High Fiber--Sarak's Visit Part 1

Sarak was with us for Valentine's Day:

Sarak, for people who don't listen to The Knit Wits Podcast (http://knitwitspodcast.blogspot.com/), is an aborted attempt by Carin (the Knit) to make a Christmas stocking for an acquaintance. Carin eventually made the stocking using other yarn, but this little piece of knitting history is now on tour, and currently with me in Park City, UT. The name was supposed to be "Sarah," but looked like "Sarak," so the name stuck. No Vulcans involved!

Sarak went with us when we took the pups for a snowshoe outing.

On Saturday, Sarak went with Joanie and me to the Acorn Antique Fair in Ogden, UT.

We stopped in at The Needlepoint Joint in Ogden. I had a credit there I wanted to use. It was enough for two skeins of Regia sport weight self-striping sock yarn and a little more towards a third skein. I bought four, enough for two pairs of fingerless mitts for dialysis patients.

Joanie bought some organic wool from Picabo Lean Inc. in Idaho. It's $4 for 2 oz. 2-ply sport weight and is natural white (suitable for dyeing). They also have it on cones. The Needlepoint Joint is the only place this yarn can be purchased. Here's what it says on the label:
"This wool is the product of sheep descended from the original ewe bands on the historic Busterback Ranch founded in 1918. The ranch, named for the men and women who almost broke their backs in labor, is located in the scenic Sawtooth Valley of central Idaho. In summer, the sheep providing this wool graze on lush organic pastures at the BBarB Ranch in Picabo, Idaho. In winter, they eat hay from these same pastures. The wool was processed at Green Mountain Spinnery using vegetable oil based soap, yielding a high quality organic product that you will enjoy working with and using for years and years!"
We found it very clean (devoid of vegetable matter) and sweet-smelling. Sarak does not knit and has no bank account, so she didn't buy anything.

It was good we went on Saturday, because we had a blizzard on Sunday. Here's what the snow looked like coming off the roof:

I'm coming down the home stretch on the second Daisy Chain quilt. Here's what it looks like with more than half of the blocks pinned to my design wall:

I used the Elna I inherited from my DSIL to piece the strips, because it goes very fast, but switched back to my little Featherweight to put the pieced strips together into blocks. It's slower, but I can get the seams to come together more accurately. I'm going to add a white border, as with the first one, but then plan on a 1" border and more white outside of that.

I've been posting little tips and ideas for quilting on Connecting Threads Quilt With Us here. Check it out.

I have been listening to Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice from Librivox. I downloaded Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett from Audible.com, so I will be starting that next.

On another note, my friend Buffy Joseph has joined Team in Training to prepare for bike riding a century (100 miles!)
in June around Lake Tahoe. The Team in Training program raises money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, which works to cure blood cancers and to support patients and their families.
Check out Buffy's website here.

Note: This blog post was produced entirely on the iPad. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for or cleaned.

High Fiber--Life Gets In the Way!

Real life got in the way of knitting and quilting this week, as sometimes happens.

Sunny and I needed to be recertified for Delta Society/Therapy Animals of Utah. We had to run through a series of tasks to see how we respond to things that might happen in a setting where we provide therapy. Actually, Sunny provides the therapy; I'm just the weight at the end of the leash. Well, I also keep the list of the rooms in the nursing home we need to visit, take Sunny out for her "break," and lift her into people's laps or onto beds as needed. And I act as chauffeur. Sunny doesn't drive.

Another earthshaking event this week was the crash of my iPad. Yikes! Dummy me, I hadn't synced since before Thanksgiving (where did the time go?) and I wasn't doing the powering off routine properly. If you're online a lot (I am) you should power off every couple of days. I thought that involved pressing both power buttons until the red slider appears and using the slider to turn it off. Actually, you're supposed to hold in only the power button on the edge to power off for this procedure, not both. I sometimes spend hours every day on the Knitting Community, Ravelry, Quilt With Us, Facebook and other websites. Supposedly I can pick up a lot of junk that way. Thanks to the nice people at Apple, I was able to restart, sync and replace most of what I had lost, but I will be careful from now on! I pledge to power down every two days and sync once a week (when I water the plants)!

Thursday Vintage Stitchers met. It's mostly a quilting group, but some of the members knit as well. Julie (the professional machine quilter) had made this cute giraffe for her granddaughter, who often attends meetings with Julie:

I had my Daisy Chain quilt top finished and ready to show off:

It's from Jelly Roll Quilts by Pam &Nicky Lintot.

