Tag Archives: spinning

light/tunnel.

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Yesterday it was cold enough for me to wear my Stripes! Yay! I’ve put it on a few times since I finished it over the summer (as you know) to admire it, but it hasn’t really been cold enough for me to do more than wear it for ten minutes in the morning. Yesterday, though, it snowed much of the day, and the temperature was well under freezing. It’s cold again today, so the first thing I did when I got out of bed was pull on Stripes! (Well, and pull on pants over my also very stripey long underwear. Too much information?) See that second picture? That’s me hugging myself. This sweater makes me want to curl up with Boh.

Particularly when it’s like this outside:

This sweater also helped me to provisionally conclude my writing project. I’m going to read it again today, and then turn it in for comments. Last night, I filled that first bobbin with most of the first braid of Pigeonroof Studios fiber:

Today’s plan? Grade one last paper, sit down with the calculator and figure out my students’ grades for the semester, and read through my draft one more time. Hence the title of this post.

Thanks for all of your encouragement this week. Here’s hoping that the light appears soon for you guys, no matter what kind of deadlines you’re dealing with!

pigeonroof.

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I impulsively bought 2 braids of pigeonroof studios merino in unknown colorways in a ravelry destash earlier this week, and they arrived yesterday.

My plan is to fill a bobbin with each braid, and then ply them together to make a squishy super-sized skein. (I made progress on this first bobbin late last night, not instead of working, but instead of sleeping…)

Wouldn’t it be cool if I could sit at my spinning wheel and produce a conclusion I’m happy with for my paper — along with pretty singles?

Time for coffee and concluding, I hope.

FO: paw (a king’s ransom).

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I’m sorry about the silly title of today’s post, but with this photo, can you blame me? (Also, I haven’t poured my coffee yet.)

188 yards of 2-ply, dk to light worsted, from 1.5 oz of superfine merino and 1.5 oz. of merino/silk in A King’s Ransom from AVFKW. This is going to become a Lacy Baktus, but I am not allowed to cast on until I finish writing and grading. (I am not allowed to cast on until I finish writing and grading. I am not allowed…)

Also, I snapped more photos of Boh being adorable yesterday. I can’t tell if he is curling up in more photo-worthy poses this week, or if I just notice it more because I am just a few days from being done with the semester and it feels like he is rubbing it in.

A few more days and I’ll be able to do this too!

beach day, skeined.

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I have no words to describe how much I love this skein of yarn. I mean, I may have pulled back the covers on my bed in order to properly photograph it against a suitable backdrop. (Okay, and I cuddled with it a little. Don’t tell anyone.)

This is 160 yards of squishable 2-ply in what looks to be a worsted to heavy worsted range, from 4 oz. of FLUFF sw merino in Beach Day. This was my first FLUFF spin. Halfway through the second bobbin, I may have emailed to get on their fiber club waiting list…

And then I spun some more. See, I accidentally happened upon a Baktus-Along thread in the Snobby Spinners group. I wasn’t planning to find something else to spin for, but a headache that would just not go away changed my plans last night at the very last minute. (Do you ever have headaches that you think are just related to food/hydration that then refuse to go away after you feed them dinner and lots of water? That was me last night, and I would’ve just dealt with it if the plan hadn’t been to go hear some live music. Headache + loud = unhappy rooster. So I pouted a bit, and then sat down at my wheel.)

Right, Lacy Baktus. I dug through the handspun pile, and didn’t find anything that begged to become this pattern, so I overturned a bucket of fiber and fished out A King’s Ransom from the AVFKW Woolly Wonders Fiber Club: 1.5 oz of superfine merino and 1.5 oz of 80/20 merino/silk. Meanwhile, Boh did this:

This is the superfine merino, which is full of subtle color changes.  I wrestled with this fiber a lot in sections, and I wonder if I should’ve tried to open it up a bit before spinning.

This is the merino/silk blend, and it spun like a dream. So fast, so smooth. Part of the way through my first cup of coffee this morning, I sat down to start plying:

Despite what it looks like (you know, that I spent the WHOLE day spinning), I actually wrote a few more pages yesterday, and did some good thinking about my project whilst spinning. I did not, however, begin tackling the pile of grading. (Yesterday, my headache was the excuse.) Today, I need to get on that.

the perfect combination.

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Spinning and reading, the heft of a pile of hardcover books and the squish of handspun skeins, superwash merino and the late nineteenth century…

I was so excited about how this was looking that I stopped plying to grab the camera.

This is 170 yards of super squishy heavy worsted 2-ply from the second 4 oz. of Crown Mountain Farms superwash merino in the Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds colorway. LOVE. Love so much that I could set aside my writing and grading and cast on for mittens for me right now. But I’m not going to. Why? Because I don’t have to do what the yarn says all the time. Really.

