Tucson is waking up

The summer months are slow in Tucson. Everyone hangs inside with the air running. I am not really an exception. If I did not have the animals to worry about, I would not be outside much myself.

The ladies above are from the Tucson Knitters' Guild, also known as the Old Pueblo Knitters. I gave a presentation there yesterday on freeform knit and crochet. I was excited to see the interest that they displayed. The feedback at the end of the presentation was really positive, which justified all the time that I spent organizing my thoughts and preparing the slides. I learned how to make a power point presentation and I had the president of the guilds' daughter (on the left in the top photo) to thank for it all going well. I get by with the computer, but operator headspace crops up occasionally. Ask me, if you want to know that whole story.

My friend, Holly, helped me assemble two Pioneers yesterday. Here is our combined review:
It is not a pretty or sophisticated looking wheel, but it has the same footman as the Rose and operates just as smoothly as the Rose does. For the price, it is an awesome wheel. I attached the wild flyer and made sure that it would really work with it. Majacraft at one point used to say that the jumbo flyer worked on all of its wheels. It does not work on the Little Gem, so I wanted to be sure. With the addition of the wild flyer, you can do most anything with the Pioneer. Holly has a Lendrum and says the foot action on this wheel is better and with the wild flyer option, is one that she is going to consider as a second wheel. Since the wheel has not been finished, it lends itself to decorating. If I keep one as a rental, I am thinking of hiring someone to paint a few animals on it.

Yarns

I have a pile of yarns sitting on my table to be priced and hung in the shop. I might list a few on etsy. I had a friend come over today to help me with the design of flyers for the wool festival. I could not believe how quickly the time passed! Anyhow, she noticed how slow my computer was, so she set it to defragment.Marc said he thought he had it on a scheduled thing, but based on how long it took, I kind of doubt it. Anyhow, I noticed how pretty the colors looked piled upon each other. Wish I had more time to knit. These would be gone mighty quickly. I love spinning the coiled yarn. Iffy colors and fibers turn out so richly.

Animals caught their heads in fences again. Can't wait for them to be sheared. Talked to Danny, the shearer's wife, and we are still on schedule for October 25th. She is also a spinner and will be bringing fiber from her animals to sell - add Merino and Romney as well as crosses to your spinning fibers. Need to try out a little of everything, if you want to talk knowledgeably about wool! She spins laceweight and will have some interesting novelty yarns. She can't access the internet to upload pictures, so I will scan hers in when they arrive.

Productive day

I am putting the final touches on my freeform presentation for the knitters guild. The above item was photographed in various stages, so they could see how a project develops.
I finished this scarf. I was going to square off the edges, until I tried it on and saw how they curved in a natural funky manner. The flash on my camera did not seem to catch the colors well, so I am going to take more pictures tomorrow. I want to put it on ravelry.com as a finished project.
Another way to wear it.
Some one emailed me about the color of one of the yarns that I listed on etsy. I put it down as green and it shows up as turquoise. I used an evergreen kid mohair with natural black (charcoal) mohair. Something about the two colors together gives it a different appearance. I think the color shifts with the lighting.

Kristie's wedding and other news

These are the only pictures that I will post of Kristie's wedding on my blog. I will put others on flickr, when I get around to it. I have presentations to prepare, flyers for the Wool Festival and publicity to organize, so it might be a while.
Kyle looks like a Bond - told him it had to be 008, because previous ones are dead. He dresses up nicely!
The little chicken -I am thinking maybe a quail - laid her first egg this morning. I will be interested to see how much yolk their is in such a tiny egg. Hope they get bigger, but could be painful for her!

In other news, I had 6 of the older goats tested for CAE, when the vet came out for No Size. I had Holly, the dairy goat, tested also. The good news is that none of them have it. He said that I tested a large enough sample of the goats to be able to say that none of my goats have it. None have ever showed signs, but it is nice to be sure. So, if you bought goats from me in the past, you can be sure that they were CAE free when they left here. The disease does not tend to run in angora goats but people, who have both dairy and angoras, could have it show up in their herds.

No Size

No picture for this, since it would be depressing. The vet came out today and confirmed that No Size does have a spinal cord injury. We are going to put him out of his misery. Chances of him recovering are pretty slim. He has been an awesome herd sire and I am so glad that he has given me gorgeous offspring to carry on his line. I will probably talk about him forever - he was such a bargain and so good.

Someone mentioned that his problem could be disease related. I did not think so, but it stayed in the back of my mind because I did not want other animals to become infected. The vet said that my animals look very healthy.

Freeform and weaving

The freeform bag I began last week is almost finished. A friend stopped in today and suggested that I use the brass buttons I had for embellishment. As soon as she did, I figured out how I was going to finish it.
This is the second side. It needs more work and a few extra pieces along the top.
I had started winding a warp for bags and possible scarves, so a Coldplay and two Josh Turner CDs later, I had the warp tied on at the bag and pulled through the heddles and half of the reed. Will finish up in the morning. I decided to go with a more interesting tie-up than the plain weave, since I put 12 yards on. I figured I would weave bags that can be embellished with freeform, if the weft is not as nice as I expect it to be.

I have washed and dyed yarn that I am going to put on a loom that I moved to the workshop (garage!) I am going to make the Lindsay Tartan. I am trying to duplicate the colors from a book that I saw years ago. The online colors seem close enough, but I think I am going to end up taking liberty with them, since I have come up with a combination that I really like. Will post photos of that tomorrow. I have a 12 yard cotton warp on that loom from the previous owner, which I am going to cut off. After 2 1/2 years, I can tell I am never going to use it, because I prefer handspun and a more interesting design!

The diggingest rabbits

Don't know, if any of you remember reading or reading to your kids the Dr. Seuss book about the dog that kept digging. Anyhow, I have two rabbits that showed up that dog today! They managed to dig a burrow at least 15 feet long, that went under the entire rabbit pen and out the far side. I know it, because I found them wandering around outside the rabbit and chicken pen. They were happy, but not for long. Marc and I caught them and they are officially back in cages. If we had not noticed (we would have), they would have been someone's dinner. Had to throw the youngest chickens out with the adult chickens, so a rabbit could go in a cage. Marc says I should let them run around in the day. I am not sure that I will for a while. The ground is nicely dug up and soft. Won't keep them in for long.

No pictures - I was too busy catching.