The Week October 23-29

October 23, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 8 Comments

Last week:

~~Walk instead of going back to bed after I finish my morning coffee. Done for today – I took Lil for a walk on the W&OD trail (a rail trail) that runs through my neighborhood and all the way into DC.~~
Done. Lil and I have walked every day since last Monday. Somedays have just been around the block, and twice so long that I broke her and had to carry her part of the way back; I won’t do that this week, I’ve promised her.

Untitled — Lil, broken (resting) on the W&OD

~~Go to TKD twice.~~
I went thrice!
~~Carry on knitting (S)urge, the new shawl and read The Essex Serpent while doing it.~~
Done. I finished The Essex Serpent (5 stars, would read again) and started Brazzaville Beach.
~~Start a new embroidery or new spinning project.~~
Started, made progress, and ruined. But I have a similar, better idea for the next one.

Write a post about Spinzilla.
Nope. But I did change the poem on my refrigerator to e. e. cummings [hist whist].

And, unexpectedly, I found the perfect kitten while browsing Petfinder, which replaced my Twitter feed for a while. I convinced my husband, with some wise words from my 13 year old who said “Dad, just give in; you can’t win an argument with Mom!” and I filled out the adoption application for this guy, who’s current name is Spider.

This week:

Carry on with walking every day, but not so much that I break Lil and have to carry her.
Go to TKD twice.
Carry on knitting (S)urge, the new shawl and read Brazzaville Beach while doing it.
Start another new embroidery project using lessons learned from the scissor catastrophe.
Spinzilla. I’m going to write about it as soon as I post this.
Spider-kitten: wait patiently. My contact at the rescue is out of town until Wednesday.
Saturday we’re going to Morgantown for my oldest’s birthday. I think there will be hiking and cake. And lots of car knitting.

The Week October 16-22

October 16, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 2 Comments

So last week I flaked out on everything and spent a good part of the week in bed, either reading (I finished a bad steampunk novel and started The Essex Serpent) or sleeping. Spinzilla was fun but, as usual, I went all-in and by Saturday was ready for it to be over. My hip flexors hurt from sitting and spinning so much and I fought with the last braid I spun late Saturday and Sunday. I’ll definitely do it again, but with better and strategic planning, now that I know what to expect.

I also happen to be in between creative projects; I’m knitting a shawl, but I’m not over the moon excited about it, and I’m not embroidering anything right now. I also have started to doubt my validity and long term plan, which I’ve managed to do in record time. Am I really an artist? Is that something I can really spend the rest of my time doing? Or am I just another person with needles and knitting patterns? I just need to do some more soul searching and long term planning, or, you know, actually execute my long term plan.

I saw my therapist on Friday and she noticed that my affect is pretty flat, so seasonal changes in the light might already be affecting me. I may need a medication adjustment, which annoys me because I didn’t need one last year, so why should I need one this year? I’m even taking vitamins this year to help keep things under control. I wish there was a blood test or something similar that I could take – just like my husband testing his blood sugar level – to determine exactly what I need instead of this touchy feely stabbing in the dark stuff.

On to planning!

The week before last week:

~~SPINZILLA!~~
It was fun, despite me having no sense of pace or self-control. I’ll definitely do it again and recommend it!

This week:

Walk instead of going back to bed after I finish my morning coffee. Done for today – I took Lil for a walk on the W&OD trail (a rail trail) that runs through my neighborhood and all the way into DC.
Go to TKD twice.
Carry on knitting (S)urge, the new shawl and read The Essex Serpent while doing it.
Start a new embroidery or new spinning project.
Write a post about Spinzilla.

The Week October 2-8

October 3, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 8 Comments

Last week:

Take fancy final project photos of Inamara, which involves getting Mr. Q & his photog skills.
Ugh – I still need to do this.
~~Carry on with (S)urge, the new shawl.~~
Making progress!
~~Spin, whether it’s handpainted or some of the fleece from my stash.~~
I started and finished spinning fleece from my stash. All the details on it are here, but I spun 378 yards of a 3 ply sport-ish weight yarn, with a 2 ply and singles left over. I couldn’t wait for Spinzilla.
~~Ruminate further on a new embroidery project~~ or, you know, actually start one.
I ruminated and cleaned up my project basket, but didn’t start anything new.

