A day can make a difference

 December was an odd month.   We went to a concert in November and a few days later, we got sick.  Really sick and it was into December before we were well again.   Non-contagious, but still had lingering effects for even longer.   It ticked me off because we'd had our jabs updated several weeks before, so should have been protected.   I shudder to think what it would have been without those jabs.  Anyway,  I ended up not getting all my seasonal cards out, which was too bad because I was really happy with them.  That being said, everything else went okay.  I got socks made for all my kids.  I also dug out a few things that didn't sell at the guild show and the kids scooped up the hats and tea towels very quickly!

The meeting of two water sources

Yesterday we went for a walk along a local trail.   Half the trail is by fields and a little bit of bush, but the
other half meanders by the river.  It's simply beautiful and I always feel like I've wandered into a fairy tale when we walk that half.   It's a circle trail, but we walk the river side part way and then turn around and come back, missing the boring side completely. 

  The river water level was  really high and had flooded over the banks, due to all the rain we've had.  You could see the water marks on the far trees which show the water levels have dropped at least 30 cm..  The path is raised and there was only one little boggy area where we had to walk around a puddle.    It was interesting because there is a stream which flows into the river.  The river is running quite fast and is very silty right now, so you could see exactly where the two water sources met.  It was really interesting to watch the flow and swirls of the currents.  The clear water is the stream and the brown, murky water is the river.

The ground was damp because we've had a lot of mild temperatures and an awful lot of rain.  We were driving to a family gathering and I was truly thankful that the temperatures were warm enough that it was rain, because if it had been cold enough for snow, nobody would have been going anywhere!

The different between yesterday and today is amazing.   Yesterday was yet another cloudy, dismally grey day.   It was crisp and cool but still a nice day to go walking as there was no wind. Today however, we stayed home!  The weather was definitely a little different.   I snapped this photo when I locked up the chicken coop for the night, at 4:25 pm.   These are the blackberry canes.  They're very resilient though and always seem to pop right back up when spring comes and the snow melts away.

  What a different a day can make!

More sock stuff

 I'd tried a couple of times to do the toes and heels different colours but had a few issues along the way.   I watched a video which mentioned a hint on a way to do this, just in passing.  I tried it and poof, success!   Well mainly success.  The socks were supposed to be navy with pink heels and toes.  I'd grabbed both the pink and purple bits from my scrap bin and for some reason wound up the purple instead of the pink.  I didn't really pay attention to it until I was doing the toe of the first sock.  By then, it was navy socks with the purple because I wasn't redoing the sock just to change the colour to pink.   They worked out beautifully though, so I was happy enough with them.    I have more navy for another pair of socks, so no worries there.

Then I knew a friend from out of town was visiting, so I made a pair of socks for her.  However I wanted to make a pair for her kid too, so I changed out the 72 cylinder to the 54 needle cylinder.   This is what I started with and I remember thinking that the 72 was a whole new game when I switched them out the first time.   This time though I had huge issues.   It's like the cylinder is just a smidge bigger than the 72.  It cranks differently and pushing the needles up is stiff and doesn't feel the same.    I did a test tube to check tension and it was fine, but lifting needles and going backwards was definitely different .  It took me 3 tries to get 2 kids socks, but I got the socks done.

Then I tried to make a pair of socks for my daughter who has tiny, skinny feet.   Stitches kept dropping and then the whole machine seized up.   Because I'd changed out the yarn carrier for a pretty, new slotted yarn carrier, it meant that I had several possible issues.   The most likely was that I had a bent needle or two causing the jam though, so I pulled all the needles, and replaced them one at a time cranking several times around for each needle.  I found one which pinged, so I pulled it because it shouldn't ping!   I readjusted  the yarn carrier and tried again. 

 The nice thing about this new slotted yarn carrier is that when there is an issue like this, I can just lift the yarn out, instead of cutting it and having to join the pieces together.   But all my fussing and readjusting didn't stop this from happening, several times.   Now I'm just beyond frustrated since this 54 slot cylinder is still working slightly differently from the 72 slot cylinder and while I've ordered a new, made to order 60 slot cylinder, it won't be here until after Christmas.   I'm hoping to have these socks made for her for a present.  I still have a few days to play with them though, after a big cup of tea!

 

 

Spinning - gasp- and more socks

 

Just a few of the November socks.  There are more unfinished ones in the work basket waiting for me .    I'm also trying out ideas for labels for my socks.   I think I want a band type label for them so that the pairs are easier to keep together.   They seem to look neater, although I know a hang tag might work well too, and it's possible I could simply design one tag which would work for both  socks and wovens.   It's been interesting playing around with label design apps and programs.  They sure aren't as simple and easy as they were many years ago.

November has been an interesting month  and one that I don't mind not repeating.   I managed to muck up my rotator cup.   Thankfully due to some anti-inflamatorys and a lot of diligence with my physio, I was able to get back most of my shoulder movement in fairly quick time.  I'm pretty sure that was more painful than getting either of my hips done.  But they said moving it breaks the pain cycle, and sure enough pushing through, did exactly that.   I'll be a bit careful in the future though, not to over-do it because the problem that caused it in the first place, irritating two tendons is still there.  

