Bubinga crochet hook.
I’m not really into crochet, I’ll do a little of it for a random lace edging. I was going to add an “or” but lace edging is about the extent of my crochet adventures. The truth is I’m really loath to throw out usable wood, any usable wood, so I grabbed a little Bubinga scrap and turned it. I like the random odds and ends things that come from the scrap box.
This is one of those “What do I do with myself?” days. I have work to do everywhere, but nothing essential. I could spin, I could turn, I could card, I could dye (that sounded rather desperate and funny in my head), I could clean, I could take a nap, I could paint. I don’t have any good “shoulds” to keep me inspired and on the ball today.
That concept should relax me, take the pressure off, let me comfortably slow down the frenzy to a steady slow flow. Nope, not for me. For me it leads to stress and discomfort, I like having points to move to throughout my day. “I shoulds” mixed with “I coulds” is healthy and relaxing for me, gives a certain structure to my day. Gives me a way to focus. If I can convince myself that I should go do something, right now; I’ll feel better, I’ll have a goal.
Now I need to make up a goal, wrap my head around it and get going. Why does that seem like way too much effort?
We decided to dress up a few of our spindles a little.
We stocked our woods the day before yesterday, added lacewood and sycamore, decided to hold off on wenge and zebrawood, but did restock the paduak.
Washing fleeces today, it’s finally warm enough out side that I have a hope of them drying in a reasonable amount of time. I ran out of ordinary dishsoap so I compromised and used “Simple Green”– bad idea. Very bad, the Simple Green left a weird scum behind on the last batch that took several very hot soaks and rinses to remove. I’ve used it before on less oily fleeces, so I’ll consider this “lesson learned” time.
My little boy is turning into quite the fiberworker. Josey has moved from drop spindle to spinning wheel, first I had him plying his singles (from his dropspindle) then I had him plying some of my singles in order to practice his treadling and to work with the energy of the plies. Then I tore off a chunk of roving, and let him spin his own on the wheel.
Here’s a picture from a few days ago, Josey’s plying singles on the spinning wheel.
Usually the boy-child fusses and complains “I will never be done.” when I introduce him to a new task. Nope, not this time. He’s actually been spinning all week, then through the weekend, worked on plying again, knitted up his first little off the bobbin mini skein, asked for both more roving and more singles. And then, “Mom can you show me again?” (that smacking sound was that of my jaw hitting the floor.) He’s fulled his practice skeins and put them out on the rain table to dry. Josey learned to use a noste.
I’m totally basking in maternal glory. This is so cool. I don’t make Josey do things just because I do them, if he wants to work with wood or knit (or spin) or cook it’s because he jumps into it, his one time obsession with rubber stamping *did not* come from me.
I just make sure that he suffers minimal bodily injury and guide him through the basics as best I can. But I think it’s really neat that he’d make stuff and do things (especially when those things are my things too) for fun
Big sigh I finally finished the dress. What should have been a two hour project was extended into a whole day due to my procrastination, my clumsiness, my forgetfulness, and basically all the reasons why I really don’t like sewing (that and a serious thumb injury resulting from a completely out of control seam ripper.)
I’m so pleased with the final results though, I really like this dress and it was worth every bit of the effort.
Trashy little sundresses are a tradition of sorts for me. When I was little my mom would sit down at her sewing machine and make two elastic smocked sundresses and a b’gillion of those trapozoid and string halter tops out of some scrap material. It would be a full day or two of shouting and being poked by sewing pins, grand fun as far as Mom was concerned (we girls would have described it somewhat differently, in saltier language.)
My sister gave up the sundresses and we’re both far too modest for the halter tops, but I am I stubborn thing so I’ve converted to a somewhat breezier (yet still pushin’ the yard) sundresses. This little thing satisfies my desire to be cool (and a little sexy) and still keep my behind out of public view.
This morning I took out my favorite little violet calico sun-dress, overjoyed with the idea of wearing it again and grabbed some matching thread to fix the strap. Strap resecured, ratty little hem edge repaired, and into the bathroom I go to slip it on for the first day of chilly but sunshiny wearing.
Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.
Yeah. Okay. Lexi is 17 months old and I haven’t worn that particular dress for over 2 years. I also haven’t exactly been riding Matt’s bike as much as I did prior to having Lexi. I’m 30.
Oh yeah, the dress fits. It fits in ways that it really shouldn’t fit. I can still slip it on over my head, and if I stand and walk straight it looks good. It however did not pass the stand-backside-to-the-full-length-mirror-and-touch-your-toes test. Nope, failed that little test.
