Tea and Yarn

Beam Me Up

2011-03-09T11:46:00.000-05:00

V-Beam Pulse Dyed Laser that is. Yup, I am finally getting around to trying laser treatment for my advanced rosacea. I actually had laser recommended to me by a dermatologist 8 years ago, but I couldn't afford the big price. Thankfully, prices have come down a lot since. I've found a doctor's office I like (facial surgeon) and the treatments are being done by the physician assistant in the office. I feel very safe.

I had my first treatment yesterday and it went well. I prefer a conservative approach (multiple treatments at lower setting vs. few treatments at high setting) and there was almost no pain. My face is a little redder then usual today, but no worse than I usually look after having been out at sea. My next treatment is in 3 weeks.

I've finished all my Mychelle samplers and these are my favorites (and what I've now purchased):
Honeydew Cleanser (unscented)
Fruit Enzyme Mist
Capillary Calming Serum
Fabulous Eye Cream
I use all the above everyday, morning and night.
Deep Repair Cream Unscented - in the morning
Revitalizing Night Cream Unscented - in the evening
I like all these peels as samples(not too strong for me), but haven't purchased any yet:
Incredible Pumpkin Peel
Fruit Fiesta Peel
Hydrating Cactus Mask
I have also tried the cream foundation and cream eyeshadow and like both.

As to sunscreen, I still LOVE the Mychelle sunscreen, but it is only SPF 28, so I am still looking for something stronger. Right now I am testing Neutrogena Sensitive Skin SPF 60. So far, so good (not breaking me out and not greasy), but it gives my skin a whitish cast, therefore I've been wearing foundation (why I tried out the Mychelle cream foundation). It feels strange wearing makeup for the first time in my life, but I've got to start protecting my skin.

My New Love is...

2011-02-14T11:08:00.000-05:00

Mychelle Dermaceuticals!

Okay, okay, a little back story. I have terrible skin (rosacea) and I am allergic/sensitive to a slew of chemicals. I have, quite literally, spent my entire adult life searching for skin products that I can use. That's right, just use. Not skin care products that live up to their own hype, just something I can put on my skin without developing a rash and breaking out in pustules.

I have had good luck making my own skin care products (check out this book), but finding time is an obstacle, plus buying all the ingredients can get expensive. The one product that I am consistently looking for is sunscreen which I cannot make myself. Because of my job I have to spend significant time in the sun. A few years ago I found Vanicream which I can wear, it gives really good protection, but makes me look like I rubbed Crisco on my face and clogs my pores. Therefore, I wear it when I am in the field, or at the pool with the kids, but otherwise I go without sunscreen.

I recently stumbled upon a review for Mychelle sunscreen and decided I should check it out. Well, I love it. Doesn't irritate my skin, seems to give good protection, AND it is not greasy!! I am wearing it everyday. This is a really big deal for me!

SO now I've been checking out the rest of their product line and I am in love. I've been able to use every product I've tried so far!!!! This has never happened to me before. I also think my skin is looking better - less red and less rosacea acne. It is also softer and smoother.

Even if you don't have the skin/allergy issues that I do I would still recommend this line. If I can use their products then you know they are gentle and free from nearly all noxious chemical ingredients.

New Year and all that

2011-01-28T09:08:00.000-05:00

I've been super busy with work and home life and realized that I've totally let the blog go. Do I have a real excuse...nope. Just Life.

So what have I been doing. Well, a little knitting, no spinning, and almost no weaving. And this makes me sad. I did, however, make a big push on getting caught up on photobook and scrapbook projects for the girls. L2 now has her own book so she doesn't feel like she is being left out.

Funny things the girls have been doing. L1 is 6, nearly 7, and is going on 13 I think. Lots of attitude, but still sweet and loving. We had some problems in the fall with lying and being disruptive at school, but after loads of talks (and loss of some prvilages) she has really turned herself around. Her biggest issue is just being a social butterfly - always talking and wanting attention. She definitely has a love-hate relationship with her sister. She can't wait to do things without L2 then immediately misses her when she does! She wants a guitar for her birthday (that would make 3 instruments she plays), and justs seems to be growing up so fast.

L2 is a little spitfire at 3, and full of sayings. She has a cold and tells everyone she is full of "BlessYous" aka sneezes. She cracked me up the other day when a grownup (my Chiropractor) started talking to her about bones. She cocked her head to one side and informed him once he stopped talking "I don't know what you are saying!" She also wants to know why she wasn't born in China like her sister (because that is apparently WAY better than coming out of mommy's belly).

Wrists hurt

2010-10-01T08:56:00.000-04:00

So I've been knitting and corcheting like crazy the past few days. Mostly crocheting which I don't do often. Now my right wrists aches this morning. Guess I over did it. Maybe I'll spin tonight? Anyway, I hope to take pictures this weekend and post them next week.

My weekends this fall are almost as busy as my weekdays. I'm teaching pre-school Sunday school (only at a Unitarian Church can an atheist teach Sunday School!!), running L1 to her Chinese classes, and next weekend is my fiber guild's day long workshop (I'm demoing rigid heddle weaving and drop spinning) plus I'm leading my church's forum with a presentation on my work in the Gulf. I'm tired already!

Found some!

2010-09-29T08:16:00.000-04:00

Feeling inspired by these hat patterns on Ravelry:
Butterfly Hat (crochet)
Bucket Hat (crochet)
Scotty's Hat (knit)
Blueberry Hat (crochet)
Peek-a-boo Flower Hat (crochet)
Lacy Rib Hat (knit)
Bayfront Cap (knit)
Jacques Cousteau Hat (knit)

These all have great stash busting potential!

Searching for inspiration

2010-09-28T09:09:00.000-04:00

I used to buy a LOT of yarn. I managed to curb that bad habitat...by buying lots of fiber. I now have lots of yarn AND lots of fiber. I've become more experienced over the years and now make, I think, better decisions when it comes to buying fiber and yarn. I don't just buy one skein of something because it's pretty and 'I'm sure I'll find something to do with it," or buy a load of stuff in a color, texture, or fiber type I don't usually care for because "It's on sale!' I've learned I really don't need a lot of wool stuff in the deep south. I have purchased almost no yarn or fiber in 6-8 months, but I still have tons of stash. Therefore, I've been trying to stash bust with my knitting and weaving.

My stash busting is starting to leave me un-inspired. I getting tired of looking at the same old stuff. I need to get my mojo back WITHOUT spending a bunch of money on new yarn. Maybe I should go spend some time on ravelry?

Here is a pic of the girls I took while visiting Charlestowne Landing:

I survived this summer

2010-09-24T08:38:00.000-04:00

Yes I did! And what a summer it was. Three research cruises to the Gulf. Tons of work. Trying to fit in time with the family. I need to find some time to re-charge.

L1 started first grade this fall and I missed her first day of school because I was at sea. I was supper bummed out that morning, knowing I was missing her big day BUT her teacher sent me an e-mail with a couple pics of L1 on her first day. Best teacher ever!! L1 is also reading now! Her piano and chinese lessons have started up and I'm trying to figure out when we can fit in her banjo lessons.

L2 just turned 3!! I can't believe my baby has gotten so big. I woke her on her big day with a loud "Happy Birthday!" She sat up in bed, cracked her eyes open and croaked - "My birthday came?" It was super cute. I did a birthday party for her at school, then we had a pizza dinner (her fav) that night. Low key, but she is 3 and had fun.

We got the girls bunk beds this summer so they are now sharing a room. The spouse didn't think it would work, but it is way easier on me (one place for clothes, shoes and hair stuff) and the girls are loving it.

L2 also has gotten her first sprinkle of freckles across her cheeks. I am heavily freckled, her father isn't, so I was wondering if she'd get them. Looks like freckles are a dominant trait. (L1 was mad that L2 got freckles and she didn't so we had a little talk about DNA from birth-mothers)

I have done almost no spinning or weaving and just a little bit of knitting. Mostly hats. I am hoping that now my life will start to settle I can get back to some fun stuff. I am also going to try to get back to blogging. We shall see!

Crap on Toast

2010-08-10T20:10:00.000-04:00

OF COURSE there is tropical system brewing right before my cruise. Really and truly I did not need this extra stress. I'm driving a 14' truck 12 hours tomorrow and this cruise better NOT be canceled. Now I'm trying to find a knitting project to take with me if we get weathered out for a few days.

Not Dead, Just Busy (and going back to the Gulf)

2010-08-06T10:56:00.001-04:00

This summer will be known (at least in my memory) by names including the summer of no blogging. Work has been over the top busy - I did two research cruises around the wellhead in June, and I'm getting ready to go back in a few days for another two weeks to conduct a large assessment survey. I have been doing a tiny amount of knitting and spinning, and I've also kept up with the exercise program (I've lost 30 lbs). And for those that like pictures I did get clearance to release 4 (see below) for general consumption. I hope to get back to regular blogging come September!

Heading out to sea

2010-05-27T23:13:00.002-04:00

I'll be at sea for the next two weeks starting tomorrow. Hope to get back to regular postings when I get back.

Swamped

2010-05-05T08:21:00.000-04:00

I'm not dead, I'm swamped with oil response planning. All is well (with me at least), but I'm doing nothing but working and sleeping. My kids keep wanting to know why I'm so late everyday. I hope to get back to regular posts soon.

Cool under-the-sea pics

2010-04-27T13:38:00.000-04:00

Check out some highlights of my recent research cruise:

Tufted Coral (Lophelia pertusa) surrounded by anemones and an unidentified octopus

Wide view of live-bottom habitat at ~ 300m

Redeye Gaper

Darwin's Slimehead

And me getting ready to put gear in the water - don't I look stylish! And doesn't my assistant look excited!

Eggs, eggs, and more eggs, plus some other stuff

2010-04-26T09:00:00.000-04:00

Not my eggs, silly. Duck eggs and chicken eggs. Charleston's Farmer's Market has opened for the season and we finally got there early enough this Saturday to score some eggs (and meat). The Charleston Farmer's Market is a nice market; a mix of local produce, meat products (happy animals=happy food) and local artisans. A friend of mine, from the lab, is a loyal market shopper, there every Saturday first thing - rain or shine. He has been going on and on about the meat and eggs at the market, but the previous Saturday they were sold out by the time we made it to the market.

Not this Saturday.

