Kindness of a co-worker

In my work building, just down the hall, is a very nice lady.  I found out about 6 months ago that she throws pottery.  A few months ago I asked her if she would be interested in making a supported spinning bowl and to let me know what she would want for her time, etc.

Today she knocked on my door and brought me the cutest little bowls.

 

Each of them are about 3 inches across.  Absolutely darling. 

I told her I couldn't decide between the two.  You know what she told me? 



"Keep them both. I made them for you"  

 That was so nice of her!

Now I just need a supported spindle to go with them. I know which one I want.  It's just a matter of hitting the shop at just the same time there is an update.

I think that these bowls need a pretty little Spanish Peacock to spin in them. :-) I have my heart set on a Tibetan spindle.


 

FO ~ Splendid shawl

Splendid shawl from Lion Brand.

Lionbrand Homespun yarn, Lagoon colorway
Needles: US Size 11

Given to my son's Godmother on May 1, 2013. She loved the colors and the softness of the yarn. I am so very pleased with how it turned out.

Chicks, man

Our baby chicks came home yesterday. They are so adorable.  I so nervous bringing them home.  I felt as if the box got too jostled around they would start getting vocal and telling me they weren't happy with my driving.

Here are most of the Wynadottes.

 

Here are two of the Guinea fowl's.  I had to laugh when I put them in the brooder we made.  All the Guinea's were big scaredy cats and ran into the corner and tried to climb the feeder.   The Wynadotte's just kind of moved around in a group like they owned the place.  

The Guinea fowl were pretty vocal when they were first put in.  It didn't bother me very much because I used to have a Quaker bird and he used to 'scipe' up a storm when he was having a fit.  

They made it through their first night just fine.  They don't make much noise now.  Just happy little chirps.

Funny story about the water dish you can see.  I had a different one in the brooder but it was too big so I bought this dish.  I waited until I was ready to put the new dish in before I tipped it over.  The water glugged out of the jar and some of the chicks came running over to watch it and some pecked at the air bubbles.

The Wynadotte's are smaller than the Guineas. However, some of the Wynadottes will walk right up to the Guineas and peck them like they are big boys.  

Here are a few huddled in the corner snuggling together.  Yesterday I watched one fall asleep right at the water dish and drop her head and one wing was in the water.  Another one fell asleep and was all cozy and another chick ran over her and she popped up like "What?! I wasn't sleeping" and dashed off.

 Guinea fowl waiting for me to hurry up and take the picture.

Tonite we did have our first case of pasting with one of the Guinea fowl.  We soaked his little butt and took care of it.  I hope he doesn't have anymore issues. 

 I did take a few little videos yesterday but I think this is the best one.

I anticipate that there will be more stories and videos in the weeks to come.  Today I couldn't wait to come home and see "the babies."


 

Chicken coop

Spring has come to the Northland.

The temps were simply gorgeous this weekend.  So gorgeous, in fact, that we built a chicken coop.

 Saturday morning my guy woke up way before me and got started.   My son and I painted most of the outside.  We painted it the same color as the house. 

 I love the little door for the chickens.  My son spent a lot of time going in and out of that door.

The baby chicks are going to get picked up tomorrow.  I can't wait. *squee!* They probably won't get to live out there for a while though.  Gives us plenty of time to interior decorate the inside. 


 

Fiber dyeing

With the change of the seasons and my playing with fiber again I've gotten the itch about dyeing fiber again. In the past the dyeing I've done has not been anything too fancy.

 I've been frustrated with my lack of being able to mix the basic colors and get different shades and hues. It seemed to me that no matter what I did, I was ending up with the same shades of colors no matter how I mixed the colors up.

It didn't matter how many youtube videos I watched and playing around with the colors, something wasn't clicking.

Some of my fiber friends suggested I get a color wheel so that I could see how the colors played with
each other. I read my copy of the Twisted Sister's Sock Workbook" yet again and decided to play around with food coloring.  Yes, food coloring.  Right now I don't have any plastic bottles that I can dedicate to acid dyes and honestly, in the new kitchen, I'm not sure I wanted the acid dye powder flying all over the place.

So ... I grabbed some of my handy-dandy canning jars and mixed up a few colors and measure out a yard or so of Superwash wool top and experimented.

