Yarn Update

I talked with KnitPicks this morning and they will be sending me a new skein of damsel yarn. Hopefully it will match one of the other two skeins I already have. If not, I've decided I'll be making a scarf with the yarn instead of socks. Not what I'd originally planned to do, but a good alternative and I do like the colors of both skeins. I just wish they'd matched. I'm glad they are such an easy company to work with.

As for weather, today we are bright and sunny and already 54 degrees. It's suppose to be mid 60's today and seems like we'll easily make it. What a difference one day can make here.

And one last update on life here on the homestead. The onions are now about 4 inches tall in the salad garden. I don't see any beets yet, but I'm hoping they'll start peeking through the ground this week. The tomatoes, cauliflower, and broccoli are coming through nicely in my indoor containers. We're still waiting on the peppers, but they do take longer to germinate. Maybe this week I'll finally go out and buy the rest of my spring gardening seeds so we can move along with the gardens, which currently are too wet to work in, but it would be nice to have the seeds ready.

Have a great day.

-Myrtle

Winter doesn't think it's over yet

It's March 29th and this is what I woke up to this morning. It was raining when I went to bed and I awoke to a pretty white world. It's now all melted, but I enjoyed the beauty while it lasted.


I finished these on the last trip, but I'm not sure I ever posted about them. They were made with Regia yarn.This is what I started my road trip with this past week. I forgot how much I hate knitting plan 2x2 ribbed male socks. But I do like the final outcome, so I guess I'm glad I made them.I started this midweek and it didn't take long to finish them. They were done before I even had a chance to think about them. Maybe because I was so tired of plan 2x2 socks, that these were fun to just knit. I also worked on my mystic waters shawl while I was gone. At the time this picture was taken I was at row 231 and I'm now at row 246. Another 100 rows or less and I'll be done. :)And finally for my disappointing knitting that I did on the way home from my last business trip. I am knitting with Knit Picks Imagination Damsel, both skeins from the same dye lot, but they are definitely two different colors. I'll be talking with KnitPicks tomorrow to let them know about this situation because it made for some extremely hard airplane knitting when I knew my work wouldn't look right but I needed something to do while I was on the plane and this was the only yarn I had other than my shawl which isn't airplane knitting.

And then for my other news. I will be teaching three ladies in Southern California how to knit lace shawls. This should be a fun change. All of them have knit at some point in their past but haven't knit for years. It all started with one of them admiring my shawl and wanting me to make one for them, but I finally convinced her to knit her own. As her co-workers found out I had requests to teach two more, so we'll be starting this endeavor later this month when I travel back to Southern CA.

-Myrtle

when two colors collide

The Chrevon Scarf pattern is quite fun when looked at as a color activity. The idea is to use two different colorways of yarn and knit two rows of each in the 4 row 'feather and fan' lace pattern. (This pattern is also called 'old shale' in some references.) Very many examples of this scarf can been seen on Ravelry. I am using Kary's Chevron Scarf pattern. I added a 2 stitch garter stitch border to each side of the feather and fan pattern

I am using Imagination Merino/Alpaca sock yarn from KnitPicks. The orange colorway is "Munchkin". The green colorway is "Frog Prince". There is one green that is common to both yarns.


-Mavis

handpainted yarns day

Saturday the 21st was handpainting day with some good friends. This was to have been a pre-Christmas activity. The weather here and the closed freeway between our homes changed the plans for the holiday period.

Sarah, Eva, my daughter and I handpainted sock yarn (fingering weight) from KnitPicks. Merino/Silk Bare and Merino/Nylon Bare. We used Jacquard Dyes. I was lead on this project and we did pretty well. I can't say I recommend the level of prep I did (reading 2 books 3 months ago and 3 websites the day of) but still...


Merino/Nylon on the left and Merino/Silk on the right soaking in vinegar water getting ready for the dyeing process


Here are the results:

All of these are Merino/Silk






These are Merino/Nylon




-Mavis

Broodies?

These are two of our Guinea Hens who have decided to brood in the hen house. We tried getting them to brood in brooding boxes, but they became extremely nervous and kept knocking over their eggs, so we put them back into the hen house minus the eggs. Well they and the other 5 females laid many more eggs this week (over 40 by my best guess) and now they are brooding in the hen house. They'll leave the eggs only to eat or drink, but push their eggs under the other female until they return so they don't get too cool. It's been fun to watch. So maybe in another 24-28 days we'll have a few more guinea fowls at our place.