I picked up a pound of local grass feed beef, a portion of local grass feed brats, some local peppered bacon, a dozen local free-range chicken eggs, and a dozen local free-range duck eggs. Yup, duck eggs. I also bought some local asparagus and cabbage. Yum.

Sunday morning the bacon was oh so yummy, thick, and full of favor. Very expensive, but worth trying again.

Now, onto the the eggs. I poached a chicken egg and a duck egg. The very first time I've ever poached an egg! I do need to admit I watched Julie and Julia while at sea and bought two of Julia Child's cookbooks since getting back on shore. Julia was right on the money, I poached an egg - no problem following her directions. The spouse and I both tried the eggs - chicken vs. duck. Both were yummy and easy to poach since they were fresh. However, the duck egg was much richer and more decadent. Imagine a chicken egg larger and with a tablespoon of sweet cream butter mixed into the yolk - that's a fresh duck egg compared to a fresh chicken egg. I then made a duck egg omelet with goat cheese (fresh goat cheese also from the market) that was rich and yummy.

I am a convert - I want only fresh duck eggs from here on out. Chicken eggs seem so banal in comparison. What I don't know is how long into the boiling summer of the deep American South ducks will lay eggs????

I also picked up some fresh ravioli at the market. Black bean, corn, and crawfish ravioli. We ate it for dinner Saturday night covered in a mushroom cream sauce I made with fresh oyster mushrooms I purchased at the market from Mepkin Abbey. Yummy is an understatement (those mushrooms where the best I've ever had).

I'll report on the ground beef and fresh brat when we eat them later this week. The deep south may suck in many ways, but holy cow I can get some damn good food at the Farmer's Market.

Inkle woven strap

2010-04-19T07:56:00.000-04:00

I've been working on turning some of my weaving into a small tote. Said tote needed a strap:

Ta da! I used my flip to weave this inkle band. The pink/silver yarn is used on the edges and as the weft. The purple metallic yarn is an elastic ribbon yarn. I warped my loom directly using an 8 dent reed. I wove using a Norwegian belt shuttle to carry the weft and beat it into place.

Still working on getting cruise pictures.

I'm back!

2010-04-16T13:42:00.002-04:00

Made it back from the cruise. Had rough seas, strong currents, and sharks! We also found the deep sea coral we were looking for. I'll post pictures next week.

Going to sea

2010-04-05T11:39:00.000-04:00

Sorry about the lack of blog posts, but I've been super busy with work and the home life. All is well, just crazy.

Wish me calm seas and light winds.

Here are pics of the type of sampling equipment I'll be using on the cruise:

We'll also keep a lookout for this elusive creature of the sea:

Although I hope never to find him doing this again:

(BTW, you sometimes get a little stir crazy at sea. Building your own cartoon character then making said character do BAD things can be a fun way to pass the time)

First Project on the Floor Loom

2010-03-29T09:05:00.000-04:00

Look, I can use a warping board!

This is cotton chenille 4 yd. warp. You can see that I ended up with 2 crosses, by mistake, but that was not any real problem. I moved the warp over to my loom which I warped back to front (thanks to the spouse for making me a raddle).

The warping, threading the heddles, and sleying the reed took FOREVER. Thankfully, I didn't have any threading problems. Once the warp was tied on to the cloth beam I was weaving!

This is my weaving study group project for March. The threading I used was a "rosepath" threading (1,2,3,4,3,2,1,4). I will try out a total of 10 different treadling patterns to investigate how different treadling patterns affect the same threading. I'm using an inch of plain weave to separate the different patterns.

Thoughts on the project: The yarn I'm using is extra from the weaving group, with no info, so I had to do wraps on the ruler to get my estimated epi of 15. I must have wrapped very tightly because the the fabric I'm creating would be great for upholstery. I really need to get a 12 dent reed so I have more sleying options. The draft I'm using must have been developed for a counterbalance loom because I'm pretty sure I'm looking at the backside of my weaving. Once you get the loom warped the weaving is fast and fun!

Swimming: I swam 1000yds this morning!! WooHoo! I did 200 free, 200 back, 200 free, 200 breast, 200 free!

2010-03-25T08:56:00.000-04:00

Bamboo is being spun:

I've been spinning the very slippery fiber from the fold which has worked well. It's giving me good control of the fiber.

I'm starting to get my stressed out pre-cruise feelings. I'm going to sea April 8-14 for some deep sea coral work and I always get stressed before going to sea. There is SO much to plan, purchase, organize, pack, transport, load, stage, and accomplish. Plus, crap always breaks, fails, gets lost, etc. Putting $35K or more worth of equipment into 500m of water is nerve wracking because you never know if it's going to come back up! And believe me, I know from experience that ocean doesn't like to let go of what you put into it.

Quick story - Back in 1999 I was part of a team of scientists assessing the impact of Hurricane Floyd in North Carolina. Massive flooding had occurred during the hurricane, hundreds of homes damaged, livestock killed, etc. We had two teams operating on the river in two separate boats just a few weeks after the hurricane had come through. I had spent the evening before we went into the field training my counterpart, Kevin, on the other boat how to use the $15K worth of water monitoring equipment. The one thing I said over and over was 'Don't forget the safety line, you need the safety line to bring the package back up.' Near the end of the next day we pulled our boats up to each other and Kevin had this sick look on his face. He had lost the equipment because he had forgotten the safety line. Apparently, when he realized what he had done they were only in 10 feet of water. He decided to go into the river after it. This was the same river we were surveying because of overflowed manure ponds, dead and floating farm animals, and all the pollutants that flow out of wrecked homes. He stripped to his underwear and went in the black, tannic water that was so turbid you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. He never did find it, but I could only be so angry at him after his insane gesture of going into that river hoping to find the equipment on the riverbed. It also helped that he bought me many beers that evening out of quilt.

Snappy Hat WIP

2010-03-24T08:54:00.000-04:00

I've been working on my second snappy hat here and there for the past week. This has been my "purse" project that I carry around and work on for a minute at a time.

The yarn is a Lion Brand superwash I had in my stash.

Randomness:

Why do republicans only seem to care about fiscal responsibility when they aren't the ones writing the checks?

I swam 750yds this morning, mostly freestyle with some back and breaststroke thrown in for variety. I've been using a snorkel for portions of my swim workouts, mainly so I'll keep swimming even after I want to quit because breathing properly with the strokes has become too difficult. I was so proud of myself this morning when I swam 100yd free followed by 200yd back without stopping. 300yds (12 laps) without a break is the longest I've gone yet.

I made black beans and rice the other night for dinner. I placed a bowl of it in front of L2. My 2 year old looked at the bowl, then looked at me "Mommy, I not eat poop."

Some cuteness for a tuesday morning

2010-03-23T09:18:00.000-04:00

A little cuteness for a chilly March day.

L1 had an interesting experience recently. Here she is in the recording studio with her music teacher and another student working on a song for her teacher's upcoming CD. I'll post here when the CD goes on sale. You can find Hazel's first children's album on iTunes, just search for Hazel Ketchum Big as the World. It's a really fun kid's album.

A little Spinning

2010-03-22T10:44:00.000-04:00

I spun and plied this skein on my Rose. The greenish/brown wool is a Punta wool blend I purchased from Fiber Fancy on etsy. The colorway is called Tree Tops. The white is undyed Falkland wool I purchased at my LYS. I spun each color separately then plied them together. I am very pleased with the final look.

If you have never spun with either Punta or Falkland you should try it. These wools were so easy to spin they almost spun themselves. They are soft and bouncy. As nice as merino in my humble opinion.

Punta wool is not named for a breed of sheep, but rather for an area of South America - Punta Arenas, Chile. The wool itself is from a mixture of breeds. This is also true for Falkland wool which is named for the Falkland Islands and is a mixture of breeds.

What a crappy week

2010-03-19T08:52:00.000-04:00

So L2 seems to be getting sick with the cough and fever that L1 had. The good news is that so far her fever hasn't gone over 100 (L1 was at 102+ for 3 days WITH ibuprofen) and her cough isn't as bad either. L1 continues to improve as well.

I've been doing a little tiny bit of knitting on the latest snappy hat and a little tiny bit of weaving. No spinning this week. Basically, I feel like I've gotten nothing accomplished except for taken care of sick kids.

But here is a pretty sunset (or possibly sunrise) picture I took somewhere in the Atlantic:

When at sea I've worked some crazy schedules. I prefer 12 on/12off with shifts running midnight to noon and noon to midnight. That way everyone has at least some period of daylight hours (putting gear over-the-side at night is sucky and more dangerous). I've also worked 12/12 based on 6am-6pm, 6pm-6am. The worst is 6 on 6 off. You still are working 12 hours in each 24 hour shift, but you only get 6 hours off at a time. This SUCKS because you never get 8 hours of sleep. I get real grumpy when working 6 on 6 off and never use that schedule when I'm the Chief Scientist. Anyway, the wacky schedules I work should help explain why I can't remember if the picture is sunset or sunrise.

Ohh, pretty bamboo

2010-03-18T11:06:00.000-04:00

L1 is still on the mend so my house will hopefully return to some semblance of normality sooner rather than later (I hope). In the mean time, here is some bamboo fiber I ordered to spin on my Turkish spindle. I plan on spinning each color separately and plying all three together.

From left to right: hand-dyed bamboo, un-dyed bamboo, and carbonized bamboo. I purchased the fiber from Silver Sun Alpacas on etsy (check them out, they're great).

L1 is improving

2010-03-17T09:08:00.000-04:00

So L1's fever didn't break on Monday, but continued on. The respiratory virus caused her asthma to flare and we ended up at the asthma specialist's office yesterday. The new medications seem to be helping and she actually got some sleep last night (and so did I). The spouse is home with her today while I'm at work. Still haven't gotten together any of the weaving pictures, so that post will need to wait. I did start knitting another hat, using the same Snappy Hat pattern.

Even with L1 being sick I've continued going to the gym/pool. I did circuit training and treadmill on Tuesday and did another 700m in the pool this morning. Even though I didn't add any distance over Monday, I did do more of the laps using freestyle. I really prefer being in the pool to being in the other parts of the gym. In the pool I'm in my own little world, with my own thoughts. In the other part of the gym I feel on display, yuck.

Quick Update

2010-03-15T15:27:00.000-04:00

I'm at home today taking care of sick child. L1 has a fever and cough, but her fever seems to have finally broken. She's upstairs watching Shrek 3 while L2 takes a nap. I hope to get a post out tomorrow about weaving on the floor loom. I did get to the pool at 5am this morning and manged 700m! I used a hodge-podge of strokes, but I made it to 700 so I'm happy.

