today is the birthday of two of my favorite people back in pittsburgh. i hope they’re having a really excellent day. in providence, it’s drizzling and cold and exactly the kind of day i prefer knitting in bed with felane to biking half an hour in said drizzle to get to work, but that is what i did. i was, however, rewarded with a seasonal treat at my office. pumpkin scones! just a little reminder that i love this time of year, regardless of drizzly commutes.
fall is always most productive for me in terms of knitting. i’ve been bundling up in the living room with the windows open so i can enjoy the fall air, drinking hot apple cider (sometimes adult hot apple cider), marathoning tv shows on netflix instant queue (so far: 30 rock, this american life and weeds), and crafting my little heart out. my progress: i finished one of the halloween costumes i was commissioned to help out with, and i’m halfway through the pair of socks that i mentioned in my last post. i’m starting to feel tempted to take a break from everything to knit myself some new gloves now that it’s cooling off, but that might just be my knitting add kicking in.
over the weekend nicole and i went to the mermaid’s purl in wickford. i had never been to wickford before, and it was really charming. the mermaid’s purl was packed with very tempting yarn treats, but i actually was really responsible and only bought the yarn i needed for my little sister’s christmas sweater. i ended up buying this:
it’s berroco ultra alpaca, which i think will make for a super cozy and soft sweater. and i think the color is perfect for the banana tree pattern, and it’s a color my sister will actually wear. she’s just like i was at eleven, which is to say, extremely particular about things. even though she picked out the sweater pattern, and i’m using one of her favorite colors, i’m still terrified that something about the finished product will be ever so slightly off and she won’t like it. does anyone else have this problem with knitting for preteens? i’m scared!
other than tackling my list, worrying about my sister’s tastes, and drinking so much hot apple cider, i’ve been playing around with my spinning wheel a bit. i spun up a quick skein of singles with the batts i bought at craftland this summer. there’s a lot of amazingly glittery angelina in this, so it was hard to get a picture where the color was totally accurate. but this is pretty close:
it ranges from very skinny to maybe worsted weight, and for the most part there’s almost no overtwist. the colors are really pretty, but i have to say i’m still not 100% psyched on the end result. i think because it’s one of those skeins that looks nice as a skein but i just can’t imagine what it will look like knit. only one way to find out though.
agh. current priorities: purple socks, brown/green hat, squid suit, gloves. expect some serious FO posts soon. enjoy your octobers, everyone!
i know i should be writing about something like the g20 in pittsburgh. and i do have my concerns about that. but the thing really keeping me up at night right now is, probably unsurprisingly, diablo cody buying the rights to sweet valley high. there is really nothing i can say here though that has not already been said. however, as someone who possibly takes ya lit a little too seriously, i will just reiterate some of the finer points that have been made recently and say that if i see enid rollins on a burger phone, i will flip a table.
as for yarn-related content, i have some serious etsy updates to make soon. gotta find a way to finance all those svh and bsc books i thrift. but in the meantime, maybe you want to take this little treat off my hands:
it lives in electronic form over in my etsy shop, but in tangible form it lives in my apartment and i came dangerously close to knitting with it this weekend. help me stop the madness. this yarn is delightfully soft and the colors are amazing. and i hear yinz want to be responsible and start your holiday knitting early this year…
i had to work at an office in bristol yesterday, which i was in no way bummed out about. i got up nice and early and took the east bay bike path from east providence to bristol. my hope was to get my work done and then enjoy a late afternoon of swimming at colt state park. the weather wasn’t really having it though, and the ol’ one-piece stayed in my bag. fortunately i at least didn’t get caught in a thunderstorm on the way there or back.
