Category: Knitting/Spinning

Ruby Mitts

After several days of knitting, ripping, designing and trying again, I finished the fingerless mitts to go with my favorite hat and scarf. Several years ago I designed a hat to use a beautiful ruby colored skein of yarn that I had purchased from Unplanned Peacock Studio (http://www.unplannedpeacock.com/), an independent yarn dyer from our region. I published the pattern on the database Ravelry. After a year of wearing that hat, I approached UPP to see if she could duplicate the color so that I might make a scarf to go with the hat. She tried, but just couldn’t quite get it right. She had a hat of the same yarn and I thought perhaps she was trying to match it, but found out about a year later that her dog had destroyed the hat and she had no sample from which to work. Again, I begged and offered her the small remnant ball I had from making my hat and again she tried, and tried, but this time she succeeded and I bought two skeins, used to design and make a scarf to match the hat. Another period of time passed and I decided that I really wanted to make mitts or gloves to go with the hat and scarf. She still had a skein of the yarn and I purchased it. Tonight brought success. The Ruby Hat, Ruby Scarf, and Ruby Mitts are all free patterns on Ravelry and here, Ruby Hat (http://goo.gl/yAfQV) and later Ruby Scarf (http://goo.gl/uzjTFo), and Ruby Mitts http://goo.gl/C80YhQ.

This is what they look like

Finished just in time for this weekend’s cold, wet weather.

November 1, 2014
Olio – October 24, 2014

Olio: a miscellaneous collection of things.

Our internet issues seem to be finally resolved, many months and many mistakes later, we are back with our original cell provider and our original internet/phone provider. The lines have been repaired, the speed boosted as much as it can be boosted given our physical distance from the nearest booster from our small community cooperative telephone/internet provider. They also provide cable TV service, but their HD is not HD, so we opt to receive cable elsewhere. Life was so much simpler with an antenna, a house phone line, no internet and no cell phones; cheaper too.

The sweater was ripped out and restarted using a yoke pattern instead of a raglan pattern, the sleeves have been put on waste yarn and the body is being worked slowly. This pattern is from one of Ann Budd’s formula books, so it should fit.

The twisty rib pattern at the top is interesting. Hopefully it will block into a nice yoke for the sweater that is otherwise very plain.

As the sweater has already gotten too bulky to want to tote around with me when I am the car passenger, I finally started the mitts that are made of Unplanned Peacock Superwash Merino in a colorway named for me as it was dyed especially for me to match a skein I purchased from her several years ago and from which I designed and made Ruby Hat (http://goo.gl/yAfQV) and later Ruby Scarf (http://goo.gl/uzjTFo), both free patterns on Ravelry. Ruby Hat is my favorite hat and has its own story, but that is for another day. The mitts are also being made from one of Ann Budd’s formula books to wear with the hat and scarf or just around the house at night when my hands get cold. They are the perfect portable pocket project for the car.

I am frequently amused at questions I get from folks that I know have grown up their entire lives in this rural county. Today, the phone/internet installer saw my chickens wandering about the yard and ask me very innocently if my hens were laying now that the weather is cooling down. My response was yes, except for the one who was molting. I could tell from his expression that he didn’t have a clue what I was talking about and he said his egg production from 10 hens was down to only a couple each day. I asked him how old his hens were and most of them are only about a year and a half old, so experiencing their first molt this season, thus his lack of eggs. He also wasn’t feeding them any calcium, not even giving them back their own shells. He left educated by the city girl with a ziplock sack of crushed oyster shell to free feed his hens and a promise that once their feathers were back in that he would start seeing eggs again. He also was surprised that Son#1 and I could kill and process our culls and meat birds. He said though he could shoot and dress a deer, he wasn’t sure he could do a chicken. Our flock is enjoying their daily freedom to dig in the gardens, to look for bugs and tender blades of grass. When we need them safely away from the dogs or driveway, I just go out like the Pied Piper with my little cup of scratch that I shake and they come running and follow me back to the safety of the electric fence.