Carol had finished the basket applique quilt top:

In other news, I had signed up to take "Sarak" around Park City. Who, you may ask, is Sarak? Listeners of The Knit Wits podcast will probably remember the stocking Carin agreed to knit, but it didn't work out. She eventually managed to knit a reasonable Christmas stocking for her client, but the aborted effort has taken on a life of its own, making rounds of the world and having adventures. Sarak has arrived in Park City, at my invitation, accompanied by some goodies provided by the last person she visited, Knittermama76 (Ravelry name). This might be reminiscent of loading up the mummy with goodies for the trip to the hereafter, but believe me, these treats will be enjoyed in this world...by me! No curses accompany my acquisition of them, either!

I will have more photos of my adventures with Sarak this week.

Instead of my app of the week, I'm going to share how I deal with photos and links in my blog and on the Knit Picks Knitting Community and Connecting Threads Quilt With Us. For the time being, the iPad has some compatibility problems with these websites. I can't type out the code, because it doesn't show up, so I took a photo:

I keep this on my iPad's yellow "Notes" notepad for copying and pasting into comments or to my blog.

I just finished listening to Audible's Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson and read by Frances McDormand, one of my favorite actresses. (Loved "Fargo," especially!) The book is a charming and funny story. On my Nook app is Debbie Macomber's Summer on Blossom Street, which includes some knitting, a nice addition to any novel.

The sewing machine I inherited from DSIL is humming along. I just needed to switch needles to get the tension right. It's an old-model Elna. It adjusts the tension automatically and works fine with the finer needle on quilting fabric. I have started a new quilt and am using the "new" machine, another
Daisy Chain with '30s fabrics, similar to the one above. I can put away my wonderful little Featherweight and save it for classes, which will leave me more work surface in my fiber studio. The shawl I'm working on is coming along, as is the spinning, and there are lots more things in the works to be reported on later.

I want to wish a special happy birthday to one of my special friends and fellow knitter, spinner, wine enthusiast and dog lover, Susan the Blue Lake Knitter, whose birthday is this Friday. Susan brightens my day in the Knitting Community. I lift my glass to many more to come, Susan! It's better to have birthdays than not!

Note: This blog post was produced entirely on the iPad. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for or cleaned.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

High Fiber--Packers, Parties and Pugs

Seems like every week around here is busy! The Gretel Cardi was finished and mailed off:

I chose some tagua nut buttons for it. The pattern is the "Natural Beauty for Baby" from Knit on Down. I made the sleeves a little longer so Daphne could still wear it when she's a little bigger. You can find this book here.

I cast on the "Highland Mist" shawl from Everyday Style Classic Knits for Women by Carol Rasmussen Noble. I'm using some white baby alpaca I spun last year during the Ravelympics. I'll try to have photos next week.

Saturday was my Daisy Chain quilting class. It's a fairly easy quilt, not something I needed a class for, but I signed up for it to help me get it done...sort of a deadline. Janet went with me.

Even though it's an easy quilt, the other students in the class were all experienced, so the class moved quickly. (That's Janet in the background, cutting strips.)

The classroom was lined with inspiring quilts that will be used in other classes.

I'm using '30s reproduction fabrics from my stash. Here are my segments C, B and A ready to be sewn together:

I barely made a dent in my '30s stash!

Here are the first two blocks on my display wall:

Sunday was the Superbowl party at a friend's house. I sat next to a Packer's fan. That was OK with me. Our DD lives in WI, and I have friends there. It was an exciting game. (That's DH in the front row, right, wearing his FI sleeveless cardi and hand-knit socks!)

I got a lot of knitting done, and the food was great. Of course, the commercials are fun. This was my favorite commercial:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpjaOUjUPUc&feature=youtube_gdata_player

For ultimate cuteness, though, check this out:

or this one with Fluffy:

If you look closely, you will see Daphne's Peter Rabbit quilt on the bottom of the playpen. (I guess you can tell I'm a besotted grandmother!)

I just finished reading Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitting Without Tears . It was an enjoyable read, if you like knitting.
On my iPod last week was David Baldacci's Split Second from
Audible. (Thanks to Kelley Petkun and David Reidy for turning me on to Audible. I have really been enjoying my subscription.) Now I'm listening to The Eyes of Darkness by Dean Koontz. (I read it years ago. One of the advantages of a bad memory is you can read the same book again and not know how it comes out!)
On my wheel is still the Gaywool, but I'm making progress.

Will I finish the quilt top in time to give it to Julie on Thursday for quilting? Will I finish the shawl this month? Will I get snowed in and have to go on snowshoes to get groceries? These and other questions will be answered next week.

