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The best laid plans…

Actually my plans are coming along just fine, it is A who had a spanner in the works yesterday.  She and SIL S went off to Augusta in the morning to visit their aunt and then the sister they seldom see.

I stayed home and worked on knitting and puttering and clearing out some stash to ship away.

I finished the shawl Monday night, actually with loads more yarn leftover than I expected, so I blocked that yesterday while they were gone.

I finished the green sweater, button band FINALLY lying flat and not pulling or rippling.  Now to select buttons.

I dug deep into stash, packed up almost all my straight and DPN needles, only kept one of each size of my grandmother’s, in her needle roll.  And I emptied two bins of yarn I will never use, all to ship off to a woman who will be going to Africa this summer and will continue teaching people to knit.  I also filled a bin of “swap” yarn for my trip to Wisconsin in September.  I hope I remember to bring it.  I might find more such yarn as I go through things this summer, who knows?

I swatched for my next sweater, teal and black stripes.  I love how the colors look but I am not sure about all those ends…

And then around 2 I got a text from my SIL.  They were headed home, but did not get to see Aunt M because she had passed away that morning, a couple of hours before they arrived.

While they were not close to her, I know it was a blow.  So few of that generation left in her family.  She was well over 90, and not well, but I think it still was a shock.  I wish we had stopped on Sunday instead of whizzing by.  A dreads family visits, and hospital visits, but I think she would have stopped if she had realized how close to the end M was.  But she didn’t want to go without her sister, so we kept going.

They did have lunch with their sister, and met her puppy, which was a good antidote to the morning. They had lunch at A’s favorite pizza place, and her sister gave her some snazzy snowshoes for her birthday, so the day ended better than it started.

I felt a little guilty about having such a good day here at home with the knitting and craft room (and laundry, in case you thought I was ONLY playing) but it is what it is.

Today we are home, it is raining, so no photos for you of all my finishes.  I’ll do some knitting and spinning and see what I can cast on.  🙂

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Just been too lazy to power up the computer or to try to write a post on the phone (WHY is that such a tedious chore?  Work on it, WordPress, please?)

 

Loads of knitting has happened and some spinning, and a day away from shoveling, and a long weekend.

Here’s the spinning:

Filled a bobbin with the second color of my planned three ply.  Now the two filled bobbins await the third, which I started yesterday.  This is going to be some crazy yarn!  Or really awful, time will tell.

I worked on socks – plan to finish this one up before March 1, according to my 6 pairs a year plan.

I finished the Corrugated Hat to match the Corrugated Cowl, these will go on Etsy sometime soon. I still had yarn left, so I am doing a striped hat in the same colors.  Not sure if this will be an Etsy listing or a donated item.  Time will tell.

I finished knitting the Gloria del Sol shawl in Purple Fleece’s Aquamarine Radiant gradient – OMG , I love this thing.  Wait until you see it blocked.  It was a challenging knit, and I didn’t bead it, but if I ever do it again (and I am thinking I will when I forget how challenging it was) I will add beads, if only to help me count the crazy long endless repeats.

I have to dig around in yarn and queue to see what I will cast on next – or maybe dig out an unfinished something to finish it.  I have a couple of things that could use some attention, I know.

Saturday I travelled down to  Mom’s so I could hop in the car with her and B, and drive over to western Maine, Bridgton, to be exact, to have lunch with my two cousins who live there.  Brother N and SIL D joined us as well, and it was a very nice time.  So good to sit down with the cousins we usually only see at funerals.  Afterwards, we went to visit a friend of Mom’s for an hour or so, then drove all the way back.  A 13 hour day for lunch?  Yup.  But it was a nice change of pace, and of course, I knit the whole way there and back, as B drove.  And let me tell you – I thought we had snow – they have literally two or three times as much on the ground as we do.  Truthfully, mom and I both found it really depressing, even though the sun was shining and the sky was a beautiful bright blue.  It took us both back to the years we lived there, and how endless the winters felt.  Mom said “This is why I moved to the coast” which I had never known, I knew she loved the ocean, but not how much she hated deep snow that never stops and there is no where to put it. So naturally, she moved to the part of the coast that regularly gets slammed by the coastal storms.  But at least she has a bigger yard and some place to put the snow.

Sunday we finished cleaning up around the driveway and paths and decks, which was great, to let everything melt in the warm spring sunshine – amazing weather! Hard to believe this is one week ago: (That’s my car to A’s left.)

We were both glad to be done with it – A even has shoveling blisters – ugh. So yesterday we enjoyed our holiday by having me work on our taxes and clean the pellet stove while she worked on clearing out files and folders.  Fun, fun!

