Hand over the llama and no one gets hurt.

Or, why the postman doesn't stand a chance
in hell. So quit worrying, Spiff.

A few people have asked what this "snow tire" is
that I claim to be knitting. Right here.
Guess who won the llama fight?

Again, I come to you after two weeks of radio silence, thanks to a plethora of fly-bys the shit-fairy decided to rain down on my head. But I come to you bearing a llama snow tire, so hopefully you'll forgive me and keep reading. And yes, I'm knitting right off the bobbin. Hey, at least I bothered to ply it. Man from south of France is desperate for something to protect against the snow, which started to fly last week. So I'm * spinning, plying, knitting brioche stitch straight from bobbin, repeat from *.

So, for excuses, let's see, how many off-the-charts crap instances can one person take? Impossible deadlines and no edited material with which to meet these deadlines? Check. Stepfather who fell off his roof after his heart surgery now needing a heart transplant? Check. Kid who had been previously screened out of occupational therapy now screened back in and having a wicked hard time? Check. Discover new country puts you on a waiting list to address an urgent need for kid to have learning help? Check. For a whole freaking year? Check. Pay through the nose for private therapy instead? Check. Re-explain "pay through the nose" to father-in-law? Check. And let's not even talk about the demise of the laptop. The machinery is minor compared to the humans, but it's still painful, and no, no word from the laptop doc yet. I'm not hopeful.

On the not-so-off-the-charts-but-crappy-anyway scale, my postman is an idiot. So really, Spiff, you should hang around just to experience the level of idiocy, whereupon you will instantly realise that all suspicions of me and the guy in blue getting it on are about as likely as me flawlessly remembering for the rest of my life to turn the oven off. And you know how likely that is....

The other llama (I did admit to that earlier, right?) is still not here AND the guy nearly sent back my Alden Amos book because, you know, there were customs charges on it. And he didn't want to collect the customs charges. Which is his freaking JOB. Spiff, darling, besides the fact that I can't live one single day without your beautiful face nearby, the postman sent back my spinning book. 'Nuff said.

On the bright side, I got to have a pseudo-wish-it-was-Thanksgiving-lunch with Kate, who at last word was still pregnant and wondering if Baby thinks she's an elephant. It's going to be tough for this kid to see the blackboard from inside the womb, you know? I gave her belly a wee little lecture about how it is not nice to keep your mother waiting (despite the insanely early birth of Twinkletoes, I have a LOT of experience with a kid who moves at the speed of a herd of migrating pregnant turtles who suddenly realise that in Montréal, the roadsigns for north sometimes mean west, but only on Tuesdays and Thursdays). Then we ate a ton of roast chicken, which was not very good, but it was as close as we could get to Turkey Day, and then we went yarn shopping. And it wasn't my fault, Kate. It's a yarn shop. I spotted good yarn for you. Duh. You know you wanted it. And thank you for giving me even more to be thankful for. You're da bomb, babe.

And then, on the "there has to be a bright side to this" side...

Remember this lovely llama-down yarn I spun?
Damned good thing I just asked Spiff
if he really likes the colour or not.
He, um, hates it. (Please ignore hobbit hand.)

Major reboot with the Elven Love Note. Mainly, all that yarn I spun is in a colour my husband really would rather not think about, much less wear around his neck. We will not discuss the exact reference he thought of in relation to this colour. It's too painful.

A more blended version of this is the colour Spiff really wants.
You would think I'd be mad. But hey, I asked.
And a good thing, too. Solution? Pierre.

Normally, I would have ploughed ahead with the scarf, and then been pissed as hell that Spiff, for some reason, never wears the scarf I worked my ass off to create lovingly created with tender thoughts of my dear husband in mind with every stitch. In the midst of the shitstorm (because I tend to think of the worst case scenarios for everything when I am in the midst of a shitstorm), I thought, hmmm, maybe I should double-check with Spiff on this colour before I design, spin, and knit a whole freaking lotta love in the form of runes for him and then discover years from now that the reason he doesn't wear it is because he thinks the colour looks like birdshit.

My brother, on the other hand, loves to dress in birdshit brown, so, you know, nothing wasted here, we'll find a taker for that yarn, yet.

Dude. You would ask first before knitting, too.
This is a LOT of work, writing a lovenote.
Note the lighting. It's bloody late. I do my best lovenotes at night.

Lest you think that Spiff is being picky and I'm rolling over and playing dead, look: you wouldn't wear a scarf in a colour you hate either. And this is a love note. I want it to be in a colour he loves. I'm just glad I asked him about it before I got to the knitting process. Colour, we can change. We would prefer to change it before we have knit over ten thousand stitches in the colour that will not be worn, but we will happily change it if it means a visit to Pierre Thiran's basement in Outremont to select an obscene amount of roving in five colours. And I'm not kidding about my brother. He will be honoured to wear a birdshit scarf. I'll do nice, simple cables for him and he'll be so happy. And he deserves a little happiness right now. His shit-fairy appears to be working overtime, too.

