ok, i can’t remember for the life of me which one of you wanted smutty pictures of unblocked bee fabric, and i can’t find the email, sooo
that’s the wrong side . . . and here’s some right-side action
(and i put another one or two at the end of the post for you too).
i feel REALLY foolish that i can’t track down that conversation in email. sigh—sorry!.
and while i was changing to a longer needle today, i took the opportunity to spread the shawl out as flat as i could get it for a couple of shots
and here’s one that’s a little closer
i had high hopes of finishing this weekend (ha! whatever was i thinking?), and although i made quite a bit of progress, i didn’t even get close to being done. or picking an edging (must do that next).
it’s that time of year when other demands intervene
like eating. our freezer stores of ready-made meals were getting low, so i spent the better part of saturday in the kitchen. and it was worth it
here we have (front row) black bean chili, and (back row) ribollita. mmm. made with fresh greens and herbs from this year’s garden, and the last of the tomatoes from last year.
i has planned to spend the whole of saturday afternoon spinning and bonding with my new wheels, but only got to sit down with them for a couple of hours last night. i spent all that time just with the reeves, finding i had to adjust a few things seemingly over and over. i also had to play with the tension a lot . . . it’s a new tensioning system for me and i’m not sensitive to its nuances yet. but i did spin some samples and found that, even in my stumbling on this unfamiliar wheel, i can spin a very fine and consistent yarn. i didn’t take a picture of the singles, but here’s one of the two ply
this is some superwash merino. i thought that i was way overspinning and then overplying it, but as it turns out, no . . .
it hangs nice and straight. if anything, it could have been more tightly spun AND plied. i need more time with it to get it right; and i’m left wanting to shut myself in and just spin for days to do just that.
i am happy with the resulting fineness of the yarn though—
(ok, so i don’t dust my mail scale—now you know my dark secret.)
60 yards from 0.3 ounce. that would be roughly 200 yards to an ounce; not bad, especially since those extra-fine laceweight yarns are harder for my eyes to work with lately. my preference is usually for something more in this range or a bit heavier.
but i do want to work on getting the twist right—i’m not so happy with it here. my goal for the immediate future is to spin this wool and some silk as a two-ply blend (one ply of each), and to do a batch of it on each wheel.
alright now, a few parting shots of bumpy/cushy bee back.
and what would the backshot be without a full frontal view?
62 thoughts on “i got your back”
I LOVE it. Sometimes I don’t want to block lace because it’s just so great the way the rolling shapes lie… but I’m sure it’s going to knock me over when it’s all blocked out and finished.
Someday we’ll have meals, instead of just home-boiled black beans, in our freezer, too.
mmmm – all that chili looks so good!
that is some fine spinning!
Your lace and yarn look so pretty!!! I like the bumpiness of lace before it’s blocked!
We eat that way too. Fast food from the garden! The only problem is when we realize that there are 5 different kinds of lentil soup in the freezer! I have to keep track of what we have so that I don’t just make my favorite soups OVER AND OVER. 🙂
Wowee, you’ve been busy! Shawl is looking really lovely.
My gosh. Are there 36 hour days in your part of the country? How do you *do* it all?!
ok, those were just dirty…..(and no, I hadn’t requested them…..heee)
You do such gorgeous work and take such gorgeous pictures of it. But how on earth did you wind up such a Jack-and-the-Beanstalk-long hank? How big is your niddy-noddy (or what do you use for one.)
L-O-V-E it. Love it. Really really really!! Will you have enough yarn with what I sent you?
Looks like you have been very productive recently in the garden, in the kitchen, and on the needles. NICE! 🙂
I am loving the bee shawl so much. I just can not wait to see it blocked and even though I am on a yarn diet I know I will just have to buy this as soon as it is available. I mean my name means “Honey Bee” so how could I not have a bee shawl? Keep the beautiful designs coming.
Oooooo! I can’t wait for this pattern – starts digging through the stash for the perfect yarn. . .
seeing the bee shawl all lumpy and bumpy gets me really excited about how it’s going to look once it’s blocked!
today, i should be cooking too. it’s hard to motivate to do that as the day’s temperature climbs higher and higher (no a.c.).
i am not familiar with “ribollita”, but both meals to freeze look like something i wouldn’t mind eating day after day 🙂
please feel free to share recipes anytime. i am often looking for recipes that i can freeze, as it’s hard to keep fresh stuff around for long when i’m only cooking for myself.
i hope you’re having a great weekend 🙂
Do you freeze large amounts of food at once for easy meals? Sounds like a great idea. I think my guy would love the black bean chili. Yummy.
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