Albert Einstein was an alpaca farmer

Small victories

2010-01-15T02:19:00.000-08:00

I broke the big toe on my right foot. I broke the hell out of it. The first doc who looked at my xrays said that it's "ugly". So, I'm in a boot for a month while we wait to see if the chunk of bone I broke off reattaches itself or if I get a pin in my toe. Because of this, my wool is still in disarray. I only have 4 days left of winter break, so I think I'm going to fail, once again, at getting my yarn organized prior to going back to school. At least it's not really my fault this time.

Because of my stupid foot, I can't work out like I planned, can't get to the eye doctor (probably not my foot's fault, but I'm sticking with the excuse), and can't get my house under control. I can, however, type, so I finally wrote an article about spinning that I've been trying to put together for several years. It's not much, but it's my small victory.

2010-01-08T17:39:00.000-08:00

Freaking moths.

I'm still dealing with the drama of the moths. Out of paranoia, I decided to empty the bedroom completely in order to make sure that every speck of dust was eradicated. First, I packed up all of the yarn and wool. Luckily, I'm not a complete slacker/idiot and I had two 30 gallon bins that were properly stored and therefore not affected. All other yarn in the room was packed into trash bags and put on the back porch until I could deal with it. I think I pulled about 50 lbs of wool out of the room.

At this point, I began freaking out. The best way I knew of to kill moths was to do the freeze, thaw, repeat process, and my freezer is tiny. If I wanted to keep ice and food in my freezer, it would take me months to treat all of this crap. Fortunately, I turned to Ravelry where I was told that you can use dry ice to kill the evil little bugs.

I bought a few more Rubbermaid tubs at Target and dry ice at the grocery store. The article with the information on fumigation suggested that you need 1-1/2 lbs of dry ice to fumigate a 30 gallon bag of wool. I started with 1/2 lb per 18 gallon tub of wool. I wasn't able to find many reports of dry ice use from other knitters, so I was somewhat concerned that the wool might be damaged if it touched the ice. I decided to put yarn that I'm not in love with directly on top of the ice just to be safe.

After a few hours, there didn't seem to be enough in the way of CO2, so I threw another 1/2 lb in each tub. The ice wasn't melting much either. I dragged all of the tubs into the living room so the ice would melt faster and duct tapped around the tubs to seal them better (the lids on these things suck more than I thought).

Then, on Wednesday, Mother Nature gave us a bit of a cold front. The temperature dropped down to 10 below, so I put the tubs back outside just in case. There is no such thing as overkill when it comes to moths.

I've began unpacking the wool this evening. I planned to rewash everything in Kookaburra wool wash, but now I'm starting to rethink that. Washing all of this wool is going to be a massive pain in the ass and it doesn't seem entirely necessary. The wool wasn't harmed by the dry ice at all, so I think I'll be fine if I just start packing everything up into freezer bags.

Unfortunately, I won't know if this method was effective until some time has passed. I'm going to be cautious with how the wool is packed and inspect it pretty regularly to make sure things still look ok. If I'm still moth free in a few months, I guess it worked. I really hope it does because the dry ice seems like the easiest way to deal with this much wool.

Reviving the blog/FRAKING MOTHS!!!!

2009-12-29T02:13:00.001-08:00

Since I've converted to Facebook, I've somewhat abandoned blogging. Ok, I abandoned it altogether. Facebook just isn't the correct format for sharing more than a tidbit of information at a time, so I am reviving this blog. Be afraid, be very afraid.

And now, the drama of the m*ths.

So, I started the annual attempt to get the stash under control and I found evidence of moths. OMGWTFBBQ!!!!!!! I live in freaking COLORADO!!!!!! We don't have a major moth issue here. I've never even seen moth eaten garments! I've even been extra careful and stored my wool with cedar chips and lavender. But still, FREAKING MOTHS!!!!!!!

Luckily, the moths only seem to have damaged a small portion of my unspun wool, most of which sould be salvageable. Unfortunately, I appear to have 60+ lbs of wool and yarn in my bedroom alone which I must now quarantine and deal with. Add to that the epic sty that my bedroom is, and we have a serious issue.

All wool and yarn is getting bagged and put on the back porch. All cloths, books, and random crap must be removed. Everything must be washed. Everything must be vacuumed. I'm panicked and overwhelmed.

