spinning – Page 2 – Enchilada Sunrise

3: A yarny post

As I said the other day, I’m not only going to be talking about bipolar, but also about the knittng and spinning that I’m doing. I’m even hoping to get some spinning done during the event (because if I sit on this computer chair for 24 hours straight, I may never get up. It also occured to me that today might be a good day to do some finishing: sewing up and blocking of some of my knits that only need that doing for them to be finished. Sewing at the computer is probably easier than knitting at the computer, right? Although I could try that too. I know last time that didn’t work out terrible well, since I need two hands to knit and two hand to type… and don’t have four hands (dammit).

In preparation for doing spinning, the current view directly to my right looks like this:

And the view directly behind me looks like this:

Topics for the Blogathon / Q&A

As I said yesterday, one of the things I’m planning to do during the Blogathon is to talk about some of my experiences with being bipolar, and I was hoping that people would ask me any questions they have about the subject so that I could have a go at answering and maybe make some things clearer. I’ve thought of some possible topics to start with, so here’s a handy poll:

[poll id=”2″]

Or do you have any other questions or related topics you’d like me to expound upon? Is there anything specific that you’ve heard about bipolar, or gathered from the media, that you want to know about? Or do you want to know about stupid things I’ve done while manic? Or what knitting has to do with it? Feel free to ask absolutely anything (er, about bipolar / being bipolar) even if you think it’s a bit personal – if I feel it’s not something I want to talk about then I’ll say so, but I’m going to try to be as open and thorough as possible with this. Anyway, leave any other questions in the comments. Thank you!!

And as well as that whole topic, I’m planning to post about:

Knitting: what’s on my needles, recent finished objects, and what I want to do next.
Spinning: it’s the last two days of the Tour de Fleece!
Books, film, TV… maybe. Things that I’ve been reading or watching recently, which may include fanfiction. (Funnily enough I’ve just started reading Harry Potter fanfic again, which is what I did during the first Blogathon I took part in back in 2003. Oh the synchronicity!)
Links to other ‘thon-ers (mostly likely when my brain has shut down in the middle of the night ;-) )

I think that should keep me going!

Spin spin spin

Today is 4th July, which means it’s the start of the Tour de France for this year, and therefore also the Tour de Fleece. (I understand the date also has some link with Americans blowing up aliens with fireworks, but I’m not really sure about that.) And what that means is spinning along every day that the Tour de France is on. I’ve joined up to the Ravelry Group for it – this is my first time, which puts me on the Rookie team and I’m also in Team Jelly Legs, which Jo set up. That’s appropriate in more ways than one, as spinning every day will no doubt give me jelly legs, and I’m going to be using fibre from her etsy shop, Limegreenjelly.

This is the fibre I’ve started with:

Limegreenjelly Bluefaced Leicester in Turquoise-Navy-Red

It’s Blue Faced Leicester, and it feels absolutely lovely to spin with. I shall post progress photos when I have them. And do what I said I would yesterday and give some updates on what I’ve been up to in general!

Conquering entrelac

Or so far… not. Heeeeelp! I’ve been going backwards and forwards on the first half-inch (the setup triangles) of the entrelac sock pattern that is the second pair for this year’s Sock Knitter’s Pentathlon. I was getting great big gappy gaps between the triangles and after I looked at this tutorial / pattern [Ravlink] for an entrelac scarf that someone on the mailing list recommended, I came to the conclusion that it was because of the extra two rows at the top of the triangles in the sock pattern – they didn’t ‘attach’ to the sock cuff. (The triangles were made by knitting increasing short rows, using one more stitch from the cuff every time until you get to six. I don’t think I can describe it any better than that, but the scarf tutorial has pictures.) The scarf tutorial, which starts the short rows with knitting one stitch instead of two like the sock pattern, solves that problem. So that’s what I’ve now done with those.

[thumb:1122:l:l=d:t=]Pattern: buttercupia: Noro Entrelac Socks. [Ravlink]
Yarn: Posh Yarn Emily in ‘Troubadour’.
Needles: 2.75mm DPNs
Ravelry Project Page: SKP09 Pair #2

However! Now that I’ve done all the triangles, I’m a bit stumped. I have to pick up stitches to start the rectangle / diamond section, and it says to work left to right. But I’m not sure if I’m sposed to turn the work before I do that, or go “backwards” on the right side, or what. Aaaaaaah, confusing! I think I’m just going to have to experiment and see what happens. I should have knitted a swatch first. Oh well!!

