A Happy Fuzzy Blog

Oh, am I actually supposed to post once in a while?

So, I guess I just haven't really felt like blogging lately.  Stuff happens, and I think "oh, that would be a good thing to blog about," and then I never get around to it.  The blogging bug seems to have un-bit me.  But I'll see if I can give you a pathetic rundown of what's been going on before I leave to go grocery shopping.

I'm almost done with my alpaca/wool cardigan.  I redid the ribbing at the bottom and did the front bands and collar all in corrugated rib with the brown for the purl and the multicolored for the knit, and it looks cool.  I'm almost done with one sleeve, and it's actually the right size this time, so I just have to finish that and do the other sleeve.  (No time right now for photos or I'll have to take a later bus.)  I bought buttons for it yesterday when I went to Knit-A-Round for World Wide Knit in Public Day.  We sat outside and took turns knitting on a monster scarf with 25 mm needles.  Yes, 25 mm.  I didn't leave out a decimal.  US size 50.  It took me a while to get the hang of knitting with needles that huge.  They were like freaking broom handles.  Bizarre.

Let's see, what else...I finished the socks I was knitting.  Started two more pairs.  Yeah, this would be a lot better with photos.  I've been spinning.  I still need to photograph the yarn I finished a couple of months ago.  I just haven't felt like taking pictures.  Haven't felt like dyeing either.  I guess it's something I really just feel like doing in spurts.  I enjoy doing it when I'm doing it, but I really can't do it full time.  I've been thinking about what direction I want to take the business, since it seems the only way I can grow is if I really do the dyeing full time on top of my full time library job.  If I were one of those super-energetic people who can thrive on only 3-4 hours of sleep a night, that might be doable.  I am not one of those people.

I need time to do other things as well, to pursue other interests, to meditate, to relax, to get enough sleep, or I become depressed and physically ill. 

And yet, I don't want to give up the business entirely.  And I don't think I have to.  I just have to give up the idea of having it grow.  I just have to accept that I dye when I feel like dyeing.  The muse shows up when she wants to.  She's not at my beck and call. 

Of course, the IRS is going to want me to show a profit eventually if I'm going to call myself a business.  Um, yeah.  A profit would be nice.

Ok, time to catch the bus.

Make yarn, not war.

Ever since I wrote how I felt that if everyone would spin we'd have world peace, I've been thinking about that more.  Sure, I'm probably naive, as always, but I don't think I'd want to be any other way.  Spinning makes me happy.  It makes me feel peaceful.  It calms me.  So, what if everyone in the world felt like that?  Surely there would be less violence, wouldn't there?  Surely fewer people would start wars and fewer people would support wars.  If more people in the world just weren't violent people, surely the world would be more peaceful, wouldn't it? 

So my brain got stuck on this idea, because that's the kind of brain I have.  And I ended up adding a new section to my CafePress store.

Buttons, stickers, magnets, and shirts.  I'll send the proceeds to Knitters Without Borders. 

I think I'll go spin now.

Yo, spinners!

Now, don't all faint.  Not only am I posting twice in one day instead of letting three weeks go by, but I'm actually posting to announce a shop update.  No, really.

Wool top.  This one is "Tropical Fruit series: extra mango."  There's more.  Go check it out.  Buy some so I can afford to buy some jeans that aren't falling off.  'K, thanks.

[Non-spinners, I'm still working on getting on getting yarn to come out the way I want with my new dyeing method.  I dyed some last weekend, and...well, we'll just call those skeins "research and development."  But I'm spinning some great yarn for the shop!]

Hey, you know what?

I figured something out.  If I wait until I have time to take photos of everything I want to show you that I'm talking about, it's going to be another month between posts again.  So while throwing a bunch of words at you with no pictures isn't as much fun, for me or for you, it's probably better than blogging so infrequently that you all start wondering if you should send out a search party to look for me.

So, you know the sweater I've been working on?  The one whose sleeve in progress I showed you and then said, "Though now that I look at it, the sleeve looks like a lot of fabric.  Hmm."? I frogged the sleeve again.  Twice.  My problem is, wait, make that part of my problem is, I just don't know what size I am.  I mean my body image hasn't caught up with reality.  I made a lot of sweaters that fit well when I weighed 265 lbs.  Then I lost a lot of weight.  Then I lost more weight.  And then I started knitting this sweater.  And now I get to the other part of the problem, which is I've lost more weight since I started the sweater.  So it's going to be a bit looser than I had planned. But it'll still fit better than any of my other sweaters.  Once I get the sleeves right anyway.

