First day at the MakerFaire KC!

It was awesome. the end.

ok, I have actual photographic proof of the awesomeness. First of all, let it be noted that I was NOT the biggest redneck at the event. I was well behaved, dressed appropriately and my clothing matched. I only had a small tear in the side of my jeans.

Mark Smeltzer, member & creator in Experimental Instrument Orchestra. This group creates its own instruments out of found materials & junk and is AMAZING! The fiddle he was playing is made from one of those old tennis rackets that had the wooden frame screwed down, a pie plate and a bunt pan with some wires and a violin bow. unreal. They just returned from playing in LONDON! Crazy cool and very inspiring. PLUS he gave me some ideas for places to go & hang out and do some pickin (my banjo hillbilly was showin a bit I admit).




A car entirely covered in BOTTLECAPS in an artful, creative manner. I'm totally going to start saving my bottlecaps now. What a great excuse to have a cold one!


A robotman doing the robot dance and pulling his battery power on the cart behind him. Awesome. I missed photos of Ironman and the bad guy from Ironman (what is he called, rustman?) They were amazing.

But I did happen to catch this action shot of someone's cute kid being detained by some Storm Troopers & Boba Fett.....

ok, that is my kid. Good thing there wasn't any carbonite around.

Here's my booth shots:




Oh yeah, FIBER & YARN were there too! Sorry, got no photos of the important stuff. I did happen to find a few braids & batts from these vendors. I promise photos tomorrow. There was an amazing booth of fiber & yarn & drop spindles & spinners spinning for Nerd Girl Yarns and Traci Bunkers had a sweet booth Bonkers too!

We'll be at Union Station (KC, MO) tomorrow from 10am-6pm. Come and say hi! I'm the first booth of the inside vendors.

MakerFaireKC! #makerfairekc woo hoo!

I can't WAIT! The countdown is on!! I'm a maker at the MakerFaireKC this weekend, June 25-26th at Union Station in KC, MO! YAY! There's inventors, bakers, candlemakers, science things, printers, crafters, basically anyone that MAKES and is creative will be representing at the fair. It's $12/person to get in the door, but there's discount tickets available online. click HERE for the discount link. There's bands playing and even a hydrogen powered fuel cell car! Come say howdy and if you tell me you read my blog, I'll give you a freebie.

I'll have my handspun yarn & hand dyed fiber & knitting patterns, but am branching out to reach a wider audience with this show. I've been crocheting my arse off and now have 117 felted flower pins/barettes and 22 felted flower headbands along with a ton of cool handmade gift tags for crafters to put on their handmade gifts. I've also got some fun yarn and fiber journals as well.


Here's a shot of the latest batch of flowers in the washing machine before they get felted. (I use my last two pairs of skinny jeans as felting tools now)

My fabulous display of felted flower headbands is below.

What's in your tornado bunker?

Would anyone be surprised that mohair was in mine? Normally tornado weather doesn't worry me, watches, warnings, sirens and the like? They usually don't get my pulse racing at all. I grew up in Kansas, for cripes sake. No biggie. Until Joplin. Watching that kind of destruction in such a short amount of time really got to me. I'm proud of the community and the fact that our kids are even getting involved gathering water, soap, necessities, toys, clothes, etc to send as well as money donations through the red cross & heart to heart.

The Wednesday after that horrible tornado came through was a bit overcast in the morning. I watched the news, the meteorologist said with the colder temperatures, there was almost no risk of dangerous weather. I gave a big sigh of relief and headed out to run errands. A little before 11am I heard sirens. It actually pissed me off. I thought, what kind of crappy ass idiots were running a tornado siren test TODAY? (KC tests its sirens on some Wed's) With the skies all cloudy and dark? Just 3 days after Joplin's devastation? What kind of jackasses would DO that? Then I looked at the sky again. Huh. It WAS pretty damn dark out. Huh. Mayyyybe this wasn't a test. Huh. Those sure look like wall clouds as far as I can see. Maybe I should get myself back home and check the news. Just to make sure.