Of course, my loving husband thought I was completely overreacting until I informed him that his Doctor Who scarf is made of wool and, therefore, in danger. "They can't have my scarf!" he said. "I love it more than anything else in this room. Well, except you." Now he shares my horror. He has come to the dark side. MUAHAHAHA!!!

I never thought I would be hoping for some seriously cold weather, but I could really use some right now. If I could use my back porch as a freezer, that would seriously speed up the de-mothing process. This is going to be a royal pain in the arse. Wish me luck.

Doin' the happy FO dance!

2009-01-05T22:49:00.000-08:00

I finished the replacement kitty hat today. I'm happy with how it turned out, not that it's a very challenging pattern or anything. The first kitty hat (seen on your right) had a very good life. It went to college in New York for 3 years, and even visited Ireland for a few months, but it has seen the end of it's days. Well, the end of it's days as my sister's hat since she washed it and it's about the right size for a six year old child. Not that she didn't continue to wear it, it just looked pretty silly. When I was out there in November, she was wearing the poor old kitty had around, and it doesn't even cover her ears now.

Fortunately, I had 3 more skeins of kitty hat yarn in my stash, so I was able to kint a replacement for my sis. I'm a much better knitter now, so I think it turned out better. I had to modify it a bit, but I think it's better than the original. I think my sis is going to give the original kitty hat to one of the elementary school kids that she reads to every week. They are in 3rd grade, so the shrunken hat should fit perfectly.

My sister looks totally thrilled about the hat, I know, but she really does dig it. We are just the opposite of photogenic most of the time. That and very very sarcastic.

The pattern I used for this hat can be found at http://www.kittyville.com/knit/kitty_hat.html

Modifications (that I remember):
Used Mauch Chunky yarn on size 8 needles
CO 72 stiches (so it was aprox 18" around rather than 22" or whatever)
Pick up 14 stiches rather than 12 for the ears because everyone thought they were too small
Forget the pom-poms because I'm lazy and I don't think the first one had them

Changes I would make in the next one: I think the ears could be double knit so they stand up better. Maybe decrease the ear flap CO along with the original CO because the ear flaps are friggin' huge!

And I just remembered that I left a stitch marker in the darn thing. I wonder how long it will be in there before she notices? It kind of blends in, so it could be a while.... maybe I won't say anything just to see if it's still there at graduation.

New years resolutions

2009-01-03T17:43:00.000-08:00

I never do this, but I feel the need to make some resolutions for 2009. Here goes nothing:

In 2009, I resolve to:
1. Spend less time on Warcraft than I do on wool related activities or school. This means I probably ought to keep it under 20 hours a week. (The fact that I'm trying to limit myself to 20 hours a week is pretty darn sad, but we'll address this at a later date)
2. Keep the stash organized. No more leaving half finished projects in the living room if they aren't actively being worked on. No more wool in the dining room. No more wool in the kitchen unless it's in the process of being dyed.
3. Photograph my work,. Seriously, how the heck am I supposed to sell things if I don't photograph them? This is just plain lazy.
4. Sell the Ashford and the mystery wheel. I haven't spun on the Ashford in over a year, and I've never spun on the mystery wheel. They must go.
5. Cull the stash. It's out of control and currently dominates the bedroom. If I've had it a year and I haven't spun it yet, it needs to go.

6. Work on my fake hair business. I'm talented with the whole fake hair thing (seriously, here's me with green hair) and I really need to focus more on it. I love making hair, and it's why I started spinning in the first place.

Ok, I think this is a pretty good start, now for some WoW ;-)

A fleece is a learning experiance

2008-07-19T10:07:00.000-07:00

I bought a beautiful CVM fleece at the Estes Park Wool Market. The fleece is absolutly gorgeous. It came from a 2 year old ram who was coated. The fleece didn't really smell bad at all and was very clean, so I figured it would be easy to wash (unlike my last targhee fleece). I noticed that there were some second cuts when I picked it, but it didn't look too bad to me, and the wool was so nice I figured I could deal. Turns out that there were a lot. That's where this fleece's lesson was learned:

Pick out the second cuts before washing or dying. It's a pain, but do it anyway because it sucks less than trying to pick them out after washing. I seriously just spent roughly 4 hours flick carding CVM locks to get the neps out. I only made it through like 8oz of fiber. The fiber is so soft that I don't want to spin anything else, but still, major pain in the ass. The hour spent digging through sticky fleece to pull out the second cuts is a much better use of time.

