Flash your stash 2009

This is a day late, but I took most of these pictures yesterday.

Here’s all the sock/lace/sweater yarn i have here at school laid out:

And here is my storage system at school. there is more plain colored wool in the cabinet below and FOs, supplies, and WIPS are in drawers but those aren’t shown in the picture. There’s more yarn in the storage system than i had laid out.

And this is my stash when I’m at my parent’s house. It’s an older picture, from january, but most of the yarn is still there and the only additions since then have been wollmeise. This is everything:

There’s two rows of cubbies below those but they have some baskets with WIPs, etc and lots of books.

And speaking of wollmeise, a shot of just the wollmeise on its own. It just shines doesn’t it?

I’m such a horrible blogger….

I was so planning on blogging all the time when i started this, and hoping to get more involved in the online community. and then I signed up for Ravelry, and all my time got sucked away BUT, i’m participating in the Summer of Socks ’08 so i’m really going to try to post more. I’ve missed so many great opportunities in the past that if i retroposted them, they would be very very long.

So here’s the first of my completed socks for SOS’08:

Started June 21 and finshed June 27th. The yarn i spun was about 16wpi and i had 200 yards left after i gifted a larger skein to thewench in the Loopy Ewe Swap 2. They have a 3in cuff, which is shorter than i really like but i used up all of the yarn i had

I have 3 other pairs otn but i don’t have pictures at the moment. I’m working on the second sock of a pair of Nutkins out of Claudia’s Hand Painted Fingering in Stormy Days. Also, I’m using Hazel Knits Artisan sock in Terrywinkle for Drunken Bees, and Tempted Yarns Good Grrl in Twilight for a pair of plain stockinette socks. I’ll post pictures later.

On the non-knitting front, my boyfriend, Todd, (3 1/2 years) FINALLY was offered a county position. He’s been working contractually for the county for the past year and a half, but that has much lower pay and no benefits. He starts on the 24th! The new job will make him less stressed out about money and that’s good for both of us.

Also, some sad news…. one of my guinea pigs, Artemis, died on tuesday, June 24th. As she was a rescue, i’m not sure of how old she was, probably 4 1/2 by my estimate. We had been fighting a disease that was causing her to waste away. After 3 months of battling and the vet finally determining that she probably had a chronic kidney infection, she passed away. I buried her in the back yard and am awaiting a riverbed stone carved with her name to arrive as a marker. I spent a great deal of crying over her passing and i didn’t really feel like knitting most of last week, or i would have finished more pairs of socks.

I know that’s a downer, but i’ve spent so much time, energy, and money on trying to make her feel better that i feel like i’ve lost a part of me. I’ll leave you with a picture of her before the wasting got too bad…

You know you have great parents when…

you get tons of knitting stuff for christmas!

 Look at all this great stuff:

There’s some Socks that rock mediumweight, Collinette Jitterbug, and Fiesta Boomerang… I’ve got a bunch of socks in my future! There’s also Lantern Moon sox Stix in 1, 2 (still in transit), and 3. My parents also ordered some medium sock blockers from Blue Moon Fiber Arts but they didn’t show up in time either. Apparently they’re backordered, which is understandable because they’re so pretty! There’s also Gilmore Girls Season 7, Grey’s Anatomy Season 3, and Charmed Season to watch while i’m knitting up all those socks. Maybe i’ll learn to how to read and knit at the same time too…

Let’s take a closer look at all that sock yarn…

That’s some Socks that Rock Mediumweight in Lapis, Pebble Beach, Thistle and Mystic Kelp! (left to right)

And here’s Colinette Jitterbug in Dusk, and Fiesta Boomerang in the Australia coloway. My sister got me these from The Loopy Ewe.

There’s also a knitting book tucked away in there…

It’s Weekend Knitting by Melanie Falick. I haven’t gotten much of a chance to look through it, but it looks like there might be some cool stuff in here

Next time…tons of pictures of all the fiber I’ve been spinning up!

New spinning wheel!

Friday was the last day of finals…so i finally got to come home and my new spinning wheel was here waiting for me   i got the kromski sonata with a walnut finish. i also got the jumbo flyer as well. i’ve been having some camera problems, or else i’d have a tons of photos to post.  He’s so beautiful! I haven’t named him yet, but i’m pretty sure the sonata is a he. i’ve been busy spinning up a storm, catching up on my spunky eclectic fiber club.  I wasn’t a very fast spindle spinner, so they definately backed up quite a bit. I’ve already finished 3 4oz. skeins, i washed them all yesterday and they spent all day drying. i’ll post pictures tomorrow.  Finally took a picture of him!

Isn’t he so pretty? Ignore all the mess in the rest of the picture…still in progress of settling into my parents house for winter break…

Delurking

Hey all! I’ve been a lurker on a ton of blogs for the past several years, and i’ve finally decided to come out of the shadows. Just a little bit about me first.

I’m 20 years old and i’m a junior in college. i’m majoring in biology and minoring in chemistry.  I tend to bring my knitting a lot with me to classes and knit during then. I figure i can study that as well, and multitask.  I’ve been knitting since I was 15, so in two months it’ll be 6 years since i learned to knit.  No one in my family knits, or even crochets, that i know.  I was entirely self taught from the internet.  it was just one of those things that jumped out at me one day and said “You should learn to knit”.  It was before the eyelash scarf fad even got started. I don’t even remember what sparked the idea, but since then fiber has become a major part of my life.

Sometimes i go through periods where i don’t knit at all, but they rarely last more than a couple months.  I started spinning on a drop spindle last spring, and finally caved in this past sunday and bought my very first wheel! It’s a walnut kromski sonata and it should be here sometime next week.

Figure i’ll leave you with some pictures of current knitting…

It’s a Baudelaire sock from Knitty! done in Socks that Rock Lightweight, colorway Haida. It’s the second sock and i’ll show you both together when they’re finished