Kiss My Knits!

http://monkeemaker.blogspot.com/ is running a contest. Comment on her blog, possibly win a monkey backpack. I LOVE this monkey. It has a very Aardman-esque quality to it. The original Sirdar pattern has its charm, but the creator gave it some extra personality somehow. I can’t put my finger on it, but it’s a singularly British monkey. The signup closes soon, so head on over and poke around. Leave a comment, and maybe get lucky!

Behold! Grapey goodness!

I spun up the last remaining super-soft cormo/silk batt (pictured left) that I had in order to take a break from the neverending itchy red wool that I had been spinning. Last time I spun this, it came out very loose (pictured right) because I was underspinning it for my desired result. This was an early attempt at spinning. I’m still not an advanced spinner, but it’s been gratifying to see how much better, in my opinion, this one looks compared to that one.


I posted after that first attempt, and got a lot of good suggestions. This time, I loosened up the tension on my wheel and treadled like a one-legged duck as I tried to spin tighter. I actually wound up making the second bobbin of singles more spun than the first bobbin, and I think it shows, but I’m okay with that. I two-plied it, and Navajo-plied the last little bit from the bobbin that ran out last. The Navajo-plied bits are hugely more twisted than the two-ply, even though I slowed down my treadling for that section. Clearly I’m letting it take up more slowly with the Navajo plying as I try to get it right. I’ll have to work on that.

When setting the twist, I took a page from ‘s “rough set” book and soaked it in very warm water for about an hour, then in cool for a bit. Then I spun it around in my bathtub, then beat the tar out of it against the tile walls. Then I hung it unweighted to dry. It hung very straight. Pictured: a closeup of the plies. This still isn’t as tight or even as I’d like it to be, but it’s miles better than the last time I tried this fiber a few months ago. I don’t spin as often as I’d like, so I consider this good progress. I’m pleased.

The finished skein has 76 yards, enough to actually make something, but I have no idea what. I’m open to suggestion as to what to knit!

Many thanks to everyone in the community for all their suggestions, they’ve really helped make me a better spinner.

(crossposted to my own journal and )

So there’s a meme going around LJ where you link to your 42nd post ever and it supposedly is predictive of how your life will be. Apparently my life is about knitted hats (correct) and multicolored jeweltone boobs (not so far).

One out of two aint’ bad.

My daughter asked for a doll to be a friend to the other doll I made her and selected a specific shade of yellow for her hair. Unfortunately, nobody local has it. So I’m asking if you have a single skein of Crystal Palace cotton chenille in colorway 1317 which is a pretty straightforward yellow.

I have many skeins of cotton chenille in colorways 6045 and 8166 (purple and red, respectively) and will happily trade multiple skeins of my own for your single skein. Heck, if you’ve got a skein of this and can get it in the mail very quickly, I’ll dig into my Lamb’s Pride, Noro, Lorna’s Laces, Creatively Dyed (some pics here and here), whatever I’ve got, whether it’s a lopsided monetary value trade or not. Just let me know what you want, chances are I’ve got it.

Won’t you please help stamp out doll baldness and make a little girl happy?

(Crossposted to my .)

I spun and plied the last remaining cormo/silk batt that I had. It turned out so well-balanced that I took pics before remembering that I needed to wash it and set the twist properly. So the really finished pics and details will have to wait until the hank finishes drying.

My wonderful Italian husband who cooks like a dream made a fabulous eggplant rolatini Sunday evening. He used an enormous eggplant from our garden and made the sauce and ricotta cheese from scratch. No, really, he made the cheese. Like from a gallon of milk, chopped spinach, garlic, and something that I can only describe as “Pure Essence of Flavor” a la Bender from Futurama.

Pictured eggplant is actually storebought and slightly smaller than the garden one. We bought an extra in case we didn’t have enough. We did.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: Ladies and gay guys, marry a man who can cook!

Ran out of yellow yarn after packing up several kits this morning. This afternoon, a cone of yellow arrived! Yay! It’s a one-pounder, which should get me through until my monstrous four-pounders arrive. Hat orders are flat, but kit orders are up, so I’m actually going through the yarn a little faster than usual, since I tend to send more than is strictly required. I’m making a yarn counter for myself that should be more accurate than my homemade PVC niddy-noddy (pictured left), which will help me keep costs down – especially important since postage rates went up. I’ll still send more than is strictly required, but maybe not, like, two hats worth of orange in a single kit. Heh.

Am now off to bed, and already looking forward to blueberry cornmeal muffins and coffee in the morning. My daughter actually asked for a muffin after I made them today, and since she never wants any new foods, I’ll take that as a major victory. Yay for cool days that inspire one to bake!

Question: pics opening in new window. Good, bad, or indifferent?

Cribbed from

37%
Well, that ain’t good. Apparently my desire to try to locate my relatives would most likely doom me. Oh well.

Drove up to Greensboro yesterday to pick up some more yellow yarn, just to get through the crunch. Also snagged some spinning fiber, 70% cormo and 30% silk. There’s more VM (vegetative matter) in it than I’d like, but I do like that it’s undyed. I’d like to take a shot at coloring it. I’ve recently spun up all the cormo/silk blend that I got from eBay, and will be plying it very soon. The store had Buffalo Gold buffalo fiber for spinning, but at $45 for one ounce, I think I can soldier on without it.

Many thanks to for the cool T-shirt for Emily. That exclamation point is the only thing keeping her from looking like a mime today. I’m trying to branch out my html skills, so the pic to the right has a bit of code that should make the larger picture open in a separate window. Hopefully it will work!

