Eve The Fiber Fanatic

Might start a Dr. Who scarf!

2010-04-04T14:01:00.003-06:00

Crafty things

2010-02-15T09:00:00.001-06:00

I have been busy with these things lately. Snow days do help with getting some of these projects done. I got a new Extra Fine Gauge Sock Loom from DaLooms and the first pix is of it inside the Knifty Knitter's smallest loom. Yep, that is really tiny.
Second and third pix are of a pair of booties that I hand knit with wool yarn and felted. The pattern I found was from craftzine website. Be nice if I could figure out how to put links in here. You just make a long strip in squares of color six colors long and then two squares off the side of the last square. Like a big L shape. Then a bit of folding and sewing and presto You have a slipper shape. Toss it in the washer for a while till it is the size you want. I actually put them back in the other day and got them a bit smaller than the pix shows as they were quite large enough to fit a size 9 or larger at that size and I am an 8 or so. Since they have a lot of stretch and give I wanted them a bit smaller. Had to really watch them tho. I really love them! They are sooooo cute and nice and snuggly warm. I do wear them with a pair of cotton socks as I am not sure that my easily irritated feet would tolerate the wool. Better to be safe and it is warmer that way. Old Farm house floors without finished basement under them are COLD. In the kitchen I keep my case of pop on the floor in the winter and it keeps my pop chilled to the temp I like. Cold but not frozen. So something on the feet is Necessary!

Update

2010-02-15T08:42:00.000-06:00

Haven't updated this blog for quite a while. Snowed in again today. Lots of SNOW! Well, not as much as the East coast got but our accumulation is as much at around 55 inches of snow. It's not been melting either this year. So when these huge piles start melting it is gonna be a MESS. I do not look forward to that either! Especially to coming home to the dog as a mud ball from head to toe, and having to drag him into the tub and scrub him off so the house and us do not end up looking the same. Yep the snow is almost to the top of those 4 foot fences! This is not the shoveled stuff either. Whoppo just loves to go diving into the drifts. Right after this photo he fell into the drift a bit behind him. There is a crust on the lower level of the drifts where it rained and froze the snow underneath so it is easier for him to walk on top of the drifts.
The other picture was driving to work a couple weeks ago. Hmmm, real fun huh??? Not! white knuckles all the way. A good year to spend the winter at home if you ask me. Nobody else seems to like that idea tho. Everyone still wants their dogs groomed. I look at roads like those and want to say cut em yourself and I'll fix em in the spring for you. hmmm, that doesn't seem to go over.

Tour de France

2009-07-29T08:06:00.000-06:00

Ok, I dropped out of the tour. Fell off I did! Not enough stamina I guess and then all those distractions along the way. I did get 1 and 1/2 bobbins of flax spun. I will wheel on as I can.

New Baby!

2009-07-29T07:49:00.000-06:00

Here's the new Baby for this year.. A Filly Keeping with our weather theme for names Rod declared her "Tornado". She has a medicine hat and may keep most of the color on that. She is also sporting a shield on her chest! Born yesterday 7/28/09. Heheh I use this blog as a record to remember facts sometimes. That looks like her sister Lighting over on the right side of the picture. Mom's name is Cheyenne and the parents are registered on the Spanish Mustang Registry. Dad is pure white with one blue eye.

Tour de Fleece update

2009-07-13T06:37:00.000-06:00

Well did not work on my tour this weekend. Am getting addicted to Farm Town on Facebook. I spend tons of time on that instead. Also Doing the Sunshine Ranch game. Maybe highspeed internet was not such a great idea to get more time. I just get into more things faster.
I did get the dye powders I got from Dori transferred to jars. At least some of each one. She sent an over abundance of each color. 15 colors! Now my porch and almost every thing on it is colored with tiny-to-large splotches of colors, mostly the turquise and one of the pinks. Interesting. At least the porch was in need of painting anyway so not a big issue. It does not come through well in pictures so no pix.

Tour De Fleece

2009-07-08T21:39:00.000-06:00

Well I changed my mind about making it a murled yarn. I am going to spin and ply the colors seperately. I think I am going to use it for warp for some bookmarks for a weaving bookmark exchange. Gonna do a linen warp and woolen weft. Then it will be Linsey-woolsey! So keeping the colors distinct would be more helpful.

Tour de Fleece

2009-07-08T08:07:00.000-06:00

I got started on my Tour de Fleece challenge on Sunday. After spending the day Saturday finishing what was on the old wheel I decided not to use that wheel as it is acting real putzy. So I got out a couple bobbins for the Mazurka and started with the natural colored flax that I found. It weighted 3.5 oz. then I will spin the bleached Irish flax (linen), which weighted 3.7 oz., and ply the two together for strength, which they say you don't need too but I want to use it for warp and not to sure of the evenness of my spinning. Some pretty thin spots there. Will work on it being more consistant but I like some variance so I am not too concerned. I love the tweady, barber pole effect of plying two different colors together too. Gives a lot more interest to the yarn. I think I will aim for a Linsey-Woolsy fabric. Traditionally that is Linen warp and wool weft. I got plenty of yarn around to use for the weft.

Le Tour de Fleece

2009-07-03T21:45:00.001-06:00

I have Joined the Tour De Fleece
Rules are to set yourself a challenge that has to do with spinning. Can be almost anything this year to be completed between July 4th and July 26th. Mostly working along the times that the Tour De France race is running.
I have chosen as my project to locate and spin up some linen rovings that I have had for some time. I think they are around here somewhere so as soon as I find them and get the other project off the spinning wheel I will begin on my challenge. I can begin tomorrow by finding the rovings. I have never spun linen before so this will be a new thing also.

Old negatives

2009-05-14T07:48:00.001-06:00

This is the coolest thing to do. I have a whole bunch of these old negatives from the 1940's into the 1960's. Most are outsized for modern photo printing equipment, so it is somewhat expensive to have them individually done at around $2.50 or more per negative. With over a hundred negatives and more curiousity than finances I am searching for ways to see these without it costing me a whole lot of $$. So this is the way I found this out. I called a local photographer who suggested putting them on a light box and photographing them with a digital camera. Find a photo program that will change positives to negatives and use that as it will do the reverse on a negative. Well I took the photo chip to the local photo place and they pulled the neg pix from the camera card and played with their program till they stumbled on the Way to Do It. Well in looking around in our programs for photos I found that I could do this myself. We have a Nero photo essentials program that will do this.

Some of the things that I have found out in doing this: No flash on the camera. Set your camera to text or museum or flower. Play around till you get the result that you want. You are going to have odd ghosts of things show up in the finished item this is not a perfect solution just cheap. If you really need perfect take it to the photo place and pay the $$. I also had to turn all the lights out in the room I was doing this in as any extra light caused more "Ghost" things to show up. Don't worry you can adjust a lot of the dark and light issues with most programs. Relax and have fun with it. Try not to loose your negatives always showing them off. I lost my first batch as I showed them to anyone who would be patient and kind enough to look. I lost em somewhere so I only have the pictures of the negatives that are on my camera card. Guard those negatives! Turn off the automatic dating of the pictures! You can crop it out but you loose some of the picture doing that!

Above picture was originally taken at Christmas 1952 by my Father. That is my Mother and my older sister looking over my older brother's shoulder to see what he got for Christmas and me over in the corner doing my own thing as usual. I can tell when this photo was taken by content and me being a baby. I was born in June of 1952.

We Got BroadBand Yippie

2009-05-06T11:27:00.000-06:00

I found this gorgeous spinning wheel on and outing to a small town in Southeastern Mn. Mantorville. Was on a crafting retreat at a local retreat house The Milton House and wanted to investigate the town. This was one of the first things that caught my eye in the first booth. The town shops in that town sported two more wheels but this was the most unusual and prettiest. Anyone seen one or know anything let me know evesch@yahoo.com No markings found other than a grease penciled white numbers 55 on the bottom which may be a dealer's marking. It only has one serious issue that I can see. There are a couple chips out of the wheel part and the wood seems to be powdering in those spots. Wood Rot??? It does have some tiny little holes in various places around on the wood. Minor problems is the missing footman (no problem to make one) and no bobbins. Maybe another brand of bobbin will work or have custom made. The back maiden seems to be broken and comes out of its hole, should be attached to a turning thing like the front one. and it is missing it's finial. The wheel may be warped the sections are seperating but my other wheel does that and spins great so not worried about that too much. I am thinking about sending it off somewhere to have it repaired/looked at. Gotta see who does that. Since I put myself in the hole getting it, the fixing it may have to wait a while. It's still pretty but I am itching to spin on it!!!

Mom's Memorial service

2009-03-28T20:25:00.000-06:00

We did the final service for Mom on Wednesday the 25th of March. There were about 30 people that came to the service and about 10 more support people ie: serving ladies, funeral directors, Pastor and wife, etc. The dvd of pictures was running while we greeted people and everyone seemed to like that very well. She recieved 4 plants and 5 floral arrangements besides the two that I had ordered. These are the two that I ordered in the photo and the Urn for her ashes. Very nice. Mom loved Gladiolas and the florist got some for the boquet. We had a nice lunch afterward. We planned for 50 people and had three sandwiches left and a couple handfulls of chips. The ladies brought cake and they were very good. Got to see a lot of people I had not seen in ages. Mostly from Henry's family. A step daughter and the kids of an old neighbor of Mom's, course they are in their 60's or so. We have recieved many cards of condolences and really appreciate them and knowing that people are thinking of us. Sometimes it seems so strange that the world and everything is still going on as usual! I want to scream at everyone to stop for at least a little while and notice that "My Mommy is Dead" This too shall pass. That is what I keep repeating to myself. I got lots of hugs on that day, just not the most important hug of all, my mom's........I will miss her a lot. Bye Mom.

