Cutting it close, again -

 This is the second glove in a pair of fingerless gloves that I made for my friend Felicity -

See that tail?  That is all there was left of the handspun grey yarn. And since I had no more roving left, that's all there was ever going to be. 

I had suspected that I would run short, which is why I put the turquoise and black stripes - but I didn't think I would come THIS close!  The good news was that they fit, and she liked them.  Yay -

And now for something (not so completely) different...

 Last fall at the Artisan's Faire I participated in,  our friend Lydia bought some of my yarn and asked me if I could make fingerless gloves for her (grown) daughters for Christmas presents. 

Well, I love Lydia to pieces and was only too happy to comply.  In fact, I decided to go one step farther and make little cowls for the gals to match the gloves.  
 


In this set, for the cowl, I dipped into my stash of "little balls of yarn" and used bits and pieces of left over yarns from other projects, the turquoise from the gloves, next was some yarn that had turquoise, blue and golden brown from a baby sweater I made a few years ago, (which matched the golden that I had left over from making the other set - see below), then some navy, that had a little of the gold color in it from a hat I made for my sister, plus some light turquoise (which was some of the first yarn that I ever spun!) and then finally another couple of rows of the original color.

 


I don't think the colors could have gone together any better if I had planned them to be that way. 

 For as many crochet books and magazines that I have, I ended up making up this pattern from an afghan pattern that I found - and added two silver buttons to keep it closed. 

This was a "small" version of my favorite scarf - Mosiac Scarf's Little Sister - I used some Ferndale Fiber Potluck Roving called "Golden Pear" that I got last year at our friends fiber sale.  It is not a color that she makes on a regular basis, so I was lucky to get it. 

I was spinning it at the Artisans Faire to demonstrate how yarn was made.  Lydia bought it right off the wheel!  After I made the gloves, I looked at the gold with some brown alpaca that I had spun up and decided that they were a natural together.

It made quite a pretty ensemble, don't you think?  I just put one brown wooden button on this one - The roving was fairly soft and of course, the alpaca was absolutely dreamy. 

I hope that they are enjoying their gifts as much as I enjoyed making them. 

The Caturday Report!

 Hello Effurykitty & Effurybody!

It's the Caturday Report - a day late as usual - I keep telling Mummy that beans and kitties expect the Caturday Report to come out on Caturday - but she said she was busy and this was a good as you were going to get.

The big news this week was THE FAIR! 

 Mummy and The Shepherd entered some things in the NW Washington Fair, which happened last week in Lynden WA.  It was a beautiful week for the fair, in that it didn't rain, but boy was it hot.  Mummy & The Shepherd went out on Wednesday so she could do her "civic duty" and spin in public in the wool barn. It was so hot, that Mummy said she was almost as roasted as the yummy BBQ Roasted beef sandwich with baked beans that she had for dinner. 

She had also entered a couple of things in the Wool Show.  All items in the Wool Show must be made from handspun yarn and then hand crafted.

She took out the fingerless gloves that she made for her nephew Jason. 




 Here is the note that she put with the gloves: 

Class B – Items made from Handspun yarn

Lot 22 – Men’s gloves – (fingerless) 

I spun this yarn from a bump of plain red merino roving, but I knew I was going to use it to crochet these fingerless gloves for my nephew,  He is football coach for a small High school in Eastern WA, and their team colors are red and black.  While I was spinning the yarn, I added bits of black and white roving here and there to give the yarn a little bit of added zip!  I made the cuffs extra long to fit under his jacket.  Go Broncos!  





 
  
The other thing that she took out was a scarf that she just made.  She said that she hated the color of the yarn, but really liked how it worked out for the scarf because of the striping.  The scarf is right below the green and black sweaters.  The pattern is called "Mosaic's Scarf's Little Sister"  It was really fun to make. 

She got BLUE ribbons on both items. 






Here is a closer picture of the scarf that she took today after The Shepherd brought it home from the fair.  She got points taken off because, as you can see, the corner of the scarf curls up.  That's because she didn't block it.  That's because she didn't decide until 10:00 the night before things needed to be out at the fairground that she was even going to take anything out.  Pure dumb luck to get the blue ribbon, - well, actually, the yarn was well spun, and the crocheting on the scarf was very well done.  She thought she would get a red ribbon on the fingerless gloves because the seam was not straight, which the judge did comment on.  But again, she knew her yarn was well constructed  and the crocheting was very even.  

Here is the story that she put with the scarf:

Class B Items made from handspun yarn

Lot 21 – scarf

The fiber that this yarn is from was part of a “roving of the month” Christmas present from my sisters.  I love the soft cushy feel of Corriedale fiber and thought the yarn it made would be perfect to use for this little mosaic scarf for my co-workers to wear around the office this next winter (it gets REALLY cold in our office – last year I made them all fingerless gloves)   It is just the right length so it will not get caught in the shredder and it has so many colors that it will go with almost any outfit they might be wearing and keep them warm and toasty to boot.   The Judges liked her stories too. 

This is Rita's fleece - it got a blue ribbon too. 