LYS Review - Posh, A Yarn Boutique

2008-04-25T13:31:00.000-07:00

I was in Posh today, and I thought I should offer up a review for others who may not have made it over there. I was never in the old location, but I've been in the new one a couple of times. It's a reasonable drive from my office, so I head over there for some lunch hour retail therapy every so often.

The store is located on Tennyson street in the cute redeveloped arts district. The store is on the east side of the street. The signage isn't all that great, so you kind of have to know where you are going, but it's next door to a yoga place, if that helps any.

The shop is kind of small, but they make good use of the space they have. They also carry a limited supply of roving for us spinning types (this is where I found my new spinning obsession: Fleece Artist Silk/Merino Silver. OMG YUM). The selection isn't uber or anything, but I've been able to find yarn for every project I've had in mind so far. They also have a lot of samples around, which are super inspiring (Gods, I wish I could knit faster).

The owner of the shop is a lady named Sylvia. She's super nice and helpful. Each time I've been in there, she's been totally willing to pull books to look up patterns, or even hop on Ravelry to check out a yarn requirement. She seems to have found that perfect balance that we all search for in yarn shop service; helpful but not in your face; permissive of yarn fondling but not too aloof; etc. The prices in the store are also very reasonable. I've really only comparison shopped on the roving, but the prices were very comparable to what you find online.

All in all, I would have to say that Posh is a great little store. So great, in fact, that I drove about 10 miles out of my way just to buy yarn from Sylvia today. :) If you live in or near Denver and haven't visited yet, you really should.

And so, I leave you with some things I've spun from the roving I bought at Posh:

Aprox 40 wpi silk/merino singles

Navajo Plied silk/merino

Spinning with class

2008-03-04T20:55:00.000-08:00

I'm taking the spinning 2 class at Shuttles Spindles & Skeins in Boulder. Maggie is the teacher and she is amazing. Her knowledge of fibers and spinning technique is awe inspiring.
This week for home work we're supposed to spin up some singles to practice plying technique in the next class. The fiber we're working with is kind of coarse compared to what I usually spin, but it has a pretty nice sheen to it. Maybe it's corridale? I guess Ill find out on Thursday.

I finaly found my camera so I could take some pics of the color. This ball is actually sepreate lengths of each color wadded up because they look cool together. I took lengths off of different colors at random and spun it into a quick and dirty worsted single. 'm guessing that it landed around 14 wpi in most places. I found this fiber pretty hard to spin evenly. The final product will probably be pretty interesting looking.

Now for the hard part; I need to practice spinning to "bumps per inch". In class, all I could get was 4.

Winston Otis can not allow mama to take pictures of yarn without noseing his way into a picture. :)

The more I play with these pictures, the more I think I'm beginning to dislike the blogger interface. I think I might go back to LJ with my fiber blog.

2008-03-01T17:42:00.000-08:00

I guess I should post about the hat a bit in case I have to make another one someday or otherwise have to reference the pattern.

I'm making this thing for Barry who is a big red wings fan. (I know, Red Wings suck). He's from Detroit, so I figured he had a good excuse. Anyway, he saw this hat on ebay and wanted one like it in red and white. I didn't think it looked all that hard, so I said I would make one for him. I didn't have a pattern so I just started.

Here's what I've been doing so far:

CO 120 sts in Red
k2p2 until it measures 7.5"
switch to white
Decide that ribbing is for the birds and start knitting in stockinette.

I think it's going to work out. I'd post a pic but I have no idea where my camera is *pout*

Schacht update

2008-01-30T18:37:00.000-08:00

I received a call from Schacht this morning and they finally looked at my wheel. They wanted to make sure I was cool with paying the repair price and get my cc#. Then they called about 2 hours later saying that I could pick it up anytime. I wanted to pick it up anytime last Monday. Now I don't know how the hell I'm going to get up there to get it.