Yup. Tornadoes. Just very small ones and thank goodness no damage for us. BUT not only are sirens going off and my kids are in the basements of their schools (gotta love texts nowadays--keeps you in touch), BUT there are multiple tornadoes spotted. VERY close. SO after hauling the bug-out bag (emergency supplies in a backpack), the small safe with our family papers, the laptop & ipad down to the basement back closet, I grabbed a knitting bag on the way down. Somehow the one I chose? Lovely, soft, comforting, MAHVOLOUS MOHAIR! I didn't do any actual knitting until later.



I actually had a knitting friend driving through that crap to come & knit with me. I pretty much told her I was leaving the front door unlocked, there was a tornado spotted 2 blocks away, for her to either run the heck away or get the heck into the basement as soon as she got here! I admit I did freak out a bit, When I heard the news call out another tornado 3 blocks away on the other side of my house, I grabbed a twin mattress and shoved it into the closet as well to huddle beneath.

Needless to say, we didn't blow away. My friend and I sat & knitted after the danger had passed us by. I was very shaken up by the close calls (one tornado did touch down right near our oldest kids' school, but no damage other than blowing trash around). It was comforting to just sit and knit good old garter stitch in this lovely blue mohair 2 ply yarn. We watched the news until the storms passed by and were very thankful for no loss of life or property.



This heavenly mohair was a gift from my friend Tanya (blogless) in a Christmas swap a few years back. It's been waiting patiently and somehow I don't have it in ravelry, so until I find the tag, will remain nameless. I'll do some digging and find it soon! I'll also have a free pattern up shortly to share. It's very VERY simple, just start with twice the stitches you want, knit every row (garter stitch) for as long as you want your ruffle to be, then knit 2 together across, then continue on knitting every row until you have just enough left to knit the ruffle on the other end. Knit one in the front & back of each stitch across (or Knit one, Make one across), knit the same amount of rows you knit in the first ruffle, then bind off knit wise.

Heaven, pure heaven. Somehow out of a laceweight merino cardigan in process, socks on the needles, handspun wool/alpaca/silk cowl in progress, the stressed out woman in me grabbed just what I needed for a calming project to take along, mohair. I was surprised when I looked to see what I'd grabbed as my mind didn't even register that I'd grabbed a knitting bag in the process. :)

Do over

So, even though I was pushing the envelope, out of my comfort zone, and trying new things....sometimes it just doesn't work. While I'm now in love with the odd combo of the orangish pink & green sock yarn I dyed last week, the greens just have NOT grown on me. It's jarring. It's odd. It's not right.
BEFORE:

SO, that means it's time for a do-over. While dying a crap ton of fiber yesterday, I threw those two skeins in a pot of green dye & lots of vinegar and VOILA! I love them.
AFTER:


Having extra dye bath left over that needed using made me wander about the stash. I found 6 skeins of malabrigo-like yarn in colors from the 80's, hunter green & dusty rose. *shudder* I see country blue and geese every time I think of those colors. *shudder* ok the yarn wasn't bad, just the NAMES of the hunter green & dusty rose? HORRID!
BEFORE:



After a bath in a large pot on the stove full of brick red dyes, it's transformed into gorgeousness!
AFTER:



My last little do-over was when I ran out of yarn & fiber but still felt the need to dye.... The new 'do!

Get out of your comfort zone

I used to HATE hearing that from my girl scout leader way back in the 80's. It meant she had an activity that was GOOD FOR US and would MAKE US GROW and all that crap. I've found myself pushing that comfort zone quite a bit lately. I'm no longer in the corporate grind, I am building a little career out of fiber, yarn and friendship. I'm learning to cook. I MAKE BREAD for cripes sake. I never, ever thought I would type those words. STILL freaks me out, actually. I've taken care of chickens, when I used to be terrified of the things.

I'm like June freaking Cleaver (if June Cleaver occasionally went out with one orange hand and one turquoise hand in public).

I've started dyeing yarns & fibers in colors and combinations that don't immediately appeal to me. I thought these colors (above) were hideous. As I combined these intense pinks & greens & ornangish bits, I pretty much knew they'd be going into a dye pot for an overdye to hide the hideousness. Even as they were drying, they still gave me the heebie jeebies. They've started to grow on me. As I reskeined them, handled them, squooshed them, these skeins seem to have become something different. I like them. I really do. I think I may even have to save one of them for myself.




