Sold

I wrote an article on balance in spinning (the fiber kind) about a year ago and sent it to a couple of places. I got no responses, and that was pretty much that, because as you might imagine the audience for articles on spinning is fairly confined. However! I got an e-mail today saying that one of the places is interested in it for publication in the spring. I was quite pleased with the article and its combination of fiber geekiness and physics geekiness, and I'm excited it found a home.

How to not to do

I am totally, totally, totally uninterested in writing. This includes the article that I need to get done by Tuesday so that I can send it to the interviewee as promised (I already know that was a bad move, but I promised) and finish it and turn it in after Thanksgiving.

I have finished all the pieces for this baby sweater I'm knitting for my friend C. I designed it, and I'm pleased it's turned out well so far. Except I started matching pieces up and discovered that one of the sleeves is slightly but noticeably yellower than the rest of the sweater. I was pretty sure I got all the same dye lot, but apparently I was wrong--or deceived.

I have done about a third, maybe two-fifths, of the quilting for James's quilt. This quilt totally rocks. I'm still considering keeping it and making him a lesser one. (Actually I'm not, but it amuses me to say that. And I'm very, very pleased with how it's turned out. I can already see where I should have improved things, but that's all right.)

I have discovered I don't really like spinning silk because its staple is so long. I have some silk-camel that I'm planning to make into some decadent handwarmers for me and the spinning isn't bad, but it's not as fun as pure wool is, or even the Shetland/angora mix I was working with previously.

I have that historical sewing seminar tomorrow from noon to 5. I'd completely forgotten about it when drawing up my plans for the weekend. So I've got writing and quilting and all my garden clean-up and canning apple pie filling scheduled. This is unfortunate.

At present I'm planning on doing garden clean-up as soon as I get up in the morning, since I can't wait until after I get home because it'll be dark; and working on the article and quilting afterward, and maybe putting off the canning, depending. The quilting has to be done by the end of Monday at least so I can use Tuesday for attaching the binding, which I can then finish on the plane and at Mom and Dad's house and leave the quilt there--though first I've got to check what airline we're flying and whether it would be cheaper to mail it, depending on how much we're packing. Fiction writing doesn't technically have to be done; article writing does. Sleep does. Off I go to do it.

Food and fiber

Blech. I have a stomachache, maybe from dinner, maybe from heat, maybe from both. Our friends came down today to see the zoo with their son, and so we walked around for three hours in the heat and humidity without enough to eat (at least on Eric's and my part). Upon arriving home, we flopped down in the air conditioning for a while and drank lemonade. Then we had...let's see. Carrots and hummus, homemade pickles, Indiana melon, onion-dill bread (except for possibly switching to AP flour instead of bread flour, I think I've hit on the recipe we want!), grilled zucchini, corn on the cob, and burgers (veggie for me). We'd thought about serving ice cream after but we were so stuffed we didn't even consider it. It was an excellent repast and a good, if tiring day, but I seem to be paying for it now.

Before the zoo, Carol and I went to the local yarn shop, which is closing and selling everything for 50% off (except books, which are 40% off). She got a plethora of sock yarn; I got a little baby yarn, some fun buttons, and enough yarn to make a baby sweater for my friend who's newly pregnant. I'm saving the big purchasing for the Michigan Fiber Festival, which she and I are going to in August. (There was a contest at work to write the department's new mission statement, with a $100 prize, and I've received intimations I may have won it. If so, that's going to be my fun money, since Eric doesn't get his first paycheck until September and my extras are going to be going mainly to my brother for his medical bills.)

I'm also going to be demonstrating as a fiber artist and selling handmade works at Canal Days at the mill in September, but that's not until after the fiber festival. I'm considering asking Michelle if she wants to make things to sell, or even come along and help demonstrate (because that would maximize her chances of selling things--who wouldn't buy handmade yarn or bracelets or felted pins from a cute blond ten-year-old?). I feel kind of mercenary for this, but it'll be fun. And I'm also planning to put up a board with different kinds of fiber on it for kids (and adults) to see and touch, so I'm not being totally selfish here.

Tomorrow I've got Shoelace to work on and a nonfiction query to send out, plus working on the Summer Sunrise quilt back. And sleeping late. Definitely sleeping late.