 

Not feeling like kitchenering up the toes of the socks, I dragged out the Minstrel and started spinning up some mill ends which I've had for several years.   This is superwash merino/cashmere/silk/nylon.   I've no idea about the percentages.  It's nice enough to spin for fibre that was like $8 a lb.   Most of it needs carding.  I've been hand carding it until I have a huge pile of rolags.  Then I can have a lovely, leisurely spinning session.   I'm on the second bobbin.  Now I   need to figure out where I stashed the rest of my bobbins.  I don't like to ply very fine yarns from centre pull balls as I have too many issues with tangling.  A little bit thicker grist and up is great plying ends together for me,  but not the very fine stuff.   I'm hoping that I'll get enough  spun to dye up and crank a pair of socks

Christmas card painting is on the list for soon.  It was supposed to be earlier this month but not with everything that's happened so far.   Then I figured today, but that didn't happen so tomorrow for sure.   I got a bit of a walk in though, which felt so good.  Then there were ice pellets and now it's raining, and "they're" calling for possible snow.  :(    We've been having windchill in the morning too and it just feels too early for waking up to -10 blasts of weather.  I've definitely a bit spoiled from living this far south.  I mean the ground isn't totally frozen yet and still I'm complaining.

Colours of November

A sunny hike on our favourite trail

The river was so still it was like a mirror

An impromptu hike because the shop didn't open 'til noon

 

last day warm enough to hang laundry

Endings and Beginnings

 

The towels with the painted warp off the loom.  They were hemmed and hung to take a photo.  I like them a lot.  The black one shows off the colours really well, however it looks out of place with the rest of the towels.  The other ones are a bit less dramatic but they look really nice.  Even the green one which I wasn't sure about.  

Folded up they look nice too.  I think the purple is my favourite, but the teal is close.  They are all boxed up and ready to be put on sale this weekend.

I thought that I didn't have very much to put in the sale.  Because of the hip replacement, I haven't spent any real time on the floor loom.  What I hadn't realized was how much I've actually woven on the rigid heddle loom.  In this case, my big bin that I thought was too large, was actually full to the top!  That doesn't mean anything will sell though because buyers are fickle, money is tight for most people and lots of folks just come out for an interesting day out.  If things do sell though, it does help with buying yarn for next year.

Len's Mill Store sent out digital coupons and the yellow tag items were 80% off.  This is a pile of yarn which would have been $80 before tax.  With tax, I paid $17 and change.    Most of these are for the rigid heddle loom.  One is a ball of Hygge, a very thin fluffy yarn which has come to the notice of sock machine knitters as you can use it to line socks to make slippers.   The horrible yellow is sock yarn.  It's ugly and bright and was $1.88 after discount.  There is enough other yarn there for 3 shawls or maybe 4 or 5 scarves.   When I'm able to get yarn on deep discount, or at least on sale, it means I can sell my non- wool or silk scarves at attractive prices.  I like that because it means that handwoven items are available to those people who may not be able to afford them otherwise.  It's nice to let people have a choice.

I warped up the Inkle loom.  I used 4/8 cotton that I'd purchased years ago when I had this idea to make guitar straps for my family.  I'd already made 2 for myself - a banjo strap and a ukelele strap.  However there were still 3 kids plus 1 spouse who played, so I thought it was a good idea.   It took so long to make mine, that I ran out of time.  Plus, I'd thought that I'd be able to dye all the white to customize them and that really didn't happen either.

   I need to make a new Birka bag and my old strap is wearing where it attaches to the handles, so I put this project on for that purpose.   But, the tele was on and I was dressing the loom while I was watching some very compelling crime drama on Britbox.   I should never do things like this.  The stripes are different sizes and I missed a peg on 2 different threads so had to cut the strap off early because I could no longer pull the strap forward to weave.   It's about 12 inches too short! 

So sometime this week I need to find table space to paint my Xmas cards.  I still need to make a couple of pairs of csm socks.  I also want to put a new scarf on the rigid heddle loom to have something alternate to play with.  This all sounds doable except for the fact that hubby has a week off and who knows what will happen then.

Don't Do What I Did!

Way before my hip replacement, I planned a project to put on the loom for my recovery. I'd totally forgotten that it would be weeks before I'd be cleared to weave again, so it was kind of a useless idea.  In the end though, it meant I had the warp almost ready to go when I needed it months later.

  It was 2/8 cotton and I did stripes, navy with painted warp stripes in between.   The painting of the warp was very successful.  It was a beautiful warp.  I started winding the navy stripes but only got halfway done before climbing up and down to the basement to my warping board  became difficult.   The project was left, semi-forgotten in a bag on the back of my desk chair.   Eventually though, time passed and I realized that I had 3 1/2 weeks left before the guild sale.    Discussion at the last meeting suggested that our stock of tea towels was low, so I decided to get this project on the loom.   It's an easy to weave project, the ubiquitous "friendship towels", from Schacht.  It's a delightful project, fun and fast, and also easy to change up the colour for each towel.  They've also provided the draft free, which was really nice of them.

See the twisting!  The navy was so much worse!

So step one -  When I dye warps I put tight figure 8 ties in the cross and also one at each end, to keep the yarns from slipping.   However all the rest of the figure 8 ties are tied loosely in a bow, so that a) it will be easy to dye the whole length without those white marks from a tight choke tie and b) using a bow so that when the warp is dry, I can tighten up the figure 8 ties to keep the warp contained and straight.  

  First mistake was not retying the figure 8 ties to make firm choke ties.   This allowed the painted warp to twist around itself, making for not so fun warping.   Secondly, I know that I painted the warp in a particular order.  I neither marked each of the painted warp chains with the order number, nor did I take proper notes.  I have a basic explanation of the project, a quick diagram with numbers etc, but absolutely none of the details which tell me what I was truly planning at the time.  My third mistake when starting this project, is that while I wound each stripe in the painted warp separately, I didn't do that for the navy stripes.  I wound about half of it in one bunch, and then because I neglected to note how many warp threads I'd wound, when I went to finish winding the warp 3 weeks ago, I figured it was easier to wind the second half of the navy stripes in one bunch too.   I'd counted my navy warp 3 times, and had 3 different numbers, so took the average and wound the rest of the stripes together as one warp.  This wouldn't have been such an issue if the navy cotton yarn hadn't been really over twisted, so it wound around itself something fierce and was so difficult to work with.   

painted warp and navy stripes, black weft.

