One Crazy Fiber Lady

Carole asked me for any hints in attaching a roving to the leader when spinning.  I remember this being a sticking point when I started spinning myself not all that long ago until someone passed this tip to me.  Instead of just sending her the photos, I figured a post, explaining each photo, would maybe be a better idea, and who knows, maybe someone else might find this of use as well.  BTW, the same technique works well with a spindle too.  This post is going to be photo rich. Click the images for a larger view.   

1.  I take a length a yarn (usually some left over sock yarn) twice as long as you would normally use.   Fold in half and tie the ends together, making a big loop.  Take the end with the knot and wrap it around the bobbin once.  Feed the other end through and pull tight.  I usually slide it to the far end of the bobbin as that end is the one short little me can see when I sit at a wheel. 

2.  I then thread the looped end through the hooks on the flyer and the orifice as normal.  Make sure if you have hooks like this Ashford Flyer on my Merlin Tree Hitchhiker here that you get both strands of the leader threaded properly.  I’ve had one get stuck in the hooks.  Sort of like making sure you pick up all the plies when knitting.  Anyway, I now have the looped end out the orifice.

3. Use your fingers to open the loop…

4.  Fold this loop back on the leader length and pull a loop of the leader through….

5.  Here you can see the new loop that is formed.  I’m sure this knot has a name, but I can’t for the life of me remember what its called.  If I get bored, I’ll go and google a name for it.

**Edited to add that Elaine provided the name for this knot:  The Larkshead.   Here’s a good up close demo for it.

6.  I then take a bit of the fiber I want to spin, here you see a bit of romney roving, smoothing out just under a fiber length.

7.  I feed the prepped fiber through the new loop shown in step 5.

8.  Gently pull the leader loop tight, making sure to hold the fiber secure.

9. Fold the fiber bits in half and tighten both loops that form.

10.  Finally, ready to spin and very rarely do the works disconnect. 

I do hope someone got some use out of this.

Craft on!

With all else that has been going on, I nearly forgot to check how long I’ve been at this blogging thing.  I knew it was early October last year when I took the plunge.  Good thing I looked, today is my Blogiversary!  A whole year.  Who’d a thunk it.  This kind of thing would be the last activity that I would expect to enjoy.  I don’t enjoy writing.  I’d rather write in code than in English.  But something about blogging scratched an itch that I never knew I had.  Through it I’ve become part of a large and wonderful community.  I’ve made new and wonderful friends.  I’ve also been pushed to expand my crafting horizons.  Before blogging, I’d never done cables, never touched beads and honestly, never strayed from a pattern.  I thank you all for that.  Not surprisingly, my first post was a mix of the twins (they’d just celebrated their first birthday) and the crafting hobbies.  For the curious, you can read it here.

Thanks to everyone for their comments to yesterday’s blog.  I’ve relayed your happy birthday wishes to the short people.  I’m trying to enjoy their lives and each stage they go through.  As I mentioned in an email to Elaine, it all goes so slowly and altogether too fast.  A confusing dichotomy to be sure, but really how I feel. 

Believe it or not, I spun last night.  Actually that makes two nights in a row.  I finished the butterscotch lincoln cross that I bought at Cummington on Sunday.  It took me almost two hours to ply it last night.  I haven’t wound it off the bobbin yet.  I took this picture last night at 10pm and didn’t want to chance it taking two hours to skein up!  I’m trying to overlook how very long it took me to spin 8 ounces of wool.  I think this is telling me that my collection of spinning wheels are seriously neglected.  I do know that 2 hours of plying on a single treadle where you can’t swap feet is downright exhausting.  My left calf is looking very buff right now and laughing at the flabby old right leg.  I’m pretty sure I’ll have enough here for the Flower Basket Shawl that this yarn is earmarked for.  I’ll have to add Barneswallow Farms to my list of booths for Saturday at Rhinebeck.  Not sure if I should start up anything else, considering how soon that fest is and how I usually come home with something that I "MUST SPIN RIGHT NOW".  I should probably anticipate that feeling and play with something that is already on a wheel.  I could always knit…

