It's Caturday!!

In honor of Caturday, I share pictures of my Emmy-cat:

She contemplates helping with the ironing...

 

...but decides to nap instead. It was a tough decision.

 

I don't like to iron either, so I can't blame her.

On the knitting front, I'm trying to finish several projects at once, and that obviously doesn't work well. I joined the "One Day a Week for UFOs" group on Ravelry, and I've decided Wednesday is the day to work on the Jo Sharp cabled cardigan. I've managed to finish the first sleeve, and have the ribbing and a couple of inches of the pattern done on the second sleeve. At this rate, though, I think I need another day for that particular UFO!

Remember this picture?

I never told you what it was. It was a cliffhanger, but given my sporadic blogging attempts, that was clearly a Fail. But one commenter did ask if it is an angora blend. Nope. It's 50% merino, 50% Tencel, and it's probably one of the most gorgeous rovings I've ever seen. I got this at Woolgathering from Carol Larsen at River's Edge Weaving Studio, and I believe Carol dyed and blended this herself. I snagged the last three rovings, so I have nine ounces to play with.

The thing is, what should I do with it? It's almost too beautiful to spin. I'm afraid that I'll somehow lose the lusciousness of the roving if I spin it. And what to do with nine ounces? The most obvious thing is to spin it fine for a shawl. Or I could do fingering weight for a scarf, but I'm afraid that neither of those options will do justice to this roving. Should I ply it, or will that make it muddy, and cause it to lose its unique shades? I'm in a quandary. Most of the time, I have a good idea of what I'll do with fiber when I buy it, but this has me stymied. It's so beautiful I'm afraid to touch it! And because it's a one-of-a-kind dye job, I can't get more. Help me! Don't let this wonderful lusciousness be wasted!

Things are changing in my life (well, when are they not? That's true for us all.) My hours at work have gone down even further, and given the state of my health, I'm not going to be able to go out and get a 9-to-5, or even a 1-to-4 job right now. So I'm contemplating doing handpainted and hand-dyed roving and yarn for my etsy.com shop (which has had nothing in it for the last couple of years, since I took out the sole eyelash scarf I had listed. There were only about a zillion other fashion scarves for sale at the time.) I certainly don't expect to get rich, but I have a dollar amount I need to make per month to maintain our existing budget, and I think it's doable. So I'm going to get my dye station set up in the basement and give it a go. Any suggestions for yarn, fiber, and dye suppliers are more than welcome (even though I would technically be setting up in competition with those who are in the know. Oh well.)

Speaking of health, that last med is an Epic Fail. (I so love the "Fail" concept. It says so much with just a word or two!) It's heinously expensive, so I don't want to pay for it in the first place, and it has nasty side effects beyond the zombie-inducing ones. So I'm weaning myself off that before I use up all the samples, and starting over again. And I'm going to call another doctor on Monday, who is a fibromyalgia specialist. It's time to try something else.

It took a few weeks after the "dry" Hurricane Ike went through for us to get our yard cleaned up and the tree cut down. But it was finally accomplished with the help of friends and relatives. And overseeing it all, the Rugrat:

 

She did a wonderful job of directing everyone, then took the time to do a little dog whispering.

What would we do without her?

So that's the latest from chez Spingirl.  I think I'll go cast on some li'l pink socks.

Trying to Catch Up

As I promised some of my Plurkbuds (y'all know who you are!), here are photos of the sock yarn in "Plurk" colorway that I got the other day:Ok, so that photo was washed out, but I wanted you to see the tag, so you'd know how to hunt it down. But here's a link anyway, because it's hard to see. This is the yarn in all its glory:
For the non-Plurking among us, those are the main colors of the Plurk Timeline when you join up. It's lots of fun--the wittiness of knitters is a blast. Witty knitters. What can I say?

Here are a few photos of other fun stuff I've gotten recently. I wish the true colors would show up better, because this hand-dyed fiber is out of this world. This first one, the teal and bronze colorway, is really different for me. But I absolutely loved it, so I bought all she had. Now I have about 12 ounces of it to spin, and I want to know exactly what I want to knit before I spin it, instead of just spinning it, then figuring out what to do with it. This came from here.

