Should have posted this before...

But here is the lowdown lately. I don’t think the festival is going to go off. We just don’t have enough vendors.
I picked up another knitting job yesterday and it looks like a neat job, just seams and 10 ends to weave in.
Nice and easy stockinet.
I’ve been working on My shawl, but may not finish it before September. I’m supposed to be working on my husbands sweater in September. I will need a small project to keep my sanity when I’m out. No socks, I think I’ll start my dad’s scarf. Black and grey alpaca. Hope he likes it, I need a reversible pattern that’s not too girly and not too boring. I wanted to try that broken rib pattern so that may be just the thing. Well maybe not, it IS pure alpaca. You know how warm that gets.
Hey, have you seen the new Panopticon shirt? Sheep on a plane, it’s hilarious!. Go look, I’ll wait….

Yeah it’s funny isn’t it?
One other thing is that I have run into a new blog, it’s called TwoSheep This lady spins knits and dyes. I have read thru a lot of her blog by category. (Spin knit dye) I find it just great.
Minnie is getting married and I haven’t spun anything for her bridal shower yet, but I have something in my stash I think she would like.

Back to the My shawl line, I think I remember why I started making rectangular shawls. The triangles are long in the stitch count. I don’t mind working stockinette for a mile or two but I am a slow knitter in the first place. Add over 200 stitches to the mix and now it takes forever to get a row finished. I still have to fix the 2 or third yarnover ‘cause it’s in the wrong place. (I know there is a Yiddish word to describe what I’m feeling but it escapes me right now.)

Work is in countdown mode, September is year end for us and I may be working a fudge load of overtime. We have exactly 18 mos left of a job and still things are droning on.
Our director will be spending the next two days out here. I swear I feel we’re the train wreck that people just can’t stop looking at, horrified. One of our senators is coming today as well to gawk and make sympathetic noises.

Sheesh!

Photo

I was reading through the blog one day... in the searching for some photos way... It came as a surprise...there was nothing for my eyes...so I'll post some pictures up today!

Here is a photo of the socks..Regia yarn in Bon Bon colorway

Here is a photo of my handspun from a couple of weeks ago, I spun the red Ashland bay and the Green Ashland bay (which did not turn out green but a really dark sorta black) and plyed them together.

















Here is the Shawl for Me, in Mountain Colors yarn, color way Firestorm, A ¾ of a ball knit up. Triangular shawl based on the Very Harlot Poncho pattern.
















Maybe later I'll take a photo of the house we want!
Here is my new car...
Well here it all is...Enjoy!

Serendipity

This weekend was just the coolest so far. Friday I picked up my Car. It’s beautiful as I hoped. (not the color I wanted but still acceptable. Saturday my daughter and I went with some fiber friends to the Iowa state fair. Nice ride, cool fair, great weather and somehow I managed to come home with a rabbit.. A sable martin Jersey woolie! Her name is Riley, and she is 5 months old.
http://www.mandyspreciouswoolies.zoomshare.com/0.html

On the whole, with her cage water bottle and herself, she cost me 40.00 Too cool. Saturday I went to Wal-mart (all hail the evil that is Wal-mart) and found they carry food bedding brushes and toys. No cages and no medicine so….
Sunday I had a early morning breakfast with my hubby courtesy of scooters and Lake Manawa.. It had just rained and we went to one of the shelters and sat down and had breakfast. I listened to the birds and animals and smelled the wet grass and trees and we talked over coffees and scone/bagel. After breakfast we went thru Tractor supply co. Great place. I found cages medicine food books magazines but remembered I was supposed to call Linda before I bought. Unfortunately there were no prices on the medicine which was what I really needed. We tooled around Council Bluffs for a while then went home to rest and get Quisha. I called Linda to meet us at the Country store across from Tractor Supply Co. We found the medicine we needed, in horse size! (Needless to say I won’t have to buy more for a year or 5)
From there we said goodbye to Linda and went to the bike shop.
Extreme Wheels also in CB is a great place too. If you’re into bikes or riding at all go talk to them. I’m buying a Trek hybrid…slowly.
We got a call from a work friend of Johns that there was an auction going on at 13th st and there was a spinning wheel there. We went and looked. It was an antique parlor wheel in prime condition.(with 4 bobbins) It looked like the lady had used it for flax. It came complete with a distaff and chair. The wood looked like maple, and was a reddish color. I noticed it was very low to the floor and the treadle where it connects to the footman was broken. Never having been to an auction, I was lucky my father in law was an auctioneer and John knew what to do. We won the wheel at 125.00 and the chair at 7.50. From there it made a short stop home, and then off to the woodworkers. $40 will have my treadle repaired. What a find.
