Pierre Thiran to the rescue.
This is baby alpaca (on the left)
and superfine alpaca (on the right).
One single of each, plied, and Spiff WILL like it.

The careful readers among you might have noticed that I have just admitted to buying not two, but five colours. Poundage? Umm...I'll give you grammage. 3,500 grams. It was so cheap it could not be resisted, I tell you. Shut up.

The amazing thing (okay, one of many amazing things) is that Pierre is delivering the rest to my door. Because he felt bad that he didn't have enough of a couple of colours divided out into bags, and he didn't want to hold me up for too long. Only in Canada do you find a Belgian guy with Peruvian connections delivering alpaca to the door of an American ex-pat (whose French husband is probably going to give birth to une vache when he sees the sheer quantity of this stuff....)

Yep, you read that right. Alpaca takeout. Because I, um, cleaned him out of three colours. This is either a sign of my life suddenly turning ultra-heavenly (alpaca takeout! could llama be next?!), or me finally jumping over the cliff of "slightly reasonable on a good day" right into the abyss of "Alpaca. Next Door. Delivery. You'd Do It Too."

After I bought all this lovely stuff, Pierre asked me to demonstrate drop-spindling some of it, as it seems he's only really seen it done in Peru. The spinners he sells to are all wheel-spinners. So I just happened to have brought a spindle in my purse. (Oh, stop. I do so spin with it.) Talk about performance under pressure...I spindled and plied a few yards right there for him. I plied! Next door! Okay, a five-minute drive, but still...A guy who has taken a dyeing class at the local textile college and still has his little scrap of yellow dyed wool yarn he did himself, and gives you the number of the college so you, too, can learn "teinture." A person who devoted ten years to cutting out the middleman in Peru and getting the fibre money to the people who raise the alpacas, before he decided to continue to sell their fibre himself as a hobby after retirement. Now, that's the kind of fibre-seller you want to support. What a gem this guy is.

I had promised the bunny wool for this next post, and I did indeed get the red, and it is the most heavenly red red red that ever was. It is absolutely Lee Ann red. But it will have to wait a wee bit for another post, and hopefully I will be able to hold it together to post more soon. I have also received some amazing books, a giftie, and a bunch of other stuff I should probably admit to at some point or other...The books and a few other purchases have to do with the "s" word.

Unfortunately, not that "s" word.

A la prochaine....

P.S. Spiff, you are the Original Bright Side of the Story.

November 26, 2005 1:47 AM  | Permalink  | Comments (32)  | Print

Just a little yarn.

See? Harmless merino/tencel. Perfectly, utterly harmless.
And it turns into yarn. Which, you know,
you can knit with. Right?

I spoke to a non-knitter about knitting this past week, while I was upstairs at the neighbor's house drinking, chatting, and trying to forget that my laptop is utterly fried thanks to a glass of liquid and a dancing child. I also mentioned spinning, of course. You see, this "someone" is a trendspotter for the home department of a very large media conglomerate here in Québec, and she was shocked to hear that knitting is hot. That young women do it. That it is no longer just in the realm of the grandmamas who either spun for a paycheck or knit to alternately keep warm and embarrass the hell out of their grandchildren. (Come on, you know you've worn a reindeer sweater. Admit it. You got one, you put it on every time she came to visit, and you pasted a big smile on your face to boot. Had to. She's your grandmama. 'Nuff said.)

Anyway, I'm going to pull together a bit of information on how this "leisure activity" has caught fire, and why she should follow the smoke signal. Because here in Québec, I have to say, people haven't caught a whiff of the trend yet. Everywhere else in Canada, knitting shops with attached cafés and Stitch 'N' Bitch groups are springing up, but here, it's taking a long while to catch on in such a big way.

The above blatant take-it-off-and-show-us-the-goods photo, or what you, too, can do with a glorious hunk of roving, is part of my effort to show that it isn't just the grandmamas here. I'm doing it too. And I'm only kind of old, as my daughter would say.

And I do so knit. See?
This is what we call blind optimism.
Spin as you go, knit what you got.

There's something I haven't blogged about, but I should have, except that I was feeling a bit shy about it. The French version of the Canadian magazine Châtelaine had an article last month on knitting, and sponsored a contest. They also listed a bunch of knitting resources in Montréal, and my blog was the only anglophone blog on their list. I have no idea how I got there or why they contacted me to put me there, but I was thrilled to be a part of the effort to get people knitting. I very quietly put a link on the sidebar, but then a reader e-mailed me and said, hey, did you know you were in Châtelaine? so clearly the link was a little too quiet....

