Friday, May 27, 2011

pardon me -

- while I pack up some yarn



to get ready and go to the Massachusetts Sheep and Woolcraft Fair this weekend, in Cummington, MA!

I am in the Sliver Moon booth, which is in craft barn #2.

Hope to see you there!!!!

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

desperate times

I am dyeing lots of yarn. Special orders, webstore, LYSs, festivals - I need to stock up.

It has been raining for at least 10 days. In fact I can't remember a full day without any rain.
One thing that can majorly hamper yarn dyeing is that the yarn doesn't dry fast enough. I have 4 drying racks, which altogether accommodate about 60 skeins, a whole day's worth of work. Usually I take one day's skeins down in the morning and dye the next batch.

This is yesterday's yarn, still not dry. It's getting here, but it's not dry enough to wind into skeins.

There is yarn all over my house, because guess what? It's raining again outside.


Fans are not helping.



Yarny home decor.


These are desperate times, and they call for desperate measures.

I am putting the yarn in the dryer.


I finally remembered that I have one of those shoe shelves for my dryer - you set the item that needs drying (but can't be tumbled) on it, close the door, and turn on the dryer.

3 skeins take 10 minutes on low (don't want to fry the yarn).

I have about 70 skeins to go.

We're having take-out tonight, probably.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

sog

If there's fog after foggy, then there's sog after soggy.

Lots of sog going on - evidently we are trapped under a system that has shower after shower coming though, for the last five days....lots of low grey clouds...with the temps slowly rising.

These blooms haven't seen a ray of sunshine since they opened, practically.

japanese cherry

The wisteria is so wet it is sagging to the ground.

The scent is almost intoxicating though...






The lilac bush is bowing too.


I've had yarn trying to dry for three days now. I have fans on it to help it along.

But once again, I am thankful I'm not losing my house to flooding.  I'll take a bit of sog over a flood...

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

brief

I went to a Contemplative Photography seminar at the Albany Shambala center last night, with Andy Karr.

You can look at some of his images HERE. I'll wait until you're done.

I went because I had purchased this book a few weeks ago, before I even knew he was coming to town.

During the slide show, I noticed that there were mostly partial images, or rather images of things where not the whole thing was portrayed, but only part of it, and yet we all still knew what the thing was. Pars pro toto. The wheel of a car, not the whole car.

There was tremendous stillness in the photographs. I liked that a lot.

When I left and stepped out the front door of the building, I saw this.





Then I decided to zoom in and do this.



I like both, but can't decide which I like better. I am not even sure that one should have more value than the other.  Knowing about both views, I feel compelled to share both.

I'll leave you to contemplate that...I must go and dye yarn.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

an outing

At least once a year every year for the last 10, by friend Anna and I go on an outing together. We decide the general direction, pack a lunch, and off we go. If we happen upon a yarn shop, so much the better.

This year we had to plan a little better, because the second Clermont festival fell on the day of our outing. Anna still wanted to come and sit at the fest with me, but you saw yesterday how we got rained out.

Now I'm going to tell you what else we did.

In the morning, right after it opened, we went to Countrywool. Claudia has been in business for over 20 years, running a lovely shop with all natural fibers, raising angora bunnies, and organizing knitting and spinning retreats. I hadn't been there in way too long!!!!



yes I went home with some of this: Dale of Norway Heilo.

and I went home with some of these cute little spinning fiber packs.


and I went home with a couple of patterns.
I also went home with something I can't talk about yet. It's a stealth project.

After we packed up at Clermont, we found out that Rhinebeck is not far, so we decided to go further south rather than back home.

We've been known to come to a screeching halt when we see a sign that points to a yarn shop - this time there was one near the tiny historic town of Tivoli. I have never been there in my life, and I am glad we turned around.

We found this shop.http://www.fabulousyarn.com/ (ok I'm having trouble with the linky thing. You get the idea.)




It's really a different kind of shop with nothing but the nicest high-end yarns....and some local hand dyed, which of course I had to try.