Do I or Don't I

2010-03-12T09:52:00.000-05:00

First here is my pretty picture for the week:

We took this on a small section of the Great Wall just outside Beijing when on our adoption trip for L1.

Now as to the to the 'Do I or Don't I' title I'm referring to whether I should document my get fit plans here. I've gone back and forth in my head trying to decide what to do. I'd like a way to keep track of my activities (and this is what I use the blog for), but what if I fail???? And it's all here mocking me in the future??? But maybe this is some of the motivation that I need, fear of failure has often been a great motivator for me in other areas.

As I noted on the blog I ruptured a disc in my back a couple of weeks ago. Thankfully I've responded super well to physical therapy and chiropractic adjustments and I'm almost back to normal already. I've always had mild scoliosis and the weight I've gained the past few years is NOT helping my back. Additionally, I am at very high risk for developing diabetes (family history combined with having gestational diabetes). I need to get fit and lose weight for myself and for my family. Period.

Now the question is HOW? First, thing I've done is to improve my eating habits. I don't smoke, do drugs, or drink much, but I am a comfort eater. I've eliminated my snacking and, under the advice of my doctor, I'm starting on a 1000 calorie a day diet for the next few months to get some pounds off quickly. I'm 39 years old and this will be my first diet. If I fail dieting on my own, my doctor will prescribe me an appetite suppressant (basically legal speed). I'm trying to face my emontional need to eat, recongize when it's happening so I can stop it (just because I've had a bad day, I don't need to eat a huge pile of nachos with cheese dip; just because I'm stressed out about getting the kids somewhere doesn't justify eating a Little Debbie snack cake, etc.).

The other thing I'm doing is increasing my physical activity. We have a great family gym with all the usual stuff just 2 minutes from my house with an indoor pool. A little known fact, I was a varsity swimmer in High School concentrating on the 100m freestyle and 100m backstroke. I want to start swimming again. I've joined the gym and plan on going at least 5 days a week for 30 to 60 minutes. I'll swim M,W,F and walk the treadmill and do circuit training on T,Th. The only time I have to fit this into my life is 5am to 6am, which isn't too bad since the spouse already gets up a 5am. I'm now getting up with him, going to the gym, and home again before he leaves for work.

I am shockingly (at least to me) out of shape when it comes to swimming. I have NO lung capacity and my technique is for shit. Since I can't swim for long, I've been combining swimming laps with water walking to build up my strength and aerobic capabilities. I found a great website with a nice program to get a swim routine going - Zero to 1650. I am currently doing the 0 to 700 phase of the program which is a preamble to zero to 1650. As of this morning I was able to swim 200m non-stop by combining free and back. I finished out my workout with water walking. Hopefully in a few months I'll be swimming a mile!

I currently wear a size 18W. My ideal target would be a size 10, but I'd be happy to get to a size 12. Wish me luck.

Plying Ball, how I love thee

2010-03-11T09:24:00.000-05:00

Why did I wait so long to try using a plying ball???? While I really enjoy using a spindle, getting the fiber off the spindle and plying is a pain-in-the-ass. I've played around with a number of techniques and have not been really impressed with any of them, until I tried the plying ball combined with a shoe-box lazy kate!

Here are some good posts about using plying balls if you're interested in learning more:
from The Bellwether
an article by Abby Franguemont
If you search for "plying ball" in the Spindlers group on Ravelry you see lots of good examples of this technique.

And here is a good post about making your own shoebox lazy kate from the Keyboard Biologist.

Ta da! This is a 4 oz. 2-ply skein of a silk/wool purchased ages ago from a yarn shop in Monterey Bay, California. I spun this on my Kundert spindle in two batches and plied using a plying ball. Very happy.

Snappy Hat

2010-03-10T08:57:00.000-05:00

My brother-in-law split his head open on Saturday while working on a fork lift. He ended up with 42 stitches and a mild concussion. He is doing fine now, but I decided to whip up a cozy, comfy hat for him that would keep his head warm and cover-up the shaved mess. I used the free Snappy Hat pattern from Ravelry and Patons Chunky Shetland Wool yarn (acrylic/wool blend). The pattern was very well written and easy to follow. The pattern author, Picnic Knits, has her own website with both free and for-purchase patterns. Go check it out, based on her free pattern she does a wonderful job of writing easy to follow patterns. The yarn is soft and warm and I hope my brother-in-law likes it. Here is the spouse modeling it last night right after I cast off.

Winding and winding and winding

2010-03-09T08:41:00.000-05:00

Yes, I'm winding a warp on my warping board. The weaving study group project for March is to investigate twills and how different treadlings affect the same threading. I have some cotton chenille that is 22 wraps per inch which works out to about 15 epi for twill. I want a 12 inch finished width on the samples (so I can cut them into 6x6 squares when done to share)and my threading is based on groups of 8 threads so I need ~216 threads. I started winding the 4 yd warp last night and I've already realized that warping a floor loom in-directly takes about a 1000 times longer than direct warping a rigid heddle loom. All plain weave projects will go on the rigid heddle loom and I'll save the floor loom for patterns.

On another note, I took the girls to the mall last night to look for pants for L1 since I think she grew 3 inches in the past week! While there I scored a DVD from the discount pile - The Day After Tomorrow. Okay, I admit this movie is totally cheesy, but I LOVE cheesy movies. Even more, I love cheesy movies where the geek scientist saves the day. And even more better, in this movie the geek scientist who saves the day works for the same government agency that I do! The DVD included a digital copy so I'll be watching this on my Ipod next month ... when I'm at sea ... on one of those government boats doing science ;-)

Silk Spindle

2010-03-08T09:30:00.000-05:00

Isn't she lovely. This is a Natalie Silk Spindle from the The Bellwether. I was able to place a special order for her and think she it well worth the money. The wood is satine and she has a fast spin, but not not very long. She does spin silk extremely well.

Erosion

2010-03-05T08:46:00.001-05:00

No matter the scale, it all kind of looks the same.

"The sea was wet as wet could be,
The sands were dry as dry.
You could not see a cloud, because
No cloud was in the sky:
No birds were flying overhead--
There were no birds to fly."
Guess what these lines are from??

I took this photo along a beach by zooming in on the dune sand eroding. It made me thing about desert mountains eroding, same look...different scales.

Stacked Lanterns Scarf

2010-03-04T11:47:00.000-05:00

To continue with the bad-back knitting I whipped up this scarf which I named the Stacked Lanterns Scarf because I think it looks like stacks of Chinese lanterns I saw during the recent Spring Festival.

This is from 2 balls of KidSilk Aura that I had in my stash. I cast on 25 stitches and knit ~9 garter ridges (18 rows) on US 13 then ~ 9 garter ridges on US 6. Repeat.

Cowl gone wrong

2010-03-03T08:33:00.000-05:00

I've been knitting while resting my back. My choice of knitting was based on something I didn't have to follow a chart for, and I could do while lying on my back. A cowl seemed the perfect choice, especially since I had two balls of Touch Me yarn (total of 120 yds). This yarn is Aran weight and insanely soft. I bought it a number of years ago during a sale and after I got it home could never quite figure out how to best use it. This weekend it screamed "Make me into a Cowl," so I did. Or I should really say - I tried to.

I went to ravelry and searched the patterns for "cowl" and aran weight yarn. I choose the Birthday cowl pattern, which is a simple, lovely pattern available for free. Unfortunately it DID NOT work with the Touch Me yarn. As you can see I don't have a cowl, I have a necklace.

It is still pretty, and I may keep it to use as a necklace/loose cowl, but it was not what I was going for. I knit this on US 8 and should have cut out one repeat (maybe even two). Sigh.

Improving

2010-03-02T09:22:00.000-05:00

My back is improving, and we will continue with conservative treament (no surgery). The MRI showed a disc extrusion making contact and deflection of the left S1 nerve root. Since I'm improving everyday we'll contiune with physical thearpy and increasing exercise. I also plan on losing the weight I've picked up the past two years. I hope to be spinning and weaving again soon. In the mean time, my kids crack me up.

L1 plays doctor

L2 plays blanket monster and attacks with her lovey

Knitting on the Knucks

2010-03-01T09:53:00.000-05:00

I've been on my back since Friday, walking as much as I can stand, and I'm starting to feel better. I go see the back specialist today at noon to go over my MRI results. The good news is my wrist is better and I have been knitting while laying on my back. I finished the Knucks knit from my own handspun!

Bad things weren't over

2010-02-26T10:43:00.002-05:00

Well, I was apparently optimistic when I thought my run of bad luck was over. I threw out my back yesterday. Badly. I'm getting ready to head out for an MRI to determine the extent of the damage. Wish me good luck. But here is a pretty picture to lift my spirits (and maybe yours).

Edited to add: I won't get the results from the MRI until I go to the back specialist on Monday, but I don't think it's a good sign when the imaging tech acts WAY more concerned after the MRI then they did before.

Point Reyes, California. I took this in 2005.

Turkish Spindle in action

2010-02-25T08:44:00.000-05:00

Finally some pictures of the Turkish Delight spindle in action. It spins like a dream (fast) and works as advertised. My only dislike with the spindle is that the spin doesn't last very long and it will rapidly start backspinning if you are not paying attention. Once I found my ryhtym with the spindle I was able to compensate for the short spin time and backspinning. Overall, I really like it and hope to get a full-sized one later this year.

Spindle with mohair sample that was included with purchase - I wrapped under one arm - over two arms to keep the bulk of the single on top of the arms of the spindle.

Shaft pulled out.

Small arm pulled out.

Both arms pulled out and a ball of yarn!

February Weaving Study Group Project

2010-02-24T09:12:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in an earlier post I've joined a weaving study group being run by my local fiber arts guild. We had our first meeting earlier this month which was really interesting and I'm excited about participating the rest of the year. Each month we will have a project to work on at home. This month we were to explore how different colors and textures interact in both plain and twill weaving. Since I just got my floor loom I haven't done any of the twill sampling, but I did complete the plain weave sampling on my Flip.