As you can tell, it has been the same old low key life around here the past few weeks – and I like it that way – no drama, no unexpected surprises, and loads of fun with fiber.

How have you been keeping busy lately?

 

 

 

 

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The last day of vacation.  Heayy sigh.

We filled this week full, yet I still feel relaxed.  Not ready to go to work, but relaxed, lol.

We spent loads of time with family, and all of it was good.  Thanksgiving Day was spent with 8 of us who are all on a similar page politically, so there was no strife, only good food and fun.

Saturday was our family carol sing – a long tradition on my Mom’ side of the family.  Mom, her two sisters and as many cousins and second cousins, etc as can make it. This year we had all the cousins in my generation, but missed a whole bunch of the next generation – the kids are getting older and all had girlfriends and homework, etc calling them, so no trip to Maine for singing.  But we did have a few who had been missing in recent years – all graduated now, they are grownups who work and have weekends free.  It was loads of fun, and even though I couldn’t sing (sinuses still causing havoc with voice), I really enjoyed listening to them  sing, and chatting with the small crowd of guys who hang in the living room not singing each year. And I got a few doll mittens knit for little E, which made her very happy as she had requested them.

In and between and among all of that, I spent a day with niece B getting a start on making the Christmas cards (still have many to go, but at least the process has begun  🙂 ); A and I went to the movies – IN THE MOVIE THEATER! – which rarely happens; had supper out once or twice, cleaned most of the house, and generally puttered and got things done that needed doing.  I also did a bit of spinning, and a whole lot of knitting, most of which is for Christmas.   I knit a few things from some handspun, which feels really good!  One of those things is this doll’s hat to match the mittens I made for E’s doll, but the rest can’t be shown yet. 🙂

This is color tag from Three Waters Farm, and it is rambouillet.  It was hard for me to spin, but I really like the resulting yarn, very soft.

I also cast this on – the girls at work have been asking for these hats, so I will knit a few of them and sell them too cheaply, because I know what they earn.  🙂

Spinning-wise, I finished one bobbin of Cadillac Mountain (from Purple Fleece) and have started the next.  It’s a merino cashmere blend and it is so easy to spin, and really soft. Can’t wait to have it to knit with!

While I was knitting and spinning, A was really struggling with her project, to make plexi-glass inserts for the screen porch.  I think she would have had an easier time of it if this supervisor had been more helpful.

But clearly, supervising is difficult work, really takes it out of you.  It takes a couple of days of napping before the fire for Zumba to recover.

Today we are being so lazy – watching many sappy holiday movies.  We record them on the Hallmark channel and watch them at our leisure… which is all day today, I guess!  Because we have taken most of the week off from dieting, and will start again tomorrow, there are brownies in the oven which I fully intend to eat with a nice cup of cocoa.  Well, I won’t eat them all – A will get one or two as well.  If any are left, they will go to work with me tomorrow.

Heavy sigh.

I think I will go check the lottery tickets before I  think too much more about all that has to happen tomorrow.

 

 

 

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We went to the fair as planned.

It rained.

Not the tenth- to a quarter-inch that was predicted.  At least an inch.  Maybe more.

We waited for the train in the rain (I highly recommend the train – it saves so much traffic and parking aggravation, and loads of walking.) Mom was generally happier than she looks in this photo – she hates having photos taken, especially with phones and for no reason.  🙂

We watched the sheep dog demo in the misty drizzle.  (Love to watch border collies move animals with their eyes.)

We visited the fiber tents and Wednesday Spinner Tent in a steady rain.

We ate lunch in torrential rains.

We took refuge in the folk art tent and watched some fun contra dancing.  While I knit (duh) and Mom and niece B shivered from the cold and wet, we all watched niece E dance with abandon.  Sister C and her husband R were visiting the fair for the first time, and they spent most of the day tracking after E as she went on horse-drawn wagon rides, made a beaded bracelet, hand ground buckwheat into flour, explored all the animal barns, and generally had a blast, heedless of the rain.

I didn’t do as much shopping as I normally would, I am not sure I found all the fiber vendors, as we got so cold and wet that we decided to head out before the contra dancing was quite finished (2:30 or so).

But I did get a bit of fiber!  I wanted to learn more about different kinds of spinning, and so I chatted with a few farmers before making my selections.  If it hadn’t been raining, I would have gotten more from some of them, but I didn’t want to carry huge amount of wet fiber around.

I got this – an ounce of Finn from a woman who raises what look like the happiest of sheep. I plan to do a little dying with this and see how dying on a dark base impacts the color.

