Sorry it has been so long since I’ve posted.  As you know, I’ve been a tad busy.  So, here’s your quick catch up!

All the way back in April (as you obviously know) I had a wonderful, wonderful time visiting your workplace and meeting and speaking so many of your colleagues and co-workers.  So many good memories and ideas from that visit!  The Navy let me hang around for a few more days so I could do some outreach for them — speaking to a number of groups in academia and youth development.  (My favorite was the time I spent with about 60 3rd-8th graders talking about women in technology.  Ten year-olds really keep you on your toes!!) 

It was great that the trip included Yarnover weekend.  Vendors, classes with Chris Bylsma, Mary Scott Huff and Susanna Hansson, and of course, time with you meant for fantastic fun!  (For our readers, no, the picture on the lower left is not one of us.)  I loved the chance to visit StephenBe’s and to enjoy the sensory overload that is his world.

And then, right after I returned to the DC area, I had the chance to take a class with Brenda Dayne of the Cast-On podcast.  She is as lovely as you would expect from her podcast.  I thoroughly enjoyed having the chance to get to know her a bit — witty, smart, funny and engaging.  She’d fit right in to any group that you and I put together, that’s for sure.

The class project was the Mrs. Beeton wristers.  I went against recommendations on my accent yarn choice (purchased at Yarnover!), but I’m very happy with it.  Future versions should include a modification to accomodate the lack of elasticity in the Seduce (rayon, linen, silk and nylon blend).  The minor problem is that without the “sproing” the knitted ruffle works up to a depth that is a bit too long.  It hides the inner ruffle knitted out of the main yarn, a superwash merino sock yarn.  I do love the contrast in texture though…even more so than for the versions of Mrs. Beeton worked with the recommended yarn types.  The simple fix will be to modify the ruffle pattern to lose just a few rows and that will be very easy.

Things are definitely popping up all over the farm these days. That gazebo I mentioned is firmly situated across from the house — bedding plants to come.  And I’ve got fairy ring mushrooms, knock out roses, peas, melons, corn, wildflowers, onions and spinach coming along very nicely!

Our tenants are doing well too.  I thought the chickadee had abandoned her nest in the birdhouse and opened it to make sure.  Surprise!  She was right there.  I quickly snapped a picture and closed it back up.  She didn’t twitch a bit and the next day was still sitting her clutch.  I was relieved I hadn’t frightened her by the rude intrusion.  The eggs above our front windows have hatched (see the tail sticking out?) and the babies are making a mess of things.  (That’s okay, we know how to use a scrub brush.)  And the purple finch who nested in the holly bush just outside our back door has laid a nice little trio of beautiful blue eggs with little black speckles.  I caught this photo while she was out taking advantage of the bird feeders.

I’ve put some time in at the spinning wheel and now have 3 very full bobbins of alpaca/tussah silk singles.  I’ll be doing some trial plying of these to see how I want to finish them.  I’m hoping two-ply will yield a heavy sock weight or light DK. 

The alpaca fleece that I ordered from Morro Fleece Works arrived this past Saturday and it is incredibly lush!  I was so glad I had an extra bobbin at the ready and on Sunday I sat down and spun up about 4 1/2 ounces.  Like buttah!  The roving drafted like an absolute dream — the closest to the zen of spinning that I think I’ve experienced.  It’s a semi-worsted spin with a lot of energy.  I want to test out how a highly spun and highly plied alpaca behaves in a fabric.  I love this color and this fleece so much that I’d really like to use it for the Knitmore SPAKAL, but am smart enough to know I need to figure out the lack of elasticity issue before I knit an entire sweater out of it!  (By the way, I’m seriously considering Mishke by Julie Weisenberger.  Yes, she seems to have both of our attentions!

Before I say goodbye, I want to share the helmet liner I knit for my trusted assistant.  He is heading off to Afghanistan for a year to command an Air Force communications squadron over there.  I wanted him to stay warm, a small token of my appreciation for all the hard work he did for me over the last few years.  He loved it…can you see the smile?  His last day is tomorrow.  We’ll all be sorry to see him go.  Good luck, Mike!