The pictures

My beloved handwarmers:


My beloved's hat yarn:


When I finished that one skein I told him, "I made you yarn!" and then, "Well, not really. I guess I made me yarn. Which I'll use to make you a hat. You don't really want yarn." The color isn't true...the earlier pictures were more accurate. It's lovely and soft and that skein is about 40 yards, which means about 120 total, and since it's fatter and bouncier than the sample I think that will be enough for a hat, even for Eric's enormous head. (He needs volume to store all that brain. And possibly extra spoons.)

I am creating a new blog for my crafts. I haven't decided for sure on a title yet (I'm not good with titles...couldn't come up with a great one for my latest quilt project, either, but Baby's First Castle will do), but I think I'd like to concentrate my efforts there. Oh great, even less content here. I'm not sure if posting less is a natural side effect of...something...or if it's something I should combat. We'll see.

The nonexistent captions

I keep meaning to take pictures so I can put them up here. But I don't do it. So I'll do it later and expound now.

The text to go with the nonexistent pictures: I feel like it's all spinning, all the time sometimes. And I don't even have a wheel yet. Here are my hand-spun, hand-dyed, hand-knit handwarmers, which I love beyond imagining. Don't even start with me about the colors.

And here's the first of the yarn for Eric's hat. I also love this yarn beyond imagining. (Wait until I have kids, the superlatives will get worse.) It's super-soft and fluffy and much more even than I had been afraid of. I also learned things on this yarn, most importantly, I think, how to find out what a balanced yarn is supposed to look like. I even wrote a pseudo-article on it, which I may look at again in a few months and clean up and consider sending somewhere.

Turns out socializing is good for you: I went to a Metroparks History Department volunteers meeting yesterday, to talk with the volunteer coordinator and see if it was something I wanted to help out with. Turns out it is, very much. They depict the mill and the canal they have as they were run in the 1850s, so they teach the volunteers about household chores and tinsmithing and blacksmithing and cooking and doing the laundry with the wringer, and have them act it out during the summer and through the fall. (The regular staff does the actual working of the mill and the lathes.) They were much excited to find out that I already knit and sew and spin. And I actually got to try a spinning wheel for the first time, and confirmed my suspicion that I need a castle (upright, non-handed) wheel, because the Saxony (traditional, Sleeping Beauty type) ones are right-handed and I do, indeed, spin left-handed.

On New Year's resolutions: I've gotten the baby quilt designed and most of the template pieces cut out, I've done some writing, I've sent Eric out gaming so that I could have an evening to myself. I'm still worried about all the things that need doing, but I'm working on lessening that (both the worry and the number of things). Next I need to sign up for time off for my wedding shower in April and my wedding in May, and find out how to get someone ordained.

Solutions

This cold began weirdly. First with a sore throat, which isn't all that weird. Then, an absolute lack of stuffy or runny nose (which is) and instead an inability to stand up without dizziness and nausea. Then more sore throat and cough. Now it's finally coming into the nose. I have found that drinking hot tea keeps my throat soothed and the cough at bay--but I have to keep drinking it. I am extremely hydrated right now.

The yoga yarn, on the spindle, was ridiculous. When I get home (I’m at work, with an ever-shrinking amount to do) I’ll post a picture. It was around two ounces, 160 yards, which is not in the least an unreasonable amount of yarn. But this was not what a spindle is supposed to look like with yarn on it. There's a hook somewhere at the top, but I couldn’t see it because it was blocked by the excess of yarn. Sometime in 2007, I am getting a spinning wheel. I've been researching them the past few days and I'm thinking a Lendrum, because it's versatile, left-hander-friendly, well-made, pretty, and relatively cheap (for a spinning wheel). That's assuming I buy new. But I'm absolutely not buying anything fiber-related until February, and probably not getting the wheel until my birthday (in April), so I can also look around for used. The yoga instructor (who adored the yarn) promised to keep an ear out for me. Next is Eric's hat yarn, and then some gift yarn while I experiment with different techniques. I think E would like some, and the old needlework group (they still meet, they told me at Marie's shower, though they often play cards rather than working on their projects) would appreciate some, I think--the thought, if nothing else.

ETA:

There's more blue and green underneath, you just can't tell.

Our last Christmas shopping occurred Wednesday. Yay! It was pretty painless. We went shopping last Sunday, in a moderately bad press of people at the mall, and even though I was sicker, Eric got tired of shopping first. When I said, back in July, that I wanted to work on Christmas shopping in September he scoffed. He expressed horror. He expressed disdain. Sunday I suggested working on Christmas shopping in September next year and he promptly agreed. (We did actually start Christmas shopping in September, at the rock and gem show; we just didn't follow up and finish it.)