See, my problem is I'm having a hard time getting it through my head that smaller body doesn't just mean smaller circumference torso, it also means smaller circumference arms.  Duh.  I need to make narrower sleeves.  I thought I was, but it didn't work out that way.  I think I just look at numbers that they possibly should be and think that can't possibly be right so I make them bigger.

I'm really not used to my body being this size.  I weigh 171 lbs now. This is the smallest I've ever been in my adult life.  Other people who've lost a lot of weight, how long did it take your body image to catch up to reality?

The good news is this yarn holds up to frogging amazingly well.

I'm just frustrated, I guess.  I mean, it's not like I'm in danger of becoming underweight or anything, so my weight loss isn't a bad thing.  It's just that my body is a stranger to me.  It kind of freaks me out.  And I've been working on this sweater for so long, it feels like I really should be finished by now.

But I got a lot done on it today.  Amy was at AADL today being her cool self.  I didn't think to take any pictures (I was getting a bit of a headache because I went too long without eating), so you'll just have to take my word that I was there.  Because you know, it takes so much effort to get to AADL, what with it being right across the street from the bus station and all, I might be making it up about going.  Um.  Yeah.  Anyway, I got about 3 1/2 hours of knitting done.  Amy is funny and talks very fast.  She was talking about No Sheep for You, and while I love my wool, I was interested in hearing about the properties of the other fibers and yarns.

One thing that occurred to me later was, if a person has a soy allergy, i.e., they react when they eat it, would they also react if they worked with or wore soy fiber?  Or is the allergen destroyed during processing?  The same thing with the other fibers made from food for that matter.  I just thought of soy because I've developed an allergy to it, but she mentioned fibers made from corn and milk.

Anyway, like I said, I love my wool, and I've been dyeing up a storm.  I've got a pile of wool top on my table that I just want to roll around in or eat or something.  I guess it wouldn't really be so good to eat.  Kinda hairy.  But the colors are so pretty.  It looks like it would taste good.  I should have it for sale in  the shop soon. 

I started spinning the top I dyed a few weeks ago.  It is so nice!  It's so easy to predraft!  It's so easy to spin!  I'm in love!  I'm gushing, I know, but sometimes my wool makes me so happy, I feel like if only everyone in the world would spin, we'd have world peace.  I am a dork.

But hey, nothing wrong with being a dork, right?

Oh, you want an update of what I've been doing?

Yeah, I thought so.  I haven't been a very good blogger lately.  I've been doing stuff, but not showing you.  What fun is that?

So.  It's Show and Tell Day here at Acme Acres.  First off, I finished my punk grrl socks.  They rock, as they should.

Now that the bus socks are finished, the former desk sock has now moved into bus sock rotation.  I really like the way the two color stripeyness is doing its thang here.

And I just cast on for another desk sock, giving Tigers on estrogen another go.  It just wasn't meant to be a Jaywalker (way too tight unless I wanted to use 12,000 stitches per round, more or less), but I've used this yarn in another colorway with Anne Hanson's Smokin' socks, and they fit great (with just 72 stitches per round), so I'm using that again, and isn't it tigery?!

I'm making progress on the sweater, though since I'm designing it the progress isn't entirely forward.  Heh.

I finished the ribbing on the bottom and along one front edge (I figured I would wait until I have buttons to do the other side's edge so I don't make the buttonholes too large or too small).  Then I decided the ribbing at the bottom edge really pulls in too much and I needed to do it over. I was kind of ribbinged out by then though, so I decided to do the sleeves first and come back to the ribbing.  So I picked up the stitches for the first sleeve and worked in the round toward the wrist until it was about half done and tried it on, and decided that I didn't like the way it was hanging, and the angle of decrease was too slow.  So I frogged back to the pickup row, then did short rows, then continued in the round decreasing every 5th row instead of every 6th.