A Tribute to my Mom

2009-03-20T21:06:00.000-06:00

This is my mom with my brother Tom and his wife Socorro. They were here two years ago for a visit from San Francisco. They took mom on a trip to Chicago to visit some of her grandchildren and greatgrandchildren.

Mom died on Wednesday early morning this week. The 18th I got the call from the nursing home that she had left us. Well, I asked them how she could do that as she couldn't walk and so who took her out. Yah, I didn't get it right away. It was somewhat unexpected. She had broken her hip last month the 19th and just was not recovering right. We think that it was the aortic anurisym that burst. She was in a lot of pain that was not dulled enough by all the pain med she was recieving, so it was good she did not stay longer. But no one had expected her to die so no one called me to come down. When I went to the Home I was still having a bit of trouble with the idea that she was really gone so prodded her a couple times and held her hand, nobody was in there tho. So when the funeral home people came I had to let her go. Made the arrangements and worked the next day. As I worked and knew I wanted to say something about mom's life for her funeral I came up with a sorta poem. I am not a writer or a poet so it isn't the greatest but it expresses my ideas about my Mom's life and means things to me.

My Mom has had a long and weary life

She has been a daughter a mother a wife

Mom worked hard and endured much;

pain and abuse, wars and such.

Happiness, Joy and Peace at times.

Mom took Pleasure in the simple things;

A deer, a pond, fishing and friends

So sorry that it all had to end.

She became a person on whom you could depend.

As a Mom to all us Kids, she wiped our noses and kept us clean,

Mom did notwant to be thought mean;

so discipline was carefully applied.

There came a time when she had to part,

or stay and watch with a broken heart,

what should not be, but was.

Mom went on to find a love so true,

who lived with her his whole life through.

She was his heart and soul.

It is hard to watch the years go past,

and see a loved one as they go,

into the twilight time of life.

My Mom lived a Good life.

They aren't the same as once you knew,

But they still look the same to you.

Your Mom is at the Heart of You!

She loved us all better than we knew!

Thank You Mom for giving Me Life.

I will live a Good Life.

Eve

More pix of horses

2009-03-14T22:26:00.000-06:00

More pictures of Lightening soon after she was born. Don't know what you call her color. She turns white in the summer and is almost that reddish brown with the white underneath in the wintertime. The second photo is the whole family at that time. In the front is Thunder Boy on the right and Whitey the Dad on the left. In back is Cheyenne and the baby Lightening. We have continued on with weather names and the newest fillie's name is Storm. I am hoping for a colt next year to name him Tornado! Think that would be a cool name.

Nakid Sheep!!

2009-03-11T20:41:00.000-06:00

Looks like I did this right. First picture is of the Shear's at work on Snow in the back and Bessie in the front. That is Wayne and Bruce Drew from Jasper, Mn. Shearing day was fast and busy with tagging and bagging and marking and hauling pregnant ewes off to the barn for the waiting time. Bessie got sheared first due to the fact that we found her with a new lamb when we joined the shear's. Unfortunely we lost her today and her lamb. Probably a vitamin deficiancy and lack of protein.

We had twins born yesterday to one of the Jacob ewes, Dutchess, We lost one of her twins to it getting caught in the fence while we were away at work. Rod was finally able to get a heat lamp up in the ewe pen to warm everyone up in this bitter cold weather we are having. -7 this morning and no better tonite other than no wind. The other two pictures are the before and after of the flock. After shearing they were all sniffing each other and everyone was strangers. Made for some interesting fights out in the yard later that day when they got let out of the shed. Fleeces of any of these sheep is for Sale unskirted as is for $4. a pound for adult and $6. a pound for lamb fleece plus shipping. Full or 1/2 fleece only please. It would include some tags and hay and vm and a bit of second cuts. Tried to grab off second cuts going into the bags but we were just tooo busy. The whole operation from them coming to us getting back into the house took 1 1/2 hours. Not bad at all. It would have take me a whole lot longer than that.

Spirit of the West Festival

2008-12-24T10:33:00.001-06:00

Here I am in costume at the 2008 Spirit of the West Festival in Sioux Falls, SD. A fun filled 3 day event. I volunteer to do Bobbin Lace and spinning and get free entrance and meals at the event. Plus I get to play dress up and do demos. I have on a hoop skirt vest and victorian style shirt with a french influence hat. I love that hat it is sooo cool to wear. I am working at my Bobbin Lace pillow putting a bobbin lace finish to some woven bookmarks for an exchange.

New family member!?

2008-12-24T10:17:00.000-06:00

Haven't named her yet but made her since the Dec. 6th Fiber Guild winter fiber day. I learned how to do the head then in a workshop that Helen Hopkins taught. Thanks Helen. Then I went home and after a week decided that she needed a body to go with the head so away I went on that. Only going to show the backside of the nakid pix. The front is as well detailed and so is not appropiately modest for my blog. She is all that I am not!! Tall, long legged and long waisted with a nice tidy figure and reasonably well endowed. All needle felted no armature. She does not quite stand on her own she is braced against the machine. The sitting pose is before she got her skin put on. A friend has volunteered to make her some clothes as I have none for her. She is wrapped in a cover cloth I use for my bobbin lace pillow. This was fun to do but another thing to get obsessed about??!!!

Horse for Sale Spanish Mustang Mare

2008-11-22T18:06:00.000-06:00

This is Lightening a 1 Year old Spanish Mustang. We want to sell her so if you are interested please email me at evesch@yahoo.com Both her parents are Registerd on the Spanish Mustang registry although we have not registered their progeny. All the foals born to this pair so far have had the Medicine cap marking at birth.

More Whoppo

2008-04-09T08:58:00.000-06:00

Well, he was posing very nicely for the picture shoot but by the second photo posted you can tell that he was reallyyyy not very happy with this photo business anymore. This dog is sooo expressive in his looks and vocalizing. Course I did take about 10 pictures of him to get all angles and looks trying to get the "perfect" picture. Acutally I think these two are pretty great for showing his character.

Whoppo One Year Old

2008-04-09T08:40:00.000-06:00

Update on Whoppo. This is Whoppo on his birthday! One year old and 67.5 pounds. I took him in for a grooming. He jumps into the bathtub and onto the table himself for me. If he wasn't such a gorgeous and wonderful friend we woulda got rid of him as he is a very high maintance dog. He is constantly tearing things up, like the rails off the porch, a sheep, a whole chair, and all the potted planters on the porch. When do they stop chewing up everything???

Winter Sheep

2007-12-21T20:47:00.000-06:00

Wow, I love the pictures I get of the sheep in the winter. The first one is of the "new" to us Jacob sheep that we bought from the Zoo. We lost one of them to our dog getting in the pen. He is now on constant tie up. He gets to run loose maybe once a week rather than the free roam he was used to. About a week after we found the one we were missing another sheep. Lots of wool was found out in the horse pasture but nothing else. We are pretty sure coyotes got her. It was our two year old Jubilee. Mom to the all black sheep in the second picture. The other picture with the cute line up behind the branch is of the "boys" Left end is Buddy Boy's 2 year old ram lamb, then we have "Snow's" twin lambs born last spring. The one with his head down has caused us some trouble with getting out of the pen and having a run around a couple times. The black one is Jubilee's spring lamb. Quite a cute fellow. Wish he hadn't broken his leg early in the summer. But he is doing well now and does not seem to have any problems keeping up with the others. I think they look so funny in that line, all the boys other than those standoffish Jacob's. Now that curious one looking over the back of her mother "Fluffy" is named "Lilly" she was soooo pretty when she was born and had brown spots on her legs to show that she was out of Choco. She unlike the other twin boys does not sport the horns or the longer "shetland" style of wool. She will lean toward the merino in her wool. None of the lambs except the black one got a shave yet. He got shaved by accident. I wasn't out soon enough when the shearer got there to say not to shear that fellow. The wool was soft and nice but very short, as he was not very old. Definitely grew it back well.

Fleece to Shawl 2007

2007-08-15T13:55:00.000-06:00

The SF team weaving with an onlooker. There were lots of people through the center that day.

Here is the Sioux Falls team taking their shawl off the loom and finishing the ends.

Fleece to Shawl Part 2 finishing

2007-08-15T11:03:00.000-06:00

I do believe that this one is by the team from Brookings. That is a Tri-Loom and they were spinning up some wonderful mixed wools with wonderful glints of color. Very bulky, as a tri-loom takes a very bulky yarn to weave with.

This is the team's shawl that is from Watertown I believe. This is not able to show the lovely extra thread laid into the plain weaving as an accent with a small loop of the yarn left loose for texture.

Here is the team that finished first. I will not try to name them cause I can't remember all the names. You have to see and feel this one to really get a good idea of it. They did this on a rigid heddle loom with a thread left out every 7th slot. They made a very textured yarn in a mohair, wool blend, hmmm, yummy.

Thats all of us that worked on the shawl. Bobbie, Joni, Johanna, Barb, ME, and Amy.

