Equipment and Distraction

One thing most crafters have in common is a love of new equipment. Especially if it is equipment that can make life easier for you. I enjoy turning a skein of yarn into a nice ball of yarn. But holding it over my knees is not that fun. My rug hooking friend told me about this table top swift that he found on eBay. So of course I had to check it out. The only swifts I had ever seen were ones that clamp onto something, which is sometimes not so convenient. I love this table top swift. It holds the yarn nicely, and when you are done, it folds up and doesn’t take up much room.

And then… And then I decided to bring my spinning wheel back into the house… Oh my. There’s the Distraction. Spinning your own yarn is so fun, and so pleasurable. After I brought it in, nothing but spinning got done for almost two weeks.

I found some variegated green roving that would work well for the redwood trees on my current rug, and I spun that up. To make a balanced yarn, you usually spin up two bobbins of thread and then ply them together, and voila!

You have a beautiful skein of yarn.

Here’s how I’m incorporating it into the rug. I like the way it looks.

And then… then I found about 8 ounces of a fiber blend I made long ago. I used to make fiber blends and sell them at spinning and weaving events. I called this one Apple Blossoms. It is 40% angora (rabbit,) 30% silk, and 30% merino wool. Its oh so soft, and it brings back such good memories for me.

So now I’ve got the spinning bug out of me for a wee bit, and I am back to working on my rug. There’s only a few weeks before Cambria Pines Rug Camp, and I want to get more of it done before I go. Because at rug camp I will be starting an entirely new rug!

In the next two weeks, I am hoping to get back in the studio to do a bit of quilting and piecing, and also, I want to dye some wool and silk before I leave for camp. After camp I have big plans to make a fiber blend and get to spinning that. I’m sure you’ll hear more about that in the next few months 🙂

Tradition!

I’ve taken a little detour. I have saved a pattern from a magazine for SIX YEARS! I love everything about this pattern. I love the colors, the way it is quilted, the blocks used, and the way they are arranged in the quilt. So, finally, I decided the time had come to make this quilt. Most of the blocks are churn dash blocks, with a few hunter’s star blocks added. The pattern was featured in The Quilt Life magazine, June 2012, in case you still have that issue and want to see it.

So far I’ve made 25 blocks (37 are needed.) It will be a large quilt, and will be a really nice bed quilt for me. Some of the blocks are made so that the churn dash pattern is not as apparent on purpose.

I finished the entrelac blanket!

And I got myself a little income tax return gift 🙂 I thought about this for a long time. Did I want to make my own blend and spin the yarn for a big project, or did I just want to buy some nice yarn? For now, buying yarn won out. I’m still hoping to get back to making some fiber blends and spinning my own yarn.

I found this company, and I really love everything about them. They source fibers from animals that are treated humanely! The yarn is superfine merino, merino/angora blend, and merino/cashmere blend. The colors are so pretty,  and I was so impressed with their customer service. The company is Sunday Knits.

Look how pretty the package was when it arrived (it arrived from the east coast only five days after I ordered it!

This kit is for the wind feather shawl. The pattern is written really well.

So that’s what I’ve been working on lately. I have a long list of things I hope to accomplish in the next two weeks, so I’d best get back to work in the studio!