The pumpkin vines are dying back more each day and revealing more of the winter squash. I thought that only the Burgess Buttercup survived and that I didn’t get any Seminole pumpkins, but realize that it is a half and half mix, except the pumpkins for the most part haven’t turned tan. The ones that I picked and put on the picnic table are beginning to turn. The wormy ones get split with a hatchet and thrown into the chicken run for them to enjoy. A side benefit is that the seeds are a natural anti parasitic for the chickens. The peppers and tomatillos survived the cold nights predicted in the last post. I am letting the remaining fruits mature until we are threatened again and I will do another harvest. The last batch was made into another 4 pints of Tomatillo/Habanero sauce, the hottest batch yet. Maybe I should change it’s name from XXX to Insanity. I sure can’t eat it, but Son#1 will love it. The Farmers’ Market last week had many vendors of apples. I came home with another peck of mixed crisp red apples and realizing that they would not stay crisp until we finished them all, I used about a third to make another batch of Apple Cranberry Chutney (http://wp.me/p3JVVn-Ja), using 1 cup of honey instead of brown sugar this time. The shelves are full of goodies even after having taken two crates of canned goodness to Northern Virginia on the last two trips to return son and grandson.

Lovin’ life on our mountain farm and continuing to gather knowledge to fight the pipeline.

October 24, 2014
Rippit, Rippit, Rippit

No, we don’t have a frog in the house. Rippit is a sound that knitters don’t like. There are times when a project just isn’t right. If it is a little error not to far back, you can Tink (Knit backwards) and correct your error. Sometimes you find a big error too far back and have to just rip it out.

The sweater that I have been making for myself to go with the lovely Hitchhiker scarf at the top of the photo had progressed to sleeves by early this week. By Wednesday night, half of one sleeve was complete and I tried the sweater on to check the sleeve length. What I found was a sweater a bit too large in the body with huge sleeves. I had followed the pattern and was very frustrated that the sleeves were so large. The Knit Night crew suggested not adding the stitches under the sleeve, but the pattern wouldn’t let you just knit around, so I picked up the stitches and did significant decreases in the first couple of rows in the underarm area. Once I had one sleeve long enough to try again, it was better, but I just didn’t like the size of the whole sweater.

This was on the heels of having just given away a sweater I made last spring that was too small through the back and shoulders. Rather than spend more hours finishing this sweater that I knew I would not ever enjoy, tonight’s decision was to Rippit. About half of the sweater is now rolled back into balls. The rest sitting in my lap awaiting the same fate. Rather than try this pattern again in a smaller size, I have found a different pattern. The new pattern will use much less yardage, but that is okay. I have two granddaughters who might like sweaters for Christmas, so I will just continue to Rippit. . .and then enjoy the process of knitting sweaters that will be worn.

October 19, 2014
Issues and finishes

About a week ago, we learned that a proposed natural gas pipeline route had been relocated to cross our county. As best we can tell, just below our property following the easement that the power company has for heavy load transmission lines, does that make sense, to run a gas line under electrical lines? This gas will be coming from fracking in West Virginia and transported across our county and several adjacent counties to one south and east of us. This is clearly not something that we support and hope that at tonight’s Board of Supervisors’ meeting, there will be strong and vocal opposition. In addition to the 40+” buried pipeline, there will be several pumping stations, the locations of which have not been decided or at least not revealed. One of the counties that was on the original route were so adamantly opposed and raised valid enough opposition that the route was reconsidered. The two counties that it is slated to pass through after our county have mounted opposition groups.

On my trip home on Tuesday, I passed through a county that is on a different proposed pipeline route and every property has opposition signs along the roadway and about 1/3 of the properties were for sale before property values plummet if the pipeline goes through their county.

We fear for our property value, but also for our groundwater and physical safety if the line does indeed go beneath the electrical lines. Our county sits on limestone and is riddled with caves and sinkholes. It is subject to rare, but recorded earthquakes. If there were a breach in the pipeline due to a sinkhole or other disaster, it could ruin the groundwater on which this county relies as most residents get their water from springs or wells.

To add to this threat, we experienced another torrential rain two nights ago that made our state maintained gravel road look like it had been clawed out by a giant cat with gullies up to a foot deep traversing across it back and forth. Mountaingdad has spoken with a VDOT representative on the road about the issue that the road swale tips in one direction then the other with no rain bars or culverts to direct the flow. It tips toward our driveway about 20 feet up the hill and our culvert fills with gravel and mud from the road several times a year. We have hand dug it out, had VDOT dig it out and now we are getting gravel building up on the downhill side of the culvert in our yard. VDOT says they can’t do anything but regrade it with the same swale and won’t seem to consider adding culverts to direct the flow. This is another battle we will have to again fight.