These are just two of the remaining 9 hens in the hen house. The other 4 are in the brooding boxes in our garage. I'm not sure the ones which have been removed are really brooding, but we'll see. At least one seems to stay on her eggs all the time. The other 3 are on and off more than I'd like, but I really don't know what I'm doing, so maybe it's normal. However, the ones in the hen house are enjoying a little more space and seem to be sitting in the laying boxes more than normal, so maybe one of them will try to brood as well without the constant interruptions of the other hens.

Sorry for the color of these pictures, but the red from the heat lamp (only source of light near the broodies) seems to really change the color of the photos.



These are the socks I finished up last week while traveling.


These are all the key chain blocker socks I've made so far. The pair on the right are the ones I made on the plane as I headed back to MO from KY on my last trip.



And these are the socks I'm now working on. I started them on the hour drive home from the airport and then continued knitting on them yesterday as I worked with the boys on their homeschooling.

I'll be off for Southern CA in the morning for 6 days. I'm still not sure what I'm taking for knitting, but ... I'm sure something will ultimately get packed. I was going to plant seeds outside today for the salad garden, but we had rain last night that stopped those plans. So I guess it will be another week before anything more gets into the garden.

Have a great day.

-Myrtle

Quick Update

Hi All! I just thought that I would give a quick update on my life and my knitting.

This past week I spent at a client site in south eastern KY. It was suppose to be a 3 day site visit to do hands on training with the financial aid department. However, it turned out to be more work than I was expecting since the software had not been completely set up. Hence, I'm leaving in an hour for the airport to head back for another 3 days.

Last week I worked on socks during my down time, which wasn't much since I was also working after hours to prepare for my next day on site for my client. But I finished them as I drove home from the airport on Friday night. They are made from Paca Ped's Singin' the Blues yarn with a sock pattern I design knit on a size 0 circular needle doing two at a time. The top has a picot edge, while the main portion has an 8 stitch repeating lace pattern over 12 rows.

Then Friday evening I started a new pair using the same lace pattern but having a 2x2 rib for the first 1.5 inches instead of my picot edging. These are knit using Regia yarn color 5033. I'm working on the heel flap now, but thought I'd also include a picture of those.



For knitting I'm taking my shawl again along with some fiber to work on a drop spindle. I'm not sure what I want to do. I also have enough yarn for another pair of socks just in case I just want to knit socks.

We now have 4 chickens set up to brood eggs. Two chickens will be brooding chicken eggs, while the other two will be brooding guinea fowl eggs. I tried the guinea fowl in the boxes, but they tend to be high strung birds and weren't coping with limited freedom very well, so they were replaced with 2 Rhode Island Red hens. I'm not sure how successful we'll be, but we figured it would be fun to try. We'll know if we are successful in about one month. If this doesn't work we are considering getting an incubator or purchasing more chicks or a combination of both. I'd really like to raise two or three turkeys, plus we are thinking about adding a little more variety to our current flock so chicks would be the way to go.

I wasn't able to get any more planting done, but I should be home Thursday afternoon. I'll work on planting starter plants and spring veggies before I leave next Sunday for California.

Have a great several days.

-Myrtle

First Planting of the Season

We just finished planting our first part of the garden. DS2, DS3, DS4, and I planted 320 onion sets. 160 yellow and 160 red. Then we put the 4' high chicken wire around the salad garden (so named last year by a friend because it's were we grew our salad fixings). Hopefully this fencing will slow down the rabbits, squirrels, chickens, and guinea fowl.

When I come home in 4 days my plans are to start our indoor seedlings (tomatoes, peppers, and such). I'd also like to purchase potato sets and plant those as well. We didn't do well with potatoes last year, but I'm hoping by placing them closer to the house where I can water them in late summer will help.

Our salsa garden will be doubling in size this year to accommodate more varieties of plants and maybe even get beans and such in. Last year it was mainly tomatoes and various types of bell and hot peppers. This year we want cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, potatoes, and beans as well.

Major goals for me, since I will now be traveling more for my higher education job. And today was my last day of working for the evil "W" empire. Ok, I didn't actually work because my foot hurts too much and I couldn't handle the idea of standing on it for 5 hours. This morning I stepped on an earring (which I've never seen before) and punctured the ball of my foot. Needless to say I wasn't happy about it, but am extremely curious where this earring came from.

And on a happy note we now can finally park both of our cars in our attached garage. Yes, we have emptied it of the boxes which were not yet unpacked from our move and the end of unpacking boxes actually can finally be seen.

-Myrtle

First Key Chain Sock

I absolutely am in love. Yes, with my key chain sock blocker and the fun of knitting tiny socks. They are so tiny that even our baby doll, Edgar, can't fit them. But they are adorable and I LOVE them.