AND i found a new (to me) yarn shop in warren. AND i walked in and they were having a big sale! i have what i call the “yarn tourism loophole.” basically, even though i am trying very hard to destash and not to buy yarn that i don’t need for a project, i always let myself buy a fun skein of new yarn whenever i go to a new yarn shop. i justify this by acknowledging that i am supporting a local business that loves the thing i love. which is wool. however, in a sale situation, sometimes i may buy more than just that one permissible skein.
some noro silk garden sock yarn (30% off) and some sheep shop sheep one (50% off). i spent under $30 but got so much squishy wonderful yarn. i also learned while i was there that the sheep shop will be no more. and so you should go stock up on as much as your little heart can handle, either at your lys or online at the webs sale. i’m trying to be good and not buy any more. but i kind of want to just because i know that before long i won’t be able to! sheep one is just a nice single-ply squishy not-too-soft yarn, and the colors are so great. ugh. you should go buy it all so i can’t.
oh, and last week i went and got myself a motivational tattoo. it was done in providence by mike brousseau at federal hill tattoo. i think it’s perfect. and i mean, you know i’m always hanging in there. tonight this takes the form of stitch and bitch at waste not want not, followed by an outdoor screening of the big lebowski. i’m trying to come out of an antisocial phase. i think this is a pretty good way to do that.
have a fun weekend, kids. and be good!
still running around a lot. staying so busy. almost done with socks, which is exciting although it makes me feel a little weird – they’ve been my main project for so long that i’m not really sure what i’ll do when they’re gone. i mean, i’ll figure it out. but it’s going to be like some kind of weird postpartum depression for a sec.
otherwise, i have been living on a pretty steady diet of beer and homemade burritos. i’m not ever going to complain about that.
also lots of biking around with beers in my bag and enjoying them at various locations. on i think friday, gary and i went to buy a six pack of pbr at tropical liquors, and when we got there, we realized we’d forgotten our ids. we got so annoyed about being carded that when we got back to the store, we bought two six packs and each drank one ourselves. that’ll show ‘em.
it was nice. also nice: i took some clothes down to barter at waste not want not last wednesday night, and i found a pair of black jeans to replace the ones that uh…shrunk over the last year or so. i got to clean out my closet a little, and then it was like getting a pair of pants for free. i love trading. it’s so much more useful to me than buying.
started trying to draw. i’ve never really done this regularly or been very good at it, but i always kind of wanted to. even though my drawings are a little butt, it’s been fun. maybe i’ll stick with it. lately i’m trying to do more things that i don’t feel good at. there’s not point in only doing the things you already know you can do i guess.
walking down newbury street in boston, i realized i hadn’t looked up any local yarn shops, which is weird because that’s usually the first thing i do in a new city. and just as i said that, i saw the sign for newbury yarns. the shop was so cute and packed with fun things, and the women working there were so nice. i bought myself a tiny treat of course.
and even though i’m not currently working on this blanket, i wanted to share the uglyprogress. it’s only going to get more gnarly from here on out. maybe when i’m done with socks i’ll work on this for a tiny bit. i’ve started a few blankets but never ever finished one. i don’t want to drop the ball this time too.
oh, and remember when i saw willie nelson for free? there was a no camera rule, but fortunately it is not hard to find pictures of willie nelson on the internet, and that is what i did for your viewing pleasure here. i love him so much. it was total luck that i got to see this for free. i’m grateful to sweet friends who like to share what they’ve got. hannah and meghan and gary and i had a really fun night. you seriously can’t understand a word bob dylan says anymore, but still, amazing. oh and also john cougar mellencamp. but seriously. willlie nelson. it was in no way disappointing. my life is really fun and good most of the time.
busy busy days here. i’m hangin’ in there though. in my temporary home there are five cats and five dogs right now, and it’s honestly really great. i never have to worry about there not being an animal around to sit on my lap.
i just finished typing nothing rhymes #5. now i just need to glue the pieces together and make copies and covers. it feels good to check another thing off the list.
i’m taking a break from productivity to share pictures of some of my handspun yarn. these are all spun, dyed, soaked and skeined for mass market 4 next sunday afternoon. i’m feeling pretty relaxed about this craft show. i think it’ll be really fun to share a table with courtney, and if i sell a few things, wonderful!
