PippiKneeSocks.com

Even with all of my running around this week, I managed to keep up with dyeing.
Maybe I was inspired by the outside world, or gas prices (OUCH!) either way, I did a bunch of dyeing!
So, I’ve updated the spinning fibers page today.
(With nearly 10 Pounds of Hand painted wool top!)

Yes, nearly 10 pounds. It seems like a ton, since my dyepots have remained pretty inactive this past winter.
(Competing for the propane, heat vs. dyeing… I vote for the dyeing, but my family sees it differently.)
Speaking of which, I should cut this here, as both the family and the dyepots are needing my attention.

Happy Friday!
XO!

Good morning!
Fist order of beeswax….
I spent all day yesterday fighting the children so I could slowly plug away at adding stuff to Pippi…
It seemed like every time I sat down, someone needed something, or someone was getting hurt, or something.
(I’m sure Mamas far and wide, you can relate with this, AssAlarm theroy; After giving birth, my midwife double crossed me and implanted an alarm in my tookas, assuring that every time I sat down, it would alert the family.)

Okay! So, Ta-dum!

The shop has been updated!
I’ve added:
A new handspun single, with plenty for those large type projects.
Three artier types, featuring mohair locks (& one with silk cocoons!)
&
One of new colorway of handpainted yarn!

The spinning fibers page has also been freshened up with 6 new wool tops
You can view everything in the shop using this link or you can see everything that is new

Second:
Happy Birthy-day Scout! (And Abbs, if you are reading!)
You both are important people in my life I hope each of you has a beautiful day!!

Third:
Wish me luck!
I am headed out to the DMV, right after I scrounge up my ID. I have no idea where I put it.

Okay, things are getting crazy around here already. Time to put out a fire.
XO!

Even tho we hit record low temperatures last night and when I finally got out of bed it was a mere 4f above, I am feeling pretty springy.

I’ve been spinning lots of bright stuffs, freestyle, like.
(clicky to make it bigger)

Scout sent me some yarn from La Lana Wools that she acquired on her recent trip to Taos.
Very inspirational stuff! I’ve never believed in having pet yarn, until now. I’m pretty functional, to a fault. (Hence my deep love of the sock.) But, this yarn shattered some of my paradigms. I love it when something comes along and blows out my brain cells like that.. It is really a gift.
I wonder if the beautiful folx at La Lana would adopt me???

Happy Spring lovelies!

After my very productive week, I hit a wall yesterday… It was big, and brick, studded with lead.
Anyway, perhaps I paid some penance today. Since I goofed off all day yesterday, I had to wake up at 5:30 to start winding my yarn for Pippi.
Yes,The shop has been updated!
I’ve added:
1 2ply yarn
7 (YES! seven) colorways of handpainted sock yarn

Oodles of hand painted spinning fibers!

& spindles are back in stock.

you can view everything in the shop using this link or you can see everything that is new
♥

To spite the universe and circumstances working against me today, I managed to update the shop. All kinds of new stuffs.

Now, I’ll take a little digression and ramble about said circumstances
Today Izabella didn’t have skool; this means her complaining about it every 5 minutes & both of the young causing chaos, for good measure..
I had pictures to take, sock yarn to wind, things to add to the data base. (which, of course i managed at least one screw up.)
And I was up against this. (Don’t let the sweet eyelashes fool you.)

Every time I break out the camera, one or the other jumps right in front of it.
It has been more chaotic here today, than it has been in a long time. Norma’s Double Motherwort tincture arrived this afternoon, and Not A Second Too Soon. I’m tellin ya, this stuff is worth more than gold. I took some, and immediately felt better. (hummm, that might have something to do with the vodka it is distilled with… ha.) But, now i have a cup of coffee sitting in front of me; even tho my brain is fried from the juggling today; my body is tired and my house is a mess (and, mother comes Monday, for Bell’s birthday. AYE!)
But, there is no rest for the wicked, as I’m about to fire up the dyepots for something I have promised for Scout

If I owe you email, please know I’m not ignoring. I seem to be behind, and I have this syndrome; If i don’t respond Right Away; they slip my mind… :0 (Sad, but true… My brain isn’t so good some days.)

♥

Lawd, it appears I even have less time for the computer now that I only have one kiddlet here with me during the day.
How can this be? Sad but true.
Today marks Bell’s last day of her first full week of pre-skool. She is really loving it. (I, on the other hand am having a Very Hard time adjusting to living by this imposed schedule…)
She insisted on having her picture taken in her new bad ass t-shirt from auntie Jessica

My baby; all growed up & hamming it up! (the picture is small but her shirt reads “Hello Kitty Forever”)

I have gotten a little spinning done too. (Very little, but very inspired)
My favorite yarn this week

Autumn Changes

• hand dyed mohair locks
• hand dyed tinkle
• hand dyed wool
• recycled silk sari
• 5 ply
• 14 yards
• 4 WPI
• 1.8 oz

Even Matt had nice things to say about it. (”That’s hotttt” lol.)

The mohair locks are very inspiring.

Purple lock eater

• hand dyed locks
• hand painted merino wool
• 2ply
• 10 yards
• 6 WPI
• 1.7 oz

Highly addictive, those locks, yes…I have some pink ones on the bobbin now.

In other highly addictive realms, I’ve been dipping into the recycled silk sari, since I was able to replenish the stash this past weekend.

