I’ve been thinking about getting an e-spinner for several years now. I couldn’t really rationalize the high price of the most popular model. Last year at the Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival, I saw a woman spinning on an eel nano. It seemed so small and delicate. I looked at reviews, I looked at other espinners. And I found the one for me.
I bought a Heavenly Handspinning Vespera, Gen 2. I had it unpacked and put together in under 30 minutes.
And I was spinning very shortly afterward. HH has nice YouTube videos to help you set up the machine and to get started spinning. And I did use them to make sure that I had all the cords connected in the correct way.
Come to our open studio event. In order to be in compliance with the covid-19 restrictions, we have some rules. You will pick a time slot. You may bring one other family member with you into the shop. You must wear a mask. You will be given hand sanitizer to use before you enter the store. $10.00 of your ticket price will be credited when you make a purchase. We will have sun tents set up in the yard if you would like to bring your spinning wheel or knitting in a country setting while social distancing. We are trying our best to promote a responsible yarnie event.
I love knitting shawls. They are so diverse. And today we have choices for a 2 skein shawl. Hug Shots, designed by Casapinka, is just one of those awesome shawls. But first I should you my shawl triads. These are one of a kind curated skeins that will work great in a shawl. There are literally thousands of shawl patterns for these triads. Just go to Ravelry and look for 1200 yard skein shawls in fingering weight. Oh and these shawl triads are on sale (15% off)!!
Pattern “Ticket to Anywhere” will drop Saturday morning. You can get a code for a free pattern, when you buy a 5 skein mini pack from any of our vendors. Coupon must be redeemed by 11:59pm Monday 6/8.
Ticket to Anywhere Shawl by Kristen Jancuk
Vendors will be doing FaceBook live presentations during the day. These will be in the Facebook group. Be sure to join the group here.
Prizes will be given out throughout the day. You just need to be in the group, watching and commenting. If you aren’t on Facebook, you can engage in the Ravelry group. We will be giving out prizes there too.
The group will have a watch party on Sunday. So you can see videos from our vendors if you missed them on Saturday, or if you just want to get a dose of cute animals, beautiful yarn and wonderful yarnie accessories, creams and spinning equipment.
I am a little sick of cooking 2-3 meals a day. How about you?
I wanted to share with you some favorite meals that I’ve made the last few weeks.
salmon cake on a mesclun salad and roasted beetsMother’s Day Brunch of sweet potato hash poached eggs with hollandaise and sugar glazed baconChili cheddar frittata with hash brown crust and mesclun salad with avocado and artichoke hearts
In this time, I am wanting to keep up my healthy eating habits, but it’s hard. I’ve always used food as a reward and I feel like I need a reward, for sure!! And let’s face it, there isn’t much else to reward us with, like a massage or a pedicure. Of course there is always online shopping as a reward, right? If you feel like you need a non-food reward, click here to pick up a skein, some roving or a kit or a set of napkins or tea towels.
I’ve been going through my newer yarns and curating more Shawl Triads. I know many of you love to have a set of curated yarn that will match and be exciting for a shawl or even for a knitted tank top. Here is my latest set (sh13). It’s all Sparkly yarn. The colors are (left to right): Moody Blues, Four Corners and Azure.
And while preparing for the next Fiber Art Studio Tour which will be virtual. I’ve been talking to Anne Paynter Hill. I love her fused glass buttons, earrings and shawl pins. I have to tell you, I’ve invested a lot into her really unique items. They are so colorful and sparkly and make me so happy. Look at this Shawl Pin. Wouldn’t it look great with a shawl made with these 3 skeins? I totally think so. You can find this pin here. Her shawl pins are magnetic, so they don’t injure your shawl.
WOW! I was blown away the last couple of weeks with pre-orders and dye to orders during the MD Sheep and Wool Virtual show. I was so worried that I was the weird one, the almost blasphemous one. To have a colorway inspired by the Corvid Pandemic, was a crazy idea…it’s not sweet, it’s not “nice”. And yet, it resonated with so many people.
Corona colorway
So I’m keeping the listing alive. It is still dyed to order, because I just don’t know how many people want to have some “souvenir” of this time.
Antibody Colorway
With dyed to order, I will continue to dye daily. You may get your order quickly because I happen to have some already dyeing. Or you may have to wait up to a week (with dyeing, drying and priority mail).
First of all, I want to thank all the wonderful knitters, crocheters, spinners and felters who are coming to our online store and finding just the right yarn or roving to express their colorful selves. I hope you are feeling your creativity fill up and overflow. As we are all slowing down, getting out of the traffic, having more time to explore, to take more walks and to play more games or solve more puzzles with our families, it is also time to let our creative juices going.
We have hand dyed roving, yarn and farm yarns from our own fiber flock
This coming weekend, Maryland Sheep and Wool will be managing a virtual marketplace where there are hundreds of vendors. We will be online to answer questions and to fulfill your orders. AND you can also be looking at what we all have to offer right now. Here is the link to our online store.
Many of us are offering discounts and free shipping, some are offering special extras in your bag too.
What do you need to do? You need to be a member of the online community. Find it here. You also need to look at this page….the posts will not come through your own feed.
Have a question? Just ask it and one of us there will be able to help you by answering. So see you there! Have a question now? Just reply to this blog and I’ll find you an answer!
Palette Perfect by Lauren Wager is a book all about color. It’s really more of a lookbook. I think it took me less than 30 minutes to read, but I have spent a long time studying the palettes that Lauren has put together.
The book concentrates on the moods of your life. Colors that represent those emotions and moods. She then makes palettes of 3-5 colors that represent the mood.
She presents 15 different emotions such as tranquility, curiosity and trendy. Within each chapter she gives images such as paintings, photographs and textiles. Each of these has a “color wheel” of colors shown in that image. The size of the pieces of the wheel represent the amount of color in that image. And then for each color she gives the CMYK percentages and the RBG percentages.
CMYK is used for printed materials. Dyeing can use the CMYK numbers too. But the numbers aren’t a direct % of each color, as the numbers add up to more than 100. But lets say that if the number is 14/0/35/80 You would have a color that is mostly black with about half as much yellow, no magenta and a small amount of cyan. So the color is a deep green color. If you aren’t a math nerd, that’s OK.
I love this book for it’s pure inspiration. Looking through it you can find some combinations that you may not have thought about before. Get yourself a copy here on Amazon. This is just a link, I haven’t received a fee for reviewing or promoting this book. It is merely a good book for those who want to hone their color sense and widen their creative use of color.
If you’ve always wanted to learn to dye, I’m working on a dyeing ecourse that is almost ready to be released in the world. You can find out more here.
I’m loving these colorways and so I’m making them in many of my fingering weight colorways. Our Sparkly yarn is 92% Superwash Merino and 8% Lurex (the man-made sparkly factor). There are 414 yards in each 4oz skein.
Here is the yarn in Sparkly:
Corona Colorway
You can grab these here. I’m dyeing to order and will let you know when to expect your yarn.
Antibody Colorway
Think you want to make a shawl with these? Here are a few suggestions:
Of course there are more than 5000 shawls on Ravelry using this amount of yardage. These are just a few I thought might work well.
Happy Knitting!!
Where to find us
We are located in Frederick MD. You can stop by during our open studios. Or buy online and stop by to pick up…I’ll run your purchases out to you in your car.
Open by Appointment!!
Monday through Friday 11-3
Closed Saturday and Sunday (Except Open Studio days)
Open Studios with Fiber Art Studio Tour
November 30…. Small Business Saturday open 11-4pm
December 6-8….. Along with CountrySide Artisans… open 10-5pm