Note: This blog post was produced entirely on the iPad. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for or cleaned.

High Fiber--High on Sundance, Quilting and Knitting

What a busy week! My Vintage Stitchers group met right in the middle of Sundance!

More on quilting later. It has been a busy week at Sundance. Here are some fellow volunteers taking a quick break between films.

We had a little excitement on Sunday, while I was at the opera. There was a demonstration by a handful of people from the Westboro Baptist Church against the film, "Red State," which was playing at the Eccles Theater, which is part of Park City High School. (They have been making headlines lately by picketing funerals of soldiers killed in Afghanistan and are known for their hatred of gays and some other groups.) They were met by an estimated 200 high school students protesting their protest, shown here in a photo taken by a friend and fellow volunteer:

No one was hurt, although some of the students and other supporters who joined them were rowdy. As for star sightings, I have seen many familiar faces, including William H. Macy and Ray Liotta. I have seen several other films I have enjoyed, but my new favorite is Salvation Boulevard. I'm sure it will be available in theaters and Netflix. It stars Pierce Brosnan, Greg Kinnear, Marissa Tomei and Ed Harris. It's very funny, but gives you a lot to think about. It's one I think I would like to own.

I got some time to work on the Gretel Cardi for Daphne. I started this last week and had time to work on it during my shift Monday, when I was a ticket-taker, and again Friday, when I got to guard a door. (My other shifts were all in the theater as an usher.) Here's a progress photo for the cardi:

The cardi is the Natural Beauty for Baby from Knit On Down  published by The House of White Birches using Knit Picks' Swish Worsted   in Delft Heather, machine-washable and dryable, good for baby apparel.

Vintage Stitchers met on Thursday, and, as usual, there were some interesting items for show-and-tell. Rebecca changed the border from what was used in the pattern:

The pattern is from Simple Graces  by Kim Diehl.


Diane is on her sixth block from Hop To It!   by Edyta Sitar. (It was the book I got my bunny block from that I used in Daphne's quilt.)

Barbara brought some quilt tops her sister made, so Julie can quilt them. Here's one:

Here's another, first the top:

The the backing, also spectacular! (The sister lives in Texas.)

The sister sent them to Barbara so Julie could quilt them for her. You can send quilting directly to Julie. You can contact her at thorum@xmission.com.

Janet started this quilt years ago. A UFO finished! (Well, all but the quilting and binding.)

Here's another she started long ago:

Remember this quilt of Diane's from two weeks ago? The quilting is done!

Barbara got back some finished projects, too. Here's the car seat cover, all quilted. Julie had to work around the ties:

And the quilt for the same baby:

We haven't had a gratuitous baby photo, so here is Daphne, waiting for her Gretel
Cardi to be finished:

She is starting to crawl now, but the photo of her in action just shows her cute butt instead of her cute face.

Stay tuned for more adventures of the fearless knitter/spinner/quilter and fan of films from the rarified air high above Park City!

Note: This blog post was produced entirely on the iPad. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for or cleaned.

High Fiber--Fans, Films, Fortune and...Fiber

Ta-da! The La Boheme Cardi is done! Here's the back:

...and the front:

This is my first adult-size sweater using fiber I dyed and spun myself. I Navajo-plied the spun Corriedale and knit the cardi in the round using EZ's percentage system, with a steek. I adapted a friend's Scandinavian yoke pattern chart, so there would only be two colors per round.

The dark chocolate and white are natural; the blue, orange and taupe were dyed as fiber using Koolaid and a little black food coloring.



For details on how I did the dyeing, go here.

 

 

I decided to put on an afterthought pocket. It's easy to do, and you can be sure of placement when you wait until the sweater is done.

Part of the body was knit during a performance of La Boheme, thus the name. What I learned from this project: button bands with the steek facing turned under will lie flatter than when the steek edges are enclosed in a faced band. Also, you can't use a wooly board for every sweater, just for the sweaters without sleeves or the ones with sleeves that go straight out from the armholes. Yoke or raglan sweaters tend to have arms that hang down a bit, so on a wooly board, the shoulders would bunch up.

I decided to weave in all the floats, so my fingers wouldn't accidentally catch in them when putting on the cardigan.

In spinning news, I took my KP drop spindle to my volunteer job at Sundance Film festival. There wasn't much time to work on it, but I was just standing around for a few minutes before the audience was allowed in, and that was when I whipped out my drop spindle. Also, I got some wheel spinning done. Here's what I have on my Sonata:

It's Gaywool Merino/Silk, 85% Merino, 15% silk, in "Wallaby," singles, shown on WooLee Winder bobbin for Kromski Sonata. (I showed the fiber in last week's blog post.)