 

As you can see, it has very nice crimp in the fleece.  Sorry, this fleece was sold last spring at the Wonderful Woollies sale - but if you are interested, I'm sure that The Shepherd would take your name for next year. 

The Shepherd took out two fleeces, but the Wool Barn lady would only let him enter on under his name, so he entered the other one under Mummy's name.  She got a Blue Ribbon too! 

They were beat out for best of show by a Romney ram's fleece owned by Mummy's friend Janet.  Oh, well, we beat her out last year. 

This is Eva's fleece - Mummy said it is so different from Rita's - soft and buttery, and hardly any crimp.  This one was sold last spring too - the ladies who bought them were nice enough to let The Shepherd take them to Black Sheep and to our Fair. 

Well, that's all I have to tell you for now.  Effuryone have a GREAT WEEK!!! 


XOX  Your Roving Reporter, Gracie

.

They're on their way

These four pair of fingerless gloves went in the mail last week for a customer down in Seattle.

I hope that she liked them.

I hope they fit her friends!







I particularly loved the blue/green wool - from Blue Faced Liecster wool that I bought at Black Sheep a couple of years ago. It ended up making the coolest stripes.

The black is from Inky's Shetland roving that I bought from Michelle (not coals to Newcastle, because we don't have any true black sheep) It spun up BEAUTIFULLY and these gloves are just the softest.

I am half the way through the 12 pairs I had on order. Luckily they are pretty easy to make...

Ready to crochet some more fingerless gloves -

This is my black yarn from "Inky" - my friend Michelle got me out of a jam with some of her lovely natural black roving. Unfortunately, the picture has a lot of reflection from the flash - I tried a couple of different ways to shoot it differently (check it out in the basket at the end of the post) - it should be really nice to crochet with though.






I did some stash busting to make this yarn - some red potluck roving and some black & white Romney that Kathy in Arizona gave me a couple of years ago.












So here it all is - wound up into balls ready to go!

The Squalicum Valley Artisan Faire -

Over, but not forgotten - I can't believe that it was almost a month ago that we did the Artisan Faire -

It was organized by our friend Lydia McCauley and a few of her very talented neighbors (click on her name to see a few more of the items that were in the show and to hear her beautiful music)

Squalicum Valley Artisan Faire - With a few invited special guests - - that would be The Shepherd and me, my friend Linda, who makes these adorable cut paper collages, and a couple of other ladies (I was never quite sure who was local or not)

Here is my yarn display (which was made to fit on a card table) with baskets of fingerless gloves and friendship roses just below - It worked just like I thought it would - although because of the placement of our table, instead of having yarn on both sides, I pushed the dowels most of the way to one side - and hung two skeins on each dowel. But that was the nice thing about having the dowels moveable - and the whole thing comes apart and is stored in a cardboard box about 6" thick, 12" wide and three feet tall, that will just fit in the corner of my closet (if I can ever get the boxes of stuff out from in front of it so I can get INTO the closet - but that's a whole 'nuther topic...)


And The Shepherd had his display of roving from our sheepies -

I sold a little over half of my yarn and gloves - he only sold the two bumps of black & white roving (from Wicket) - but I think he made some very good contacts - Roving is not really something that one expects to buy at a craft fair.

I also had my spinning wheel there, which elicited quite a bit of attention (also the fact that I was just about the first person that people saw when they came in the door)

All in all I sold enough to cover the costs of the new display, the new table for the roving display, the wire cubes that The Shepherd had his roving in - all things that we can use again. So I was happy.




There were lovely jewelry items -













And some knitted and crocheted items from a small yarn shop in Skagit county.













Nancy Rumbel was there with some vintage collectables, and items of "whimsey" - she also plays the ocarina (in addition to many other insturments) and sat in with Lydia when she played her music -











If you click on any of these pictures, they will biggafy and you can see some of the exquisite work that these talented people brought to sell.










These are my friend Linda's collages and greeting cards.

Linda & I played some music together too - We'd been practicing for about 6 weeks - she on banjo and me with my 12 string guitar. She did a short set alone, we played three songs together and then I played a half dozen songs by myself - I hadn't played in public for several years (with the exception of church) and I was nervous - but it went well.




These painted silk flags were some of my favorite items - and you have to look more closely at her felted people - I think I might have gone to college with the fellow in the red jacket...










This was Lydia's display of soaps,lotions and essences that she makes - She did a wonderful job of advertising and marketing the show - we had nearly constant traffic the whole six hours - something unusual for the first year of an event. We were also lucky that the weather was exceptionally nice (almost too hot) - but it certainly brought the folks out to see what we had.

Even thought we were both totally exhausted. I unfortunately decided the night before the show that I needed to re-measure/re-price all my yarn & was up until about 3:00 a.m. - and we had to be up at 6:00 a.m. to be out at the grange by 8:00 to set up - so I essentially got a three hour "nap" - but, I would absolutely do this again. I know my "pitfalls" and how I would change things for the future - in fact I even got an email from someone who was in the process of planning a small arts & crafts fair in one of the assisted living facilities in town. If I had more yarn spun up, I might have considered it, but I have a 4 oz. skein of yarn and 7 pairs of fingerless mitts to make and I still have to spin the yarn for several of them - so, I think I have my work cut out for myself without adding in another venue, don't you?

