Meanderings - Kate Robertson
Monday, 10 October 2005
New week
Well its a new week and hopefully I will be better adjusted to this working thing. I am a little more comfortable driving again. It seems I am stuck in rush hour going to work coming home and at lunch time. With just a few modifications I can lessen that fact. taking different roads and all that, it seems to help.
WeavingMy friend Amy came over last night to show me her latest blanket before she mails it out. It had dark greens and browns primarily and really looked nice. Really made me want to finish my blanket that has been on my loom forever. Now for the time.....
KnittingI have been knitting the green vest and its at a point where I need to sit down with it and figure where I go next. So it is not a traveling project anymore. So I am now taking the Norwegian's sleeves as a travel project. I have one cuff's ribbing done and have started on the color work. I may also want to start that Opal sock for the 3rd time. the first time it was too wimpy the second I downsized needles but did not add extra stitches so it was too small. Oh to begin again.
I don't fell quite so sore today. Sure the pain is there but it is manageable. I guess finally having a day off helped.
Wednesday, 5 October 2005
THe Morning After
Yesterday - a day I'd like to forget. The truck at work did not get here until 11:00 so it was wait wait wait again. So we ended up working until 530. By the time we left I was really exhausted. MOving books around is hard work. Within 5 minutes I was in a car accident.
17th street busy as can be. The light must have changed while I was looking elsewhere, I plowed into a lady. Racked up major damage on her rear end and minor to the truck. I ended up with a 62.00 fine I need to pay now. I guess I can no longer say that I was never in a "fender bender". I don't want to even drive now. I hate how that happens. I just have to remember that no one was hurt and that its only minor damage, sure our insurance rates will climb but there is nothing I can do about that. I need to put it all behind me but that is hard. Here is hoping today moves smoothly and effortlessly.
I eased my troubles with a hot bath and read the Yarn Harlot she was especially funny ... I really needed that. I spun a little of the red silk which is as pleasing as spinning can get.
Tuesday, 4 October 2005
Back to the Grind
Well I am back to the grind of working. Yesterday was easy since it turned out trucks were not to arrive until Tuesday. So we spent the morning cleaning the place and orientating ourselves to the store. We only worked 1/2 a day.
I went home at noon and thought I would weave but do to a lack of sleep and major stomach issues I went to bed and slept the entire afternoon.
Sunday night I managed to get about 18" of Tartan woven. So it is on the down stretch I am hoping. I hope that I am not too exhausted tonight to work on it.
KnittingI picked up the green vest the other day and have been working on that. I have the back done to the armholes and am just knitting away on that now. I see the end of this pretty soon. I am getting all these project to sorta end status where they are hard to take on the road so my mind says "new Project". Danger....
I did attempt to start Birch and had issues with my cast on being too tight, so I will sit down and begin again. I found I can undo knitting with this yarn but the cast on is impossible. So I will start again sometime soon. I think I will cast on a larger needle and then transfer it. That should help.
I guess I am running out of time...
Monday, 26 September 2005
Wicked Tinkers, Bonny Legs and Yarn
Mood:
chatty
Well we had a Bonny Time at the Treasure Valley Celtic Festival and Highland Games in Boise. We got up at 4 O'Clock am GROAN... We were on the road by 5. We stopped at a Scottish Restaurant in Chubbuck you know the one Mc Donalds. Now that we were fortified we were on our way. Sarah and I slept most of the way since we had our trusty chauffeur Dave to do the driving.
We found the festival just fine. Too bad it was so flipping cold. I had brought a wool sweater and my Clan Robertson scarf that I got in Inverness last summer. I could have used some heavy wool socks and boots. I had tennis shoes on and the field was wet so my feet were cold most of the day.
Not having attended one of these before I didn't quite know what to expect. Men and women in kilts and skirts of various size and type from the tiny kids to the old men. It was great, so many different Tartans represented. They had vendors selling lots of Celtic jewelry, We took Dave around and showed him what we liked. Hopefully some of it shows up in our Christmas stocking.
A few pics for your enjoyment.
A group of Pipers 
The Wicked Tinkers - what a band 
Here is Sarah with the band wearing her "Wallup the Cat" T-shirt
Some of the Men in the bonny knees contest 
here is my favorite... he was such a cutie! He is in the center.
More contestants 
Now see the women judges at work
I met with my Tartan buddy aka Tim Cayler, the man I am weaving the samples for. I met his wife and several other people in the organization. I left my samples with him. They were pleased with the initial offerings so that was nice.
Here I am with Tim and Eileen.