I did finish the never ending Socks On A Plane today. They have been on the needles for at least a year.

They have a lovely little cable down the outside edge of each foot that the yarn totally swallowed. And to add insult to injury, they are too small for my foot, so I am going to have to find a new owner for them whose foot is smaller than an 8.

Last night at Knit Night, I ripped out the entire sleeve on the sweater I have been knitting as the armhole was so ginormous that I could put 4 of my upper arms in each one. I have started them again following a decrease patter that has brought the sleeve size down to one that is still large, but might actually fit inside my winter coats. My sweater knitting has not been very good for the last year. One I made for me was too small and found a new owner in a knitter friend. This one is too large, but I don’t want to rip it all out, so if I can make the sleeves work, I will just wear it.

October 16, 2014
Knit, Spin, Stain, Cook

With two days of beautiful weather, I finished all of the staining that I can reach and with the cooler, wetter weather coming, it may be all that gets done this fall. We will have to finish it this spring. I made up a gallon of the stain mix this morning and the area that was to be done didn’t require that much, so the excess was used to get about 2/3 of the coop “redecorated.” The girls were on a walk-a-bout on the farm, being supervised by Romeo, so it was a good time to get it done. We have a few days of rain due, so the last bit can’t be done for a few days. The year and a half it has been in use, it has gotten very dry and faded. The egg hatch, pop door and side drop window are all made of the same plywood siding as the coop and their exposed edges are really showing wear from the weather. I guess at some point, those three features will have to be replaced with a more weather resistant material.

Coming in, stain covered and worn out, after a thorough clean up, I turned my waning energy to less strenuous tasks. I’m working on one of the sleeves of my sweater, the one that is being knit to go with the Hitchhiker scarf made during the summer.

And an Ouroboros Moebius scarf, a design by a friend Mergaret Radcliff, published in the December 2013, Knit n’ Style magazine. The scarf will be for Son #1 as part of his Christmas gift.

Both projects are pretty mindless knitting at this point.
I’ve looked at “Hot Mess” for enough days that I think the measly 106 yards of tight overspun very fine yarn is going to become a knitted cover for a small sturdy plastic cup to hang from my spinning wheel to hold the machine oil, orifice hook and notions I need when spinning.

Tonight we enjoyed a “gourmet” meal utilizing some of the goodies from this year’s garden. The basic baked pork chops were topped with chutney that I canned, the Roasted veggies a blend of our yellow and white sweet potatoes, garlic, and rosemary added to farmers’ market potato’s, carrots and onions. A farmers’ market salad mix topped with beets, our radish kimchi and goat cheese.
Lovin’ life on our mountain farm.

October 9, 2014
Olio, October 6, 2014

Olio: A miscellaneous collection of things.

The garden survived a 31ºf night and a 37ºf night through the aid of some row cover over the peppers and tomatillos. The beans that haven’t been eaten by the deer that have breeched the electric fence also survived. The pumpkins/winter squash patch is finally beginning to die back and there are dozens of the Burgess Buttercup squash beginning to show through. So far I don’t see a single Seminole Pumpkin which is disappointing. Today I waded through the thigh high patch, pulled back the squash vines and tried to dig the sweet potatoes.

I’m sure there are more there, but the vines will have to die back more before I try again. Now that they are harvested, they require a few days of curing at 80ºf. I don’t know how that will happen with the daytime temperatures at least 15 degrees lower than that and we haven’t turned the heat on in the house so it is 20 degrees cooler. I put them out on a rack in the sun this morning, but then the rains started, so they are in the utility room until we see sunshine again.

In July when visited our daughter’s family in Florida, our granddaughter came out in the cutest sun dress.

She and her mom love it because she can dress herself in it and it has no fasteners. Over confident Mountaingmom announced, “That would be so easy to make.” The bodice was traced on printer paper, the tiers measured approximately and brought home to the farm. Later two packets of fat quarters were purchased and I stalled. Before the Spinning retreat, I decided to begin them. First off, I failed to cut the front on a fold, I do know better. Second error was attempting to use three strands of narrow elastic to gather the back, I ended up buying wide underwear elastic later. Third error was in the measurements I had made of the ruffles which I realized before cutting. Daughter remeasured everything for me and a few days ago, I got serious about finishing the first dress.