Then we went on to Rhinebeck.

As you may recall, some of my yarn now lives in the Knitting Garage of a general store.

Here's the store.



Inside, it looks like an old-time Woolworth's store, except this was never a chain store.
I saw some yarn on the way in....but couldn't quite see a "garage".

Kept on going, allll the way to the back,


and voila, there it was. A literal garage, nicely and artfully transformed into a very modern little yarn boutique.


And there was my yarn, right on the shelf. Hi, Periwinkle Sheep!


 We just sat in the quiet space, perused some patterns, bought some of them, and then left to explore more of Rhinebeck's lovely shops before we had dinner and went home.



Wing and Clover had a small selection of delicious yarns, too...definitely click on that link. There is a marvelous art scene to behold.




Now if you are in the Hudson Valley and are looking for something to do this coming weekend, here's a suggestion:


I just hope they have good weather.

Monday, May 16, 2011

The rain in Spain, uhm, Clermont, stays mainly in the plains

On Saturday, we were ready for another fiber-y day at Clermont. A day given to us vendors for free because the previous festival had us endure lots of rain, with half the vendors unable to come and display their wares. This time was supposed to be different.

I'll show you the pretty walk from the parking lot down to the meadow in front of the main house.









Who could ask for a more gorgous setting??

My booth under the tent:








But what can I say.

Two hours into it, the rain started once again. It was blowing a bit sideways, too, so we could not keep our wares dry. We were officially permitted to pack up and leave....since not very many customers ventured out that day.

To the ones that came: thank you for stopping by!!

I'll tell you tomorrow what my friend who came with me and I did before and after.

Because knitters never let the weather get in the way of a little yarn crawling.

Friday, May 13, 2011

stay tuned

Turns out that yesterday's blogpost was up for a little while and then got lost while blogger was out.

It was about a special order yarn in Sunny Yellow. A customer is using it to make Sun Break.




A match made in heaven, if I may say so myself....hehe.

The beautiful sunshine from the last couple of days has given way to clouds again, with on and off rain....so right now I am waiting to hear from the organizer to see if tomorrow's fiber festival at Clermont will be cancelled.

Stay tuned. I will update this post in a couple of hours to let you know.

PS: we have received an update!! The Fiber Fest WILL go ahead as planned.

The following vendors will be present:

The following people are outside the Clermont tent:


JB Moth Designs & Dizzy Dragonfly

Jill Draper Makes Stuff

Hampton Artistic Yarns

All Things Fiber, Creekside Acres

The following are under the Clermont tent:

The Periwinkle Sheep

Bittersweet Woolery

Three Wise Women

Fenwood Designs

Woodstock Knits

Stitched by Jessalu


Once again, here is the website you need to read for directions, etc. It should be a fun day, I hope to see you there!!!!

Thursday, May 12, 2011

sun soleil sol Sonne

A customer approached me - she had found a skein of watercolors II in the colorway "sunny yellow"....would I be able to dye some dk weight so she could make a throw?

Not a problem! This batch is now up on etsy as a reserved listing.




The yarn will become THIS gorgeous throw. Sunny yellow for "Sun Break". A match made in heaven....

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

morning visitor

A few minutes ago, I grabbed my camera to go out front and take pictures of the flowers in my front yard. I stopped at the top of my front steps - something made me halt and look - it seemed like an awfully big bumblebee - but then I realized it was a hummingbird!

I held my breath as I tried to stay frozen in my spot and zoom in on the little guy. They do flit from flower to flower, but then again almost stand still when they get the nectar from a blossom. So I managed to get 3 snapshots before he moved on.

Look for the ruby throat among the flowers.




I've seen him many times in the summer, he comes to our back yard a lot. Never have I gotten a shot at photographing him.

And this came as I had just gotten frustrated again with the weeds...all I can say now: please people, plant as many flowers as you can! Plant with wild abandon. Then take the time to sit quietly among them. You never know what you will see.