The two ends of the shawl. Braided ends

June Vacation

2007-07-04T18:20:00.000-06:00

June vacationing in the Black Hills, SD with Whoppo. So here are my two hansome guys up on a cliff overlook in Custer State Park. We had a great time and Whoppo did good till the last evening there and he kinda went nuts and started full tilt running to the end of the leash and full turn and run the other way till he toppled me over and got loose in the campground. Boy did he have fun. Only got him when he got interested in what one campsite had on the grill. Yep, he's a chowhound. My guess is that he just got real tired of the restrictions of a leash or tye out for so long. Whoppo did love hiking but Rod had to take the leash most of the time as Whoppo pulled too much with me and made hiking dangerous for me. Although it was most handy on uphill slopes!

Ryan and Kalina's wedding

2007-07-04T17:50:00.000-06:00

Went to a wedding on Saturday! Ryan and Kalina. Well I have known the Bride since she was a little girl and she is gorgeous and very nice. I don't know 'him' so good but he is getting a real prize. I wish and pray for the best for them. It was a gorgeous event that the Bride's mother and the bride put together. Great Job! A little Spanish and a little American. Wonderful. Mother of the Bride is from Guatamala and had some of the relatives here for the event. Wonderful to see them. They had the wedding at one of the Biggest Churches in Sioux Falls, SD. Never saw anything so big. Large Chapel for the wedding and it was their little chapel! The Main Whorship Center was awesomely huge.

King of the Mountain?

2007-06-06T20:58:00.000-06:00

Here's a pix of Whoppo actually posing by DH's old firebird that he uses as his shelter. I had told him I couldn't get a good picture of him so close all the time to go out there a little and play or something and he ran over and posed for me! Those are his muddy paw prints all over the house.
Click title to go to picture.

Now really who can resist This!

2007-06-06T20:03:00.001-06:00

Pupppy Grad!

2007-06-06T19:58:00.000-06:00

Who's The Daddy?

2007-04-25T15:27:00.000-06:00

Meet "Choco" Daddy to all those cute lambs. He's all Shetland. Awesome looking fellow, ain't he? Don't get on his bad side. Really he looks awesome but he is not much bigger than a Golden Retreiver. But he does spend a LOT of time bashing those horns on just about anything at all. That flatbed farm trailer behind him for one. But more than anything he loves a good scratching and comes a running for that. And he gets along with the dog so far. The momma's hate the dog of course as any good momma would. But he did not like it when we took the "Girls" away to await their lambs and butted me. So definitely to be respected and watched, especially when it comes to "His" herd.

Jubilee's Lamb

2007-04-25T15:12:00.000-06:00

Jubilee had this little fellow on the 28th of March and had a hard time of it. We had to help her with him and pull him. Then she did not want to nurse him. She licked him and cooed at him but refused to let him near those Teat's. So we have had to go out and hold her for him to nurse. She still won't let him nurse although he has gotten quite creative at getting sips in. Very vigorous fellow. He and Fluffy's lamb who was born two weeks earlier are almost the same size.

Snow's Lambs

2007-04-25T15:01:00.000-06:00

These cuties were born the 13th finally after a long wait for her to have her lamb she presented us with Twins. Both boys and sooo cute. She managed it all by herself, Good Girl.

He is growing!

2007-04-25T14:48:00.000-06:00

Well he is still cutest thing ever but I miss the floppier ears of a couple weeks ago. And he must weight around 30 pounds or so now. Still trashing the house and I may have to do some dental work if he keeps chewing on my spinning wheel! But still not wanting to go outside to the bathroom without me. It's cold out there right now. He loves that but it is too cool for me.

Cutest Ever picture

2007-04-25T14:35:00.000-06:00

Is this not the cutest cuddliest thing you have ever seen. Well Yah, he's mine so I am a "little" pregidist on the cute issue, but not much!

Another new addition!

2007-03-24T18:12:00.000-06:00

Introducing "Whoppo" A Big Whapper of Dog at only 8 weeks old. New to our home as of Thurs the 21st. A friend/client came in with his brother to show me her new addition as they were getting his puppy shots at the Vet and told me that her sister still had one male puppy left that looked just like the mom. Since I knew what mom looked like and had seen her puppies from last year it was a no brainer. Rod had kept talking about us getting a puppy and sometimes ya just gotta jump in. Beside the price was right at Free other than the puppy shots, food, toys, leashes, etc. He weighted in at a whopping 19.5 pounds so that is one Big Puppy! Felt kinda like bring home Clifford! His momma is a registered Red Husky and dad is a Labrador. Seems kinda like a mellow fellow and has one blue eye(mostly) and one green eye(mostly) so yes you are seeing two different eye colors on the picture. Each eye does have a mix of color. So far he has learned to walk on a leash and respect the cat. "Lucky" was not amused. Oh well can't please everyone. He has had only one accident in the house so far and mostly hides and rips up cardboard boxes. He likes the sheep and eats their wool that he finds in the house. Hoping he will fit in well.

New Lamb!!!

2007-03-18T20:44:00.000-06:00

We had a new Lamb born Friday nite. We think around 7:30 ish. She was still very wet when Rod went out to check the sheep. I went out and we dried her off and got a pen built for them and got them under the heat lamp as the temps were going down to the mid 20s for the nite and it was already below freezing. This picture I took today after she is all cleaned up and doing very well. Scampering around so cute. She is definitely from the Shetland Ram "Choco" So this proves him out as a breeder. She is white with a bit of brown on her legs and tail and some apricot colored fuzzy stuff out of her neck. That may come from the shetland in her mom or from her father's chocolate color. I know those spots on her front legs are the same color as her father!

The Other two girls have not dropped theirs yet. Still checking a lot. We both have to work tomorrow so hope they wait or do well by themselves. We don't worry too much about "Snow" as this will be her second and she did well last year but "Jubilee" is a first timer and is better to be on hand. But Jacob's do well on their own too. One of the reason's that we are chosing the one's we have are the natural birthing records without help is high. We Cannot Improve On the Art Of God in the Birth of Any Living Creature. Gorgeous work the Creator does.

Text for the Krokbragd weaving

2007-02-25T20:15:00.000-06:00

Have been trying to post about the Krokbragd weaving and seem to get debugging messages. If anyone knows anything about getting rid of those let me Know please!!! I tried to edit the Krokbragd weaving entry and it kept coming up. So since this is working I will do it here. The 1st pix is of the modification I made to the two heddle loom that I have so that I could do the Krokbragd. I tied on a rigid heddle that I had that was for a backstrap loom. It has a much wider spacing of the holes and spaces than called for so I had to change the threading in the reed to 2 threads skip a dent and 2 threads across. So it comes out 6-6 1/2 inches rather than the 4-4 1/2 inches it is supposed to be. So I also added an extra repeat in the middle of the first mat to make it a bit longer to keep it a little bit squarer. This worked great and I really zipped along with it yesterday. And finished the first one. The second pix is of the magazine's pix of the finished coasters with my finished first one! The mag pix shows that pattern in the upper left hand corner of the pix.

Krokbragd Weaving

2007-02-24T20:21:00.000-06:00

New spoiled babies came home

2007-02-04T19:16:00.000-06:00

These are the new babies. Got them at the rabbit show in Sioux Falls, SD the 27th of January. Got them from a gal I met on the Yahoo Spindler's list. www.somebunnyswool.com is her website. These boys are 3 months old and are Jersey Woolies. Yep. More Fiber. I got .6 oz. from them already!!! They came starting their first molt. The white one in this picture is already plucked and the grey one is still in all his wool. He took 3 sessions to pluck. They are the same age but are from different parents. Were raised together so the breeder agreed that they could room together just fine. They do seem to love each other a lot and spend a lot of time grooming each other and snuggled up together....hmmm... which reminds me they are wonderful snugglers! They were very well socialized and rush to the front of the cage and sit expectantly every time I come in the bathroom where the cage is installed till warmer weather. (they were house raised) Lucky them the temps outside right now are in the below 0 ranges this week. brrrr. The poor outside bunnies are doing well and have full coats on. But, I still wouldn't want to be them!!! brrr. We give them a whole bunch of hay to burrow in to help stay warm and we did get them moved into the chicken house out of the wind and weather but no heat and no door. Just a nice south facing doorway. I did notice that Precious likes to sit in the sunshine now. We have not decided on names for them yet. Rod leans to Snidely and Dudley. For Snidely Whiplash and Dudley Do Right cause of the cute little mustash on the white one. That cutie would have been a show baby if he had had the color all over his nose instead of that little snip out of the end of it. But I think it is soooo cute. And his hair is really silky. He actually is smaller than the grey/blue one. Who is of course the more domenent one. The grey one is much more outspoken and demanding and very curious. They cannot have run of the house as I remembered that I put a lot of mouse poison in odd out of the way places, just the right places that bunnies would love to explore. So they only get to excersize in the bathroom as there is no poison in there, and I can close the door. They are not as good at not peeing on the rug as I would like but they do try to hit a litter box at least 1/2 of the time. They are just so much fun and so cute. And lots of work in the house cause 2 bunnies make LOTS of poop and pee! So have to be simi cleaned every day to keep the odor down and keep it liveable. And they have gotten even more spoiled in the last week.... Well... what do you expect an animal lover to do with two cute cuddly sweet baby bunnies????? Spoil the crud out of em of course.