This week:

I’m taking precious time away from the wheel to take care of some non-spinning stuff and then it’s back to the grindstone! What’s Spinzilla, you ask? All the details are here, but it’s basically a week-long spin-a-thon. (Hey! That rhymes!) I’m almost 2/3 of the way through my first braid of fiber and actually considering drinking some coffee so I can stay up later and spin more! (That’s probably a bad idea and I don’t think I’ll do it, but the thought is there!) Have a great week!

The Week September 25 – October 1

September 25, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 12 Comments

Last week:

Take fancy final project photos of Inamara, which involves getting Mr. Q & his photog skills. Use his camera this time, not my phone.
I talked to him about it but we never got around to it.
~~Continue working on the new blanket.~~
Finished. I started and restarted (twice) a shawl, and finally found a pattern that I like and started that over twice, going forward with different yarn.
~~Continue spinning the braid of Pigeon Roof Studios fiber.~~
Finished.
Start a new embroidery project.
Nope. I’m still stuck on the last one, but I have some ideas of what to do next.
Hopefully hear back from my friend and decide what to do with The View From Mt. Peg.
Nope. She’s a high school English teacher in Hawaii, so that may explain why she’s not online much.
~~Saturday: meet Becky & her daughter Mia at Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival. From there, go to friend gathering in Martinsburg, WV.~~ Sunday is free, so maybe I can get Ky to go to the Leesburg Fine Arts Festival (day 2) to poke around and maybe make some connections in this local artist world I’m trying to be more active in.
We went, we saw, I bought stuff – spinning fiber and vintage buttons; I’m ready for Spinzilla. And I also had a really good afternoon catching up with Leticia & her littles. I slept on Sunday, pretty much during prime Fine Arts Festival time so we didn’t go.

SVFF Goodies — My favorite bump of fiber from SVFF; BFL, llama, seacell. I absolutely love this color combination!

~~Some sad news: Moose, our 12 year old big black dog, hasn’t been doing well and so we have an appointment on Thursday to ease his pain and help him across the Rainbow Bridge.~~ It went as well as could be expected. The in-home vet was very compassionate, Moosie went out without any pain and with a dog bone in his mouth, very fitting for a guy who could never eat enough. We miss him but are all glad he’s not in pain anymore.

I also carded some fleece from my stash, so I have a batt ready to spin. Now if I could just find where I noted the breed …

This week:

Take fancy final project photos of Inamara, which involves getting Mr. Q & his photog skills.
Carry on with (S)urge, the new shawl.
Spin, whether it’s handpainted or some of the fleece from my stash.
Ruminate further on a new embroidery project or, you know, actually start one.

The Week September 18-24

September 18, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 10 Comments

Last week:

~~Weave in the ends of Aranami/Imanara (there are lots even though I’ve been weaving in as I go), and wash & block, then sniff & squish.~~
All done!
~~Choose and start a new knitting project. Will it be a blanket to give away or will it be a shawl to keep? I have ideas and yarn for both.~~
Done. I’m knitting a blanket of my own design (nothing fancy, really) for the Welcome Blanket Project (HT to Shirley for making me aware of this project!).

~~Carry on embroidering The View From Mt. Peg. It’s ready for all the background mountains and the sky. It occurred to me that I could use the gray background color for clouds, so there’s that.~~
I think it’s done without the sky, maybe. I queried the always helpful and funny Mildly Offensive Fiber Arts group on FB for advice about pricing because I have an old friend inquiring about it or a similar commission piece. I gathered my thoughts, made my calculations and came up with a reasonable-to-me-for-the-situation price and am just waiting to hear back from the old friend.
Decide on fiber to prep for Spinzilla, if any, and get started while trying not to spin all the braids I’ve got. I have clean, undyed locks I can dye & card or just card, but I also have some alpaca fleeces that need to be washed that would be a joy to spin if I ever actually get around to doing that.
Instead, I started spinning a braid of fiber from Pigeon Roof Studios. I should do a test spin of those locks and wash that alpaca fleece, but this seemed much more fun.