That’s it — next post will be sooner and shorter.  I promise!

Love, Jan

As you are well aware, this last weekend was Shepherd’s Harvest, the biggest fiber festival in the Twin Cities area.  Four barns plus some freestanding tents of vendors, sheep, alpacas, goats and bunnies, classes and fleece sales all combine to make one of my favorite events.

I took 3 great classes.  The first, taught by Dee Heinrich of Peeper Hollow Farm, was on sheep color genetics.  Awesome, awesome, awesome.  Looking at the photos of lambs and figuring out their possible genetics was like sudoku on hooves.

The second was a photography class with Gale Zucker.  Yes, this is the second class I’ve taken with Gale, but now that I’ve been applying some of her wisdom I was ready to absorb a bit more.  Like how changing the exposure setting on your camera can make a big difference in picture quality in general, and how lowering it as much as a full f-stop can allow you to actually capture black yarn in particular.  The picture below shows the results of decreasing the exposure setting (with no other editing of the photo after it is downloaded).

My last class was taught by Carol Wagner of Hidden Valley Farm & Woolen Mill.  We played with fiber blending, color blending, and color layering.  A total blast, and I’m afraid it may have pushed me toward doing some dyeing.

It definitely pushed me toward buying one of her Coopworth fleeces.  The fiber we worked with in class was so lofty and lustrous.  I also bought a pound of raw Rambouillet just to compare that fine stuff to the stronger Coopworth.  A Rambouillet lock  is on the left below, the Coopworth to the right.

In between coming and going to the festival, I did get a little knitting done.  I’ve gotten a start on another test knit - this one for Erica.  Her spiral shawl is a great travel project, at least at this size, as the pattern is simple increases in a stockinette ground.

And I haven’t forgotten the big event of the summer.  I’ve gotten a start on my sweater to wear to your retirement.  The pattern, Paulina by Julie Weisenberger, is much lovelier than this bit of sleeve suggests.

All in all, I’m ending the weekend smiling.

Love,

Ellen

I am still catching up on work and home since the big Yarnover/FiberFest weekend.  Part of that includes posting the beginnings of some projects that resulted from classes we took.

I admit.  I really didn’t expect to get tons out of Susanna Hansson’s Off the Cuff class, taught at StevenBe’s on Sunday.  It seemed more of an excuse to spend time with you and Susanna.  What I forgot to take into account is that this was one of Susanna’s classes. She never just gives you a pattern tutorial - she gives you history and context and little ideas along the way that make it all go so much easier.  Photos of early use of the beaded pulse warmers, books from Europe and Japan showing modern designs, and the concept of using bead gauge instead of counting beads - all made the price of entry well worthwhile.

Not to mention the product.  I’m very amused by these, knit out of Madelinetosh Tosh Light (merino wool) and beaded with size 8 lime green lined beads from Matsuno.

Ditto on Monday’s class for a Domino Scarf also taught by Susanna.  Simple project, great history of modular knitting, current context of  domino and modular knitting, fabulous examples, and many tips and tricks.  I incorporated our Habu yarn tasting class from Friday into this - while most of these scarves have been knit with a kid mohair/silk lace yarn like Kidsilk Haze, I opted to go with the Habu A-20 silk/stainless steel blend.

And again, the product is amusing me to no end.

One more project to share - one that was begun without my knowledge.  I dallied in removing the Christmas wreath from the front door, making the perfect real estate for family of house finches.

Watching this project progress is sure to be very amusing, as well.

I hope your weekend was amusing, and the week to come is excellent.

Love,

Ellen

After our wild weekend of wool, I settled in for a quiet spin last night.  I filled most of a bobbin before a small calamity arose - a lost end, gone in the wooliness that is my woolen spun Columbia fleece.