anyway, (a very small sample of) the goods:
there’s much much more to come. but for now i’m gonna go knit and hang out with this little guy:
i mean, isn’t that what you would want to do? vargas is seriously my favorite dog maybe in the entire world. he’s wheezing at my feet right now and looking at me with that gross smooshy face and seriously, i can’t believe i’m anywhere other than on the couch gazing lovingly into his eyes.
time to go do just that. bye!
there are so many loose ends and so many little details my brain is struggling to process. but i’m working through it. you know what helps? yarn, obviously. just looking at beautiful yarn calms me down in a way that words cannot describe. so in case you’re having a wild week (already!) as well, let me share some of my treats with you.
this is the skein of yarn i bought for myself at the rhode island wool and fiber festival. it’s from spinning bunny, and it’s seriously so amazingly squishy and dense and soft and wonderful. what i’m trying to say here is that i like it.
and this little treat…i mean, it’s noro. it’s not surprising that it is beautiful. it’s like a technicolor dreamyarn. i don’t even know if i want to knit with it as much as i want to spoon it at night while i sleep.
i got these tags in the mail yesterday, from a friend who makes really great art. i ran into gary and danny at the post office and got ice cream at nice slice with them while i opened my mail. i was looking at these and gary said, “are you crying?!” and i said, “they’re just SO NICE!” going to get the mail is one of my favorite parts of the day, and i just feel lucky to know the people i know. okay?
also, in my email this morning i found out that the second issue of modern seamster magazine is online now. it’s not out in print yet, but you can go look at the pdf. there are lots of really fun things, and then when you get to page 72 you can look at a goofy picture of me and my craft tattoos, and also read a quick interview. okay!
it would be in kinda poor taste for me to not ever mention that wool and fiber festival i went to last saturday on you know, my knitting blog. right? still, i’m not so focused on woolly matters right now, so mostly you just get a few of the pictures i took while i was there.
those are all naturally dyed fibers. most of them were dyed with plants, but one was dyed with copper pennies – kind of awesome.
nicole and i didn’t see any actual shearing happen, but we did get to touch all this fresh wool that was just lying on the ground. ps. nicole is engaged now! congratulations!!
and we got to touch so many animals – sheep, a bull, a donkey (the bull and donkey were just residents of coggeshall farm, they weren’t there on any kind of woolly agenda), angora rabbits, alapacas, and goats.
obviously we also touched so much roving and so much yarn. everything felt amazing. we touched cashmere and yak fiber, and camel and lots of beautiful hand dyed sock yarn. there were big bags of alpaca roving that i seriously just wanted to crawl into and roll around in forever. is that weird?
it was also really nice to meet so many people who cared equally about producing quality fibers and about taking care of their animals and treating them with respect. it was a pretty heartwarming thing.
i bought a few things, because i can’t help myself. but i was not even remotely extravagant. when i get back to providence, i’ll take pictures of those things.
which i guess reminds me, i’m in pittsburgh right now. i’m interneting on the spare bed in josh’s room, waiting for brandon to wake up so we can get half gallons of turner’s iced tea before i leave. i’ve been here a day or so now and it’s been nonstop nice in every respect. maybe i’ll tell yinz more about that later. now i’m going to get dressed and start my day.
