I have managed to wear myself out in a single morning of domestic chores. Vacuuming, doing laundry, changing bed linen and various other tidying has led to a sore hip and taken the cheeriness with which I started the day. I think it's just getting old; as R emailed me yesterday "Getting old sucks" and he's 6 months older than I am. I read an article from Sydney Morning Herald about how bitchiness is becoming regarded as not the most nasty trait that a woman can have, that perhaps a bit of bitch makes you stronger. I mention this at this point because what R and I were sharing comments about was the appointment of a particular person to a post as VP of my former employer, for whom R still works. I loathe this woman, not only because she took my job against my advice to management when I left to come to Australia, but that she is smarmy, self-aggrandizing, possesses an extreme case of trees instead of forest mentality and is the author of a discussion paper that strikes at the heart of everything I believe about the virtues of my profession. Now she will be in a position of authority at the place I adored working. Granted, I left them, and their position in the marketplace has changed, as well as most of the staff I worked with. I try so hard to detatch myself from my work these days partly because my devotion to my former employer also caused massive burnout and I don't want to get emotionally committed to that level ever again. I often get nostalgic for the good times circa 1985 when both my job and my marriage were great; but today I am happy for different reasons (when I'm not grousing about my health) and my fibre life has replaced software development and gourmet dining.

The bitchiness article also reminded me of another person who used to work at my old employer who could be the poster girl for bitch. While she and I were the members of a quartet who used to dine out frequently, I knew she was also play-acting as friend. Once she fed me a lie (that she had cancer of all things), solely (I think) to see how fast I spread the idea as gossip. She must have been terribly disappointed when I told no one. She was also convinced I was having an affair with a male colleague, an innocent enough misapprehension until she used it to kill a project which she thought I was championing only because he had designed it. No, it was just a good idea that worked well. He might have used me as a tester but I would be one (of many people) who would be using it. She was in a position to kill it and told me it was because my "relationship" with him had clouded my judgment. Appalled doesn't begin to describe how I felt about that one. If that's what is being proposed as an acceptable way of getting along in the workplace, I hope it is only being used in jest. I try very hard to be honest and transparent in my life, simply because it uses up valuable energy trying to keep track of the lies and feeling angry over things one has no control over, such as who has been appointed as a VP. These days I try and keep my head down and work my (limited) hours doing the best job I can for my current employer and not let past injustices allow me to get angry all over again.

On to happier topics: The latest issue of Wild Fibers magazine arrived yesterday and I have only had time to skim it so far but, as it does with every issue, I want to stop doing everything in order to do fibery stuff all day every day. There's even a weaving article I can take to class when we restart next week. Obviously that would mean somebody else doing all of those domestic chores mentioned at the beginning of this post. Where can you find a house boy these days? An article about Shetlands has the most adorable photo of a mixed coloured group of lambs. My battle to get the paperwork for getting wool processed in the US has made a leap foreward when we all made contact finally with the USDA Vet Services officer who is in charge of granting the certification. One of the fleeces awaiting this blessing is a black Shetland lamb fleece, and I have a very pro-active Shetland breeder in Illinois (Shepherdwoods Farm) who has at least 2 more. Chris Green sent me samples of a white and a grey that are gorgeous. Once I get the alpacas sorted, I think I will be doing some blending. I think I might have to get the Ashford Book of Carding even tho Amazon is not stocking it.

Round 5: Finally a convincing win, even if it was against bottom dwellers Melbourne. Percentage will make a difference later in the year (teams that have equal win/loss records are ranked by the difference between points they scored and the points scored against them). Sour note: Tadhg may have dislocated his knee cap. I hope it's "only" that because that is recoverable in some cases whereas if he's done the knee in completely, that could even mean loss for a season. I admit I switched in and out because we watched Borat first and then I watched 2 episodes of Dead like Me which of course I only discovered long after it was cancelled. One thing I thank the DVD magnates for is access to so much on DVD that doesn't cost large amounts. We have complete sets of Stargate: SG 1 and Atlantis and Farscape, plus Hamish MacBeth and Dead Like me and some of Gilmore Girls and Six Feet Under. I wish we could afford Star Trek, mostly Voyager and Deep Space Nine, but they are too expensive. I had mixed reactions to Borat; some of it was hysterical and some cringe-making and some just stupid (naked wrestling in the convention dinner). I have joined a mail order DVD supplier, mostly because there are things I want to watch like The Hours that I know he doesn't and I want a broader selection of films than are at our local video rental. Foreign films, older ones that have been weeded out of their collection. I am a serious film fanatic but rarely go out to the local cinemas, because their schedules don't fit mine, their seats are extremely uncomfortable for someone like me, and they make decisions like Happy Feet was a children's movie and only shown at matinees.

