Is it Time to Knit Yet?

Garden and Yard Stuff

I mentioned last week how I was going all nuts in the garden and yard trying to make it a little bit nicer.  I'm sure we have one of the worst 'lawns' in our neighborhood, though we are definitely not alone there.  If we were in a Homeowner's Association we'd have been given the boot long, long ago!  Our problem is weeds, as I don't like to use a lot of chemicals in the yard.  We forgot to overseed this year, so nothing will happen this year with any sort of lawn so I just have to deal with the weedy ground cover until the fall.  So with that disclaimer, check out our new trees!  We picked these up from Western Gardens - I trust them way more than Home Depot or any other big multi-purpose store.  The one on the right is a Mimosa, we couldn't resist the pretty flowers and the beautiful leaves, plus it attracts butterflies and we soon found out that it also attracts hummingbirds.  Even better!  The one on the left is our tree with personality, a sumac.  It looks totally crooked but I think it fits us perfectly.  Let's just hope we don't kill it like we have done with quite a few trees in the past!

I also built a new flowerbed, though right now it is only full of shrubs.  We had the dirt delivered on our driveway and I took one whole morning and shoveled it all onto the lawn.  There were lots of clumps in the dirt that have yet to be taken care of, so this one is definitely still a work in progress.  I like it though!  You can even see part of the old ugly fence in the corner by the street there.  If you look close in the picture on the bottom you can see the new 'fence' we put in.  It was a quickie solution, just some rebar and garden fencing.  Lucky for us there were already fenceposts put in right where we needed them - someone had the same plans as us but just never followed through.  I also modified another bed and made it larger, the only thing missing is some plants ;)  At least it has some cute solar lights in it though.  I know it still can look loads better, but believe me, all of the work we've done is a major improvement!

I guess that's enough for today, since I'm so limited with blog fodder lately due to hardly any knitting and spinning I'll save the rest of the yard and garden for some other posts.  Have a great day! 

Baby Cable Rib Socks

I have finally taken a picture of a Finished Object to share with you, hurrah!  I finished these socks about a week ago and I'm pretty happy with them.  The yarn is some Knitpicks Bare that I dyed up myself and I love how it turned out!  The pattern was fun too, I'm really digging the 2x2 ribbings with 4 row repeats.  So here they are, and I promise I will be a better blogger this week and actually share with you what I am doing!

As always thanks for looking :)

Not much knitting

I have injured myself doing yard work, the injury being a major blister right where yarn hits my right hand when throwing so I haven't been knitting.  But I do have a progress shot of the Oregon Vest so here ya go!  I've been very busy since the weekend doing things like making new flowerbeds, constant weeding, planting trees, and even tearing down an old ugly fence!  My yard needs tons of work that I've either been just plain neglecting, or putting off because of money.  Now that we are doing a few things like buying a truckload of dirt and some nice trees, I'm getting super excited about trying to beautify the yard on the semi-cheap and making it a nicer place to hang out.  It's going to be a while before I'm satisfied though!  But it is fun (mostly) to work hard in lieu of exercise so I'm going to keep doing it until it gets too hot to even be outside.  I'm sure my neighbors are getting tired of me hammering and The Baby making noise right at 7:00 am, but such is life.  There are plenty of things my neighbors do to bug me, so I'm just reciprocating their 'efforts'!  Anyway, that's what I'm busy with so I won't have too many updates about knitting.  Bear with me please! 

The First Harvest of the Season

So we headed up to the Farmer's Market this morning just to see what was what so far this season.  There wasn't much that we wanted to get, but did snag a nice bag of organic baby spinach and a loaf of Crumb Brothers' Roasted Garlic bread.  When we got home after some more veggie shopping it was time to do yard work.  This year we tried planting some radishes and some of them were ready to pick today (I didn't know that I probably planted them way too late as they don't like hot weather.  Anyway.).  I decided to pull up the first batch I planted and we got a nice couple of handfuls of small radishes after trimming, which were very delicious with salt and herbed butter - another first for me.  The best part of the harvest was the tons of radish greens we got!  The lot on the towel will be sauteed tonight to go with some fish, and the stuff in the bag will go with some other greens for salads.  I'm so happy to have made this new-for-me discovery about how good the radish greens are! 

Look what I've started

When I got my kit for the Oregon Vest I put it in the hallway on a shelf under a table.  I walked past it probably a million times, and then 3 days ago I walked past it and couldn't stop thinking about it.  So I did what any self-respecting knitter who has multiple projects going would do.  I got the box out, fondled the yarn, and then started winding up what I needed right away.  That was on Tuesday night.  Wednesday afternoon I had the entire bottom edge of ribbing done when I realized I had completely messed up and would have to frog.  UGH!  It really was a good thing I did because after re-knitting, I realized I had made more mistakes than I had originally thought.  Now all is good again, and I almost have leaves :D  This project is so fun, captivating andeasy to knit, I just cannot put it down!  Each time I finish a row or change colors I see all these little details and I love the colors blending together more and more.  I'm sure this one will get the most of my attention until it is done, which will be soon if I keep neglecting every thing else that needs to get done around here! 