And this – Angora/wool mix.  I chatted with the woman in this booth about my spinning skills, and asked her how hard Angora is to spin – it’s hard, apparently, and she recommended a blend with wool, so this is angora and merino.  SO SOFT!

This I found in the Bartlett tent.  Bartlett has a million colors of yarn, all of which I want.

But then in a bin, I discovered these little batts of unidentified wool (Debbie at the Purple Fleece said it feels like Romney, which is why I need to keep learning.  Her fingers can tell her this?  I need a label written in English.)

And that is it.  Everything I bought at the fair. I spent perhaps 50 dollars, including ticket and lunch.  Very unlike me. I blame the rain. The absolutely only good thing about the rain is that it keeps the crowds way down, it was wonderfully uncrowded.  Oh, and I guess it is good that we got the rain, since we are still exceedingly dry around here.

I made up for the lack of yarn spending  on Saturday, when I went to Whorls and Purls at the Purple Fleece.  My roving of the month was waiting for me – inspired by a mushroom!  It just feels like autumn to me.  Here are the front and back, looking a bit different from each other.  I love the little touches of purple.

She also had a whole new batch of gradients that I had not seen before,  I got a two skeins of one of them.  I am not completely sure what I will do with these, but I am thinking maybe a shawl, because I need another one, ROTFL!  But with over 800 yards, I have a lot of options.

So while it wasn’t what I expected to be showing you, I did manage to get a wide array of fiber-y goodness this weekend.

Not sure if I will go to the fair in the rain again…if it rains on Friday next year, I might give it a miss.   I love the fair, but not the cold September rain.

 

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I took the day off to even out from last week’s crazy hours, and so you get  a Friday list this week. (You lucky thing!)

Oh, such a simple list!

Get up and dressed in a very special fair outfit, meet up with niece B, head off to meet Mom, then go to the (Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association)  Common Ground Fair!

It is supposed to be a rainy day, so the very special fair outfit involves shorts, sneakers and warm socks, a t-shirt, sweater or sweatshirt, a raincoat, and a ball cap.  All of which seriously impedes the ability to shop as all these layers fill the day pack when they are not in use!  A towel, shoes, and socks go in the car so that the ride home can be warm and dry.

This year we are going to Thorndike to catch the train to the fair – a ten minute train ride that hopefully saves lots of traffic congestion and walking from distant parking lots. We would rather spend our walking around energy AT the fair, not getting TO the fair. Conveniently, the train drops us off near the flush toilets!  Mom planned this change, can you tell?

Mom and B will want to spend loads of time with the farm animals large and small.  Fortunately, the animal barns are always located fairly near the fiber and yarn tents.  I am excited this year to check out spinning fibers by local dyers.  Still not ready for a whole fleece (haven’t got hand carders!) so I won’t be lugging three bags full of wool around the fair.  Maybe next year? But I do plan to get some pretty, unique yarn and fiber.

And who knows what I will find in the Maine-made artisan tents?  So much great stuff is made here.

We have a new family rule this year for the fair, though, that I have to keep in mind – if you buy it, you carry it.  So maybe I will leave a layer of clothing off so I can carry more. We’ll see how cold it is.

Then there is the food – !  Cousin B will likely be selling his wood-fired pizza, so delicious – and there is so much more.  The food has to be Maine-sourced, which can make an interesting meal – but we harvest crab meat, and grow potatoes, and make maple goodies….I am hungry just thinking about it.  I will take pictures there and pictures of the things I buy, and share them with you as I do each year – it will be like you came with me to the fair – get ready for a fun day!

 

 

 

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I can’t tell you how we have waited for this week.  A’s job has its busy season in June, July, and August.  That means no vacation, and only the occasional long weekend.  But usually by September, it slows down.  She also has to book her vacations well in advance so that the office can work around that vacation schedule when setting up all her trainings and software installs.  She is the only trainer/installer, so the calendar is important to the whole company.

As a result, we decide in January when our vacations for the year will be.  And this one always seems to take the longest to get here.  It is tough to go all summer working while everyone else has vacation time.  But then, September finally arrives and we get to relax and enjoy chilling for a whole week.

So what are we doing this week?

Well, since it is Monday, we have already had two days of it – how it flies!

Saturday I spent some time with spinning and knitting in the morning.

This is “Life’s a Beach” from the Purple Fleece, on Falkland.  OMG look how thin I can spin this stuff.  I love it.  I can’t begin to think how much yarn I will get from this.