I have almost finished the blue Opal socks and the Bear has chosen his next sock yarns: Regia stretch in a blue & brown which I have no idea of pattern that will form if any. I think the stretch is a good option for him. I may be gifted with a rather large amount of alpaca fleece from a friend of my Bowen therapist who says she can't sell it. To test what's involved with raw alpaca, I am washing some from the stash, some black and some light fawn. I knew they were dirty because alpacas like to roll but I was a bit taken aback when the first wash water was itself black. They are soaking for a second go as I type. At least you don't have lanolin to get out.

Here is a close-up of the first skein from the filthy fleece. It is a very non-descript grey and this skein is from batts carded before I learned to comb first so there are more bumps and lumps than I'd like. But I cannot convey how soft it is. It has quite a bit of bounce (moderate crimp) and is soft enough to make you want to cuddle it. I may over dye it and knit a scarf. I've changed my mind about my weaving project as I don't want my dress red & white scarf to be in any way screwed up because it was my first woven object. There are some really nice dish towels in one of my magazine that use Log Cabin colour and weave in a very interesting play of colours. We always need placemats and napkins because we actually use them. Putting a clean tablecloth on is a major operation due to the Bear's clutter, so changing place-mats is much easier.

There may be unexpected interruptions in blogging over the next week or two while I get new carpet installed in my bedroom. Yes, it's taken us since New Years to get around to it, but we did have the interlude where we bought 29 acres of land. Now things have settled down, and the guy is coming to measure on Tues. I don't know how much wait there is after that. It has meant I've had to move all the books out of the bookcase, clothes out of my dresser, etc. so the furniture can be moved. And then of course, move everything back in. We are going with a neutral wool Berber not too different to what was down here when it was new (a long time ago).

It Rained! 27 nmm on Saturday and 17 mm today! and that's not here (where it also rained) but onto the 29 acres!. It looks like more rain is coming. I also noticed that there there was only one day (until this rainy weekend) when the temperature didn't get over 20C when we in Canberra have had numerous days of highs of 17 or 18. So it really is warmer there. I can grow citrus and figs, which some people seem to be able to grow here, but I have killed too many lemon trees to try again.

I know, I know. It's been ages. I have been either flat out busy or flat out asleep. Nothing got done either last Saturday or on Weds, which is a usual day off for me but was ANZAC Day holiday for everybody else. Sunday we went on an extended trip to the mall and both of us were flagging by the end. There have been days when my legs hurt so much I was wondering if I could walk down to my car, even tho it was in the handicapped spot next to the staff entrance. I have been much interested in the story line we are seeing currently here in "House" (which is one of my favourite shows). This line revolves around a cop who was given the usual House treatment of sarcasm and contempt and has decided to get him by removing House's pain meds. House is deemed a "drug addict" and not capable of practising medicine while taking narcotic pain killers. This is a scenario I live in fear of, especially when we go to the States for a visit. I take controlled release morphine and strictly controlled sleeping pills. I would not be able to function without them. US customs says you may not bring in drugs that are not allowed in the US. I haven't specifically investigated my meds because I didn't want to raise any red flags, but I am always nervous that some hardline customs official might decide to search my luggage and find said meds and despite the doctor's letter I always carry when I go overseas, might decide I was a druggie and confiscate them. The cusoms web site says you should go to an American doctor to get the prohibited drugs. Am I suposed to waltz into a doctor who knows nothing about me and ask for morphine and sleeping pills? I actual had to do this on one trip when I forgot (stress of overseas trip --> cognitive impairment & short term memory loss) my sleeping pills and had to get Saint J to FedEx them to me. Meanwhile I had a week of no sleep, until I convinced my sister I really really needed them and went to a local (NY) GP who looked at my letter and said "Good grief, what's the matter with you that you are taking all this?" Fortunately he believed me and wrote me the prescription (which required govt approval just as it does here) and I finally got some sleep. People with chronic pain take pain medication not because it gives them a "high" or any euphoria, other than that which happens when the pain is significantly reduced, since I am never pain free. The US I know has real sensitivity on opiates, and I had a GP who didn't even like using codeine for migraines. Here it's available over the counter and while I do have to do a lot of paperwork for my morphine, I also have a rheumatologist who is pragmatic about pain and managing it.

