Anybody looking for a rabbit?

A friend of a friend found him wandering around her driveway. He was caught, the house that they thought he came from was approached, and they admitted to letting him go just because they didn't want him anymore. (who thinks an angora will be okay on it's own. Especially in Sacramento in July???) I said I'd take him because I had an extra cage, but I'm not sure if I have time to groom one more bunny. He's a satin angora, he's small now but I'm not sure if that's due to neglect, or if he's simply young. I also need to attack his coat, and I'll probably just chop it all off.

In other news, more scarves on and off the loom- I was playing with a pattern and tried it out in several different color combinations. By the last one it's evident that I was getting tired of it! Here is a picture before that last one was off the loom.
The warp on all of them is Webs merino/tencel yarn, and the weft is various heavy fingering weight yarns, some are bamboo/merino/nylon, one is merino/tencel, and one is some cotton/wool/nylon sock yarn that I had a single skein of sitting around.

A recent project- it's now finished weaving, but still on the loom while I finish the rest of the warp.

Two "new" toys.

One belonged to a friend of my dad's. It's a 1908 Singer 66K-1.

It has Brown Lotus decals and my dad restored the cabinet. (I guess it was in pretty poor shape, I still need to work on gluing down a loose part of the veneer. The machine itself is in great shape.

The other machine was my great grandmother's White Family Rotary. It's a 1909 machine and sews wonderfully, even though it's in not as nice cosmetic condition. I'll need to do some work on the cabinet, as it got left outside for a while.

After tuning them up, I've been playing with them and made a couple of modern dresses, a small carpetbag and a cat bed.

I've been neglecting this blog, but what is new- I get busy and forget. I do update my bento blog much more often at least!

I've been up to a lot. I just did an art show this weekend and sold a little yarn. I've been spinning, weaving, dyeing, sewing and working with the critters. Here are some shots of yarn.


These yarns are all naturally dyed during a dye workshop I took a couple weeks ago. The first two on the left are cochineal, one was dipped in ammonia, and there is a slight difference, but not enough to show in the photo. (not to mention that the picture is taken with artificial light at night!) The third skein is cochineal overdyed with one dip of indigo. I hope that the indigo holds up. The next skein is just indigo, several dips to get it reasonably dark. Then there is a walnut overdyed with indigo, a dill overdyed with indigo, a walnut and a dill. The dill and walnut are lighter than expected, which is probably due to a high mineral content in the water in Grass Valley. It was fun and hopefully will help get me to try more natural dyeing.


This second picture is some handspun cormo I've been working on. Over the summer I was on a lime and orange kick. I mentioned it to a friend at Lambtown and talked her into watching my booth when she mentioned that one of my favorite wool vendors had some lime green and orange roving for sale. I ran and grabbed it. I've spun a few bobbins, but still have a reasonable amount to go. I have an idea for this yarn, but I need to see just how much I have when I'm done to make sure it will work.

What I did last Saturday......

I sold yarn and fiber at Lambtown. I didn't have time to take any pictures, but there is one here.

A new dress-

It's not the best picture, as I'd just had a tooth filled, but I do like the dress. I didn't think that the skirt was full enough, so I made a corded petticoat to wear under it. I do like how the skirt fits with the corded petticoat, a tucked petticoat and my full plain petticoat layered under it. I wore it with my new robert land boots to a Civil War period dance on Saturday. (yes, I know it's about 15 years too early.... It's what I had!)

I have been knitting a little bit, I've got several socks going, and a pair of mittens almost finished. I also finally decided to just serge the raw edges of the towels I took off of my loom months ago. I hope that they hold up, but they've already been gifted, so I don't have any pictures of them. I also made a dress for Gianna, but it's still a little big for her.

There is no need to honk your horn!

I've been getting back in the habit of riding my bike- my goal is to be able to ride up to Grass Valley by the end of the summer. We'll see, I was able to do stuff like that in high school, of course that was 14 years ago. In any case, I want to make sure that I don't gain weight this summer like I do some summers because I'm not as active as I am during the school year.

So anyway, I've been riding down the street I live on for several miles into the county then back home, it's not a low traffic road, but not a city traffic road either. It's steady for the most part, but only two lanes. For all but a couple hundred yards there are shoulders big enough for my old bike. So, why are people honking at me? Most people are just fine, but a few people today were honking at me, as well as swerving way over into the middle of the road. If you're honking for me to know you are coming, I do have good ears and I can hear your car behind me. If you're honking because I'm in the road, you're very mistaken. Look at the lines in the road, I'm a couple feet away from the edge!

Tomorrow I plan to ride into the post office, hopefully this doesn't happen on the other roads I will have to take.