Daphne is getting a new cardigan:

With the La Boheme finished, I could CO the "Natural Beauty for Baby" from Knit on Down using KP's Swish Worsted in Delft Heather. I'm calling it the Gretel Cardi because I worked on it during the performance of the opera "Hansel and Gretel" by Humperdinck.

Speaking of the opera, one of the regulars who always sits close to us brought her daughter, who watched me knit. The daughter asked me where I bought my yarn, complaining that every place she looked was too expensive. She has done quite a bit of knitting and didn't feel she needed help from an LYS. I took the ball band off my KP Swish yarn and gave it to her. She also got to feel the yarn, which she found wonderfully soft.

There's not much quilting news this week. Last time I took my quilting to my volunteer job at Sundance I had Matt Dillon and his friends standing there watching me hand piece. The wanted to know what I was doing, and then why! They were very nice, but knitting is self-explanatory and more portable than a bed-size quilt. However, I have signed up to take a couple of quilt classes using Jelly Rolls, one in early February and the other in early March.

Stars spotted so far this Festival: Danny Glover, Stanley Tucci, Julia Ormand, Paul Rudd and a few others. So far, my favorite film has been "My Idiot Brother," starring Paul Rudd. Not his usual fare, I can tell you, but very entertaining!

What's on my iPad iPod: Alexander McCall Smith's Tears of the Giraffe from Audible. Also numerous podcasts, including the Knit Wits.
What's on my primitive iPod iPod: Jane Austen's Persuasion from Librivox, which I haven't listened to for a while.

Until next week, happy knitting, quilting, spinning and film watching!

High Fiber--Foto Folio for Fabulous Fiber Fun

I had to start with this photo:

Diane's Drunkard's path

This photo was too beautiful not to lead with! It was from my Vintage Stitchers' meeting on Thursday at Diane's. This is her Drunkard's Path quilt, which she made using the applique method. I love the still life on the table! More about Vintage Stitchers later. (They have been busy ladies!)

In the meantime, my little spinning group met Friday afternoon. Here's what I've started spinning:

It's Gaywool Merino/Silk, 85% Merino, 15% silk, in "Wallaby."

Here's Linda spinning her alpaca on her Kromski spinning wheel. I think it's the Minstrel. She has a jumbo flyer for it, and she uses it primarily for plying.

Linda uses the Ashford Traditional (above) for spinning singles. Lynda has a Majacraft Rose.

Linda showed us the progress on a giant shawl she is making using fiber from all the alpacas she has ever owned.

Before we left, we had to go out to see the alpacas. Gabriella the orphan is doing great. Here are two other babies:

That was Amanda on the left, with one of the boys. Here she is with her mother and Mike--a family portrait!

One reason we went out to see the alpacas was to see their new gray boy. He's a show animal!

So here are the photos from Vintage Stitchers I promised. First, Barbara's house applique which she is doing at a local quilt shop as a block of the month.

Barbara is also expecting a new grandson, so she has pieced a baby quilt. Here's the top:

...and the backing:

She has also made a car seat cover:

Rebecca is working on a new applique project. This one is from "Simple Graces" by Kim Diehl. (I'm afraid to try to put in a link, because I don't want to lose what I've done so far. This is my first time to do my blog on the iPad, which was not possible before. There are no icons for photos, links, etc., so I have do type out the code. However, you can find the book on Connecting Threads, and it's featured in the latest catalog on page 26, where you can see the one Rebecca is working on.)

Julie, our machine quilter, has made a wedding quilt for her nephew and his new bride. They helped pick out the fabrics. She used paper piecing to make the stars. She has finished the quilting and is sewing on the binding.

Janet has been working on another charity quilt. This one will go to someone who has a terminal disease. This is the same collection of fabrics she has used for several other charity quilts. When she goes to make a charity quilt, there seems to be just as much left as the last time. Sort of a neverending stash of fabrics!

I have finished the knitting on my La Boheme Cardi, with nothing left to do but the steek and front bands.

This photo was taken while I was working on the neck ribbing. You can see the steek sts at the center front, where the pattern goes into alternating 1 st of each color. This is where I will cut.

While I was decreasing for the neck, I remembered this tip. If the number of st you need to decrease doesn't give you an even number of sts between dec's (in my case, between three and four sts) you can take as many st markers as you need decreases and distribute them as evenly as possible.

That's it for this week. Next week I'll be in the middle of the Sundance Film Festival. I'll try to check in, though, but my blog may not happen.