Happily, I had a bit of a lifeline.  I don’t recall where I saw this tip, but I’m glad I did see it and put it into practice.  I fill my bobbins from one end to the other, and rather than work my way back to the other end of the bobbin, I move immediately to the far end and work my way back.  See what happens?  You get a strand of yarn running roughly perpendicular across the wound singles upon which you wind your next course.

And when you permanently lose an end, you never have to cut back more than to that perpendicular thread.  I barely lost any at all here.

One more storage bobbin filled, and disaster averted.

I hope you enjoy your Brenda Dane class tonight, and that you report on it soon!

Love,

Ellen

I told you I was a bona fide test knitter some time ago; now I can reveal the test knit!  It is the Woman’s Cardigan from the new book WearWithAll, published by a group of active knitting and designing friends from one of my LYS’s.  Edited for clarity: the pattern for this sweater is not my design, I simply test knit it as part of the editing process of the book.  My sweater doesn’t appear in photos in the book, but may go on any trunk shows in the next few months.

Knitting this sweater in just 4 weeks on size 3 needles (the pattern calls for 4’s, I’m a loose knitter (not in THAT way!) was surprisingly fun.  Who’d have thought miles of stockinette in a fine gauge would be lovely.  The secret - gorgeous yarn (Kidsilk Haze).  Hmm, reminds me of knitting Bohus sweaters!  Another secret - a simple, elegant design and pattern.

I’m very happy with the way it turned out.  When it returns home to me after touring with the book, I will really enjoy wearing it.

You can read the story of the rest of the book here, and we will do our best to get our hands on a copy of the book this weekend.

This weekend!  And it starts tomorrow, really, when I pick you up after work.  Sure, we both have to work the rest of the week, but I suspect it will be a much more interesting week than recent ones, for me, anyway.

Love,

Ellen

One doesn’t typically think of Ohio being a state with tremendous natural beauty, but if you’ve ever spent a spring weekend in the southeastern part of the state, your mental images will shift from corn fields and steel mills to rocky cliffs and wildflowers.  Hocking Hills State Park, just outside of Logan, is the epicenter of the lovely, and Helen, Neil, and Leila joined us there last weekend.

The beauty of the park ranges from delicate wildflowers…

…to magnificent rock formations.

The light feels liquid as it flows into the gorges, lighting up the ferns and mosses…

…and falling on well-loved faces.

I  found this shot of sisters laughing together to be especially beautiful.

So wonderful, so quickly gone.

At least you will be replacing it in just a couple of days!

Love,

Ellen

I believe that sometimes the body just takes over and tells you to slow down.  I woke up this morning feeling a bit of malaise which grew to a lot of malaise, coupled with some minor chills and lack of interest in food.  Coupled with a dank and rainy day, no real agenda, and a companionable cat, I had no choice but to go back to bed, from which I’ve just gotten up at 5:30 pm.

If this wave of minor illness had hit me during the week I likely would have muscled through it.  If it had hit next weekend, your visit and all the yarny activities would not have been as much fun.  And if it had been beautiful outside, I would have felt a bit more guilty at burrowing under the covers.  It certainly could have been worsted worse.

The brown merino from the Wool Gatherings sampler pack not only could have been (and, in fact, was) worsted, it could have been (and, indeed, also was) woolen.  I spun it up both ways, directly from the top for true worsted and after carding some rolags for true woolen.

Here is the top on the left and the rolags on the right.  The fiber was nicely prepared and spun easily, but I was surprised to find dark and light kemp fibers in a merino.  You can spot one of the dark fibers in the picture of the top.  Perhaps the natural colored merinos are not as uniform as the white ones.

And the resulting yarn from left to right - woolen 3-ply, worsted 3-ply, woolen 2-ply, and worsted 2-ply.  Note how the fluffy woolen yarn actually looks lighter in color because it is so airy.

