect spring to come earlier than it does. By the time April rolls around, I think there should be daffodils and warm sunny weather, but there never is. This year seemed especially rainy and cold, especially on days when I planned to be outside running. (I'm still running! But that's another post.)

A few weeks ago, when Lisa came over I showed her the yarns I'd spun. She really loved some merino I spun sometime last year, some hand painted stuff that I got at Downtown Yarns when I first started spinning. (I can't remember the brand, unfortunately. Though maybe you can recognize and identify the tag.) This is how it looked unspun.And this is it spun, last May.Lisa thought I should make some mitts. I don't usually take other people's advice to heart, but I cast on for a pair of mitts within a week. And I improvised the pattern as I went.
They fit perfectly, and I've been getting quite a lot of use out of them for the past month or so.

Unfortunately, I can't seem to photograph them very well.

They are squishy and soft and so cozy, and wearing them makes me smile. I made these. I spun the yarn and made up the pattern and knit them. And they fit me. They warm me.

working for myself

You probably realize this by now, but I'm slightly obsessed with this economy. I'm sure it will bring a lot of trouble to my life, as I know it's already wrecking havoc on others. Theater work (at my level) seems to be drying up as the funding disappears, and I'm left hoping that every show I'm connected to won't be postponed, downsized, or just really small to begin with (my experience so far this year), and that I do in fact have a future in this business.

I realize that not everyone is experiencing the economy in this way. I went out with some Broadway and Off-Broadway set designers a few weeks ago, and they are very busy. Of course, one of them was doing a show that was way below her level, something a young up and coming designer (like me!) should be working on. But I guess that's life: In a downturn, people take what they can get, and those who are less established get pushed slightly backward on the food chain. (Thank goodness I'm not just finishing grad school or college this year.)

The economy is the Topic Of Discussion in most of the circles I'm in. A few months ago I had lunch with a writer-friend and her composer-husband, and they declared that we should all be seeing this slow period as a time to enrich oneself. Like, with your extra time from being unemployed, learn something you've always wanted to learn, a skill that will get you a better job when the market picks up again. Like, another language, or a software system. I suggested that I could learn to quilt, which they thought was hilarious. I guess they didn't realize I was serious.

With their advice in mind, and my disgruntlement at today's latest you-almost-had-this-design-gig-but-it-no-longer-exists, I've decided to see this as an opportunity to broaden my horizons. I will send out letters, I'll get to know the theater community better and network more. And I'll do some things for my mental health too. Like learn to quilt. And run. And spin yarn. And spend more time with friends.

Last week I started the Couch to 5K program. For those of you who don't know it, it's a running program that gets a non-runner to run. In 9 weeks you should be able to run 5K, or about 3 miles. It starts with a walking warm up, and then intervals of walking and running. I've downloaded a weekly podcast, which instructs me when to start to run or walk, and as of today I've finished week 2. So far, with the exception of Tuesday (the day after the snowstorm, when I went to the gym) I have done all of my running in Prospect Park, which is so gorgeous and just down the street. I have no regrets so far, and am really enjoying being outside (near trees) and getting into shape.

On Saturday Lisa came over, and we spent a few hours spinning together. Unfortunately, we both forgot to take photos before it got dark. But it was inspiring in the way I imagine a running partner to be, both of us there treadling away. I finally finished spinning the half pound of turquoise roving I got from Persimmon Tree Farm at Rhinebeck last fall. (I've actually been spinning it since last fall. Very slowly. Really.) I now have 322 yards from it, and a DK weight, which is a first. I am thinking of making a scarf, something warm but elegant for next fall, to go with my knitted coat. I realized recently that I haven't made much with my handspun, which is kind of ridiculous.

As for quilting... no progress yet (other than my sachet from months ago) but I am 90% sure I'm going to take a course entitled "the Art Quilt" this summer up in Maine. Two intense weeks of quilting, with no internet or cell phone reception. Sounds heavenly, right?

November update

I feel like I've just awoken from a long nap or something. I guess that's what happens when you have a break in your crazy work schedule.