Other than the entrelac socks, I’ve been doing some spinning, actually remembering to keep up with taking Project 365 photos (I’ll post those soon), and… um… also doing other stuff? Oh, I know – I have new glasses which is great because now I can see what I’m typing (always helpful), and I’ve also been reading a fair bit. In fact, I’m thinking of doing Dewey’s Read-a-thon, although I should probably make my mind up soon if I am going to join in. If I do, I don’t think I’ll commit to the whole 24 hours because I don’t want to mess my sleeping patterns up again just as they seem to be improving, but I could do 12 hours easily. I would say more, but it starts at 1pm BST (the site says GMT, but they mean current UK time by that, not actual GMT) and that would make my finishing time too late. And in fact, since it’s just past 1am right now, I think I’d better go to bed and get some kip! Night.

Fibrey goodness

Recently, I’ve been spinning as much as knitting. Jo has lent me her spare spinning wheel which is an Ashford Kiwi and I’ve been having lots of fun with it. I still need lots of practice, and so far I’m using some of the fibre that came with my drop spindle. There’s no fear of me running out of stuff to spin, though: even before Jo lent me her wheel, I had some of the yummy fibre from her Etsy shop. I now have six 100g-ish braids of hers, and I’ll post some pics here soon. Not right now though, because I’m about to upgrade my photo gallery as a prelude to the whole site upgrade – which should be quite soon now! I’ve got some really gorgeous colours in BFL and Merino, and the Merino/Tencel is even more delicious, but you’ll just have to take my word for it until the upgrade is all done and dusted.

In other Etsy news, my friend Rae has opened her Etsy shop, Angel Rae Arts. She’s selling some very cool (and cute) fridge magnets. I love the buried treasure one (which is from a photo taken when she was visiting me a few years ago!), and also the caffeinated cat one (painted) which really reminds me of the Xandermog. *g* The original one’s been sold already, but she’s done some more that aren’t identical, but very similar. Yay!

Carnival time!

It’s carnival week again, and I’m excited. Whee! I know it’s daft, but it does make me feel like I’m little again and it’s the summer holidays. *g* Not only that, but the Olympics starts technically-today (I’m going to bed any minute, really), which for me mainly means the Ravelympics. Which is like its own Olympic Games, only for knitting! No, really. I’m going to be having lots of fun with it anyway, and it might make me actually sit and watch some of the actual Games on telly if I have something to occupy myself with knitting-wise at the same time.

Since multiple affiliations are allowed, I’ve signed up to be in Team TARDIS (duh), Team Dog, Chicken and Aardvark (AKA the Brighton & Hove (and surrounding E Sx) Safari Knitters), and Team Posh Knitters. The ‘Events’ I’m doing are WIP Wrestling (because my WIPs need wrestling into submission very very badly!) plus the Handspun Heptathlon for Team DCA (yes, I’ve started spindle spinning, but no, I don’t have to do seven sub-events, it’s just a catchy title) and the Amigurumi-n-Toys Toss for Team TARDIS during which I’m going to actually try to crochet an Adipose. Well, it’s sposed to be a bit of a challenge, you see, so I thought trying two small projects in crafts that I’m a novice at would give me that and also give me a break from wrestling the WIPs so that doesn’t get to feel like a chore. There’s method in my madness! This time ;-)

Getting back to the carnival, there’s been various events going on all week and I’ve been down to a couple. I got well and truly drenched last Sunday, going down to the gig in the Old Town – elen_ancalima was visiting, so I was showing her the typical British summer seaside weekend ;-) Which of course includes sudden torrential rain! Anyway, I’m hoping to go down to a knitting exhibition thingy tomorrow afternoon, and of course to the main Carnival parade itself on Saturday.

Anyway, I think I’ll wrap this up now and get to bed. Zzzz. With a bit of luck, it should crosspost to LJ. However, I have now decided to change how this site works, so alterations to the look (as well as ‘my end’ of things) will be coming…. er…. some time this year? I have planning to do first! Night all.