Okay, show of hands, how many really believed my "this is my SLW contest entry" declaration last week?  If you’ve read more than oh say 2 posts, you know I flit from project to project, changing my mind repeatedly on the "rightness" of a project.  Witness what happened in the evolution of Rogue -> Eris -> Samus -> Twist.  So what am I working on instead?  I decided that I wasn’t really in love with that stole, that working on it was just a compromise between yarn and time.  There were several other cobweb items that I’d rather make.  So the stole is out.  Gloves, or more precisely handwarmers are in now.  They won’t be your average handwarmer, like these (which I’ve made in handspun merino) or even these beautiful ones.  For the last couple of days, I’ve cast on any number of swatches and started handwarmers in various yarns and stitch patterns.  I initially tried the Cherry Tree Hill Possum laceweight that I bought on the yarn crawl with Elaine.  The color changes really distracted from the lace and the eyes just didn’t see anything but the color.  I went to a sockweight but the fabric was too solid for what I really wanted after seeing this image.  I switched back to the cobweb on a size 0 needle.  After much futzing with yarn and which stitch pattern to use, I’ve finally settled down and really started knitting.  There isn’t much progress as yet since I’ve frogged so much.  But here’s some nice lace porn for you.

I’m still working in the J&S Cobweb that I really wanted to use.  I’m designing.  I’m using beloved double pointed needles in tiny sizes.  What else could a girl want?  Dental floss on toothpicks.  I love knitting!

Craft on.

While this should have been posted yesterday, I generally don’t do Sunday posts and was just too darn busy to do one.  So please pretend that today is October 9th and not the 10th.  You’ll see in a moment why….

In two short years, we’ve gone from this:

Two tiny little people were born in the wee hours of October 9th.  Kathryn came into this world weighing in at 4lbs 8.4oz.  Alex was a bit larger at 5lbs 13.4 oz.  Both went to the NICU with respiratory issues.  They each spent some time on CPAP.  Alex got the cool shades and spent some time under the billy light.  All in all, after a week, they came home.  It seems like yesterday.  In a blink of an eye, they’ve grown…

They constantly amaze me with how fast they are growing, how smart they are, and how very sweet they can be. They also tire the heck out of me. I love them dearly.

Happy birthday my very special babies.

Craft stuff will return tomorrow.

Now that my mid-week mini-break is over, I can hopefully put together a decent post.  Sorry about the Reader’s Digest version on Monday.  I was hopelessly frustrated by tech problems and the approaching departure time.  I do want to say, while it is nice to be out of the office for a couple of days, weekends (and weekend wanna-bees) are extremely exhausting.  The monkeys plum tuckered me out.  I’m happy to be back in the office.  They pull no punches and are teaching me to look at all sorts of things in a different way.  I have learned, probably not quickly enough, that quiet is a very bad thing when they are awake.  I should seriously start jumping when they get up from a nap, but I’m slow in learning this lesson.  Tuesday after nap they were playing in their room and it got quiet, but not that quiet that I should have been suspicious.  Oh no.  That would have been too easy.  What did they get into you ask?  Baby oil.  I had some seriously slick toddlers.  Yesterday wasn’t nap time, but general free-play and they took off for the new territory of their room.  It got quiet.  I moved faster this time and caught Alex spreading cat litter on his bed and floor.  Eeeew.  Can I just duct-tape them to the wall or something?  Does it ever get easier?  I’m friggin exhausted!  It was two days of chasing little people, making sure they didn’t choke on whatever small thing they found and needed to taste sample.  Making sure they didn’t stand on something they shouldn’t be.  Then drying the tears and giving hugs when the inevitable fall happened.  This is why they are cute, right, self-mechanism of theirs.

