The Answer is Socks... And Rain

Today was cool and rainy. A perfect day for knitting and a movie. I watched Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with Thing One and worked on her socks.

I'm having to adjust the pattern - apparently I counted wrong on my gauge swatch (you know, the one I didn't do - I just started knitting the socks and stopped after a while and counted stitches and rows). There's no way that sock isn't going to be too long if I do 30 rounds of increases like I'm supposed to... but even so, I'm having ton of fun.

I've decided to make socks for everyone! Thing Two and DH and me. DH says he doesn't care about the pattern - I had been thinking of doing something with cables for him - but since he doesn't care, I'll stick with the plain old socks like I'm making for the Things. DH's feet tend to get hot, but these will be winter socks, so they need to be a little warm. I chose the Naiad in Espresso Roast. I figure the 70% Superwash merino will make them warm, the 10% nylon will keep them tough, and the 20% Bamboo will help wick moisture away. I hope. I bet he loves it, but i do hope it looks a little more brown than the gray that's in the picture.


Thing Two has a serious passion for red and black. I had originally thought the Ruby, Ruby Dragon sock would be best for the color, but I wasn't sure the yarn, 100% Merino, would be as durable as in the Djinni Sock, which has nylon mixed in for durability, so that's what we landed on. Thing Two put some serious holes in the last pair of socks I knitted him.

For myself, I chose the Crack In The Wall in Djinni. I know it'll be just like Thing One's socks, and I like the way it feels. Also, I love the colors. And, there's the thing about it being Djinni sock yarn for Djinn. And I'm pretty darn sure the color name is a reference to Dr. Who, which I also completely dig. I'm thinking some kind of lace. Just a little bit. Probably, I'll pick a pattern from one of the books a friend recently gave me, or from my favorite lace stitchionary. I'm so completely psyched. ... but I have got to get back into my spinning, too, because I have got some awesome roving and new bobbins, and the beginning of an excellent support net.

Fiber-Slump, With Hope

Ever since moving up here (I'm in Maryland, near Baltimore), I've found it hard to get motivated.

First, my stash was un-findable in some box labeled "Office Stuff" - the box labeled "Yarn" had not a single thread in it. There's still a bunch of stash that is MIA, four months later. I'm pretty sure that there's a box that didn't make it from Georgia.

Then, I was incredibly fortunate to be gifted a spinning wheel - something I always wanted to get into. I got books, and I got into spinning. A little. But it's hard. It's not singing to me yet. And I'm getting frustrated.

Then, there was this God-awful heat wave. There's no central air in this house, though we have window units in the bedrooms, but there's no chair in my bedroom. It is awfully hard to get excited about putting your hands in yarn or roving when it's 87 degrees inside.

Apparently, I'm not the only one facing a yarn-slump. Looking for inspiration, looking for a song, I picked up a copy of Knit ' Style, only to find, in nice big letters on page 18, "A Knitting Slump," an article by Jack Lewis, who seems to be facing the same problem.

Attending the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival was a temporary fix, like a addict, having one hell of a binge weekend.

While there, I picked up a skein of Djinni Sock Yarn from Dragonfly Fibers. I had to, you see, as I often go by Djinn on the interwebs. There aren't many of us that spell it that way. It's a gorgeous mix of greens (Thing One's favorite color) with tiny spots of rust here and there. I'm using the basic pattern from the book Two-At-A-Time Toe-Up Socks and really like it, so far. It's the least-painful sock method I've found yet, but it's still going slowly. I'll post gleeful pictures about the whole process of these socks later, in a much happier post. Hopefully seeing those socks on Thing One's feet will perk me right up. Also, my spidey-senses are tingling; I have a feeling I'll be knitting for a special occasion very soon.

Lamps

After discovering that my bedside table lamp was not, in fact, packed up with my lamp shade last night when I really wanted to read in bed - just 5 minutes! - with minimal disturbance to DH, I resolved to go through the unpacked boxes again and find the rest of my lamp get a new lamp. So I was thinking about lamps today, and craftiness and knitting.

