a dyeing day

this is some merino/bamboo yarn i dyed.  it really does give me a spring feeling!  hoping it will look good with the entrelac and mitered squares project.... everwhat that becomes.

update on Justify Your Stash

The 47" cable for my Options needles came, and the edging has about 12 rows done!  No more photos til it's finished.  the edging on both sides is all on one circ.  It's one of those bits of magic where you gotta just follow the directions and it will all work out.  it's mobius, after all, and that's magic in itself!

fiber from Madrona

one of my most favorite color combinations!  no surprise it was tempting and that i gave in to it.  it is merino and seacell, which i've never spun so it should be a real treat.

this lovely little bundle is merino/silk, dyed by Fleece Artist in NovaScotia and purchased from Village Yarn and Tea Shop, Shoreline, WA.  It is SO soft and shiny!  

photos of latest purchases (shown w/stash)

When i bought the yarns at the Madrona market, i wasn't sure any of it would go with anything in my stash, just bought it cause i loved it!  So.. as i went pawing through my stash yesterday, i came up with some marvelous go-togethers!  these 2 on the left look like they were made for each other.  in the foreground is the new one i bought at Lamb's Ear Yarn Shop in Tacoma, ("Jewel", Collinette, 4ply merino, 110gms) with this lovely skein i bought at SAFF from Mary Ann at 3 Waters Farm in NC!  The 3 Waters skein is SW Merino, called "Underwater", 400 yds.  They are so very gorgeous together!!

and this lovely from Chasing Rainbows (called Pansies), is55% Mohair, 45% Merino, 4oz, 300 yds.  It is beautiful with a skein that Lynne bought for me in NH. which i've already used part of  in the entrelac piece.

and i love this one so much it makes my knees weak, so here's another photo of it!

I put 2 of the new yarns (L edge and R edge) with the entrelac and the mitered square pieces to see how they would work together.  the L one will probably work well, the R one i'm not sure.  will need to wait and see how the whole thing works out.  

the last photo shows 2 bundles from the stash. Top one is a handdyed  Mohair (54%) with silk, wool and nylon, boucle from Mary Ann at 3 Waters Farm.   And it looks quite fine with the skein of a handdyed from Dicentra, SW wool and nylon.

wheeee!  i'm feeling overwhelmed with all this stash.  and i need to get over that and do something with these lovelies.  

hey! it worked

Sad to say, but usually when i neglect to do things that "should" be done, because i'm lazy or have a bad attitude or whatever, it does eventually bite me in the ass!  For once it did not, so i'm quite surprised and pleased!  I haven't done much fiber dyeing since before BSG last June then did a little bit before we left for Crete in Oct... and i left everything out on the counter in my studio.  jars of dye solution, cups of random-who knows-what dye combinations... everything.  Until tuesday i'd just let it sit there and tried to ignore it, til i finally got motivated (where'd that come from???) and decided to try some of the dyes to see if they would still work.  and lo and behold, i can hardly believe it... every color i poured on the wet fiber and steamed looks just as i expected it to look!  of course, i had to pour hot water into some of the cups to bring the gloppy dye back to pourable solution, but it worked!!!  so, that success brought the motivation to clean up my studio and do some dyeing.  and i found a whole bump of superwash corrie which i'd forgotten was there, plus smaller amounts of other fibers.  I guess i'll get started now doing some dyeing for BSG and for Northwest Wools.

Yesterday Linda and i took a took a trip to Tacoma to the Madrona Fiber retreat, just for the trade show.  had a great time and did a little bit of buying.... some yummy sock yarn and just one small bundle of fiber (merino-bamboo) which was just too tempting to leave there!  then made a visit to a fiber shop several blocks (actually MANY) from the hotel where the fiber retreat was... Fibers Etc.  It was worth the hike.  A small (very small) shop with more fiber crammed in there than i could imagine in a space that small!  The owner (Roberta) and the woman working in the shop (Kathy) were just delightful people.  The second shop was Lamb's

Ear Yarn Shop, also in Tacoma and was also worth the search to find!  Got home late, tired and hungry.... and so glad we went.  it was fun and fun is a good thing!  Also, saw TS Gail at the market... 

photos of new yarn stash!  later....

Justify

OK... i've justified a lot more stash, and have about 6 or 8 inches left before i graft the ends to each other!  onward....

for some reason the intensity of the colors in my photos is way decreased when i upload from my desktop.  that hasn't been the case when i transfer them from flickr.  wonder why??!!  anyway, the colors are a lot more intense and prettier in real life.

stash reduction???

Not much has happened in the reduction department, tho i did get some organization done.  OK, here's the story to which i am sticking... all that fiber to spin and yarn to knit is on those shelves because i like/love all of it and going through and looking at every bit of it just convinced me of that truthiness.  so what's a fiber slut to do?  i'm keeping it all and whenever we move up north it's going with me.  and fiber does compress well and fit into very small containers!  there is so much lovely fiber there waiting to be spun and making me want to get to it... which i will, one of these days.  actually, i try to rotate creative activity otherwise my hands or wrists or shoulders start aching, which is a good reason for jumping from one project to another, so it's not all the  "easily distracted" bit.

nothing new on the moving plans, but around here we are going thru stuff and getting stacks of stuff for goodwill, craig's list, give-away.. and it doesn't appear that there's been a dent made.  eeeeekk...

Kate and Chris (mostly Kate I suspect) have been looking for a suitable property and not found it yet, but i kind of think we'll get that first property we looked at... and i hope so!