These are more my usual mode. Semi-solid yarns or yarns that stay within a general color family. Somehow all this new age hippie love thinking has changed me a bit. After a lifetime of being told that redheads CAN NOT wear red. Can not even THINK of wearing red, I've found that I LOVE LOVE LOVE bright, intense reds with just a hint of orange. I LOVE THEM!


I've got two full skeins of this gorgeous BRIGHT red/orange stuff plus a couple extra bits that were wound off the cone between yarn knots. I wonder if I have enough for a little cardigan? Some form of a summer sweatery thing?

Yarns were dyed when a little group of friends got together for a very cool dye night. Fun, fiber & friends. What else could you want for a Friday night?

Snakes & Chickens in the suburbs

Any of you with averse reactions to snakes should click away now. I'll have happy yarny things drying and will have those photos soon. :)

We had a bit of excitement yesterday.

THIS 6 foot long thing

Tried to eat THESE




Until Outdoorsman did his usual amazing snake wrangling and then THIS CHILD disposed of the offending snake.



Outdoorsman was on a phone call with a client (he's a salesman by day, super-outdoorsman by the rest of the time) when he heard a mighty squawking coming from the "chicken coop" aka under the back porch. He sees this BIG ARSE black snake coming out from there. While STILL ON THE PHONE he goes out, picks up two logs from the wood pile and pins the snake. After hanging up from the sales call, he goes out and while it's hissing and rattling its tail and coiled and royally PISSED OFF, he manages to grab the thing by the back of the head. This snake is 5-6 feet long, coils part of itself around his arm until Outdoorsman does his traditional snake wrangling--aka stands there and whips the snake in a big circle above his head like a lasso...whoop whoop whoop whoop whoop and then lets it fly. It usually is dizzy and confused enough that it slithers off in a new direction. This one didn't get to slither off, but got its head removed.

I KNOW black snakes aren't poisonous and I KNOW they're good for your garden as they eat bugs and rodents and such. But they also eat SMALL CHICKENS which still happen to live in our suburban back yard. This big momma also has been laying hundreds of eggs and Jeff's been pulling out quite a few baby snakes from the creek at the end of our yard as our kids and all the neighborhood kids spend a LOT of time in those waters.

I come home from running errands and missed all the excitement. Before going into the house, I walk back in my espadrille wedge heeled shoes and was getting ready to open the door to see what had my chickies all freaking out and THERE WAS THE SNAKE STILL SLITHERING IN A PILE!!! Jeff thought the kids would want to see it, and left it there till after school. Apparently snakes are like chickens and still boogie around for a while without their heads. ICK ICK ICK. Let's just say I set a world record for high wedge heels up uneven turf and let out a mighty HOLY CRAP MOTHER FUXXER...... stream of cursing that would've made olympic history should it have been a sport.

My daughter who can't possibly be related to me (even though she does look pretty damn identical to me at that age) thought it was VERY COOL and even protested having to put on gloves to carry it out of the yard after school. Who the hell IS she?

Let's end this post on something happy. Something yarny. Something that doesn't try to eat my chickens or move independently of its head.


AAAHHHHHhhhhhhh that's better. Deep Teals worsted weight wool yarn hand dyed by moi. Isn't that better?

April Ennea Collective issue is live!

Ennea Collective

New issue of the Ennea Collective is up! It's a pretty issue, theme is Naturally Celtic. It's got some sweet knitting patterns in it plus some spinning articles too. I'm thinking those celtic knot fingerless mitts may be calling my name.....

Still knitting away on my Whispy Cardigan. It's got a LOT of stockinette, in laceweight yarn. You really get your money's worth when knitting with lace yarn.

When good yarns go bad.....
Anyone remember my Elizabeth Zimmermann's Pie Shawl? The one with the unfortunate appendage? That yarn was just doomed. While I HAD TO HAVE IT NOW NOW NOW when I saw it at a Knitting in the Heartland vendor market a few years back, once I knit it up, it was just not meant to be. I actually thought it was hideously ugly (even without the appendage).