The weather is beautiful. The leaves are nearly all off the trees, and those that are on are beautiful shades of yellow, red and orange. Today is sunny and bright, a day for being outside. I wish I had a yard I could do some work in. (I know, I could just walk down to the park and skip the work part, but I've sworn that today will be used for much needed apartment-fixing projects, and a walk to the park doesn't count.)

I have been finishing but not blogging various knitting projects. I've also not really been photographing them, so you may be hearing about them here and there.

First up: socks.
I have never had much interest in knitting socks. I mean, you can buy a decent pair for less than $5. But people seem to love making them, so I thought I'd give it a try. Of course, I knew that a plain sock would drive me crazy, so I picked a complicated pattern (Spring Forward from Knitty), and I started them on my trip to Cape Cod in early September. They were a great road trip project, and later turned into a good subway project. Of course, pulling my sock-in-progress out of my backpack over and over resulted in a broken needle, and so I knit most of this pair with 4 #1s and 1 #0 needle ala EZ. You can't tell, there's so much going on. Anyway, the last sock was sitting around for a few weeks, waiting for me to graft the toe, and I finally did it last week. Grafting is no big deal; not sure why I have such an aversion to it.

Second: handspun.
I don't even know when I stopped writing about my handspun. I've been trying to get back into spinning, and realized at some point recently that I haven't been treadling the wheel fast enough, so my yarn is a bit underspun (and extra fluffy). I am trying harder to treadle faster, and wonder if my wheel might benefit from some oil to help me do that. Of course, the whole point of this style of wheel is that it's not supposed to require lubrication. We'll see.

Anyway: yarns I've spun since I last blogged my spinning:
Two different colors of wool from roving bought at the Hope Spinnery this summer.
54 yards of orange30 yards of brown/orange/redthen there's 82 yards of the Blue Faced Leicester that I dyed with goldenrod this summer. And lastly, 69 yards of Jacob Sheep wool bought at Rhinebeck. I'm not doing so well with the yardage here. Clearly I should be trying to spin a little thinner.

Maybe I should also be trying to find something to make with my handspun. I seem to just be accumulating it at this point...

my Tour de Fleece

Well, as I thought it might happen, I finished spinning my Shetland this weekend. While this is good, it also means that I have completed the Tour de Fleece early. I'm not sure what to do next-- start spinning something else?? (Not a bad idea, really.)
Other than finishing early, I'm rather pleased with this yarn. It softened considerably when I washed it, and it's really light and fluffy. The color reminds me of a melted popsicle.

For those who don't remember, Tomo and I dyed it with Kool Aid back in early May. There are only 2 ounces, and it spun up easily and quickly. I wish there was enough of it for mittens, but I only got about 100 yards of it. Another neck warmer? There must be some other perfect thing to use this for.

In other knitting news, I'm getting antsy to cast on a new project. I have tons of large (but not large enough) skeins of wool from Denmark, and I've been eying one of them for a while. This is Gotland Merino 8/2, by Old Mill, an Estonian yarn company. It's a blend of 75% Gotland (which is a Danish sheep, I learned), and 25% Merino.

According to the label, there are 225 grams of it. This yarn (and all of the yarn I bought there) was sold by weight, and no two skeins weighed the same. According to Ravelry, 225 grams of this yarn should give me 437 yards. In some fit of hopefulness, I decided that I had about twice that, and was brought back to reality when I balled and measured it on Sunday night at my knitting group. (The good news is that I have closer to 485 yards.)

In the meantime I'd become obsessed with making a short sleeved sweater from it, something I can wear over a long sleeved t-shirt in the fall, and I still want to make that work. I'm so set on it (plus I can't find the right pattern) that I've decided to design my own sweater. It's about time that I design something. I've been wanting to since last fall. And so yesterday, between visits to the eye doctor and the dentist, I studied Sweater Design in Plain English by Maggie Ringhetti, and swatched lace patterns from my mother's worn copy of The Craft of Lace Knitting by Barbara Walker.
I'm learning a lot from that little swatch, which i haven't yet washed. What's most interesting to me is that this yarn, which is supposedly fingering weight, already seems to be blooming. (The swatch is on #6 needles, which I thought would knit a looser fabric than it is.) I expect that when I wash this the whole nature of the swatch will change. Stay tuned for Eliza's experiments in knit wear design!