This whole project has been kind of a two steps forward one step back thing, but I think it might work this time.  Though now that I look at it, the sleeve looks like a lot of fabric.  Hmm.

I've finished spinning the yarn for the Cobblestone cardigan, washed it, and it's hanging to dry.

I think it's my new special friend.

I'm spinning some yarn to make a scarf because my old scarf is kind of ratty and it's fucking cold here and I'm so sick of winter PLEASE SOMEBODY MAKE IT STOP!!!



Aaaaannnddd...I dyed some wool!  No, really!  Look!

You know what's really cool?  I dyed all of that in one dyepot, all together.  It was totally mad science, which is the funnest kind of art. I swear, I was yelling "Mad!" during the process, which tells you I was inspired, and also that I was just totally obsessing on the mad science concept but that's Shaenon's fault.  Heh heh heh.

Since it's still experimental (because it is mad science, after all), I'm still figuring out how much dye I should use, and that would be, uh, less than I actually used.  This had a lot of excess dye molecules.  I rinsed it several times and dye was still coming out, and I didn't want to rinse it too much more because I didn't want to felt it.  Right now it's beautiful -- no felting at all, so I'm going to spin it and then wash the yarn some more to get the rest of the excess dye out.  I need to do some more dyeing (hee hee, more mad science!) and experiment until I get some fiber than rinses clear before I can sell it as fiber.

Hmm, what else to tell you about?  Oh, yeah.  I seem to have developed an allergy to soy.  Isn't that just a kick in the head?  I had found some stuff with tofu in it that I had grown rather fond of, and a soy-based salad dressing that was rather good on my veggie sandwich, and I've been forced to face the reality that every time I eat any of it, before I'm even finished, my lips and surrounding area feel weird, like everything is about to turn red and swollen and itchy.  It lasts a little while and then returns to normal, though the little while has been getting a little longer, and the affected area has been getting a little larger.  I guess I need to just stop eating it.  I went an entire week without it, and then had some of the dressing on my sandwich to see how I would react, and yeah, it was pretty clear that my body doesn't want this stuff in it. Crap.  So ok, no more soy.  I've been finding plenty of other things to eat.  Like I can put hummus on my sandwich instead of salad dressing.

People keep asking me how the vegan thing is going.  Aside from the soy allergy, it's going great.  I've been trying a lot of new foods, and I've actually lost 15 pounds since I went vegan, despite eating till I'm stuffed and eating whatever I want.  The key is to only want to eat healthy food, not crap.  (Newest thing I've discovered: baked sweet potato with non-hydrogenated margarine, salt, pepper, and chives.  It's yummy!)

My problem now is I need to buy some clothes because the ones I'm wearing are too loose in ways that are driving me nuts.  I don't mind shirts being loose.  That's fine.  But when my bra isn't the right size, it's annoying as hell.  And when my pants are a size too big, it drives me nuts.  Have I mentioned one or 5347 times that I hate shopping?  I can just never find what I need, so it feels like a complete waste of time and a wretched chore.  There are so many things I'd rather be doing with my time, like knitting, or spinning, or dyeing wool.  Even shopping online is frustrating because I don't know what size I am anymore, and sizes are totally inconsistent from one brand to another.  Urgh.

Tick tock

I meant to write a post looking back over 2007 before 2007 actually ended. And then somehow the year ended, and the new year came, and we're several days into it already.  I seem to be time impaired.  This is one of those left brain/right brain things, I think.  I'm just not very time oriented. So be it.  I can accept that in myself.

So.  2007 was one weird year.  Some really bad stuff happened.  I'm not going to write about the bad stuff.  It's too personal and too depressing.  But some good stuff happened too.  But I can't really write about most of the good stuff either because the bad stuff has forced me to be much more careful about my privacy.  Which all leads me to wonder, why the hell do I even have a blog anymore?  You probably don't all want to come here and read "stuff happened, and I'm not going to tell you what it was."  Yeah, that's pretty annoying.  Why do I have a blog?

I guess partly it was supposed to be therapeutic, right?  But if I feel like there's so much I can't say because I need to worry about my privacy, I'm not free to really write.  Maybe I should just talk about knitting. I never really meant for this to be just a knitting blog though.  It was supposed to be a me blog.  All the stuff in my head and my life.  Maybe I should start an anonymous blog.  Or maybe the stuff in my head and my life is just too much to write about. I don't know.   