First we were to wrap cardboard blocks with different fibers with at least one card in each of 3 categories (same color - different textures, same texture-different color, different color-different texture). Then pick 2 cards and warp your loom to sample. Based on the sample choose yarn to make a small project. `

Here are my cards:

Top left - Same color (yellows), different texture (thick suede, thin chenille)
Top right - Same texture (2 ply wool), different colors
Bottom left - different colors and different textures
Bottom right - different colors (yet united by all metallic) and different textures (pink silk wrapped in silver thread, silver multi-ply, blue ribbon)

Here is my sample - plain weave on 12 dent heddle:

You can see I used the top left card and the bottom right card yarns for the sample. I used each yarn as both warp and weft (bottom right is pink/pink progresses to top left suede/suede). I learned from the sample that the pink-wrapped-in-silver yarn made a terrible warp (kept breaking). The blue ribbon, while very pretty, caused bunching as both warp and weft. I didn't really like the gold and cream chenille yarns next to each other in the warp, should have tried the suede in between them. The silver weft made a very pretty accent in the cream chenille, but I didn't like the silver warp with the cream as weft.

I decided to use the silver and pink-wrapped-in-silver yarns to make a small drawstring spindle bag. I used the silver as warp and the pink-wrapped-in-silver as weft. It's so shiny!

I hope to have the bag completed this weekend so that it's ready for next week's study group meeting.

Retail Therapy = Floor Loom

2010-02-23T09:08:00.000-05:00

So I did it, I bought a new "old" loom this weekend! Isn't she lovely!

This is a 30 year old (just reaching her prime) Harrisville Designs 22" 4 harness 4 treadle folding loom. I have been thinking about, and pricing, floor looms since I finished my first rigid heddle loom project and I realized how much I enjoy weaving. After all the trauma of the past couple of weeks I couldn't believe my luck when I saw a craiglist's advertisement for a used, small loom in my area. The loom is in great shape and I'm looking forward to getting her warped.

More pictures:

This is a direct tie-up system which I plan on keeping (I don't plan on upgrading to 6 treadles)

(one of the few things that need cleaned on her are the heddle rods, just a little rusty)

Original leather cables, I will probably replace these. See how nice the wood looks!

Model no. A80 0 59

I also got a 12 yd warping board, 2 grocery bags of Harrisville coned wool, a stack of weaving books (from 70's and early 80's), 2 shuttles plus lots of bobbins, warping sticks, and lease sticks all for one low price!

More on the hemp/bamboo napkins

2010-02-22T08:21:00.000-05:00

The napkins are off the loom, washed, and pressed. I still need to cut them apart and hem. They are SO soft. The hemp, when I spun it, was very stiff. I did boil the yarn, which softened it up some, but the yarn was still rather stiff when I wove with it. Well, after the washing and pressing it is deliciously soft plus the bamboo is silky. As you can see below, the thread clumping on the bamboo/bamboo sections (will be the hems) evened out, but did not on the bamboo/hemp sections. That is ok because I think the pattern is pretty. My guess is the two different fibers just didn't slide (hemp holding the bamboo, maybe?).

Pretty Picture and a little Weaving

2010-02-19T08:31:00.000-05:00

I snapped this picture during a hike the spouse and I took along the continental divide in the Colorado portion of the Rockie mountains. Spit on one side of the ridge and it would end up in the Atlantic, spit on the other side and it would end up in the Pacific.

I have done a little weaving on the hemp/bamboo napkins.

This project has the bamboo crochet thread warped at 16 epi using double heddles. Each napkin will have a border of bamboo as the weft that I will hem, and the main body of each napkin will have my handspun 2 ply hemp as the weft. The paper you see is to make sure each hemp portion of the napkin is the same lenght. Everything is going along smoothly expect for the spacing of the warp threads due to the double heddle arrangement. Here is a closeup:

In the front heddle, of the double heddle arrangement, I have one hole thread and 3 slot threads. When I beat with the heddles (and I beat with the 2 held together) you can see I'm left with the 3 slot threads grouping together on the fabric. I am hoping the warp threads will slide into a more even alignment after washing (although the pattern it leaves is pretty). The other issue I've noticed is that I cannot, no matter how hard I beat, get the weft threads packed tightly. Maybe because the hemp is so inelastic??

Hell Froze Over

2010-02-18T08:19:00.000-05:00

... aka, it snowed in the Deep South. That's right, it snowed this past weekend at my house. We had a little less than an inch, but the girls loved it. Check it out:

SnowLady!

We didn't have mittens for L2 (remember, deep south) so those are socks on her hands!

An Easy Shoulder Bag

2010-02-17T09:16:00.000-05:00

Haven't been doing any crafting the past two days, but I did load up photos of some stuff I worked on last week including this tibeatan style shoulder bag:

The pattern is from Doni's Delis, and is SO easy. You weave one long piece of fabric, do a little folding, a little sewing, and ta da! I did line the bag in a matching fabric (matches the blue yarn). The yarn is the same as what I used in the card weaving project I discussed here. I used a 10 dent heddle on my Flip and had a very balanced plain weave when finished. The only real problem I had was sewing the lining to the bag. The lining fabric had no stretch, but the handwoven fabric had a ton of stretch therefore there is a little bunching in one section.

Bad things come in threes.

2010-02-16T08:36:00.000-05:00

They really, really do and I hope the bad things stop at three, at least for a little while.

A little over a week ago my dog Willow bit L2 in the face. Thankfully L2 was fine, just a small laceration right below her eyebrow.

After vet consultations plus much hand-wringing and crying we decided our only option was to euthanize Willow. Willow was a great dog, and we loved her very much. We pulled her from a shelter 8 years ago, she was heartworm positive, had a crushed shoulder, and was an adult high-energy, crazy border collie. We treated her heartworms. The orthopedic vet determined the shoulder could not be repaired so she was permanently disabled. We loved her anyway. She bit an adult on the leg a couple of years ago (she thought the man, trimming a neighbors tree, was a trespasser in her yard). Ever since we have been very vigilant about Willow and new people, and Willow and stressful situations. We never knew Willow's real age, but we think she was 10-12 years old. She was getting old and aggressive. We have to protect our children and there was no one to take her. I held her in my arms on Saturday while the vet administered the drugs. We miss her very much, and we are focusing on all the fun times we had with her.

Yesterday, Monday, I took the girls to the playground. While running with them L1 grabbed my arm to pull me in another direction. I fell, hard, on the concrete. The intial x-rays of my hand didn't show any broken bones, but I have significant soft tissue injuries to the heel of my palm/base of my thumb. Bascially, I sprained my hand and cannot use my thumb. It's all nicely wrapped up and the doc told me to keep it that way for at least three days. No knitting or spinning for me.

I sincerely hope life improves soon.

That's Willow in the center.

Pretty Picture

2010-02-12T08:11:00.000-05:00

I thought each week I would try having one post that showcases a picture that I've taken with my own camera, either while working or playing. Below is a photo I took while sampling deep sea corals off the coast of Georgia along the southeastern U.S. We were in ~ 200 m of water and ~ 80 km offshore when this pod of dolphins was spotted while we transited between stations. The day was clear and windless, and the seas were bizarrely calm. I thought it made for a lovely picture, hope you enjoy.

First Card Woven Band

2010-02-11T10:20:00.000-05:00

I finished the card woven band I was working on, and couldn't be more pleased with the results. I really enjoyed card weaving, and I really enjoyed card weaving on the Flip loom. The hardest part of the project was figuring out how tight to pull the weft to really close the band. After I took it off the loom, I machined washed and dried then steam pressed. The mercerized cotton yarn had a nice sheen at the end.

I'm using it as a band to tie together fabric weights I sewed in matching fabric (the yarn in the band is leftover from another weaving project that I needed the matching fabric for...more on that project another day). I've discovered that I like using weights to hold together fabric and pattern when cutting rather then pinning. Here are the fabric weights in progress, I made 4 different sizes. I machine stitched 3/4 of the edge then hand stitched the bag closed after adding dried beans for weight. You can also see the sewing reference book I'm using to help improve my sewing skills.

Knitting Knucks

2010-02-10T08:53:00.000-05:00

Above is a work-in-progress. A pair of Knucks knit in my own handspun. Knucks is an interesting pattern because you knit the fingers first, then knit your way down to the wrist. It is also very easy to follow, I'd recommend this pattern if you're looking for an easy, straightforward fingerless glove.

My handspun fiber was purchased from two different etsy sellers. The colorful yarn on the hand is a high-energy single I spun from a 2 oz mix (Alpaca, merino, falkland, punta, romney, jacob, cotswold, leicester, mohair, bamboo, angelina, firestar, silks - sari/waste/tussah) batt from Fiber Fancy with some mohair locks mixed in for texture:

This was a wonderful batt to spin on my Rose. I was a little worried because of all different fibers, but it spun easily (well blended). I found out about Fiber Fancy through the PhatFiber sampler which is a great way to try different fibers and etsy vendors.

The fiber I'm using for the wrist was spun from a 2 oz. batt I purchased from Giffordable:

I also spun this single on my Rose. This batt was an interesting mix of Shetland wool in oatmeal shades, bamboo and organic green cotton. It is soft, warm, and yummy. I really like it on my wrist.

L1 has requested a pair for herself. I'm thinking I just might have enough handspun to do a child's fingerless mitten once I finish with my gloves.

Yummy Food

2010-02-09T08:44:00.000-05:00

I cook, from scratch, about 80-90% of the dinners our family eats. Primarily because of food allergies in the family, but also because I prefer to know what my food really contains. I belong to a local CSA (community supported agriculture), have some great food stores nearby that carry local meats, plus my brother hunts and generously shares with me. Because of my access to some great resources, I am able to have fun with cooking, and fun developing my own recipes.

Other than baking, just like when I knit I cannot follow any recipe without making changes. I also know my favorite flavors and create dishes around that. Here is one of those dishes:

Turkey meatballs with chard and wild rice.

I get the wild rice cooking.

I make my meatballs out of ground turkey with chopped onions plus spices (salt, pepper, smoked paprika, and whatever else I feel like that night). Set aside.

I wash my swiss chard well, then coarse chop the leafy part and fine chop the stems. I fine dice some onion and garlic. I saute the onion and garlic, then toss in some golden raisins and the chopped stems. Saute awhile longer then add spicies (whatever you like, I usually do pepper, paprika and oregano). Add the leafy parts of the chard and saute breifly. Add stock to cover the slightly wilted leaves and simmer until chard is tender. Add the meatballs and cook uncovered allowing the cooking liquids to condense.

Place wild rice on platter as bottom layer then top with chard and meatballs!

