Maia Spins

A Good Weekend

We took Kay up to the lake for the first time.  It just happened to be the weekend of the Berry Creek Berry Festival.  Nothing is better than a small local festival in my book.  Well, maybe a small local museum.

Kay looking cute (as always!) at the Berry Festival.

Roger at the Berry Festival in his new hat.  With the shades, he looks like your grandpa doing his best Blues Brothers impression.

The Pomatomus Sock made an appearance at the Berry Festival too.  It was feeling very color appropriate. 

After all the excitement of a band, cloggers, local crafts, and berry sauce over ice cream (yum!), Kay and I headed into town.  Oroville that is.

Oroville is a big small town.  It's history began with the California Gold Rush and was home to Ishi.  Now the economy is based on agriculture (citrus and olives), gambling (two casinos in the area), and tourism (Lake Oroville).  It has the usual main drag littered with fast food joints and chain stores.  If you get off the main drag, you'll discover a quaint old downtown area.  That is exactly where we found our point of interest.

The Yarn Shoppe is a cute store owned by a very friendly mother-daughter team.  The store front is an old fashioned one with lots of display area.  It doesn't really tell you what to expect when you walk through the door.

Inside it is cool and a bit dark.  A welcome relief after the blazing sun and heat of Oroville.  The selection is good.  Much better than I expected.  The store is tidy and easy to navigate.  I would be happy to have this store be my LYS.  Well worth a stop.

Of course we had to get some yarn!  From the left: hand dyed sock yarn from FurrYarns, a mohair blend yarn (there is one more that Kay has already started knitting a scarf out of), and some Trekking pro Natura, a yarn that is 75% wool and 25% bamboo.

Next stop was getting cute(r?).  I am not very girly.  Kay is always trying to get me to girlify.  So we went for pedicures.  They had the massage chairs.  Nice!  THAT is the way to get me to girl-up! My toes are painted a coppery orange.  Kay's are a deep rich mahogany.

After dinner we went fishin'.

I know next to nothing about fishing.  Is it common to use stinky cheese or day glow yellow mini marshmallows? 

We didn't catch a thing.  Except for a bit of tree bass a.k.a. getting the line caught in a tree.  That was my contribution.

Still we had fun.

More pics on my Flickr page.

That was all on Saturday.  An eventful day to be sure.  Sunday we rested up and I finished a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and the Pomatomus socks.

Pattern: Pomatomus by Cookie A.

Yarn: Trekking XXL #78 with lots left over.

Needles: US#3 metal dpns (I knit very tightly, it would be US#2 for a knitter that gets gauge with the specified needle).

Started: August 2nd or 3rd

Finished: August 12, 2007

Modifications: I used a slightly larger gauge to make the finished sock larger than the one size offered.  I also shortened the ribbing to 3 rows and the leg to 2 repeats of chart A.

It was a fun knit and much easier than I had heard.  I don't know that it deserves the piquant rating that Knitty gave it.

Social Butterfly

I don't seem to have a lot of fiberish time these days.  I have been busy socializing.  On Friday we went to Rachael and Lala's house for a game of Power Grid.  It was a hooting good time (the beer may have enhanced the experience). I got silly and reportedly laughed a lot (and loudly).  Hopefully, I didn't embarrass myself.  Too much. 

I got to see Digit the miracle cat.  If you don't know about Digit, go read his story.  Really.  It is a good one.  There is a happy ending.  And a naked cat butt involved.  See!  Who doesn't enjoy embarrassing a cat?  Dogs don't understand these things.  Cats do.  And, it pisses them off.  (Hmm, it is sounding like I shouldn't have cats isn't it?  I like cats.  Some of my best friends, . . .  Oh never mind)

The lovely Rachael with Digit.  He has a cone.  Poor guy.  It is too keep him from worrying his stitches.  Apparently, he just got the cone off and discovered his naked butt.  Too funny!

On Sunday, we had our first spinning group.  What a great time!  More on that tomorrow.

In a couple of weeks I'll be socializing with Portlandians (is that what one calls residents of Portland?  Oregon not Maine).  Roger has a work thang on Friday the 24th and I am joining him for a weekend get-away.  On Saturday, I'm yarn crawling with a posse of Portland knitters.  I can't wait!  It is being coordinated through Ravelry.  If you are a PDX knitter who is not on Ravelry and want to join us, let me know.

