Miscellany

I am so glad this weekend is over. It was exciting and busy, but went entirely too fast, with not enough down time. So now, its "I can't wait for Friday to be here..." Although, I have cleared my schedule for most of this week, so I should have plenty of time to rest and relax in the evenings.

Before I get onto the knitting and fiberish content...Sunday was awesome!! There are not enough adjectives to tell you just how well the Easter presentation went! The church was packed (Thank you, Lord!) and the performance went off without a hitch. Here is a pic of the final scene:


It was the full Easter story, including Roman guards and Crucifiction scene. They taped both performances (Friday and Sunday) and will cut and paste and edit to create a nice DVD, which the choir will get to see at a party in a couple of weeks. I can't wait. From the comments and compliments it was truly awesome.

Now on to fibery things...

I dyed some more Saturday - straight BFL roving this time. It didn't felt or full at all, for which I am very please about. It was still very easy to spin up, as you can see in the second pic. (Nice sock yarn!) Very spring-like colors - very nice for this weekend. The orange I dyed by pouring in orange and yellow into the same pot and not mixing. I like the shadings that occured. Once I spin this up I'll see how it goes - maybe a hat or scarf.



Continueing my fascination with all shades of green - I started (yet) another (rolling of the eyes) project. Another shawl out of "Folk Shawls":

I know it's kinda dark - on my computer at home the colors are rich and fabulous. This is the Fir Cone Square, in Harrisville Shetland, color Emerald. This green is so rich and deep, in the sunlight there are blue flecks. I love how it knits up, pretty quick. The inch or so that you see there was done just yesterday evening!

And of course it wouldn't be a post with out gratuitous feline pictures:

While Kitty played with the camera strap...

Lexy snoozed at the top of the kitty condo!

Stash Enhancment (or S.E.X.)

As you can see - I've been shopping!! Trekking XXL, which I have heard soo much about lately. 1 ball will make a pair of socks - 1 in reds, and the other pair in grays and blues. It feels pretty soft, but is superwash with nylon, so hardwearing! I got all this at the Yarn and Fibre Co (thanks to Claudia lauding them on her blog.) And they are fast - I ordered this last Friday and got it Tuesday! The Cherry Tree Hill skein on the right is their merino sock yarn in color "Northern Lights." All sorts of colors from dark purple to green to light pink. Can't wait to knit this into another pair of socks.

Now for the best part. The dark purple hank at the bottom is as you can probably tell - "Helens Lace" form Lorna's Laces. 50/50 Merino and Silk - I can't wait to knit this up into a lacey shawl. There is even a free shawl pattern on the back of the label.

Kitty was feeling quite frisky the other night and had fun while I was making the bed! :-)


Happy Easter, Passover, etc - "He is Risen, He is Risen indeed!!" Amen and Amen!

Saturday Dye Day

(Warning - Picture Heavy Post Ahead!) ;-)

Well, I certainly had fun on Saturday! I tried my hand (for the first time - I might add) at dyeing. I had read in the spring issue of Knitty about dyeing with food coloring and somewhere else about dyeing with KoolAid. So I grabbed some cream wool from Michaels, along with some merino lace weight I have from KnitPicks, and a sample of unspun BFL (for non-spinners - Blue-Faced Leicester), and I got dyeing!

The red is cherry KoolAid and the purple is grape. When they were first done, and I had rinsed and hung to dry, I was kinda dissapointed with the unevenness of the color, but the I realized it looked kettle-dyed. Cool! :-)

These two pircture are kind of before and after shots. The roving on the top was grape Koolaid, and before dyeing I had let it soak in vinegar water. So it pulled up the blues and reds at different rates of the purple dye, thus the variations. It also fulled a little, but after it was dry I was able to spin it up without too much trouble. I navajo plyed it into the skein you see on the bottom.

Now for the piece de resistance:
I just love these colors. Rainbow-dyed with easter egg colors (food coloring). I wish the red were not so pink, but I really like the intensity of the green, orange, and yellow.

This is the merino lace weight from Knitpicks. I dip-dyed it in the purple from the easter egg kits. I tripled the dye so the intesity would be high. The yarn was also soaked in vinegar water, so there is more variation in the blues and reds. The process is this: I dunked the yarn almost all the way in then pulled it out a little, let is sit for about 10 mins, then pulled another little bit out, let it sit for 20 mins, and so on and so forth. So as you can see it gradually darkens the longer that part of the skein was in the dye bath.

Needless to say - I had a lot of fun. Fortunately, not a whole big mess to clean up, and no spills! I might not be so lucky next time with cats running around!

Speaking of which, Kitty and Lexy relaxing (as usual):

On a completely different note:

I know its kind of dark, but this is the set for the Easter performance at Sierra Bible. Very impressive! On the left is the tomb with a "rock" to roll in front at the appropriate time. In the middle (the hump with the cross atop it) is the "cave" where we the choir are going to be crammed into. And on the far right is the Jerusalem"wall". It is going to be an amazing, emotional performance. I don't expect that there will be a dry eye in the congregation near the end. With the choir stuck in the batcave, we will miss all the good stuff, but that is probably to the good, so we can actually get through the performance. Pray for many people to have a seed planted this Easter. God is so good!!