After much fussing, winding, a few crossed threads and some broken threads from the over spun yarns twisting in the heddles, the warp was on the loom.  This was not a fun process and if I didn't absolutely love that warp, if it wasn't maybe 7 feet long, so 6 tea towels, so a lot of thread to waste, I might have cut it off.  Once it was on the loom though, it was very pretty.  I wove off two in a teal colour, one in a lighter green which was nice but not spectacular, two in purple which were awesome and one in black which is stunning.   I hadn't realized that I had any 2/8 black cotton in my stash or their would have been more of them.  I used all the purple I had.  My initial thoughts were to use the navy for the weft, thinking the navy on navy would give a sold stripe against the painted stripes.  However to my eye, because the navy is a broken twill, it just looked a bit messy to me.

1- take lots of notes, even if you don't think you'll need them.   If you put that project aside for a bit, you'll really want to know those details that don't jump out at you, including warp length, that the yarn is over twisted or delicate or just fine etc.

2- document numbers - how many are in each stripe, how long, did you add extra threads for use in breakage etc.

3 - don't wait until last minute and have to rush.  Give yourself time to enjoy the process. 

4- sometimes it's best to wind your stripes in the right number of threads to facilitate that enjoying the process bit :)

The towels have been washed and dried.  They are waiting for me to hem them.    I'm happy with the outcome.

Historical Kitchen Fun

I can't believe how busy it's been or at least seems to have been.   I thought after the fair demos things would settle down.   However it took a bit longer than that.   My car was acting odd on my last trip to Westfield and we took it in to get looked at and boy, were we lucky.   The hose to the transmission had worn and was leaking transmission fluid.   But it seems like we may have caught it in time and it was only $650 instead of $3000.   Hubby says this could be normal wear and tear.  I think though it's the excessive bouncing over the train tracks on the route I normally take to town.  The asphalt is always pitted and cracked around the tracks and you have to slow down to a crawl to go over them unless you are a huge farm vehicle with giant flat, seemingly solid tires!

Besides that, I've been dressing the floor loom and that is fodder for another post.   Just... next time.  I've made some socks.  I've planned a new Birka style bag on which I've planned some Bayeux stitch embroidery - also for another post.

A gorgeous and functional stove

However, last Sunday I took a cooking workshop at Dundurn castle.  It was much less a cooking workshop than a tasting class.   It was still fun though.   I got to cook on the stove which is a pretty awesome beast.   (Well, I stirred onions in a pan, but it's still cooking!)  It was about soups and it was quite informative.    I like the booklet we got, which has some new cookery sources in for me.   I also realized that the people running the  course are simply people like me, and while I didn't butt in or anything, I did know the answers to the information that they forgot.  There is another workshop coming up in December, on puddings, which could be fun, but it's a tad more expensive and I spent the rest of my discretionary, non- yarn budget inviting my daughter along with me.   I sure would like some other insight into steamed pudding though, considering the several recent failures I've had.

Some of the transferware in the kitchen

The soups were all easy to make and most were quite tasty.  Even though I'm not a huge fan of tomato soup, the fresh tomato soup was quite nice.  The pumpkin soup was good although I'd make it with broth instead of milk as the milk sort of overwhelmed the pumpkin flavour if that is possible.  The onion soup which I helped caramelize the onions for, was delicious but it was really just a lot of fried onions in broth.

There was a huge display of transfer ware.  I didn't get enough time to check out all the patterns, but gosh, it was beautiful.  I do love transfer ware and really wish I had a bit of time to check them out.

This is a picture of a cupboard in the kitchen which I really liked.   I could see this as a yarn cupboard - or yarn-oire which I've been asking for.   It was a decent size and would hold a lot of stuff, as well as keeping it out of sight.

The amount of period equipment in the kitchen was quite amazing.   It gave me a lot of ideas and inspiration.  In all, it was a good morning.   It did begin with the person escorting us into the kitchen telling us that the scaffolding on the outside was period in that in October of 1850something, they were planning for one of the daughter's weddings.  To make the house more grand looking, the front pillars were installed.   It was a fun bit of information to start the day.

Proof I got to use the stove!

Fall Fair Weekend

 Last weekend I was one of the hand crafters asked to demonstrate their craft at a local Fall Fair.   On the Saturday I was asked to demonstrate spinning.   This is my display table.  The colour wheel is of nature dyed yarns.  Almost all of them were either harvested locally or grown in my garden, except for the Cochineal reds and a logwood purple.  The rest of the yarns were examples of different yarn structures or different fibres.   Sadly this is the only photo I took.  It was a lot of fun.  I talked with a lot of people and even helped a few gals with some spinning issues they had.  It's amazing how many people see spinning as "keeping a skill alive", and don't realize that there are many modern spinners out there, making miles of yarn.

On Sunday - and I wish I had photos- but I forgot to bring my phone or a camera.  On Sunday, a bunch of us got together to do a Sheep to Shawl demo.   The demo was nice because we didn't have to rush things.  It also allowed us to have a beginner spinner with us, who learned but was under no pressure to produce yards upon yards of consistent yarn.   We had a shawl warp on a table loom and 4 spinning wheels.  I also brought the same table cloth  (which is an old sheet) and the nature dyed colourwheel.  The colour wheel became a good talking point, which lead to the spinning and weaving.   And the loom became a talking point which lead to the wheels and the yarns.  The spinning wheels became a talking point which lead to the dyed yarns and the weaving.   We talked with so many people.  At one point, 4 of the 5 of us were talking with small groups of people.  There weren't many slow times, but mainly steady people through.  

