New News!

Almost two months since I posted! Wow time flies. So here is a quick update on the most recent fiber news.

Tour De Fleece yarn - handpainted roving made into 2ply

 Froggy Fibers has ended participation in the local market. Sadly, I believe we were no longer a good match. I'll miss my Saturdays there. However, due to a "miscommunication" with the organizers we were unable to attend in June. We were advised they were at full capacity. So apparently there was no regard for a regular vendor who advised them of our attendance at the end of the previous market and emailed prior to the deadline for June. Well..... lesson learned. No matter how good things seem, it is bound to come to an end.

  Also, for those who look forward to my Phat Fiber samples..I'm going to miss this month. The good news in this is that my reason is taking on a new part time job starting mid-June. My new job schedule was almost 40hrs for the last 3 weeks. However, once the store opens (this Friday!) my hours will drop closer to a normal part time schedule. Which means we should be back on track for the August box. =D

Other occurrences on the fun side of things is that I choose to try to participate in the Tour De Fleece again on Ravelry. I joined back up with fellow fiberistas from last year (previously Rawfish's Ravelry forum now all grown up into LaiGrai.)I haven't been 100% successful  but since the July 3rd start I've spun 3-4 days. I even have pics... just not uploaded to Flickr yet. Which means... lucky you blog friends! You get first peek at my recent yarns including the one above.

 spun pumpkinhaus batt and froggy hand painted roving

more handpainted froggy roving to be plyed with white (maybe)

Always end on a good note! (It's going to be my new blogging motto... I just came up with it and decided that when I wrote it. Serendipity is a wonderful thing.)

and there goes May...

I've been in and out of a little funk this month so not many... *ahem* any, posts from me. I did still manage to attend my local market and drew tons of attention even though there were no sales. I also got back in touch with an old work friend. Well, I would call her a work friend but I guess these things are always so iffy when you lose your job.
Anyway, outside of the market the only other thing I've managed this month was contributing to the Phat Fiber Sampler. I sent a mix of 27 yarn and fiber samples in and slipped in just by the skin of my teeth so to speak. I didn't get my market set up photos this time but I did get the Phat Fiber samples before boxing them up to go.

 Hopefully I'm back on the upswing and will be posting here more. Until then.....

Grassy Fun

Just a peek at some wool that I got in a swap. I washed it the other day and boy is it soft. Sadly, there is a ton of VM in it. When I say a ton I mean lots... grass... all over the place. When I pick it up it falls out. When I set it down, it falls out. When I look at it... IT FALLS OUT.

So very disappointing. However, I'm going to break out the handcards in hopes to salvage the wool to spin. It felt fairly soft even with all the grass which pleases me since its my first go at Shetland. I guess we will just have to see what happens.

Low Cost Tips from the Lilypad #1

Look at this neat contraption. This is my tubing to keep yarn from collapsing in on its self once I take it off the ball winder. This works especially well for sock yarns and thinner weight handspun yarns. Yes, its bootleg but effective. Plus depending on how much yarn your winding, you can get about 3 tubes of cardboard from one paper towel roll but only one for each toilet paper roll. Plus you can reuse the tubing until it starts to get to soft to hold its structure. I have found this to be a good way to avoid tangling up yarn but I do concede that I use a old plastic gallon ice cream container and knit (or ply - when spinning) these yarn from the outside instead of center pull. That way the yarn can turn and bounce in the bucket and I don't have to worry about the center tangling and pulling apart as much.
Its a great way to reduce, reuse and recycle all in one!

cut cardboard tubing from paper towel holders

(This is something new I just came up with today because I found something I wanted to share. As I was writing this post I decided to try to find a new one each week or two to share with everyone.)

PS - Join in on the Fiber Arts Friday Blog Carnival!

Goodies!

I am so happy to have a chance to sit down and post about my new goodies. Up first, I purchased 5 pounds of uncoated coopworth wool from Homestead Wool and it arrived on the Tuesday. It really is just as nice as it looks on the site.


Look at that crimp!



Then Wednesday I finally conquered my fear and purchased a pair of rotary cutters and mat. I don't do alot of fabric cutting so I just stuck to Walmart. I've been really scared about getting the rotary cutters because of my nine year old and I can be rather clumsy sometimes. =P



I plan to take a few scrap fabrics to practice on then make a couple of fleece tie blankets. Hopefully my lines will get a little straighter now. I'll even have to break out the sewing machine again and continue to practice my stitches.