Monday Musings or, The Beginning of the End

Of Summer, that is...

I had last Wednesday - Friday off from work to get ready for the Artisan Faire that I'm participating in next weekend. The weather, which has been SO nice for the past month, suddenly took a turn - grey and cloudy - not too cold, but not really warm either.






George was napping on the back porch, catching what rays he could. This is one of his favorite positions - stretched out, arms in front - flat like a pancake - but on his tummy, not on his back like Neelix did.

Funny cats - it is hard to believe that we've only had them for two months on Friday. They really have taken up a niche in my heart. It's hard to imagine life without them now. The V.E.T. is coming tomorrow evening to give them their last shots for the year. *(Shhh)







One thing I did this week was set up a mock-up of how our table was going to work & I wanted to show you my new display stand for my yarn. A friend of mine is a great "woodworker" and put together this awesome stand for me (if I don't sell any, and don't have plans for any other shows, I don't know what I'll do with it.) It fits handily on our card table and the dowels go through both sides so I can hang 10 skeins (minimum) - And it comes apart into three pieces and stores flat, so it will fit in the closet without taking up much space.

I hurriedly stashed my yarn on it to take this picture, and have re-skeined almost everything so I could put my price tags on it. Hopefully it will look a little tidier on Saturday.





Since it wasn't too bad out, I went on a walkabout with the kitties - took some pictures of the leaves that are turning on The Shepherd's bonsai plants...












And the black-eyed-Susans that are blooming to beat the band.














And it started to rain, so the Mrreows & I headed inside.













I also promised to show you some of the other things that I have made for the Faire - these are little (well, they are about 3 1/2 inches across) rose pins - they have a pin back sewed on the back side. Aren't they cute? If I don't sell them, I'll use them as Christmas presents.

So, there you go, my Monday musings. Got some busy days coming up - I'll try to post when I can.

Busy hands are --- well, busy hands...

I have been doing a LOT of crocheting lately - this baby quilt for a friend's son and daughter-in-law who just had their first baby -

It's about 3 1/2 feet wide -










And this one for a co-worker whose wife is expecting their second child. It is about 3' x 4' - both of them are double strand baby acrylic - (I finally found a use for all that baby yarn I inexplicably bought two years ago)

I wish that the color on this one had come out better on the big picture -





but you can kind of see it here - it looks like you are looking into a swimming pool - all green and blue (my favorite colors) and sparkly white. -









I have them all wrapped in tissue and stashed in some neat cloth bags that I bought on line from Oriental Trading Co. I was looking for some project bags for some of the kidlets at church that I am teaching how to crochet - these were bright rainbow colors - about the size of a small fabric shopping bag - a dozen for about $12 - one for each kidlet and a half dozen for me for gift bags - such a deal.






After I took the afghan pictures, I puttered around on the porch taking pictures of our Japanese maples. This pictures is for Michelle because I know they are her favorites.













This made me think of all the Sci-Fi movies and TV shows that are coming out this summer - no, it's not a pod people plant, just a wisteria getting really close to blooming.

You probably won't hear from me for another week or so, as I'll be working on a project for church - a craft that is really seductive - I can see why people fall in love with it...but certain people read my blog sometimes, so... mum's the word...

Mission Complete

This was the scene at the Sunset Fibers booth at my spinner guild's March 2010 Spin-In.

Faced with so much yummy lushness, my eyes always glaze over and my hand immediately reaches for my check book.

"My Pretty - My pretty" - I sound like Gollum in The Lord of the Rings!

I decided that I absolutely needed to purchase enough wool to make sweaters for my bosses impending twins.



I chose a colorful rainbow mix for one.

It ended up that I didn't get as much as I should have (12 ounces instead of 16 that I really needed), so I blended some of the rainbow with a white Shetland wool single (and some of the lavender pastel with grey Shetland single - )







And a lavender pastel mix for the other -

Little did I know that they planned to name one of the girls "Violet"

If you have been following my blog for a while, you'll remember that I told you about my first BIG mistake HERE (ahh - the first round through - they were too small)



Could I have "revised" the sweaters so they would have fit? Maybe. But I wanted them to be better than that.

So, after all the frogging (rippit, rippit, rippit) I finally got them re-crocheted and finished - washed, blocked and buttons sewed on -









Can you see this adorable lavender rose button?
(click on the picture to biggify it)









Here is Annie's "coat of many colors" - on the "re-do" I was actually able to make the pattern of the colors from the sleeves match the pattern of the colors on the hood. I thought I was very clever for that...










And I found these sweet little heart shaped buttons for her coat.











And here are none other than the recipients themselves.

Probably the cutest babies I've ever seen.






And the sweaters fit! Their grandma Mel said that she thought they'd be able to wear them for a while.

Spring and summer in the Pacific NW is often chilly, so I'm hoping that they will get a lot of use out of them before they outgrow them. The hazards of making a sweater for a baby...




But it was a fun project and I actually enjoyed myself.

Thank you to Mommy Rachel for the lovely pictures of the girls.

The end...