Finally an Update

2007-01-24T14:27:00.000-06:00

Well finally getting around to the Blog. Been only moderately busy since I last posted. Just is sometimes a pain to do it. I want to put lots of pictures on here and it won't upload them nicely. Unless I use another service to upload them and then paste that link in here, yadda, yadda, yuk. Takes lots of time to do all that. Then I do not have time to work on things. Like playing with my new Charkha. Or all the new fiber I got back from the wonderful processor. Or processing some for my self. Been mixing up some silk, alpaca and some of Snow's merinoX wool. Then spinning it on a drop spindle. I got to meet a fellow crafter and fiber friend last Saturday. Tina is very nice and so kind. Glad I could get to meet her and gift her with a bit of fiber to enable, I mean, uh, Help her get more stash up. Heheheh, actually I think it will get her more involved with the fiber. Like major addicted to different fibers, like I am! I need more addicts in my circle to validate my addiction!!!

Crossthreads fiber Guild meeting

2006-10-11T09:10:00.000-06:00

These are some of the pieces of fabric that we dyed at our last FiberGuild meeting. They were done with the Accidental Dyeing Method. We got 3 yards of fabric. Divided them into 1 yard pieces and tied, bundled or whatever we wanted to cause a pattern to show up, kinda like tie-dyeing techniques. One piece is put in the bottom of a jar and the dye added, wait a while and add the stuff that stops the dying, add the next fabric then the dye A different color, to it and repeat the dye stopping solution. Add last yard of fabric and do the same with the third color. fill the jar to cover the fabric with the Soda Ash and cover and take home. Take the material out of this muck the next morning and rinse, rinse, rinse. When it rinses clear put them in washing machine and wash with Synthrapol soap and wash em up. These had looked like they were sitting in a jar of dark mud. No way did they look like they would turn out like these did. Major cool. That's me with one of mine the second from the right. I folded that one and then tied it up, it was the top yard of fabric.

Newton Hills, State Park Festifal Festival

2006-10-11T08:25:00.000-06:00

First picture on the left is of Marti spinning on her very cute little wheel which I do not remember what it is called. She has a couple attentive little ones by her learning how to card wool. Second one is Barb with Pat behind her and an attentive lady learning about how this is done. People are always fascinated to find out people are still doing this!! We get lots of stories of wheels in the family or attic, etc. Next one it my wheel, off course I am taking the photo so I am not in the chair spinning on it. It is a Kromski, Mazurka. Made in Poland and imported. It's major selling points were: it's weight, only 9 pounds great for taking to different events also small size... it's price was mid-range. It's looks are Great and looks old and since I do a couple of reinactment events that is a plus.
This pix is just the other side of y wheel, the business side. I am spinning some Perridale wool that someone else had gotten from New Zealand. They were doing a stash reduction so I got some wonderful different fibers to try. This is the last of that stash and I have carefully avoided finishing this stuff off cause it is sooooo nice to spin. I could not find anymore of the peredale breed wool so just held on to this. This summer I found a source of white Peredale wool. So it is safe to finish this stuff off, I will still have more fiber from A Peredale sheep to spin up.

Last bunny pix

2006-10-11T08:21:00.000-06:00

This one is "Silver" she is a black french angora bunny. Got her this spring as a tiny little thing from the Sheperd's Harvest Festival at Lake Elmo, Mn. She has been doing her first mold and I have been so busy that I have not been able to pluck or brush her and have lost most of the fiber. She is coming back with a lot darker coat of hair now.

Spirit of the West Festival

2006-10-11T08:15:00.000-06:00

This is my friend and mentor Marion who does so many events and things to promote the art of Bobbin Lace. Willing to teach anyone who is interested. She is almost as old as my mom and much healthier so it is nice to be able to toodle around the country side with her promoting our art. The other picture is of my bobbin lace pillow set up. I am doing a sampler of some different Milanese style braids, trying to learn how to do it.

Colt at 5 months old

2006-10-11T07:54:00.000-06:00

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This is "Thunder" born May 2nd to "Whitey" and "Cheyenne" his devoted mom "Cheyenne" kept him safe and did a great job rearing him this far. He loves to follow his dad around pestering him and taking things away from him. I watched them playing together yesterday morning as I went to the car to go to work. Too cool.

My bunnies

2006-10-07T10:06:00.000-06:00

this is Freda, she came to live with us a year and a half ago. I fell in love at first site. Don't know why this pix is not so good.

This is Precious he is a fuzzy mini-lop. Came to live with us last winter. I saw him at the local pet store and kept going back and loving on him. Promised him if he was still there by a certain date I would bring him home. It was too cold to bring him home and put him outside earlier. He had been living in the pet shop so long he could have died from the temperature shock. He is still doing well and getting kinda ornery sometimes.

Hats!!

2006-10-07T08:00:00.000-06:00

This was the first hat that I knit for felting. It was really hard to believe that this was going to turn into a hat!!! Well the brown colors are handspun and the orange is Brown Sheep. I was low on the tan color so I had to try to plan some other colors in it. Then when getting to the top I ran out of the tan so I just knitting the rest with the brown. A design feature I call it. Seems like most everyone liked it just fine that way. The fiber was the bad alpaca. Well that is what I called it cause it was a poor quality alpaca with lots of vm in it and purchased off Ebay. Sometimes they aren't such a bargain. But it made a very nice hat. There is a use for everything.

Well it did turn into a HAT Lovely to wear and got a lot of compliments till I sold it. I really need to make another one sometime. It was great for winter time, I put my earmuffs on over the floppy brim and it was really warm and held it down well in the Mn. winds.

2006-10-07T07:41:00.000-06:00

I made this hat about a year ago for a little girl's birthday in Oct. Well I know it does not look like a hat so look at the next photo of it felted down to size. It is done in white alpaca that I handspun and decided to handknit because I have not figured out how to do the floppy brim on the knitting machine yet. If I made this again I think I would charge more than the $30. that I recieved for it. It was a lot of work! So soft and silky and the addition of the funfur yarn was wonderful to see how it changed with the felting process.

here is the finished hat. For an 11 year old's birthday. So the hat size is a wee bit smaller than for an adult. Very soft.

Me and my older wheel

2006-10-07T07:20:00.000-06:00

This photo was sent to me by the person who took it for a small town newspaper. I was demonstrating spinning at the Festifall Celebration held at Newton Hills State Park in SD. I found the name and more details for the wheel on a New Zealand spinning wheel site. It is called a Sleeping Beauty and only came in kit form imported from New Zealand. Made in the early 1970's. This is my first wheel and was quite a challenge to learn to spin on. It is quite finnicky. But I have spun a lot of yarn on it! It no longer goes to the demonstrations with me. It is too big and one of the legs is just taped on so it gets to stay at home.

Weekend Fun

2006-09-19T05:50:00.000-06:00

Well I was going to post a pix or two but can't find them on the 'puter yet so will post those later. This last weekend was spent at Spirit of The West Festival just north of Sioux Falls, SD. A 3 day event where we dress and act a bit like we are back in the Civil War to late 1800's era's. This is the second year that a friend and I have been asked to participate as Demonstators. We set up our Bobbin Lace and I also bring along my spinning wheel and demo that. We get lots of time to wander about the grounds and enjoy the Festival too. This year it rained a lot the first day and then the wind started blowing the rest of the two days. We had to pack everything in the van late Saturday afternoon due to a nasty weather report of Tornadoes and high wind predictions. So everyone battened down whatever they could and brought vehicles and trailer's onto the grounds to provide wind breaks to protect the tents and things. The worst of the storm went around us, Thank God, as there were several farms in the area hit badly. A couple vendor's lost their tents and the next day there were a few less display's and vendors, but we did not close down. The weather was a bit nicer but windy and quite chilly. And I did manage to sell some of my vast overstock of fibers, (Hi Patience, hope you enjoy them) Overall it was a very nice weekend.

My Sheep

2006-09-13T22:28:00.000-06:00

Well finally gonna get this posted of my sheep. That's Choco on the left. He is a purebred shetland sheep. He is going to have a fabulous set of horns and loves to be scratched and to butt the other sheep around. It you can spot a black and white sheep in the background that is Jubilee the Jacob. She always cuts one of the other sheep away from me. Always one of the other ewes. The white sheep are a lot harder to ID from the photo. I can tell by their size and horns. The largest is "Snow" the oldest here now and mother to the next largest "Sweetie" her ram lamb born last spring. The other white is the merino/shetland ewe lamb we got up at Sheperd's Harvest Festival in Lake Elmo, Mn. last May. This is one of the pix I took the day I was dyeing all that wool yellow. I have since also dyed some with berries and some other found items and madder root. Came out kinda peachy leaning to the orangy side. Last Sunday was at the Homesteader Days At the Beaver Creek nature center and Carol was there with her dye pot. Yippie I did not know she was going to be there or I sure would have tried to have more along than I did. I had some Border Liecester wool along that she could throw in and it turned a lovely blue/gray. My hubby said it looked like a used SOS pad. Litely used. Actually a very pretty color. Tuesday I found out from Sue that her sheep that the wool came from had been killed by something that got in the sheep pen on sunday nite. So I will have to make her a rememberance something from his wool. It is pretty once I get it pulled apart and carded. A lot of work. Well it is getting quite late here and I have a big weekend. Need sleep. Goodnite all.

Update I'm Weaving!!!