Join in the fun with the Fiber Arts Friday Blog Carnival.

August 1st Market and Blog Interview

This weekend I will be participating in the local Market at Wesleyan College. This will be my second time there and I am very excited. Luckily TheBoy is going to his grandparents for a few days so We have plenty of last minute prep time. =D Let's hope this day is not as insufferable hot and the previous one... If your in the Middle Georgia area please stop by Wesleyan from 10-2 on August 1st. Its a market of plants, fresh vegetables and crafters and artists!

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So lately I am no good at transitions so I am just drawing a line (literally) and jumping to the next subject. I had a chance to do a blog interview with a fellow Etsy seller on her blog. It was tons of fun and I feel like I opened up quite a bit. Pop on over to FiberArtistToo and have a look!
One of the pictures I sent that didn't make it on the blog is of my first handspun yarn. Okay, loosely its handspun yarn.... I have come a long way from where I was.
Take a look:

This is why I tell people that it takes patience and persistence to spin. If I had stopped here I wouldnt have any of my beautiful yarns to show for it. So for all those newbie spinners who think it should be just so that first time.... relax. It just takes time.

Tour De Fleece

This year I decided that I should participate in the Tour de Fleece on Ravelry. It's this fun challenge that takes place each year during the Tour De France. I figured that if I can do the Everyday Yarn Challenge back in April then this should be a breeze. There are even built in break days. Originally I was going to join the rookies team but a fellow fiberista named Rawfish has a Ravelry group that got together and became team "Tour de Fish." Its a nautical theme galore. See I even have a temporary avatar made courtesy of Laila of Rawfish. =D


So far my progress is well... pitiful. I have barely spun anything at all. I did finish a navajo plied yarn from some hand painted roving that I just had to spin.


So that is what I have to show for my July 5th spinning. July 4th saw BBQ, Beer and Friends and I just didnt sit still long enough to do any spinning. I did start some beautiful purple merino/silk blend on July 6th and worked some more on it today but my progress is still so terribly slow. I am so embarrased. To top all this off, I will be participating at the local college's Market selling my goods this Saturday and have a job interview on Friday. So much to do, so much to think about, so much worry about.... ahhhh! *Whew* just needed to scream a little. Hopefully I can get back on track with Tour de Fleece, ace my interview, and score big at the Market. With everything going on my First July update was delayed but I hope to have a small update by Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. Until then... lots of fiber-y love to all!

Photo Tutorial - Wool Washing

I made the decision to place the wool washing tutorial on my own domain as opposed to blogger. (Makes it easier to locate and link to in the future)

It can be easily accessed here: Photo Tutorial - Wool Washing

If there are any questions regarding the process feel free to contact me via the comment box.

Customer Creations - Easy123

The other day I received the best type of message on Etsy that a seller could hope for. Michele from Easy123 had purchased some yarn called "Parakeet" from which she made a beautiful scarf.
Just look at it!










Michele has lots of great items in her store so be sure to check them out!

Everyday Yarn Day 2

So, I thought since I was trying to push myself to spin more it should be a natural connection to blog more as well. One of the *many* things that I regret not doing more of is writing. I don't know why but I could write a mean paper. On the other hand, I like blogging because it has a bit more personal and informal touch. So I will try to write everyday to show what progress I made in the spinning challenge (and anything else that comes to mind.)

Day Two's yarn was more of an unfinished object than it had any right to be. It was originally spun at one of our Second Sunday gatherings and I had every intention to ply it with thread. Then I got home and started wishing that I had core spun it... should have thought of that before I went to town though. So I took this off the bobbin, wound it into a ball and wondered if there was a way to unspin it into a thread and make it a corespun yarn. After that I just forgot about it. Until today.

Today I was searching through my "misc" bin of fiber related goods. Basically, its a big bin of things that I have used or purchased that hasn't found a permanent residence anywhere. (Or as my mom would say... that I hadn't put away.) I looked at a bunch of fibers that one of the ladies was destashing at the spinning group and realized that I still had this ball of blended, glitzed, thick and thin handspun. Then I sorted through another bin and found some embroidery thread. SCORE!

Now for the result...


The top yarn is approx 49 yards (pre-set). The bottom was what remained when I ran out of thread so I just plied the remaining yarn back on itself. It's a little tadpole of love. =D

(At the end of the month I will try to upload better pictures of my yarns. I usually end up spinning at night so my pictures are not as nice as I would like them to be.)

