fibergarden

OK, maybe not “big time”, but I am moving….moving it all over to my new URL, finally! Right now the new blog is kind of lousy in a layout and graphics sense, but I’m slowly working on it. I’m not the kind of person to say: “…and now….I unveil this totally fantastic, finished, never-to-be-updated or changed format”, so it is what it is and can only get better as Craig helps me work on it while the software is in it’s development stages.

I toyed with the idea of having two blogs, one personal and one fibery/business blog. But the reality is that life is way too short for two blogs, and that my fibery existence is completely tied to my “Momminess” at this stage in life–an obvious fact as I write with a snuggly one year old on my lap–got the picture? So, that said, away I go! Please join me at TemptressYarn. I’ll keep this blog up and running until I can hopefully transfer all of the old posts over there to save.

My goodies will still be for sale at Handmade for now. I get too much organic traffic there to ditch it, and it’s my official business name, so I think it’ll stick with it for a while. And I opened a new Etsy shop under TemptressYarn and will be moving my items there from the old Etsy shop as I offer new items.

New Years’ Resolutions: I usually don’t do it, thinking (in advance) that I shouldn’t make promises I won’t keep. So after mulling it over and waiting until January 4th, I am making a few, public resolutions that I have good intentions of keeping. Here goes:

1. Lose 10 pounds by making better choices and exercise. No earth-shaking goal here, just a reasonable one that I really need to do for my own self-esteem, comfort and health.
2. Feed my family more vegetarian meals.
3. Waste less, especially food. I have a bad habit of buying too much and then we get distracted, end up getting take out or eating out and then there’s icky food to chuck or compost. We are not doing CSA veggies this year, so that will immediately help us not have weird veggies around that we don’t like and are too difficult to use (like how much freakin’ KALE do they think an average household eats? Blech). Otherwise, I just need to learn to use the big chest freezer we have better…if we’re not gonna eat it, freeze it asap. Then make sure to use the frozen goodies within a month. Just takes some better planning, really. I can do this!!!
4. Be a better friend. Just make an occasional phone call and be more accountable with thank you cards in a reasonable time. This should be easy but I hate hate hate the phone and have been really bad with birthdays and thank you’s for the past year and a half or so. Having a new baby was an excuse but he’s 1yo now and that is wearing thin, so I will try. I also want to get in touch with a few “long lost” friends. After going to my 20 year high school reunion in November and having a really good time, it hit me that I need to reel some old friends back into the fold.
5. Patience and kindness..with others, especially with little A who is so lovable and yet so hard to understand, with energy I never had and never will have, with her unusual issues, sensitivities, and strong will to boot. Gotta be more patient with her and I know she will respond well.
6. Make our home liveable again. It’s not dirt, it’s not too cluttered (more than most, but still reasonable), it’s just in need of decorating style work, really. I am going to bite off small “feel good” projects and make progress on this disaster of a house. We are dying from the non-renovated, “old and yucky” style and some minor work will make it 50% better. This is a “do what I can, on my own” attempt and hopefully will lead us to get the big projects worked on (like the back room that’s been under construction for 3+ years now). I want to be able to invite friends over without being embarrassed by this place. I started by getting a new beautiful lampshade for our antique lamp to replace the old, stained one, and ordering a few light fixtures that need to be replaced….good progress already, gotta keep it up.

And fiber resolutions…wouldn’t be right without em:

7. Shop from my stash first. I am a sucker for pretty hand dyed fibers from certain vendors on etsy/on-line, and just keep stashing fiber away. I don’t have a ton of yarn (yet), but loose fiber is building up around here and I just need to use my drum carder and either blend it and spin/felt it, or start to liquidate a bit by selling some batts. I am NOT going on a fiber diet, just vowing to slim down how much I have stored here, and also plan to wash and dye the couple of fleeces I bought in the fall at Rhinebeck.
8. Fibery resolution #2: Make more gifts in 2008. Craig is always telling me he’d prefer that I give things away that I make instead of selling my stuff, and while this resolution is not for his sake, he’s really right. The few things I did manage to make and give away were hits at Christmas, and I need to do more of this. I’m not gonna stop selling as I can’t shake the entrepreneur bug, but I am going to use my talents to make friends and family some nice unique gifts.
9. Finish some needlework UFO’s. For a while I was going strong on this, and lately I am much better at seeing projects from start to finish, but I need to go back to my “finish an old before I can start a new” item diet, which worked for me for a while.
10. Learn new techniques and do as much knitting-spinning-felting-weaving-crochet as possible in 2008! This is my easy goal, thrown in to make an even 10.