At least the repairs were only $96. I'll post details once I get my wheel back

ETA: Lost the receipt things, so I will not be posting details. C'est la vie.

Schacht: A small rant

2008-01-28T12:31:00.001-08:00

I'm kind of frustrated right now.

I purchased a Schacht matchless ST in July from a vendor at Ren Fest. It had seen better days (it's 18 years old) and needs some work. No big, it was super cheap. The wheel wobbles because of a missing screw and a small wooden piece on the upright probably has to be replaced. No big deal. I live in Denver and the Schacht factory is in Boulder, so I figured I'd just run it up there one day and get it fixed.

So six months go by and I can't find the time to get up there during the week (the factory closes at 4:30 and I have to work till at least 5). Plus, it's about a 45 min - 1:15 drive depending on traffic, and I just can't take 2-3 hours out of my work day for the round trip. I contemplated shipping it up there, but the price to get it shipped back was pretty high. This somewhat annoyed me because if I can ship it via DHL to Boulder with $900 insurance for under $20, why should it cost them $60 to ship it back? But whatever. I just needed to get a day off to drive it up there.

Finally, my day came since my office is closed for MLK day and the Schacht factory is not. I called the factory the week before and scheduled an appointment. They asked if I could leave it up there and I let them know that I'd rather not since it's a pain to get to boulder during a work day. I'd need to pick it up the same day. They said that was fine but it would take a few hours to fix it. I told them that was no problem, I'd just go to Shuttles and blow some money in the meanwhile. The nice lady on the phone reminded me that Shuttles doesn't open until noon on Mondays and suggested a place for breakfast while I kill time. I made an appointment for 10:00 on Monday to give them plenty of time to work on my wheel.

So Monday rolls around and it freaking snows. I left my house super early so I wouldn't miss my appointment. I got up there right on time and dropped off my wheel. The lady at the front desk verified my cell number, I made sure I had cell service in Boulder, and my step-daughter and I headed off to breakfast while we waited. We killed about an hour and a half with breakfast, another hour at Target, another hour at Shuttles, and another driving around aimlessly.

Finally, around 2:30, we were getting bored. I just wanted to get my wheel and go home. I finally broke down and called the factory to get an ETA, and guess what? THEY HADN'T FREAKING LOOKED AT IT! I drug my happy ass out of bed at 8:00 on a holiday to cart my ass clear the hell to Boulder in 10 degree weather and wasted at least an hour driving aimlessly while waiting for my wheel to be done and they hadn't freaking looked at it? WTF? I thought I had made it pretty clear that I needed to pick it up the same day.

The lady I spoke with said that they were pretty backed up. She apologized and promised that my wheel would be done by Today. I was very nice about it and just chocked it up to a miscommunication. An annoying miscommunication, but whatever.

So, today I called the factory to check in. I can't really get up there today to get my wheel, but I wanted to know how much I owe them for the repair. The lady on the phone said that she'd have to check and get back to me, but sometimes it can take 2 weeks for a repair. It's now been 4 hours that I've been waiting for that call back. I'm so freaking aggravated.

New FO!

2007-12-08T18:37:00.000-08:00

My boss' birthday was a couple of weeks ago, and I had no idea what to buy him. I decided to knit him a scarf and since he wasn't in town again until this week, I was able to get away with a belated gift.

I spun about 7 ounces of alpaca fiber for this scarf. It ended up about bulky weight in most places. I had a hell of a time spinning an even single with the alpaca roving I used. I think I'm going to have to blend it with some wool if before I use it again.

Anyway, here's the fabulous scarf:

The pattern is the Men's Cashmere Scarf from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. According to the book, it was supposed to take 4-6 hours. I think I finished it in 8, so it was pretty darn quick. The only gripes I have about the pattern are:
1. It rolls like mad
2. Her finished measurements and gauge don't add up

Other than that, it was great. I will probably knit another on from myself someday.

Oh, and the boss loved it. He nearly cried. :)

knit. knit. knit. knit.

2007-11-16T20:43:00.000-08:00

This fraking scarf is driving me nuts. When I started it (IN JULY) I was all like "Oh it won't take me that long. I'll just knit 20 rows everyday and it will be done in 2 months". Whatever. It's getting cut down to the season 13 ish version because I don't think I can muster another 100 or so rows of boring ass garter stitch. If Rob says anything, I'll choke him with it.

