Whoops! It's Tuesday

And I was supposed to announce the giveaway recipient yesterday. *scrambles*

The winner this month is Jamie! I'll contact via Ravelry regarding the McMorran balance.

I'm going to blame my lack of focus on dyeing yarn inside. All those fumes, you know (not really). This is why I'm mostly seasonal and usually do my dyeing only in the temperate months. It's both easier and harder than when I can set up my station outside. For one thing, there's half as many pots going, and everything takes an interminable amount of time. And while it may be more comfortable, it's also cramped and messier.


That's two measly pots and all that will fit in the bathroom where I dye in the winter. I managed four batches of yarn yesterday. 12 is typical of a normal day when I've got 4 pots cranked up. *sigh* So instead of 2 days dyeing, I'm going to do three and hope to finish up properly tomorrow.

I have to finish by tomorrow because Thursday is set aside for shopping and cooking because Friday is my birthday. I decided this year that I just wanted a nice dinner at home, but I wanted DINNER, and I wanted free rein to go to the supermarket(s) and buy anything I wanted to make anything I want whatsoever, and damn the cost. Which, given how I can shop for food will be not inconsiderable.

I have a menu already and it's 7 courses. I've got my shopping list and my prep schedule and I'm debating what to drink with dinner and if I can include a new bottle of gin in the total. We'll see. But it should be good.

More after the jump, including a very limited time coupon code for the shop, so click through!

It's that time again (a well balanced giveaway)

So I may be a little flaily because I have so very much to do and never enough time in which to do it, but that doesn't mean this post can't be well balanced, like a healthy breakfast.

Or this McMorran balance.


Yes, today I am giving away a metric McMorran yarn balance. These nifty tools are used to determine the meterage of a given quantity of yarn. The balance is very precisely weighted and when you drape a bit of the yarn over it and then trim it until the arm is level, the length of that remaining bit of yarn will tell you how much yarn per gram you have. Weigh the remaining yarn, do a little basic math,and Bob's yer uncle. The instruction sheet is included, but it's really that simple.

It's not as accurate with yarn that's slubby or thick/thin, but it can still generate a good ballpark figure. Can you do the equivalent with a scale sensitive enough? Yes, but do you have a scale that goes to at least 2 decimal points to the gram? If so, then you don't need this. Which would also be the reason I'm giving it away.

I'm a little fried and crispy around the edges so just comment with anything to enter this drawing, and remember to make sure I have a way of contacting you if you win. If you've got a fun yarn or fiber (horror or otherwise) story, even better. I'm going to let this one run all the way through Sunday the 6th and pick a random winner on Monday March 7th because my plate runneth over all this week. As always, you can double dip with the Ravelry group giveaway. That one is foam display heads this time around.

But hey! I finished my weaving.

It came out 54in long after soaking it in hot water and the silk bounced back to it's pre-tension length. Ahh, relaxation shrinkage, at least I have a name for it. And I have decided I can never complain about weaving in ends in knitting again. I wove back every single warp thread along itself to finish the piece. I'm sure there's a better and faster way to finish a piece of fabric without fringe, but I was too impatient to research it. After all, it only took me 6 hours to weave in 100 warp threads. *facepalm*

The scarf is really light, but the silk gives it a bit of body so it doesn't feel insubstantial. The wool softened up as well and I'm really pleased with it. And I doubt I will ever need to weave anything again. That particular urge is well satisfied and my mother likes her new scarf.

Short attention span

Deadlines in February always have a sort of headlong quality to them. The month is only short by a couple days, but those extra hours add up when March 1 is within sight.

I've been participating in Nerd Wars all month, and I have a weaving project to finish. This was it last week. I have 18in left to do and not much time to do it in. We'll see if I get it in on time.


It's a backstrap loom warped with some matka and noil 2ply silk I have, and I've been weaving with some 2ply Gottland wool. I've started splicing in extra silk where the warp is thin, so we'll see how that changes the character of the fabric. I do like how it's turning out, but I will never really be a weaver. I much prefer my knitting needles.

I've also wanted to post the most ridiculously easy warm apple deliciousness ever, and since I had three overripe Golden Delicious apples and the desire, I made it this morning. I've got the method after the jump as it's not really a recipe so much as a thing to make when the ingredients match up with the inclination. There are two ingredients, apples and butter, and it can be eaten by itself or as a condiment.

I should learn to luge

First things first, I forgot to do this yesterday. The entries for February's giveaway really cracked me up and the winner of the giveaway stitchmarkers is Bretta! I'll contact via Ravelry.

Meanwhile, this winter is certainly full of enough ice and snow. We've been on ice since the sleet storm, with an impassible driveway. Rather, we could get down but getting back up again is always the kicker. This was the top of the driveway this afternoon. This is after a couple days of thaw, but it hasn't dented the inch thick layer of compacted snow and ice pellets.