What a weekend, the little stuff is just as cool, My bank decided I was right, Apple replaced my I-Pod for free, I found out what my puppy’s issue was, My teen got a hoodie (and can stop stealing mine! =^ ) and today John and I will go take the dogs out for a run while he bikes in the 70 degree weather.

Seriously, what the hell was I thinking?

Some of you may remember the web site You Knit What? Sadly while listening to the Pixy purls podcast yesterday I was sadly informed that they were giving up on the fug. We shall miss it, but we under stand the time issue.
On to knitting and spinning. After yesterdays blog post I went on the front porch and spun on my drop spindle. I think I was out there for a good 20 min. I felt LOADS better. Some times you just need to follow your own advice. Then I just kept going…

There are at least 3 knit meetings that I know about around Omaha, Joann’s Bellevue Tuesday nights, Mangelsons Omaha Tuesday nights, Southroads Bellevue Saturday mornings, and string of purls Tuesday morning and Thursday evening. I went there last night and felt..well relief!
Knitters were my own age, used computers and the internet A LOT, and had a goofy yet classy since of humor. Not a one of them used a pattern none of them were crocheting, and not one of them was using manmade fibers. Nobody needed teaching, and there were enough people there to talk to or not as you felt.
Some had businesses, all seem to have blogs or read them, it was just so different. (And yes there was 1 dog but it was nice, calm and so a non issue.) I got started on MY shawl and knit several inches while holding a quiet conversation with some very cool and kooky ladies.
I may go back next Thursday if they’ll have me.

When life gets in the way

Do you ever feel like breaking down? Do you ever feel like giving up? Those are some lyrics in Welcome to my life by Simple Plan. My life is in a whirlwind and it only seems to be gaining speed.

I spent 4 hours cleaning the house and working in the yard on Monday, and 2 hours working on a friends farm Sunday. My hands are so sore, I haven't been able to knit or spin since Saturday. Today is Thursday and I'm just getting over the soreness.

The fiber show is still not quite taking off, we have a new month and almost every vender we've petitioned has said Umm...I don't thinks so, we're gonna be really busy that month/weekend. No vendors no fiber festival.

I bought a new car almost two weeks ago and it still isn't here. I'm also finding out the gas mileage is very affected by the A.C. as well as whether I take the highway or not. It doesn't even look like I will be getting the color I want.

It has been HOT and then raining, then HOT and Humid, then raining, then... well you get the picture.

My lace shawl is a monument to fixing stitches without ripping out rows. I had gotten to row 7 in a 10 row pattern only to find that I had made mistakes in the previous pattern row, (which would explain why I ran short on the stitches) so now I'm still at row 7 two weeks after I started. That doesn't include the 5 rows of garter stitch on the bottom.

School starts in two weeks and the money sitch is weird! My husband was told last Friday that he had 6 weeks of work left, and this is after He just bought a brand new car.

I haven't slept well for days and tomorrow I get paid, pick up my daughter from Fremont and then we go to the Iowa state fair with some friends. I hope we have fun. I feel as wound up as a clock and I don't know how to let go.

Damn the torpedoes..Full steam ahead! I think I'll go spin some wool.