Well, when life (or your totally unstoppable urge to BUY YARN NOW) gives you ugly yarn, make it beautiful!!! I frogged the shawl, reskeined the yarn, soaked it, then put it in timeout for a few years. The other day I stumbled upon it in the stash. It's lovely merino wool, soft, fluffy and squooshy. It shouldn't be stuck in the back of the stash. I overdyed it with a deep forest green and VOILA! I'm now enjoying knitting this into a cardigan that will be worn all summer long!


If you find yourself with some ugly yarn, think of a way to give it new life. Either find someone that thinks it's beautiful and make a lovely gift of it or overdye it into another color that you love! If you've not got a dye lab on your back porch, find a friend that does. OR mix up some kool aid dyes. Have some fun. Enjoy your yarn!

Chicken Herding Fiber Dying Yarn Spinning Knitter, with the hats to prove it.

The TreasureGoddess Hat


This is the hat I wear while teaching classes on techniques for knitting with art yarn, I also wear it while selling my handspun yarns & fibers at events, and 99% of the time at the lake when I'm relaxing during the summer. It's hard to believe, but this was once an expensive, high quality handmade hat bought at a fancy schamcy hat shop in Cabos, Mexico. I used to think I should've just got a hat off a corner vendor for $10, but I'm sure it wouldn't have taken the abuse this poor, gorgeously ORANGE hat has gone through. I've dyed, spun and knit some amazing fibers while wearing this hat!


Then I went to Mopaca this March, an amazing alpaca festival, complete with the critters themselves AND people selling their fiber. The only issue is I went on the day BEFORE it was actually open to the public due to an error on their website. It saved me money as two years ago when I went I bought an obscene amount of alpaca. BUT there happened to be a cowboy hat stand setting up as I wandered through the building... I ended up with TWO hats. For no reason other than the belonged on my head. Little did I know one would end up being JUST THE HAT for my new occupation!!!


Chicken Herding Hat


Yes, chicken herding. When I came home from my lovely fiber weekend at KAWS, I found the boys smiling. Standing there smiling. BIG SMILES at me. It freaked me out. Then I walked inside and heard "tweet tweet tweet chirp chirp chirp". The man had brought home a box full of 6 little balls of yellow fluff. 6 cute little poop factories. (First photo is 2 weeks old and the other is 3 weeks old, just taken today.)



Yes, we DO live in the middle of the city. No, chickens are NOT approved by our city or homes association. Yes, I am actually HERDING them as they're sort-of contained in a shelter under our porch, which gets good light, shelter from the elements and predators. I take them outside to scratch & peck and free range poop. They are able to crawl/hop/short flight around and then go back into their little pen with food & water & such. They are truly crapping machines. Yet another reason why I don't want my own alpacas. Just think how much poop those things would make!!


My goin-out fancy schmancy cowgirl hat, if I ever actually went out anywhere (also bought at mopaca)


My Knitter Hat
Ok, I admit this one was a bit much, but hey, my new excitement is hanging out with little chickens. See how much I need to go out and USE my goin-out fancy hat?

As actual proof that I am still a knitter, I started Whispy Cardi out of some of my own hand dyed merino wool lace yarn. The colors are most true in the photo of the skeins, but the closeup of knitting shows how there's a lot goin' on in that deep dark green yarn. So far, so good. I HAD to knit this after falling in love with See Jo Knit's amazing Featherweight Cardigan by the same designer, Hannah Fetig.



I'm getting used to this not working in the real world any longer thing. I have to say, it's an adventure and I freaking LOVE it. I'm still looking for a real job, just hoping that it'll not have to start for a while yet.

AND of course my first real jobs are being a mom & a wife. But I'm not sticking any of them up on my head and taking a photo. I figure these hats & a ball of yarn will have to do for now.

KAWS...like Jaws, but with more yarn

Here's a few highlights from my weekend in Manhattan. My class for teaching techniques for knitting with art yarn was SUCH FUN! :) YAY! ART YARN!!

Thanks to fiberTERIan for coming along, sharing my vendor booth and keeping me mostly sane!

PS, I'm working on a tutorial for making those fun felted flowers, should be on the blog in a couple of weeks!! Stay tuned. :)

mo-o-THER!! one of your hands is ORANGE and the other is GREEN! (whisper yelled)

I've found it! I've finally, finally found it! The perfect explanation to use when we're questioned for doing something the rest of the world finds odd and we find just being fibery people!

