I think they should be called something like “Pale Seas”.
The mixed one is from the faux batts (dyed first, then spun). The other skein was spun, made into a LONG skein and half dyed berry blue and half lemon-lime. They are both spun from The Sheep Shed Studio spinning bells. 🙂
So, I don’t have a drum carder. I am much more happy with batts and rolags than with most roving. Probably because I spin semi-woolen modified long draw.
This gives me some problems. I don’t much like to buy roving. I like hand-carded wool, but, then I have to spend a LOT of time processing it. I won’t break down and get a drum carder yet. So, my favorite inexpensive, prepared fiber is spinning bells from the grab bag at The Sheep Shed Studio and laps from A Yarn or A Tale.
I wanted to make fancy, multicolored (multilayered?) batts. So, I dyed some pieces of spinning bell different colors that I thought would look good together and pulled the layers apart and stacked them up and rolled them up to spin.
Not perfect, but pretty cool, I think. And they look nice just sitting there, too. If I do say so myself.
Tomorrow is our Guild picnic (potluck, 11 am Ritter Park, bring chair and drink, too). I love potlucks. Did I mention that? 🙂
I’ve actually been getting a goodly number of t-shirt orders, which is very exciting! If you want to get one of your own, go to my etsy shop.
I love it! 🙂
I hope the person I’m giving it to loves it too!
From now through 9 pm Eastern Monday night (Memorial Day), I am offering a special! Buy a regular price, in-stock batik-animal t-shirt ($20 value) and I will send you a FREE baglet in your package! I get to chose the baglet animal/color/etc (you can make requests, but it depends what I have on hand). Don’t put it in your cart, just write me a note (“FREE BAGLET”) so I don’t forget.
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More items coming soon (they are piled up on my dining room table!)
My box came today! I don’t think I have time right this minute to do the whole blog thing, but it was full of lovely things! Yay!
alpaca
sheep
bunny
“Get Your Green On” Thursday, May 14th @ 3:30 pm, Main library We celebrate Children’s Book Week (May 11-17) as the library goes green. Children will receive a special seed packet just for checking out 5 books. Children will decorate a recycled cup and plant some seeds in it to grow a plant.
I just got home from tutoring at school. When I got there, the kids were watching a Brain Pop video about Cleopatra. The boy I was working with had lots of questions about “why did she kill herself?”, “why did they build pyramids?”, “what happened to the Roman empire?” and I tried to give him some insight into the whole Roman Empire thing. I’m not sure I’m qualified, without reading up more, first, but I’m glad he was so interested. Not sure how I can get that interest to translate into helping him read better… Mr. Hanna told me that he wasn’t positive that it is true, but it is rumored (off to look it up soon!) that the Roman chariots made such indelible ruts in the roads/tracks, that in all the countries where they ruled, wagons were made in the same dimensions so they could ride in the ruts. And that this carried over even into the new world, as the Connestoga wagons had the same axel/wheel spacing and so do railroad tracks. FASCINATING! LMK if you have info on this, as, while I am going to look it up, I can’t do it right this second because I have other work to get done today.
Did find this:From http://www.naciente.com/essay94.htm
American railroad tracks are 56.5″ wide (the “gauge”) because the English built the first railroads in America and they used that width. Why did they use that width? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that’s the gauge they used. Why did “they” use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that were used for building wagons which used that wheel spacing.
Why did wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Because older wagon ruts throughout England used that spacing, and if they changed it, wagon wheels would break by either falling into or being forced out of the old ruts, which were 56.5″ wide.
The old ruts were that size because the roads were built by the Romans, who arrived in England in 54 BC and left about 400 AD. Their wagons, and their chariots before their wagons, used that spacing, and that spacing was used all over Europe and wherever Rome conquered, because their wagons used the identical wheel base everywhere. So the modern railroad track width derives from the Roman chariot.
Why was the Roman chariot track width 56.5″? Because that was the width of a chariot that would equal the width of two “standard” Roman horses. Thus, wagon and horses would fit through the same narrow street. Specifications and bureaucracies live forever!