Well no trip to another town should leave out checking out the yarn shops. I knew of 2 in town. We did not have much time to get there before the shop closed. I had 20 minutes to shop. I think I would have come home with more treats but it was hard. Too much to choose from. I will be glad to go back there again. I should of taken pics, the camera was in the car but I did not think about it till too late. oh Well. But I did end up with this gem
Yes I got this to do Birch. It is actually lighter than the picture shows. I hope my skills are up to the task. I thought I might try a swatch in another yarn before I begin just to become with the pattern and all.
We spent the night at the Econo Lodge, Cheap Motel but nice. I found Knitwits the next day. I was glad they were open on Sunday. Once again hard to choose but I found this to make FiberTrends Faina Scarf. It should be lovely. Its an 8 ply wool from Australia and should be lovely with this pattern.
The Faina Scarf
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at 11:31 AM MDT
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Updated: Monday, 26 September 2005 12:58 PM MDT
Friday, 23 September 2005
Katrina revisited
My sister Marianne sent these pics of Susan, Katie and Ginger getting their package from me.
Here they are when the package arrived.
Susan in her new shawl, I think it looks great on her.
Here are Ginger and Katie showing the dishtowels I sent.
Susan reading the letter I sent. This family could use a lot of assistance so please help if you can. The Address to send things in below in the Katrina post.
Well I am determined to weave today so this has to be short. I am off to Boise this weekend to go to a Scottish festival. It should be great Men in Kilts... what more can you ask for.
Wednesday, 21 September 2005
Rain Rain Rain
Mood:
bright
Yes its raining and raining buckets which is unusual for here. I didn't have my table outside covered up so I headed out in the deluge. I thought I could cover with a plastic tablecloth but it was too short. Went and grabbed a tarp and its covered now but of course I am drenched. I wish we had some wood, I would light a fire.
I just got back from knitting group. Wow it sure is fun to go to this group. I will miss it the next few weeks. I will be working full time until the store is open. Then I can schedule the time off.
Well yesterday I got the loom warped and threaded. I am trying to decide whether I should push and try to get it woven by friday night, or just relax and do it next week and then just mail it to the guy. Tommorow I work and then I have evening plans to so I have this afternoon and friday to finish. Well I guess I will do what I can today and see. We have a college advice seminar to go to tonight. I think I may try using the endfeed shuttles this time. I need to have good edges. I am not that comfortable using the shuttles yet but this whole project has been about trying something new.
Its really starting to look like fall. Some of the leaves on the trees are starting to change. With all the rainy and cool weather it gives me the feeling of nesting. I feel like curling up on the couch and knitting or spinning the day away.
Tuesday, 20 September 2005
If I knew then what I know now
Weekend recap
I managed to finish the body of the Norwegian so now I am working on the sleeves. I finished the BFL socks. Aren't they pretty and they both fit now.
I then picked up the lace socks to finish and decided on 9 repeats instead of 10 so now I am working on the body of the sock. Slow going on size 0 needles. These socks are from the Folk Socks book by Nancy Bush
I took apart the purple vest and am redoing the ribbing. Decided to do seed stitch instead and it looks much better. When going from one project on size 0 to another on 9's it is really strange.
TODAY
I am starting to feel like the Yarn Harlot with her mishaps or Sara Lamb with her deadlines. The next time I am thinking of volunteering to do something will someone please stop me. Here is my new rule if you volunteer to do something remember it is going to take 1o times longer than you think it will.
We are going to the Scottish Festival in Boise on Saturday and I said I would have the tartan done by then. After my last bout of resleying the sett I had about 30" of warp left. So I thought I could at least weave one of the samples needed and deliver that and then put on a new warp. Well by the time I tied back on I had less warp then I thought. So I thought I will just tie on a new warp on the back of the old. Now of course I have never tried this before. I discovered it works best if you have some warp left over. So I stopped weaving at about 6" of my sample.
What you end up with is something looking like this.
You will see 2 set of lease sticks for each warp. Then I had to beam the warp without going through the heddle area like I usually do. I ended up attaching the raddle to the top of the loom. It was time consuming but worked ok. Here is a shot of that.
After getting that all done you set about to ties the knots between the 2 warps. You do this under tension and it would have worked great with different yarn. I broke three out of 25 thread in my first grouping. At that rate I would have a lot of broken threads. This was not going to work, the yarn is just too weak for that stress. So now I am back to square one. I am threading the new warp the old fashioned way and the cloth I had hoped to weave on the old warp is toast. I just ended up cutting it off. Now I could have saved a lot of time if one I had originally put on a longer warp or just skipped this tie on. Live and Learn I hope.
Saturday, 17 September 2005
A new job and other digressions
Well its Fall again. It rained all last night and its overcast and cool today. I do have some news. My days of leisure are over. I've gotten a temporary job at Barnes and Noble. They are opening their new store in the Mall soon. I will be setting up the store and may continue on in a part time basis if I like working there. I am thinking it might be a nice part time job, but we will see.