The whole team was comprised of SCA members and we were all dressed in garb; mainly viking.  People commented on how good we looked (yay us!) and how right it looked that we were weaving and spinning.   I had to appreciate that people recognized that the skills were ancient but no one realized that our equipment was thoroughly modern!  Still, a good impression was made and many people were amazed and intrigued by what we did.  And nope, we didn't finish the shawl.  I think we got it half woven.  However we went in with the goal of education, and there was no need to finish.   Regardless, it was an awful lot of fun, with much socializing.  We took lunch breaks and saw some of the fair.  It was a very good day.   I'm a bit sad that I didn't get photos though.

The fun stuff and not so fun

 

At our last Weavers Guild meeting we had a guest speaker.  Cat Haggert came to speak to us about processing flax.  After a brief introduction on how to grow flax, she showed us how to use her processing tools.  These were modern tools that were made by a fairly local gentleman who makes and repairs spinning wheels.   Cat also showed us how to process flax using easily available tools - an ice scraper and a dollar store pocket comb.  Of course these are only useful for small amounts but they did the trick.   These are some of our guilds results.   The top 2 small stricks of flax were processed by me and the bottom two were Iva's and Ashley's, who gave them to me to spin up.   It was a fun program.  Cat is incredibly knowledgeable and an excellent speaker.   

These are a few of the socks I've made this month.   I finally found the right tension for this yarn.   I've one more pair to make and I have all the Xmas socks done for my kids and their spouses. I was having issues with sizing in that they were coming out too small or odd.  One pair was even different sizes between socks, which were done in one shot.

  One day I read an online post from one of the prolific sock makers/teachers.  He said the weights should be changed up for different weights of yarn.  His thoughts were 1 weight for super fine or laceweight yarn, 2 for normal sock yarn and 3 for bulky sock yarn.  A single weight is 580g.   Adding the second is 1159g, and with the third weight it weights 1589g. The next piece of information he gave was that the spaces between stitches while you're knitting on the sock machine should be about the size of the yarn.  

I removed a weight while knitting up my regular sized sock yarn and all of a sudden, everything was good.  My sizing was spot on and as a bonus, there were also fewer dropped stitches.  The dropped stitches though could also be me reminding myself to pay more attention to needle latches and toe V hook weight placement too.

I asked for some info before trying out my ribber.  I was directed to search for videos.  I've been watching SockTV - yes it really is a thing, which was one of the suggestions.  However while this summer has been the summer of ribbing, it's all about different ribbing patterns.  As a hand knitter of socks, I already know I can do any ribbing patter that my stitch count will allow -and subsequently, how many stitch combos the ribber will accommodate.   What I didn't have information for was how to set up the ribber to get started.  Luckily there is a gal out in Vancouver who has put together a whole bunch of very beginner videos on sock machines. She had one on how to get the ribber set up her machine.   Happily I have the same machine that she used for her demo, so I don't have to work it out on a different machine.

Blackberry update -  2 kg of berries are in the freezer, waiting for me to make jam!   There are more on the brambles, but the weather has cooled dramatically and now they're starting to get smaller and seedier.  I may call it done for harvesting them.  

Tomato update -  The tomatoes in the garden are finally ripening.   I've managed to can 5 jars of the plum tomatoes.  They are really nice fruit, but ack, having them ripen this late and slowly is frustrating. I've no idea how many more will ripen in time to be used.

Threes - the oil light on the truck came on...  The lawn tractor will only run for 10 minutes at a time and periodically, the new battery dies...  The sole of my only pair of running shoes has detached from the shoe...  I hope that's it for now.   While I'm sure we can replace the shoes, a new truck and lawn tractor aren't in this year's budget :(

 

Preserving the harvest

 

The weather this August has been cool, wet and very grey.  Many people are saying how many plants in their gardens are slow to ripen.  My tomatoes are definitely on a slow pace to ripen.  So slow that I worry they may not ripen at all this year.   There were no Amish Paste Tomato plants in the garden centres this year, so I had to settle with the only Roma style tomato plant that I could find which was San Marzano which has a longer time to ripen.  Next year I may break down and start my own tomato plants, to get the ones I know will work in my garden and climate.

Because all the tomatoes are still green, I ended up buying 1/2 bushel of tomatoes at the market.   There were few to choose from because even the farmers are having issues with slow ripening this year. They were still not quite ripe enough, but luckily I was away all day after purchasing them.   I ducked out of the house until the evening on Saturday so when I started canning on Sunday, they were just starting to be perfect.   I got over half of them done, in 2 canning pot batches, and a third on Sunday finished them off.   I have 20 pint/500 ml jars in the pantry.  My hot water bath canner will do 7, 500 ml jars at a time.  If I can get at least two more batches done, there should be enough for the winter.  

The blackberries are also ripening this year.   The past few years  I haven't had enough berries to harvest, but this year the patch has finally matured enough.  They are late though and with the weather, I'm only able to harvest every 2 or 3 days.  However I already have 785 g of berries and there are still many more unripe berries on the brambles.   I'm washing them and tossing them in the freezer.  My plans are that when or if I get enough berries, I will let them thaw and push them through a sieve to remove the seeds.  Then I'll make seedless blackberry jam.  With the batch of apricot jam I made earlier, while not having a great variety, there will be more than enough jam and 2 of my favourite kinds.