Autumnal Mayhem

• hand dyed wool
• hand dyed tinkle
• recycled silk sari
• 2 ply
• 46 yards
• 7 WPI
• 3.5 oz

I am planning a wee update of Pippi tomorrow. If i can get my sock yarn hanked up, and some special batts made; that is.

I’d love to sit here and blog about how I love the colors this time of year; or how MG Tank and Mike e called the other night, as soon as i got home from my first ever PTA meeting. Saying that they had a stolen Caddy and were on their way up. (Talk about paradigm shift.. There was no way my feeble brain would have withstood going from a PTA meeting to hangin out with those two. NOPE. ~
Hopefully this weekend’s rain check still stands.)
Yes, I would love nothing better to go on and on about it all. But my son has other plans for me… That, much to my dismay, have nothing to do with me sitting at the computer.

♥

i haven’t fallen off the face of the internets or anything; i’ve been busy and sick. mostly sick; and it seems like forever now, it has far surpassed the point of “gettin’ old”. & it has been so long since i have written here, i think i may have forgotten how. which is terrible. i should utilize this space to try to help me make reading about spinning interesting. after i hit “send” on my latest article, i had some pangs of regret. solidified by making matt read one of the eleventy hard copys; and him only getting past the third paragraph on the first page. so, i’ve failed. (seems to be alot of that going on with me in recent weeks. but, you know that can work to my advantage, by making me try harder. sitll and all, not a great place to be; in the right here, right now. I should try starting by using proper capitalization and punctuation. I’m no ee cummings. Ever notice, My favorite punctuation is the ! followed by the ; what gives? Reading my stuff out loud, and doing edits is very painful.)
So what has been going on in my world? (clearly you didn’t click on your bloglines to be witness to my beating myslef up, did you?) Let’s see; in no particular order…
WORD to

Lime & Violet (for those of you unawares of L&V… hottest new fibery goodness pod cast out there! can we say Chock Full of Fresh & Funny!!! And by hottest, i mean they are getting all kinds of attention from the i tunes peeps and bloggers alike; and we all know that the blogosphere is always right on ze money.)
So many of my lj peeps were talking about it, I tried to listen, but being a podcast virgin; I didn’t know one had to wait.for.the.page.to.load. I also i had no idea they had mentioned me in some fashion until my mama Scout shouted out to me. Thanks Scout! I do have to shamefully admit, that i haven’t given it full listen yet,(just bits and bobs) I’ve been so far removed from this box it isn’t even funny. Even if i was sitting right here, the noise level in this house is decibels above my preference; making it hard to pay attention to something; or anything really. (bedtime you cometh not a moment too soon.) But from what I was able to gather from the little bites i was able to hear, it is up beat and funny! And Lime and Voilet are stand up chicks, so I’m sure it is all good stuff! (sooooooooooo, go give a listen and when you are done, click that little donation button; any podcast that is awesome enough to give me a shout out deserves a bit of fundage to keep their servers up.(Podcasts use up a metric butt ton of bandwith, in case you don’t know.)
So, what else…?
ah, the “I wanna be an elf” hat

Made from a ever so slightly variegated (kettle dyed) green bulky think and thin single, on size 10.5’s. With YO’s every few rows, carried along with a semi-coily number.

Semi coils, interesting, but I’m still not too thrilled with them. I’m far too anal it seems.
I’m not happy with the hat in general, I’m going to frog it. But, I continue to knit on it. (WTF?) I think it has something to do with “the drugs” Velma mentioned…. ‘I do it for the drugs.’
So, I’ll keep knitting on it until it is done, then i’ll frog it.

My second sock is progressing ever so slow.

I may have mentioned this before, but I was suffering from SSS even before the first one was done. I was putting off the toe decreases, and kept putting them off, the poor sock wound up being a bit too long with a boxy toe. Will I undo my kitchener, and frog back an inch? No. Boxy toe will stay with us as an ode to imperfection. An ever present reminder that I need not always be perfect.

I’ve only done a wee bit of spinning.

This yarn, will hopefully become this sweater. I can hardly wait to get the book in my hot little hands, so I can see just how much of this i need to spin. (Well, there is a plethora of reasons why i can’t wait to get it; have you seen the table of contents?!?!?! Lynne Vogel!! among many other super talents, including Crystal Canning & if I’m not mistaken, the book is lovingly dedicated to her memory.
Another reminder that our time here is short, we are only passing thru. People will not remember us for what we do, as much as how we do it & how we are.

Well, I’ve tap-tapped here long enough, perhaps if I blogged more than once a week, I wouldn’t be so painfully long winded.
Live gracefully & stay true to yourself.
♥

and i don’t mean me (although, some very well may disagree! hehe)

the pattern for the booze bag is up over on knitty
i made a few others, from handspun..

it took under 100 yards of x-bulky (roughly 80)
& i modified the pattern a bit.
i have another one that i’m trying to get finished out of regular bulky thick and thin, but, i’ve been so caught up in this, that, and the other, that i put it aside and forgot about it.
when i was working on the pattern to go with the coil article, i saw how i could take this basic idea, of the eyelets, and really run with it. hats, bags, belts… (my first idea was a belt, being for the summer issue and all…. but, i wasn’t able to find notions i was happy with in time…) it will be fun fire side knitting come this winter.

now, go! make one!
♥