Tour de Fleece

I mentioned a few days ago that I was joining the Tour de Fleece. The idea behind this is that during the Tour de France (July 5-27) each participant would take on a spinning challenge, something that would start and end on those days and that would also use stash roving. Since I've been so bad about spinning in the past few months, I set myself an easy goal: To spin the Shetland that I dyed with Tomo back in May. It's only 2 oz and seemed like a very manageable goal.

I think I need to backtrack a little. In the past few months, the months where I showed nothing that I'd spun, I actually had something on my wheel. I had been feeling gutsy (or overly confident) about my spinning abilities and I had started spinning the 2 oz of Bombyx silk/wool that Christopher gave me for Christmas. In theory this is was a great idea, a challenge for my beginner skills and something very different. The silk was really slippery though, and since it's also lighter and less dense than wool, there was a lot more of it to spin. It also is undyed, which offers lots of possibilities (like, I could dye it this summer when I do my big dyeing spree) but it also made it really unsatisfying to spin.

And so this stuff just took forever to finish. I think I've been working on it for months, and I'm pretty sick of it. But I only have one spinning wheel and 3 bobbins, so it had to get finished before I could move on to another thing of roving. The lure of spinning the Shetland for the Tour de Fleece was the kick in the butt I needed to finish the silk/wool, and I finished plying and washing it on Friday. Voila!I actually like it a lot and am still thinking of what to make with it. (I managed to get 211 yards, which is a personal best. :)

On Friday evening, while my silk/wool was drying, I started spinning the Shetland.Yeah, my spinning mojo is back! This stuff isn't as soft, but it is so much easier to spin. And I love the colors. (Kool Aid, baby!) In fact, it's so much more fun to spin that I finished spinning the first half of it yesterday morning. I'm clearly not getting the yardage (or fine weight) that I got with the silk, but I am still totally thrilled with how it's coming, and I keep wondering what I can make with it. (2 oz of somewhat scratchy and probably worsted Shetland, hm. A hat??)

But there's a hitch. At this rate I'll be done with my Tour de Fleece challenge in a day or two. I think I made the challenge too easy.

a day of fiber

Christopher has been in Dallas all week. A theater there did a staged reading of his play tonight, and he was there for the rehearsals and to revise it. It was a busy and stressful week for him, and it was our first time with one of us in another city since he was assaulted. I think it's good for us to be apart, though I also think that Christopher would have benefited from having a familiar face down there with him.

Anyway, I've had a bunch of deadlines in the past week, and today was my first free day all to myself since I can remember. For months I've been dreaming of fiber, and of what I can do with it, and so today was a bit of a fiber day, even though the weather was extremely hot and humid. I'm not sure why I would want to play with wool on a day like today, but well... I guess I'm obsessed!

This afternoon I made a trip to the Yarn Tree, a yarn/fiber store in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. I had to take two buses to get there, and stood around at the bus stops in the 90+ degree heat, but it was totally worth it. I got some undyed merino, undyed Blue Faced Leicester, some more Kona Mohair Merino, and some undyed superwash merino. I also got some things that I'll need for dyeing with plants this summer: alum and soda ash. And I got tons of advice on how to dye with woad.

In fact, the women in the shop were all excited that I was going to grow woad and then dye with it. One of them wanted me to send her photos of the woad flowers and she told me about her own experiences dyeing with woad. It was nice to meet someone who had as much enthusiasm about this as I do, and now the pressure is on to get this to work. (I think my family is beginning to wonder when I'll get tired of this fiber and dyeing thing. The knitting thing is fine as long as I keep making them hats and scarves.) Honestly, I feel like it's a grand experiment, and though I'm planting 6 dye plants, I'll be happy if I dye successfully with one of them. And if that happens to be the woad, so much the better.

When I got back I did a little spinning and then somehow decided to start in on prepping some camel hair that Christopher's aunt had sent me. She was in Mongolia a few years ago and collected some cashmere and camel hair directly from the animals. In March she sent it to me, but I was rather overwhelmed and unsure of what to do with it. I've done some research on Ravelry and felt at least somewhat ready to try prepping it. So I pulled out the camel hair and started separating the guard hairs from the fuzzy, fluffy part. There was more fiber than I thought there was, so I only did 1/2 of it.
Once I pulled most of it apart, I threw away the guard hairs and put the fuzzy part into a lingerie bag, which I dumped (carefully) into a bowl of warm soapy water. I let it soak for a while, eventually changed the water, and will soon pull it out and let it dry.

