The Michigan Fiber Festival

This last weekend was the Michigan Fiber Festival, and once again, I bent the credit card in half. I bought 2 small batts of mixed fibers--one in sunset shades, one in fairy shades, and 3, yes, I said it, THREE trindle pin sets--2 in Jade and one in a black tiger eye. All three are just beautiful. When I came home, I didn't have much to revel in, and it was something of a let down. I'm spinning some fiber already on the trindle I purchased at Stitches, and my husband asked me "Why don't you use your wheel for that!" Typical. Just typical of a man who simply doesn't understand fiber things. He doesn't understand why I have so much yarn (and he hasn't see the half of it yet, but he doesn't know, so don't tell!). He doesn't understand why I need so much fabric. He doesn't get that this is my retirement! I plan to live 2 more lifetimes! The weather at Fiber Festival was perfect. Lots of animals to pet, including lots of bunnies. I almost walked away with a lilac bunny, but I slapped my own hand and moved on to the alpacas... And of course, they hummed their worry about me. I don't know what it is about them. They are only social with each other or their owners. Usually most animals will come right to me! Then, there was a mother and her cria. And the cria was so little! And the cria was so cute! Cream color with deep brown eyes. That one will be a head turner! Of course, the sheep were being sheared in the back of the barn and I watched for a couple of minutes while the shearer went about his business with one sheep, while the rest of the herd stood at the other end of the "corral" with worried looks on their faces knowing that one of them would be next to feel the coolness of no hair--and it's supposed to be a wicked Indian summer (in the 90's!), so a late shearing this year might be a good thing. Don't worry, they will have enough hair again by snowfall! Several of the show sheep reminded me of PeeWee, and one of them allowed me to scratch her brisket. Sheep love that, but PeeWee used to shake her tail in happiness when I did it. She was such a lovely girl! In other news, I signed up for retirement today. I have no idea if I'll rescind it or not, and if not, my retirement goes into effect on February 1. It means I will have to drive in the snow and walk in the most extreme cold, but then, just as it's REALLY getting cold, I'll be home, and then spring will come with new opportunities. I'm looking forward to that. Spring will bring new beginnings. Hubby and I plan to do some camping, and maybe a bit of traveling. Nothing set in stone, but it sounds like there's going to be some fun in the future. So wish me luck!

Stitches Midwest!