Actually, I spun this with a particular as yet not fully formed human being in mind, but now that I see it all skeined up, all that pink might get in the way of my plans to knit a non-gender specific baby something. Thoughts? (Sorry guys, if you were hoping to be completely surprised. While I’m sort of banking on the fact that you’re too busy prepping for the big day and might not read this, I do need the advice of the internets.)

Which brings me back to my love affair with my wheel, and my decision last night to start spinning some FLUFF superwash merino in Beach Day.

(Artificial evening light above, natural morning light below.)

I think what I really need to do is swatch to see how the colors look all knitted up. And keep spinning this bee-yoo-ti-ful FLUFF fiber. Oh, and keep writing. Perhaps in the reverse order.

boh is concerned.

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What’s the matter, big dog?

If you’re worried about the fact that I spent my first hour today doing this:

Don’t be. I’m not going to ply it with the first bobbin until I make sufficient progress on that other stuff. Really.

And don’t worry, we’re still going to take a nice W-A-L-K today.

Happy Friday, folks!

pretend productive.

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Let me explain: I did spend a few hours on my writing yesterday, but in a “pretend productive” kind of way — you know, the kind of productive where you don’t actually increase the word count. Now, I would argue that one of the challenges in grad school — and really, academia more broadly — involves coming to terms with what it means to be productive. Sometimes, even when I don’t write anything down, I do some really important thinking that makes it possible for me to write something  substantial when I return to the project. That’s not what I mean by “pretend productive.”

“Pretend productive” is when you read comments you’ve received on drafts, track down citations, request books that you know you should look at from the library, rearrange the piles or files you’re working from…and then (and this is key) derive a false sense of accomplishment from these tasks — and stop working.

I was “pretend productive” yesterday. I don’t really have pictures of what that looks like, but I think you get the idea. I do have pictures of fibery productivity, though.

First, my friend H (you may remember her as the recipient of the purple ishbel/springtime bandit brokeknits mash-up wedding shawl) came over to make applesauce and do some knitting. Boh assumed his supervisory role, and did a very good job of keeping our feet warm.

As you can see, this hat is way too big for me — which is a good thing! It should be perfect for my dad. (Apologies for the blurry photos.)

This is the largest size of the seaman’s cap, knitted even longer than the pattern called for, and made out of my handspun — Southern Cross Fibres polwarth, spun as a worsted weight 3-ply. (I still have about 80 yards left, so I may try to incorporate stripes into mittens or a manly cowl or something. We’ll see.)

H. asked me to show her how my wheel works, and because I had emptied all of my bobbins, we had to decide what I would spin next. I decided on the second 4 oz. of Crown Mountain Farms Superwash Merino in Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, spun as a fatter 2-ply. I started it to show H., and found it so captivating that late last night, I made myself a cup of hot cocoa and kept going.

I am in love with this, and all I want to do right now is spin the second bobbin. Alas, today I MUST be “real” productive. I received some great advice last night about how to get work done when there is really fun knitting in the house: lock it in the car. I may have to banish the second bobbin’s worth of fiber to the backseat today…

Stay tuned for pictures of the buttons that perfectly answered yesterday’s personal ad, as well as (I hope) a triumphant report about my productivity…

FO: winter storage.

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Boh really likes handspun. How about a few more?

You’re looking at what happens when a certain rooster decides to clear off ALL of her bobbins: lots of navajo ply practice wth leftovers of fibers past, and a squishy, 350 yard skein of mostly fingering weight 2-ply from some absolutely stunning Hello Yarn finn in the winter storage colorway.

This was my first adventure with the fast flyer for my Lendrum — first of many, I should say.

And this — this is how I can tell that he really is my dog. He just wants to sniff, paw at, and, let’s face it, roll in all of my yarn.

Happy Monday, folks!

boh battles the red vacuum cleaner.

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(In place of Yoshimi and the pink robots, of course.)

Boh faces his opponent.

(This is a new development. Boh used to hide in his box whenever I would get out the vacuum cleaner. Now, he plays his own version of chicken with the machine: he runs towards it or waits for it to approach him, and then squeezes by it at the last possible moment.)

Boh dashing past the vacuum cleaner.

This is absolutely hilarious, and I wish I’d gotten better photos of the whole sequence. It is rather difficult to operate a vacuum cleaner with one hand and snap photos with the other.

Now, would you like to see some spinning?

Yesterday’s time out made it possible for me to sit down at the wheel and finish the second bobbin of this gorgeous Hello Yarn finn in the winter storage colorway.

This morning, I started plying the two bobbins together, and snapped a few photos part of the way through. This looks to me like it is going to be fingering weight rather than laceweight yarn when it is all plyed and soaked, and I’m thinking it might make a lovely shawl. (That will not be for me to decide, however, as this skein is intended as a gift for a knitter!)

It seems my time out has stretched well into Sunday. That’s the trouble with taking breaks: it is so hard to end the time out and jump back into the fray. Maybe after my afternoon yoga class…