And then?? I'll card it and pull out the rest of the guard hairs, but I'm not sure whether I'm up to spinning it. Camel hairs are pretty short and hard to spin. I might need to wait till I'm more experienced...

check it out

my fourth handspun.141 yards of hand dyed merino.

I'm happy with how it turned out, but I think I should also consider this yarn a learning experience. Instead of splitting the roving vertically into very thin strips (and essentially pre-drafting, which it seems a lot of people do) I split it in half vertically and spun each half onto a bobbin. Which makes for some very long color repeats.

I'd like to knit it into something fairly soon so I can see what that looks like in a knitted garment. It might be really cool (esp if the color changes are subtle, as I hope they are), but it also might mean that there's a chunk of brown, and then a chunk of green.

fibers

As you can tell, I've been spinning a lot in the past few weeks. I have been working my way through (and using up!) the fiber that Christopher gave me, selecting fibers from that collection that are already dyed or have a tint to them, saving the white fibers for future dyeing experiments.

On Friday evening, while wasting time in the East Village, I dragged Christopher to Downtown Yarns. (he's getting very good at going around yarn stores and squishing the balls) I swore that I was just going to browse, but then it turned out that they have a small selection of hand painted fiber. It wasn't that expensive, and I've never used hand painted fiber, so I bought a little. I started spinning it almost immediately. I love how it's coming out, and I'm anxious to start plying it to see the final product.On Wednesday afternoon I met up with a woman from my knitting group who has done some dyeing, and she showed me how Kool Aid dyeing works. I used grape, Jamaica and pink lemonade on my Shetland wool, and we set the dye in her microwave. I'm rather pleased with how it came out, but I have to be patient and finish spinning my merino from Downtown Yarns. My dyer friend also loaned me a few books on dyeing and spinning, so I've got plenty to keep me busy.

After our dyeing adventures on Wednesday we went to our knitting group. I hadn't been since February, I think. My trip to Germany, the show in Hartford and then Christopher's assault got in the way of my going. It was a very happy reunion. I'm so glad to have that group of folks who are also excited about fiber, knitting, crafts and Brooklyn. I showed them my newly dyed (and still wet) fiber, and everyone took turns smelling it. Because of the Kool Aid, it had a strong grape-sheep-farm smell. Not something you smell every day. The knitting group was exactly what I was needing. I'm so glad I have them.

another handspun

This is some of the mohair/merino blend that Christopher gave me for Christmas. (the touch of red is from the Gotlandish/merino I got in Denmark. It turns out to need some carding before I can spin it.)It's great yarn, but there are only 84 yards. What can I do with that?

I'm running out of fibers that are dyed or otherwise a color... I could just spin some undyed fiber, but wouldn't it be fun to dye it?? I'm just not sure where to start.

two photos

One:
my second ever handspun.
I'm not sure what to do with this. There're only about 138 yards of it. For now I will fondle it and maybe someday make a hat or little scarf or something. I'm improving, I think!

Two:
The amaryllis in my kitchen window.
It rained all weekend, and I started feeling a little like the amaryllis: longing to go out and so sad at the weather. I had to turn it around because I was taking its behavior a little too personally.

exhaustion

Recovering from Christopher's attack is strange. On the one hand I feel like it shouldn't be that hard for me: he's looking tons better, he's now able to take the subway alone to Manhattan (though not home). On the other hand, his eye is still bruised, he still sees double, and we're both nervous to go out at night. We are both feeling rather vulnerable.

Each day is very different. Some days I feel energized. I have things to do. I go to work. I get my hair cut. I go grocery shopping. I vacuum. Other days, I feel really sapped. Yesterday was like that. We had put a lot of energy into Christopher's reading (which went very well!) and totally crashed on Thursday night. When I got up to go to work on Friday I just felt unable to face the day, and I went back to bed for a few hours. (Luckily for me, my work is flexible and they have been very understanding. Not that I get paid when I don't show up, but at least I don't lose my job.) I spent the rest of the day at home, doing yoga and pulling our tax information together (yeah, we still haven't filed. It was just really low priority).