There, I’ve made a public list, now I hope I can live up to much of it in 2008!
Happy New Year to all!
Carrie

I dunno…here, there, everywhere. Too busy to blog in too long. Here’s the dirt, quick updates, a few pics:

Home and Shelter Island, shuttling back and forth for weekends by ourselves, with friends, and my parents before they head south to FL for the winter. Up to Rhinebeck for the NY sheep and wool festival in late October, where I bought a ton of fiber, a few tools, and a test run on that Ashford country spinner that is now on my want list for sure:

In laws visited on a weekend in late October for a quick fix to squeeze their grandkids and go home. We got to go to a really muddy but pretty cool halloween display (2000 carved/lit pumpkins!) at the Nassau County Museum of Art…

Working my arse off spinning a selection of yarn to get some into NYC for the first time ever, which is very exciting for me. Some of these yarns can now be found at The Point NYC!! The rest are available at Handmade (my web shop) and/or etsy shop for great last minute quick holiday knits, or just give a skein to your favorite knitter:

Kindergarten…PTA meetings, school, wow. Keeping track of homework, permission slips, school paperwork. Little A is learning so fast and loving K, thank goodness! Also managing the Feingold diet to see how it affects her behavior…the jury is still out on this one, I’m afraid.

Hugging baby O, who is almost a year old now. Time flies. He is currently on a nursing strike and I don’t know how long it’ll last. I sneak him some mama milk when he’s half asleep, but otherwise he won’t take it. He got mad at me when he bit me and I yelled “NO!” at him (not really, more like raised my voice a fair amount, but ouch, he was really hurting me!!!), we’ll see how this situation resolves soon enough, I guess.

My Sister has opened up a gallery in Greenport and has some of my finished fiber art wearables on display there with her beautiful photos of the East End of Long Island, so I’m currently scrambling through all my UFO’s for things I can finish up and put there. This is keeping me busy, along with an ever increasing array of new projects, feeding my kids, keeping the house in order (not really), holiday planning, etc.

Aaaaah…the life of a fiber-artist-mama is busy but fulfilling. Aside from not having enough hours in the day, and no longer being able to keep my eyes open late into the night, I can’t complain really.
xo

I finally posted a small Temptress Yarn update at Handmade, with a gorgeous self-striping yarn that I spun from babycakes batts I bought from loop (a dream to spin!), a simple singles in lavender and this festive pair of Vegan (no animal fibers) skeins, spun from a drumcarded batt of red and lavender flax, cotton, denim cotton, orange ingeo (from corn), and black and gold sparkle. I plied it with a synthetic textured thread from Habu, my favorite fiber store. Anyhow, here’s a sneak peek of the vegan yarn, “Salsa”:

And a finished object I almost let “get away” without a photo, duh. I did this once before, this Spring. I created a gorgeous felt/knit combo scarf incorporating yarn I purchased from the marvelous Jacey at Insubordiknit. I brought it to a show only days after I finished it, priced it high because I didn’t wish to part with it ‘…but for the right price…” and it sold. An hour or so later I was kicking myself because I have NO photos of the damned thing, aargh!!!!!! (”It took so long to bake it….and I’ll never have that recipe again…oh no!”)

