Spin, spin, spin

Very little knitting action, but I have been spinning. It is the sort of thing that is easier to pick up and put down at the moment. No need to count where I am or figure out what I've done. I can just pick it up and go, and put it down whenever I need to--no need to get to the end of the row.

So, I mentioned another spindle in the last post. Here it is.

This is a trindle!
In April trindleman was offerring a special--where I received an extra set of arms. Yes, the arms are removable from the shaft. You can change them up, and they come in different weights. The pair I ordered were a midweight (below), and I requested a lightweight (above) for the extra set. The shaft is nice and long and it spins very nicely.

Trindleman is offerring another special in May--who knows I may end up with some more trindle gear in my collection.

I actually even finished some yarn. Here is the Frabjous Fibers that I have been working on for ages! About 175 yards worth--please don't laugh at all the miniskeins, I'm getting better at all this, but slowly.

I have also finished spinning 4oz or so of BFL that I hand dyed with Kool Aid. While the fibers looked nice as fiber, the spinning of it muddled up the colors. Live and learn. If I do any more dyeing I will stick with a more tonal palette. I haven't set the twist on that yet. I'll get some picture up once I do that.
Also for a future post--NH Sheep and Wool 2011!

Down the slippery spinning slope

I've had a couple of student grade spindles for a while and every so often I spin with them, but didn't get really excited about it. More recently I have been reading more of the spinning and spindling forums on ravelry and I got the bug to get another spindle. After a bit of searching around I ordered a Golding.

She is a beauty and a pleasure to use. Quite different then the clunky spindles I had (which are perfectly fine and weigh about 1.5 oz). The one I got is a 0.75oz carved in the tsunami design. She spins and spins.

Here I am giving her a test drive en plein air on the day she arrived.


For school vacation week we took a few days in NorthWestern MA/SouthWestern VT (where we drove through a snow squall by the way!). This was spitting distance to the farm where the Goldings are born and I was in touch with them about stopping by, since they have a showroom and open their workroom to the public. But alas, the baby was just not holding it together, and it would have added too much driving time for him. He seems to have a 2 hour limit before he loses patience. Maybe lucky for my wallet that we could not go--I'm sure I would not have walked out empty handed.

And would you believe I ordered another spindle since then. But I'll save that for another post, when I've got some pictures.

Brother Slug

Well my first slug was so cute I just had to make another.

I also wanted to make Easter bunnies. I made one and didn't love it--but it did end up in an Easter egg for the baby. He just stuffs it on one of his toys (with the slugs) anyway.



And how do you like my tangled Easter egg?

Slug Love

I don't knit softies. I can only remember having made one toy, a little bear for my nephew. It was so fiddly, and seemed to take a long time for something so small--though he was pretty cute. So I don't know how I got sucked in by the slugs!
Here is my first.






I've already started another!

What a fun way to use up bits and bobs of random yarn--of which I have plenty!

Garden Slug by Kahra Grae
from Cheezombie on Etsy

Baby Birthday Socks

It has been over 2 years since I knit a pair of socks! I know, crazy. The last year has been light on knitting, but I don't know what happened the year before that. In any case, I've eased back into sock knitting.
I knit the baby some birthday socks--I did the same for my older son. They were infant sized and worsted weight and so were lighting fast, even without much time to knit.



I even got to use my new Knitpicks Harmony needle.

Needle US 7 - 4.5 mm
Yarn Adriafil Knitcol Trends

Yarn Crawl 2011

Last week was the North Shore second annual yarn crawl. I had fun visiting some new (to me, and just new) shops and old friends. Got a few lovely goodies for knitting and weaving.




Last year I was way pregnant and did not venture far from home. This time I dragged a nearly 1-yr-old all over the place.

Today is warm and windy. I washed my winter sweaters--they really needed it--with my new Soak wash, and they are outside drying.
I even used some of my yarn--check out the next post.

More weaving

I finished another project on the loom. Although this was supposed to be a stash busting machine, I find I am buying yarn and stuff to use for it. Another black hole of crafting.

I finished this scarf for J.



Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool
2.25 skeins = 432.0 yards (395.0m)
Colorway: Thundercloud

And I bought a sewing machine to hem my ends.