What I've Been Reading

About a week ago my family and I went to the library. My husband went with TheBoy to find children's books he would be interested in and I walked to the adult reading section. Our main mission was to find a book on renter's rights to make sure we weren't being screwed over in our current living arrangement. There are tons of tiny things wrong with the house but we can live with most of it. Then there are things we are not sure we should have to. Mainly, our neighbors have recently created a fuss about one of the other rental houses and we just want to make sure we stay on the up and up.

Once we found the most recent Nolo book to cover our needs, I immediately went to browse the business and craft sections. (I swear they are so close that they should just be the crafty business section!) I found tons of books that I hope will be helpful but I was particularly surprised by finding Craft, Inc at the library. So I grabbed up a bunch of books and the Craft, Inc by Meg Mateo Ilasco and made my way to the check out.

As an adult I haven't been much of a reader. Occasionally I will grab book to read but I rarely finish them. However, I am happy to say that I sat down and read this book over a few days. I found the information useful for people in multiple crafts. I was seriously hesitant when I first heard of the book. (Keep in mind I am reading this a couple of years since it was issued. I tend to be a bit behind the times on my reading list.)

Overall I enjoyed the book. I think that it has great and easy to read advice for the small business craftperson. I admit, there was one or two subjects I skipped over but it was no more than 3-4 pages total. Definitely light, friendly reading that has helped me gain some perspective. I wish more craft books were this easy to digest.
(Of course, this post was 4 days in the making as I started May 10th and have suffered some bad writers block. Since then, I am almost through reading Made from Scratch by Jenna Woginrich.)

Road Trippin' part .....?

Yeah, so there is no way I'm going to keep track of my day trips of craftiness. I would but I want to pretend I go all sorts of wonderful places all the time so I'm not. That being said, yesterday I spent some time yesterday at Knitch in Atlanta.

We had been to Knitch before but it was probably over a year ago. That first trip was a bit lackluster for a spinning nut. But since then I received an email that stated they had opened the upper section of the store. While I'm not a fan of the narrow winding stairways, I decided to go back for the "expanded" fiber section. I was so pleasantly surprised when I got to the second floor. They had a nicely finished area with yarns on one side and plenty of fiber on the other. The great part was before I could get my bearings about me, MrFroggy had already pointed out the selection of glitz in the wall bins. Glitz, I wanted glitz! So we had to set a budget. Realistically there is no good budget to have when your in fiberlust but I managed to skirt under it. All told, I got 7 ozs black merino, a bag of fiber puffs from Pagewood Farm, and 6 - 1/2 ozs of glitz in red, pink, gold, cooper, green iridescent and blue iridescent. I feel all the richer for having made the purchases.

A couple of great little bonuses:

1: I meet a fellow Etsy seller, Megan. She works at Knitch (lucky lady) and has recently gotten the spinning bug. Plus she has like 20 yrs knitting experience.
2: I saw some awesome colors of roving inside Knitch that I wanted but wouldn't fit into my budget. Fortunately, the seller had a website.... unfortunately it doesn't appear to exist in a normal Google search. What does come up is the sellers Etsy store. (Darn that Etsy, its just to darn popular.) Gale's Art is an Etsy store run by a lady out of Stone Mountain, Georgia who dyes roving in Merino and BFL. She has standard colorways which is great since you can always go back for more.

(Of course this was an all-purpose family trip consisting of Japanese grocery stores, Oxford Comics on Piedmont Rd, Whole Foods, Borders etc.... but thats not what I write about. Overall, we did have an excellent family geek-out trip. Cause seriously, everyone in my family is a geek for one thing or another. Whether that be tiny Japanese candy box figurines, comics or spinning fiber supplies. The important thing was we all had fun together..... until the little one got sick on the way home. Still... overall it was fun!)

Road Tripping...

This past Saturday the family jumped in the car and took a quick road trip. Now when I say jump, I mean decided at the last minute. When I say quick, I really mean two hours away to Savannah. The only real reason we went was because we had a little extra money and I was wanting to get at some fiber goodies. So off we went, little tourists that we were, on a two hour all highway drive. My husband was so fortunate as to not have to drive seeing as he let his license expire on his birthday this past December.
Putting all these small details aside, the whole family traveled down the road. Our first stop was to a little shop called "Wild Fibre." When I say little it really just means its not as large as I would have wanted it to be. I did get a tidbits pictured here. This is a small picture of the dyed wool bumps and some tencel. I couldn't remember if tencel is dye-able with acids but once I got home I found out it is not. Since I'm still enjoying the mighty fine benefits of apartment living, this end up natural but blended with some colored fibers.
I think that I was a little disappointed. I mean two hours you think would merit a decent adventure but I think I had more fun after we left the shop. I met up with my friend and her son and his two friends. She moved down that way just about a year ago. Honestly, the store looked like it was a fiber shop that moved into a previous tenants domains. There was no real cohesiveness to the shop and the levels (i.e. odd step ups) where more of a detriment then an interior design element. Also, I'm thinking that some of these items are a little overpriced. I was just on Etsy and found this seller who sells tencel at 4 oz for 6.00. I paid over $12! Anyway, that was certainly a lesson learned. My LYS is better stocked for the spinning and weaving artist. Besides, she host our local spinning group and really like to show her that I support her business. The next time I head to Savannah, it will be to visit my friend and that's it!


On a project related note:


This is the beginning of my hand-spun single. I noted in a previous post that I was spinning a handpainted roving from my store. This is my new ball winder (yay tax refund!) and the start of the winding process. It's actually all wound up now but I'm a little nervous about plying it. I hate to start plying a project and have to stop in the middle. If I have to wait till this weekend though I might go nutty! Decisions, Decisions! Stay tuned for continuing coverage of the "Great Yarn Debate of '08."

I promise, more goodies and more bloggy-blog talking soon.

Library Finds....Father Brown Shears his Sheep: A Yarn about Wool

I have to say this was perhaps the neatest find during our recent library outing. It's a little children's book about a farmer who decides to shear his sheep. His sheep however are none to happy about it. It is delightful to read and the pictures are true to the reality of spinning. (i.e. the spinning wheel picture is drawn accurately. It helps that the artist is a spinner as well.)



I really got a huge kick out of the fact that it was my husband who picked up the book. We grabbed the elevator from the third floor and he spotted it dead on. I was like, "neat" and preceded to get in the elevator. My husband preceded to tuck the book under his arm.
In short, all about shearing and carding and washing and spinning and (yes) knitting! Its just adorable and simple. Father Brown shears his Sheep is probably and great book for the times your 2-5 yr olds look at you like your crazy or wants to know where fiber comes from.

Spindling....

I admit I haven't done much spindling in a while. In fact, I was asked (while in Etsy Chat, yes a bit of an addict) if I did most of my spinning by spindle. Well..... of course not! I'm kinda impatient. Even still, I know a worthwhile product when I see one.
Check out these "Don't Drop Spindles" at Glass Pens. These spindles are made with borosilicate glass while the hook is made from Sterling Silver wire. I particularly like the Honey Brown Caramel (pictured left.) Plus the hooks are made one of a kind so once its been sold, you can't get a hook that's exactly like it.
For those non-spinning folks, Glass Pens also carries Crochet Hooks and Knitting Needles. (This is why its such a treat to pick up Interweave's Spin Off.)