When we were out, we discovered that those Visa/Mastercard/AMEX gift cards that work just like cash? They require a $4-$6 activation fee. We were going to send one to Eric's sort-of-sister in Las Vegas (because she just had a baby and what they need now is really money), but we've now decided that we'll either get them a Target gift certificate or just giftwrap some cash.

Last night was cookie making with Michelle. Aside from intervals of impassioned coughing, it went pretty well, though Michelle definitely still needs improvement in the paying-attention-to-the-recipe department. Bev called while we were on the third dough, a gingerbread (she’s going to let me borrow her veil, and also she has donated her old car, which she bought from me exactly four years ago yesterday, to ALA because she has a new car), and Michelle was content to proceed by herself, with the occasional whispered “Yes” or “No” from me when she asked whether she should use the low mixer setting or had she mixed it enough. Once I hung up she announced she was done. I looked at the scrawny, soggy dough and decided to do an audit. She had added only one quarter of the required one and three-quarters cups of flour, half the molasses, and no sugar at all. We fixed that and watched “Muppet Treasure Island,” and then the mothers took her home (with a bike, but she won’t know that until Christmas) and I wrapped presents and went to sleep. I woke up twice, coughing, just like the night before, but at different intervals. My coworker today (one with whom Eric and I are going to double-date, in order to see whether we can reduce a waiter/waitress to tears through sheer pickiness) said I sound better than I did yesterday. This weekend should be a pretty lazy one, so maybe I’ll actually be feeling better by Christmas. I’d take that as a present. It hasn’t been a very festive Christmas season, but I’d settle for health at the end of it.

Yoga yarn, part 2

This is the roving that I dyed last Monday:


And here's what half of it looks like today:


I had debated on whether to split the roving many times, to make stripes, or just the once, to get a two-ply yarn that would go continuously from yellow to green to blue. But I really wanted the one color change, so I split it just the once. Then I realized I only had about two ounces and that might not be enough to make anything, and should I Navajo-ply each half separately to make into two matching yarns, because then Katie could finish the ends of something or make matching wristbands or something? I finished spinning this half of it yesterday (while watching more Alton Brown DVDs, an early Christmas present to Eric) and spooled it onto the back of my chair, which charmingly is just about a yard around, and found that this little skein contains about 200 yards. That's enough to do something with. I could still Navajo-ply it and its twin, which would give me two 70ish-yard skeins, but now that I know there's enough for a hat or a lacy scarf I'm happy to just make the one big skein. So I've got slightly over a week to spin the other half, ply and set.

In the meantime, I've been doing a little writing, plus decorating the house, doing housework, making earrings for Michelle from Santa (imitations of some earrings she saw at a craft show we went to Thursday that she couldn't have because she doesn't have pierced ears), and taking care of my poor sick fiance. He's feeling marginally better, but I'm starting to seriously consider Dad's recommended remedy of honey, lemon, and whiskey.

Being bad

I have discovered the spindle Eric's hat must be spun on: the Quantum Butterfly. (He would also appreciate the Foo, but it's a laceweight spindle and I do not love him enough to knit him a hat at nine stitches per inch.) This is merely because I am a geek and he is a geek, but that's fine. I ordered the spindle but have no idea when it will come. I also ordered four ounces of Tussah silk, but I know that will come this week. I have very much got to get started on the dyeing of all this white, white fiber I have.

(Okay, I do love him enough. But only if it were, for some inexplicable reason, absolutely necessary. And it's not.)

My cousin Jaime wrote to say that her unborn baby will probably not live past birth. Is it terrible of me to wonder whether they'll use the same name for their next try? I'm sure it is, but I can't help it.

We did some Christmas/birthday shopping over the weekend, and also went to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. It was fantastic, just like last time, and made me think I really ought to get out my guitar (and change the strings already; it's been a couple of years at this point). I want to create music. I want to create a lot of things. I also want to be very lazy and idle, and that's the essential struggle.

Food and fiber and forgetting and finances

We went to the Beirut last night for my first-paycheck celebratory dinner. (Incidentally, when I received my check stub I looked at my bank statement and found it hadn't been deposited yet. I checked again yesterday and it still hadn't, so I wrote a worried letter to the finances person and she wrote back saying kindly that the first check was supposed to be live, had I gotten it? I'll be depositing it in a couple of hours. And no more questions to the finances person.) Eric won't eat Mexican or Thai or Indian with me, so I'm glad he likes Middle Eastern. (Lebanon counts, right? There was a time at my old job we discussed that, but I think the consensus was that it was really only disputed because it's mainly Christian.) It was good, except for me spilling my extra tin of tea by putting a pat of butter under it to soften and then not thinking to remove the butter before it melted. But we decided that Aladdin's, a new place in a more convenient location (though it feels more like a cafe than a restaurant), has better tabbouleh and falaffel and, Eric says, shish kafta, so I guess we've got a new favorite Middle Eastern food place.

