"Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till its gone…
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot…ummm baa baa bap"…….

There hasn’t been much spinning happening at the Woolen Rabbit this winter.  Time has been spent either at the dye pot or knitting and my wheels have been pouting in their corners, until this week.

I received my order from CMF the other day and the colors just begged to be spun.  Yellow as bright as daffodils that have yet to poke their noses thru the soil here in the Mountains. 

I have never spun superwash merino until now and I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying it, even if the texture is very different.  Spinning it with a bit more twist than I normally would, as I get the feeling that this will bloom alot once it is wet.  I’m hoping that I am getting the right amount of twist to keep the pills away, but still soft enough that it will be comfy on the feet…..we will see.

Teyani emailed me this week after I mentioned how much I love the names on her rovings and yarn.  She thought I could probably guess she was an aging hippie….LOL.  Well grrl….I am right there with you….LOL! 

The funny thing is, my middle daughter who is graduating from college this year has discovered the music of the 60’s and early 70’s during her college experience.  As evidenced in this picture, you can see what a huge fan she is of Bob Dylan who also at one time sang Big Yellow Taxi.

Music has always been such a huge part of my life.  I can hear a song and almost pinpoint where I was in my life when I heard it….I bet alot of you can too.  One of the very first blog contests I entered was Vicky’s music questions from 1976.  That was the year I graduated from High School, so I had a blast going down memory lane with her.  This was the first and almost only contest I have ever won….haha!

Anyhoo………I LOVE the names and I LOVE the roving!  It feels good to be spinning again!

Leaving On A Jet Plane..

Speaking of music….
Cleo and I are heading out early tomorrow for a dog show in Atlanta….

For any of you wondering which picture won out for my ad….here is the picture that we went with :-).  As much as I loved the other picture, her breeder loved this one more.  I figured I should probably go with her choice as she has always done a fantastic job on this yearbook…..and heck, what do I know….LOL!

I hope you all have a GREAT weekend!

This little Swallowtail stays here with me….and yes…those nupps are always worth it!

Is this not the cutest thing ever??  This little guy is straight from Cancun, Mexico and I just love him!

Lynne hosts a special swap every other month for a small group of friends. Our current swap involves building a dream vacation for our swap partner.  My swap partner, Marisol sent me on a trip to Cancun 🙂  Come along with me….

First stop, we pick up a lovely little Mexican jewlery box and some Mexican hot chocolate with a promise of a yummy recipe via email.

Next on tap is some yummy Peet’s coffee in the Costa Rica blend.  Given that I am a huge fan of good coffee, this was cracked open immediately.  Underneath the coffee is a gorgeous calendar of Mexico….such beauty in this country.

Next stop is Vosges Haut Chocolat for some rich, dark chocolate with chili peppers and cinnamon….yum….I think that this will go really well with the margaritas we have planned after the dog show in Atlanta this weekend.

Every trip should involve color right?  Well stopping along the road to pick some flowers was just the right thing to do.  These sweet flowered stitchmarkers were tucked inside a handmade box…..just beautiful!

………I saved the best part of the trip for last :-).  Tucked in that box was a bundle of Crown Mountain Farm roving in "It Takes Two Baby" colorway.  Whoo hoo!

What a great dream vacation….Thank you SO much Marisol!

Why O’ why would anyone wrap their fingers in tinfoil?

A few weeks ago before I took my trip to Williamsburg, as a treat for losing 10 pounds, I had my nails done.   How I made it to almost 50 years without ever having as much as
a manicure surprises even me……however….

As much as I enjoyed having nice nails, I just can’t get past the feeling of something fake on my nails. That New England Yankee side of me kicked in though and I did manage to leave them on for almost 3 weeks until they got to the point where I needed to either have them filled or removed though and I opted for removing them.

As I sat down with a bottle of acetone thinking it would be easy~peasy……..let me tell you grrls……it’s not!  I spent 2 hours getting those suckers off…yikes!  Next 10 pounds, I think it is going to be just a manicure and a polish for me 🙂

The rest of my weekend was filled with better things, once finished with the barn chores.  A lot of knitting and spinning was done and finished (photos coming). In addition to the knitting, little Miss Cleo, Hannah and I went for a walk in the village, searching for the perfect place for a photo shoot.  The weather was unseasonably warm for us up here in the Mountains, which made it hard to want to stay inside.