Yesterday after finishing it, I decided that dress #2 was going to be made with a pattern and I purchased a simple A-line toddler dress pattern from McCall. As I still wanted to use the fat quarter that I bought for the second dress, The solution was to cut wide strips, sew them end to end, then side to side to create a large striped panel that was used to cut the pattern. I had some unbleached muslin that I used as facing as the pattern called for binding the edges with bias tape and I didn’t want to do that. Dress #2 was much easier to assemble.

As granddaughter lives in Florida, she will be able to wear them all year with a long sleeve T-shirt under them, so 3 T’s were bought to add to the package. Also in the package is a giraffe. Yes, a giraffe. Two Christmases ago, we bought her a little barn that has various activity parts to it and a collection of farm animals to put inside. Their dog got a couple of the animals and chewed them up, some of which were replaced, she selected a moose for her farm. Near their home is a farm that has a giraffe. We don’t know why or how they obtained it, but it is a source of amusement as we drive by, so her barn will now also have a giraffe.

The Hot Mess yarn that I spun at the retreat, was soaked and hung with a weight on it. The treatment helped relax the over twist some, so now I have a 106 yard skein of smooth, but tight yarn.

I have no idea what to do with it. It is too little for anything other than trim on something. There isn’t even enough to make a market bag.

The yarn on the bobbin is the random color Merino that I purchased at the retreat. The color isn’t showing up very well with no sun out and only house lighting to photograph it in, but it is basically lilac color with gold and maroon highlight. I haven’t finished plying it yet to measure, but it looks like it will be a couple hundred yards of fingering weight yarn.

Lovin’ life on our mountain farm.

October 6, 2014
The Retreat

Thursday morning, I departed, leaving Mountaingdad home to care for dogs, chickens, and for part of the weekend, also Son #1 and Grandson #1, while I traveled two hours west with a spinner friend to Hawks Nest State Park for a 3 day spinning retreat. And a treat it was. In route the other 4 of the other spinners from our local group met us at Tamarack, a delightful juried craft market with a cafe run by The Greenbrier. We wandered and ogled the wood, glass, pottery, weaving, prints, and quilts then had our lunch in the cafe before making the last half hour trek to the park.

There we were treated to rooms, most that overlooked a long section of the New River Gorge.

The view from our room and from the conference room of the retreat.
Check in area of the lobby.
We didn’t even unpack before we set up our wheels and started to spin, Shetland, Mohair, Cotswold, Dorset, Alpaca, Yak and Silk. Many vendors with more fiber to tempt this hungry group of fiber artists.

Spinners and weavers, tables of fluff, chatter and knitting, all lots of fun stuff.

At night we partied on goodies brought from home and pot luck shared with beverages of choice. To town we zipped for lunch at the Cathedral Cafe for homemade soup, salad and bread, then homemade Chai tea and carrot cake. Another evening to town for pizza, salad and beer or rootbeer.

Three days of new friends and old, food, fiber and fellowship. Each of us leaving with a goody bag of fiber samples, notebooks, pens, pencils, patterns and a door prize each of wonderful donated weavings, fiber, photo frames, salsa and chips, bags or other wonderful surprises.

In spite of the chattery good times, much yarn was made, much was woven or knit. I succeeded in over 400 yards of a mixed fiber skein.

This will be added to my growing mixed fiber yarn of naturals and colors that will be a blanket someday.

This hot mess of overspun Merino that looks like a 106 yard long hair scrunchy.

And 100 grams of beautiful Merino that is awaiting the other 100 grams to be spun and plied that will become a gift scarf for some lucky person.

The Hot Mess was Merino purchased there as is the Merino that is only half done and the 8 ounce bag of Dorset Lamb fiber the Hot Mess is sitting on. I will enjoy more spinning reminders from the weekend and look forward to the next retreat in late winter of the one next fall. I will return.

September 28, 2014
Where have you been my whole life?