Have a great weekend - you know what I'll be doing ;)

Not that anyone's listening

Since Bloglines doesn't know I exist, and who is reading anyway?!  Anyway.  Since it is a crappy day for pictures and I still don't have any of anything new, I wanted to share my latest adventure.  I saw this on Ravelry and signed up for the Hush Hush Handspun Hootenanny Swap.  I've only ever done one other swap, the Dye-O-Rama, but it was totally fun and I'm thinking this one should be too!  I generally stay away from them as I'm nervous of getting burned but like I said, I couldn't resist this one.  So I guess I should get spinning to get some practice in huh?! 

Hello? Bloglines?

Why are you not picking up my feed?  Have I been bad?  *Insert pouty sad face here*

Still Showing off Spinning

I do have some finished objects to show you, but don't have the pictures to go with them yet ;)  So today we have more spinning.  I've been a busy bee over the past week and have a few yarns to show for it!  I tried another bulky yarn with coils and this time granny stacks, or knots.  It didn't turn out quite as awesome as the first coiled yarn, but still pretty cool.  I spun up some singles to go with it and it has already been made into a super long skinny scarf.

I had about 8 ounces of some self-dyed Corriedale that had been sitting around in my stash for about as long as I've been spinning, and it finally made it's way to the wheel.  I ended up with 2 separate skeins of a kind of heavy worsted 3-ply and I think it turned out great! 

I also dyed up and spun some South African Fine top that had too, been hanging around in the stash for some time now.  I wasn't quite going for what I got, but I still like it.  It's also a 3-ply that is about a worsted weight, I ended up with 160 yards or so from about 4 ounces.  The 3-plys are both 'real' in that I spun 3 bobbins and then plied them.  Aren't you proud of me?!

Is that enough blue for you?  I hope so because that's all I've got right now ;)  Have a great day!

It's Official

We are being all selfish over here and are going to Vegas once again!  We are going at the end of August, partly to celebrate The Boyfriend's birthday.  But the main attraction will be CHRIS ROCK!!!  This man is so freaking funny I can't stand it - I'm so excited to go see him!  He better be funny too, for the price we paid for tickets ;)  Anytime I've watched him on TV he's been sooo funny, and of course there is Head of State, one of my favorite movies.  Hilarious.  We will also be in the neighborhood at the same time as another favorite, Lewis Black.  And of course we have to go back to Mesa Grill!  It should be a lot of fun :)

There is also another exciting event that I will be going to, possibly by myself - unless any other Utah grrl spinners need to go learn how to make crazy yarn with me.  I bought myself a space in one of Pluckyfluff's spinning camps.  Yep, I'm going to Seattle in September for what should be some great fun!  The Boyfriend is not sure if he'll go with me or not, so if he doesn't it should be quite the adventure as I have never gone on a trip totally by myself.  I thought about driving but since gas could cost upwards of $300 (yikes!) I will just fly.  Anyway.  I have been spinning a ton (surprise, surprise?) and even knitting a little bit.  Next week I might even have a pair of socks to show off, and definitely a few yarns. 

Have a great weekend!  I know I will with the truckload of dirt that is supposed to be dropped off in our driveway tomorrow!

The Need to Spin Novelty

I like spinning novelty yarn.  Granted I haven't done all that much of it, some thick and thin here and there and the wavy yarn I tried last week.  It is super fun and very gratifying and almost freeing in a way too.  Plus it can go very quickly!  The latest crazy yarns to come off my wheel are these.  The first is the weirdest one, it is some superwash in two different colors.  One is from my friend Eva and the other is some unknown stuff I got and forgot where.  I was trying to do giant nubs, or slubs with the brown stuff and then just thick and thin with the darker stuff.  I know now (and should have known before the fact) that superwash was not the best fiber to do this with.  But I loved the colors together and it did turn out quite nice - how it will hold up is a question yet to be answered!

The second is my first attempt at some coiled yarn.  I think it turned out pretty well for my first try!  I believe the roving was some Brown Sheep mill end type of thing.  When I split it up, it kind of split the colors up, so I spun a black base yarn and then did the blue and white stuff thin and super thick.  When I plied them together, I tried to do the coils with the super thick parts.  Coils are way fun and I'm sure I'm going to do some more - maybe even with the black and white Brown Sheep roving I have!

I have plans for even more novelty yarn, fabric scraps, sequins, color changing thread - the possibilities are endless!