2006-08-30T11:36:00.000-06:00

This is what I am weaving!! I modified 2 small looms to make this 4 harness loom. Took off the two harness frame from the first one and fit it to the second loom. Works great. These were those two harness looms that you lean the little dowel on the top forward or back to make the harness' switch from one to the other. I had been given these two identical ones, and wanted to try this experiment to make a 4 harness loom from them. Once I had this done I started a warp (that should be the next pix) when I started to thread the loom I realized that it did have some limitations on the possibilities but I could not get my brain to 'warp' around the solution. I ended up writing to the small_looms yahoo list for help. I wanted to warp it up for a twill. But it could not lift the 1-2 or the 3-4 harnesses together. I figured there was a way to do it but I just could not figure it out myself. Sara from www.woolgathers.com wrote back the solution. Thanks a bunch Sara. So I got it warped and threaded and am a happy weaver. I am doing it in one direction and reversing the direction of the twill for the other color. So 8 wefts in one direction and 8 in the other. So I have a plaid twill scarf on the loom

This should be the picture of the warp for the loom in progress. It is hand dyed hand spun wool. The reddish I call Strawberry Parfiet cause it looks like it is a bit varied in color. It was a dye experiment. I used my crabapples to dye it but they were not doing much of anything so I added 2 packages of cherry and 2 packages of strawberry koolaide to the pot. The wool is a Baby Doll Southdown/mohair mix. Premordanted with alum. Simmered the pot till there was very little color left in the pot.
The other purple color was gotten from my concord grapes with 2 packages of grape koolaide added. Alum for mordanting the wool and then simmered till the wool did not take up anymore of the color. The lighter color of wool was some wool I picked up in passing and decided to throw in the pot cause it wasn't full yet. It was not premordanted or even wet first so was interesting to see what it did. It did not soak up so much of the color so makes a wonderful coordinating color in just a different shade. Perfect for what I was wanting to do. Decided I had to "do" something with all that wool I was making! Gee, it is the most frequently asked question when I am demonstrating or taking to people about my spinning. "What ya gonna do with all that yarn???" Duh, I don't know. I just love making yarn, mostly. Well I am making something. A scarf in a nice plaid with a twill pattern. Ya it feels good to do something with some of it but I do like just looking at the yarn and feeling it. I know it is a bit strange but that is why I call myself a Fiber Fanatic.
I am getting into this dyeing stuff. I dyed some of my yarns a few weeks ago with some Queen Anne's Lace mentioned on the spinfree list. Made a lovely light yellow. So I got carried away with trying different weeds in our area. The lightest stuff hanging there is from some burdock growing by our door, be carefull that stuff is all out of the pot before putting your wool in! I may try just the leaves from that for a green as the stuff was much more green before I put more burdocks in and took the leaves out. The brightest with a slight color changes are done with the flowers from yellow flowering plants. Mostly a daisy like weed and a ragweed looking plant. Since I am not into identifiying them don't know for sure. Anyone know where to find pixs to help identify plants? The third batch was all purple flowers. hmm I think that one did not work too well. It came out the same yellow as the others. Just not as nice a color. They were all premordanted with alum and cream of tartar. I have ordered some natural dyestuffs from www.hillcreekfiberstudio.com. Carol has a lot of different natural dyestuffs and mordanting materiels at a reasonable price. She sends a great newsletter too.
So will post more about my adventures into adding color to my world of fiber.

Update

2006-06-29T06:19:00.000-06:00

Haven't had time to do much this spring and summer other than work and take care of the animals. I have been doing a lot of Demonstrations of fiber skills each weekend in June. Between April and May we had a very busy time with the animals at home. They were having their babies. We went to Sheperd's Harvest Festival in mid May. We brought home two sheep and 1 fiber bunny from there. Then the next day I heard of a local person selling their herd of Jacob sheep so got hold of them and we purchased a ewe lamb from them. So now we have a total of 5 sheep, 3 bunnies, and 3 horses! not to mention the cat population which seems to be remaining stable since there is only one female in the group she is not getting to raise her litter's. We have a hole in the back door screen and I am finding one of the outside cats sleeping in the kitchen every morning lately. hmmm maybe something needs to get done or maybe when our housecat goes to kitty heaven that may be the next housecat. Since so far he is behaving himself well and we are not seeing him on the counters, etc. As long as the whole bunch doesn't get the idea that they have house priveledges it might be ok.
Work has been extra busy too. I am working every day this week other than sunday. Next week I do get 4th of July off cause we are closed anyway. At least this week end I do not have a fiber event. But do need to go up to my sister's and help her out. Last weekend we went to West Bend, Iowa to The Grotto of Redemption a very beautiful Catholic site where a priest built a lot of little and big grottos to honor God and tell the Salvation Story. All built by hand and done in semi-precious rocks. It is just gorgeous and well worth a stop or a day trip to see. They give tours with a great history of the site. No charge but they do need the donations for upkeep. My sister being a bit of a rock hound was very impressed with the site and thought it well worth the 3 hours we drove to get there. And We Are NOT Catholic. So ya know this is a good place to go. Oh, and it has a small man made lake with ducks and SWANS with baby signats!!! Now how can you top swans! One of my most favorite things!
Got another infection in one of my right hand fingers. Same type of infection, a cellulitis type. It went into the sheath that the tendon goes through and is constantly swollen and varies in discomfort. Is worse in early morning for some reason. Dr. is starting to look at possiblity of other things going on that may be contributing to this infection thing. Like diabetes or a B12 diffecency, etc. Will do a fasting blood test next week for that to check those. If not any of those things than I go for a nerve study. Yukky, beentheredonethat! not fun, they stick needles in you!
Time to go to work! bye for now.
Eve

Have fun

2006-05-16T06:33:00.000-06:00

Have fun with the cute little hedgehog. You can feed her by clicking on the more button on the bottom right. Try clicking on her 3 times!

2006-05-16T06:30:00.000-06:00

adopt your own virtual pet!

New personality test

2006-05-11T21:28:00.000-06:00

What Classic Movie Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Well Of All Movies I do not think I have ever seen this one! Looks kinda sleezy!

2006-05-07T07:49:00.000-06:00

This last few weeks have been quite an adventure! We had a lamb, I got a small gouge on my hand from a cat at work and it got super infected and my wholw hand and arm swelled up and turned red. Very dangerous condition and I just escaped a hospital visit due to my bloodcount still being normal so the doctor's just added a couple days of antibiotic shots to the oral antibiotics. Still on the antibiotics for a few more days. It is doing nicely but still not gone yet.
While I had this infection raging our Stallion decided to jump into the Ram's pen and he did him in most horribly. Don't know what bug got in his bonnet about that ram but he wasn't even going to leave the ram's horribly injured body alone when Rod came home to get the ram out of the pen. The ram did not survive.
The Friday after this infection got real bad I slipped on some wet sidewalk and fell and ripped the toenail off my big toe. Well it was nice that it was about 40 minutes before my doctor's appointment so after I soaked it at my mom's in ice water and wrapped it in a kleenex to keep it from bleeding all over the place, I let the doctor deal with it. He said I was on so many antibiotics that it wouldn't have a chance to get infected! But he did say do not remove the nail as it was still a bit attached and would heal better that way. Well I got a whole 5 days off work cause of it but that put me way behind. And I couldn't do very much either.
Sometime in the nite of 5-1/5-2 the foal was born and that was real exciting! It is so cute.
Got news that Rod's brother Harlan was going to have triple bypass surgery on wednesday that week. So Saturday the 6th we went up to see him in the hospital. He wonders why he feels so tired??? Duh!!! You just had major, major surgery we reminded him. A very active man of 70 who does not slow down much is finding it hard to just lay there and recover. He will do it cause his body will make him do it. We pray a lot for him. He has wonderful wife and daughter and granddaughter by his side most of the time. So lots of motivation to get better quick. It's spring and he is a farmer too!
That brings things up to date. Oh ya, I got another rigid heddle loom and a few other small things from a local weaver that was selling off her whole studio. Will have to put a pix up when I take one.
Eve

Spring babies are Here!!!!

2006-05-05T20:54:00.000-06:00

This little darling arrived in the middle of the nite sometime between May 1st and 3 am on May 2nd. Rod came in all excited that the foal was here from his 3 am check. Mom did well all by herself on this birth too! We are so thankful for these good births. We had to wait till daylight to go get pictures of him before his Mom led him away from us. They are doing well with Mom now having to keep up with the frisky little fellow.

Well, this lovely little fellow greeted us when we came home from church on the 23rd of April. We figure he was born around 1pm in the afternoon. "Snow" his mom did real good all by herself for the first time! Thanks Snow! Both are still doing well and the little one is growing like a weed. Certainly wish that Dehlilia and her babies had survived as it would have been so much fun to watch them all romping around in the field.

Sad News

2006-03-26T18:49:00.000-06:00

Sad thing happened this week. We lost our ewe Dehlilia. She was 1 month short of lambing due date and started aborting the babies. We work and were not home to help her so we came home to find her gone. The sheep had not yet been sheared so we sheared her before dealing with the remains. About 3 pounds of usable wool. I will have to find something special to do with her fleece. I will miss her a lot. She had a lot of spirit. I will miss seeing her and her lambs, something I was very much looking forward too. We suspect she had been carrying triplets as she was quite large.
We have become very watchful of the remaining ewe "Snow" She is now checked at least 3 times a day with one of the checks being in the middle of the nite. She got put in the barn and "Buddy Boy" is missing his "girls" very much.
Snow got her shearing today. I did it myself and it is far from good or even OK. But it is off and she is more comfortable. We had been waiting for a wee bit warmer weather to do the shearing of the sheep not so much for them as for us. ten to twenty degree weather is not fun to work in. So today being a lot warmer and off of work we got the ewe done. Buddy Boy will have to wait. It's a lot of work to shear a sheep. I give a lot of credit to those who do this for a living. They don't make enough I am sure.