Good news at last! We now have the piece of paper that says Box 6A is ours, even if they misspelled my (maiden) name wrong on the title certificate. When we go to the wool show in July we'll need to get a lock for the gate and do some enquiring about what we can do without a building permit. There was even a whopping 4mm of rain last Sunday.

Round 4: We lost to Adelaide, in Adelaide, which is always a hard ask. Their kicking accuracy was atrocious. I have to admit I only watched the last quarter, since the Bear and I were watching a DVD together (Friday and Saturday nights are our movie nights). The Swannies were only down by 14 points when I turned it on, but it only got worse from there.

I have been knitting furiously on the Opal socks after I spun the last of the first pound of BFL I have. I wound off another hank of plied BFL which is a bit finer and more consistent than the last. I also wound off a skein of the filthy fleece. I would have posted a photo but I decided after its usual dip after winding off that there was too much lanolin still lingering so I gave it a hot wash with dishwash liquid. This is partly because I want to overdye it and no lanolin makes dyeing easier. I may be gifted with a substantial amount of alpaca so I've been taking a dive into the stash to find my raw alpaca to see how hard it is to wash. I know there is no lanolin issue, but that alpacas like to roll in dirt. I finally found a podcast I like and that is Fibercast, partly because Nancy sticks to her topic, provides helpful stuff like what it's like to raise alpacas (The Bear loves alpacas and like to go and hum with them at sheep shows), an interview with Earth Hues Dyes about natural dyeing etc. No fluff, Just The Facts. Of course I am consumed with envy at all the announcements of upcoming fiber festivals in the US. We'll have one wool day in May at the Old Bus Depot Sunday Markets and then the nationals in July.

The Aussie dollar is high at the moment so I am buying stuff I have been holding off on like some knitting books (trying for used when possible) and some fiber but not much. I tried the Heal my Hands stuff (what do you call it? a cake, a container full?) and since it has lanolin in it it is extremely long lasting and makes the palms of my hands really soft and supple. But I have really bad cuticles and dry finger ends (another FMS thing) and it's hard to get this semi solid cake of lanolin, beeswax, etc. to penetrate there. I like the Body Shop's Mango Body Butter for my nail areas. I slather that on before I go to sleep at night. The Imp has taken to sleeping with me but usually starts jumping up and down on me around 5AM, when she is escorted to the door. Then she goes and licks the Bear's toes.

Still enduring the saga of the inability to get the proper permits out of the USDA for my fleeces to be sent to me. According to the mill and a Shetland breeder, their USDA people don't know anything about such certificate but Quarantine here assures me that they do it all the time. I am left in limbo with 2 fleeces ready to be shipped to me if we can just organize the frelling certificate. There will be at least 2 more Shetlands and 2 of the crossbreeds I think I already mentioned.

This is what carded batts of the filthy fleece look like. After
picking open the tips of the locks which were encased in mud, washing several times, combing with a dog comb and drum carded (sometimes twice). I still get noils because the fibre is so very fine. I shudder to think how much of my time has been spent on $8 of raw fleece I have a plyed bobbin full what I will wind off in a day or two.








I got the latest issue of Knitters earlier this week and something in it jumpstarted my knitting flame. Not that there was a partular item that screamed "KNIT ME" although there were several I liked that were lace (damn it). But I suddenly felt like knitting. I got some very old stash yarn called Alpaca Fiesta from Diamond Yarn It is a 2-ply, loosely plied of 2 singles, one bright turquoise and one thick & thin dark green. My gauge swatch was sorta difficult to knit even in garter stitch. But the garter stitch showed plenty of texture so I think I'll just plug numbers into Knitware and spit out a basic vest. I will have to be careful not to split the plies.

Hope had asked what I was going to do with my spindle-spun silk and I hadn's really thought of what. I have one scarf out of hand-dyed tussah and it was a bitch to knit. The silk I'm spinning is bright coral and will need something to tone it down. So I thought of using it as weft with commercially spun silk as weft. I have some undyed from Glenora Weaving so I think I will aim for.