Sewing Aprons

2010-02-08T08:08:00.000-05:00

I've known the basics of sewing since I was a teenager, but I've never been very good at it. I can sew a curtain (and have sewed all the window treatments in my house), but anything clothing related usually comes out AWFUL! So I have a nice sewing machine (thanks Mom), but rarely use it.

Well, now that I've started weaving I realize I need to improve my sewing. See, when I knit I am creating the finished object as I go along. But when I weave anything other then scarves I am creating fabric. Even placemats and handtowels really require some sewing to finish properly. Since I'm creating fabric, I need to better my sewing so that I can make someting nice from my handwoven fabric.

The upshot of all this is I did some sewing! I want to practice on store bought fabric before I hack into my handwoven. I found this adorable apron pattern from The Paisley Pincushion that made multiple sizes, then I bought some interesting fabric at my local fabric store. The girls and I now have matching aprons!

And they seem to get a big kick out of wearing them. The cool thing is they are reversible, the other side has the stripes as the main fabric and the birds as the pockets.

New Turkish Delight Spindle

2010-02-05T08:31:00.000-05:00

Introducing my new Spindle>>>

It's a Turkish Delight made by Ed Jenkins. The crossbars are Osage Orange and the dark shaft is Bolivian Rosewood. I LOVE it! It spins so fast and so evenly. Amazing! And it is tiny, I can't imagine how small his Kuchulu spindles are if the delight is now the mid-size. The blue you see on the shaft is a silk hankie that came with the spindle. As soon as I unwrapped the spindle I spun the silk hankie. Now I am working on the mohair that was also included with the spindle (what the spindle is sitting on). In my excitment, I forgot to wrap the silk hankie around the crossbars, but I am wrapping properly with the mohair. For anyone who doesn't know what a Turkish spindle does, the main idea is that you wrap your single around the crossbars and when you're done spinning you dissassemble the spindle leaving you with a center pull ball! The second shaft you see is the maple shaft that comes with all of Ed's spindles, the rosewood shaft was a special order (because I wanted a dark varigated shaft against the yellow/orange variegated crossbars). This spindle is such a dream to spin on I want the orginal Turkish spindle and the kuchulu spindle sizes now as well.

When I'm this age I want to be a Ragin' Granny!

2010-02-04T09:38:00.003-05:00

Had to Share - F-ing awesome!

Weaving Study Group

2010-02-04T08:16:00.000-05:00

Last night was the first meeting of the new weaving study group being formed by my local fiber guild. There were seven of us plus the teacher. I really enjoyed our first class (focused on understanding sett), and now want a floor loom more than ever, but I just don't know where I would put it! The teacher had 3 of her own looms and two guild looms. After all the weaving reading and research I've done it was great to see and touch floor looms for the first time.

The down side is there will be a number of projects planned for the year long class that I will not be able to do on my rigid heddle loom. I can use the guild looms for practice though, and even if I can't weave the projects myself I will enjoy learning the process and seeing what others have done. Our first class project will focus on how color and texture affect weaving (look for pictures to come).

I have also warped my loom for weaving napkins with the 2-ply hemp I spun.

As you see I have 2 heddles setup. Since I thought bamboo and hemp napkins would be nice, my warp is Aunt Lydia's Bamboo Crochet Thread that I've warped at 16 epi using two 8 dent heddles. I'll be using my handspun as the weft. My plan is to weave 4 tabby napkins. This was my first time warping 2 heddles and it was really easy. I used the figure from Sara Lamb's book (Woven Treasures) as my guide and I didn't have any problems.

Blog update

2010-02-03T08:36:00.001-05:00

So I've given my blog a new look! I've been blogging for 4 years now and figured it was time. I am fairly happy with the new look, but I still want to tweak a few things (like figure out how to have my Blog Roll show the titles of recent posts - edited to add: figured it out!). I've also decided I want to blog more this year then I have the past couple of years. I started this blog as a way to keep track of my knitting projects, but after L2 arrived I got lazy about taking pictures and writing about my projects. I thought Ravelry would take the place of the blog, as a way to track my work, but I also spin, weave, and sew, and Ravelry doesn't have a good way to track those other kinds of projects.

After losing my friend a few months ago I've also been reminded of how tenuous life is. If I were killed in a car accident tomorrow, what would my girls remember of me? We have photos and videos of our life together, plus I wrote journals for each of them, L1 as we worked through the adoption process and L2 as we worked through the pregnancy. My scientific publications are available and will long outlive me, but they reflect my work and, by their very nature, have almost no reflection of my personality. Recording my joy of creating useful things, here in this blog, is another piece of me that I can preserve. And it is fun to look back through the blog from time to time, reminding myself of things I had forgotten about.

The most important part of all!

Hemp Spinning

2010-02-02T08:45:00.002-05:00

(on the left is a few yards of singles, and the right is 2-ply)

So here is my first attempt at spinning Hemp. Let me admit this was not what I had expected. In my imagination hemp top would be long fine fiber that I could spin super fine.

Hemp top is NOT long or fine.

Hemp top is the coarse crap that is left behind after the long, fine fiber is combed out and presumably sold for commercial textile applications.

The fibers in the top ranged from < 1 cm to about 10 cm in length. There were thin fibers to chunks of tree bark (just kidding, but there were some REALLY chunky pieces of something in there) mixed together. The only way I could spin it on my wheel was from the fold, with a slow whorl speed and fast take up (too much twist made it kink). I had a lot of waste plus uneven singles. Out of 4 ounces of fiber I ended up with ~ 190 yards of 2-ply sport to DK weight yarn.

Bottom line, I did not enjoy spinning this hemp, but I did end up with usable yarn (plan on weaving into napkins). Sadly, it would appear that the Flax top I purchased will be (generally) the same prep as the hemp top although a little more even. The long, fine fibers of my imagination are flax stricks, not top. Here is a good Knitty article about flax spinning with some definitions.

Some fiber Stuff

2010-02-01T08:17:00.002-05:00

So this fall I attended the Southeastern Fiber Fiber Festival in Asheville, NC. I had a great time, took a spinning class from Rita Buchanan that I totally enjoyed (and learned some good stuff in), plus I bought some fiber:

The big ball of fluff is ~ 2 lbs of BFL, then I bought Hemp top, Flax top, and Ramie top. Along the bottom is some wool/tencel blend. I love spinning wool and wool blends, but I live in a hot, swampy climate so I've decided I need to learn to spin plant based fibers.

If you ever have a chance to take a class with Rita go for it. I am spinning (on my wheel) a lot more evenly and consistently now, and my joins are a thousand times better.

Entertaining conversation I over heard between my 5 year old and 2 year old:
L1 (5): "You're a punk."
L2 (2): (very indignantly)"I not a punk."
L1: "Yes you are."
L2: (even more indignantly) " I NOT a yes you are!"

Here they are covering their noses because of the "stinky" marsh during a walk we took a few days ago.

Fish Hat!

2010-01-29T08:36:00.003-05:00

As a marine biologist I feel it is totally within my rights to knit (and force my children to wear) a giant fish hat!

And here are the girls modeling the hat:

This is the free Fish Hat pattern from Knitty. I used Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted for the green and orange and Lion Brand's Fisherman Wool for the cream and brown. This was a very fun and easy knit. Who knows, I may have to knit a school of them.

iPad...I lust for you

2010-01-28T08:26:00.003-05:00

Isn't this lovely!

I've been waiting for this device for about 3 years. It's perfect, just what I wanted. Why?

I have a great desktop (iMac) that is perfect for my home computing needs: BIG screen, powerful, fast, great storage, etc, but it sits on a desk and cannot move.

I have a smartphone (Blackberry) that I love when I am out and about (phone, directions/maps, email, facebook, twitter, weather, movie times, etc.). The phone's small, fits in a pocket or purse, lots of great services, but you can't do a real internet experience on it or read books.

I have an iPod classic that I love. I can listen to a book, podcast or music while I knit, spin, weave, or go walking. The video is ok, but tiny - no book reading, no internet. Fun games to play when you have a couple of moments to kill.

I have an ancient (8 years old), crappy, PC laptop, that is only good for the internet, but it is slooooooowwwwwwww...takes forever to start up. My home network is fast (airport extreme), so once started page load times aren't bad, but I can't easily carry it around the house b/c the battery life sucks and you still need a place to sit it on to use (can't use it while holding it).

I've wanted to replace the laptop for awhile, but I did not want to invest in another full blown laptop because I already have a great home computer I like to use for desktop applications. I considered a netbook, but I wanted something better and simpler then a paired down laptop that would still have all the maintenance needs of a PC, but no power. I considered a Kindle DX, but I wanted color, and real PDF support, and a real internet experience, and photos.

So I've waited and it's finally here (well almost here) - the iPad. An easy to hold and carry internet appliance that will serve as an e-reader, plus play movies, show photos and have fun apps. I'm in the kitchen cooking, need a recipe? The iPad can find it. I'm sitting on the couch knitting - need some advice (ravelry)? The iPad is there. Laying in bed, reading a book on the iPad and want to check the weather for tomorrow? The iPad can do it. Visiting family and they want to see the kid's holiday pics? The iPad can do it in style.

This appliance won't replace my phone or my computer, nor will it replace my iPod. I will not be buying a new laptop. The iPad is my choice. The iPad will be by my side around the house for quick net apps, or playing a movie for the kids in the car. Or allow me to show patterns I like to my knitting group. I want to never buy another paper cookbook again. I want all my books and magazines electronically ASAP (here that Interweave!!!).

Card Weaving

2010-01-27T08:39:00.003-05:00

So I tried my hand at card weaving on the rigid heddle loom and really liked it:

I don't have a warping board, so I can only warp my loom using the direct warping method (see this post). Direct warping is fast and easy. When I started reading about card weaving (was inspired by Sara Lamb's book Woven Treasures) all the instructions wanted me to use in-direct warping which requires a warping board or multiple warping pegs. So I figured out how to direct warp my loom for card weaving!

Most card weaving uses 4 threads per card, and you twist the cards to create patterns. I warped my loom with 4 threads per heddle slot, then threaded each card using one slot's threads...kept everything nice and organized. Because the Flip is a very long rigid heddle loom, and has extra heddle slots, I was able to place the heddle in the far back of the loom, leaving myself plenty of room to twist the cards and weave. Great fun, and a great way to get multiple uses out of a single piece of equipment.