apparently i am a total liar. i know i keep saying and saying and saying that i’m going to knit my way through some of my yarn mess. and that i’m not going to keep buying more yarn while i’m at it. nonetheless, i have made three separate online yarn purchases in the last week. one was justified – i had to start buying yarn for a custom sock order (five pairs for one of my favorite zine friends, amber!) so i’m not beating myself up over that one. but i also couldn’t resist another skein of hand dyed recycled yarn from cantrix; her yarn is so pretty, and really reasonably priced, so i thought, maybe just this little treat for myself. but then dazzle ships blogged about the webs anniversary sale and because i am weak, i clicked on over, and really felt like cascade 220 for only $4.89 a skein was a deal i should not pass up, so i limited myself to two skeins of the straw colorway and got the heck off the internet. and seriously, maybe someone hates me, because today i found myself directed to spinster’s emporium, and being something of a spinster myself, i obviously knew that they would have everything i need. and they kind of do. it’s such a cute store, full of fun odds and ends. somehow i am resisting, but i am passing the link along to you, and if you live in the uk, i really recommend jumping on this shop, because you will get free shipping. thank goodness the free shipping option doesn’t extend to the us, because i would be done for.
i’m sorry. stay strong.
in my knitting, dyeing and spinning, i think a fair amount about how i can keep my hobbies fairly “friendly.” as in, environmentally friendly, animal friendly, and personal health friendly. obviously, this is always a work in progress. but as with most things, the more you learn, the harder it is to ignore what you learn, so consistent improvement is inevitable.
so i just want to share with you some of my favorite recent discoveries. some of these i have already tried myself, and some i’m just eagerly awaiting a few extra dollars to try.
greener shades dye starter kit seriously go check this out! greener shades dyes are non-hazardous dyes that work on all animal fibers and don’t use any metal compounds to get really pretty colors. the starter kit is $34.95, but it includes all 9 colors and citric acid, and apparently is enough dye for about 14 pounds of fiber. if you don’t need/want all the colors, you can also get a 1/2 ounce jar of each color for $6.75, which is not bad at all. these dyes also meet the standards for organic fiber processing, which is nice. i haven’t used ‘em yet, but i plan on it very, very soon!
north star alpacas one of my favorite etsy shops. the alpaca fiber she sells is awesome to work with, and comes from her family of 15 alpacas. she also includes a picture of the alpaca your fiber is coming from with your order. mine came from celeste. i think this is a really nice practice because it gives a sort of feeling of personal connection with the animal, and also because alpacas have really funny and endearing faces and are great to look at.
enchanted knoll farm another great etsy shop i’ve had good experiences shopping with. they apparently live my dream life – a solar powered farm in the woods of maine, with lots of sheep and dyeing and spinning and other yarny treats? it sounds wonderful! it feels good to buy from a shop who really seems to care about the well-being of their animals.
cascade ecological wool bulky 2-ply yarn that’s not dyed or chemically treated. it smells natural and woolly, which i really like. (obviously, if you don’t like that sheep smell, it goes away when you block your knitting!) i used this for my owl sweater and am really really happy with it. i have half a skein leftover and can’t wait to knit more with it.
blue sky alpacas organic cotton a cotton yarn option that still uses no chemicals or dyes. and if you’ve knit with blue sky alpacas yarns, you know it’s maybe the best feeling this side of a free chinese buffet. probably healthier, also.
vermont organic fiber company i haven’t shopped here yet, but i’m more or less itching to. you can get organic, environmentally friendly yarns in almost any weight, and the colors are beautiful. reading their standards page is also very eye-opening if you’re wondering what might really differentiate regular commercial yarns from organic and eco-friendly yarns.
ANYWAY. this is barely an introduction to the topic. expect more updates on the subject as i test out new things. and as always, i still recommend just going to a thrift store and finding a nice big sweater to unravel. shopping second hand is always a great resource, and you will find bizarre and unusual yarns more often than not. maybe find a nice undyed wool sweater, and try out some natural dyes on the yarn you get from it!
also, i’d love to hear about products and practices you’ve tried out and liked. hit me with it!
ps. meg and i believe andrea, i think you both have mentioned on your blogs an interest in building spinning wheels out of old bicycle parts. i am very curious about this process! i found a few links (like this and this) but i’m wondering if anyone out there has more info. admittedly, i am more likely to just cave and buy an ashford or something, but i don’t know. maybe if someone more mechanical than i am wanted to enlighten me, this could be a fun experiment?
