Michelle's blog

I am a little late (what's new?) but here are the photos I promised of the yarn I have been spinning. This yarn is lumpy and bumpy. It is some type of purple wool (from a purple sheep I am sure) mixed with Triple Play Roving by Crosspatch Creations. I purchased both sets of fiber from Linda at Sunset Fibers. She has a ton of colorful and fun fiber to spin. She also has a roving of the month club.  The Triple Play Roving I purchased from her is a mixture of wool, silk, and viscose. It was a bit more challenging from me to spin, but I think I am in love! I love the lumpiness of it and how unique it was when I spun it. I certainly didn't get bored.

These next sets of yarn were also spun from fiber I purchase from Sunset Fiber. I am bad at remembering what type of fiber I have purchased. I think this was a wool/silk blend. When I first started spinning I pretty much had decided I didn't care what type of fiber I was spinning and I also didn't care what the length of the finished product was. Well, as you can imagine the more I spin the more I care. Ugh. So much for "I don't need to do it like everyone else!" I have decided to keep track of the type of fiber I am spinning so that I can attach a tag (I am getting all grown up) to the finished product with this info on it.

This next bit of yarn was spun from roving that I purchased from the wonderful people at Taylored Fibers. If you live in Western Washington you definately have to check these guys out. Super freindly people. The are going to be part of a Fiber Farm Tour event next month. What a great way to spend a late summer Saturday.

Ok. so this last bit of yarn isn't quite done but I wanted to show it to you anyway because it is so cool! But first, let me tell you that the reason it is still on the spinning wheels is because I have decided it isn't coming off until I have time to take it off and count the length too.You see, I am growing up into a more well rounded spinner. When I first started spinning I somewhat defiantley told my mom, "I'm not counting my yarn, I'll just weigh it!" Ok, she was right. I think it is better to measure it in length rather than weight, I just didn't think that I would ever care. Now I do. Well, a little at least. 

This yarn is two plys of some goldenrod colored wool (once again, not sure of the type) and one ply of some bright yellow and muted orange. I spun the yellow/orange mixture very loose and lumpy. The goldenrod was spun fairly evenly but thicker than what my expert spinner friends spin. Once the three were plied together it looked so awesome. I love it love it love it. I think it will make a great hat. Now I am off the remove the yarn from the spinning wheel!

About two weeks ago I was fortunate enough to buy two spinning wheels from a lady I know that has moved to New Zealand. Up until this point I had been using a wheel that my mom gave to my daughters. Both of my girls can spin much better than I can although I think I am catching up. The first one pictured is a cottage style spinning wheel. I haven't been able to fully use it yet because I feel like it needs some type of break mechanism. The previous owner said she used it as it. I think her spinning skills are infinitely better than mine.

The second wheel is an Ashford Tradition wheel. It needed a bit of work to get going. Thankfully my husband was up for the challenge and got it into working order. I haven't decided if I like it yet or not. I am used to spinning on a wheel that has a different style of tension so this new wheel is taking a bit time for me to get used to. I spun some gorgeous lumpy yarn last night on it and then plied with my borrowed wheel.

I'll post pictures of all the yarn I have been making tomorrow. 

While in New York this summer I took several photos of graffiti and walls/doors thinking that I would make some digital collages with them. I have gotten around to it yet, but thought I would share the photos with you. The full size images can be found on Flickr.

Feel free to use any of these images. I would be interested to see what you come up with. Remember, full size higher resolution images can be found on my Flickr page.

A few weeks ago four of us got together and spent the day working through a couple of projects in the latest issue of Sommerset Studio. I don't have the magazine with me right so I can't tell you exactly which articles inspired us. But, I do have some photos of the second project we worked on. None are mine however. I guess I was so busy taking pictures of what everyone made I forgot to take any of what I made.

I really like the background that my friend painted on this one. The image was taken from the free pages that are in the middle of the magazine. Then we used several books to create "found poetry."