There is another thing that I've finally found solace in (and I knew I would, it just took a little time): my spinning.

I'm not a great spinner. And I mean that in many ways: I'm inexperienced and I don't produce a lot of yarn. Since getting my wheel in December, I've made one skein of (rather ugly) yarn. That's not a great average. Since then I've been very slowly working my way through the rest of my maroon merino multi 64s. Some of it was on a bobbin and I started filling a second one right after Christopher's attack. I didn't get far because it was just overwhelming, too much for me to deal with right then. Well, yesterday I sat down for about an hour and just spun and spun, and this morning I spun some more, and I'm now out of the maroon roving. I'm rather proud of myself, and I'm pretty excited about how much I liked spinning. It put me in a calmer place, and that's what I need right now. I hope to ply it this weekend, and I'm looking forward to trying a new fiber. I'm so charged by spinning at the moment that all I want to do right now is spin and spin.

If only that I didn't have other things to do, like our taxes.

my yarn!

Well, here's a toast to my father. Just about two weeks ago I scanned and sent him plans for my missing spinning tools: a niddy-noddy, a bobbin holder and a special ruler to measure wraps per inch. He whipped them out and mailed them, but it took a week for the box to arrive. Here they are on unpacking. Dinah was really curious. I have been very busy with a set design, and haven't had time to use my new tools. Until tonight. I managed to finish plying my yarn, and then I couldn't contain myself and I pulled out the niddy-noddy.

It was a little tricky at first- the yarn kept slipping off- but once I got the hang of it the whole thing was rather simple, involving a twist of my wrist. I could see this wearing on my wrist after awhile; it's no wonder that everyone directs you to hold your right hand stable and then wind the yarn with your left hand. bah!
I quickly wound my yarn (120 times around, which means that I have roughly 180 yards), tied it in 4 places and then slid it off. It immediately twisted itself up, which (I think) means that I definitely need to wash it to help the fibers relax a bit.
(This photo is of the yarn after I twisted it into a skein.)It's definitely a bit uneven, especially in the middle. (Plying two colors was really useful to a beginner like me, as I could see how well spun it was.)

business

Somehow since coming back from Seattle we've become really busy. Maybe we were like that before, I dunno. It just seems like I'm always doing things and then I have to stop so I can go to bed.

Tuesday night Christopher and I anxiously watched the election returns. Since the TV is in my room-o-yarn, I took the opportunity to get Christopher to help me ply my spinning. I stuck my two bobbins on a dowel, ran the singles from the bobbins to the wheel, and had Christopher hold the dowel. It worked rather well, I must say. Perhaps Christopher has a future in dowel holding ahead of him.

The plying revealed something interesting about my spinning ability. First, you must imagine that I started spinning right before Christmas, filled 1/2 a bobbin and then moved on to my second bobbin. Simple enough, right? The thing is, the singles on the first bobbin are rather uneven and icky. As I went along, I got better at spinning, so the yarn on the second bobbin is much more even and well-spun. Plying it together put the better with the bad, so that the finished plied yarn is completely uneven when it gets to the very end. Likewise, my first try at plying is uneven, the middle is better, the end got sort of mucked up with the gross yarn.

(the stuff in the middle isn't so bad, right?)I'm not sure what to do-- perhaps I should cut out the horrible stuff and graft in some better yarn?? Christopher thought I should be true to my craft and just keep it in, as testament to what I completed. I'm not so sure.

good news

I've found my #7 needles, which means I can continue my Forecast sweater. Strangely, they were sitting right next to the TV. Maybe they ended up there when we cleaned today; I can't imagine that they've been there for the past month. Bad news: I can't find the yarn for the sweater. Do you ever feel like you're chasing your tail?

In other news, I took the plunge on Friday night and jerry-rigged a bobbin holder so I could ply. It was not ideal-- I strung the bobbins on a dowl that was held in place by the arms of my office chair-- but I did manage to ply a little. The result reminds me of some horrible Harry Potter goes to Harvard nightmare (though Christopher tells me that Harvard's color is just crimson, there's no yellow). But it's yarn, and it doesn't look too bad. I'm sure I can find some use for it at some point. (The color in the photo isn't great. Sorry about that!)