Sewing tricks and csm grafting socks

 I sent in my volunteer availability to Westfield for the next couple of months, and got my building assignment already.   Since I'm in the Misener house, which means a great woodstove for cooking and baking, I decided to make myself a new work dress.   I've several dress lengths of 1860's prints from when a local store had put them all on clearance.  I got a couple of them on sale for buy 1 yard, get 2 free, and they were already reduced to begin with.

Anyway, I chose the blue one, not because it was my favourite print, but because I looked in the bag and I already had purchased the thread and notions.  That was a no brainer.  

I was trying to find my pattern, which already fits.  I obviously put it in that pit of despair known as a "safe place", and not my pattern file, so I'm redrafting a pattern.   Last week was a write off for getting anything worthwhile done, but today I picked it back up.  I was only able to get a fit that I liked by using an amscye dart, which I've not seen on any photos of that period of garment.   A bit of searching though, came up with instructions on swinging the dart to  a waist dart.   I wasn't sure about doing this, but I bravely cut the first dart and although I had to make it a tad longer, it worked a treat and the muslin now lies flat.   I'm hoping that it fits as nicely.

This is a toe that I just grafted closed with a kitchener stitch.   It's a lot more grafting with a cranked sock than with a hand knit sock.  In this case, 36 stitches on each side to graft together.    I'm not that fond of grafting but it's easier on the cranked socks because you have to do it from the back.   The stitches are held in place by waste yarn rather than needles, and there is no need to make sure you're picking them up on the correct side like pearling or stockinette side.   You do them from the backside and it's just stitching through the previous stitch and the new stitch, previous stitch and the new stitch, until you're one.

The downside is that there are things to get in your way.   If there isn't enough contrast with your waste yarn, you can't see the stitches to pick up.  If you don't have enough light, it's also difficult to see those stitches.  Plus, you have to be careful not to pick up the waste yarn when you're grafting the live stitches.   On the upside, it's pretty easy to do and I found it easy to get the tension pretty close so it's difficult to see where you've grafted.

Another downside is that it sort of looks like a hungry worm monster which wants to eat your arm when you don't get it stitched up quickly enough.   Once the seam is closed, I'll just pull out all the white waste yarn and the sock will be done!  Otherwise, that partially grafted sock could be inspiration for nightmares!

And Then There Were Two

 Last week on Thursday, hubby asked me if our kitty Phil was okay and I said I thought so but would check. On Friday, I thought that something might be wrong. On Saturday we realized he wasn't eating his kibble, so we gave him extra gushy food.  We even got him some special food just for him. We thought maybe he had a bad tooth or something.   Then on Sunday we noticed one pupil was larger than the other, that there was now a lump on his neck or under his chin and his breathing was odd.   We got him to the vet on Monday, in the only emergency time slot that was available.  Monday afternoon we brought him home to bury him. 

We were totally stunned and hadn't expected to lose Phil at all because a few days ago, he was his normal self.  An xray showed his lungs were full of fluid, so much that there was barely any clear area and it had pushed his esophagus along his spine.  The vet said that the pupil size differences suggested that this was an incurable virus that he'd picked up as a kitten and that there was no cure, at least that is available here.    We had to make the difficult decision right then.   We really weren't prepared for this and had no expectations that we wouldn't be bringing Phil home.

Phil was my lap cat.   He slept on my legs almost every night.  Many days he demanded that I let him nap on top of me in the afternoons, which lead to a lot of novels being read, with a cat snuggled on me. In the winter he would crawl under the covers at night.  He'd figured out that if he wiggled his head up near the pillow, so that his head wasn't under the blankets, he could sleep there for hours or all night. 

He chose us as a home.   One summer we kept seeing an orange cat around the property for a few weeks. 

Supervisor Phil asleep on the job

Then one morning I was outside and he came up to me on the deck, crying and meowing.  I didn't know what to do, but I brought him some food and water, as he was so very skinny.   The next morning he showed up with his brother.  After a couple of scary incidents with predators, the two boys became house cats.  

They were both sweeties and didn't act like feral cats.  We thought they may have been drop offs, which sometimes happens in rural areas.   They were both well socialized and accustomed to people.   They fit into our family perfectly.  Phil was such a character that he was best friend to all of his chosen people and shared his affection freely.   He was a helper kitty, curious and liked to supervise everything.  I will miss him thinking that every skein of yarn was his to play with.  I will miss his cuddles, his charm and his personality.  This loss will be difficult to get over as it just hit us without any notice or time to prepare. 

RIP Phil, and safe trip over the rainbow bridge.

More socks, and odd things happening

We don't have a bush lot, so we buy our wood in logs from a local tree service, in dump truck loads.  What type of wood we get and when we get it, depends a lot on where he is cutting and for whom.   We've been getting a lot of maple this year in smaller sizes, which slices and dices so quickly.    Last week he dropped off a load, but one long, skinny log got caught under the dump truck tailgate.  It unlatched half of it, and while trying to hook it back on, it dropped on the other side, and crashed to the ground.  Unfortunately, he couldn't pick it up until the next afternoon, so it sat in the middle of our driveway looking quite sad.   I got photos but I didn't run outside to do so, as I didn't want to get in the way, or make the driver feel badly.

Sock that wouldn't fit anyone!