Our weaving group team has been meeting to plan our Fleece to Shawl compitition shawl. We planned a test warp and finished weaving it last weekend. A supplemental warp plan. We still need to decide on the details of the real one, like color and pattern of suplimental threads. We may use some of the wool from my sheep. I took samples of all three about a month ago. Buddy Boy's fleece worked up the nicest with the least amount of trouble. I am going to keep Dehlilia's fleece so it is out. We are planning on using silk from silk that one of the other team member raises for the supplementary warp. We want to use lots of color so this should be fun, fun, fun.

what sci-fi character am I???

2006-02-18T07:18:00.000-06:00

You scored as Moya (from Farscape). You are surrounded by muppets. But that is okay because they are your friends and have shown many times that they can be trusted. Now if only you could stop being bothered about wormholes.

Coming on December 1, 2005:

Your Ultimate Sci-Fi Profile: which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? The Sequel

Moya (from Farscape)

94%

Millennium Falcon (from Star Wars)

81%

SG-1 (from Stargate)

75%

Nebuchadnezzar (from The Matrix)

69%

Enterprise D (from Star Trek)

56%

Galactica (from Battlestar: Galactica)

56%

Serenity (from Firefly)

56%

Bebop (from Cowboy Bebop)

44%

Which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? v1.0
created with QuizFarm.com

blogthings

2006-01-21T19:08:00.000-06:00

Your Blog Should Be Purple

You're an expressive, offbeat blogger who tends to write about anything and everything.
You tend to set blogging trends, and you're the most likely to write your own meme or survey.
You are a bit distant though. Your blog is all about you - not what anyone else has to say.

What Color Should Your Blog or Journal Be?

Well I guess this does decribe me pretty well. Can't say I really am in love with that last little bit though. hmmmm

2006-01-04T10:25:00.000-06:00

This is one of the cutest dogs that I do. His name is "Half Pint" He is real sweet and took to grooming very well. Loves to come and see me and does not act like it is a pain to get groomed. Some dogs act like I am really abusing them to do this. Then they go home and preen like they are the most beautiful things in the world. I hear the stories from their owner's on this. I do have a few like this fellow who do not want to go home and act like the owner is abusing them. With this one I know that is not the case. I do give a lot of love with the groomings that I do cause I believe they should want to come to me. It is something that will happen their whole lives and should not be an unpleasant thing to go through. for either of us.
Then I had the brilliant idea of looking out the front door and look what I found out that way. Gorgeous! God is So Good to Us to provide these beautiful scenes for us to stop and appreciate. It IS like the whole of Creation Celebrating! Why aren't we celebrating every day also???
This photo was taken from my back porch the tuesday after Christmas. Wow, I said as I let the cat out the back door. It just looked sooo cool outside with wonderful colors to the sunrise due to all the foggie conditions and lots of frost on the trees. Just had to share the beauty of it!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2006-01-04T09:44:00.000-06:00

Been a few days since I posted. Whatever have I been doing with my time....Well...not a whole lot. I have been doing a lot of hand knitting some spinning and a lot of 'putering. I've had a lot of time off for the holidays. Of course we went out to the Black Hills of South Dakota for Christmas as I told in previous post. For New Year's we went visiting to Rod's family. His Auntie in Iowa and his sister in Worthington, Mn. Took most of the day on NYEve. Then of all things I SLEPT throught the midnight hour! I think I woke around 2 am for a little room trip and wished DH a Happy New Year! We had hoped to share a glass of our favorite Mogan David wine for the New Year and had put the 1/2 bottle left over from last year in the fridge. We don't drink a lot I guess. Well we did share that glass later on NYday. I made a very nice supper of sweet potatoes (dh's favorite) and porkchops with a glass of wine. Deliously simple. We never do last awake till New Year! Tis a fact that these things happen as you get older!
For knitting I have been doing a pattern that I won off of ebay of a pair of 1870's fingerless mittens with an openwork pattern on the back. Wellll.... they call for something called Andulasian wool and size 16 and 18 needles. Well in researching the needle size it should be sizes about 000 and 00000 in american present day sizes! Eek are these sizes of "Pins" available nowadays? Yes I have seen them especially for miniature work but not the easiest things to get hold of and to use them is gonna cause a headache for sure. Not that I couldn't do it that fine just do not think I want to deal with it that fine. Take me forever anyhow. So I did knit the pattern up in the size 0 that I do have on hand as is. They are of course much to big. I used some of my handspun merino yarn that was very finely spun. About a fingering weight. Even with smaller needles it would have turned out tooooo big with this yarn so the yarn called for must be reallly fine. Maybe a laceweight. Hmmm. I do have a laceweight yarn in stash that I bought the beginning of Dec. for a shawl.... I could somehow convert a couple of those antique double point metal needles I have to pins. Need to find something to put on the ends to keep yarn on em. But it is just as easy to convert the pattern to what I need for size. Since I only have the one size needle and its wants me to go down in needle size after the cuff I needed to double up some of the stitches so I doubled up all the knit stitches of the knit 2, purl 2 ribbing. I had decided that the cuff was close in size to what I needed so I only reduced it by 4 stitches. Since they were knit flat and the thumb comes off the side and increases till it is finished seperately I wanted that left but there was a lot of slack between my thumb and the lace on the back of the hand part so I reduced that area and kept the lace area the same then whatever was left is the other side and palm of hand. Whenever this lets me post a picture I will get one up of the finished unaltered mit on me. Very baggy. It takes hours of trying to get pictures to upload to this blog. A big pain in the you know what! Agravatting to the max.
Glad the I have a forgiving Savior as sometimes I need it real bad for the bad thoughts that I get. Sometimes words too. Even if there is noone there to hear or know it is still sin. And needs forgiveness. Just cause nobody else knows does not mean it is not sin. Some times I think that is the kind of sin that needs forgiveness more than the 'public sin'. Think about it. What are you hiding that needs to be brought to the forgiving sight of Christ. Nothing is 'Too Bad' for HIM to handle or hear! Anyway how unique could we possibly be! He's been listening to us since the Beginning of Time. Do You really think you have come up with something that is New. I really doubt it.
Eve--- going to try to upload some pix now.

Fiber bunny

2005-12-28T11:09:00.000-06:00

Hi I realized that I had not posted a picture of my bunny. She is a French Angora and is named 'Freda'. We got her at the Sheperd's Harvest Festival last spring up by the 'Cities' Minneapolis/St.Paul. http://burroak.hypermart.net/festival.htm She was pretty cheap cause she is about 5 years old which is pretty old for a bunny so they don't want her to have anymore babies. Since I really don't want to deal with a lot of baby bunnies that worked out fine. I coulda got some nice baby bunnies there but bunnies are a lot of work. Especially fiber bunnies. Now that winter is here it is even worse as we have her out in this shed to keep her warmer and drier. I gotta tramp through all the snow to water her every day cause the temps are so cold the water freezes. With her up by the house it is easy and the water lasts at least 2-3 days and I can check her at nite if I forget. So don't look at those cute, cute little bunnies and think that they are not very much work. I still need to clean her cage out a bit while the weather is a bit warmer, she is getting great piles of frozen poop in her cage. nothing to be done about it when it is so cold, but as it warms a little I can get it scraped out a little. She needs a grooming too so maybe this afternoon that will be the activity.
Enjoy the Holidays
Eve

Merry Christmas!

2005-12-28T10:05:00.000-06:00

Well, I know I am late with this wish for everyone! But the season is not yet over. We still have the New Year! So HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Hubby decided that we would go to the Black Hills, SD for Christmas. So I got two (2) nites in a nice Super 8 motel with a pool and hot tub and continetal breakfast. I did not have to cook or clean or drive. We tootled around the Hills for Christmas Day enjoying the grand Beauty that our God has created for our enjoyment and wonder. We did have to drive all the way into Rapid City for a place to eat on Christmas. We found a wonderful restuarant open called the Hunan Buffet on rt 16. Very nice atmosphere and decor and very good food. Very busy too!
We did not go to church but did invite Jesus to help celebrate the day with us. Since we had a wonderfully peaceful day I feel that Jesus did just as we asked. I hope that He enjoyed seeing the Creation through our eyes. I think I was influenced in asking Jesus along by a song played on our local Christian radio station KNWC. It was a letter from Jesus about not being invited to the parties or celebrations given because of HIS Birthday. About being left outside and unwanted. Hmmm it made me think. Why wouldn't we invite HIM to celebrations to do with HIS Birthday. Selfishness was the first thought. Commercialism, agnosticism, other religions,etc.
On Soap Box: I think that this holiday has been wayyyy to commercialized. It has lost the original purpose of the day being chosen; ie: to get the new Christians away from the Pagan celebrations. Seems to me that we are back to the Pagan celebrations anyway and still leaving The Lord Jesus out! The evil one still is coming between Jesus and His Church! I love the Holidays and the idea of celebrating Jesus' birthday but what does Santa Claus and Christmas Trees and lots of other things have to do with it??? I can see decorating with lights as Jesus is the LIGHT of the World. Maybe trees too as Jesus is the Tree of Life but Santa Claus was just a man who did a good deed in giving to others. Now he is a god to all our little children who write him letters and ask for everything they want. He is celebrated in parades and pictures and movies. Jesus said "Let all the little children come to Me." But now they go to Santa instead and sit on his lap and whisper their secret wishes in his ear when they should be doing that with Jesus! The tradition of gift giving that he brought is good but it has gotten way out of hand.
Now it is not so much a wish to give but a 'have to give' tradition. We are pressured from all directions to buy, buy, buy! 'No one will be happy unless they have this or that latest thing.' Bullcrap! We choose to be happy or not. Things will not make us any more happy and sometimes make us more Unhappy. I think I had a happier time the way we spent the holiday than most other years of doing the 'traditional' thing.
So what shall we DO about this. Maybe more people should skip the 'gift' thing other than something tiny and meaningful and do something with Jesus. Send someone on a trip that could not otherwise afford it. Make clothes for homeless and give them out. Do housework for some senior who can't do their own so well anymore. There are so many things to DO for people than just giving them the Latest Thing. Sometimes with your kids just to tell them NO is a gift. Do something as a family or couple that makes the time together memorable. Avoid all the buying frenzy! Save up for a very nice holiday instead of getting in debt to the credit card companies. They are the ones benefitting not you! Look around your area of the world for God's handiwork. It is alllll around you! I look at a snowflake or a blade of grass and think in Awe that My God Has Made That and He did it for Me. Is that not the Greatest gift. And even Greater is that He sent His Son to Earth to Pay My Debt that I owed for MY Sins. I earned that death not Him. Yet He paid it! Most Awesome! Off soapbox.
Well I did warn you in my bio that I am a Christian and have opinions! Agree or disagree that is your right and I will stand by that right too.
I hope that all are safe and well through the Holidays and celebrate them with meaning. Not just mindlessly following traditions or advertizing scams.
My brother got hold of us that his son and daughter had an auto accident that broke both axles on the vehicle and has pretty much totaled the car! The kid were ok. Like a miracle they only had a few bruises and scrapes. The next day they went siteseeing with the rest of the family that had gathered together. So thankful that they are fine!!!
Eve

