Saturday, April 16, 2011

Old and New

The problem with knitting a big solid-colored blanket is that it's painfully boring to watch.  Anyway, most of my knitting lately has been devoted to making a dent in this:

It's actually a lot of fun to knit, and surprisingly easy on the hands despite the many cables.  Perhaps because this project is a relatively large gauge?  I haven't knit on it much except at knitting group, at the rate I'm going my nephew will be too big for it by the time it's done.

Anyway, I started a new craft within the last couple weeks - something about tackling something completely new really helps me through rough patches in my personal life.

Thanks to a kind friend who handed me a free spindle, I've been spinning.  As in, making yarn out of fluffy stuff.  It's awesome!  (Although, so far my results aren't as awesome as the principal of the thing.)

I got some wool to practice with from DBNY.  As this is my first attempt, I can't really say if the fiber is good or not, but I'm doing just fine with it.

So far I've been looking to youtube and the book Respect the Spindle for guidance. The book is really helpful but I would suggest watching at least one or two videos first, because I really couldn't understand what the photo tutorials in the book were getting at without seeing somebody spinning first.

I'm pretty excited about the whole spinning thing, especially because I think that my little sister would take to it really well.  She likes the idea of having a hobby but hasn't been able to find the right one yet.

So I bought another spindle and a learning DVD from The Woolery, so my sister and I can learn together.  How cute is that?

I've definitely got a lot going on in the New department.  But I also got reacquainted with some older things, specifically my silver jewelry.  It's amazing what a cleaning cloth and some elbow grease can do.  For example, here's a pair of earrings I've had for six or seven years:


The darker one isn't in shadow, it was just that tarnished.

I feel like I got a whole new set of jewelry for the few bucks it cost me for the silver cleaning cloth. I'm glad I found a way to be happier with the things I have instead of springing for something new.

But, it was my birthday the other day, and I received a very thoughtful gift that will be leading to some new things around here...