Messing with the template just for fun....please bear with me!

Somehow it seemed a shame to felt perfectly good fiber.

So, I made a wrist distaff out of the silk cord by finger crocheting for about 12 inches and then tying it together with a knot. I added more knots to the ends.

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There is still lots of cording, so maybe I'll make a prettier one with beads next.

What to do with the fiber? Spin it of course!

I always love a trip to New York. City or State.

This weekend, Cindy, Carrie and I took the train up to NYC to meet up with Alison, Kerstin and Sandy.

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Here's the picture everyone in our group took at Habu Textiles.

The results of yesterday's hollyhock dyeing experiment are what definitely interesting. Interesting as in "not what I expected and I am still in denial that all that work was in vain."

The whole experiment was fun and though the results were not what I was going for, I am happy with the olive green.

It could have been a yellow grey or a muddy brown. But olive green is pretty good, not purple, but good. Afterall, green is my favorite color.

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I've been reading Jenny Dean's book about natural dyeing. Inspired, yesterday I went out to gather some black hollyhock flowers that were starting to wilt. With only 5 hollyhocks, I still got enough to dye 8 ounces of Finn roving.

I sat outside and pulled the calyces off. Sort of akin to snapping beans or shucking peas. My fingers turned purple in the process.

After that, the flowers went into a pot to soak overnight. Almost immediately, they started turning the water purple.

That night I filled up a big bucket of water and let it sit to gas off the chemicals that might be in it and then I went to the store to get the ingredients to mordant the fiber. A mordant prepares the fiber to bond chemically with the dye.

Chemicals used in baking and pickling (surprised?)

After reading about the toxicity of most mordants, I was surprised that the Alum* used to make an alum mordant has traditionally been used in some pickling and can be found by the spices in the grocery store.

This morning, the pot of flowers looked like this:

It stank.

Results tomorrow....

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*this Alum was referred to as "the crafters' alum" on a website I was reading and apparently isn't the hardcore Alum you can get from a dye or chemical supply store

What have I been up to?

Sewing!

My original intention last Friday was just to square the fabric and possibly cut out a few pieces, but it turned into an obsession to finish and see the final product:

Click for a closer look

Carrie and Cindy introduced me to Amy Butler sewing patterns. Last weekend, at the Mannings, they were accessorized with the coolest bags. I asked about them and they said, "We made them!" I was so impressed! They did beautiful jobs on their bags.

Here is Amy Butler's Art of the Midwest website. She has some nice patterns and gorgeous fabrics. The one I made is the Rural Messenger Bag. It was easy and quick to sew, although I never saw the point of all the velcro called for in the directions so I just omitted it. (Sort of felt like when I buy and assemble something from IKEA and end up with a dozen little nuts and bolts rolling around in the box. What the heck?)

Here's a picture of the inside of the bag. Note the doily in progress. Note that it's not ORANGE.

The one thing I keep kicking myself about is the fact that I didn't go with my gut instinct and shorten the strap. It ended up being about 5 inches too long and bugged me so much I thought I would just rip out all the topstitching and a few other seams no problem to just cut off the offending 5 inches of fabric.

You can probably guess that I wasn't too much fun to be around when I was doing that.

For any little Thomas the Tank Engine fans out there, this is for you:

Dah dah dah daah da dah

Did his eyes just move?

We did not go to Strasburg planning to see Thomas. He was just there as were hundreds of other people waiting to ride the train. My advice: don't spend the money on the train, because once you are on the train, you cannot see Thomas and as a result you get to listen to the kids saying, "What happened to THOMAS? WHERE's THOMAS?!" But if you ride on the regular train, you get to pass Thomas on the tracks and that's a lot more fun. Sort of freaked out my kids though. What's real and what's not?

Eric are you working hard or hardly working? haha

Do you like our bandannas?

I just got back from a trip up to The Mannings for their Annual Spinning Seminar, where I got to meet the wonderful Cindy and Carrie. They are such fun!

A cria (baby alpaca), 2-weeks old.

It was a beautiful day and we were in Pennsylvania, sort of near the Maryland border and near Gettysburg. The Mannings' place is right by a river with a little waterfall and groups of ducks swim up and down and waddle about the shore. It's very pretty and serene.

Hi! My name is Hazel.