I have also found a possible source for alpaca roving in my very own town, and I'll report as soon as I have something to report. Suffice it to say that the source told me he sells to over a thousand spinners in Ontario, but can count the number of Québec spinners he sells to on one hand. I told him, Sir, if I have anything to do with it, you will have to use at least one more hand to count. And then, if that wasn't glorious enough, I found a shop called Paisley Fabrics (no website, to my knowledge, but they are located on 7489, St. Hubert), which sells Fleece Artist and ArtYarns. Oh. My. Aching. Visa. AND Ginette Verdone, the propriétaire, had the Fleece Artist catalogue, AND she did not think it at all insane of me to ask if she wouldn't mind ordering me some merino roving in Ruby Red. I wonder if she might consider selling spindles...hey, she sells banana silk yarn, so weirder things could happen, you know? The fibre life here may not have totally caught fire yet, but it does keep getting better.

In other knitting news (I do so knit), I'm designing the Elven Love Note. You would think that designing a scarf would be simple. There are certain measurements that insure the antidote to the dorky, too short or too thin for a guy kind of scarf. So you work within those measurements, kind of like the available grid for whatever you plan to place within it. A puzzle, of sorts. Heh. You have one cubit, so use it well. Well. Wellllll...heu...as Noah said in that infamous Bill Cosby routine, Riiiiiiiiight. What's a cubit?

It is not as easy as it looks. You don't want to create a strangulation device, and you don't want to create something that really should have been the kid's blanket instead. And you want it to be stunning and you want it to say I love you in the best way you know how. In my case, this would be translating my husband's name and the fact that I love him beyond belief into Elvish runes (excuse me, but why do I have to be the dark woods at the edge of the field while he gets to be God-Man? Hellooooo, Mr. Tolkien? Dude, you wrote to your mother with that pen?)

A surefire sign I'm a bit nervous about accidentally making a blanket:
This is what we call the start of a swatch.
Yes, that's handspun llama. Yes, I said "swatch." Shut up.

This exercise in patience and devotion soon-to-be-excellent scarf-cum-love-note will be done on US size 2 needles. When I'm done with that, I'll be knitting myself a straightjacket. Because I have a shipment of silky white llama coming soon, and it ought to do just fine for that, don't you think?

That shipment also includes a bunch of black llama. And a bunch of black walnut llama. I stopped short of actually asking for the animal, the llama-feed, and the shit shovel....

I admit it. I have only a small amount of black llama right now. So we are fighting over who gets the finished product from it. Therefore, in the interest of continued marital bliss, I thought it only right to find every llama farm I could contact in Canada and the U.S., ask them for more black roving, and see what I got.

What? You don't think that's perfect example of creative thinking in a tough situation? Just you wait till you touch the llama, honey. You'll thank me for this inventive alternative to couples therapy. Don't worry, I'll be posting llama farm addresses as I get them. I do like to share the love, you know.

Next post, bunnycrack. It's here, it's gorgeous, and I'll be using my new wheel to spin it, as soon as I get said new wheel. Oh, oops...I kind of forgot to say...I'm, uh, getting a Hitchhiker. I decided that I can't bear to let the one I'm currently using go to her next unsuspecting victim of that cute little foot-shaped pedal happy recipient, but she isn't mine to keep. So now I don't really have to let her go completely, because I will have my very own. Dave Paul makes them, and he is a living, breathing Wheels-In-Review, this guy.

And I really need to, uh, keep up the spinning production here. You see, I can't find the furniture anymore, and for once, it isn't on account of the unfolded laundry.

I left that in the dryer. What, you think I got all efficient all of a sudden?

On the other side of this house full of wool, there's a handsome prince who really needs a scarf, like, yesterday. Wish me luck.

November 11, 2005 12:16 AM  | Permalink  | Comments (38)  | Print

Variations on a theme of lucky.

I have not posted in a loooong time. Ten days at least. But I have excuses. (Geminis always have excuses...but I married a Scorpio, so I get extras.)

One big reason for spending no time at all blogging is that the love of my life turned 35. (There, how's that for devotedness, revealing Spiff's age to the world...but I'm three and a half years older so I figure I can get away with this and several shelves in the bathroom devoted to me and my peels/ microwhateverthehellthisisbutitbetterdosomething/ keepingupwiththehotties creams. So there. Put that in your friteuse and snarf it.)

Anyway, as I was saying before my crow's feet distracted me, the absolute love of my life and quite possibly the nicest man on the face of the earth for reasons I can't quite go into was worth an entire day of searching a major city for foie gras. Worth figuring out exactly which bird this came from and discussing with several shopkeepers in an accent I still can't bloody well understand why one animal's liver is orderable and why one's is merely readily available. Worth searching out a Margaux and paying through the nose for it (just a Margaux, not a Chateau Margaux. This is not France, people, and I am not that rich, nor did I have a week to go find it in Toronto). Worth explaining to the father-in-law what "paying through the nose" means.