First I found a really gorgeous decoupage how-to. I'm so going to make this. Only, you can't get the required  Grono lamps, except by physically going to an Ikea, and I'm not prepared for a 3-hour shopping trip within the next two weeks. I checked Target, they don't have cheaper more available knock-offs. Maybe I'll gather all the supplies and host a party, like the Painted Fish Studio people did, and we can all decorate lamps together. Or something. Someday.

Then, I saw this really nice lace candle-holder mason jar cover. And that's great. I'll make that, too. But I want to read, and DH is convinced I'll set the house on fire with all my candles, anyway. He'd totally not go for nightly bedroom candle-lighting.

So. I need lamp guts, and some kind of frame for the shade. There are two ideas in my head:

1) Use the 6" outer diameter Plexiglass tube from these nice folks. Use a hot something-metal (screw-driver?) to make a little hole for the cord, and glue or melt in the lamp guts. Consider sanding the inside of the tube (or the outside - does it matter?) to soften the light. Knit a cover for that. I think it'd be really pretty, like a combination between the candle cover and the Grono lamp decoupage. The challenge would be getting the lamp guts stuck in.

2) Use a wire frame, like the one to the left, that I'd order from these other folks, and knit around that. I'd have to order lamp guts, probably here, and hope that they all fit (or can be made to fit) together. The plus side is, I think it'd be easier to add some feet to the frame (to give the cord room to slide out the bottom) and add lamp guts to this, than it would be to trick out the Plexiglass tube. The down-side is that, other than the yarn, there's nothing to soften the light.

I think the cost is roughly the same ($15ish) for the wire frame as for the plastic tube. I can steal the lamp guts from the lamp that's still in a box somewhere (I never liked it anyway), if I ever find the rest of the lamp, or buy new guts like I mentioned above. I think, either way, I had better assemble the guts and the lampshade frame before I start knitting, or I'll finish the knitting and not want to do the rest.

Crappy Yarn

I made super-crappy yarn! But it's recognizable as yarn, not just roving wrapped around the bobbin, which is what I had before! And I made it!

So, turns out you're supposed to pinch the yarn as the wheel spins. This means that the fly wheel will continue to revolve around the bobbin, and the bobbin will turn because the fly wheel is. When there's enough twist in it, then you let go, at which point your scotch tension keeps the bobbin from spinning, allowing the yarn to wrap around the bobbin. I think.

First Real Day With Spinning

So, this is what I posted on FaceBook, with the addition of nifty hyperlinks (I may have been just a teensy bit steamed when I posted it. Husband was not amused):


Husband threw away (!!!) the cord I had set aside for my drive ... thingie. Not a shaft. A drive... cable. Thing. So, I'm using some Cascade 220 I had, spare (no such thing, but, whatever), and it's not working very well. And I think my ratio is all hosed. And there's not nearly enough twist in the fibers before they get wrapped around the bobbin. And I definitely need one of those orifice hook thingies, because my pipe-cleaner is getting worn out. And the AlpacaDirect video mentioned oiling the leathers and I don't even know what that is, much less did my $35 (read: thirty-five-goddamned-dollar) Ashford spinning book even mention oil.


Plan for tomorrow: hit the internet and figure out where to get an orifice hooky thingie and drive cable stuff and whether or not I really need oil and what kind and spare bobbins and what the hell I'm doing wrong that my roving is virtually unchanged when it hits the bobbin.


 In all fairness to the spouse, if the Things had not been messing with my wheel (!!!), the drive cable stuff wouldn't have been in the floor (!!!) where it was picked up and thrown out. In all fairness to fairness, who the eff finds a bunch of cord lying near the woman's new wheel, picks it up, and throws it away?!?

This is the picture of my fly-wheel/bobbin/leathers. And the shitty twine.

I haven't called the store in Spokane (yet). I've been lazy and laundering. I'll take care of that Monday.

As I posted later in FB, I had an as-I'm-falling-asleep epiphany, and think I know some more stuff to try. I'll check some stuff in the book and hit the YouTube and re-adjust my attitude (and tension levels hehehe) and re-try. I may try lubricating with cider instead of sewing machine oil and see if that doesn't help.