I've been making socks, or trying to.   If you don't want to practice and practice some more, this is not the
fibre art you want to try.   The learning curve is huge, but if you practice, watch videos, read and have someone to either help you out or answer your questions, it's not insurmountable.   I'm having successes now.  I went to a "crank in" on the weekend.  That's a gathering of people who haul 50 plus lbs of cast iron and aluminum bits and pieces, plus some yarn, and crank socks together, while socializing.   It makes for a fun day, but very little productivity, because counting and chatting doesn't work for me.  Not having a physical counter on my Legare, I have to count in my head, and as soon as I drift off to a conversation, I lose my count.    At the end of the day, I made one sock which wouldn't fit anyone in my family.  I also forgot to write down the various numbers of rows for each step, so I wouldn't be able to make a second one.   The whole event was very good for me in that I learned a couple of things, but moreso, I realized that even experienced crankers are making the same mistakes that I am making.  Plus I had a lovely compliment from the gal who sat next to me, who hadn't realized that I was a "newbie".

I went with a friend who is the mentor who is answering my many, many questions.  I'd asked her about cast on bonnets with metal rings.  She gave me some rings, plus teeny tiny stitch markers  to try.  I made a cast on bonnet with the rings yesterday.   It's different, and when it works, it was really easy to use.  A bit faster than a traditional one, in that I didn't need to fish out the little bit of yarn and manually hook it on a needle.  However, it was pretty easy to get a ring hooked on a needle without yarn, which causes a jam.  I'll try it a few more times before I make a judgement.   I've realized though that having a few extra cast on bonnets is a good thing.

I tried out the new cast on bonnet last night, making a tube at various tensions to test gauge of this yarn.   Today I did the math and made this mock rib sock.   It should actually fit someone!   Once I make it's mate (yes, I did write down the pattern this time), I'll have to learn how to graft the toes together.   It's a bit different from doing it on hand knit socks.    That being said, I've also been told that I start to knit my socks from the wrong side, probably because of that hand knitting.   I don't think it really matters in the end, as long as I can translate any written patterns I might use.

chipmunk for cuteness factor

CSM practice

This is the first pair of matching socks I've managed to knit.   It was with a fairly thick sock yarn, with only 150 yards per 50 g.  It was only $3 per 50g, and there was no choice in colour, and as you can see, the patterns don't actually match.  I first thought it was a tension issue, but I redid the one sock and it was the same.   This sock yarn though, is insanely soft. I've never wanted to just fondle a skein of yarn as much as I'd have liked to do this stuff.   They are too small for me but they'll fit my daughter, except that I think they may be too wide.   They are just sitting there waiting for me to decide whether to rip them out and redo them or finish them up for her.  Except of course that I changed to a different cylinder with more needles, so one way or the other, they'll have to wait.

I've started knitting several socks a day over the past week.   I've learned to remind myself to rehang the weight before cranking after starting to hang the hem.  I can't believe how many times I did this, only to have stitches drop and tangled yarn, leading to taking it off the machine, ripping it out and starting again.

Then I got the hem hung and the leg of the sock knitting and halfway through the heel, some stitches would drop, usually on the left side.   It turns out that sometimes the brake doesn't quite tighten the yarn up all the way, leaving a loop which is too large to make a stitch.   If I'm slow and watching carefully, it's avoidable.   

Then I realized that I was using cheap sock yarn and it had little recovery or stretch, which made for difficulties in itself.  I don't know if it was because I was reusing the same skein over and over, or if it's all the yarn from that company.  It was $5 /100g, so it's super cheap, but maybe not the best to practice with.   I bought a bunch to make practice socks for my kids, but I'm not so sure if it isn't yarn that I might need to wait a bit to use, until I have more experience.

socks are different heights - but otherwise good!

Today, after a false start, I made a whole sock.  I'd done the math to hopefully get it to fit.   When I got to the toe, I was a  little leary, because yesterday I also made a sock which made it to the end, and them my waste yarn didn't catch and I'd ended up casting off the whole sock.  No waste yarn means that stitches drop and you can't graft the toe together.   But the waste yarn was fine.  Then I put some crochet yarn in for a separator and knit the second sock.  Somewhere in there, hubby started talking to me and my brain, which was counting rows went AWOL.  The results is 2 socks which are almost the same.   Sock 2 is just a tad too long for my foot but it's also 1.5 inches longer than the first sock!

This yarn was mid priced, and I'd tried to hand knit a sock from it, but it wasn't my favourite because it's a bit splitty.  However, it knit up on the machine quite nicely.

There aren't quite enough hours in the day for all the things I'd like to accomplish sadly.   

This weekend we're doing a cooking class about hearth cooking.  I set the menu as Vegetable soup with forcemeat balls, waffles, carrot pie and lemonade.   Forcemeat is sausage, and little balls were made and either cooked separately or just popped into the soup to cook, to enrich it.   Waffles because I got a cast Iron waffle maker and haven't had a chance to use it yet, and carrot pie to show how to bake in a dutch oven.  Carrot pie is like a pumpkin pie, but using carrots instead.  It's surprisingly good.

 

Legare 400-

 It's here!   "It", is a Legare sock knitting machine my husband purchased for my birthday.   It's a newer model, but I don't really have a date for it, just that it was one of the later models.   It's mostly complete.  It doesn't have the box and is missing a couple of tools, but otherwise, it's functional.   It's heavy!  I knew it was heavy, since it's cast iron, but I wasn't expecting it to be quite so heavy.

Unpacking it was fun.   It was packed into this tiny box, with lots of paper, bubble wrap and tons of packing tape was securing everything.  I know what most of the pieces do and where they go, but one is still unknown.  It's a tiny little key thing.   The manual is in french, and my francais isn't good enough to understand it.  My French  is good enough to say that "My French isn't good enough to understand the manual in French" though.   