My 4 shawls are moving along, and I wanted to get lifelines in, so I did that. And in the process, discovered that I had made an error on the Biophilia.  I looked at it long and hard and decided that while maybe no one else would notice, I would, and so I would need to rip back. Nine rows. About 2500 stitches.  Sigh.  I put it aside.

I also experimented with photos, taking them with camera and phone.

 

Obviously, they get turned about, even though I think I tried to be consistent with orientation.  But the colors and light are also quite different as well. The ones on the left are the phone, the right, the camera.  The sun was up, but still behind trees, so it wasn’t really the best light for this experiment.  I might try it again in brighter light.

I had to pick up everything from the pop up shop at noon time, so after a delicious French toast breakfast made by A, I went into town.  Holiday weekend.  Have to turn left onto Route 1 to get to town.  Ugh.  I waited at least ten minutes before I could make that turn. But I did make it eventually and picked up the things which didn’t sell.  I did not sell a whole lot of anything, but luckily some of what I sold was shawls, so I made enough money to make it worthwhile.  Jewelry sold slowly, but it always has.  I am thinking that it is just not worth making for sale. Even though the pieces are incredible, soft and lustrous…silk and glass beads, how can I go wrong?…most of the patterns I use are from Laura Nelkin and she asked me when I inquired to please not sell them online.  So, I won’t.  But I also won’t knit anymore that aren’t ones I want to keep. And I might off-load some to nieces and cousins this winter if there is no pop-up shop again. Which is still up for debate.  The fabulous Sonja is thinking of a year-round shop in a nearby town, I will have to think long and hard about that, since my things don’t sell fast, they sell slow and steady. But they do well in the winter.  Not sure I want to stock (and pay a fee) all year long.  I’ll think about it.

From the pop-up shop, I went on to Whorls and Purls group at the Purple Fleece, where I spent more than 2 hours frogging the Biophilia mis-knit rows.  Sigh.  I did get to knit a row on the Oaklet, so it wasn’t a total loss.  They have a little froggy who travels with group members – I took him home this week, and he will likely show up in a phot or two over the next few weeks.  (No group this upcoming week, so I get froggy for a spell)

When I got home, I got right to knitting on those 9 rows, of course.  So Saturday was my kind of day!

Sunday, we were mapping out our plan to get 4 tons of pellets (200 40 pound bags) into the cellare and stacked.  With no direction from MDs on what I can and can;t do, A felt I should not lift them, and I felt like what is the point of wearing the monitor if I dont; do my normal things? How will I know what I can and can;t do in teh future?  We were figuring out how to do it so it wasn’t too awful a  chore, but didn’t last all week.  I posted a photo of the pellets on facebook and lo and behold – !  A’s nephew-in-law J spotted it and the next thing we knew he was here with his daughter (niece E the elder) and niece S, and those girls MOVED THE WHOLE 4 TONS INTO THE HOUSE IN ABOUT 2 HOURS. That 2 hours included water breaks after each ton and a lunch break.  They brought them to me, I put them on the ramp to slide down to where J caught them and A moved and stacked them.  J, A, and I could hardly move following this endeavor, but the girls seemed like it was no big deal.

I did pay for this, and learned a lesson – I had an uncomfortable night.  I’ll pace myself better next time.  But what good is the monitor if all I do is sit around for a month?  🙂

So now it is Monday, and we decided to havve a down day, not knowing how we would feel today (we both feel better than expected) and knowing that the tourists are all moving about today.

I’ll spin and knit, and go out back to where I spotted a japanese knotweed that needs to meet it’s demise.  And I will do that last bit with my bathing suit on so I can hop in the pool to cool off.  We are not getting Hermine, but the weather is getting warmer and more tropical as she disturbs the weather pattern.

I’ll also clear off the folding table in the craft room, because we need to lend our 4 tables and 24 folding chairs to work for a series of picnics that will happen at the end of this week and all of next week.  I let the boss know he could pick them up any time.  which means they need to get cleared off and make their way downstairs.

Tomorrow we don’t have any real plans, but that is a day we will likely go out to the dump, grocery store, PO etc, since we didn’t do it this weekend.  And maybe we will think of a little adventure to go on, too.  No telling!

Wednesday is a day for appointments.  I have one for the eye doctor in the morning, and the stove/chimney cleaners are coming around the same time, so A will stay home and deal with them. Not sure what we will do in the afternoon, but it wont; be any close work, as my eyes won;t be able to focus very well.  I wonder if I can spin without looking yet?

Thursday we are going off to visit Crimson Crow and watch a movie with her – looking forward to seeing her again, and we haven’t been to her house in a long time.  She lives in the most amazingly well designed house – not quite a tiny house on wheels but not that much bigger – definitely a very small house! She would deyny this, but I love how organized it is, and how much space she has made forl the tiny touches that make it hers.