Digging around in the shed revealed a bag of rock salt and a bucket of sand, so everything visible in the picture was given a going over. This allowed us to get out and, more importantly, back up again with staples like milk, eggs, and cat food. That last one is really important. We are perfectly capable of surviving until spring thaw with what's in the freezer and pantry, but the cats are more particular than we are. :P

Not only that, but there's been a stranger cat visiting late at night since the 3rd. It's a large black and white long hair, very skittish and it runs away whenever I turn on the light and go out to look for it. But it lingers around the house and cries and cries. I think it may be a housecat that got out and is now lost in the wilderness of ice and snow. I've been putting food and water out for it, so hopefully it will become less skittish over time and I can see about finding where it belongs.

Being iced in gives me a weird sense of limbo. I've been knitting up a storm and getting not much else of worth done. I'm separating some 6ply silk into a 2ply and a 4ply for a weaving project I want to do (which is a special sort of tedium since I don't have a wheel) and I've been making stitch markers, but there's no urgency to anything. Getting to the mailbox has been hard enough, let alone the post office. With the second half of the week expected to go back down to single digits overnight, our driveway is unlikely to improve very much. I feel like I'm hibernating.

Still, one thing I did do was post my free knit jiaozi pattern to Ravelry, and I made a little instructional video, too. Both links are in the sidebar, too.

Ravelry pattern page
Ravelry pdf download link
YouTube supplemental tutorial

These dumplings were a good idea, actually. The cats have been going stir crazy indoors, and so I've thrown a bunch of these around and it lets them blow off some excess energy. Not all of them have catnip in them and they still seem to work.

Tigers and Rabbits and a giveaway

February! I'm a little scattered because February 3 is New Year's day according to the Chinese lunisolar calendar, which means that I've got to clean and clean and clean some more. But tonight I have a giveaway for you all! This month, I'm giving away half a set of stitch markers. But it's not just any half set.

You see, normally my stitch markers come in sets of 4. But the February Phatfiber box theme is gems and minerals, so I decided to make a very big set indeed. That set will be an assortment of 15 widgets in five sizes including the rarely seen extra large (12mm) marker. So, half a set will net you seven widgets, and I've thrown in a couple ring markers, too. That's 9 markers total. Here they are displayed on corner of my helical blanket, which will incidentally take up the other part of this post.


Some of the widgets are made with copper this time, which is softer and will develop a patina more quickly. I don't actually know what all the stones are.

For this month's giveaway I'd like a story, true or made up, involving Tigers (for the year we are leaving) and/or Rabbits (for the year we are entering). It can be as silly or as serious as you'd like, and coherence is overrated. I'll accept jokes, limericks, and haiku in lieu of a full narrative.

I'm leaving this one up through Saturday, February 5 and I'll randomly pick a recipient on Sunday. Once again, entering both the blog and the Ravelry group giveaway is fine.

For me, I'd like to mention Hotshot. She was an elderly little dwarf bunny who died of old age last week. I got her in July 2007 from my niece who was moving overseas, and she'd been a grand old lady ever since.

Last winter she became very sick with one of those mysterious rabbit malaises where she went all lopsided and couldn't balance. We moved her inside and made sure she was hydrated and could eat, and she got much better. She was never quite 100% again, but she'd run around on my floor and bother the cats quite comfortably.

Now her not-quite-buddy Squirrel (also a dwarf rabbit and also from my niece) has moved into Hotshot's indoor digs and is getting used to being actually warm. Poor guy usually overwinters outside, but it's just been ridiculously cold. So while I'll miss Hotshot, I'm glad Squirrel will have a more comfortable time of it.

Now it's your turn!

Meanwhile, this was December's Mystery Box, for those who were wondering. 



And below the cut I'm going to talk about my Helices blanket.

A tale of two bulbs

See that? That's a 42W warm CFL and a 65W daylight CFL (6500 Kelvin, full spectrum, CRI 80), behind a piece of white tissue paper I'm using to soften the light. A 65W CFL is about equivalent to a 300W incandescent bulb, so it's bright.

The 65W bulb isn't bright enough on its own, and tends to cool things down just a little too much; it's just a little bit flat.  Pairing up both lights seems to give me a better range of color.

tap*tap*tap*tap*tap

First up, January's giveaway of a pair of earrings from Written Insight goes to AbsolutGillian! I'll contact via Ravelry. :)

Second up, a repick for December's giveaway is Ilina!  I'll contact via Ravelry as well. 

Meanwhile back at the ranch, I'm making a lot of stitch markers lately.  The January Phatfiber theme is Chinese New Year, and I was able to squeak in this month's samples under the wire.  I received the beads I wanted to use yesterday and shipped out the samples today. I was focused on finishing so I didn't take a picture, but I have the pieces I'll be making for the shop in progress.


6mm widget removable stitch markers in progress, jade and red brass.

I'm actually pretty pleased with this picture. I tweaked the contrast but not the color or white balance, and I think it's pretty good.  Of course, that's partially because I started with this:


I'm still putzing around with trying to take more color accurate pictures and it seems to help to put something pure medium blue into the frame. I suspect the camera registers the blue and no longer feels compelled to compensate so hard in that direction.

