I'm back

The allergies are still kicking my butt, but I'm alive so I guess I will have to shut up, grin and bear it. The BF and I went to see Angel's in America this past Sunday and I have to tell you that you all NEED to see this play. It was great. All of the performers did a great job, but my favorite was Jamie Rogers who played Louis in the play. He did a great job and was really comfortable up on the stage. You didn't feel like he was acting. My only criticism is for the woman who was playing Harper, Thia Stephens, she was just a little over the top for me and you got the feeling that she was reading a prompter or something. We still had a great time. I have to tell you, my BF may not be perfect, he makes mistakes, but sometimes he hits the nail right on the head and it reminds me why I love him so much. Ok, enough of the mush, on to the pictures!


Well I've got a lot of pictures for you today. I may not post often (except for last week when I was very prolific) but you know you will always get your fill of pictures with me. I'm going to start today's ride with a picture of the beautiful alpaca roving I bought from a friend in my spinning class. She runs a non-profit which owns the alpacas and they sell the fleece in order to raise money to send kids to summer camp. They don't have a web site yet and this is the first shearing so I don't have any info on how you can get some of this fiber, but she is putting some information together for me so I will let you know as soon as I know.

This fleece was not the softest (it's from the legs) but since it's alpaca it's still very soft. This is a blend of black and white fleece. I bought it because I loved the heathered grey color. She sold me this for $1.50 and ounce. She also has, black, white and brown fleece from the blanket area which she sells for $2 and ounce. Great price and a great cause, I will be sure to post an update of how you can buy from her as soon as I know.


I also did some dyeing over the weekend. This is about 8 ounces of the punta roving I bought at Village Spinning and Weaving dyed with Wilton Cake dyes in my crockpot. I think I added too much water causing the green to mix with all the layers but I like it a lot. Who knew you could get such rich colors with cake dyes!


I took the alpaca off the wheel just so that I could spin up a bit of this to see what it would look like. I'm loving it so far. Take a peek...


I also dyed a bump of wool that weighs about 3 lbs. I don't remember what kind of wool this is so.. there you go *smile*


I put one end in the pot at at time hoping to get some interesting color changes. Here it is taking the first dip


Here is is after I've flipped it from dyeing the top brown and now i'm dyeing the bottom with some blue cake dye which I was hoping would split into some nice colors.


Here is the final result. In the middle the colors are a nice light green and brown. You can't tell in this picture though. I will try to post some pictures of the lenghts I have pulled off soon. This thing took 4 days to dry! So keep that in mind if you ever try to do this. It is also very hard to keep a big sopping mess of roving from falling apart while you are dyeing it this way. I'm amazed I didn't felt the whole damn thing, LOL


After seeing Bonnie's Sideway's Spencer I decided I had to have one so I started knitting. I'm using some brown tweed recycled yarn. I started knitting on Friday night making the size 40" on my addi size 7's nad this is how far I have gotten. You can see that the first sleeve is finished and I'm starting on the body. This is a lot easier to knit than I thought it would be.


Here is a close-up of the stitch details. I would like my loyal readers to notice two things... #1 I'm doing cables!! Who-hoo! I knew I could do it (ok, so I didn't but I tried. I've got to get credit for that). Not only am I doing cables, but I'm doing them without a needle! Haha. Not as dumb as you thought, huh? *smile* #2 For those of you who own this copy of Interweave Knit, you will know that this is knit from a chart. So not only am I knitting cables, I'm knitting them from a chart! Miracles do happen. I'm also planning on making this longer just like Bonnie did. It's a little too short as is for my fat body. I've added an extra pattern repeat to the body already and it comes just about to my waist. I just hope I have enough extra yarn to add the cuffs, collor, button bands and bottom ribbing. Please, please pray for me *smile*


I will leave you with the greatest find of my lifetime. Last week at Target (thar-jay) I found these 2.5 gallon zip lock bags. I was able to get 1400 yards of yarn in one bag, enough for a whole sweater. I plan to use these to organize my stash by project (if the yarn has one planned). I will put all the yarn in the bag and then place a photocopy of the pattern I hope to use the yarn for in the bag with the yarn. I will then write all pertinent yarn info on the front of the bag. I'm sure this is going to take me all weekend. Again, pray for me, LOL!


Ok, so I lied, one more picture. My brother wants me to make him a hat liek the ones in this picture. Does anyone have any idea where I can find a pattern like this? I think the hats in the pattern or crochet, which is fine, but I'm also open to knit patterns if anyone knows of any. Thanks!