We were at my daughter's high school-to-be at the pre-tryout cheer meeting. Holy crapamoly those high school cheerleaders are freaking INTENSE. You know what's even MORE intense than them? The cheer coaches & teachers. I was signing us in on the sheet when I heard this "*gasp* OH...My...What?" from the head coach. Lizzie whisper yelled "mo-o-THER!! One of your hands is ORANGE and the other is GREEN!!" I looked at the coach and said, "Oh. Well, I'm an artist." The coach's eyes got big, smiled at us and said "OH, how exciting!" I replied, "Yes. Yes, it is." It was awesome.

(And, yes, that is in fact three empty 1.5 gallon tubs of vinegar in the background. I was dyin' my arse off last week. There's nothing better than the smell of vinegar & wool, baby.)

How many times have you tried to explain your yarn at the office on the desk, in every tote bag and purse you own, your orange & purple fingers (or maybe that part is just me)? The more you try to explain the amazingness of the fiber world, the more people's eyes glaze over and they start backing slowly away from you in a non-threatening manner.

Go on, use it. It works in almost every occasion. Try it. "Oh, I'm an artist." That's all you have to say. It's funny that an "artist" gets instant approval while Crazy Yarn Girls/Boys just get strange looks and lots of gossip in the elevator.



Oh, and for the record? My hands were not "orange" and "green". They were crumbling brick red-orange and pouting peacock teal.

Unemployed!

I suddenly found myself reorganized right out of a job. SO, as anyone that had her priorities straight and finds herself suddenly unemployed, we're making cuts and scrimping and saving. Goodbye fancy Arbonne facial system, hello Oil of Olay. Goodbye shopping at the LYS, hello stash! (thank GOD for a sweet stash) Goodbye big F150 King Ranch Truck, hello rebuilt sad little dented and rebuilt trucklett (from my wreck last year). *sigh*

Hello ski trip. what? Yup. We're going the cheap route, (packing sandwiches, bringing our cooler full of food & drinks, staying free on the husband's points at hotels) but still living large and heading to Colorado with all 4 kids, the hubster and a van full of yarn. YAY! We're only skiing two days, but I figure that should be more than enough as none of the kids have skiied other than hitting the local mini ski place in MO once. I'm looking forward to the 10 hour drive each way. Another YAY! I'm taking ORANGE YARN and lots of it. 10 skeins of noro cash iroha in a fabulous bright and sunshiney ORANGE! I'm taking a few patterns and my knitpicks set of circs and we'll see what that yarn wants to grow up to be. Another AMEN for a sweet stash full of yarn.

The surprise of unemployment is actually a good thing, but it's stressful. We'll get through and I plan to ramp the heck out of the dying & spinning business when I return from the slopes. And as always, I'm knitting on....

Edited to add...I think I'll start the Snow White pattern from Ysolda. It's going to be called "Evil Stepmother" though as I'll be stuck in a van with FOUR CHILDREN (two of them step) and with the history of the overprotectiveness I exude as a mother and the throw-them-off-the-cliff-then-see-what-happens parenting plan of Outdoorsman, I'm going out on a limb and thinking there may potential for a little, um, venting of the frustrations. Just a hunch, but it's probably a good bet.

When life gives you lemons....

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. Well, what do you do if life gives you shit? NO, you don't make shit-n-ade. When life gives you shit, you SIT AND KNIT! and knit. and knit. and knit.

Life is very, very good. But there's a LOT of extra stress going on. Thank God for family, friends (here in person and on the innernets) and thank GOD for knitting. It's helped me through so many tough times in my life. I can't tell you how much knitting has been done in hospitals (our family is accident prone AND having a son with CF - cystic fibrosis- means lots and lots of time spent sitting, waiting and worrying.)



It'll all work out for the best, I have no doubt. I've just got to make it through the next couple of weeks and not lose my freaking mind. :) No problem, right?

My project of choice right now is good old garter stitch. Knit, knit, knit, knit, knit. It's soothing, comforting and MAN do I love garter stitch projects. They're squooshy, have good texture and make lovely projects. My project? Another square of my Itty Bitty Sockyarn Bits Blanket (free pattern link on ravelry). For a non-ravelry free download, click HERE