Par-tay!

This past week the spinning guild (or at least part of it, about 16 brave folks) held the annual xmas party, at Swinney Homestead. We were masked except while eating potluck and laughed our way through the gift exchange.

I don't know what they call the kind of gift exchange we do. Each participant brings a wrapped present and selects a number from a hat. Person #1 selects a gift and unwraps it. Each subsequent person can either select a gift to unwrap OR steal a previously unwrapped gift (limit of three steals per gift). At the end, person #1 gets a chance to steal if they wish. It's the stealing that produces the most laughter.

I brought a braid of Tasman Comeback. (I can't find a good online description of this roving, but basically it is produced by breeding a merino sheep with a long-wool sheep, then breeding the resulting animal back to the merino, I believe.) I wound up with a skein of Bamboo Blossom thick 'n thin yarn in a colorway called "Spicy Mustard". I think this will become a long cowl.

Knitting: I'm down to the final bit of sock yarn for the Habitation throw, so theoretically I should be done with it by next weekend. Or would be but for the holidays. The scarf is 26" long.

The physical therapy sessions are DONE! I just need to continue stretching most days and exercising my shoulders twice a week. I'm pretty pleased with the results of the replacement. As I go about my daily routine, I don't even think about that joint.

I hab a code

Despite being vaxxed, using hand sanitizer, avoiding crowds, and distancing socially, I managed to catch *another* cold. This one felt very ordinary - sneezing, running nose, watery eyes - so I didn't worry that it might be Covid. I've always believed that being exposed to germs was a good thing as it exercises one's immune system. I'm wondering if the way we have been avoiding germs lately has had the opposite effect, leaving us more vulnerable. (There is nothing scientific about my so-called theory; just some musing on my part.)

Knitting: Not much progress here because of all the napping I did the past few days. The marigold/loden scarf is 17" long now. The twist feels a bit loose, so I set up a shoebox system to avoid adding/substracting twist as I knit.

Our last weavers guild meeting of the year involves eating and crafting. This year, instead of a potluck (or as it is called in Indiana, carry-in,rhymes with carrion), we ate prepackaged foods. For our craft, we made ornaments. Those who had inkle bands used those, while the rest of us used ribbon. My bands seemed to be too narrow or too wide, so I used some (non-xmas-y) ribbon just to get the feel of the process.

The tetrahedron one is from a pattern in the Holiday 2020 issue of Little Looms. I don't know where the star pattern came from. Maybe someday I will weave some holiday-looking inkle bands and make these (and others) with that.

Swatching matters

When the local spinning guild visited Wabash Woollen Works (which I have yet to blog about), my SO acted as my chauffeur (and earned props as the only man brave enough to do such a "girly" thing). While there, I told him to pick out some yarn for a new scarf. He chose a skein of alpaca in hand dyed "Marigold" and a skein of merino/alpaca in what I will call "Loden". Before starting the scarf, I created some samples to see what he might like.

I was concerned about the alpaca stretching (it doesn't snap back), so I first tried holding both yarns together and knitting some garter. Then I tried mistake rib with both strands, which proved to be too bulky. Then I tried some striping in mistake rib. And just for fun, wove a tiny sample.

Despite the diameter of the alpaca being smaller than the blend, the marigold overwhelmed the loden in the weaving. My SO did not want stripes and wanted less drape than one of his current scarves, so he picked the plain garter. I am slipping the first stitch knitwise to give the fabric more stability.

Knitting: The new scarf is now 7.5" long. I feel like I am in the homestretch with the Habitation throw, but each row is over 250 stitches now, so it is slow going.
Weaving: On the inkle loom, I wove about six inches of the Krokbragd sheep, then unwove about six inches, as I found I wasn't picking up one thread. I was tempted to just give up and cut the warp off the loom, but I knew I would feel better about it today. (I do.) This isn't the first mistake I have made on this warp, so I will soldier on and make more mistakes while I practice.

When I had my windows replaced recently, I took down the bathroom curtain I knit a while back. The inner side looks fine, but the outer one is surprisingly faded. I used Dem-N-Nit Pure Indigo Cotton yarn, so I guess I should have expected it to fade, just like denim does.

This past week was busy. One happy surprise was being able to attend my granddaughter's dance recital. Other than her piano recital last spring, I have not been able to see her in action up on a stage for a l-o-n-g time. This county is in the red zone now re Covid, so I don't know if "they" will try to shut down such events again. At least everyone, dancers and audience alike, was masked and there were enough performances that people could spread out in the high school auditorium. Unless things change, this will be our new normal going forward.