Legare - was a company from Quebec, although the Creelman company in Ontario actually made the machines.    It's a closed cam machine, which means it's pretty quiet.   While I'd have liked a new machine, because they are really state of the art and lovely, the cost is just too much right now.   This one works though and I've assembled it, learned to make a tube, hang a hem, make a picot, make a heel, and right now working on the toe.  It's a bit confusing to me, that since the toe is the same as the heel, that I should be having issues with the toe.  I also learned to cast on 3 different ways: with a web, using the cast on basket, and then with a cast on bonnet, which was the first project I made.

The first day I assembled it, and worked on trying to knit a tube.   I managed to get the yarn stand assembled backwards.   I found a video which showed the proper way to assemble it which was nice, since while it did work backwards, it was confusing to me because I couldn't figure out how the heel brake worked.   It's all good now though.

I've been running through all my little partial balls of leftover sock yarn in playing with it.   Then I used some yarn which I had a full 100g of, but it got crunchy after a short while, so it's been sitting, waiting for a project.  It was lovely stuff when I purchased it, but I've no idea why it changed.  It's never happened before, but it's now harsh and icky.  This is what I made the cast on bonnet with.  It's never going to touch a foot, so it doesn't matter that it's a bit harsh.

I took the rest of the crunchy yarn, after I'd made the bonnet and practiced some heels.  I actually made a tube with 7 heels on it.   I was having issues, and then I managed to look at a diagram of the cylinder from another company's manual ( maybe Creelman?) and saw where I should put the heel hooks.  I am currently using just the one V hook which was original to the machine.   Once I figured out where to place it when making the heel, it was a game changer.     It's supposed to be the same for the toe, and since the toe is exactly the same as the heel, I'm not sure why I keep dropping stitches.   

How do I know I'm having problems with the toes?  I found a formula for making socks to size.   I knit a tube to check the tension of this yarn, and then followed a formula to work out how many rows I'd need for the foot.  Everything is good until I get to the toe.   I'm guessing that I just need to figure out where the weights should go for the toe to make it perfect.

Yesterday my V hook fell apart and one of the very sharp hooks fell out of the brass tubing.   Hubby re-crimped it into place and it's working just fine now.

This sock yarn is a bit thicker than most,  It's lovely and soft though.    I will rip this one back and try again tomorrow.  Everyone has told me of the really huge learning curve to making socks.  I've only had my machine for a week, so I'm pretty happy with what I've accomplished so far.  I'm even keeping notes!   I've a book in which I'm writing down my steps/patterns, so I can make a matching second sock, and then duplicate them if I like the yarn and can get more of it.    I'm also keeping a running list of tension settings and stitches per inch/gauge, so that I can also have a starting point.

I've been reading blogs, forums, articles, books etc, and it seems some people use only specific yarn brands, which would definitely make it easier to keep your tension and gauge even.  However, I do enjoy a good sale, so some of the yarn I have is off brand yarn, and sometimes name brand stuff,  that I got at bargain price.   I recently got some yarns to practice with that were $4.99 for 100 g.   That's a very good price for sock yarn.  This will make practice socks and I'll save the good stuff for when I know what I"m doing.   I've gotten all my kids shoe sizes, so I will use their feet to practice getting different sizes.  :)   Now to find a 60 needle cylinder, a buckle and some heel forks.   And.. yarn, lots more sock yarn.

Summery projects

 I'm waiting for a parcel.   It's my birthday present and is supposed to arrive next week.   I just got the tracking number so the estimated delivery date is probably correct.   However, once in a while when I order things, they come early.  My fingers are crossed that this is one of those times.  We're also taking a family trip to Dundurn Castle.  I've been before but it was a number of years ago.  This time we'll be taking my daughter and her husband, so it will be fun.  I bought the tickets online.   I got a barcode for a ticket.   I used to be able to save my ticket stubs as memorabilia.   Barcodes just don't evoke the same memories.

I used an old sheet to fit the bodice pattern of Sew Liberty's Hinterland dress.   Then I found this piece of fabric which was enough to cut out the dress for a wearable mockup.  I've no idea why I purchased this, except that I remember it being crazy cheap on sale.  It's nice enough but not normally my style.  I do however, have a similar fabric but in blue stripes which I do like.   Once I know of any other changes need to be made to the pattern, I'll use the fabric I really like to make a second dress.

The Hinterland has been pretty easy to fit and assemble.  One of the hints was to use masking tape to mark the right side of the fabric.  Usually I use tailor's chalk, but it hasn't stopped the occasional  mistake.  But with the masking tape, I've had no issues at all.  It's now my new go to for making sure I have the right sides of the fabric marked.  Because it's green low tack painters tape, it hasn't left any residue yet.

My old but really nice Pfaff sewing machine is being cranky.  I haven't been able to get the tension set properly.   It probably needs a tune up, but since I have several old black Singers and an old Kenmore which all work well right now, I'm just using one of those instead.  This is mainly because I need some new socks, so that means a trip to the yarn store.

I found a skein and a half of this Paton's Lace yarn.  It's acrylic and a little fuzzy, so it acts a bit like mohair, getting caught up on itself.   I made a scarf on the floor loom a while ago, and had no problems.  This one though, I put on the rigid heddle loom and had to fuss about a bit to figure out how to weave it without having to unstick the shed every throw of the shuttle.   I found it needed a lot of tension and very easy beating, just gently placing the weft rather than pushing it down.   It's much faster now and I'm enjoying weaving it.

The rippenkopper cotton/hemp tea towels are still on the table loom.  I'm still not enjoying the 3/1 twill and having to use a stick shuttle..  But if I can weave them off, I have a fun tea towel project to do next.  I'm not sure I have allowed enough loom waste to do them on the floor loom, but that would be even easier.