I'm not usually one to go ape over a trade show, but this one--holy cow! Keep in mind that I've never been to a "Stitches" trade show, but when I walked in through the doors, my chin literally hit the floor, and dollar signs shot out of my eyes. This thing was huge. All the colors! All the yarn! All the doo-dads! (This is the stuff I can really get into.) It all started with a trip to my mother's the night before. Since we were all getting up really early to take the bus, but first had to drive to Delton to pick up friends. So, 5:30am, I am up, bright eyed and bushy tailed, rolled up my bed roll and ate breakfast. When the clock hit 6am, I was in my car, and on my way. I drove to my friend's house, where she was running around like a chicken with her head cut off, looking for her glasses (which were on top of her head, but no one noticed THAT.) I finally went to my car for my extra pair, and handed them to her. She put them on. Another friend asked why she was wearing two pair of glasses. After much laughter and embarassment, she gave me back my glasses, and the last rider showed up. We loaded up the van and headed for Delton. When we arrived in Delton, we unloaded the van and loaded the bus. There were several people on the bus already. I sat with one of my friends, and the other sat up front with her sister. The bus took off and headed for Kalamazoo to pick up more folks. Then the long trek to Chicago, boredom staved off by good, friendly conversation, lots of laughter, bus-door prizes, snacks and sock knitting. We all got goodie bags with coupons, snacks and yarn. SCORE! When we arrived, there was a lady outside with a camera (from the newspaper?) and we all gathered around for a picture. We all smiled and waved! Then we were finally allowed inside. And that's when my chin fell on the floor. I had to drag it along for a little while--wanting to keep my hands free to touch all the pretty things...like yarn and fiber and yarn, and did I say "yarn"? There were project bags everywhere. And yarn. Shawls and shawlettes are coming into vogue BIG TIME and there were dozens, if not hundreds of them scattered all over the place, many made with self-striping yarn that was soft as a baby's bottom. And yarn. My first purchase was a project bag, red, with black and white sheeps on it to hold the coupons and whatever else I might buy. (I should say now that I did bend the credit card clean in half. My hubby is not going to be happy about it when he finds out, and so I'm keeping it a secret for now.) I walked all over the place, the last booth was #933...that alone should give you an idea of how big the place was, and I walked the whole of it--at least 12 times. And then I started bending the credit card. My next purchase was some rosy red and pink sock yarn. Then I found the booth with the Signature Needles. Well, you know that I *had* to have some! I bought a set of size 1 dpn's with stilletto points. I can't wait to try them out, and I considered really casting on the pink yarn, but decided to wait until I got home. Hubby can buy more of these for me for Christmas. They are so pretty! Then I bought a knitting abacus--which is a bead bracelet that helps count your rows. Then I found the contraption that holds your yarn on your wrist, and I bought that, too. Then, a yarn store had a 50% off sale, and I bought some novelty yarn for a shawl. And then, late in the day, I found the spindles. Now normally, I would wait until the Fiber Festival for things sheepy, but I couldn't pass these up. I kept coming back to the booth and drooling over this nice walnut lace spindle. I tried it, and it spun like a Golden. On the last trip through the arena, I finally bought it. Then, while walking around with my friends, I found a Trindleman spindle. I tested this out, and just about died and went to heaven...you know I didn't escape. After all of this buying spree, I thought..."Gee, I really don't need to go to Fiber Festival....NOT!" and laughed at myself. How silly of me! I need another set of arms for the Trindleman spindle for normal fiber, right? We ate sometime during the day, and shared our goodies, each of us jealous of the others good deals. We ooo'd and ahhh'd appropriately, and smiled about our good fortune. I found some cakes of yarn going for $70. I thought it was a little too much, and told them so. It was sad, because I really did want to make that shawl, but not with that yarn! In the end, we closed the show, and put our purchases under the bus so that we had room to sit down. The sky started to darken, the bus lit up, and we all got out our socks to knit. I didn't quite finish mine, but my friend finished hers up to the kitchner. I finished mine on Sunday. They are ready for kitchner, which I'll finish tonight after I get home from the office, or perhaps I'll take them with me to the hospital while I wait for my husband. Or perhaps I'll start a new project or finish another? Goodness only knows. I just know that I have a lot to do, and I'm going to have so much fun when I retire.

The Perils of Guttony!

Erg! I ate too much at lunchtime, and I simply ache.

Of course eating that chocolate muffin after lunch helped matters not one bit.

I should be more careful. I have a banana here too, but there's just no way. I peer in it's direction only to become aware that my stomach is turning flip flops at the thought of ingesting it.

"No, no, no!" Saith the gastric monster. "Thou art already splitting the seams of thy pantlings, and 'tis assurance that thy gluteus Maximus is already Maximus enough!"

So much for my Shakespearean belly. Or would that be rubenesque? Probably the latter, since I resemble neither a shake nor spear.

Elton is coming along. His head is finished, and I'm working on his body now. I figure that I'm about half done with it. I won't be able to work on him much tonight because I have a quilting class. All this and a bellyache, too. I think I'll say no to McDonald's tonight. That's a first, right?

I have 10 minutes to go. I want to lie down and take a nap. Cya!

Great Notions!

I volunteered to help with a project at the office. It's all non-profit stuff, and while I was thinking about it, I had this epiphany.

I could teach kids to knit, crochet, sew--all sorts of things! Like having a "home ec" teacher.

And then maybe have a weekly "knit night"!

So I talked about it with the "boss", and he thought it was a GREAT idea.

So at some point, I'm going to be in charge of a "group knit", and I can barely wait to start. Something neat to do with my retirement, too.

For now, though, I'll do the liaison stuff and help create stuff for the website. Can you believe it? I was asked if I would like to do that! Of course, I accepted. What cool padding for my resume! Not that I'm considering working that much longer. When I retire, I want to be able to have a little fun, work on my house and garden, help my husband remodel the basement, and other assorted things.

Tomorrow, we're taking the air conditioner in to be worked on--it didn't cool us last year very well. I hope we can get it back before the heat gets back into the red zone.

But today, we're just lazy around the house. Hubby has been burning lawn waste and limbs from the pine trees (don't worry, we started early in the morning before the grass even considered accepting dew drops). Firing off the blaze was hotter than hot, and it was hours before we could get close enough to it to rake up the tinder around the main fire. It's all down now, and smoking still, but there's no open flames. We're keeping our eyes on it.