WOOL!!!!!!!!!!!

I waited all day Monday for the UPS man to bring this:


10 Pounds of Merino... and I have already started dyeing! *happy dance*

Froggy's Funky Fun Scarf

Hello all my bloggerinos!

I recently spent some time knitting a scarf from my very first novelty yarn. I love it and its so colorful. I started out making it into a crocheted hat. Unfortunately that was one of those UFO's that never got finished. I guess in the long run that's just not what it wanted to be. On my trip to Sheepish I picked a pair of jumbo needles. Jumbo you say... yes... size 19 in fact. Its weird though, its like I knew that I was waiting on these needles and the minute I got home the yarn just hop, skipped and jumped on to them. (I encourage hopping when every I can =D )



Here is the humble beginnings of my scarf. I started out thinking I would do ten stitches but it seemed to small at first so I added five. Then I knit 1 row, purl 1 row to create the stockinette pattern. Once I was finished I bound off and lightly blocked it. I'm actually a fan of the curl from the stockinette stitch but thats probably because it adds to the scarf's novelty look. Plus, since I used stockinette instead of a simple garter stitch there is a lot of play in the scarf. It will be nice and stretchy and can be draped across the back or around the neck. Total length is 41 inches and width is 6 inches across. I added it to my Etsy shop yesterday and is my first finished item on Etsy! (i.e. not a supply which can be made into another finished product.)


I really enjoyed making this scarf. I'm even all riled up to make another scarf to add to the store in the next week or so. Will have to see how everything works out first. Comments are always welcomed!

Recent "hop"penings 'round the lilypad

Corny I know, I couldn't help it.
I haven't posted much on my blog and I am a bit ashamed considering the extra time I have on my hands. In between entertaining the idea of getting a new job I have been working on my two storefronts. I have added a couple of listings to my Etsy and I'm up to ten listings on my ArtFire. Just a few more and my $7 dollars a month will be in use. No point paying if I'm going to keep ten or less items so I'll be listing a few more items there.

Recently I visited Sheepish in Decatur, Georgia. This was only my second visit but it truly is a lovely store. True, its smallish, but its really going to have to grow in its own time. Both times my family found the staff friendly and I found them knowledgeable. Huge plus! I was at another local Atlanta yarn shop that day and people clammed up the minute we walked in the door. Well excuse me for invading your quiet little home away from home! If you don't want to be around people, keep your knitting in your house.



I got some sweet goodies at Sheepish. First, I picked up some Lorna's Laces wool top in nice, bright colors. I'm pretty tired of winter right now so its a nice pick me up. I also picked up a bundle of Alpaca with a Twist (pictured above) in white and a pair of size 19 needles which have already been put to use. All in all, it was a nice relaxing daytrip and one I was able to enjoy it without waiting through all the weekend traffic. YAY!

Jumbo Yarn

This is what I call in need of a Jumbo Ball winder. I wasn't quite expecting it to be this large! I never measured the yardage because I plan to make a lacy scarf out of it and figured I probably have enough. I know, lazy me.



More likely than not a jumbo ball winder is far down on the list of equipment needs. I just don't have skeins that large that often. Plus, I hate measuring so a yardage counter will come first closer to the top of the list. WHOO! Yarn

Handspun Undone.. kinda

Just recently I finished spinning up some commercial Wool/Soysilk Blend. I was very excited about it because I it felt like it was taking forever to spin. I was impressed with how much yarn was produced. Okay, I don't know what the yardage is yet but I think its a fair amount. I was planning on using the yarn to knit the Morning Surf scarf on the cover of the recent Spin-off thinking how I wanted it to be relatively lacy. But then I chickened out as I often do when it comes to knitting something thats not simple knit purl knit purl. So I went online to find another pattern and picked this. Its probably a little more complicated (since I dont know how to PSSO) but I think it will be perfect for this yarn. Besides, I have this month's spinning meet up and I'm going to take the pattern and have someone show me how to do it. They are such nice people in the group.

Speaking of, just this past week I set the twist on the yarn and to my disappointment the color ran. Ick! Okay, when I say ran I don't mean just a little dye. What I am talking about is the OH NO my water is no longer clear its (insert color here.) In this case my water was a dark orange color. The water wasn't hot it was luke warm. The yarn wasnt sitting in the water for hours it was there less than two minutes... not more than five, before I took it out. The only reason I took it out then was because I didnt want the color to bleed on the lighter fibers in the yarn. Seriously... disappointed. A major commercial brand should not bleed when the fibers are set. My husband commented that the water looked like Kool-Aid.