After some of the bad stuff happened I just wanted to hide from the world. That's kind of hard to do when you have a business.  I considered going to wholesale only, or starting over with a new business name, or anything, just so I would be completely unreachable.  Eventually I decided to continue with the business I have, but to be reachable by email only.  I realize there may be a few people who choose not to order from me because of that.  But there are some people who won't order online at all.  I can't be all things to all people.  I'm not a huge corporation.  I'm one person.  My safety and my sanity (or what passes for it) have to come before all else.  So I'm doing what's right for me.

To be honest, one reason I do have the blog is to attract people to my store.  Since I haven't been blogging as much, my sales have gone way down.  But I haven't been doing updates either.  I haven't been dyeing. I was under way too much stress from the stuff that happened to be creative.  If you've been coming to the blog or to the store looking for new stuff, you haven't been finding it, so I can't say I'm surprised my sales are way down.

But I think my dyeing mojo is also sort of paralyzed by the realization that the process I've been using (cold-pour) just uses way too much plastic, and I have to find a more environmentally friendly way to dye.  I like my stripey yarn.  I love the socks I knit with my stripey yarn.  All the other ways I've read about to dye multi-color yarn sound like the results are different.  I need to experiment.  I've got some ideas.

Anyway, I don't think I'm going to be dyeing the way I have been anymore, and I don't know if I'll be able to get the same results I've been getting or not.  I'll experiment until I get results I like, but they may not be the same as what I'm selling now.  They probably won't be, and some of my ideas are certainly going to take me in some different directions.  I need to play so this is fun or I'm going to get burned out.  I'm probably going to be going back to smaller lots of each colorway, partly so I don't get burned out, and partly as a limitation of the change in technique. What I'm saying is, if there's something in the store  you like, buy it now because I won't be making it again.

Of course, if you think all my stuff sucks, maybe you think my dyeing mojo should just go drown itself in a dyepot.  Yeah, well.  To each his own.

So, maybe I should talk about knitting.  Yeah, I've been kind of negligent about that.  Did someone mention stripey socks?  Oh, I did?

My bus socks are moving along.  Um, no pun intended.  (Bus...moving... Sorry.)

I started another desk sock.

I only dyed one skein of this yarn, and it was kind of an experiment.  I was dyeing some other skeins with purple and there was way too much dye, so I grabbed an extra undyed skein to sop up the extra dye -- this one! It turned a different shade than the purple in the other skeins since the purple is a mix of dyes and some of the colors had already bound.  I added blue to the other end of the skein, and I didn't think I would like a skein with only two colors, but I really like the way it looks knit up!

And sweater progress!  I finished the body and did a three needle bind off on the shoulders...

And then I picked up stitches around the bottom and I'm working on the ribbing.  Amazing how much longer it seems already now that it's not curling!

If you look carefully, you can see the piece of paper with my notes scrawled on it poking up from underneath the sweater. 

And there's more!  I've been spinning the yarn for the next sweater!

I'm going to modify Jared Flood's Cobblestone pullover  from the Fall 2007 Interweave Knits  to a) fit me and b) be a cardigan, because yeah, give me an entire issue of several women's sweaters and one guy's sweater (and Jillian's vest which I'd consider unisex), I like the one that's for a guy.  You know, I'm just not a girly girl.  What can I say?  It's not that I don't think some of the women's sweaters are pretty.  It's just that I can't see myself wearing them.  They're too fitted or too lacy or too low cut or too "Hey! Look at my breasts!" or "Hey! Look at my stomach!" or just too...something.  I don't know.  They're not me.  Jared's was the first one I saw as I was leafing through the issue that made me say, "I'd wear that!"  Then I realized a guy was modeling it and said, "Oh, it's supposed to be a guy's sweater?  Well, fuck that, I'll just modify it to fit me.  And make it a cardigan, of course, because I always make cardigans."  Yep.

As for the color, you know, I work with a lot of Chinese people, and I find I've adopted their thinking of red as a lucky color.  So I'm bringing more red into my life for luck.  Why not?  I can use it.