There has been a bit of sockiness.  I started a pair of Pomatomus Socks.  It (they?) have been on my list forever.

This is the lovely Trekking yarn that Debi sent me a while back.  The subtle color shifts are perfect for this pattern.  It is a fairly simple pattern too.  I had heard that it was a tricky one.  But no, deceptively easy and straight forward.  Unfortunately, the pattern comes in one size: women's medium.  Since I wear a large, I've just loosened up on the gauge a bit.  The fit is great.  I also reduced the ribbing to three rows as the pattern stitch is a form of ribbing plus shortened the leg for a high ankle sock.

I've also been playing with the drum carder.  There was some Rambouillet pin roving that got a bit too felty.  Pop it into the drum carder with some alpaca, tussah silk, recycled denim, and silk noil and ya get some soft fluffy goodness.  Everything is naturally dyed except for the recycled denim.

I love the way noil pops out when you spin it fine.  The recycled denim does this too.  What a nice texture.  The 16% silk and 30% alpaca make it deliciously soft.  Yumm!

Batts are a wonderful way to make dyeing accidents and boring fiber into something fabulous.

One more batt.  This one is Blueface Leicester with mohair locks, bamboo, and tussah silk. 

I'm in heaven.

What Was I Saying?

Today has been like a conversation constantly interrupted.  A bit like my blogging of late.  And my knitting.  And my spinning.  Sigh.

I have made progress on the handspun sweater.  Now that the fleece is all picked, I have started playing with blends.  With my trusty hand cards I tried six blends and spun them up into itsy-bitsy mini skeins.  I did my default weight which is a sport to DK weight as a 2-ply. 

Pay no attention to the bits of white fiber.  I used some BFL top in between the different samples to keep them separate.  I wound off each as a separate center-pull ball and plied from both ends.

I wanted to figure out several things: would the two fleeces spin to the same weight in my I'm-not-thinkin'-just-spinnin' mode, do I want a two color sweater, and what colors of silk do I blend with each of the fleeces.

The proof is in the knitting (click for big).  From the left: lac-dyed fleece with pink & yellow silks, lac-dyed fleece with brown & pink silks, madder-dyed fleece with yellow & pink silks, madder-dyed fleece with yellow & brown silks, all of the fibers well blended, all of the fibers not as well blended.

I learned that the lac-dyed fleece is too pink for my taste.  I like pink, but I can't see wearing a pink sweater.  I like the color of the madder-dyed fleece for a sweater.  I really like all the fibers blended together, especially when they aren't fully blended.

The result:

I'm going to blend them all together like this swatch.  I like the way there is subtle variation.  The pink is downplayed and bits of silk come through where it isn't completely blended.  I didn't comb the fleece so it still has the short fibers making pink and orange slubs here and there.  I like this texture. A lot.

The next step is to get out the drum carder and start making batts!

At some point I'll decide what kind of sweater I'm going to make.  All I know is that it will be a cardigan; I'm not much of a pull-over kinda gal.

Hubby's Socks from the MerLin yarn are half done.  He likes little socks.  I turned the heel, did an inch of seed stitch and cast-off.  Gotta love that!

I used my basic sock pattern and my toe-up gusseted heel.  I am such a dork, I can't remember how to do anything even the stuff I make up.  I had to print off my own tutorial for the heel.  I printed the pdf version and was grateful I'd done a pdf version.  I guess I'm not such a dork after all.

A little of this . . .

More bits and pieces today.

First I need to remove my foot from my mouth (too common an occurrence if you ask me).  I referred to my sister-in-law, Deb, as my favorite and only sister-in-law.  Roger reminded me that his brother's wife is my sister-in-law too.  Yikes!  I guess she is really my sister-in-law by marriage.  Whew!  I will go as far as saying that she is my favorite (and only) sister-in-law by marriage.  Please, if you are also my sister-in-law (heretofore unknown), you are my favorite too.  'Nough said.

Let's get back to knitting.  I know I said I was going to knit Roger's Merlin sock next.  And, I meant it.  Until I remembered the Knitty Gritty episode waiting on my TiVo showing Cat Bordhi and her Coriolis Sock (from her upcoming sock book). 

It's not my fault.  Really.  I couldn't help myself. 

(Click any picture for bigitdeness)  It starts with a garter square.  You pick-up stitches on all sides and start knitting in the round.  I used a small needle to make it easier to pick-up stitches.

Here it is looking like a regular sock.  Just you wait . . . 

