Monthly Archives: May 2008

Tiring Weekend

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We had a good weekend, but it was a bit tiring. We went to visit my sister in Atlanta. My parents were there too. For some reason, Amelia decided to be especially clingy to me the entire time, so it was very tiring.

But we bought a new 20" iMac and a Time Capsule to go with it. Pretty awesome. The best part was that my sister is officially a Mac user. She got her first Mac this weekend as well. Of course this means that she’ll be calling me for every little how to question. DH told her to ask her fiance, he switched a few months ago, so he’s somewhat familiar with Macs already.

We never made it to the movie, mainly because we just never found time for it. :( Isn’t that how it always is when you are visiting with family. It’s hard to get back into the swing of our routine after being away for a few days, but I’m sure we’ll settle back in pretty quickly.

Oh yeah. The hotel we stayed at was having a TimeGate convention going on…sci-fi convention for fans of Dr. Who and Stargate. The actor who plays Master Bra’tac was there. I missed him, but my husband saw him when we were checking in. People were dressed up in costume and one night, my husband got a photo of someone dressed up in a Storm Trooper outfit drinking a beer. :) There was also a Delorean parked outside the hotel. Pretty wild!

Atlanta Getaway

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Kind of weird to call going to Atlanta for the weekend a "getaway", but for us it is. We don’t usually go anywhere and never go out without the baby. She’s never stayed with a babysitter. We are going to Atlanta to visit my sister. My parents will be there as well and they haven’t seen their granddaughter since Christmas! They are so excited to see her, I know we’ll be coming home with more stuff than we went with. They’ve bought her clothes and shoes and who knows what else. But the exciting part is that DH and I plan to leave Amelia with her grandparents and have a "date".

For one, we have to take my laptop to the Apple store to get the battery replaced. It’s crap and I need a new one. So I’m crossing my fingers they replace it. Then we hope to catch dinner and/or a movie. He wants to see Indiana Jones, but to be honest, I don’t know that we’ll get to see it. He hates crowds and I know it’s going to be crowded, no matter which time slot we choose. It’s opening weekend in Atlanta! So I have a feeling he’s going to change his mind on that once he sees the mass of people. But we’ll see.

More Fiber/ Making Socks

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I recently purchased more fiber. Yeah. I know. I have enough already to keep me busy spinning for months. But I couldn’t help it. I bought the same stuff as before (BFL from Sakina Needles in Woodstock), so I could spin it up and have more yarn available for the campfire socks. That way I can make socks that come up higher than just my ankles. I’m plugging away at the socks and although I don’t have photos yet, I’m make decent progress on the foot. So far they look okay although I think they will be a bit loose. I probably should have gone down to a size 3 needle, instead of going up to a size 5. I will post a photo as soon as I can.

I’m having computer issues. My battery is bad and I’m taking my laptop to the Apple store this weekend, in hopes of getting a replacement.

Teacher Appreciation

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dishcloths

I’ve been a little busy bee. I managed to knit 4 dishcloths, one for each of Amelia’s daycare teachers. See, it’s teacher appreciation week. And although we may not be the friendliest with each other, I still very much appreciate that they keep watch over my baby during those times when I can’t do it myself. Like when I’m working. Bah!

I also made them a thank you postcard. I worked up two digital scrapbook layouts in 4×6 size with a photo of Amelia, then wrote a little note on the back of each. I’ll have to get pics of the cards that I made. Pretty simple, but definitely unique.

I sure do hope they appreciate my gesture of thanks.

Upgraded

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I’ve just upgraded my installation of WordPress from 2.2.1 to 2.5.1. Wow! What a difference. I think it’s going to take a bit of getting used to the new admin interface. I was previously using the Tiger Admin plugin to make it look a bit cleaner. I like the new interface though so far. Seems a bit cleaner than before and I like that it has a bit more color to it. :)

I’ll have to play around, because I can already see that I’ll use the tags quite a bit, instead of having to use a bunch of categories that don’t really get but a few posts.

Spinning

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First HandspunI’m not sure if I mentioned it before, but I recently learned to spin. My SIL had been wanting me to spin for a long time, but I never got into it, although I thought it looked fun and interesting. A while back, I won a free CD spindle kit from Interweave, so I decided to try it out. Of course I got instantly hooked. My first yarn looked like crap. I purchased a few spindles from ButterflyGirlDesigns and some roving from Sakina Needles and started practicing. I started out with Superwash Merino and some really pretty colors. Sakina Needles has gorgeous stuff. You should check them out. I did okay, but still felt really clumsy with my drafting. I also felt that my CD spindle was akward. But I kept at it and produced a small amount of bulky weight 2-ply. I still have about 2oz of superwash merino left.

Wallpaper: Fibery GoodnessOnce my BGD spindles came in, I decided to try some Blue-faced Leicester (BFL) because everyone at ravelry said it was better than merino for beginning spinners. So off I went. I purchased 4oz again from SN because I just love their colorways. It was instant success. Drafting was going extremely well, I was struggling so much less with this fiber and my spindle spun light a dream. I managed to get some pretty fine, fingering weight yarn. I was in spinning heaven. I was making yarn finally, something that really looked like yarn! It was so exciting I took pictures and was showing everyone. I emailed my SIL and told her I was officially spinning. She was over the moon, so excited she was doing a happy dance. LOL!

antique wheelWe immediately planned a fiber weekend, so she could show me how to spin on a wheel. She has an antique wheel dating to pre-civil war era. She set it up and got me spinning on it pretty quickly. It was so much easier than I thought it would be. I was using some mystery wool she had brought with her and it was very easy to draft, I filled up the bobbin pretty quickly. The disaster came when I tried to work with the merino. Even she had problems getting started. So I quickly put it away and decided to wait on it and try with something a bit easier. But I absolutely fell in love with spinning on a wheel. It was very addictive and I was sad to see her leave at the end of the weekend with her wheel.

My New Kromski PreludeI shouldn’t have been. My husband, wonderful man that he is, saw how much fun I was having and surprised me with my very own wheel a few days later!! I’m now the proud owner of a Kromski Prelude and I absolutely love it. I’ve managed to churn out some gorgeous yarn with it as well. I finished my BFL on the wheel and plied it. I managed to get approx 205 yards of DK to worsted weight yarn. I’m still trying to figure out what to do with it, but I’m thinking I will make some fingerless mitts for when the weather turns colder.

Handspun BFL 2-ply Handspun BLF 2-ply

I’ve also been spinning some other fibers. I’ve got some gorgeous deep royal blue corriedale that came with my wheel that I’ve been spinning on my spindle. I really like spinning it, the color is so pretty, but I’m partial to blue. :) and drafting it has been a breeze. My only complaint is that my spindle has a murano glass whorl and the yarn keeps slipping on it, so I’m having to figure out ways to keep that from happening.

Handspun Corriedale

I’ve also been spinning some south african fine yarn that I bought on etsy. It was started as part of a spin-along at ravelry and I’m challenging myself to spin it laceweight. I checked my WPI last night on the tail end that is on the bobbin and I got 40wpi!! Definitely laceweight and gorgeous. I love the subtlety of the color changes.

South African Fine