Anyhow…long story longer….I almost let this one get away at the Shelter Island show, and was able to get the buyer to model it for me at the last minute. I didn’t get permission to show her on my blog, so I cut her head off, but at least I have a few pics. The details are not showing well, though. I hand “wove” this on a large bubble wrap, laying pieces of felting roving over and under, then wove in a black and turquoise handspun of mine called “night sky”. After felting, I added ceramic beads on the fringe, and sewed on hundreds of little seed beads here and there in blues and blacks and irridescent hues. I was really happy with this piece. It sold before it got a name:

I just found this too-cute skirt pattern–Hey Mickey–designed by Jacqueline over at This Kitten Knits that I think I’m going to try to knit up for my daughter. (By the way, she’s having a Blogiversary contest, so be sure to sign up for it and say that I sent ya!). This skirt has a vintage look to me that reminds me a bit of those Catholic school skirts I had to wear for 12 years of my life (frightening thought, isn’t it?!), but in the right colors I think I’ll be able to erase that thought from my mind and it’ll look great on miss A, who is a picture of cuteness in skirts (and shorts, and t-shirts covered with mudpies, and well heck–she’s just cute, but I’m her Mama so I am allowed to have a jaded view of how totally cute my kid is, right?)

This is a formula pattern so I can probably work it up in my own handspun if I’m feeling really adventurous. I have a pound of a gorgeous green-purple wool-llama-mohairish blend that I bought last year at the NYSWF that would look great on little A, so maybe I can discipline myself enough to spin it up thin enough to use for this pattern. Then again, maybe not.

She’s also got a gorgeous shawl pattern called Nerides that I love, complete with little pearls on the fringe…check it out!

All my handspun is on sale over at the shop–Handmade. $5 off any skein until Labor Day. Say that you found it at my blog and get US shipping for only a buck (free shipping on any order over $50 as usual).

I thought a sale to help clear out some stock would inspire me to stay up late spinning down some of my ever-growing fiber stash. I may even post a few brand new yarns there in the next day or so if I can get the twist set and dry in time to photograph, so you may get access to some brand new skeins at sale prices. Run right over and check it out!!

Quick FO photo post…to show off a few things I’ve been pulling together lately. Two handspun necklaces–one plain, one with beads. And a hand felted pin with glass beads, sequins and decorative yarn trim. The pin is called ‘Flame’. Necklaces aren’t named yet, but probably will be. These should appear on the web site after the Craft Fair this weekend, provided they don’t sell. I had a lot of fun making the necklaces and will definitely try more. Already have new techniques in mind. It never ceases to amaze me that the possibilities with fiber art just seem to be endless. Anyhow, enjoy the pics…the other photos I took came out terribly. I think it’s time for a new camera (or a new photographer!)

Just a fast post with two new fo’s to show off(”what”, you say, Carrie has actually finished a project?) Well, yes I have…imagine that! Anyhow, here are sneaky peeks as they lay flat blocking on a blue towel that really doesn’t make them look their best. Top is a snippet of a yarn over scarf from a skein I spun called Carribbean. I had that skein on consignment at a lys and got it back a while ago. Decided to knit up instead of re-listing it. I used a commercially hairy yarn carried along on the tightly knit areas and in the fringe (fringe not shown).

And this one is the end of a belt-scarf hybrid from a recent skein I spun up and couldn’t keep my hands off, called ‘Royalty’. Knit both sides, with a buttonhole like loopy bit at the other end to slip the tail through if you want to wear it as a belt. Or it makes a great skinny scarf. I also made a wacky cell phone bag-cosy from this skein and a necklace that I’m pretty happy with. Will try to post those soon too

Not listing these for sale until after my show on Shelter Island in a few weeks, so if anybody is interested, give a yell. Will be at the Chamber of Commerce Arts and Crafts Fair at the school grounds, on August 25th with my Sister and her beautiful photos in the booth next door. It’s usually a good show for both of us and we meet lots of new and old friends there every year.