I won’t move on to another breed from this set until you catch up with Jocelyn and me.  Maybe you want to select the next one?  I’m skipping the Lincoln Longwool, which Joce has already done, as I gifted that fiber to a friend.

More later,

Ellen

I’m bushed!  We’ve managed to cram 3 days into 2 again.  I should sleep well tonight!

The pups took it a little easier.  Max lolled about on the porch.

Ruby found a nice cool spot in the shade of the wall.  All the while I was working in the garden which I am happy to say is all in except for some plants that are yet to be…the seeds are planted in a seed starter.  They should be ready for planting by June.

Dale was preparing the ground for receipt of his new gazebo.  Never let your husband go to a mud sale alone.  Yes, these two facts are related.  It will be delivered on this coming Saturday.  Once in place we’ll decide if we want to paint it or just stain it.  The plan is to surround it with rose bushes and put flowering vines at the base of each pillar.  Should be lovely come wedding time.

Another new home builder took residence next door.  This little black capped chickadee has a nest inside the birdhouse that Chris and Jim gave us for Christmas.

I also accomplished a few things in the knitting world.  The Aloha Onesie is finally done — though I still need to wrap it and get it on its way to Hawaii.

I think I found the perfect buttons for the blue and white cotton yarn.

And the snaps at the crotch worked well too.  I redid many parts of this, so it ended up taking far longer than I expected, but I’m glad I took the time.  Next time I do the pattern (which I do like a lot), I’ll be armed with the modifications I made…if I actually put them in my project page instead of just counting on remembering them.

I also knocked out a quick dishcloth.  (We really needed one!)  It’s a simple eyelet pattern broken up by garter ridges.  The ridges are in yellow and the pattern in a color called creamsicle.  I was amused that they gave 3 different languages for yellow on the ballband, only two for creamsicle.  The first in english and the second — who knows, it said creamsicle too, but was Italicized.  Do you think they think Italian might just be italics?  Take a look at the lower left corner.  I have noticed that using the Neatby bind off method tends to cause the bind off to lean forwards.  It makes sense given the method.  I’ve also noticed that when using it to bind off in purl it leans backwards.  So, I decide to try to alternate knit and purl bind offs to see what would happen.  The 3 stitches on the right were all bound off knitwise.  The 3 stitches on the left were bound off alternating knitwise and purlwise.  I like the way they line up right on the edge and now that I’ve tried this on a dishcloth will do it on other projects too!

Last, I’ve got 4 ounces of a wonderful suri alpaca/merino/silk blend waiting patiently on a bobbin.  It’s waiting for me to spin the other 8 ounces that I have.  Dale is working on making me a bobbin winder for use with weaving bobbins.  He also came home from the mud sale with 3 old sewing machines so he can use the motors and presser foot controllers.  Should be slick.

I’m going to sign off now — still too many things to do before bed!  No kidding!

Love, Jan

Although I did not have a 3 lb. mile chocolate rabbit for Easter, the day was filled with many of my favorite things.

As you’ve likely noted, I’ve been on a birdwatching bent of late, and I was treated to a good deal of entertainment by our feathered friends.  The cardinal was particularly stunning. 

I finished up the fronts to Fooling Around on April Fool’s Day.  I decided to get them and the back to blocking while I work on the sleeves.  I’m hoping to have this sweater ready in time for Yarnover.  If I keep having to tink and rip, that may be a problem.  It’s really not a difficult pattern, but I seem to be knitting with half a brain as of late.

A recent addition to my repertoire is roasted seaweed.  I have really become fond of kale chips and when I tried these I realized they were easily as tasty, just as healthy, and completely free of risk that I might be making kale charcoal.  (Yes, the curse of the burnt rolls seems to extend to kale chips, at least in my case.)  At 60 calories in an entire package, these fit in my diet plans very nicely.  They are a bit high in sodium, but my blood pressure is low, my consumption of water is high, and I don’t eat a whole package in one seating.

And my favoritest thing of all?  Well, you could have guessed it, I’m sure.

Love, Jan