Tonight I finished a ganomy hat, pattern by Elizabeth Zimmerman in the Knitter's Almanac. I bought this book last summer, inspired by Jared Flood's February Baby Sweater. I had never heard of Elizabeth Zimmerman (was I living under a rock??) but the BSJ is so incredible that I wanted to know where this came from. The book is so much more than patterns. I have been carrying it around in my purse, reading it when I can't get a seat on the subway, and it's fabulous. Entertaining, educational, inspirational. She makes knitting seem so accessible and flexible, easy to understand. Anyway, when I got the book I fell in love with this hat and when I bought the Miski baby llama yarn in Seattle, I had this hat in mind.
There actually isn't much yardage in the Miski, so I had to use part of the second ball for it. I also ran into some trouble with the decreases; I did stop increasing earlier than I was supposed to, but somehow the decreases decreased into each other at the very end and I wasn't able to decrease fast enough.

I'll try to get some photos of the finished hat on my head. I'm rather pleased with it and hope that it will be warmer than my other hats. I also rather like that it makes me look like an elf. Since I'm tall I tend to feel more lumbering and clumsy so elfish is good.

slowly spinning

Some of you might have wondered whatever happened to my spinning wheel and all that roving I received for Christmas. Well, I've been working on it. But it's slow going.

After receiving the roving and book, I read a little and then just set to it. Somehow I don't feel like this spinning thing is that hard, but what I'm creating isn't high art, either.

A month later, I want to ply my singles. (Translation: I want to twist what I've spun, so there are two pieces instead of one. This will make it stronger and thicker.) In order to do this, I need to have an equal amount of spun yarn on two bobbins, which I will then spin together into one yarn. One bobbin is rather fat with wool, but the second one needs more and since I ran out of yellow superwash I've grafted on some of the merino top that Christopher gave me. It doesn't really match, but I don't care. At this point I am just learning how to spin, and the merino is fairly easy. The color combination also reminds me of Harry Potter, so maybe it will be fine. I'm also missing what is called a Lazy Kate, which would make plying easier. A Lazy Kate attaches to the wheel and holds the bobbins with my singles while I'm plying them onto the bobbin that's on the wheel. It keeps the singles from tangling. (Does it feel like I'm speaking a foreign language? I certainly feel like I am.) Anyway, I'm missing one of them, and I could probably rig something up, but I'm slightly unsure of what I'm doing and so I haven't.

I can do it! I can do it! (Right?)

an early Christmas

In planning our holiday, Christopher and I decided to limit our family visit and save a little of Christmas for just the two of us by celebrating a day early, in Brooklyn. We'll head down to Philadelphia tonight, spend tomorrow with our families and return on Wednesday night. Quick, hopefully not too painful.

We spent last night wrapping presents and listening to Christmas music. Today I made a feta and tomato frittata and we opened our gifts for each other. I gave Christopher a few books he's been wanting, along with a giant mug. Not exactly romantic. I had asked for some beginning spinning supplies and books, and he went all out. I have to confess that I am blown away by what he got me and how much thought went into his gifts. First, he gave me The Alden Amos Big Book of Handspinning, which is an extremely thorough bible type book on spinning. I've read a little of it and it's very informative. I'm sure I'll learn a ton from it.

Next, there were a bunch of little packages, each labeled either "To Start With," "To Make With," or "To Experiment With." The "starter" package contained 2oz of Shetland fiber, which is apparently a great fiber to start spinning with. The "To Make With" packages each had 4oz of Multi 64s. I don't actually know what multi 64s are, but I guess I'll learn! The "To Experiment With Packages" each had 2 oz of different more expensive fibers and blends: silk/yak, bamboo, merino/mohair and silk/wool.



I'm pretty floored at Christopher's thoughtfulness. I shouldn't be surprised, he always really thorough in his gift giving. But he had all sorts of interesting stories to tell about his trip to the store where he bought the fiber, about what he'd learned and seen. He even compared touching the fiber to crack. I'm glad he understands, at least a little, why this interests me. I'm so excited to start, though I'm not sure where to begin. Should I read the book? Or skip directly to the Shetland? Or finish up the free fiber that came with the wheel?