Every year the dog club I belong to, puts out a lovely yearbook.  It just so happens that Cleo’s breeder is the editor of the yearbook and is a fantastic photographer in her own right. (but she lives in Texas).  I wanted to have just the right picture of her to make not only me happy, but her breeder proud to have bred her.

Let me tell you just how hard it is to get 12 pounds of wiggle worm to sit still for even a minute.  Over the last few months I have tried and tried…even a professional photographer tried and failed, but I think we finally were able to get 2 pictures that capture this little itchy britch’s spirit 🙂 
Now the question is….which picture do I use?   

This week I have finally found some extra time to do a little spinning on my favorite wheel.  Every now and then life gets caught up enough to just spend a little time with the wheel and the needles….it’s nice when that happens.

As I was spinning up this roving, I found I really liked the variation in the colors and want to preserve them when I am plying, so I thought I would try my hand at Navaho plying again.  I’ve never been very good at it, but after reading Margene’s successes and asking her about it privately, I’m going to give it a try this weekend.  Thanks for your helpful tips, Margene!

Frequently I like to put some mellow music on when I am spinning …not only is it relaxing, but I find that I contemplate alot when listening and spinning when my house is otherwise quiet.

As I was spinning, I was thinking about the different kinds of fiber people I have met along my way.  I have been working with fiber in a production type mode for many many years.  I was a sample aran sweater knitter for Merino Wool out of NYC when my older children were babies, I was a production machine knitter for the Betsy boutiques in New England for a spell and finally landed where I am today….trying to find a balance of doing what I love for work and still keeping it a hobby that is fun.  The day it ceases to be fun will be the day I stop. 🙂

On my journey, I have found that there seems to be 2 types of fiber producers …the givers and the takers.  The takers will ask you lots and lots of questions about how you do things, who your suppliers are, why you do something one way as opposed to another…etc, but when you reciprocate in question, your questions are never answered…..they guard their secrets very close to themselves and rarely give for fear of competition.  I have never quite understood why people do this, as I believe that each person has their own unique style that eventually shines…but I respect a person’s decision to guard if they choose.

Then there are the givers……….the above picture is some roving that I just purchased this week from CMR. (I hope Teyani doesn’t mind I snagged the picture….my roving is not here yet).  I ventured over to CMR on my friend Ann’s recommendations on her website.  She raved about how helpful the owners of this company are and the wonderful customer service….she is right, it’s great!  The roving is nothing I would normally ever be attracted to, but I love the finished  Big Yellow Taxi socks here so much that I thought I would give it a try.

Never having spun this type of roving, I wanted to be able to create the same kind of yarn so that my socks would look like these when finished, so I emailed Teyani.  She gave me some great tips and sent me to her March 12 blog entry for more tips and information. 

As I read it this morning, I thought to myself……ahhhhhhh…..she is a giver.  Someone who shares knowledge freely…a teacher.  Over the years, I have come to respect the teachers in our community, who are willing to embrace the learners.  Those who teach either freely or in the classroom setting the knowledge that they have learned in their fiber experience. 

Even though I still see myself very much as a learner, I always want to be willing to help another on this wonderful journey we call fiber artistry :-).

Imagination, song, the soaring spirit.
Separate them to know them as aspects of the whole,
Join them to know the mystery of totality.I 
Deng Ming~Dao

Did you ever have a day where you just couldn’t help but smile?  As I packed away the dyepots, lit a juicy apple candle and opened the window, I couldn’t help but smile.  The day is bright and sunny and the chimes are banging around in the wind, sharing their lovely melody……………I love days like this!

I quickly remembered this weekend why I dislike nupps.  I had cranked along pretty well with this swallowtail shawl a few weeks ago until I hit the nups and set her aside to work on a few other things.

This weekend, I figured it was time to sit with Cracklin Rosie again and work on those darn nupps.  You see, I know that I could just omit them, but I remember how worth it they were the last time I made this shawl….but oy~vey, what a PIA they are!  You can be sure this shawl is staying here this time.