*SIGH* Okay, but its not the only thing I did this week. I spun the roving that I purchased at Knitch from Gale's Art. (She has an etsy store.) I wanted to keep the colors true so I split the roving into four long pieces and spun them with the expectation to do a two ply. That way the long repeats she created in the roving would ply against itself and make a somewhat self striping yarn with defined blocks of color. When I finished I pretty much changed my mind and decided to Navajo Ply. (See a theme here ;P) I am seriously no good at it. Every time I do a Navajo ply I end up with a very dense yarn. I believe the culprit is that I am treadling too fast on the ply. I think. I'm welcoming any opinions or advice to the contrary. Oh and when I set the twist on this fiber... Just a small light green tint in the water. Yea for well prepared fibers from small business owners!

And a quick note in unrelated (i.e. real life) news. We are finally getting some of our stuff moved into the new place. And yet again I realize two important things.... I hate packing and I hate moving. It's even worse at the moment because my husband is injured and can't lift more than 5 pounds and only on one hand. Of course this would be the optimal weekend to have these issues since the father in-law could only help us move all our big stuff like dressers, bookshelves etc on his trailer THIS weekend. That's just our kind of luck though. Bah! I can't wait til this is over.

Handspun, Corespun Yarn

I call this yarn Mossy. It was made from wool batts that I carded from various fibers dyed green. The fibers include coopworth, mohair, wool, and silk; carded with lots of glitz. I spun this on a DMX embroidery thread.


It was really frustrating at first. I just couldn't get the swing of it. Eventually I was able to get more of a rhythm and method for spinning and it went a bit easier. I haven't measured yardage yet but I wouldn't put it more than 100 yards if that. Just sort of a show and tell post. I needed to show off a little since my weekend got off to a pretty bad start.

Yarn and Traveling

The weekend always goes by too fast for me. I spent the entire week at work being the only person processing cash for my department/division. I deserve a longer weekend dagnabit!

As weekends go this wasn't a bad one. It wasn't quite the excitement of last Sunday but it was definitely welcome to being at work this week. On the yarn front I finally finished that wool/soysilk blend I purchased a few months ago. It was a very long time coming in my opinion. I think what finally did it was the new wheel I get to borrow. I was able to fit the bobbin from my Babe unto the S51 and finish spinning my single. Then I took a Louet bobbin and plied the two singles together. I ended up putting the remaining single into a center pull ball and plying it onto the same skein as well. Hefty!

There were a few casualties though. I tangled a portion of the center pull ball and lost some yarn. It was almost 1/2 ozs worth of yarn. Fortnately, I was able to pull the tangled center portion out of the ball and salvage the remaining yarn to ply with. I really hadn't thought that the yarn was thin enough to tangle but it's certainly a lesson learned. I did end up with some knots in my yarn which I am not to pleased about. I try to make my plying work out without the use of knots but it wasn't happening this time. It's not much of a problem though. I am not selling this yarn, I intend to find a nice light/lacy pattern that will best utilize the finished yarn. (If you know of one send me a clue!)

The book in the picture is a recent purchase as well. It's one of my "To Do's" in the fiber world now that I will be moving into a house. We have this utility room which will serve as storage once everything is sorted out and it makes me feel much safer about trying natural dyed methods.

The other fun thing from this weekend was our spur of the moment trip to Knitch. We had traveled to Forsyth to take a look at a furniture liquidation store and some sofas. Then I convinced my husband (and son... though he didnt have much say so) that we should go into Atlanta and see if they had more of the black merino fiber from the last trip. Unfortunately they did not. Of course I didn't come away empty handed, not after driving in the car for that long. So I picked up some roving from Gale's Art called Rose Garden. I also got some Gaywool Dyes. It appears that since the last time I was there Knitch has decided to start offering some dyes. I think the price is more than I wanted to spend on dyes but it will be a good chance to try another brand. I only picked up two colors though so I will have to make sure to work them in as needed.

(Side Note: I opened up a poll on how often a blog should be updated. I'm doing a little market research and would really appreciate the input even if you just happened here by accident. Thanks!)

More Batty Goodness!