Edited to Add: BTW, I will be really freaking disappointed if Apple doesn't announce a kickass tablet that will be everything I wanted to read knitting, spinning and weaving books and patterns on, plus surf the web, do simple web applications (think google cloud apps), games, videos, and other fun cool stuff.

More sock yarn weaving

2010-01-26T08:33:00.003-05:00

Here are some more of my sock scarves I made as holiday presents this year:

Weaving!

2010-01-25T09:30:00.002-05:00

So I've taken up weaving as well as knitting and spinning (like I didn't have enough to do)! I purchased a Schacht 15" Flip back in November and love it, so much fun to weave on. So far, I've woven scarves (great stash buster for sock yarn) and I just finished a bag (pictures to come).

Here is my first warp and weaving project using Noro Sock Yarn:

Corporations and Unions are People???

2010-01-22T08:47:00.004-05:00

The Supreme Court of the United States of America overturned a century of court precedent yesterday, as well as reinventing the meaning of our constitution, by giving corporations and unions the same political rights as citizens. The Court's ruling in Citizens United vs. FEC poses a serious and direct threat to democracy, as Justice Stevens said: "The court's ruling threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions across the nation."

You thought politicians spent too much time grubbing for money and catering to special interests before? Well, it's going to get a lot worse real soon. Most corporations are multi-national - do you really want other countries controlling our government?

Thanks to the political activism of this Supreme Court we, as living breathing human beings, are left with two options: 1) public financing of campaigns to unlink candidates from special interests or 2)a constitutional amendment (see Free Speech for People)

Call, write, email your local, state and federal representatives, tell them what you think of this ruling and demand we protect our democracy.

https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

http://www.senate.gov/

Meagan

2009-12-10T20:42:00.001-05:00

Dear Meagan,
You will be missed. My heart breaks for Ava and Jeff. I so wished you had lived to see Ava first's birthday.
Love,
Cindy

Did I mention...

2009-12-10T09:33:00.003-05:00

I have a loom! That's right, I bought a Schacht 15" Flip rigid heddle loom. It's so much fun, and it powers through yarn! I am using up a ton of sock yarn, that I have purchased over the years and will never have the time to turn into socks, to make scarves. Between the loom and the wheel I have really been enjoying the fiber lately.

Here is some of the fiber I've spun:

Top - Gifforables shetland wool, cotton and bamboo blend bottom
Bottom - Zebisis silk
Both are singles

Lisa Souza wool and silk blend (2 ply)

PhatFiber samples from June

Breast Cancer Awareness

2009-12-03T08:43:00.003-05:00

This video is just f-ing awesome!

FYI, a friend of mine is currently fighting stage 4, triple-negative breast cancer. She was diagnosed in June with a primary breast tumor and smaller tumor in her liver. As of last month it has now spread to most of her bones and organs. Her time is short. One year ago she defended her PhD and two weeks later gave birth to her first child (a little girl). That's right, she is 33 years old, just finished her PhD, and had a six month old baby when diagnosed. Her daughter turns 1 on Dec 29, we are all hoping she will live to see her baby's first birthday.

Random Updates

2009-09-02T07:59:00.003-04:00

Been rather busy with work and family lately.

L1 has successfully started Kindergarten and even seems to enjoy the homework. She also has started up with her fall piano lessons AND her banjo arrived yesterday. That's right - a banjo. Actually it is a banjolele (a banjo body with a ukulele neck and tuning) since she is too small yet to play a full size banjo. She took music camp this summer and LOVED playing the banjo. Her music teacher also said she was a natural. She has her first lesson tonight, although she has already been "composing" songs on it.

L2 is doing great, talking up a storm, singing songs, and full of attitude. Now that she is alone in the car when I take her to daycare, she has to entertain herself. The other morning, after she had been in the back laughing and talking to herself, I turned to look at her and she proudly told me "I so funny!"

I've been spinning on my new Majacraft rose wheel, spinning on my drop spindle, learning how to crochet, and doing a little knitting. Just busy, busy, busy!

Fun, but useless, thing of the day

2009-08-04T10:32:00.002-04:00

Pick you own apocalypse! I love Slate.

Here are my results:
I picked doom by overpopulation, laziness, food supply, theocracy, and/or asteroid!

What my result said about me:
You are a bloodthirsty misanthrope. You believe mankind is stupid and fallible and that America will destroy itself in a bloody mess. You'll know you're right when: The United States succumbs to a torrent of Russian nukes; we clone ourselves, get bum genes, and die.

Spot on.

On top of the world

2009-07-13T14:58:00.002-04:00

or at least the Cooper River Bridge. We did it at last, walked to the top of the Cooper River Bridge in Charleston, SC. Great view, nice breeze, not too bad a walk in the early morning of a hot summer day. L1 was worn out by the time we made it back to the car, but L2 loved every minute of it.

That big ship is the USS Yorktown, as you look out over Charleston Harbor towards the Atlantic Ocean.

Embarrassed by my Govenor (who I did not vote for)

2009-06-25T16:52:00.002-04:00

This says it all-

'Another politician with a conservative mind and a liberal penis'
Jon Stewart on The Daily Show

So Sanford wanted to impeach Clinton for similar behavior (although at least Clinton never just DISAPPEARED for a week), does that mean Sanford will resign as governor??? I can only hope.

So much to do, so little time

2009-06-18T20:30:00.003-04:00

Wow, I've been busy. Was out of town all last week working 12+ hour days in the broiling sun of coastal Georgia. I kid you not - it was, literally, hot enough to cook a shrimp (the shrimp in our bait bucket cooked enough to turn pink). The upside was we stayed at a house on deep water with amazing views, sometimes I really love what I do.

I didn't get any spinning or knitting done while I was away, just too tired (and the beers to wind down with didn't help much either). But I did spin up two more of the May Phat Fiber samples before I left town.

Sqwish in a 2 ply.

Pacos alpaca as three singles.

Plied together in my first 3 ply yarn!

And I am half way through the enormous sample from PortFiber. The only thing left to spin from May after that is the raw alpaca from North Star Alpaca that I just washed. This is good since I just got the June Phat Fiber Box!!!

Everything in it is awesome! Please go check out my photostream over at Flickr so you can see everything in the box with information about who produced it (notes on the pictures).

For the may box I tried to spin everything up and knit it as well. I choose that approach to maximize my exposure to different fibers and preparations. Not only how they spun, but what the final knit would look like. This month, I still needs lots of spinning practice, but I am thinking of making one big skein from all the samples and knitting a crazy scarf. Mainly, I just can't wait to get my hands into all these fibers.

On a more personnel note, I weaned L2 while I was away. I'm a little said about it (as is she), but we nursed for 20 months, were down to just once a day, and I was ready to have my body back. My youngest is growing up!

More yummy samples

2009-06-05T18:51:00.003-04:00

I spun up the BFL roving sample from WC Mercantile and really enjoyed it. Very easy to draft and spin - soft and squooshy.

I wanted to try this as a thicker yarn (thinking cosy hats and sweaters) and ended with a ~11 wpi 2 ply.

The swatch I knited was in sand stitch from the Walker Treasury.

I ended a soft, non-scratchy flat fabric, with subtle color shading.

This was fun to spin and super easy to spin as a lace weight. At 70/20 mohair/merino lamb, this was pure luxury from Natchwoolie.

I ended with a 2-ply lace weight at 22 wpi.

I totally want enough to spin for a shawl - wrap myself in luxury!

The swatch was based on the vertical lace trellis from Walker Treasury.

And then two new spindles from A Spinner's Lair. A lovely little 1.21 oz black walnut and mulberry drop spindle. And a double bobbin support spindle made from reclaimed walnut.

It's a challenge

2009-05-30T21:23:00.002-04:00

Wow, 100% bamboo and 100% milk fiber is a real challenge for a newbie spindler. I think I strained my index finger! These fibers proved to be very slippery.

The 100% Bamboo sample from Polyartgirl Designs was a beautiful, vibrant strawberry color. L1 fell in love with the color and, though I'm not a fan of pink, I liked it as well. I spin this on the zebra stone bottom whorl using my standard short draw. The slipperiness of the fiber forced me to spin a heavier yarn then I planned on. Whenever I tried for laceweight it would slide apart before I could get twist into it.

I ended up with a 2 ply yarn at ~12 wpi that had a lovely shine to it. The yarn was very inelastic, not a surprise, but the swatch did hold the lace pattern.

After wash and blocking I noticed the swatch has a soft halo/fuzziness to it. I don't know if this is typical of 100% bamboo or just my poor attempt at spinning it!

The 100% milk fiber from Serendipity also proved quite challenging to spin. Based on the suggestion provided with the sample, I attempted to spin this from the fold. Again, this was a slippery fiber, but spinning from the fold did give me better control over the fiber (also spun on the zebra bottom whorl). I ended with a 2 ply yarn at ~18 wpi, but highly variable with lots of thick/thin sections.

The yarn was inelastic and had a halo/fuzziness to it that reminded me of yarns with a small amount of kid mohair. The swatch held its lace pattern well.

The artisans that dyed these samples did an amazing job. The colors of both samples were rich and vibrant. I think, if I work with these fibers again, I would want to blend them with some wool to make them easier to spin and the final yarn more elastic. Also, once I've improved as a spinner, I may find these fibers easier to work with.

Superwash and Merino/Tencel

2009-05-29T11:41:00.003-04:00

When I first looked at this while in the roving state I wasn't that impressed, but I was really pleased at the prettiness of the yarn once spun. It had a real depth and glow. This was a superwash merino from www.twistedfiberyarn.com that I spun on my bottom whorl spindle from Zebisis Designs. The yarn was easy to draft and spin.

I ended up with a ~12 wpi, 2 ply yarn.

As my swatch I knitted the simple lace headband from www.innerchildcrochet.com.

Overall, I ended with a very lovely yarn that was soft and sweet to knit with. I am also learning that it can be hard to tell how your yarn will turn out based on the look of the roving. I've seen some colors become muddied while other colors devlope much greater depth like this sample did.

Next was the 50/50 merino/tencel from Spincerely Yours. Boy did I enjoy spinning this one, the blend made it super easy to draft, but not too slippery. I ended up with a 2 ply yarn at ~20 wpi.

The yarn was soft and almost glowed. A very pretty shine to it once spun. I knit a bookmark in an arrowhead lace pattern as the swatch.

The yarn was nice to knit with and blocked out well, held the lace pattern.

