You never know until you try

I have found my dyeing muse! I feel like illustrator Stephen Gammel before he found "his" way of painting. I was happy with the dyeing, but now that I've found a technique that looks like I've been imagining it all this time I don't think I'll ever go back to dyeing in any of my "old" ways again! (As an aside, I love Stephen Gammel's illustrations - particularly his "own" style. Monster Mama is one of my favorites.)

Today was a very successful dyeing day! I have three new rovings up at Etsy and am busy dyeing yarn to sell at Cozy's Annual Yarn Sale on Sept 7. Deb and Margaret are allowing me to bring my wheel and spin in the shop and sell rovings and yarn on that day! I'm trying to remain calm about the whole thing, but I'm nervous.

Ok, the rovings. All are in superwash merino and are a combination of techniques. What I like best are the blending of colors and the sudden surprises of other colors. My favorite is called Too Blue because there's a lot of purple in it and purple is my all time favorite. For like the last twenty years or so.



Then comes the green with other colors peeping through. This is Salad (I have run out of name ideas).



And the next - Heart - has the brown overtones.



The yarns are still drying or in process. The boys are amazed/horrified at how I can make this take all day. There are kettles on the stove right now and one of them came into the kitchen and said, "How long are you going to keep doing this?" Huh. Hadn't really given it much thought. Until I'm done?

What do you mean, "it's not broken"?

Hmmm. As you can tell my orthopedist visit was annoying. All this pain is apparently a strained tendon. There's still swelling and bruising and now I have thereputic exercises (with pain) and the boot for another 13 DAYS. FUCK! Sigh. I am a horrible patient, this is during my "vacation" when two of my three children are home and expect something FUN to happen, and I would like a little fun myself. Also, about three weeks before this accident I had been very much into exercising again and I feel myself melting back into blobness.

Despite foot pain I have been dyeing... and dyeing... and dyeing. I'm doing some over-dyeing which takes longer, but the results seem worth it. I've used up all my merino/tencel roving and have moved on to superwash corriedale and merino. The merino/tencel is so soft and silky, but frustrating to photograph because of it's lovely sheen. My favorite of the batch is Plums.



The superwash corriedale (the only dry one) is called Wild Side.



I've been spinning from the stash and found some blue-faced leicester from funky carolina. Yep, more bulky! The first skein is 81 yards with nine wraps-per-inch. Skein two is on the Turkish spindle as I type.



Tonight I hope to finish the last twelve rows of the hemp skirt and begin weaving in the 300 ends. In addition to knitting, I'm cooking Jamie Oliver's Tomato and Sausage Bake. I got some beautiful heirloom tomatoes, local sausage, and crusty rustic bread. YUM!!

Still here...

There has been a giant pause in blog land over here. I've been doing quite a bit of dyeing, some knitting, and today it's been spinning. I've also been playing with the new camera. I was playing with the macro lens the other night and got this picture.



Then, this morning I found the rovings I dyed on Friday afternoon were dry. So, they've been finger crocheted for display purposes. There's one I'm calling Rosemary.



Sage.



Zinnea.



And Hyacinth.



I'm still working on random spinning and have almost a full bobbin. I'm pondering spinning another bobbin of one roving the whole way through and plying it with the random one, or doing another bobbin of random and seeing where the chips fall. No clue yet.

In family news Morgan broke his left pinky on the playground this week. He was playing tag and his finger got wrapped in another kid's shirt. The kid turned quickly and smacked his arm away while it was still wrapped in the shirt. The pinky has a transverse fracture and I am happy to report no special surgery requiring a pin was needed (this was the worst case scenario we were presented with). Morgan took a copy of his x-ray to school and got a cool fancy, custom made splint (gotta love the orthopedist - never go to the ER for broken bones if you have an orthopedist near by - quicker service, more qualified help, and they are nice to you). Bowen broke his arm a couple of years ago, so the boys were comparing stories at the dinner table. Bowen said, "Erin, all you have to do is break something and we'll ALL have had broken bones." She looked at me and said, "Mom's never broken anything, right?" I said, "Nope." She said, "I don't want to break anything either."

Bye, bye Uniqlock

I had to get rid of it. It was too loud and busy and despite the lure of a free cashmere sweater or scarf I reflected that I have never won anything in my life. Well, I once won a cheap "as seen on TV" mandolin in a raffle at a Halloween party when I was 11 or 12. I don't think anyone would call me lucky.

In the World of Fibery Goodness there are more rovings in the dye pot, yarn drying in the shower, and socks still on the needles. The rovings are similar to the previous batch (because I love the colors, that's why) and I'm still pushing the plying together idea. I swear to the Goddess of all Wooly Creatures it is the best thing since a scone! The first I'm calling "redbud" because the fuchsia in it reminds me of my favorite indicator of spring here in North Carolina, the lovely Redbud.

See?



And the other is different shades of browns, I'm calling it Trunks. Naming fibers is not my forte.



Tomorrow cleaning, feeding the snake, dyeing and teaching a friend how to knit socks are all on my To Do list. I'm planning on doing some of it early since I am awake at the crack of dawn (before, actually) every day so that at 9:30 I can sit down and knit or spin while watching my favorite cooking show and Brit Jamie Oliver. He made a Guinness, steak, and cheese pie a couple weeks ago that looked brilliant. I may have to order the UK version of his new cookbook, Jamie at Home, because I can't keep waiting for the US version. I have a scale that does grams anyway, so I'd be set! It's the little things...

Speaking of little things, I'm torn about my favorite Brit comment. I adore Neil Gaiman, Eddie Izzard, and not to mention one of the coolest women I know, Amanda. Hmmm. Maybe they're all my favorite? Here's a little Eddie 'cuz I had the crappiest day and he always makes me laugh.

"Where is my mind?"

to quote The Pixies. Multi-tasking seems to result in lots of back-tracking because I tend to forget which task I was off to and start on another. Twice this week I've started the laundry but didn't put the lid down because I was going to make one final pass through the kid's rooms to make sure I had whatever I needed, got sidetracked by some other task only to find laundry that had been well-soaked and drained, but never actually washed. UGH!

The thing I'm having fun with right now is some columbia/dorset blend roving. The first is bright gold, red, purple, and plum. And the second is greens and browns. The idea would be to spin separately and ply together. I've been "studying" my random socks for color combos I adore.







My second pair of random socks are almost half done! I've been neglecting all my other projects for socks and I've been feeling guilty about it. They are just as beautiful as the first pair. I've scored some more fiber scraps from funky carolina! Psych! More fun for me! A co-worker wants me to make her some random spun mittens. So far, I've just kind of laughed to avoid having to take any kind of stand one way or another. Honestly, I don't think I'd even make them for my children (their feet grow too fast)! That sounds incredibly selfish, but since I'm not about almost everything else, I think I get to be about this.

There's some more roving cooking in the pot and I need to do a little more work on the last skein of yarn I did (looks too much like an Easter Egg for my taste), and then it is knit and read after the kids are in bed.