Finally something fibery to talk about! Spent the day doing this and that…taking care of baby, eating, doing dishes, etc. Went to the Bellmore Antiques flea market and picked up a wild dress that I think I’m gonna shred and spin up, Pluckyfluff style, though I don’t expect it to come out great like “The Emperor Has No Clothes” which was truly amazing! This dress is sheer and sparkly and has it’s own brilliance that I hope I can transform into a beautiful yarn…I figure for $6 it’s worth a shot! I also ran across another Sheffield Farms glass milk bottle to add to my collection. This one may be a cream bottle as it’s a half pint. My Grandfather worked for them (out of Brooklyn I think) as a milkman–I believe it was around the 1920’s– delivering milk with a horse and carriage, so I keep grabbing the bottles as I run across them.

So it was pretty much “do anything” today to avoid doing more cleaning/organizing/paperwork that I’ve been working on, though I’m off to work on it again late tonight after I scavenge something to eat for myself. This evening, baby O went to bed around 7–teething, cranky and exhausted–and since the rest of the fam is in FL visiting Grandparents, I broke out my bulk white roving and the dye pots and went to work! I always forget just how easy it is to dye, really. I managed to do about a pound of miscellaneous stuff in about an hour and the results, though still too hot to handle, look promising. I won’t bother to touch it until tomorrow when it’s cooled off. I think it’s just easier that way and less likely to have a felting accident from too much handling and wild temperature changes.

So, on the stove top I dyed some Wensleydale in sunset colors (accidentally let that one boil, so cross fingers it’s not a big felted glob when it cools!!). In my enamel roasters in the oven, I dyed some merino/tencel in red-purple-chartruse blend and some bluefaced leicester in a red-purple-dark green blend. I’ll add pics tomorrow when I rinse and hang it all to dry. It’s not much compared to the amazing Yarn Wench or others who dye for hours and produce piles of rovings to spin and sell, but a pound is enough for me to accomplish, and will keep me busy for some time.

Maybe I’ll use some of it to finally get some of my spindle kits packaged up to sell…a girl can dream, right?

Sorry I’m still not posting about fibery stuff, but I have to get this one out there. Mattel is recalling 92 (YES, you read it right, I count 92 product numbers on their recall page–horrific!!!!!) children’s and baby fisher price toys that have lead paint on them. Here’s a link to the CPSC page about it. Most of them are Dora and Sesame Street characters, and all of them seem to be aimed at kids under 6 or so–the ones most likely to get brain damage from lead poisoning.

I’m on the CPSC mailing list for recalls, and every week it seems that I receive 2-3 emails of toys or kids’ jewelry that contains or is painted with lead paints. Remember the lead pvc lunch box scandal of two years ago? The recent Thomas the train recalls? Why can’t these companies have quality control? You know they would turn the stuff away if a shipload arrived in the USA painted green instead of orange. Why can’t they attempt to keep their customers safe? It makes me sick to think about it. I paid $2 apiece for good-quality lead testing swabs to check my house. Why can’t these companies simply test samples of this stuff before they make billions selling them to our children? I think that corporate lead testing needs to be a law to protect our kids. It’s simple and can’t cost more than a few bucks per item. Enough is enough.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I believe that PVC is an evil toxic product and that much of it is tainted with lead (no real science behind it yet, but from a little reading I’ve done I’ve come to this conclusion…apparently lead is often used as a stabilizer in vinyl–remember warnings not to drink from the hose? That’s one of the reasons!) Beware and be suspicious of all PVC products, and all items that come from places where manufacturing standards are questionable. Think of those poor people who painted all that stuff, probably not wearing any protective gear, and then going home to spread the lead onto their kids. No doubt the recall won’t protect them. Blech.

Off to throw away anything suspicious while little A isn’t watching, and to pray that someday our corporations act responsibly, sigh.

Sadly, I have to add this bit, from today’s Reuters news, 8/13:
China recall toy factory boss hangs himself IMO, despite the lead painted toys being his fault, and that he does bear responsibility for the safety of his workers and their families, ultimately the burden for this horrible crime rests elsewhere. If they had simply done routine and cheap testing (as I suggested above) when the toys left the factory/entered the US, the whole problem would have been avoided. At the heart of it, corporate execs in charge of quality control at Mattel and Fisher Price are responsible for this mess. So sad…