They did go to shul on Tuesday, but got ansty very quickly.  We left the main sanctuary probably 10 minutes after we arrived.  They did get to hear the Shofar blown, but didn’t seem overly impressed.  I wound up outside with them as they ran around with a friend’s son while mom stayed inside.  Yesterday, mom stayed home with the twins and I got to go to services.  I met some very nice people and will probably wind up joining this Synagogue.  It’s a smaller temple in my town that is in that rebuilding phase.  While I was mortified that my kids were making noise during services, I got nothing but smiles from the other congregants.  They were happy to see a new generation there.  As one woman told me, they are the future.  She’s right.  Its just that I’ve spent my life in a temple that frowned on noisy children and encouraged their leaving the main sanctuary.  They did provide babysitting services and junior congregations as an alternative.  We’ll be taking the monkeys back next week for Yom Kippur.  This time, I’m bringing the side by side stroller so that at least they are contained, if not quiet. 

Other than the religious stuff and cleaning, I have been doing a little knitting.  Here’s the closeup of the cable-y-goodness that is Twist.  Love it.  I finally made it off the ribbing of the second front piece this morning on the train.  In the tradition of seemingly starting a new project every week, I started a new project.  Elaine announced the contest specifics over on the EZasPi list.  I had to give some thought to what I wanted to enter in the contest.  Since I ordered that lovely J&S 1-ply cobweb, I really wanted to use that.  I dug out my Shetland Lace books Tuesday night and curled up with them, scanning for a project that would be just right.  While I found oodles of gorgeous shawls for cobweb, I didn’t think I’d really be able to finish them by the Nov 14 deadline.  Well I probably could, but not with my wandering attention span (and exhausting toddlers).  I struck on the "Fine Lace Stole and Scarf" from Gladys Amedro’s Shetland Lace.  I’m going to attempt the stole.  Here’s a picture I just found doing a search for the book (somewhere else other than my employer’s main competitor of a finished version of this stole.  Pretty.  I just got nervous when I read it took her 4 months?!  I better get cracking   I have 10.5 of the 21 scallops for the bottom edge done already.  I started it yesterday morning while I waited for my mom to get out of Physical Therapy so she could take the monsters her grandchildren and I could go to temple.  They were pretty awed by the swift /ballwinder combo, though they got over this awe quickly and I let them take turns helping me.   It isn’t making for great train knitting as I’m using the ebony needles from Webs in a size 4.  The pattern does call for a 3mm, but I didn’t have any and really a .5mm difference isn’t all that much.  I did buy a couple of Susannes in Rosewood in 3, 3.5 and 4mm sizes, so I might switch when they arrive.  Though if I do switch, I think I’ll go for the same size, I do hear the points are better.  I’m finding the ebony a bit duller than I’d like.

Anyway….

Prey that the vitamins I started to take give me a better oomph than the coffee is.

Oh, fellow spinning / knitting bloggers, please welcome another to our spinning fold:  Carole.  She’s been seduced by the siren’s call that is spinning.  Welcome Carole.

Craft on!

Okay, typepad ate my post.  I gotta go and can’t come anywhere near the glorious post I lost.  Here’s the replacement….

Reader’s Digest Version

After giving the monkeys more running room they slept very well, if a little crowded in their little beds. I let the run free through opening of the hallway and their bedroom. It was nice, though I did check on them frequently when they were out of sight. The cornstarch incident is still fresh in my memory.

Knitting was done while watching the Yankees and Red Sox mix it up again this year.  I finished the first front piece to Twist.  Yay.  Love them cables. I have a cableygoodness closeup that I will post later.  Need to leave in 5 minutes.  Trying to cram it all in now.

Had very ripe bananas. Remembered I owned one of these and made banana bread. Yum.

I spun! Finished the 3rd of 4 batts of that butterscotch stuff I bought in Cummington. Need to finish it before Rhinebeck to justify further purchases of fibery goodness. or maybe not.

Moving on, I called (S), we’re trying to schedule our next outting. That’s made a touch more complicated with the Jewish holidays over the next couple of weeks.

L’shanah tovah