One goal achieved

Well, I got the new camera. I'm still trying to figure out how to use it, but suffice to say things are going to look a little different around here.







More to come. Oh yeah, more to come.

Promised fiberish update

Not a lot. I'm in an inexplicably foul mood and have been ever since last night. We went out for karaoke, (FUN!) and for some reason, when I got home my mood went so far south it was speaking Portugese. It's up to about Mexico now but still not good.

Anyway.

Here's the fiber stuff.
This is Cotswold again, shades of blue with angelica for sparkle. I like the fiber, but it's a little "neppy", it has some unusable lumps. However, it's much softer than the last cotswold I got. I like the feel of the resulting yarn better.


It's also Navajo-plied. It was touch and go for a while, but I got the hang of it pretty well and feel confident using the technique again. I've got about another 8 oz of this and will see how much I can spin of it. Because of the grabby/curly quality of the fiber, it is VERY easy to spin fine, fine, fine. It's a nice feeling to see that teensy little string coming off the drafting zone and into the orifice. The three ply is just a hair over sportweight so I'm going to do up the rest in the same fashion and hope for socks.

Speaking of socks... (nice segue, wasn't it?) and also speaking of cotswold, here's the socks I made from my very first handspun fingering weight yarn.

I am insanely proud of these. The pattern is Razor Shell Lace and I kinda made it up as I went along.


The last thing is mitered squares of Noro Kureyon.

My ambition is an afghan from these once I get enough done. Each skein makes two squares, so I can just pick up random skeins of NK a few at a time here and there and do 'em when I feel like mindless knitting. Very easy, a square can be easily done in an evening. Since you start on the two long edges and work your way in, it is a very satisfying knit. And pretty. I have some duller colors in the stash too so piecing it together is going to be a lot of fun, whenever I have enough. I love playing with visuals like that.

So, this will likely be my last post with the HP Photosmart. Friday, I plan to pick up an Olympus Evolt E-500. I'm hoping the quality of my photos will go up dramatically since this is a full SLR digital camera with two lenses and a "most bang for the buck" rating from pretty much everywhere. I'm excited, I've missed SLR photography and have been wanting to get into digital, just waiting for something that was a decent compromise between price and bling.

Oh, one more set of pictures just because Figment is the chillinest cat ever.

Been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely time.

Wow, you turn around and it's been three, four weeks since you updated.

Things are much the same, yet different. We joined a pool...




They have an indoor pool as well, which will be nice in the cooler months.

Let's see.. Younger daughter was in for a week and we had some fun. She got some rest and some driving practice in. We had a nice cookout on Sunday with lots of charred meat products. I made cheddar bratwurst, italian sausage, chicken breast, and apple-gouda chicken sausage.

And bool kogi.


We also had some wonderful pasta salad and a great tossed salad that had everything but the kitchen sink in it.


In things fiberish, I've been doing quite a bit of spinning and just a little knitting. I'm hoping to have photos soon, just haven't had time or motivation to shoot lately.

Here's a brief garden tour, too. The daylilies are in full frenzy.

These are big, huge, fragrant orange lilies that I've been taking from one house to the other with me since at least 1992. For comparison, here's a standard "shithouse" or roadside tiger lily.


The deep pink/purple ones I got from Trax last year are in bloom, and are they ever gorgeous. I'll definitely be going back there for more daylilies, now that I know how good their stock is.


This yellow one my Mom got from her neighbor several years ago and shared with me. It's a big sucker, too. Reminds me of lemon cookies for some reason.


Here are some forget-me-nots...


and a snapdragon.

The snapdragon was a cutting we got from Phipps Conservatory.

And this rose I thought we lost in the late freeze, but it's coming back. Yay!


And finally, some "moonbeam" coreopsis.


I really wish I had more energy for weeding and garden maintenance. Maybe next year. So many weeds...

I will try to update again soon, once I get fiber photos done. I'm doing some interesting things with cotswold again!