That leads me to put my scissors in everything, so if you see them hanging out at the edge of a shot that's why. To whit....


This my anvil for when I make the widget stitch markers. My father is a retired civil engineer and this is a piece he picked up on a job site.  It's a small discarded section of a long threaded steel rod that was cut with a diamond saw.  They're used to draw together items under tension.  It's 1.5in in diameter, weighs a hair over a pound, and is the perfect size for my purposes.  I've used electrical tape to wrap the sides so the rough sides don't damage my beads, but the top where it was cut with a saw is very smooth.  The scissor serves double duty in this shot, adjusting the color as well as providing a sense of scale.


And here it is with my knitting which I put on pause for the stitch marker frenzy.  Six balls of yarn were a bit annoying to move around whenever I had to clear my work surface, so I stuffed everything in the basket. This is one of those times I particularly appreciate center pull balls that can sit neatly stationary while still feeding out the yarn.

OK, hammer back to the anvil time, I need to finish my markers for the shop!

Light and helices

First up, today's the last day to enter my January giveaway for a pair of earrings from WrittenInsight, so do pop on over there!

Next, I wanted to talk about two things today.  The first is my latest knitting project and the second is trying to take product photographs when the light doesn't comply.

So, knitting.  I got itchy fingers and decided to try a technique that has intrigued me for lo these many moons.  Helical knitting, or spiral knitting for single row stripes. There's a short description here at Grumperina's blog.

The idea is that since knitting in the round is actually a spiral, it should be possible to stack those spirals for single row stripes that positively do not jog. And it works. It doesn't even have to be just two colors, it can be as many as one likes. So, I decided to try with 6.  I dove into my stash last night and picked out 6 skeins of yarn that seemed like they would combine well, if unconventionally, and set to work.  Helices (Rav project page)


Lots and lots more pictures and blather after the jump.

Happy New Year! (a belated eclipse post and a giveaway)

It was a very busy December with my father's 80th birthday banquet on the 19th and family coming home for the holidays, as well as other assorted goings on.  One cousin's family has expanded with a bouncing baby boy, and another's is expecting any day now.  It's been full of moment and now that I can pause to breathe and blog, I'd like to post about the lunar eclipse on the solstice since I took a lot of pictures that make me ridiculously gleeful.

I'll talk about the giveaway first, though.  One thing is that December's mystery box remains unclaimed (and no, it's not exactly the same as the Rav group box).  Soooo, I'm going to do this.  I'd like to send it to cols journey who won it, but if I don't hear back by the end of January's giveaway, I'll do another random pick from the existing entries for December and announce it at the same time as January.  I think that's equitable.  Meanwhile, January!

This month I have a pair of earrings from a friend of mine who has a thoughtful and literate Etsy shop called Written Insight (closed for the holiday, it'll reopen tomorrow).

These earrings are about 2in long and they're made of text on newsprint that's been carefully dipped in resin, as well as green and white marbled glass, wood, and silver beads.  The hooks are silver plated brass.

For this giveaway, I'd like to talk books. Specifically favorite books.  I have a lot of favorites since I was one of those kids who would read under the blankets with a flashlight.  But if asked, the one I always go back to is Jane Austen's Persuasion.  It's got the right blend of funny and heartfelt for my tastes, and I like how Anne isn't remarkable or perfect, but she's mature, intelligent, and good (almost too good for her, Austen said).  Her Frederick has the whiff of a storybook romantic hero, but when you get to the real him he's just a man who's a little foolish but ultimately well meaning to go along with the "handsome, capable, and rich".

So, what's tops on your list and why? Comment by Thursday, the 6th to be entered in this drawing, and as always leave some way for me to get in touch with you.  I'll pick a random winner on Friday, January 7th.  And I do hope everyone will visit Written Insight and take a look around. It's perfect for logophiles and bibliophiles, and nature lovers, too.  The Rav group has a different pair of earrings, and as usual entering both giveaways is fine.

*** Eclipse! ***


The 2010 complete lunar eclipse was entirely worth staying up for, even if I didn't see a single falling star.  We lucked out and had a gorgeous, clear night for it although it was very cold.  I found my half-fingered gloves in the pockets of my parka so only my toes froze.  I had to pop inside and take off my shoes to warm them up periodically.

More after the jump....

BBBrrrr....

First things first, the December giveaway!  I loved the stories, thanks to everyone for sharing them.  My favorite thing about this question was how it made me think.  A good friend of mine came up with it and I thought it was easy at first, but then had to really dig to decide what makes a gift I've given special.

I've plugged the numbers into Random.org and the winner of December's giveaway is cols journey! Your mystery box will be winging its way to you as soon as I get an address. And I will eventually post a picture of the contents here, but not until later. I want it be a surprise!


Meanwhile, I think I should probably do a recap of the Boston Bazaar Bizarre since it and visiting up in Boston ate my brain for weeks.