No plans right now for the end of the week, but A is wanting to build a simple shelf for niece B, so maybe we will run it up to Bangor, and once we do that, there is no telling what else happens.

 

I’ll leave you with some shots of the mail this week – August’s offering from the Purple Fleece, and the skein of Quince and CO. that I ordered to stave off losing at yarn chicken.  So much fiber in the world, I might need it all.  🙂

Again the phot experiment – the colors are all too dark, I think.

 

These are from the camera:

And these are from the phone:

 

 

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Friday night after work I went to Bangor to help B move into her dorm. What a nightmare of a week this kid has had! Denny the bunny remains a concern, not eating or drinking well, now scared of her because of force feeding, and we had to move him again!!!  She was in long RA training sessions each day, it was hot, her dorm wasn’t ready until Friday afternoon (renovations) and she had a very short window of time to get herself into her permanent room, unpacked and set up, out of her temporary room and then to an evening meeting. She still had to do her door decorations and bulletin board, and her girls were arriving the next morning!

Aunt Salpal to the rescue. In just two hours we got all her things moved in, unpacked, bed made, clothes put away, bunny settled. It was 85 degrees in that building since it had been closed up tight all summer. We were both drenched and exhausted. We got fans running, though, and it cooled off outside when the sun went down, so I hope it got cooler in her tiny little room.

Not impressed with how her school handled any of this. Lack of communication, lack of flexibility on the rules. Not nice. (Bulletin boards had to be decorated per contract. They were not installed following reno, they were on the floor, but they had to be decorated anyway, even though these RAs were not given access to the building the week before like all the others.)

So here’s a question- why did they take a third or more space from the RA’s room when they expanded the bathrooms, to put in handicapped accessible bathrooms? When there is no elevator? There are 9 floors of this building! I could see it on the 1st floor, but the 6th? Seems like a waste of space.

Anyway she is in and got it all done and I think collapsed today! No bunny report today, I hope all is well.

Saturday was the party to celebrate the twin niece’s and nephew’s college graduation this spring.  A stayed with stepdad so Mom could attend (he’s a couple of weeks post knee replacement) so Mom and I traveled together to brother N’s home.  All the family was there excepting the two nieces in college, but including Dad and step mom S from Connecticut, and my brother-in-law’s mum A from NZ. Always so nice to see everyone! A is always amazing, she seems to remember everything about us since last we met a few years ago. I love when she comes to visit.  Dad and S looked well, and we had a few minutes to chat between food and photos. 😀

But it it was a long day- got back to Mom’s in time for supper, got home well past 9. Cats felt they should get some attention, so we were up much later than normal.

Today I spent some serious time with knitting and spinning. (Read sitting.) The knitting all looks the same as the last time you saw it, although I am at least on row 5 of all my lace patterns on all my shawls, it barely shows. Oaklet is farther along but no photos. I’ll get you some this week.

However I did get photos of this finished object- more yarn!

This is Color Tag fromThree Waters Farm. Let me start by saying I love it! The colors are bright and fun. And I got my best yardage yet- the two skeins are two-plied and came to 350 yards before washing. The littlest skein is a chain-plied end and is about 13 yards.

Now on that you know that, I can tell you it did not come out at all as I had anticipated!  I broke the braid carefully, making sure all pieces began and ended the same as each other. I weighed each little nest and they were pretty close. I concentrated and went slowly so I could spin evenly. I hoped I would get solid colors flanked with a bit of barber poling. I got barber poling with a few solids. The beginning and the end of the bobbins behaved as I had planned but the middle was wild and crazy wonderful color.  I don’t think there are two areas the same- it is going to be interesting to knit with, for sure!

I moved on to my next spinning project, Purple Fleece’s Life’s a Beach, which was last month’s roving of the month.

I didn’t try anything too scientific here, just split it in half and divided it down into random thickness nests.  The colors are nice and soft, I am looking forward to the change from the brights. Didn’t actually spin any of it yet, but I am ready for tomorrow.

That’s really all I did today, spin and knit. Oh except that when I was hanging the newly washed color tag, I noticed a problem in the garden. Huge green caterpillars eating tomatoes!!!! I banished 4 of them to the woods but not before they completely defoliated a couple of plants and ruined a few tomatoes. This is the first year I have had this problem. Might have to skip tomatoes next year, they are gross and ugly things. No photos. You are welcome!

i didn’t even swim in the pool this weekend, but I will make up for that. We have a few more weeks of summer.

Last crazy weekend for a while, I hope!