I dyed some more fleece in rabbit brush and then some in madder. I may overdye both of them next week. It is supposed to warm up in a couple days.
I am still plugging away on all the knitting projects. I am starting to feel like I have too many going so I will have to finish something I guess. I did the toes on the socks so that pair is done. I am working on a Lace pair from Folk socks. I am beginning to hate size 0 needles. Man the going is slow, no wonder I never finished them before. I am doing the heel flap now. I may have to work on the green vest(size 8 needles) or that purple vest(size 6 needles) just to regain my sanity. Those projects are in transition, they never made it to UFO status since they stayed in my knitting basket. I think a UFO needs to be packaged up with pattern and yarns and put away to qualify. I have plenty of those. The Norwegian has about 5-6 rows left in the body and then I need to do the sleeves, which means back to size 1 needles for sleeve ribbing. The sweater is a drop shoulder one so that means the sleeves will not be that long so thats a plus.
I sat and spun a little last night and then plied the yarn that was pleasant. I think I want to get back to preparing my silver Shetland fleeces. They are time consuming but I think the batts and the yarn will be lovely. I haven't decided if I want to spin that peach/orange basket of batts yet. I have no purpose for the yarn yet. It got prepared because I found a bag of dyed fleece and figured it was time to use it. m Maybe I should do that with the other dyed locks I have found. I know I have yellows and greens in containers downstairs. Time for an inventory and then set up some plans on what I want to process next.
Tuesday, 13 September 2005
KATRINA
I haven't written about Katrina since I had so many other things going on. My sis Marianne is in Natchez MS and all they got was rain which was great. It took a week and a half for her to find out if her grown sons were OK. They live in a suburb of New Orleans. Can you imagine that!
Well Natchez now has 3 times its normal population. She is staying with her friend Maggie, who has rental property and they have a displaced family from New Orleans staying there. I have adopted the family in the sense that I am sending what I can and getting the word out to others who might like to help. I know many of you may have already donated to the Red Cross but if you haven't and would like to help here are some particulars about the family.
The family consists of the mom Susan and daughters Katie and Ginger ages 11 and 8. Clothing sizes are girls 10/12, girls 14-16, woman's large top 14 bottom. She is from New Orleans. She has the kids in school and they have school supplies and such. Marianne says that she is a single mom and the job prospects in the area are slim to none. Money is the easiest thing to send, that way they can get what they need. Or you can send a package if you like. I sent a handwoven triangular shawl and some dishtowels. Its so hard to realize that they have lost everything. I sent the towels because that is what I tend to make. The thought that she might not have dishes to use towels on was sort of heartbreaking. One feels so small in a tragedy so huge I guess if we can find something that helps at least one person we become part of the healing that needs to take place.
The address is
217 Clifton ave.
Natchez ms. 39120
Here is the family. Thanks for your help.
Monday, 12 September 2005
Mangles, dishwasher and Knitting
Topic: Knitting
Here is a pic of my new toy. Its a mangle in case you are clueless. I got it free from a member of our spinning guild. I will use it for ironing, and setting handwoven fabric and maybe in the felting process too. I played a little this morning. I ironed handkerchiefs, napkins, dishtowels and tried a shirt. I need to practice more to figure on how to do a shirt but it is doable.
I finished the purple vest so I pulled out another UFO, first the pattern and then the work in progress.
I had to undo a row as there were mistakes but now I am moving on. It is so close to being done. By the size of the woman's glasses you can tell this is an old pattern. It was from Knitters years ago.
Last night I carded all the orange- peach fleece. I have not decided if I should blend or spin as it is and have several different shades or not. They do look pretty though. There are more lighter shades than the picture shows.
Now to appease the hubby who started reading my blog, oh no does that mean I can't chastise him here anymore, of course I can, its my blog after all.
He lamented that I never talked about the dishwasher after I complained about it well here is a lovely picture to show that he does get things done sometimes. Now isn't that a beautiful dishwasher!
Last night I finished the second sock but the first had been a little short so I planned to rip out the toe and redo and guess what I did, Now I can't believe I was really so stupid, maybe it was too late to be working on knitting or something but I ripped out the wrong toe, yes the toe I had just finished knitting. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRr So now today I have 2 toe's to do. Now I wonder about other knitters and what they do when they are really frustrated with a project. Do you throw the piece of knitting across the room and refuse to look at it for a couple days, or do you work it out right away. Now I know thats how projects become UFO's and I do plan to finish my socks just not today. I have to work on something else to keep my sanity.
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