Round 3: I missed most of the action due to what I tend to regard as the reverse-jinx effect. They play well until I start to watch at which point the wheels fall off, so I stop watching only to return to watch them tidy up the match with ease. I don't know whether it's the fact that I'm watching that I get to see Schneider handpass to a Brisbane player, Spida miss several goals, whatever, but while I went back to my ironing in despair, they controlled the fourth quarter and won easily. Mick scored the first and last goals on his 250th game. Barring injury and making the finals, he could hit 300 by the end of next of season. He still has the desire because he definitely shows his emotions on the ground. Since Brisbane was undefeated, this was an important win. Not so nice seeing Ben Fixter playing for Brisbane but I don't know what the internal factors were which led to his de-listing and subsequent drafting by Brisbane. Might have been mutual for all I know. Because of the screwy nature of the broadcast rights this year, the match was shown on one free-to-air channel while the commentary was from the Foxtel pay TV network. They cut off coverage immediately after the siren so we didn't get to see Mick chaired off the ground or the team singing the team song in the locker room, which we had become accustomed to. Cheer cheer!

Yesterday we went to Fishwyck markets which is so dangerous. Loads of lovely fruit and veg, 2 fish markets and too many deli/gourmet food shops. We came away with 2 kinds of plums, pears (a choice of 4 different kinds), a rockmelon (cantelope), the first mandarines (tangerines) of the season, flat beans, a sweet potato (which are absurdly expensive here), fresh corn (ditto re expense) and 2 of 8 different varieties of potatoes (from common Desirees to purple congo), a piece of swordfish for me and snapper for him, and blood orange sorbet and a smoked chicken breast from one of the delis. I resisted sheep's milk cheese and mango gelato, and figs were 2 for $2.50 which is a bit pricey even though I salivate in thinking about them.

I knitted away on the Bear's jumper while I watched TV last night and finished plying a bobbin of the filthy fleece.Tonight is combing locks of filthy fleece before I go back to BFL and I may take up a turquoise and black alpaca vest from the stash after the fiasco with the lace jacket.

BTW I finally finished His Majesty's Spanish Flock, and cannot recommend it highly enough to anyone with an interest in wool genetics and the commercial development of wool internationally. Only the illness of George III and of Sir Joseph Banks led to the demise of the experiment as the Regent had little interest in things agricultural. What surprised me was that the proceeds of years of shearing were simply stockpiled and then dumped on the market as an extremely bad time for the price of fine wool. I didn't find it terribly clear why this was unless it was Sir Joseph's withdrawal from ongoing management of the flock. The experiment certainly had profound impact of Australia through the purchase of some of H.M.'s sheep for Australia. I also found it interesting that the ordinary English judge of sheep found the merinos pitiful because they were used to looking at meat sheep. One pertinent comment was that you don't judge a merino on horseback, but get down and part the fleece. All that lanolin attracts a lot of dirt which obscures the true nature of the fleece. (Hence my filthy fleece which is delightfully soft but wouldn't look like much on the hoof).We call merinos in a paddock (field) stealth sheep disguising themselves as rocks. The normal washing procedure prior to shearing English sheep was to wash them in a river. This obviously doesn't not work with merino due to the level of lanolin in the wool.

Current BBBB is Beautiful Swimmers about crab fishing in Chesapeake bay. Australia is slightly lacking in crabs, making up for it in succulent oysters and enormous prawns. Mud crabs are found to the north in mangroves but are usually served as chili mud crab which leaved me out. I long for crab imperial from the Chesapeake or in desperation crab cakes. And can I have red Lobster cheese cornbread and a deluxe margarita with that?

Round 2: They beat Richmond by 16 points but I have to hang my head and say I didn't watch. By the time I remembered they were playing we had to leave for Cirque du Soleil so I wouldn't have seen the end anyway (big cop-out). The Bear reported that Spida kicked 2 goals, had 15 possessions and did well as ruck. Good to see Darren Jolly still there and contributing as I was afraid that Spida would push him out just as he was maturing. Having 2 available ruckmen who can also play forward is a Good Thing. Mick seems very pumped up this year and even hoped to reach 250 matches which is amazing. And to think I watched him debut as an 18 year old. (a rookie is called a debutant in Aussie sports. Picture a 6 ft black footballer in a fluffy white dress).