I'm a sucker for pink and yellow together, so this (from here) found its way into my shopping cart:
And then here's a study in blues from the divine Ms. Z:
And then we sidle back to the yellow and whatever side of things for this, from here:
Obviously, etsy is a major trap for me. I have so many shops favorited it's not funny. You'd think that would be enough, but no, last night I did a search for "roving" and just about went out of my ever-lovin' mind! Do you have any idea how much gorgeous handpainted roving is out there, just waiting for my credit card to come a-knockin'? I did escape with ordering only one braid--another pink and yellow, but softer than the one I showed here. That's it. No more. I mean it. ("Yeah, yeah," they all sigh, "just like The Last Purchase sock yarn.") I know, you've read it before.

Speaking of etsy, here's another batch of really fun stuff (notice the quick change of subject?) I've already bought several sets of stitch markers from WeeOnes. That's where I got the cute sock monkey markers that were a few posts back. I wanted ice cream cones and cupcakes for my daughter, who loves both, and these were custom-designed for me:


I wish you could see the real thing because the texture and detail is beyond amazing. Missy keeps raving about what an artist Jillian is, and she's right. I simply have to stay off that site for at least a week or two!

This is what she custom-made for me when I described my Jack Russell Terrier, Boomer, to her:


I think she came pretty close, didn't she? Only the face is a little different, but it's close enough! Here's the real dawg. Is that too cute or what?


And what of SOS, I hear you cry? Oh, I haven't totally given up, but I'm still putzing along on the same pair I started last Friday. I should get them done tonight. I still haven't felt well at all this whole week, and I've been playing the violin more and doing some spindle-spinning as well. I think I just needed a little break, but I feel myself getting fired up again. The competitive urge is coming back, so though I'm down, I'm not out yet! I've had to resist casting on a sweater coat (don't say a word) and so far I've been successful at that. So it's back to socks tonight. And no more shopping on etsy!

Gotta go plurk. And knit.

Trying to Catch Up

As I promised some of my Plurkbuds (y'all know who you are!), here are photos of the sock yarn in "Plurk" colorway that I got the other day:Ok, so that photo was washed out, but I wanted you to see the tag, so you'd know how to hunt it down. But here's a link anyway, because it's hard to see. This is the yarn in all its glory:
For the non-Plurking among us, those are the main colors of the Plurk Timeline when you join up. It's lots of fun--the wittiness of knitters is a blast. Witty knitters. What can I say?

Here are a few photos of other fun stuff I've gotten recently. I wish the true colors would show up better, because this hand-dyed fiber is out of this world. This first one, the teal and bronze colorway, is really different for me. But I absolutely loved it, so I bought all she had. Now I have about 12 ounces of it to spin, and I want to know exactly what I want to knit before I spin it, instead of just spinning it, then figuring out what to do with it. This came from here.

I'm a sucker for pink and yellow together, so this (from here) found its way into my shopping cart:
And then here's a study in blues from the divine Ms. Z:
And then we sidle back to the yellow and whatever side of things for this, from here:
Obviously, etsy is a major trap for me. I have so many shops favorited it's not funny. You'd think that would be enough, but no, last night I did a search for "roving" and just about went out of my ever-lovin' mind! Do you have any idea how much gorgeous handpainted roving is out there, just waiting for my credit card to come a-knockin'? I did escape with ordering only one braid--another pink and yellow, but softer than the one I showed here. That's it. No more. I mean it. ("Yeah, yeah," they all sigh, "just like The Last Purchase sock yarn.") I know, you've read it before.

Speaking of etsy, here's another batch of really fun stuff (notice the quick change of subject?) I've already bought several sets of stitch markers from WeeOnes. That's where I got the cute sock monkey markers that were a few posts back. I wanted ice cream cones and cupcakes for my daughter, who loves both, and these were custom-designed for me:



I wish you could see the real thing because the texture and detail is beyond amazing. Missy keeps raving about what an artist Jillian is, and she's right. I simply have to stay off that site for at least a week or two!

This is what she custom-made for me when I described my Jack Russell Terrier, Boomer, to her:


I think she came pretty close, didn't she? Only the face is a little different, but it's close enough! Here's the real dawg. Is that too cute or what?

And what of SOS, I hear you cry? Oh, I haven't totally given up, but I'm still putzing along on the same pair I started last Friday. I should get them done tonight. I still haven't felt well at all this whole week, and I've been playing the violin more and doing some spindle-spinning as well. I think I just needed a little break, but I feel myself getting fired up again. The competitive urge is coming back, so though I'm down, I'm not out yet! I've had to resist casting on a sweater coat (don't say a word) and so far I've been successful at that. So it's back to socks tonight. And no more shopping on etsy!

Gotta go plurk. And knit.