Monthly Archives: June 2008

Weaving. Really. Well, almost.

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There hasn’t been much in the way of weaving around here for a long time. The last thing to actually come off the floor loom was my rainbow scarf, in February 2007. Since around October last year, I’ve had two warps draped on looms – a blue one on my baby table loom for some plain weave fabric for trimming a jacket I’m intending to make from some handwoven overshot I wove years ago, and a black one on the 4-shaft floor loom for both a scarf, and also some plain trimming for another planned jacket. Both warps got wound onto the back beams of the respective loom, and then progress… stopped.

Today, I decided to take advantage of the sun pouring into the sunroom (its winter here and chilly) and spend a couple of hours and get the loom threaded. After all, I only had to find my spare set of lease sticks, thread 224 ends, sley the reed, tie on and then I’d be weaving, right?

First step: find spare lease sticks (because my usual set are on the baby loom, where I’ve done over half the threading, but it’s a very awkward height to thread and if I wait until I’ve finished with them, I’ll never get the other warp done.)

Nope, spare lease sticks I was sure I had don’t seem to exist. But I have a pair of suitable sticks, so all I need to do is drill hole in the end, right?

Battery of cordless drill is dead. Found DH. Found his power drill. Talked DH into driling holes, because his drill is too heavy for my hand. Sticks are ready….

Nope, sticks need sanding. Rummaged in laundry cupboard for sanding paper, and finally found it. Sanded sticks in carport, while freezing my fingers off. Sticks now ready to put into warp cross…

Hmm… better dust the loom first. Fine black wool warp plus accumulated dust are not a good combination. Dust loom. Insert lease sticks. Set things up to start threading…

Where’s the pattern?? I was sure I had a suitable draft printed around here somewhere. Okay, I can quickly draw up a basic twill/advancing twill combo on the computer…

No I can’t, because I’ve changed from a PC to a Macintosh since I last did a weaving draft, and my weaving software doesn’t work for Macs, and I can’t find a suitable up-to-date basic software…

Finally found a previously printed out draft I could easily adapt without resorting to graph paper and pencil (phew!!). Sat down at loom, started threading…..

By this time, it was after 3pm, and the sun was getting low, and the room cold. I’ve threaded two inches of the eight, but the rest will have to wait until tomorrow.

However, at least I have made some progress! And here’s the evidence:
20080614loom

Medicinal knitting – and shopping

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I’ve been making good progress on the Berocca sock, but got to the point the other night where I needed to add in dark blue contrast yarn for the heel. Night not being the best time to start knitting with dark yarn (especially with one slightly blurry eye!), I picked up another set of needles and started knitting the Dream in Color Gaia yarn into a pair of lacy Veronik socks. So, even though I finished two pairs of socks just recently, I now have two more on the go!

20080606BeroccaSock

20080606DICsocks

I’m really enjoying knitting both projects. I’m very happy with how the Berocca ‘fair-isle’ is coming out, I love the subtle shades in the Dream in Colour – it’s working very well in the lacy pattern.

You’d think, that with the recent generous gift from my friends, and my own purchases, I’d have enough yarn. And I do. I’m still enjoying fondling and dreaming what I’m going to do with it all. But at the weekend, I made the mistake of clicking on the Yarnomat website. And I managed to convince myself that with surgery to come, and time in hospitals and hotels, that a couple of skeins of Cherry Tree Hill sock yarn counted as medicine. Or therapy. Or both. Before I could argue a dissenting case, two skeins had leapt into my shopping cart, wrangled my credit card from my purse, and committed themselves to coming to my place.

(At least I currently have the excuse that I’m not right in the head, right??)

Anyways, DH brought them home from the PO box last night. This is the first time I’ve ever seen Cherry Tree Hill yarns in real life. They’re beautiful. Now I’ve got even more yarn to fondle. I may even get some of it knitted up, sometime in the next few months!

20080606CherryTreeYarn2
Cherry Tree Hill Supersock Potluck – colourway Jewels

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Cherry Tree Hill Supersock merino – colourway Blueberry Hill

Exer-stash becomes Write-a-stash

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The Exer-stash was working reasonably well, motivating me to exercise more than I would have otherwise – until my medical drama started. For the past month, and for the next month or so until surgery is over, I am not to exert myself. So, the exer-stash has to go into hiatus for a while.

However, since I now have to work solidly on writing book 2, and am having a struggle getting the concentration happening on it, I have decided that to motivate myself to write, I will turn the exer-stash program into the write-a-stash program, at least for the next month or so.

So, given my writing pace and style (I generally edit as I go, rather than write a rough draft quickly) I’m going to earn $5 for every 1000 words.

To encourage myself not to eat too much chocolate while I’m writing (and not treadmilling), I’m going to up my ‘earning’ for each kilo lost to $10. I did lose another kilo recently, but unfortunately it found me again, so I’m not claiming it – yet!

Today, the revised book wip stands at 20,425 words – not counting draft scenes from the previous version which may or may not end up in it. So, I’ve got some serious stash to earn!

And yes, there is a connection between writing and knitting – to keep my fingers from clicking on internet links, and to occupy the part of the brain that wants to be distracted, I often knit plain socks while I write. I’m not a fast writer, and do stare at the words on the screen a great deal, so, strange though it may sound, plain knitting I don’t have to think about can help to keep me focused on the story.

Now, I’m off to cast on with this:
20080527BeroccaSox

and to write at least 1000 words.

FO: plain socks

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These have been on the needles since January, and I decided to be disciplined and finish them before I started the next pair.

20080601socks2

Yes, that’s two pairs of socks finished in the last few days. But no, my halo isn’t really shining, because there’s still a few other UFOs lying about.