So this means that my favorite little violet calico sundress will be cropped to a decent shirt length and worn with jeans. It also means that I have to make a new and improved sundress with a more modest hemline. This means I have to sew or live encumbered in jeans and t-shirts all summer or put myself through the horror of horrors retail dressing rooms. I’m so not into sewing (although I collect, repair and restore vintage sewing machines) but it’s better than fitting rooms and sales ladies ‘helping’ me.
Fortunately, I never got around to cutting the fabric for my maternity dresses and I’m not planning on being maternally fashionable again anytime soon so I can cut two or three dresses and sew them all at once and get it all out of the way.
After tolerating all of the issues with tag-board (including the pop-ups: I hate pop-ups) I decided to find an alternative. You can find the board here you have to host it yourself, but if I can install it– pretty much anyone can. Very cool stuff.
I used Kiwi Kool-Aid and tied the roving with crochet cotton to break up the color.
Here I smooshed the wet roving and poured the dissolved KA into the crockpot. The effect of both is very similar, although the pink has more even pattern.
I’m still spinning the pound of lead gray Merino. Still spinnin’. Yup. I passed the 1/3rd mark and I’m edging into the 1/2 territory (should be at 8 ounces spun by the time I go to bed tonight.) Then comes the plying…
Speaking of plying. I’ve had Josey practicing plying for the past few days on the spinning wheel. His treadling is pretty good, he knows clockwise from counter-wise and now we’re working on getting him to draft and treadle at the same time. He’s doing pretty good, still he gets freaked out when he thinks he’s put too much energy into a single. I am trying to convince him to make thinner singles with lots of energy– but I’m Mommy so what do I know?
This one is blue Easter egg tablet and 18 drops of red “deco cake” food coloring, in 3 quarts of water, 1/3 cup vinegar, and 3.2 oz of wool roving.
With the food dyes the dye colors absorb at different rates so if you want a even all over color you need to *omit* using anything that slows absorption (I use alum or salt, typically salt), HOT water, damp (not drippy at all) roving. For the multicolored stuff *add* salt (about a tsp for 3-4 quarts of water) and start with COOL water, letting it heat to a simmer (or until the dye exhausts), very damp/slightly drippy roving. For the monochromatic variegation use HOT water, extra salt (about 4tsp), and just barely damp roving.
There’s a physics and chemistry to it, which means rules and reproducible results.
Immature or not, I like my weird little colorways and blends from food coloring, Easter egg dyes and Kool Aid. If I want subtle and natural colors I have plenty of moss, lichens, barks, earth pigments, roots, veggies and herbs to choose from and a whole assortment of white to colored fleeces.
When it comes down to it I like to see things that comes from study and technique, and not necessarily the size of the wallet. I make what I like to see.
Next I’m going to experiment with surfactants and dyes.
You might recognise some of this yarn from before, the green yarn was previously a ball of singles.
Concerning the art school rant I’ve had a few very nice people with art degrees that either wholeheartedly agree with me or think that I’m the scourge of the earth. It’s my opinion that art schools suck the creativity out of creative people (notice– I did not say art classes, I’m all for art classes.) It’s my experience that many art school dropouts and graduates (more often than not) lose their confidence and spontaneity. I may have more opinions on this later.
Any six year old can put together a decent arrangement of texture and color, without it looking contrived and without using gimmicks. Any ten year old can create a freeform sculpture that conveys an emotional setting. Any twelve year old learns to add depth. And so on. So the problem with grownup artists seems to be that they have unlearned what once they knew and don’t have the patience to refine what they have retained on their own.
And any chick with a crockpot can make this colorway:
It’s all part of my plan to take over the world.
I tried to reproduce an Italian spindle after visiting UrbanSpinner.com and poking around. My choice of wood is questionable (I should have used something denser, instead of the fluffy burl) and I should have probably shot for a longer leaner shape.
I did manage to take it for a test spin.
I think that it’s meant to be worked completely with one hand, either held or spun and dropped, letting gravity do more and more of the drafting as the cop builds up. This one, because it’s so little and must be half-hitched wants to literally fling itself into a nearly horizontal wobble and it’s not a very efficient spinner.
After about forty minutes of messing with hand positions, I did manage to spin it one handed for a little while– it was NOT a relaxing experience.
Listen to me whine! I shouldn’t complain all that much, it was fun to make.