Hey. I’m recovering from the birthday party of my 8-year old son and then a trip to Cincy to the Zoo. Both were fun. Little boys can be so gross. My own are not so bad (I’m sure this is true for every mom), but a whole bunch of them in one place? With food? 🙂
I was working on the Anytime Wrap and really enjoying the yarn, the colors, the lace pattern (not to blow my own horn, since I spun and dyed the yarn, lol), but I ran out of yarn and had to stop. I knew I would, but I wasn’t ready with the next skein yet. I had gotten all the singles spun up (or at least enough for a second skein–I haven’t calculated yet if it will be enough for the whole wrap! I told you I wasn’t a technical knitter, spinner), but hadn’t plied the yarn and then there is the WAITING while the finished yarn DRIES after being washed/set. I finished plying it last night while I watched Castle on tv (I LOVE Nathan Fillion! I admit it!). Washed it, even though it was past my bedtime, squeezed it out as best I could in a towel and hung it up. Today it has been fair and sunny, so I hung it out in the sun on my porch. It is almost dry! Tomorrow I can knit with it!
I ordered the Lil Dynamo box picker from Kaydessa on Etsy and it came yesterday while we were at the library storyhour. So, I played with that a little before I finished my plying. The jury is still out. I am not sure how much faster it is going to be than handpicking, as it is not very BIG and I had to put the blog of wool back through several times. I am not sure if I need to put in MORE wool or less. Need to experiment more with it. I am particularly curious how it will do with the VERY VM-y parts of the fleece that I set aside from the rest. If it does a decent job with those parts, I guess it will be worth the money. I like to save those parts of the wool for demos, etc, where the thing the kids or whomever spins is gonna go right in the garbage in a few minutes anyhow–no sense in wasting good yarn!
I am still crocheting the hippie vest. Have decided (I am very bad at largish projects, apparently) that there is NO WAY I will have enough yarn for that, either. And it is handspun. And I don’t have more of that particular roving. I have one ball of the yarn left and one ball of single (it is three-browns variegated fairly randomly). I am considering plying that ball with a single of white, then using the other matching ball, then finishing in either white or a similar handspun which will need to be created after purchasing similar roving. Got it at the Sheep Shed Studio–which is great, but they ship UPS and that means I really need to buy at least 3 lbs of wool or I am just throwing away money on shipping. Like I think I just did with Little Barn–I ordered three 8 oz bags of fiber and then got a refund for one of them, but now I’ll be paying $9-something to have one pound of fiber sent to me. I emailed them about making a substitution, but they haven’t gotten back to me yet. Sigh. Maybe it will go well. I went to Little Barn because I wanted some Ecospun (recycled soda bottles–wanna try that in a blend) and Tencel (ooh, so pretty mixed with wool!). They also had BFL, which I wanted to try.
Still working on batik t-shirts. Just got a new boxful of blank drawstring bags. Still working on some science standardized test items. Have Cub Scouts tonight–I think we are going on an Urban hike–must decide best route.
Our Guild’s first baby in ages was born the other day!
The lady who runs Phat Fiber had an inland hurricane come right by her house! Ack! She is fine, her house is fine. Power and utilities are pretty messed up. She says the Phat Fiber boxes (this concerns me, hmmm, because I have sent samples to go in them!) will still be sent out this month and go on sale on Etsy on Saturday!
On one of my groups on Ravelry, this is a discussion thread. I had my husband save me Altoids tins (I don’t eat mint)…but they were empty so far!
Yesterday, same wonderful husband went to the head shop (he is a college professor and hopes that if any students saw him they don’t spread rumors–he was there for me! nothing illegal!) and bought me this little scale.
tobacco/postage/WOOL scale 🙂
I had heard of this sort of scale, but I’d never seen one. You put the keyring looking thing on your finger and the solid circle hangs down. You clip the thing you want to weigh on and it hangs and the arrow points to the weight. One side is marked up to 4 oz and the other side is marked up to 100 grams. It cost $7.
And it fits in my Altoids tin.
🙂
I just read about this and don’t know if I will get around to doing it, but I thought I would pass it on in case someone was interested. The quilt squares (due soon!) will get put together to make a quilt/afghan at the Sock Summit and auctioned or raffled or something with the money to go to Doctors without Borders.
All the info is available from a pdf on Larissa’s Blog.
Goodness Gracious WV's Weblog 