Isis was trying to help me knit so I took a picture

And here's the stupid scarf on the back of the couch

I'm going to beg borrow or steal a knitting machine for Josh's scarf.

Drum Carder

2007-11-16T11:47:00.000-08:00

So, I broke down and bought a drum carder. Hopefully, it will be here next week. I picked a Strauch Petite since it was the least expensive of the ones I was looking at and my DH nearly had a heart attack when I showed him the price tag on the PG carder I really want. I can't wait to play with it.

2007-11-11T20:02:00.000-08:00

Dear Santa,

Let's skip the pleasantries and get straight to the point. This year for Yule I want:

An electric skein winder
~~A drum carder~~
a yarn meter thingy
Card weaving tablets
lots of fiber
An extra month of vacation time to play with my new toys

Thanks,
Kayla

Ravelry is the shit!

2007-11-01T22:20:00.000-07:00

I freaking love it. LOVE IT!!!!

I'm going to start blogging my projects more. I'm a bad blogger.

So here's a couple of pics of the infamous scarf. I'm still not finished with #1 even though I have been knitting it everywhere. It's been on 3 planes, in 3 states, to my mom-in-law-to-be's house, to a smashing pumpkins concert, etc. I'm about 80% done now. Here's a couple of pics:

2007-07-24T22:41:00.000-07:00

Yay! School is done for the summer! 3 weeks of freedom (sort of, I still have a job).

During this time I hope to:

1. finish the socks in progress
2. spin the yarn for alex's falls
3. finish the DIY combs
4. organize the stash

After this, my knitting/spinning priorities are as follows:

1. Tom Baker scarf for brother-in-law
2. Tom Baker scarf for hubby
3. Spin hot pink sock yarn for Angie
4. Knit socks for Angie

All of these must be done by Yule.

Customer's FO

2007-07-22T22:29:00.000-07:00

Amanda from BrickMillStudio posted some pics of the socks she knitted with my yarn! I'm really excited about how they turned out.

This:

Became these:

I really love the way they look. I'm so proud! I'm always nervous about my yarn.

The wool I don't like

2007-07-14T09:46:00.001-07:00

This is what my failed dye experiment ended up looking like:

Yuck. I now have 4 ounces of this. It's kind of a burgundy brown color, and I have no idea what I'm going to do with it.

2007-07-07T00:59:00.000-07:00

I have a speech due on Wednesday, and a presentation in my Econ class. So what did I do all night? Dye wool, of course.

Well, I ran out of syran wrap right before my last bit of wool, which was supposed to be red and black. I thought "why not just throw it in a pot and do that hot pour thingy?" Well, I did, and this is what I got.

Awesome! 4 ounces of failed dye experiment. My only hope is that the black ends up really black, since I have my doubts about black in a colorway. I don't know if I can make it black enough.

On the bright side, I HAVE PINK

Get it! Bright side, lol.

Thanks to LotusKnitter for helping me out with this color. I'm a very happy woman right now.

Sale!

2007-06-22T23:07:00.000-07:00

I finally posted my wicked bruise roving. I didn't get as close to the actual colors of the epic bruise as I had hoped, but it looks cool as hell. If this doesn't sell soon, it's becoming the front flap of a purse.

Also, it's my Golden Birthday on Monday (25 on the 25th) so I'm doing a 25% off sale in my ETSY shop.

This one time, at Speech class

2007-06-22T23:01:00.000-07:00

I'm finally taking Public Speaking. So far, this class hasn't been too bad. Especially because it gave me an excuse to show off my spinning wheel.

We had to give demonstrative speeches for the last class. I knew right away what I would talk about, but I had no idea what a hit it would be. I'm in a class with a bunch of thug guys, so I figured I'd bore the hell out of them.

I started off by talking about the historical importance of spinning and showing off a little bit of my hand dyed roving. Everyone was being polite and kind of paying attention. Then I busted out my drop spindle for a demonstration. I explained how to tie on a leader and the basics of drafting, then I went for it. The overall reaction was "woah!". Everyone was totally enthralled with my spinning. I had no idea that non-knitters would find this so interesting.

I freaking love wool.