This particular sock is knit from the yarn which Sheri at the Loopy Ewe sent me as part of the Loopy Red Sock Kit. However, the pattern is one I created specially for this sock blocker. It took two attempts before I finally got the sizing right. I think I am hooked on creating new sock patterns. This is my second new sock pattern this month and I'm enjoying the art of creation.

-Myrtle

Rainbow Sherbet Socks

I stayed up and finished by Rainbow Sherbet socks last night. I wanted them off the needles so I can knit the key ring sock blocker socks. The two major modifications I made to these socks are the toe and heel design. I switched to a heel flap design for the heel and then decided to use the pattern all the way down the heel. I've never done this before except when doing a ribbed heel. Then I also added the pattern all the way down the toe so there was no distinct line where the toe starts. In this case I decreased the top of the toe using the pattern and when it became a single stitch in the pattern descreased those as well with a k2tog. I like the way they turned out even if I'm not a rainbow sherbet colorway fan. Pastels just aren't the colors I enjoy wearing.

I also decided to do a side by side comparison of what the socks look like on a sock blocker compared to having the picture taken like I normally do. Wow! I knew I wasn't seeing the pattern well before, but I didn't realize it was so dramatically different.

Off to knit a cute sock. And I don't even have to worry about single sock syndrome, since I'll only need one. :)

-Myrtle

My newest yarn arrival

My newest package from the Loopy Ewe is pictured below.



I received my shipment third shipment from the Loopy Ewe today and I love it. I ordered enough yarn for three pairs of socks, plus the large sock blocker so the photos of my socks look nicer. I'm tired of the patterns not showing up in the photos because they aren't stretched correctly, so I figure this will help. Plus this sock blocker is nice enough that I can also use it to display a sock if I want as a decoration.

(NOTE: The sock yarn will come in handier than I thought when I ordered it, since I found out today that I will be traveling three out of four weeks this month. If last month is anything to judge sock knitting from I'll need yarn for two pairs of socks each week I'm gone. I'm really planning a pair of socks, plus some shawl knitting each week, but who knows what I'll be inspired by.)

I bought myself a fun present as well. I wanted the key chain sock blocker, so that is what I purchased. However, Sheri at the Loopy Ewe surprised me with an extra special gift. She included the Loopy Red Sock Kit in my order along with two samples of sock yarn. I can't wait to get my current socks off the needles to knit up the new one which is in a variegated red colorway to put on my new key chain.

I think the key chain will be a fun way to create seasonal socks to have with me on my computer case as I travel to decorate. I guess that means I need to find some left over green sock yarn to knit a St. Patrick's day sock.



I put my last two pairs of socks I knit on the sock blocker and photographed them. I like the way they came out and you can definitely see more patterning using the blocker. The first pair is from a pattern I found called wavy lace using the Opal Winter sock yarn.



The second pair of socks is knit from Brooklyn Handspun and were inspired by a pattern Wendy Knits created called waterfall. However, I don't like to knit toe up socks, so I started modifying the pattern to suit my needs. In the process I actually created a new pattern because I forgot that yarn overs would also need to be changed in order to get the lace the way she'd done it. But I like my lacy texture as it came out, so I finished the socks.

I need to get back to knitting on my Sherbet Rainbow Socks which are being made from a highly modified pattern out of last years Rockin' Sock Club using the goody goody colorway that really looks more like multicolored sherbet to me. I was hoping to finish them today as I worked around the house, but that has not happened yet. I may have knit 10 rows total today.

-Myrtle

Version 3.7a improved yarn club

Mavis,

I have the solution for you. You need 12 fun gift bags. In 6 of them put pattern and yarn for new projects. In 6 put UFOs with their associated patterns. Then you pull one new bag each time you finish a project not knowing if you'll be getting a UFO or a new project. Allow your children to put the projects in the bags so you won't even know which project is going where. Or if you are feeling really energetic move the quantity to 18 bags with 9 of each. Or maybe you'd want 6 socks, 6 sweaters, and 6 scarfs and you can have some UFO and some not depending on what's in the pile to be done.

Then only allow yourself two open projects at any one time. That way as you finish one you can grab another. That way if you get said 6' son's sweater in July you can just do other projects until Sept/Oct when it starts to get a little cooler and you can handle said project's weight on your lap.

I've thought about doing this, but when I realized I didn't have much sock yarn in my stash and I only have two projects on my needles (current socks and lacy shawl that I can only work on in non-interruptibility situations); I realized this wouldn't work. So my solution to wanting to be in a sock club is telling myself I can order new yarn whenever I complete two pairs of socks.