For Dale and Mary Ann

2005-12-22T23:49:00.000-06:00

This is "Dolly" Yes she is real cute. She has one blue eye and one brown/blue eye. She is so small that she is a bit hard to do. She was hand raised by her very nice owner's. She just lost her 'mom' a couple months ago to a sudden heart attack. She was a very special person and we all miss her a lot. She had been in a nursing home for a while before this happened and had had a couple heart attacks already. She had been recovering from a broken hip and suffered from macular degeneration. I always knew her to be cheerful and helpful to everyone. The couple was very active in their church and I consider them a true christian witness in their lifestyle. I know that she resides now with God and is now truly well and whole, and waiting for her family to join her in due time. These are also true 'Pet' people and will never let an animal go abused or neglected. Patience is also one of their virtues. Patience with pet,people and life in general. So this is my tiny tribute to a fine wonderful couple who have been a joy to know and be of small service to. Love you both Dale and Mary Ann.

"The Snug's snuggler"

2005-12-22T23:04:00.000-06:00

This is finally a picture of "Snuggles" with her new sweater. Daddy was trying to stay out of the room but she had gotten wind of him so wasn't going to pose for me.
"Snugs" before her "do" She's done with her bath and blowdrying. Such a ham! She had been trying to get out of the photo shoot and then decided to cooperate. She held her paw up till I got the shot then put it down. Toooo cute! Her Mom says she is a total ham for the camera but only when she is pretty. She evidently doesn't like pictures taken when she ain't at her best.
Hi Sue I finally got this to upload. Only took me 3 days of trying 2-3 times a day to get these two little pictures to upload. Tada! I really think it should be easier than this so if anyone out there has some suggestions, please let me know.

Monthy Snow Globes

2005-12-07T07:51:00.000-06:00

This was way toooo cool to not put on here. And you can use the link at http://www.luvscreations.com/ to get your own. She has lots of different ones and lots of other stuff. If ya like angels this is a site you need to see.

2005-12-03T21:54:00.000-06:00

Here's the closer up of the sheep. The merino/shetland cross is a really cute girl. Very friendly but follows the example of the wild one more than not. Delihia sometimes come close if I have good stuff to give out, but will not let me touch her. The other two let me touch them a little. The wool feels quite stiff this time of year because of the cold. It hardens the lanolin grease in the wool. "Snow" feels very stiff and hard she has so much merino blood in her it gives her extra lanolin.
The bunny "Freda" got put in the old chicken house. A small building so she is out of the direct snow and winds. Hubby fixed a place in the barn all snug in the middle of the hay bales for her when the temps go down under -10 F. And got a heated dog water dish to put in with her. We don't have that out in the chicken house as no electric. So I go out with water every day. A warm 1/2 full bottle and make sure she starts drinking right away. Friday morning worried me a bit cause she did not go for the water right away like she usually does. But it was very frosty out that morning and she was also very frosty coated. I don't think she could see it well. She finally started drinking tho. Today I was late getting out to water her and she was wanting it right away. She has to get her water in before it freezes up. I cannot fill the bottle too full either or it will burst it. If I do not put enough in it will freeze too soon and she will not have enough.
The horses are doing well and the female is starting to look pregnant. It is going to hopefully be a wonderful time this spring with all the young ones about. I think my DH has been missing the young ones and animals to care for. Even if it is a pain in the *%# in the wintertime. He a farm boy at heart! Always will be.

2005-12-03T21:26:00.000-06:00

Winter finally arrived here. Looks pretty. Those are my fiber on the hoof out there by the barn. The big white is a polypay ram. I call him "Buddy Boy". The smaller white one is a female merino/shetland X I call "Snow" and the black one is "Delihia" The evil wild shetland female. All of these are a couple months short of 1 year old but all the things we have checked say it is alright to put them together this young as long as they are 1 year old by lambing time. Besides "Buddy Boy" was simply wearing himself out pacing the fence all day long.

2005-11-28T11:43:00.000-06:00

It's a blizzard day! I get to stay home from work as we are expecting a blizzard. So I have been washing and carding wool. The postman brought a box with more wool and I got a box of wool delivered on Saturday too! Fiber heaven more wool. Lovely Rambolliet from Texas and today the merino/cotswold from Maine.
EEK, the SNOW finally got here. Comming down pretty good. Need to call hubby to come home soon cause the news is saying they may close the interstate. More later.

2005-11-21T07:48:00.000-06:00

Ok it only took 5 times to get this pix to load. I just finished this dog sweater last nite. It is of some of my handspun yarn in maroon and pink with some Lion Brand funfur around the rolled collar. So cute and little for a little Maltese named "Snuggles" She is not available for pix yet as they are out of town till after the 1st of Dec. So Maybe I will get to post another pix, with her permission of course, when she gets back.
Eve

2005-11-16T22:32:00.000-06:00

Ahhh these finally uploaded after 5 tries. Here is Grete showing us her FINISHED tapestry. She of course did it in about 1/2 the time of the whole workshop. Great Work Grete. Thanks.
This one is of the room with two of the afhgans hanging in the background. We had 3 tables set up in this rather limited space and two more tables in the open hallway area. 14 students and the teacher with people coming through now and then as it is an open art exhibit for the public

2005-11-16T21:44:00.000-06:00

Hi I think I am finally recovered enough from this last fabulous weekend with Grete Bodogaard. Phew what a full weekend. Friday 9 am to 5 pm and Saturday 9 am to 9 pm and Sunday 10 am to 4 pm. We worked hard and everyone got at least 1/2 way through the tapestry sampler. I must say if you get a chance to take a class from this wonderful lady do so. She was at the Versterheim Museum in Decorah, Iowa teaching so maybe someonegot time with her there. She is well worth your time if you are into learning weaving especially tapestry. Hoping to get some pictures uploaded. I took some of the afgan squares and finished afhgans that were there also. They are part of the exhibit that our guild has up. We have been working on these (well at least some guild members were) for over a year. I did not work on squares but I did start the book long enough to learn how to knit Continental style. Hmm I will have to go look for that book to give you it's name. It only took me a couple weeks of diligant practice to get the technique. Now I am quite fluent at it and am working on teaching my fingers to do the purl stitch in it better. I do not like to purl in the Continental but it is improving some. Just not as easy as the knit stitch. Boy did it increase my speed to learn this. Making the idea of doing larger knitting projects that are complicated a lot more doable for me. Best thing I ever did for myself.
Eve

2005-11-11T21:48:00.000-06:00

Oh Wow does Grete do the most fantastic tapestry work. So nice also. It was fun work. Tired and need to do a bit of study of the handouts yet. Need to remember to take the camera with me tomorrow and take a couple shots for the blog.
Eve

2005-11-11T08:00:00.000-06:00

Today I start a Tapestry workshop in Sioux Falls, SD. Greta Bodegaard is the teacher. I am hoping to learn some good techniques for using up more of my handspun yarns! The collection of yarn is growing but not moving out of the house very fast. I think if I spent a bit less time on this computer and more doing things I might get more done......Although it worked quite well to set the carder up last wednesday near the 'puter and while waiting for things to load up I got a lot of work done. The carder is borrowed from our Fiber Guild's Equipement. We have all kinds of books and equipement to rent. Guild members get to rent real cheap. And the Guild fee is only $20. a year and cuts the cost of things like workshops. The 3 day workshop that starts today is $100. for non-members and $50. for members so even if you want to attend and are not a member it would save you to sign up as member anyway.
I got all of the black wool and the shetland wool that I had washed carded up on wednesday. The last two nites I have been working on the cotswold. The breeder gave me a hint to use a bit cooler water to wash and that seems to have worked to cut down on the webbing of this fiber. Someone else on the spinfree list mentioned that it comes apart when it is dry better. Very unusual. Most wools I have found do not come apart so well after dry if they got matted or webbed in the wash, so I have been spending a lot of time pulling this stuff apart,,,,,,grr. Oh well I have several piles of this softly glowing creamy locks lying around to feel on.
Worked on plying the two bobbins of singles last nite. One bobbin held the cinnamon alpaca and the other the buffalo/alpaca/shetland mix. Since the buffalo mix is more brown than cinnamon, plying them together gives a sparky look. Very nice I like it. There is still some of the alpaca left on the bobbin that I will navaho ply sometime.
Off to workshop now.
Eve

2005-11-09T10:15:00.000-06:00

Hi finally getting a chance to post. Busy week so far and going to get busier.
Fiber Guild last nite. OOHH my the feature for last nite was surface design. Yummy fabrics from the Surface Design Group. And a CD show of even more surface design items.