Last night, the local mall had its Independence Day fireworks early. We were able to see them from our driveway. I stood on the bumper of my car and steadied myself with a hand on my husband’s shoulder. We got a few mosquito bites (my husband got more than a few) but I felt it was worth it. I won’t speak for my husband.

Emily’s doll is mostly knitted. Only part of an arm remains. Today Emily dug out my bag of polyfiberfill stuffing and stuffed the two legs and arm. She’s very anxious for this thing to be done. I’ll try to finish the arm and sew it up some tonight.

Hope you’re all staying cool – assuming it’s hot where you are!

I’m a little too tired, busy, and tired to make a proper post. However, here’s the alpaca rose, before and after felting. The leaf didn’t felt down nearly as much as it did last time I made one. Maybe I cast on fewer stitches last time. Hm. I need to stitch the rose to the leaf more firmly, and attach a pin back.


Emily is really putting the screws to me, sibling-wise. For the last two days, it’s been nearly constant “I want a baby sister.” Then she conceded that a baby brother was okay. I’ve been telling her that it’s just not going to happen, so she got clever and said I could adopt one. She found a set of magnetic kid poetry words that we’d been hiding to dole out later. Note subliminal message. Nice try, kid.

I think she’s just wanting someone to play with. Her camp this week only lasted four days, and was very chaotic and noisy, so it wasn’t really a good way to make friends (not really her strong suit anyway). I’m going to call the mom of one of the other girl scouts and see if we can go get ice cream together or something. I also want to clean the house more so I’m more comfortable having people over. Not that I know whom we’d have over.

Just tired. And a little down. And hungry. Mostly tired. But there’s an Office marathon tonight, so we’ll watch that and maybe order take-out that we really shouldn’t, try to get to bed at a reasonable hour, and then it’ll all be better.

Emily’s going to Vacation Bible school at a very liberal Baptist church (liberal is good) this week, thanks to my mom’s gracious sponsorship. I asked Emily today if she heard any stories.

Emily: “Yes! I heard… ‘Baby Jesus 2: Search for the Wise Men.”

Wow. Let me tell you, it was quite the story. Apparently Mary and Joseph had to find the wise men. Then Mary and Joseph built the wise men houses out of straw, sticks, and bricks. Then the houses broke, so they had to live in the “manger scene” with Mary and Joseph (I imagine this part of the story as a wacky sitcom). Then the wise men took the angel to a playground. It reminds me of when she told us Noah sailed on the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria, but two of them sank.

I knew Mom’s church was liberal, but c’mon. (I kid, Mom!) Good imagination on this kid.

Here’s an artist’s interpretation of Emily’s new doll, who has apparently been demoted from Elizabeth’s sister to her friend. She’s also turned from redhead to blonde. Emily told me that she wants to take the doll to the beach, so now I’m on deadline. The two pieces of the head are done, and I’m making a leg. Dr. Frankenstein’s got nothin’ on me!

Today I’m calling around to various nearby cities to see who’s got more of my yellow. I’m perilously low (that’s a very old pic), and the order I placed to the mill won’t be ready for another couple of weeks. I could have made it if I hadn’t made the extra charity hats, but that was my call, and I’m glad I did it. It makes me happy to think of them out there, and it did seem to raise a fair amount for Equality Now. So I’ll be sweating a little today while I try to get my mitts on more yarn, but it’ll all work out. It always does!

I’m part of sock_kit_swap, a group of LJ users who were, as the name implies, swapping kits for knitting socks. Packages are supposed to go out in the month of June. Well, today, I got a package from Canada.

Eeeeee! My kit arrived! Pics and details under cut!

Orders are up a little for Jayne hats, including one from a person who just missed winning a bidding war for the hat at the St. Louis screening. It’s not suprising that orders are up. However, if things follow the same pattern as last year, then orders will pick up more in about a week. What happens is that someone is dragged to the movie by an overenthusiastic friend, falls in love with it, watches the series, then wants a hat. A week or two is just about enough time for all that to happen.

Tanya Morris, our event coordinator, reports that we sold 194 of 200 tickets, and that our screening raised $2600 for Equality Now. Last year we raised $479, so that’s quite a jump. Go us!

The cards, by the way, were well received everywhere that I’ve heard so far. I haven’t heard from all the screenings yet, but I got a lot of compliments at the Charlotte screening, and Raleigh and another screening – I want to say Denver? – also wrote to say that the cards rocked. Good. Hopefully people will want to keep them.

I’ve got a non-Jayne project going for a client. A felted purple rose like this one, but without the bee. It’s almost dry. It turned out well, I think, so we’ll see if she likes it. If not, eh, someone else will want it. I’ll post pics once I’ve got it nicely formed and attached to its pin backing.

That purple purse from yesterday looked like it was the right size for Elizabeth, the doll that I knitted for Emily, so I slung it over her shoulder. This renewed Emily’s interest in Elizabeth. The two of them had a sleepover party yesterday. I was very pleased to see her playing with the doll, since I spent so much time and effort on it. Then:

Her: “You need to knit another doll.”
Me: “Another doll?”
Her: “To be a sister to Elizabeth.”
Me: “… um… well, would she be bigger or smaller or the same size?”
Her: “The same size.”
Me: “Would she look the same?”
Her: “She would have red hair. And white pants, and a blue shirt. I’ll think of her name after you make her.”

So apparently a very patriotic sister to Elizabeth is now on the knitting list. I should have just hidden the purple purse. Oy.

Emily’s off at a morning camp, so I’m off to get a few things done before she comes home.