There were demonstrations set up by the river--some spinning and some with their sheep. One particularly interesting group of women was spinning with medieval spindles, dressed in medieval clothes. Interesting, but I don't do low whorled spindles, so I guess I won't be reenacting any medieval spinning any time soon. But they did beautiful work.

There was also a guy preparing flax to spin. He had on traditional linen clothes and I wanted to ask if he'd spun the thread and wove the cloth, but forgot because he asked me a question and then I got caught up wondering if he'd cut out a pattern and sewed it himself too. And where did he get the pattern anyway? Would he have bought it in downtown Gettysburg in those reenactor shops? On the internet? Did he hire out someone to make it for him? (can you see how I forgot?) Hmmm. I like a man who spins and can boss around flax all the while wearing a funny (yet charming) hat.

Little Jacob lambs eat ivy.

I did get the spindle. I love the spindle. It's my favorite spindle. I never believed I'd have a desire to own more than one spindle, but it seems I now have 5! How did that happen?

But I did not get the Koigu. I've decided I'm not going to knit the shawl afterall. Doilies are still beckoning, so I bought this bright orange Tencel yarn as well as these cool 4-inch, size 0000 DPNs (made by Carol's sockery in case you want to know) to knit it with. Or perhaps to just play with. How could I turn down 4-inch steel lace needles?

I also bought some Tweedy Cotton in a nice blue color.

And I bought some camel top. I knew it would not be as soft as camel down, but in the bag, it seemed fairly soft and I thought I'd give it a try.

Yarns spun with new Hall Traditionals spindle
Romney, Camel, Alpaca

It turned out very hairy and coarse. Sort of like twine. Nice color though.

You know what I'm thinking--Wish I'd gotten the camel down!

Four ounces of wool silk sure goes a long way. I spun for what seemed like
F O R E V E R. And now I'm ready to ply. (And to buy more Copper Moth fiber in Rhinebeck, don't you know.)

11:45 pm: Here it is. All done! My niddy noddy says it's 162 yards. Could that be right? It seems like there should be more.

I'm a little disappointed with the plying. I overplied this wool silk because I'd noticed the last skein came out seriously underplied after it went through the bath despite the fact that it looked pretty balance before it was washed. So, I seriously overplied this time thinking I'd hit it after washing, but nope. (but closer than before! Baby steps...)

So, is it the silk contributing to this? It has to be the silk,yes?

I can always run it through the wheel again. Maybe as it dries it will magically become balanced.

Now to pick a doily...

Not that there's anything wrong with dishcloths.
They are very practical and perhaps what I really should be knitting, but for some reason, I place doily and dishcloth knitting in the same genre.

Lately though, I've been thinking I've become too practical in my knitting.

Ironic, since, when I knit the very practical sweaters, I end up never wearing them anyway for one reason or another and the yarns cost a shitload of money to buy. (Could it be that I'm not a sweater girl afterall?)

So, why not make a doily out of half a ball of lace yarn for USD 3.99 anyway?

I'm spinning up some of the Copper Moth stuff from Rhinebeck to make a little star doily. Here is a site with free patterns of some great doilies. (This is my favorite!)

Ever wonder why doilies (Lysedugen) are usually white? Check this out.

Click for a close up.

Anyway, the reason I'm knitting mittens is that Noel's school has an auction every year to raise money for the school. Everybody contributes something. Last year, I donated a lace shawl and this year I'm doing mittens. More practical, don't you think?

Speaking of lace, I've decided to join Julia and Kate's Lace Along. Lately, I've been paging through the old lace books I have. Right now, I'm thinking I might knit a doily.

Yes, you read me right.

A doily!

I never in all my days thought I'd even have the remotest desire to knit a doily, but hey, you never know.

I will still be knitting Charlotte's Web mind you.

Perhaps I'll send that to the auction this year too.

Becky has been asking for her own "glubs" since last Autumn.

Technically-speaking, they aren't gloves, but we won't tell her, right?

Click for a closer look

The pattern is from that handy book of knitting patterns but with a few changes--no ribbing and a rolled edging instead of a picot. Also, I'm not too crazy about the swirly decreases on the top of the mittens in the book so I did all the decreases on the sides and then did a three needle bind off for the top.

It turned out that the top was a little short so the mitten has been ripped past the decreases to add a few more rounds and then see where that gets me.