The directions for the project called for using glass photo slides (I think.) We didn't have anything like that, so we made our own. In this piece, the picture of the bird is sandwhiched between two pieces of glass and then we wrapped the glass with copper foil tape and then glued it to our canvas.

In this last one the bird image is actually stamped onto the glass with Staz On ink and then a piece of dictionary page was put under it before it was closed up with copper foil tape.  

While in New York we ran across some bikes. The first one I couldn't resist taking a picture of since someone crocheted over the entire thing. It looked like triple crochets to me for the most part. I really wanted to see someone riding it!

The next set of bikes we came across belong to the NYPD. Very nice.

Near the end of our trip I ran across this super colorful bike.

The last two weeks or so have been a whirlwind! My oldest daughter graduated from high school and community college. After her college graduation ceremony we hopped on a plane and flew to New York for a week. Among the many people we saw was the Naked Cowgirl. Come to find out she is from Portland. She was super nice and gave Kenzie some advice about summer jobs to pay for college.

We saw these guys a couple of times singing in the subway system. They are actually pretty good.

And a trip to New York without a Broadway show would be incomplete. So, against my desire we saw American Idiot. I wanted to see South Pacific or Mary Poppins. But, to my surprise Amercian Idiot was excellent. I enjoyed every minute of it. It was a super fantastic show and I am glad that Kenzie was able to talk me into it. The music was great and I was surprised to realize I knew a lot of the words! I guess my kids rub off on me.

I then flew to Seattle and ran in the Rock-n-Roll Marathon on Saturday. Whew.This is a race that has bands set up about every mile or so. It sounds great, but as a runner you only hear the music when you are pretty much directly in front of the band. And since we are running that time isn't very long.

The race is so huge (27,000 people) that I wasn't even able to find my running partner and ended up running the 13.1 miles by myself! Even after the race I couldn't find her. I guess we'll figure it out next time. 

I am glad to be home now. I spent yesterday weeding my garden and cooking.  So today my vacation is over. Back to work!

My oldest daughter, Kenzie, graduated from high school this last Saturday and wil be graduating from the local community college on Friday.

To celebrate we are taking a trip to New York. I had thought we would see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway, but Kenzie wants to see Legally Blond. Oh no, what have I gotten myself into? What she doesn't know is that we will be making a trip to Tinsel Trading Company. Do you have any "must dos" while in New York?

My procrastination paid off, for you all that is. I have been so busy lately and then went out of town for a bit so I haven't had time to follow up on my Scrabble Charm giveaway. I have decided to send a charm to each person that left a comment for that show.

Thanks everyone! And special thanks to Megan for asking me how to make this project without any of the suggested materials. That is the subject of my next show.

One of the Yahoo groups I belong to is having a challenge to create a collage using a brush that you create. So, I created a brush using an image of a compass and then added several other images, layers, text and came up with something that I liked.

Well, I have finally slowed down enough since Sunday to take a look at some pictures and share them with you.  On Sunday I competed in my first half marathon in Olympia. I think there were about 1100 finishers in the race. I finished around the middle of the pack.

Here I am at the start with my crocheted headband that works wonders (maybe a future show?) It keeps my hair back and my ears warm!

Here I am at the end. I actually felt pretty good. I ran the entire way with another lady. We chatted the whole time. It wasn't until about an hour later while at Home Depot that I realized my body was running on empty. I sat like a zombie on a pile of lumber while my husband finished shopping. Then, after I ate a bit and got some more fluids in me I was ready to go again. I got home and hopped on my tractor and did a bit of digging for our garden. And then it hit me again. Ugh. Tired. I almost felt too tired to even get out of the tractor. I left it sitting in the yard with a load of grass and dirt in it. I was done. What a satisfying feeling. You know, that one you get when you have done something so hard that your body and mind are too tired to do anything else but recharge. I am looking forward to my next race. I am going to run in the Rock - n - Roll marathon (doing the half) in Seattle in June. Are any of you competing/racing this summer?