Well Now

After catching up on some blogs that I follow, I feel as though I have even less reason to not have posted recently. I have no excuse other than just not making the time. As usual, life fills up the time one has with the real priorities, over the things one tries to make their priority. So, the blog fell once again to the back burner.

We have been busy. Even now I am sitting here playing with photos and a way to present it all to you in a logical way and realize I have neglected to call my Mom to wish her a happy thanksgiving. Another item to throw on the list. I better get to it.

Remember this guy?

This isn't Sullivan, but the foster dog Dooley. I know, it's a crappy picture but he was always on the move and I was always making the poor abused boy nervous when the camera came out.

Here's another equally bad shot but you can see how skinny he is. He makes Sullivan look a little heftier than he is.

Well, this sweety found a new forever home.

Dooley and I never really bonded, but I am happy to hear that he is doing well with his new family (That's them in another equally bad shot above). He has done some counter raiding, but what can one expect from a starved giant of a dog?

As you can see, he found the Guy a more comforting present than myself. But then being the one that got to feed him most days, that makes sense. I on the other hand took him to the vet to get neutered, had to "cone of shame" his licking self before leaving for work, and constantly pushed the limits to assure we would not have another fear biter before giving him a green light to go to a new home.

That alone is a fuzzy enough feeling rather than getting to cuddle much with this one. I have my own cuddlers for that after all. Here you can see them resting while I create our Thanksgiving feast for the day.

And then there's our "special one".

I know, I hear you thinking, "But yesterday was Thanksgiving..." And it was. I was nicely surprised to find that I did not have to work for it so I volunteered the Guy and I to serve a free Thanksgiving feast to those that needed it. It was great fun. A long but joyful day. After which we went to see "The Book Thief" with friends. It's a good flick but we got home just in time to go to bed.

Then this morning I got a little time to spin before digging in to work on our holiday meal. I hope to find a bit more time to spin today and throughout the weekend. If I don't, I do have to scratch out some additional time to bake.

These were the rolls I baked for todays dinner. They came out lovely and lofty. I don't know what happened to the one in the upper right hand corner, but it tasted lovely though a little bit ugly.

I figure you can tell they are homemade by the amount of variation in my hand rolling of them. If they all look the same you know they cane out of a machine.

The rest of the dinner including the turkey, stuffing, herbed mashed potatoes and fresh green beans with almonds was lovely. I'm sure the Guy would have preferred a little less vegetables, but hey, I have to have some green to go with my meat and potatoes.

Other than that we have just been busy with life. We still don't know what the future holds for the Guy's job, so we have been just kind of in a waiting pattern. The kids had their photos last week for the holidays and I volunteered an afternoon there too to assist Black Dog Animal Rescue in another fundraiser. That is also one of the rescues we foster for frequently.

I have done some more spinning, little knitting and no weaving. Again, it's all a time suck.

I tried adding some sparkly nylon to the final ply that I currently have resting on the bobbins before making it a three ply yarn.

I only did about a 100 yards because I didn't like how it made the ply feel. We'll see what it does to the finished yarn. I have plenty more of it if I like it.

Anyway, I better go help finish up dishes and call my Mom. Hope you all have a good rest of your weekends.

Q

It's a short one

Whew, the weekend is over. Isn't it supposed to be, "Whew, the weekend is here?". Yes, yes it is, and on that note I will get here and blog and have photos in a couple days, but with the busy busy weekend and now the Monday I just had, I am going to go spin for a bit before bed and restarting this all over tomorrow again.

Have a good night,
Q.

Not the plan, but ahead I go

So, this was not the planned post. I was going to get the big camera out and move some outdoor photos over. But today started at 0400 with the lasagna sauce getting started and continued with bread baking and went from there.

See?

Today we had the first gathering of the Wyoming Fiber Skeinks. Okay, let's be honest. The first Official gathering.

And it was fun.

As you can see.

But it left some of us wiped out.

And that includes me.  So off to walk the dogs and then to bed. Have a great night guys.

Sore Fingers

I guess I over did the spinning yesterday in my efforts to sit back and just relax about it all. I am taking a bit of a break and just checking in while listening to our regular Saturday morning NPR shows.

I have dug into the blue merino/silk/bamboo mix whole heartedly. It was special order from Huckleberry Knits, and as usual when it first showed up I thought, "Well, that isn't quite the color I wanted." And as usual, I was wrong.

I will never be a dyer and know the hue magics. Because as I've spun it, I have realized that once again Scarlett nailed what I wanted. As you can kind of see from the above picture, as you spin your fiber color darkens and get's richer in it's color. I ended up with the very color I wanted. You can see the variation in the blue from a corn flower to a steel blue and it is EXACTLY what I was wanting. And the fiber itself? It is a dream. I am spinning it down very fine. How fine? It is easily holding up at 60wraps per inch.

Now, like Smudge here, most people don't know what the heck that means. So, let me tell you. I have a little tool that I use to find out the actual diameter or my yarn, or more appropriately, how many times I can warp the thread of the yarn around the tool in a given inch. And the answer is... 60. And yes, that is actually as small as it sounds.

There are some issues with spinning so small. One, it takes forever. Which I don't mind, I love the act of spinning. Two, it's fine enough that the area of my finger the spun thread runs across, gets sore. That can be an irritation. Thirdly, the fiber often breaks when spun this small. Or at least that has been my experience before. However, the added strength of the bamboo and silk content has been making accidental breakages almost nonexistent in this yarn. Seriously. It has been spinning up like a dream. Scarlett has once again provided me with a superior product for me to play with and it has been lovely to work with.

Unfortunately for my kids, this time suck of a project leaves them absolutely bored with me as you can see.

I think I caught their excitement level with my project well, don't you?

I think this was my favorite. He looks disgusted with me.

Actually, they still got their walks in. They had a morning walk when we got up. The midmorning walk after I dropped my car off for its fall oil change. And then a post dinner walk while The Guy did dishes. So they have not been neglected. I promise. They are just having an afternoon nap while I spin.

Then The Guy came home from the gym while I was trying to get a shot of Emmitt and Sullivan cuddling. Ruined the entire cuteness of my shot. Oh well.

Anyway, I got my spinning in this morning but the left hand let me know it was about done with the abuse so I thought I would come say hello over here before continuing with the day. It is a beautiful cool autumn morning that I will share pictures of as soon as possible (they are on a different camera). I forgot a camera when I ran out to look for the massive flock of geese I could hear flying over. It was possibly one of the largest flocks I have ever seen numbering a couple hundred. Absolutely beautiful in the early morning sun.

We had the joy of Great Harvest Bread Company finally having their grand open yesterday. Of course we could not resist partaking. And let me tell, you, that blueberry cream cheese scone in the middle... delicious. And i don't care for cream cheese. I can't wait to dig into the pumpkin bread to the right. Hope you have one of these locally for your own carb fix.

Have a great weekend guys. And for the local readers that are fiber enthusiast, if you haven't gone over to Ravelry to see the news, next Saturday at one o'clock, I am hosting a fiber gathering. I will be cooking lasagna and baking bread. Bring a side dish and your fiber craft of your choice (spinning, knitting, crochet, felting, it's all welcome) and join the fun. It's the first official gathering of the Wyoming Fiber Skeinks. If you're interested and don't know my address, shoot me an email. I won't post that here guys. Sorry.