Later, when the sun starts to go down, we might do a little weeding in the garden. It certainly could use it.

Elton is not coming along very fast. When weather starts to heat up, my need to be close to yarn goes way down. Even with smaller projects.

And while I was sitting in my chair this morning, I saw a doe and her twin fawns! That was really cool.

Elton

This is Elton. This is the picture I borrowed to show you the end result of what I'm working on, since what I actually HAVE done doesn't look like much just yet. That is to say, I've done the curly mop on the top of his head, and the snout. No ears, so he can't hear. No eyes, so he has no real personality yet. I haven't even sewn his lips, so he's not talking much either. So I used Paola Novarro's picture, so you could see that he's at least going to be extremely cute and cuddly. 

You can find the pattern on Delicious Crochet and he is one of a great many patterns that you can buy there, each one is cuter than the last, and Paola is going strong, putting out about 5 or 6 new creations in a year! I think that's awesome. You have no idea how long it takes to plan these patterns, and my hat is off and I'm bowing low in homage to this designer.

So head on over to Paola's site and check out the creations there. There's an adorable caveman...

And The Beat Goes On....

Things have been rolling around and along so nicely (except for the heat--can't take the heat), that I've forgotten many things...

Such as the kitchen needs a good scrub down--

Oh well, we spent a good deal of time over the weekend cleaning the grill after a starling decided that it would become her favorite nesting place. We finally ended up cleaning it out and disinfecting the entire thing, and moving it to the front of the house where we can put it in the garage--safe from birds, but not from the mice.

We have a shrew in the house that's squeeking. You can't see the durn thing, but it keeps moving from side to side in the water heat distributor. The cats are too well fed, and bored with trying to reach up inside there, and still.not.quite.get.that.little.squeeker.

I finished an English Sheepdog, and it turned out really cute. Almost done with the second one--just some sewing and cutting of the loops and then Ralph is done. Pictures when I have a chance to post them...well, what do you know. The chance.



This is Sam. Cute, yes?

Ralph is a bit different. Here's his face.



As you can see, both ears are grey, while Sam's ears are white and grey. I wasn't too fond of the one ear being so much smaller than the other due to the yarns being different weights. Apparently, this adds to Sam's charm, but I think Ralph is older anyway (even though he's younger).

After this, the plan is to start working on my sweater again. It's been languishing in the WIP pile for a long while, and if I want to wear it this fall, I need to get going.

So, there you have it. Some of the doings for our household and my projects in process.

Oh, and one more thing....I'll be going to the Kalamazoo Highland Festival and the Detroit St. Andrews games in August. It's okay if my ex shows up to either or both...and this time he doesn't have to walk past me and say nothing with his nose in the air like he did at Alma.

The Latest (or What's Going On...)

I am <--> this close to being done with one of the English Sheepdogs. I've been working on it, albeit slowly, for some time. I have to sew things, stuff things, sew it all together, then I have to snip all those loops.

And since I'm not fond of hand sewing, you understand now, why I'm dragging my feet in finishing up.

These amigurimi things are just adorable, but my right wrist has been screaming at me again...which generally happens when I over work. I should really learn to crochet left handed. Perhaps I'll try that--then I can switch hands when one wrist starts complaining.

My next project, I believe will be Kate Middleton's Shawl. I am going to need a break on these dogs, and a knitted shawl would be perfect! It's herringbone, and I'm not certain how to make the stitch, but I'll figure it out. Once started, I think I'll be able to get things going pretty quickly. I might make it out of my own handspun, as I have quite a bit of it going on the wheel. It's a little heavier than the laceweight the pattern is calling for, but I think it will be fine.

This weekend is tied up with Demo's at JoAnn's, weeding the garden and a sewing class at JoAnn's. First class I've had in about 2 months. Notice it's not my regular crochet or knitting class, but the sewing class. Now there's a humdinger. Something new to do. I'm looking forward to it, but which machine should I take??

I only have 6 or 7 machines...

I suppose that I should put them on Craigslist or something along those lines. We'll see. The machines I would never let go of are my featherweight, the quilting machine and the White treadle. So old, I can't find needles for it anymore. It needs a little TLC, though.

Well, on to bigger and better things.