To give myself and my fingers a break from the nupp frustrations periodically, I played with the dyepots in between knitting.  Having a snowy weekend, gave me a good excuse to just stay in and play with fiber.

Every now and then I will accidentally create a color that really makes me smile.  Not because I think other people will like it, but because I like it.   I had a certain vision of what I was hoping to get, which of course was nothing like what I actually got……but that’s the fun part about dyeing.  Sometimes the accidents are your best  finds.

I liked the colors so much that I quickly dyed up a few more skeins and some roving, just to see if I could recreate my faux pas again.  I smiled even more when I saw that I could.
Now the roving may not be anyone else’s cup of tea, but I can’t wait to see how the browns and greens spin up.  This goes on my big Lendrum tonight :-).

The funny thing is, before I played with the dyepots, I had been looking for something to spin on my big saxony wheel that I love.  I just couldn’t find the right roving here that this wheel deserves, so instead I sat down to my little Robin to spin on the Rhinebeck roving I have been spinning on for some time now……… I don’t know if you can tell from the picture as it is a bit blurry, but the colors in this roving are almost the same as what came out of my dyepot accidentally. 
Hmmmm……….what’s up with that?

One Down and One To Go

Rain comes, and birds…
Silhouettes against the pearlescent sky…
Respond excitedly in song.
They open their throat to heaven’s nectar.
And rhyme with the drops.
Deng Ming~Dao

We have the rain today, but I think the birds are still in Virginia…..well almost all of the birds.

One of the things that I love most about Spring is the first time I wake up in the morning and realize that the birds are back home again….when I hear their happy little voices again.  Tuesday while I was sitting at my desk working, I heard a solitary happy chirp.  It wasn’t one of our Winter bird chirpers….this one was different.  It was definitely one of our Summer chirpers!

While we were traveling down to Virginia, I noticed the birds flying in their northward pattern.  Hmmm…………..this little chirper, must be one speedy flyer to make it all the way to New Hampsire so soon 🙂

Where to begin?  The disappointment?  The pain? Do I cry?  Do I laugh?

You have seen me work periodically on my Lisa Lloyd vest.  You heard me voice my concerns about my gauge when I finished the first side.  Had I swatched?  Nope….
Should I have swatched…..yep….and the real question is…..Have I learned my lesson about swatching?
I surely hope so!

I am sure that I will be able to pull this apart and make it work, but right now having it be too snug where it should not be and too big in other spots is just too much for me to deal with out wanting to cry, so this little vest has been packed away for now.  I think I will wait until mid summer to tackle it again.  Maybe I will be a bit smaller and hopefully over the agony of defeat.  One thing for sure, I am going to order one of these~

Now on to happier things……

I am trying out a few new sock yarns that I am hoping will be a nice addition.   I thought that I would try to knit up some samples so that I know exactly what the strong points of the yarn are and maybe what some of the flaws are too.

This is a blend of merino and bamboo and so far I am really loving it.  The pattern that I am using is one of Marguerites

A few years ago, I made her old shale socks and to this date they are my all time favorites.  I love the ribbing pattern that she makes for the foot portion of the pattern.  It’s comfy on your feet :-).  I started out using a size 1 2.5 needle but quickly realized that I needed to go down to a 2.25.  Yes, THIS time I listened to that inner voice.  So far….so good!

I have also been playing with the carder and the dyepots.  This weekend, I took some Polwarth fleece that I purchased a few years ago and blended it with some pink silk/merino top.  For some reason, the combination of pink and gray has really jumped out at me this season.  They are not really my colors, although with my graying hair they could quickly become my colors….but anyhoo, I am really loving the combination.

This past week I found some great links on Cindy’s page for spinning your own sock yarn.  This is something that I have never attempted, so I am going to snag a few ounces of this roving for myself and give it a try.  The polwarth is similar in itchibility factor to merino, but a little stronger and of course silk always adds strength, so we will see.  After the vest fiasco, I think I am going to stick to smaller projects until my wounded ego feels a bit better…LOL.