My first Homemade Spindle

So I Made My Own!
I'm really liking the hand spindling. I think it is one, fascinating and two, such a feeling of satisfaction when an entire spindle is full with lovely singles. Here are the pics. Its just a basic dowel, little wire hook and a rubber grommet I got at a local hardward store with a 50mm donut bead ordered off the internet.
I now have three spindles and this is the lightest one. I haven't weighed it yet, but I sure am able to get a very fine single out of it. I can't remember what this fiber is and maybe I never knew anyway. It was some freeby fiber I got when I took a class with Judith MacKenzie last year in Santa Monica. What do you think? Want one?

Finally I'm IN!

I just got notification that after 3 years of prospective member status...

I won, I won, I won too

Though it wasn't yarn. I won a worm factory Yea! I'm starting a balcony garden and I thought why not do balcony composting to. So very soon I will have a couple hundred new pets to take care of. Well I won't be walking them or anything, but I have to make sure I eat my vegetables so they can have the leftovers.

Also I've been drooling over the Judith MacKenzie workshop at Maryland Sheep and Wool. I might just spring for it and come out three days early so I can learn from a master.

My vote is over and now I must find yarn for Oblique and Tangled Yoke. Any suggestions?

FO to report "Sweetheart Socks"
and "Surplice Lace Top"
boy do I need a hair cut! Sorry the pics need to be rotated, but I don't have time I'm off to work. So be careful and try to avoid a kink in your neck.

Dawn

I won! I won!

Isn't it funny how when you spend money in a store you bought something but when you spend money on Ebay, you won it. In any event, the sense of victory is overwhelming. I have a ball of Trekking XXL #126 coming my way, and I am so happy with myself. I saw this yarn knitted up at Sellyn Yarns in Augusta, GA while on a yarncrawl with some of my new knitting coworkers. We were smitten, but they no longer had the yarn in stock. I figured it would be easy to identify the Trekking colorway and find it for sale online. On the contrary, apparently this yarn was a hot commodity in 2006 and had been discontinued, reissued, and discontinued again. I'm so out of the loop here in rural SC. Discovering that it was impossible to find made me want it that much more! There was a lively discussion on a Knitter's Review forum about an Ebay auction of this yarn going for $43. Who cares how much someone spends on a ball of wool? Ebay functions on the fact that a thing is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. All that said, I got the skein for $13! I guess that's the beauty of being out of touch with the rest of the knitting world... No one's competing with me for 2006's must-have sock yarn!

On the sock knitting front...

Completed the 4x4 ribbed socks I was working on back in November when we were down at the beach...

Immediately cast on for a new pair in Lorna's Laces. As usual, I hadn't even taken care of the loose ends (literally) on the Cascade Sassy Stripes pair. It didn't even cross my mind to wear them-- After my finishing techniques class, I hid my ends, promptly wore them outside with no shoes, and even tidied the ends on the completed Lorna's Lace sock while the second one was still in progress!

Here's the Dream In Color I bought on the internet during a moment of weakness when I realized I had switched the needle tips on my Denise interchangeable needles to a larger size in the middle of doing the lace repeats on the Diamonds for Rhiannon baby blanket!

Have you tried the Noro sock yarn yet?

Reminding myself...

that I can handle today.