Hungry for Handspun

Blog Move and a Hiatus

Well, I've not been around much at all here, have I?  My move across the country in May went quite well..we're all settled here in Wisconsin. 

I am taking a Hiatus from dyeing while we in our current lodgings.  Everything here is wood.  Wood countertops, wood floors, wood wood wood and as this is not our house and there is not easy to clean up tile or metal or other surface for me to dye on..I am not dyeing for the time being.  I do plan to return to it..but it will be quite some time before I do.  I miss it..I really do.  I miss the magic and the colors and the wool.

I am still knitting and will be listing the occasional wrist warmer in the shop.

I seem to have lost my spinning mojo..but I'm sure that will return in time!  There will be occasional listings of handspun in the shop as well!

In the meantime..I've been working on building up my soap business.  You can find the soap shop here:  Lake House Soapworks   I've also been working on a shop blog for the soap here:  Soapy Blog

Anyway....This blog will remain here as is...but I have moved the blog to wordpress and hope to resume blogging fibery things there when I am back to it!  You can find it here  It needs a good deal of tweaking, so please forgive the dust!

Thanks to everyone for all the wonderful fiber support!  I will return to the wonderful world of wool dyeing soon enough....

Until then, happy knitting, happy spinning and happy sudsing!

 

The Other Me

Before I became a Wool-Dyeing-Soap-Making Freak I was a Baker and Chef by profession for 16  years .  And I really just wanted to share with you my other blog (Which I rarely post to nowadays...as I'm still a bit burnt out in the baking/cooking area....so my posts there are now few and far between).  So, if you like baking recipes..have a look!  And many of you who have purchased fiber from me before will recognize lots of the photos over there..as they are the ones I use for my "Zero-Calorie" greeting cards.  Here's the link if you want to have a lookie (I last posted in July of 2009...but there are quite a few recipes to look through):  The Barmy Baker  

Oh, and it's Eye Candy Friday!  Enjoy:

The only perk to oral surgery:

(Ice cream for lunch)

My flock of soap sheep grows every week (this photo isn't the best...it's dark and rainy here and the sheep were feeling restless):

 

(these are an unscented castile breed of sheep soap)

And Tim has discovered that his wild life of sleeping and eating and doing catnip is finally catching up to him:

Poor exhausted Tim...

In other news...Moving is creeping up on us.  We're starting to pack a little here and there...I won't be dyeing any more wool until after the move...so sometime Mid May.  The shop will be closing mid April so intensive packing can take place and I'll be reopening as soon as we are settled!  I will have more soap photos as the next few weeks pass as I've not quite used up the lye yet.

Hope this post finds everyone well!

The Cursed Oven...

*Warning:  Photo and Babble heavy post*

Last time I posted, I had said our oven was about to be fixed.  Well, um..it's still broken.  It's now been 3 weeks and it was supposed to be fixed today. One of the minions was just here with a new element in hand!  I turned off the power to the oven!  He unscrewed the old mangled sad element!  He got ready to put in the new happy pretty element!  Um...wrong part.  So the wait for nice baked goodies continues.  I don't know if he'll be back today with a new part or if it's going to take another week. Once I know how long it will take, I will know when I can dye again.  It's not that I use the oven when I dye..it's that I don't want to have to bring out all my dyes and get my wool soaking in the tiny little kitchen only to have to put it all away at a moment's notice so the oven can be fixed...so sadly and annoyingly my dyeing is on hold yet again...and I had just set a date for an update in the shop, but I may have to change that....

Otherwise I've kept busy making more soap:

Here's one I experimented with just after I made that nice Castile soap.  This one is made with Calendula tea, Calendula petals and orange essential oil as the fragrance.  I love how the color turned out..and I'll know how well it bubbles and such once it's cured in a few weeks time.  It's got a nice light orange scent to it as well.  Here it is just after I poured it into the mold (next time I make it I'm probably not going to put the petals on top...I like how it looks, but I think they will just wash off after the first soap use and they seem a bit silly now that I look at it):

And here it is out of the mold and sliced:

Yesterday I made some "Lavender Swirl" soap (I'll think of a better name, really I will).  Which has quite a few nice oils in it and some lavender essential oil for the scent.  I just cut it, so here are the photos....just poured in the mold:

Out of the mold:

Sliced and ready to cure:

I thought this slice would make a great  Rorschach test:

What do you see in it?*

I love the smell of lavender, so this one is a favorite already.

As for my knitting..there has been a problem with the Wing o' the Moth Shawl...It seems I can't count, or I can count and I like to add mysterious extra stitches.  When I finished the first chart (with carefully marking each row and repeat after I had finished it) I had 35 extra stitches.  I have no idea where they came from, I don't know who invited them to hang out on my shawl.  I looked it over and over and over and checked and doubled checked everything...and then I frogged it.  sigh.  I am to sad to photo the frogged pile o' yarn.  I'll start over once I am feeling the love for it again. 

I have made progress on my Woodland Shawl :

It's nice easy knitting and I'm loving the color!

Well, till next time..May all your ovens work!

* I see a butterfly

Rainy Day....

It's really quite gloomy here today.  I love the rain, I love the gloom!

I'm trying to be a better blogger..and I figure that photo posts count, right?  Good!  I made some soap today:

 

It's just a nice simple Castile style soap.  No scents, no color, just olive oil, a bit of castor oil and the usual water and lye.  I'll be making quite a few more loaves of soap before we move...I don't really want to drive over 2000 some miles with lye in our vehicle.  And one can never have enough soap!

I ate some oranges..because they seemed sunny:

And I took a few photos of a Calla Leaf with rain drops on it:

  

I also knit a bit more on the Wing o' the Moth Shawl (very nice and sunshine-y):

I'm through the first skein of the Malabrigo lace and one repeat away from finishing the first chart.  Hopefully I can make some more progress on it this weekend..while it rains.

Annnnd.....Our oven, which has been broken for the past two weeks will finally be fixed tomorrow..or maybe Saturday...whenever they get around to it.  Thank the gods!  I want some comfort food hot from the oven (and I want to bake quite a few goodies as well).

In other boring mundane news...My ribs are feeling much healed and I plan to start dyeing this weekend or Monday.  Woot!  So hopefully there will be a shop update in a week or so (I'll announce it in my shop and my Ravelry group).

Hope everyone is having a happy Thursday!