While we were there we both noticed a nearby mother taking her tiny, weeks-old baby out of her carrier and holding her close. She was small and frail and dark-haired and had a tiny active curious face. We looked at each other, stricken, and Eric said, "The courthouse is open on Monday." We seriously fail the baby test.

In the summer, when I made that thick brown hat of my own homespun, Eric had tried it on, said he looked very J. Crew, and mentioned he wouldn't mind having such a hat if it were less scratchy. So when I went to the Michigan Fiber Festival in August, I bought some merino/tencel and made swatches of that and some merino/silk I already had for this purpose, and he chose the merino/silk. Last night I mentioned something about the hat, and he said, "What hat?" I explained, and he still didn't remember. I persevered and repeated the project idea and he's still in favor of it, so I'll be dyeing some fiber dark blue ("Gray," he said yesterday when I asked what color he wanted, just to be sure. "Or green." I said, "Last time you said blue." He said, "I did?" and then told me to surprise him, that either one was fine) and spinning it soon. Only I don't like the spindle I have to do it on. Heavier yarn requires a heavier spindle, and my heavy spindle is a bottom-whorl (and very simply made and decorated by someone who sells them on eBay, and the decoration is already coming off) and I think I'm coming out in favor of top-whorl. So I want to buy a new one. I was concerned about the expense of it, but then I got a hefty raise with the new job and it's been a while since I bought something just for myself. And as for Eric objecting, forget it. He won't even remember in a few days.

I bet some marketing person has called it INGEOnious.

The ingeo kicked my butt.

It's pretty, it's shiny, it's soft, but I am putting it away until I am a more experienced spinner. It's got a very short staple length (the length of the individual fibers), which makes it difficult to work with (and also confuses me because, hey, it's manmade, couldn't they have made it longer?), and a strange squeaky stiffness to it, which caused me at various points to try to tug gently to make the yarn even and have nothing happen, then tug slightly harder and have it all come apart. It broke apart as I was quick-plying it, which is why I decided to try knitting a sample plied and one unplied. The plied one was reasonable; the unplied one--well, there are a lot of ends on it. Putting it away now. I wonder if the soy silk I picked up at the fiber festival has similar properties. However, I know that wool is much much easier to spin, and I still haven't finished all the green BFL (though did I mention I finally finished and plied the laceweight? It's not quite laceweight anymore, at least not in all places, but it's got a nice sunset color to it and it's very fluffy) so I think I'll recover my ego with a little work I know I can do.

Falling short

I'm now, er, a fifth through PV. But we made root beer and chai ice cream! And salsa! And the onion-dill bread was a qualified success! And I got some sock yarn as a gift! And the dishes are done! And I'm almost done spinning my first attempted laceweight!

Ahem. Apparently my intention to work was not strong enough to resist the seductions of ordinary life. That's okay. I will continue to work on this until it is done. Preferably before my parents get here (in ten days!).

I did not get the job. The woman who interviewed me called this morning and I knew from her tone of voice when she identified herself. I don't see anything good at Monster or USAJOBS.com, so I will look again in a few days.

My first attempt at laceweight is pretty irregular, and I've discovered that spinning this thin leads me to (a) drop the spindle more often and (b) have a harder time recovering from each drop. I pulled the roving into pieces to distribute the colors a little more evenly, and it looks like I shaved a Muppet:

To counteract all this (ha!), I got on the scale yesterday and I've lost a few pounds from earlier in the year, which is very nice. I've been eating smaller meals with healthy snacks and drinking lots of water and running up and down the stairs twice every time I use the bathroom at work (because I'm out of my seat anyway) and exercising with Edith on Mondays. I also bought a pilates DVD, because we're probably never going to hook up the VCR so my tapes won't work, and found that I am not as flexible as I thought I was. But if I keep doing the workout on Wednesdays I should eventually become more so. At any rate, I think Mom will be reasonably happy when we go out to try on wedding dresses. (We won't be buying any. She's going to make it. We're just going to try them. It's what we did for Bev's wedding.)