Plan the weekend: Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival is this weekend, so is parents weekend at both my sons’ schools. We’re going to skip it and take Ethan (who’s at JMU in Harrisonburg, VA) hiking on Sunday in the Shenandoah National Park instead. That leaves Saturday for SVFF, except some of my roller derby friends are getting together and I haven’t seen a lot of them for a few years. I have conflicts.
We visited Ethan this past Sunday, which opens up my Sunday. All other plans are settled.
~~Try to sleep Wednesday night after seeing IT at the Alamo with Becky. Avoid clowns.~~
No problemo! It was startling in a few spots, but I realized it’s most like Stand By Me but with a scary clown demon instead of a dead body. Also, there’s a kick-ass girl, but the groups of kids is as close as the group of boys in Stand By Me. Can’t wait for Chapter 2, may need to re-read the book or start reading King again in general.

This week:

Take fancy final project photos of Inamara, which involves getting Mr. Q & his photog skills. Use his camera this time, not my phone.
Continue working on the new blanket.
Continue spinning the braid of Pigeon Roof Studios fiber.
Start a new embroidery project.
Hopefully hear back from my friend and decide what to do with The View From Mt. Peg.
The View From Mt. Peg, probably in its near-final form.
Saturday: meet Becky & her daughter Mia at Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival. From there, go to friend gathering in Martinsburg, WV. Sunday is free, so maybe I can get Ky to go to the Leesburg Fine Arts Festival (day 2) to poke around and maybe make some connections in this local artist world I’m trying to be more active in.
Some sad news: Moose, our 12 year old big black dog, hasn’t been doing well and so we have an appointment on Thursday to ease his pain and help him across the Rainbow Bridge. He will be dearly missed by us all, but it’s time – he’s having problems just getting up from lying down, along with having problems with the stairs to the back yard and some so far minor potty problems. We’re treating him like a king this week.

The Week September 11-17

September 11, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 1 Comment

Last week:

~~Order from Campus Cookies for Ethan for his birthday Thursday. Eat more of Ky’s cake to celebrate in Ethan’s absence. Our first birthday apart and his 18th.~~
The cookies & balloons were a grand success – Ethan, his roommate and the guys on his hall feasted. I think it was a pretty good birthday for him.

~~Carry on with Aranami/Imanara. I’m almost halfway through the final row.~~
Finished, except for weaving in ends, washing & blocking.
~~Carry on with the embroidery.~~
I’m about halfway done with the canvas, but only 1/3 of the way through the colors, so the funnest part is still to come.
~~Choose and start the next spinning project.~~
I chose and spun a braid of Dragonfly Fibers polwarth & silk roving and did a 3 ply, with 2 ply and a single left over. I think it’s the squishiest yarn I’ve spun; I seem to only be able to do a short forward draw, alternated occasionally with a long back draw, which makes for a pretty tight twist. This time around the polwarth was sticky enough that I didn’t feel like it needed a lot of twist to stay together, so I adjusted accordingly and I love the yarn I got. The color, Salt Marsh, is really awesome too and I’m glad I got to spend so much time in it.

I also registered with Team Spin Off for Spinzilla, which is happening October 2-8. This was the thing I forgot to mention last week. I’ve never done Spinzilla – it started the same year I got caught up in roller derby, which is kind of all-consuming, and I just haven’t gotten around to trying it until now. Let’s see how much I can spin in 7 days!

This week:

Weave in the ends of Aranami/Imanara (there are lots even though I’ve been weaving in as I go), and wash & block, then sniff & squish.
Choose and start a new knitting project. Will it be a blanket to give away or will it be a shawl to keep? I have ideas and yarn for both.
Carry on embroidering The View From Mt. Peg. It’s ready for all the background mountains and the sky. It occurred to me that I could use the gray background color for clouds, so there’s that.
The View From Mt. Peg
Decide on fiber to prep for Spinzilla, if any, and get started while trying not to spin all the braids I’ve got. I have clean, undyed locks I can dye & card or just card, but I also have some alpaca fleeces that need to be washed that would be a joy to spin if I ever actually get around to doing that.
Plan the weekend: Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival is this weekend, so is parents weekend at both my sons’ schools. We’re going to skip it and take Ethan (who’s at JMU in Harrisonburg, VA) hiking on Sunday in the Shenandoah National Park instead. That leaves Saturday for SVFF, except some of my roller derby friends are getting together and I haven’t seen a lot of them for a few years. I have conflicts.
Try to sleep Wednesday night after seeing IT at the Alamo with Becky. Avoid clowns.