More Shetland Project

Well, I've been busy - and it is going so quickly! I am already half way through the light brown.

2 huge skeins already. Finished 'em up last night while watching Stargate SG1 Season 10 cach up. Shown above blocking - still somewhat damp.

Showing here - the 2 skeins with one of the grey - just see the colors. And there are two more!

Happy spininng!

Do the Twi-i-ist!

Its kind of dark, and not as focused as I could have hoped - but can you see the loops and over-twists all over the place? This is some leftover gray shetland I was navajo plying and having a hard time keeping the spin the same. I was also watching TV, so my focus was split. (Note to self - don't so that!) :-) Also - this is AFTER blocking.

This is a lot better - still navajo plied, but closer in loft to the 3-ply I had done before. I need to practice this technique some more to get it all even and uniform across the board. If I can do that, then I won't need to ply the old fashioned way anymore. Well... hm, I still like plying the other way, though. But check this out...

Those two pictures above

...are from the SAME skein!! Wow, my focus must have really been off in the beginning part of doing this! :-/ I didn't know you could do that. I must have tuned out the TV later, to be able to have a much softer yarn with much, much less twist. And it is split pretty close to 50/50. Yeah, I'm not sure I'll be able to use this skein. Maybe part of it, but I'm not going to count on it!

Winter, Spring...then Winter Again

What is up with the weather? The weekend was absolutely beautiful - with clear blue sky, a light breeze, and temps almost to 80. Trees, grass, and plants are starting to bud and green. And flowers are starting to bloom. Then today...its cold and cloudy again. Actually, it's good, as there is rain on the way, and we definitely need it. I was looking for a picture to show all the green, all the different shades of green - I guess no one took pictures yesterday of the valley.

I was driving south and east on S. McCarran yesterday afternoon, and coming over the crest of the hill past Caughlin Pkwy, the whole valley was in view for a moment, and it was stunning. Instead of the gray fogginess of bare branchs, there is now a faint lime green tint - quite cheering actually. And there are so many shades of green - the dark alpine green of the evergreens, the verte of the bushes, gray green of sagebrush, kelly green of growing grass, and the bright, lime green of the willow. The golf courses were certainly busy this weekend.

In spinning and knitting news - one nearly completed project. I am almost done with the green sweater I've been knitting on for an older client. Just have one more arm to go. Still working of 2 socks at one time. Oh, and I finally had time to block the Icelandic Triangle Shawl. Picture to come.

I finished spinning up the grey shetland, and now I'm onto the light brown. Still spins just as easily. Last night alone I got one bobbin filled and part of another started. I should finish this up fairly quickly.

Been a while...

I just realized yesterday that is has been over 2 weeks since I posted last. Sorry about that - but it has been a very busy two weeks. My back has been steadily getting better, thanks to my wonderful chiropractor and a couple of good massages. It kind of hurts today, but I think that is from yesterday - we had an extra choir practice at church in the afternoon.

Fortunately it isn't work that is stressful or super busy anymore - its everyhting else. :-) Things just seem to snowball, and you find yourself at the end of the week just looking forward to a couple of hours to sleep in on Saturday. Not only is it the usual knitting lessons and stuff like that, but the choir at church is preparing and rehearsing for the Easter cantata. It is a fabulous piece called "He's Alive" by Gary Rhodes and Clair Clonniger. It was first published quite a while ago - so not a new piece. But the orchestration and songs are quite wonderful. I have been busy not only with extra rehearsals for that, but up until yesterday I was getting ready for an audition for one of the solos (I don't expect I got it as there were several ladies with much nicer auditions), and I have also had practice early Wed. evenings for worship team - I am playing my oboe every Sunday morning in the 1st service along with Andrew (plays sax), Becky (trump) and Erin (violin.) It is a lot of fun, and I am praising God with the talent he gave me.

This last weekend was busy - but good. My mom and I had a great time together on Saturday, just hanging out - shopping and having lunch. Andrew and Dad went to a conference through church for most of the day. Then I had a knitting lesson, and by the time I finished up with that - it was 5pm already and Mom, Dad, and Andrew were coming over this way for dinner. So I got both lunch and dinner on Saturday! But it was really nice being able to see Dad, too.

On the fiber front - not much going on. I am trying to finish up a commissioned sweater, and am on the sleeves. So almost there. Of course, she's not going to be able to wear it until the fall! Can you believe the weather? Here in Reno it has topped 78F!! So sunny and clear. I guess we broke a record today - the last time it was this warm in March was in 1888.

Anyway, I haven't done much more spinning, but I am almost through the grey shetland I was working on. I still have two single socks on the needles along with a host of UFO's. :-\

On a different note:
Stargate Atlantis, Season 2!!! Wooo Hoooo!!! :-)

I *heart* John Shephard!!