Here are the batts I promised a couple of days ago. Since then I have begun carding a multicolor blended batt. It has no glitz in it but thats okay. What I do know is that it is the perfect color combo to go with Mystic Dreams. I wasn't sure what to make with that yarn but I know it wanted to be something sorta hip and funky. Unfortunately I am not the hip and funky type. Plus it was knit a scarf or crochet a shawl. A very tiny shawl at that.

So after talking to my spinning group I decided to make Mystic Dreams into a crocheted handbag. We got to talking about it and figured 132 yards of bulky isnt enough. So I was going to make some black three ply for the bottom and the handle. Instead I have to figure out how to incorporate this blend. Do I try to create a cabled yarn with 3 black and 1 multicolored strand? Do I do a black navajo plied yarn for the bottom? I don't know. So many options!

I do however know that these batts are lovely. On the left is "Technicolor Yawn" and "Overload in Red." On the right is "Overload in Yellow" and "Mixed Berry." Mixed Berry is the one that is going to be spun and paired with Mystic Dreams. I'm having a lot of fun with the batts as always, though sometimes I wish they werent so time intensive. You really can not multi-task and card at the same time. I did list "Rebirth" (below) in my Etsy store as separate batts and will probably list the two "Overload" batts as well. I may even make more to add to the listings later. On a happy note. I did make a sale today. Yay Froggy! I guess that is my prerequisite "one-per-month" sale. I'm super thrilled about it though. It's still a really good feeling.



(P.S. - It looks like we will be moving in the next two months! Woot! Goodbye apartment living, Hello rental house! Keep your fingers crossed cause five years is too long here.)

Carded Batts and Rebirth

I took a minute this weekend and listed some mohair locks in the store. It's the last of the locks that I had on hand but I feel fortunate in that I had spent the previous weekend dying up mill ends that would be better off carded. Sadly, I don't have pictures of those quite yet. I think I will try listing some on Etsy and see how it comes out. I'll be sure to post a picture before that though.
Now on the other hand, I have a picture of one of my carded batts for you to view. This batt is called "Rebirth".

On the left is the original batt made of wool fiber dyed in pink and grey, loaded with glitz. On the right is the new batt with fuchsia dyed wool, mohair, and alpaca, undyed carded bamboo, more glitz, sari silk along with the original dyed fibers and glitz. I had two of these batts but by the time I added all the additional goodies I ended up with four. So far I have carded 2 red batts, 2 yellow batts and a multicolor batt in addition to this with plenty more wool to go. I'll probably work on getting 2-4 carded a night and start listing some mid-week. Once I start listing some on Etsy I think I will get back to spinning up the plain handspun for Mix and Mingle yarns. All I've got to do is get a little schedule working. Some days its just very difficult with work, kid, husband and everything else. (On a bit of a positive note, we might be in a position to move from this crappy apartment. I mean basically the best chance we have is this one so keep your fingers crossed! Hopefully we will know a little more by the end of the week.)

Fibery Tidbits

I have been working on spinning up some plain wool yarn to dye into more Mix and Mingle colors. I really like how they have come out so far and they seem to have gotten a good response (i.e. views) on Etsy. I start with what I can get for the time being. I finally caved recently and got an order of the Sheep Shed Mill End Grab bags. Monetarily the price can't be beat. However, as is the case when purchasing things like fleece you do more work trying to prep then you do with the more expensive already processed "nice" roving. Case in point; I purchased four pounds of mill ends grab bag i.e. whatever they send me. Roughly a pound of the mill ends are colors including black, brown red and a little blue. Then there is another pound thats mostly batts that have been cut off the machine. Then of course there is the regular mill end roving bits and the mohair mill end roving bits.
Yes, there are a lot of mill end roving bits.


So after just a few hours of spinning I was already through the easy to use roving mill ends. Next would be the easy to use batts. Unfortunately almost all of the batts had cut ends. Fortunately, I had the experience with some of the cut ends from the roving and manufactured a plan. I took all the batts and carded them into ... well, batts. I basically recarded the wool which there by eliminated the hard to deal with blunt cut ends and made the wool soft and bouncy and easy to draft. Yay me!

The other thing that I did was to divvy up the rest of the undyed bits and started dying them. I have green and yellow that I did this past weekend. I will also have purple and hot pink which I am doing today. The plans for these bits are to card them up with all the variations of colors, texture, glitz and anything else I feel like putting in there. I'm really excited about this but wish I didn't have to wait for the other wool to dry tonight. Where is an air-only dryer when you need one!