Did I say clowns? Here’s a palate cleanser: the Dragonfly Fibers Salt Marsh single on my hardware store niddy noddy. Those colors!!! Have a great (clown-free!) week!

Untitled

The Week September 4-10

September 5, 2017 ~ madgeface ~ 3 Comments

Last week:

~~Decide what’s next for Aranami/Imanara. The choices:~~

~~Work the final row (different from regular rows) in the bright colored yarn. The final stripe would be 1/2 a row taller than all the other stripes.~~
Work another stripe of the dull colored yarn, with the final row being part of the stripe. All stripes would be the same height, but the stripe sequence would be off by 1 – I started with the dull yarn but I like the bright yarn better and would prefer that to be at the top of the shawl.
Work another stripe of the dull yarn followed by another stripe, with final row, of the bright yarn. Risk running out of yarn. Ripping back would be especially tedious and cumbersome since the shawl is knit in wedge modules.

I went with choice 1. This shawl is big enough and I want to finish it and move on to something else (probably another shawl). I may incorporate the dull color in a wide band at the top, which would be totally off-pattern. But I haven’t exactly followed the pattern to the letter (colorwise, at least) anyway. Patterns are just gentle suggestions, right?

~~Publish This Is My Heart, the heart pattern that I came up with for Hearts for Cville and~~ write a blog post about the whole heart thing.
At least I did part of this. I posted it all over the place – Ravelry, Twitter, Instagram – but did not, in fact, write a blog post about it. Maybe this week?
~~Begin actual embroidery work on The View from Mt. Peg.~~
Check! I finished the first two layers of mountains – so much satin stitch and so many french knots.

Decide on the next knitting project, which will use either a rainbow variegated yarn from Marigoldjen that I got at MDSW 2016 and the black yarn I got from Neighborhood Fiber Company at MDSW 2017 or yarn that I got from The Fiberists at Shenandoah Fiber Festival 2017. Or I may re-knit or crochet Jeff’s cat cave, which is currently laying collapsed and unused in my family room.This is still up in the air. I’ve been thinking about it, but embroidery & spinning & Imanara/Aranami have been keeping me busy.

I also finished spinning the Spunky Eclectic bump. Here it is on my niddy-noddy. It’s currently soaking it a tub, waiting for me to squeeze it out & whack before drying.

And my husband’s birthday was on Sunday the 3rd, so I baked him a cake. He used to be cake-averse, but since discovering he has type 2 diabetes (somewhat under control after 10 years), he loves it. This is Almond Cream Cake, which I’ve not made before. I’d bake again with some modifications; the cake was too dense (an egg white problem, I think) and the frosting looked broken/separated (perhaps I didn’t whip it enough).

This week:

Order from Campus Cookies for Ethan for his birthday Thursday. Eat more of Ky’s cake to celebrate in Ethan’s absence. Our first birthday apart and his 18th.
Carry on with Aranami/Imanara. I’m almost halfway through the final row.
Carry on with the embroidery.
~~Choose and start the next spinning project.~~
That’s right, I already did this yesterday. How nice to be able to mark something off on the new list. I’m spinning a braid of Dragon Fly Fibers Polwarth Silk (85/15) in the Salt Marsh colorway, which I think was the MDS&W 2016 exclusive colorway. I’m doing a fractal spin (divide fiber lengthwise into 3 equal portions, spin 1 length, divide next part lengthwise into 2 & spin, divide last part into 4 & spin). I already spun 1/3 of it – it’s going to be lofty thanks to the Polwarth I think/hope.

I feel like I’m forgetting something. Oh well – if I am it’ll make it into next week’s The Week. May your week be memorable and peaceful. 🙂