Ok, so should I confess to everyone that I ordered yarn today because I did finish two pairs of socks this past week and I really wanted to try knitting socks in a heavier weight yarn (sports) versus using two strands of yarn to achieve a heavier sock. I also ordered a sock blocker to see what they are like and if they would make the sock looker nicer for photographing so it showcases the design better.

And for those thinking about their yarn stashes I really like Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's thoughts on this from her book "Casts Off: The Yarn Harlot's Guide to the Land of Knitting", which I listened to on audio while traveling on my last trip. She basically said a stash is a personal choice and that only you can tell when your stash is too large. If you stash overwhelms you and you can't chose what to knit because there is way to many possibilities, that your stash is too large.

-Myrtle

Update on Bush Fire Appeal

Thank you one and all!

Jacqueline of the Serendipity blog reports on her blog $21,811 was raised for the Australian Red Cross through her Knitters Helping Victorians appeal.

Keep an eye on your email this week if you were able to donate. You might be the recipient of one of the generous prizes donated to the fund raising effort.
-Mavis

Version 3.7 of the blank of the month club

So here's the deal. I was drolling over the different yarn/sock/lace/fiber clubs and thinking of all the cool knitting involved when reality hit. Thud! Dang it hurt. I haven't kept up with what I do have and I allowed myself to accumulate much more stash in 2008 then I will be using in 2009. Rats! not possible to justify membership in any fiber related club. But wait... I saw a comment on one blog of a 'personal sock of the month club'. Then I heard about it on several podcasts.

The basic premise is to set up a sock club using your own stash of yarns and patterns. I've seen people wrap the two together in identical tissue paper packages, paper bags, what have you. The idea is to set everything up at once and then randomly grab a project to work on each month. One creative variation I heard was a person who had only 6 paper bags the day she set up her personal club so put two projects worth of supplies in each bag. She would open the bag choose one of the two and reseal the bag and toss it back into the mix.

I continued contemplating. I like to have more than socks on the needles at anyone time. I could create my own variation. dah dah The project of the month or quarter club. Not just sock projects in the bag, how about a lace project, or a scarf or a whatever.

Then I got extremely wild and crazy --- A UFO of the month club. (A UFO is an unfinished object.) Now this is one I don't even have to do too much prep for. Most of my UFOs are already in bags. Granted often transparent Ziploc bags so not too much of the surprise value. I bet I could remedy this - I'm creative, right?

Yuck, I don't want to spend the whole year only finishing things. So to really mix it up I could have the UFO/new project of the quarter club. Ah ha! I could package both a new project and an UFO together in opaque packaging. The club guideline would be that a new package could not be opened until both projects of the previously selected package were completed.

My kids would love to have their sweaters and socks finished this year. Just my luck I'll be pulling out the 6 foot tall son's sweater in July/August.

-Mavis

Pruning the Roses and Other Spring Activities

Yesterday morning J and I took a walk with the dogs. We walked a little more than 4 miles along the city streets and the bike path in light jackets. At noon, as I sat in the family room looking out at the rose bushes, I realized that they were setting new growth and that I had missed the optimal time for pruning them (January! UGH!!!). After 10 minutes outside, I was back indoors for a heavy jacket, hat and ski gloves. The temperatures had dropped to the 40's and the wind had picked up. (Okay the ski gloves were really an attempt at protecting my hands from the rose thorns.) This morning, we had a dusting of snow on the ground and they are predicting 4-7 inches this evening. Welcome to Spring in Virginia!

So what are my other spring activities? First,I am in training for the Avon Breast Cancer Walk on the first weekend of May, and I have finally realized that training means getting out the door inspite of everything else I need to do. I am determined to complete the full walk (and stay off the support van). I have attached the link in case you want to help me out, or check out my fund raising progress, www.avonwalk.org/goto/sonja_walk.

Another Spring Activity for me has been preparing for an adult Sunday forum class on Forgiveness using the video The Power of Forgiveness by Journey Films. I recommend the video to everyone. It is really well put together and is a very thought provoking investigation of the various aspects of what it means to forgive and to be forgiven. So what have I learned about my journey in forgiveness? I have little difficulties forgiving other people for things that have happened to me in the past. Mavis and Myrtle, you and all of the rest of the family can assume I am holding nothing against you (not that I can think of anything from our childhoods that would be deserving of a long term grudge). What is much harder for me to deal with are my own faults. I working on getting beyond this, but I am not there yet...

My other spring activities are much more mundane. Family stuff, work stuff and trying to read more books, which is what I am off to do right now.

- Maude