The weather has been either hot and dry, or cool and wet.   Our pond almost dried up because we had no rain for so long.   Then it rained, and rained and rained.  The pond almost overflowed!   When conditions get hot and dry during the summer, our grass goes dormant.  It may look like it's dying, but it's just turned off until it rains.   And rain it has.   We even had a whole day of steady rain.  We couldn't remember when we last had a rain like this.  So after days of rain on and off,  the grass is green and the garden has gone wild with growth.

These are slicing tomato plants that my son in law started for me.  I don't think we've ever had fruit starting so early in the season.  The cherry tomatoes or maybe grape tomatoes are also fruiting already.   I've been harvesting zucchini already.  I staggered planting the green beans to hopefully have a continuous harvest.  However with the rain and heat, the second planting has almost caught up with the first.   I have space for a 3rd row of beans.   The potatoes I forgot to dig up last fall, have survived the winter and are growing like crazy too.   So yay for that! 

We found a fly strip that works.  It's a sticky paper, but it's not gloppy, doesn't drip and actually catches the flies.  Since we live in a rural area, there are flies.  There are so many fewer in the house this summer because of this new fly strip.   That makes me happy.

 

On gardens, and spinning and some bits and pieces

DH has been in his happy place lately.   Finally his wood supplier, dropped off 2 small dump truck loads of logs.   The loads were definitely smaller than normal, but were maple and a size which was easy to slice up.  Then he got a call that they were in the area, and did he want a 3rd load of Locust wood.   He said sure.  Locust wood is very hard, but slices and splits easily.  Because it's so hard, it takes longer to dry.  However it burns really well and for a long time when it's mixed with other hardwoods.    It took him only a couple of days to have it all sliced and ready to be split.   He does enjoy doing the wood, which is nice since we use it for heat.   

I've been seeing this little guy in the garden for weeks now.   He was just barely a handful when I first saw him.   He's still around.   We had a couple of larger rabbits around for a couple of years now, but I haven't seen a large bunny since last autumn.    This guy though is all over our garden.   He's in the front, the back, and this picture is from in the fenced off garden. The last time I had bunnies in there, I was planting on the ground and my whole crop of kohlrabi had bites out of them.  Not a single one was harvestable.  However with the beds now being so high, my veggies are safe from bunnies at least.  I put in some of the solar lights, some sticks,  some really tacky dollar store spinning decorations, and a lot of straw mulch to try to protect the plants from other hungry garden pests.   So far it's kept the robins and grackles away from my young, just sprouted seedlings.   

We finally had some rain too, so I've not had to water the garden for days.  It's been cool though, so many of the plants have just stalled.   Nothing has grown much over the past couple of weeks except the lettuce and kale.   They love this weather.   I've been harvesting fresh salad every 3 days.   I planted a green leaf lettuce, red romaine, buttercrunch lettuce and kale.   It makes for a lovely salad.  In other garden news, something ate my pumpkin seeds before they sprouted, so they've been replanted.  It's been so cold though, that they haven't sprouted yet either.  

I wish I could say I've woven lots of things.   I've done a bit of spinning.   I thought I was spinning superwash for a pair of socks, but nope, just regular Blue Faced Leicester, so while it's nice yarn, not what I was looking for.  I do have some superwash merino that I can card up for socks though.   I have been weaving off the project on my table loom.  It's a bit sucky because it's a 1/3 twill and the sett is such that I need to use a stick shuttle because the boat shuttle falls though.   Since I'm alternating the twill, there are always 3 shots in a row that I can't used the boat shuttle.   The stick shuttle is slow.   I'm a lot faster with it because I usually use a stick shuttle with the rigid heddle loom, but I'd planned to use the boat shuttle, so it's taking a lot longer than I'd anticipated.

I started dressing the rigid heddle loom with a scarf.  I'm not sure why but I definitely chose the wrong reed, so will have to pull out the yarn from the reed, change it out and rethread the whole thing. Maybe this is why I don't weave nearly so much during the nice weather.

I've been doing lots of research on Circular Sock Machines.   They are expensive.   I don't want to make a mistake.   I may have a line on a functional antique one, but I'm getting impatient waiting, although it's really not that long a wait.  It would still be faster than waiting for a new one and at least I could afford it  more or less, and have a larger fund for yarn available.  New csms cost thousands of dollars, plus they are either coming from the other side of the world, so take weeks to get here, or come from closer, but have months long wait lists.   I'm still hoping for the antique one though.   Hubby thinks the antique one would be best, or if I need to get a new one, to get one from the US, with a long wait list, but more accessible parts.  Plus there is the whole political issues locally with people having had bad experiences with the ones from the other side of the world.   I don't want to get involved in that stuff. 

I was at the Marr shop at Westfield Heritage Village.  Because the day started off very slow, I didn't bother to untie the great wheel.   That was a bad decision though as it turned out really busy.  As well, a lady from Maryland I think, came by.   They were visiting for a few days.  She brought her drop spindle and some flax that she'd grown in her garden.  It was lovely stuff.

I had to make Dion kitty some kitty kickers so he'd leave my baby wombat stuffy alone.   We're both happy now.   I did make baked donuts, filled with jam.  They were delicious.  We ate half of them before I found some ants on them.   I thought they'd be safe in the glass cake stand.  It has a domed cover and keeps baked goods fresh for days.   Obviously not safe from marauding ants though.   I'll also have to replace the sugar as they're in the bin too.   Everything at risk will now go into the cupboards for the summer and not on the counters.    They don't seem to find the ant traps inviting so I'm not sure what options I have other than putting things out of reach and wiping down the counters every time I see an ant.