I'm really pleased with what turned out.  I kettled dyed and handpainted the yarn.  I took my time and let one color exhaust before adding another color.

It's so happy.

I originally mixed up red, yellow and orange colors and towards the end of the process I took the little bottle of green dye and just dropped drops here and there over the fiber.  You can see in the above photo where the green broke up a little bit and turned blue. 
 

Like I said, so very happy with how it turned out.

Then I subscribed to the Knitting Blooms Podcast and saw she had shared a tutorial on handpainting roving.

The clouds parted and the angels started singing.  Her tutorial was exactly what I need for handpainting fiber to click.  Yes, that day I went to my local Wal mart and bought what I needed and that night I used leftover dye and dyed 3 ounces of superwash wool top.

I can't help but smile when I look at this braid. I can't WAIT to spin it up.  But first, I need to finish plying my Tour de Fleece 2012 fiber. 
 

I can't wait to break out the dyepots again.

Snow storm

Last week yet another snow storm came to my area. I knew it was coming and as soon as it started I left work early to try to get home before the storm got too bad.

It took me an hour and a half to get home last Thursday when it normally takes 45-50 minutes.

On the way home there was one car that slid into the ditch on the highway.  The highway patrol was there with it flashing lights so we all knew to move over.  I don't think anyone was going over 50 miles an hour.

I was "lucky" enough to get yet another snow day.  Though at this point I think everyone in my family is sick of snow days.  Monday I woke up yesterday to 3 email alerts about the next, yes, next, winter storm that was coming to my area. I was able to get home last night without a problem

This April has been the snowiest April on record and they've been keeping track for the last 150 years according to the weather person this morning.

Bah!!!

But today I woke up to 10 more inches of snow and ended up coming late to work and bringing my son to school late because our road had just enough snow to make my husband worry that I might get stuck if I was the first person on our road to try and get out to the highway, which was clean.


But, I'm sure you are dying to see what it looked like on Friday (April 18)  You are in luck because I have pictures and video. I just didn't have the heart to blog about this that day. Also, my internet was running sloooow.

This is my husband in the middle of snowblowing the driveway.  The cowl on the snowblower is 2 feet tall.

 

I made my son stop so I could take a picture. 

This is my son running through one of the paths that my husband made with the snowblower. 

  Here I am standing in the driveway. 

This was my road.  (south direction) 


Here I am standing in the middle of the road.  This was just incredible to me.


Here is the road in the other direction (north)

 Here is the back of our house.

Oh, did I mention that a branch the size of a small tree fell on my garage?

Yes, and thankfully there doesn't seem to be any major damage.

Here we are at the end of the day. Look at the beautiful sky and the sun making it all rosy and pretty. 

Here was some video I took when I first stepped out of the garage.

And another one showing the trees.  You can hear the wind a bit as well.

I've been told that better weather is on it's way.  I hope so.  My baby chicks are supposed to come next Tuesday.

Spinning!

I've been so bad about spinning lately, much less posting pictures.

Recently I finished my second bobbin of the fiber I started spinning for 2012 Tour de Fleece.  How bad is that?

I thought I had posted a picture of the fiber I dyed on the blog, but when I did a quick search I couldn't find it.

I did find it on my flickr account.

 Thank goodness for notes.  It's Merino top, 3 ounces.  You can't really see the greens in the fiber.  I kettle-dyed this becuase that was the only kind of dyeing I knew how to do and not freak out at the results.

Here's a picture of it being plyed up.


Here's a close up.  You can see the greens better in this photo.

I was trying to go for a thin enough ply so that I could get a two-ply sock yarn.  Or close to it.  I'm  not sure if I'm going to get it though.  It seems to be a fine thick and thin, if there is such a thing.  I'm also only about a third done plying.  This is going to take me a while.

A couple weeks ago I got a some books from the library on spinning.

I learned a LOT from each of these books. The DVD that came with  "The Intentional Spinner" by Judith MacKenzie was really helpful.

My only "disappointment" with the DVD was that I watched her method of plying and I tried it and it did not feel natural.  So I've reverted back to my old method of how I hold my hands when I ply.  No biggie.

Another thing in her book that was really insightful to me was the ability to change what yarn you can make by switching up the whorls.  Now I knew you could do this, but I hadn't given it much thought.  After seeing her switch it up it was a light bulb moment for me and I feel like I've rediscovered my wheel again.