Lots of Etsy stuff

2009-05-26T22:12:00.004-04:00

I spun the 80/20 merino/bamboo roving from www.lotusjulie.etsy.com and it was a dream! The draft was smooth, but not too slippery.

I spun this on my lace spindle and I ended up with true 2-ply laceweight yarn at 23 wpi!

As my swatch I knit up a book mark sampler using Walker patterns.

It was soft and squishy and the colorway (Flourish) made me think of popsicles from my childhood. The yarn was just dreamy to knit with. I need more of this stuff!

I also received my orders from two Etsy shops that I learned about through the ravelry community.

Here is my Zebisis Designs order-

New bottom whorl spindle, silk roving, and two free samples! Packed very nicely too.

And here is my Gifforables order-

Wool batt blended with bamboo and cotton, stone whorl support spindle with three cotton samples, and a free sample of roving!

I attempted to spin the tactile sample from the phatfiber box, but it proved beyond my capabilities as a new spinner. It was very pretty and super soft but I couldn't manage to draft it well so gave up.

First sample

2009-05-24T14:06:00.006-04:00

My first fiber spin from the Phatfiber box is the Feeling Sheepish Corriedale roving. This roving is very elastic which I assume is a feature of corriedale wool. The roving was painted in long color blocks so I was able to divde the fiber in half - a pink section and a green/yellow section. I spun the sections on my 1.3 oz kundert spindle. They were a pleasure to spin, drafted nicely (were a little sticky in places where the dye was heaviest, but I assume that is a side effect of the dying process). I then plied the two sections together on the Hitchiker wheel, after cleaning cobwebs off it.

I ended up with a 2 ply yarn with ~13 wpi (about a DK weight).

I liked the pink and green sections of yarn, but not the pink and yellow. I knitted the sample into a 3x3 swatch with US 5 needles and ended with ~4.5 spi.

The yarn turned out to be a very soft wool (except for the sections I overspun!). Overall, it was fun to spin, and turned into a nice yarn.

Next I tried the Wild Hare organic wool top. Since this was a small sample, and I'm trying to spin enough to knit a swatch for everything, I decided to to spin a heavy laceweight 2-ply yarn. I spun this on my lace weight spindle from A Spinner's Lair. Even though this was my first attempt at heavy laceweight/fingering, this wool made the spinning very easy. This wool was super easy to draft for lace weight, a real pleasure.

And I loved the colors! I did not appreicate how pretty it was until I saw the plied yarn. I ended up with just a few yards of ~18 wpi yarn.

The dye from the yarn did stain my hands while spinning and I noticed a bluish tinge on the wood of the spindle. When washing my swatch more blue dye came out. The swatch turned out nicely, the yarn was pleasent to knit with, and the colors were pretty.

Also, you may notice that I am plying the singles from the same spindle. Given the small quanities that I am dealing with I did not want to bother transfering the singles to balls for plying. Instead, I spun one single, pushed it down the spindle, then spun the second single. Worked out nicely.

My first PhatFiber box

2009-05-23T08:15:00.005-04:00

Yeah! I scored my first Phatfiber box after learning about this product from a Stash and Burn podcast. This box provides a great sampling on etsy fiber artists, and I was able to get one of the 'Fluff' boxes, a fiber only box.

The needle pouch was full of bits and bobs including a bunch of discount codes to use at etsy shops.

There was a selection of stitch markers.

Then I got to the fiber.

Left to right: Alpaca roving in natural colors from www.pacos.etsy.com (insanely soft); Combed merino top from www.tactilefiberarts.com; Corriedale wool roving from feelingsheepish.etsy.com

Left: Wool roving from www.sqwish.etsy.com (this is the spouse's fav, he likes the color)
Right: Raw alpaca fleece from northstaralpacas.etsy.com (this will be interesting to work with, totally new stuff to me)

From left to right: Milk fiber roving from www.serendipityfiberarts.etsy.com (can't wait to try this fiber), Soap from Smoky Mnts Apothecary, Bamboo roving from www.polyartgirl.net (this is L1's fav and looking forward to spinning this)

Top left - Merino/tencel from spincerely.etsy.com (I love these colors)
Bottom left - 80/20 merino/bamboo from lotusjulie.etsy.com (feels super soft)
Right - Merino/bamboo roving from portfiber.etsy.com (This is a huge sample and I love the colors!)

From left to right: Superwash merino top from www.twistedfiberyarn.com; BFL roving from www.wcmercantile.etsy.com, Organic wool top from wildhare.etsy.com.

On the left you can see the felted fiber included in the Wild Hare sample, and on the right is 20/30 Kid Mohair/merino from natchwoolie.etsy.com (soft and squishy).

I'm looking forward to spinning all of these samples and plan on documenting how the different fibers spin and knit up.

Knitting, fiber, and spinning

2009-05-22T22:04:00.002-04:00

Preschool is too PC

2009-05-20T08:10:00.002-04:00

L1 is preparing for her preschool graduation on Friday (seriously??). The class will be performing skits based on nursery rhymes for the parents. Should be really cute, although I think preschool 'graduation' is rather goofy. However, I was taken aback when I heard L1 practicing this nursery rhyme:
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe
She had so many children she didn't know what to do
She gave them some broth without any bread
Then spanked them all soundly and sent them to bed.

Apparently the last line is now politically incorrect and TOO violent. The children are learning the last line as 'Then kissed them all soundly and sent them to bed.' WTF!

Star Trek Movie - Awesome

2009-05-11T11:28:00.002-04:00

As a long time fan of the Star Trek universe, I had misgivings about the new movie. Could they really re-make the original Star Trek?? It had been tried before and failed. Well, this is an awesome movie. Loved it! Funny and compelling, great action...everything that I could want in a sci-fi/fantasy flick.

Whoever did the casting deserves an award. These actors owned the characters, they pulled the best parts of the original cast into their roles, but still made them all their own. I can't wait to see it again. Go see it, and see it in IMAX if you can.

And check out Spock's sweater and Scotty's hat. Some potential knitting there.

Twilight

2009-05-04T13:45:00.003-04:00

The whole Twilight thing has been bugging the crap out of me for awhile. I need to vent. If you love the Twilight books stop reading now.

Buffy would put a stake through Edward in a heartbeat.
Vampires are not supposed to f-ing sparkle.

Ok, I feel a little better.

I cut my teeth on vampire mythology as a little kid, watching the old black and white movies with my Dad on late night TV in the 70's (my Mom hated it). I watched tons of various crappy vampire movies of the 60's, 70's and 80's. My two fave classics are Dracula (1931) and Horror of Dracula (1958). Nosferatu is a badass movie as well. I liked the original Blade and Bram Stroker's Dracula is pretty good. Fright Night was a surprise winner of the 80's and I was enthralled with Lost Boys for awhile. From Dusk till Dawn was overly gory but still worth a watch. There have been so many movies I could go on and on. But my true loves were the books.

I read my first vampire novel when I was 10 - Stephen King's Salem's Lot. I still won't sleep under a window thanks to that book. I then found Anne Rice - Interview with a Vampire was awesome. I ran to the bookstore when The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned came out. I also read Bram Stoker's Dracula, all Twilight fans should be forced to read this as a dose of real vampire literature.

I saw the Buffy movie and hated it - way to not-on-purpose campy. When the TV series started I was skeptical, but loved it!

Being a grownup now, I haven't been able to keep up with all the latest cheap vampire literature that has sprung up since the early 2000's, but Twilight got so big I thought I'd give it a try. I listened to it on my Ipod and could not believe how badly it sucked. I could not STAND Bella as a female lead, sniveling and subservient. Being stalked and lied to is not romantic. And the very concept of a vampire not being able to go out in daylight because they "sparkled" had to be the worst drivel I had ever read (well, listened to actually).

I would never let my children read this series as teenagers (but I'd give them Dracula in a heartbeat) and I truly do not understand its popularity. I cannot bring myself to watch the movie; this whole vent came out of seeing Twilight available on PPV. What I wonder (because I have close friends whom I love and respect that adore this series) is if I had not grown up watching classic vampire movies and reading those books, would I be as opposed to sparkling vampires as I am? Are there any Buffy fans that like Edward (he is no Angel, and I never liked the Angel/Buffy romance either)? Can you have loved Salem's Lot and bear to read Twilight?? 'Nuff said.

Vermont Rocks!

2009-04-08T08:08:00.001-04:00

Vermont ROCKS and so does Iowa. Always good news when I hear about a little less hate and little more love in the world!

On another note, we celebrated L1's adoption day this weekend and had a great time together as a family. A highlight of the weekend was L1 climbing the local rock wall (she had been begging to do it)! She did an amazing job, made it within 8 feet of the top on the 50 foot wall when her helmet started to come off. The belayer called the climb off and she came back down. We were so proud of her, she was fearless on the wall!

Kids say the funniest things

2009-03-18T11:31:00.002-04:00

...especially when they are learning to talk. L2 is 17 months now and has really been working on her language skills this month, including the use of two-word phrases. This morning she had a bowel movement in her diaper, which we lovingly refer to as a 'stinky.' After I finished changing her, and put the dirty diaper in the bag, she proudly announced "Stinky All Gone!' What a smart girl ;-)

I screwed up

2009-03-13T12:49:00.002-04:00

Dammit! I have almost finished the first sleeve of the lace tunic and realized I screwed up. The pattern calls for kidsilk HAZE and I've been knitting with kidsilk AURA. Aura is a heavier, thicker yarn - only 82 yards per 25g vs. 229 yds for the haze. FUCK! That must be why I had to go down needle size to get gauge. And I kept thinking to my self the knit fabric left heavier than what was pictured in the book.

I used two balls of the eight I had purchased, and the mohair means I won't be able to rip it out. Any thoughts of what I can make with 6 balls of kidsilk AURA.

I think I'm a little crazy

2009-02-25T08:49:00.002-05:00

Among other things there has been a lot of knitting going on, but very little blog posting. The whole family has been sick over the past 2 months with a variety of viruses so I just haven't been in the mood for blogging.

Since I've finished a number of projects I've cast on a new one - The Lace Tunic from Knitting Goes Large. I'm knitting this in Kidsilk Haze on US 2. That's right US 2. The pattern called for US 3, but to get gauge I had to go down a size. I cannot believe I'm knitting a freaking tunic length sweater on US2.

Music to my ears

2009-01-21T09:17:00.000-05:00

"We will restore science to its rightful place..." President Obama, January 20, 2008.