I got some sample skeins done this weekend of the shetland and the cotswold. Here is the pix of the sample skeins.

And a close up picture. The two on the left are two of the colors in the shetland fleece. I have found 3 distinct color variations and have seperated them so as to get more colors. The one on the right is the cotswold. The picture does not do this justice at all. It is very glowing. The color shows nice but it does not show the glowing of the yarn. The one in the middle right was done in the grease then washed and is cotswold and that golden mohair at that I posted earlier carded together and the shetland carded then I pulled them into rovings and put the two together and spun them. Took them off the wheel with a nostipine and plyed them from the two ends of the ball. It created some interesting effects in the twist like little X's. It had been plyed from two balls it would not have done that. Learned a new thing for me.

I wish this did not take so long to do with my slow service but it does give me a chance to process some wool while I wait for things to load. I am working on some black wool that was given to me. The only thing they wanted was a couple pair of socks. And that is what it is good for or rugs. I mixed a bit of my supersoft black alpaca with some of it for the socks. Helped a bit. At least made it feel silkier if not a little softer.
Finished another pair of socks over the weekend for friend. Just have to sew up the ankle openings and tuck ends. Then wash. Brown BluefaceLiecester/Cheviot cross I have a lot of. I think I have most of that fleece spun up. I run into more skeins of it all the time. It is one of the first fleeces I ever got and not very soft. Some of the skeins are real interesting cause they are amoung some of my very early spinning. Then I run into the much better stuff and see the major improvement in my spinning. So Cool to see that progress.
Off to swimming now. Gotta get some excercise!!!
Eve

2005-11-05T20:21:00.000-06:00

Wow isn't this stuff nice! It's mohair. A color called Red. I know it does not look red. But that is what the color is called. Ha I would have called it medium carmel. It is adult but very nice and silky. I could share a few ounces of this if someone is interested in purchase. Email me at:
evesch@yahoo.com

2005-11-05T19:29:00.000-06:00

Hi
I am back in paragraph. Yippie! Ok folks check the Edit Html button up at the top right it should be brown for plain. If it is blue it is a do it yourself thingie. Since I am not html literate that is not an option.
Now lets see if I can get the picture thingie to work. Phooie it didn't work. Still get a cannot find server. Oh well I wrote to support for help so maybe sometime I can put up pixs of some of my fiber and some of my projects.
Goodnite good folk
Eve

2005-11-05T18:25:00.000-06:00

Hi fiber folk. Well I see this still won't let me make paragraphs. grrr. Fixed it!!
I have been very busy the last couple days. The shetland fiber is a dream and thursday I got the cotswold fleece I was waiting for. Very nice and different than I am used to. A lot finer fiber than I thought it would be. Silky. I love silky.
I love alpaca the best of all the fibers that I have as yet gotten. Believe it or not I did not care too much for silk. (ducking to avoid all the books the silk lovers are throwing) maybe I just did not get hold of the right stuff.
Of sheep wool so far my very favorite is Rambolliet. I have 3 fleeces of rambo. A creamy white lamb fleece(lamb tips) a wonderfully fine soft morrit and a very nice brownish black. I love the fluffyness of this wool when it is spun and it seems to be a might silky too.
In Alpaca I have a lot mostly browns, cinnamin, a white fleece a black fleece that is normal course black and a small amount of a supersoft black cria fleece and beige. I sent a rose grey fleece out for processing once to the wrong place and they had to add wool to it to process with their equipement. I did not know better at that time. I chose white wool to go with it. Choice was white or black.. It really changed the color and it was not the best wool that could have been used. But it has been a nice spin too. RULE Always ask how they process and do not send alpaca to places that have to add wool to process it. There are plenty of places to send that do not have to add wool.
Well back to work now. I am machine knitting a pair of socks for a friend who gave me a fleece. They only wanted a couple pair of socks. Not a bad deal! It is a good fleece for socks or rugs. Very black no brown tips. Some weak tips and lots of sand burrs. Some of the fleece is unusable due to matting and vm but about 10 pds of unskirted fiber should net out to at least 4-5 pounds usable fiber. I sat with my friend Pat (whose brother gave me the fleece) Sunday afternoon and taught her how to take those burrs out while I added my precious supersoft black alpaca to the wool mix to card it. It does soften it out a mite and at the least adds a bit of silky feel to it. Heheehee, she went home with more of the fleece complaining that it was addictive to do the cleaning out of those burrs and work with the fleece......heehehheh.... I got another one addicted!!!
so have some fibery fun this weekend folks.
Eve

2005-11-02T12:30:00.000-06:00

Ok new post today.
I got some new fiber!!!
Shetland lamb fleece! Yummy soft and clean! From LaVonne Stucky out of Belgrade, Mt. I love her shetlands. So nice. This is what? I think the 4th fleece I have gotten from her. It is brownish grey. I think I saw the color described somewhere as musket. Some darker areas and some lighter. I think I could spin this in the grease. I almost never do that. Of course I will not be tired of working with this stuff for a long time so no sharing of this one yet. Maybe I will keep it all...... mine!
I will have another fleece comming soon from a cotswold. I do not have that breed yet in my stash. I got so anxious waiting for the shetland fleece that when I found a 1 pound bag of unwashed red mohair on the table buried under other things I went to washing it. Will post pixs of it I took while it was drying in the sunshine, gorgeous.
Eve

2005-10-31T21:23:00.000-06:00

Hello all you other Fibery Friends and others.
Well as it says at the top I am a Fiber Fanatic. Actually I think I may be a fiberholic. Ok so I admit it.
I collect all sorts of wools, thread, yarns, fabric, beads. and the equipment to work with anything that takes my fancy.
Things that take my fancy right now are: Spinning, bobbin lace, knitting both hand and machine knitting with lace-knitting being currant handwork project. Crochet and loom knitting are in there somewhere also. Nalbinding is also one of my on the go projects.
I have skills in tatting, beading, macrame(sp?) embroidery. I like to sew and did the quilt thing a few years ago. I ran out of room to do quilting as I learned more things and after I got married two people's (mega pakrats) stuff took up too much room. I think I have done most crafty things that are commonly out there.
I do seem to have a passion for the lacier things. I do not know why other than they are so beautiful and intricate. Lace work does take a great deal more time and patience than some other persuits. But oh my the results are gorgeous.
I have a stash of fiber that is getting pretty awesome. I should inventory it sometime but I don't like work. Do as little housework as I can get away with. That's not much. Actually it got away from me a couple years ago cause of my/our collecting habits so all I do is clean a little around the stash piles. ( His Mine and Ours)
WARNING: If YOU are a mega pakrat DO NOT marry another mega pakrat! The resultant nest is Not a pretty site. Well, unless you are a mega pakrat that is.
I hope to destash a little. So will post things now and then so check back to see how I am doing. If I am not doing Please Encourage Me to Keep to my Destashing.
I have a lot of wool of every kind. I love to collect different wool breeds, well I guess I reallllly don't need a whole fleece of all of them so some of the fleece and rovings could go. (no I will NOT part with all of it) Have to keep some of each.
Yarn is overflowing all over the place here too since I spin the wool into yarn, it kinda collects around the house. I will part with a lot of that. At least the yarn I do not have earmarked for projects in the next 2 years. Then for some reason I also seem to keep buying commercial yarns on EBAY. Another WARNING: Stay off of Ebay if you are a mega pakrat and have a compulsive personality! Also keep mega pakrat mate off Ebay, also. So if I dig around in those yarns I will probably be able to come up with some to part with.
What do you think I do with all these fibers and yarn and Stuff??? Make things!! Of course then I have a lot of what do you do with that things around. So I will have some of those. I love making socks and hats. Besides the lace. I adore shawls also. But how many of these things can a person wear and use?? Since I am running out of room to store them they will have to find new homes. I hope they find good loving ones.
Going to go do some more spinning. I am plying a maroon/with multicolor hues singles for a dog sweater for a client of mine. Oh ya, I almost forgot to tell you I am a full time Professional Dog Groomer. (more fiber) Been busy doing that for the past 30 years. Clients won't let me quit! I am also wanting to get back to the mysteryshawlalong that I am doing. Or should I start that pair of socks I need to have done before friday?? Sometimes it is hard to decide. It usually is whatever is the most pressing. I suppose that should be the socks but I think I feel like spinning. The socks will only take a few hours on the knitting machine anyways so I can do them later. I gave the other pair of socks to Pat yesterday to give to her nephew later this week and she wanted to take another pair along for her brother. Well I don't have anymore of that yarn spun so it has to be a different yarn but I can do it. (Pat is bestfriend for last 12 years)
So Goodnite all
Eve