(And, while you are waiting, no snippy comments about using double pointed needles on a sock designed by the Queen of Socks on Two Circulars).

About halfway up, you start increasing.  The cool trick is that since you are knitting with a double strand (oh, yeah, did I mention that it is knit double stranded at a DK to sport weight?), you can knit into each strand of a single stitch to increase.  It looks very odd.

But in the end, everything sorts itself out.

The increases make a shape that forms a heel without a flap or short-rows.  There is a bit of a heel turn and incorporating stitches to form the heel.

Pretty cool.  And quick.  I am at the heel turn of the second sock already.

Speaking of Socks

My modification of Nona's Sidewinders has garnered some interest.  I will write up a more thorough accounting of how I did it. 

Darn!  Now, I have to knit that wonderful pattern again to get all the appropriate pictures. I sure hope I have something in the stash and I don't have to go shopping at the yarn store.  That would be awful!

Bits and Pieces

I was asked about the knitting coasters that Ronni gave me.  She bought them on our yarn crawl at Commuknity.  They are available for Martingale Press in sets of 8.

I am still trying to catch up on my Bloglines.  Time sitting at the computer is limited.  I have grown to really appreciate blogs in foreign tongues (and they are all foreign to me, a typical American, I only speak English).  This one, Luinelenin, is a great example.  It is in Finnish.  I feel no obligation to read anything, because, well, I can't.  It is just fabulous eye candy.

Speaking of Bloglines, my feeds aren't always showing up in a timely manner.  I emailed them about it and they gave me a canned answer about posts occurring during upgrades, blah, blah, blah.  I must have an uncanny ability to post during upgrades.  The problem is worst on the feed that has 95% of my wonderful subscribers.  Argh!

Speaking of links to great eye candy, check out the knee socks at Diva Knitting.  Are those incredible or what?  It doesn't hurt that she used my Toe-Up Gusseted Heel either.

</speaking for today> (Yes, html humor.  I know, bad joke, but I am punchy today.  It's a theme.  Maybe.  I hope.  ??? )

Summer of Socks

Summer of Socks is off and running.  You can see lots of progress pictures and a few finished objects on the Flickr group.

ETA: I am on Flickr now.  Check out my pictures here.  Feel free to add me as a contact.  And, if you know of any cool groups on Flickr, let me know.  I think this is going to be addicting.

My first pair of the summer are off the needles.   You may notice that the right sock is inside out.  I like the way they look and can't decide which way to wear them.

They are another pair of Sidewinders, but with a twist.  I knit these on two circular needles which eliminates the seam under the toes.

Pattern: Sidewinders by Nona

Yarn: Socks That Rock medium weight, Carbon colorway

Needles: 2 - 3mm Addi Turbo Lace circular needles

ETA: A write-up of how I do Sidewinders on 2 circular needles is now available here.

I start by casting on at the ankle instead of the mid-line of the sole using the Turkish Cast-on.

After a couple of rows, you can see the heel (top middle), toe (left), and cuff (right) starting to take shape.
No,  I am not making heavy metal gestures.  The sock was trying to curl up.  I was moving my hand away and snapping a picture at the same time.

At the halfway point, it looks like a sock.

(I am LOVING this old picnic table for taking pictures!  Hubby made it about 12 years ago when we lived in Seattle.  The weathered look is so great)

Here it is with the knitting done, but the grafting is not yet done. 

Same state just moved around to show the open ankle.  As you can see, this method starts at one ankle and works from the cuff around the toe, over the heel to the cuff.  Then the sock is turned and worked back the way you just came.  (Make sense?  I think I am confusing myself.)  If you have knit Nona's pattern, it is quite logical.  In addition to eliminating the toe seam, this version decreases the amount of grafting required by about a third.

I made a few modifications to accommodate the yarn.  This is a sport weight yarn knit at 6.5 sts/in instead of the original 7.5 sts/in.  I just used ratios to find the number of stitches and rows at the new gauge. 

I also shortened the cuff and made the short row calf shaping like my first pair of Sidewinders.

Verdict?  Love 'em!

Next on the sock needles is the MerLin yarn I naturally dyed.  These will be for my sweet hubbinator.  He likes simple, so they will be plain ol' Vanilla socks.  Toe-up so I can see how far the yarn (100g) goes.

I am almost at the heel flap now, but this picture looked so good (loving that backdrop!) that I couldn't deny it its time.