Over a month!

2009-01-14T08:17:00.002-05:00

I cannot believe it's been over a month since I last updated the blog. I was super busy with the holidays and now work is kicking my butt in the new year. I did mange to finish up a few projects (need to get the pictures up) including a sweater for L1, but I've still got a lot of projects on my needles that I'm dividing my time with. However, I'm not currently working on anything that I'm REALLY excited about. I need to find a project that I'm totally in love with to motivate me.

Cutting Teeth

2008-12-07T09:08:00.003-05:00

I'm glad to say that I finally know why L2 has been so miserable for the past week. She is cutting 8 (yes, eight) teeth all at the same time. I knew last week that she was working on the top two canines, but this morning I got my finger in and checked all over. She's working on all 4 canines AND her first 4 molars. No wonder that past week has been so terrible. It feels like all but one have cut through the surface and the last one just has a thin layer on it. I sincerely hope she starts to feel better soon!

Sad about Knits

2008-12-05T14:19:00.002-05:00

Confession - I've fallen out of love with Interweave Knits. This used to be my favorite knitting magazine. It was stylish, pretty, a mix of difficulties - something for everyone. I haven't bought any issues in over a year now. Some of the sweaters are pretty enough, but the sizes available are limited and everything feels more geared towards a younger crowd (or am I just getting older!). Anyway, I was not even tempted by the winter issue and it made me sad.

On happier notes I've been getting more knitting done - Check out these Selbu mittens for L1:

COLD!

2008-11-19T07:37:00.002-05:00

It is freakin' COLD in Charleston today and I'm kicking myself that I haven't finishing L1's mittens and sweater, nor mittens for the rest of family...we could really have used them this morning! I am, at least, wearing my two-colored cabled socks which are keeping my feet toasty warm.

My last political post - for awhile at least

2008-11-18T08:21:00.003-05:00

I was hoping to get back to knitting posts, but then I saw this:

Too funny! If you want more political humor check out http://punditkitchen.com/.

Strep Throat - Ugh

2008-11-14T08:11:00.002-05:00

I am finally recovering from Strep Throat. Started coming down sick on Sunday, went to doctor on Monday and diagnosed with Strep. You know you have something bad when a second after your doctor looks into your mouth they flee to other side of the room, wash their hands, and stay as far away from you as they can! Thankfully, no one else in the family has come down sick with it - yet. On the flip side, it did allow me to get a lot knitting done.

I finished a lace weight shawl I had been working on for awhile (ok, I'll fess up - two years most of which was spent in a bag in the closet), and started on a pair of mittens for L1, plus made a little progress on my second Sheldon turtle, and my red thread socks.

Yes We Can

2008-11-05T10:03:00.002-05:00

And Yes We Did!

Barack Obama
President Elect!

Vote!

2008-11-03T08:49:00.002-05:00

Tuesday, November 4 is election day (finally)! No matter what your political leanings are...VOTE! Voting is one of the most important responsibilities that we have as citizens.

South Carolina polls are open from 7am to 7pm.
You can check your voter registration by following this link:
http://www.scvotes.org/check_your_voter_registration

From your voter registration information page (a popup) you can read where your polling place is, plus there is a link to driving directions.

Obama
Biden
2008

Ketner for Congress

Because I think this important

2008-10-30T08:50:00.002-04:00

I am an adoptive mom AND a biological mom. I've also lost a baby to miscarriage. I love my children and am so thankful that L1's biological mother carried her to term. I am pro-life AND pro-choice. Laws like those on the ballot in Colorado and South Dakota (and laws already passed elsewhere) are dangerous and affect ALL women -- please watch this.

Please pass this video along to your friends and run it on your blog, website, or social networking profile!

My Bountiful Bohus

2008-10-30T07:44:00.002-04:00

Yeah - I finished my first sweater for myself (that fits!)!!! Check it out -

This is Bountiful Bohus from More Big Girl Knits. I knit it in Lamb's Pride Worsted on US 8 needles in forest, pumpkin, and cream. I'm super pleased with how it turned out. I did some simple modifications included 3/4 sleeves (long sleeve wool sweater would not get much wear in South Carolina) and slightly lengthening the body. It has actually been chilly enough in the mornings (when still dark out) to wear into work.

Just call me Bette

2008-10-27T07:51:00.002-04:00

Since I haven't uploaded any of my knitting pictures recently - Here is this (taken from RAOY):

Your result for Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz...

You Are a Bette!

You are a Bette -- "I must be strong"

Bettes are direct, self-reliant, self-confident, and protective.

How to Get Along with Me

* Stand up for yourself... and me.

* Be confident, strong, and direct.

* Don't gossip about me or betray my trust.

* Be vulnerable and share your feelings. See and acknowledge my tender, vulnerable side.

* Give me space to be alone.

* Acknowledge the contributions I make, but don't flatter me.

* I often speak in an assertive way. Don't automatically assume it's a personal attack.

* When I scream, curse, and stomp around, try to remember that's just the way I am.

What I Like About Being a Bette

* being independent and self-reliant

* being able to take charge and meet challenges head on

* being courageous, straightforward, and honest

* getting all the enjoyment I can out of life

* supporting, empowering, and protecting those close to me

* upholding just causes

What's Hard About Being a Bette

* overwhelming people with my bluntness; scaring them away when I don't intend to

* being restless and impatient with others' incompetence

* sticking my neck out for people and receiving no appreciation for it

* never forgetting injuries or injustices

* putting too much pressure on myself

* getting high blood pressure when people don't obey the rules or when things don't go right

Bettes as Children Often

* are independent; have an inner strength and a fighting spirit

* are sometimes loners

* seize control so they won't be controlled

* figure out others' weaknesses

* attack verbally or physically when provoked

* take charge in the family because they perceive themselves as the strongest, or grow up in difficult or abusive surroundings

Bettes as Parents

* are often loyal, caring, involved, and devoted

* are sometimes overprotective

* can be demanding, controlling, and rigid

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz at HelloQuizzy

Gluten free, egg free, and a birthday

2008-10-01T11:30:00.004-04:00

So L2 has officially turned 1 and started real daycare this week.

My mom has been living with us for about a year now taking care of L2 when I went back to work (L1 stayed in daycare). It's been really great having mom with us and a relief to know L2 was so well taken care of during those early months. However, mom is going back north until she can sell her house (which didn't sell after 9 months on the market last year). She'll will hopefully move back to Charleston sometime in the future to be close to the girls.

I really like the daycare that the girls are going to. L1 has been there since she was 16 months (now 4.5). I trust them to care for my children. That said - it has still sucked ass this week transitioning L2. Having my youngest digging her little fingers into my arms and screaming bloody murder as the teacher pulls her away is heart wrenching. Thankfully, she quickly settles down once I'm out of her sight.

The biggest issue I have, however, is with her food allergies. I'm scared to death someone is going to feed her something she can't have. I've had meetings with her teachers, the director, and assistant director, but I'm constantly worried. I'm bringing in all her snacks and lunch, but I've already had to warn the teachers not to sit her next to other children when eating in case she grabs some of the other children's food.

On a fun note - L1 has started playing soccer this fall and made her first game goal this weekend!

Socks!

2008-09-15T13:56:00.002-04:00

I've finished two, yes two, pairs of socks. I made a pair of short ankle socks on US 2 with Memories from Knit Picks (they no longer carry this yarn). I used the Ridgeline pattern from New Pathways for Sock Knitters. A nice, quick knit.

Then I dug up a pair of socks that had been put to the side for two years (!). I started these socks when Eunny Jang released the pattern, Chuck's Cabled Socks, in 2006, but put them aside after completing only one sock. That first sock, and the top part of the second sock, were knit with doublepoints and a cable needle. Way too complicated! After learning magic loop and cabling without a needle ... ta da! Very easy to knit by changing my tools.

Another note - I had known Eunny's sock patterns were for super skinny legs (hers!) so I decided to use a thicker yarn (Dale of Norway - Falk), knit on larger needles (US 5) to get a wider leg and foot. I left the stitch counts the same and knit to the lengths that fit me. They fit perfectly.

The only thing I had a problem with due to the time lag between completing socks one and two was the toe, they came out a little different.

And I got my Knit Picks order!

Must Have Sheldon

2008-09-09T11:05:00.002-04:00

This is completely cheesy BUT I must have Sheldon. Knit Picks, you are evil for creating such uber-cheesy temptation - I must make all the Sheldon outfits. I cannot stop myself. I am ordering today. I cannot decide which is cuter - pirate Sheldon or Superhero Sheldon... I love them both.

P.S. - Why does the offer of free shipping starting at $50 always suck me in? I ALWAYS end up buying more so I can get the "free" shipping. Hello, I would have spent less, overall, if I had just payed for the stupid shipping. I am so weak.

Helena is finished

2008-08-29T07:58:00.002-04:00

Hey, I actually finished something! I completed Helena in just 2 months (which is really good for me). This was a very enjoyable sweater to knit, generally easy, but with a few interesting details to hold your attention. I knit this in CotLin from Knit Picks. I was less then thrilled with the yarn when knitting (it was a little stiff), but after washing it is quite nice - softer and shows off the pattern. My gauge was way off, but that can happen when you don't bother with a gauge swatch. I knit the size 2 thinking I could get two years of wear out of it for L2.

As you can see she is swimming in it.

However, it fits L1 perfectly who is 4.5 year old! The good news is they can both wear it, L1 now and L2 later.

unhappy politics

2008-08-26T08:25:00.002-04:00

I'm a liberal. Have been my whole adult life. And I am very unhappy with the Obama-Biden ticket. It strikes me as schizophrenic. Mr. Hope-and-Change combined with Mr. Washington-Insider-Owned-by-Special-Interests? Yes, I admit I would have preferred Obama-Clinton, but Biden? Hello, he voted for the Iraq war just like Clinton, he's been in Washington WAY longer than Clinton. On what planet is Biden a good choice? There were a few governors that could have been good running mates that didn't carry that baggage (the same baggage that Obama kept slamming Clinton for during the primary). Obama did nothing for me during the primary, I always felt like I was in the high school cafeteria listening to how "lunches would be longer and the day shorter if you vote for me" when I heard his speeches. Now his choice of running mate shows he didn't pay attention to what half of the democrats wanted (Clinton), and his hope-and-change rhetoric is just that - rhetoric. You don't mean hope-and-change when you pick a Washington insider like Biden for a running mate.