The canning was finished yesterday by early afternoon and Mountaingdad was off riding his BBH (big bad Harley) as it was a beautiful day and beautiful riding days will soon end for the season. I drove down to the local grocery, a real small town affair with produce displayed outside and much of it local and picked up half a peck each of Golden Delicious and Rome apples and spent hours peeling, coring and chopping them for a batch of applesauce. Thinking that it would be enough for the season, I jarred it up for canning and realized I only had 7 pints, not enough. My hands were so sore I wasn’t looking forward to another round of peeling. Though I am not a big fan of gadgets, trip was made to Walmart for a flat of jars and an apple peeler/corer, but it was a double fail. This morning, a quick internet search showed that Bed, Bath and Beyond in a nearby town carried the peeler and I knew that Kroger Grocery had the jars, so we made a pre football run to make the purchases.

Quick work of another peck of apples, peeled, cored, sliced and chopped in about 30 minutes. Part of that was learning how the device worked. The apples have cooked down and another 6 pints prepared for the winter.

The Green Tomato Chutney smelled so good yesterday, and made such a small amount that I decided to spend some time gathering and picking just about every green tomato left in the garden, many requiring significant paring of bad spots and making a double recipe of the Chutney. It is simmering on the stove.

I wish you could smell my kitchen right now. I’m hoping for at least 4 or 5 pints from it after it has cooked down.

Last night after the canning was complete, I did finish one of my sweaters. This is homespun yarn made by a friend and gifted to me by another friend. It should be a great fall sweater.

Perhaps I should wear it with a contrasting shirt. Now I am back to working on the other sweater and the dresses for one of our grandgirls.

Lovin’ life on our mountain farm.

September 21, 2014
The Last. . .

…harvest of tomatoes that is. The vines are dry and brown, the handful of remaining tomatoes are being decimated by the stinkbugs and each day I pull and toss a vine to the chickens to pick over. There are a few remaining green slicer tomatoes and I will enjoy them as fried green tomatoes, a treat that I rarely indulge, partly because my diet contains very little fried food and partly because I let them ripen on the vine during warm weather to enjoy sliced or canned.

These will be canned probably into salsa to add to the root cellar shelves to enjoy and remember a successful tomato season when the snow is falling or the cold wet wind is blowing much sooner than ready.

…the last pullet figured out the egg laying business, sort of. There was a tiny egg this morning, apparently laid yesterday in the run and not seen until this morning when I went to let them out. It was dark when I locked them up last night when I came in from knit night. Surprisingly, nothing found it during the night. Now, if she will just lay them in the nesting boxes with the other hens. Romeo is a very frustrated young roo. None of his ladies in waiting will stand still for him to mount them, they run and peck. When he was first added to the run, several squatted in submission, but not now. It is going to be hard for us to raise a heritage flock if that behavior continues.

…of the 5 gallon bucket of stain will be mixed this morning once the fog clears, to stain the soffit and fascia board overhang from the front porch. At knit night last night, I ran into the manager of the Sherman Williams in the coffee shop and he suggested I wait until this weekend to buy more as the stain that we use will be on sale for 40% off and that is a significant savings in dollars for our budget. That also gives me two days for my sore and painful shoulder to calm down before I tackle the log wall of the front of the house. Saturday is to be mild and breezy with humidity in the right range for the project, so that will be the day to complete the task.

…the last few rows of the beautiful handspun sweater. The photo doesn’t do the color justice but it is lovely. It should be ready for the spinning retreat I will be attending soon.

September 18, 2014
Production and loss

We seem to have a reprieve from the rainy weather. This is allowing the deck maintenance to commence. Yesterday our handyman neighbor painted the railing and balusters with the semi opaque stain. Today he is rolling the stain on the front porch and given enough time will move to the back deck.

We are trying one of the new deck resurfacers on the back. That deck is uncovered and south facing, so it is fully exposed day in and day out. Perhaps the acrylic based resurfacer will hold up better than stains have.
Last night after dinner, I took table scraps to the chickens and every one came scurrying over for their share. Two hours later when I went back over to lock them in for the night, one of the March pullets was dead at the bottom of the ramp. There were no signs of trauma, there had been no signs of illness and no warning. Internet research was unhelpful other than to suggest that since she was young she may have become eggbound. I have only been getting 3 or 4 eggs each day for the past week out of two hens and 11 pullets, so perhaps she just never figured it to out.
I finished my Hitchhiker made with Rivulet Island Yarn in Peacock color. It is larger than the pattern as I continued adding points to use up the yarn. It is currently drying on the spare bed downstairs.

I am pleased with it and as the evenings are cool now, I’ll begin the cardigan out of Shepherd’s Wool in Great Lakes color to wear with it.

August 26, 2014