He was also worth spending another whole day searching out white truffle oil and a pastry bag, plus learning how to make puff pastry for the first time (dead easy, by the way, but much easier with a pastry bag) because he wanted not cake, but profiteroles. And he was even worth telling the kid that veal rolled with morelles and white truffle oil served with a wine sauce is normal food and she should just give it a shot (she did, and rather liked it, but we think it was the lure of the profiterole with ice cream and homemade dark chocolate sauce). Worth my mother's resulting freakout when she reads this....

So my pastry puffed and my husband was happy. I did, however, manage to get some spinning and knitting done. Of course. How do you think I made it through the twenty minutes dying, hoping the hell that the birthday pastry puffed?

I scavenged the blue Spinner's Hill stuff
that refuses to look blue for either me or the camera anymore.
I told you that everything I touch is turning to laceweight.
Ted understands. Thank you, Ted.

I heard from Ted, the master laceknitter, who is, alas, blogless. He saw my laceweight, my shawl, and gave me the beautiful gift of a compliment plus a lot of information on how to keep up the good work. I'm absolutely thrilled when people do this, and Ted, I thank you for your wealth of knowledge. I expect to see cobwebs coming from your wheel very, very soon. An admirable goal. And it will be entirely your fault if a Polwarth sheep mysteriously appears on my balcony.

And here's what the blue-disguised-as-purple laceweight became:
Smiling diamonds from BW1. Look carefully,
and you'll notice the goofy grin inside each diamond.

So I was feeling frisky after that last bout of spindled laceweight, and I had just gotten lucky with a prize shipment of Kim's bunnycrack in Dandelion. I went to the wheel and got this:

The singles are laceweight.
I am speechless. Um, okay, almost.
I kind of contacted Kim for a custom order...

The resulting two-ply is more of a fingering weight,
and less even than I could have achieved on the spindle,
but I'm still thrilled with the result.

I'm also absolutely in love with this fibre. So much so that I e-mailed Kim and asked her if she would do a stronger colour for me. She did two, and thus Bundrops were born. In a week or so, I will be the proud owner of the very first bright red bunnycrack. Periwinkle too. I am sooooo lucky.

I also got a package from my secret pal, who is not so secret but we like to pretend sometimes. She sent me teal Fun Fur, and I will so get her back for this. All I can say is that she should expect googly eyes in her future. But she also sent me something that on the one hand, totally freaked me out and necessitated an emergency IM to the head of the Spindicate to find out what the hell to do with them, but on the other hand, totally thrilled me because, look, I got a bag of Cari's yarnhair!

These are dyed locks. Of which sheep, I do not know. A curly one.
You, uh, have to comb this stuff. I, uh, don't have combs.
But now I have dogbrushes.
Not the best option...but not horrible.

So after my emergency call and my emergency trip to the emergency pet store, I got something to urgently separate the fibers, because how can one wait, into this:

I'm sorry, Cari. I promise I will never,
ever try to comb your hair.
However, the locks turned nice and fluffy, eh?

So, after my adventure in carding without really knowing how (in fact, carding without real carders), I got something that I could actually spin with a spindle. I'm not so crazy that I think I can put this stuff on the wheel. Yet.

This is what Cari's hair might look like
if a dork like me got at it with a spindle.

Uh, yeah, it's laceweight. Threadweight, in fact. I'm having way too much fun,here....

And then I discovered that the drunken Canadian ponies had finally deposited three packages at the post office with notices to say that if I did not pick them up today, last notice, emergency emergency, they would go back to their senders. Except that I never received a first or second notice. Damned drunken ponies...but I managed to get this before it went back to the people who kind of conspired to make me the luckiest girl who never went to Rhinebeck, ever:

Someone found the perfect blue. Someone else
got me more of it. And the peacock queen decided
I could use a fiber fix and a little help with the spinner's hands.
Did I mention how lucky I am? I can't thank them enough.

All of this luckiness came after the other reason why I have not blogged lately. I've been working my fool ass off. Plus the kid puked all over her princess costume midday on Monday and could not go out for Halloween night as a result. She managed to pull it together to be the Halloween Princess and give out candy, and sang everyone songs, but after a month of waiting for the big night, it was a tough time for everyone. She admirably managed to have a good time despite the disappointment.

Today, I have to say that my child was brilliant, trying to read books and draw pictures and not go stir crazy while I was chained to my computer on deadline. And tonight we all hung out listening to Spiff have his guitar lesson, as usual, and all seems to be well and good in the land of Fuzzy Logic.

The massive pile of roving plus the husband's declaration that I rock do wonders for a girl's mood, I tell you. He says it's all happened because I'm wonderful. God, I love Scorpios. But to be honest, I think I'm just damned lucky.

November 2, 2005 7:12 AM  | Permalink  | Comments (32)  | Print