Instead of ironing, I hung out online, carded 3 more batts of filthy fleece, cast on the Bear's new jumper and uploaded new CDs from Not Lame. They seduced me with Hook Heaven 2, so as long as I was buying one, I also got Class Three Overbite's Rendezvous, and Love by design's Let the Outside in. I must go iron if I want to listen to them. But my hand hurts, she whined. Too much mousing, she grumbled.

Having plucked 2 enormous butternut pumpkins out of the autumnal garden, I have pumpkin roasting for my roasted pumpkin and ginger soup. Winter is definitely soup weather so despite the weather pixie telling you it's warm and sunny (which it is) I feel like soup.

I just found out that it is not me being incredibly slovenly in leaving gobs of hair on the floor when I blow dry, because I cleaned the existing hair up yesterday and it mysteriously re-appeared, so I think The Imp has been pulling it out of the waste basket. Where does she get these ideas?

I have a lot on my mind that I want to post about but my legs are killing me and for some reason both hips have been sore for days. It may all go back to another mall trek, this time, besides going to Medicare and Medibank getting refunded $, and Coles for things the Bear couldn't find in Woolies and looking in vain for fish and debating buying frozen baby octopus... You get the idea. I also bought a couple of blouses to tide me over until I get fully slim. I know I've danced about this subject but I'll come out and admit it. I have been seriously dieting (as in I joined A Plan) since last August and I have lost 35 kg. Now I need that uninvented invention, shrink-wrap skin where I stand in a hot shower and the loose skin tightens right up. Instead I have droopy thighs and torso but you can now see my collar bones, I have only one chin, I have gone down 4 sizes and am on the cusp of the last. Of course the first things to lose size is my fingers so all my rings are loose. Should I get to the point that they are falling off I shall have to think about resizing them again, because my weight does tend to yo-yo but over very long periods of time (years, like). My search for slacks is continuing as every "fashion" store I went in had the very same hipster, wide band top, extra long (even on me), flattering only on an 18 year old skinny child. K-Mart was pushing shorts. In the middle of April when I'm into freezing feet weather. See Crazy Aunt Purl for her rant. And why do they think larger sizes (like an 18, wow) all want cropped pants? Nobody looks good in them. I bought a fitted (!) ruby red blouse and a black long sleeved number with white pin stripes. In my ideal world I'd wear Lands end all the time. I'd live in 7-day twills and turtlenecks with handknit vests in the winter. I am a tiny bit leery of ordering jeans mail order. I wear nothing but Lands end shoes because they are the only shoes I find always comfortable. I have 6 pairs of their All-weather mocs. There is a Fletcher Jones outlet in our new outlet mall so I may hit them for some seriously nice slacks, but then I work with dirty books So I walked from one end of the mall to the other and by the end my hips hurt so much I was wondering if I would make it back to the car. I did (thanks to my handicapped pass) but my hips still hurt 3 days later. I will iron this afternoon but that's it.

Searched out some new fibery podcasts to try. It was so nice to hear Brenda's voice again that I saved her podcast till the last as a treat. I am very jealous of having all that time to knit Aran jumpers, but not of her illness. I wish I could get some of the super blogs I find as podcasts. One I have found is Curious weaver which sparked my interest being Aussie and, aside from being an awesome weaver, dabbles in using weaving software and even Photoshop to spark her creativity (an idea close to my heart). She lead me to The Online Guild of weavers spinners & dyers and I looked at their longwool challenge. My English Leicester looks very much like theirs although I didn't comb mine. I have Wensleydale and Marsham in the stash. I am plying the spun filthy fleece, still picking out VM. I am hoping with a plyed yarn when washed will bloom into something soft that I might over-dye and knit a scarf out of. It hurts to sit for very long. It hurts to lie in bed too long. It definitely hurts to stand. Maybe I need to to take my Neurontin.

I haven't sorted out the fleece buying yet. as Matt has gone silent again and I am waiting to hear from my other fleece sources. I bought some Gotland from Copper Moose as well as a couple of small items as the dollar is high. I have so many books I have none that are on my wish list that I crave. I'd like to pay for these fleeces while the dollar is high. The dollar is high and I am lacking time not stuff. Knit from the stash. Spin from the stash.

As I expected, Cirque du Soliel was wonderful. I have seen everything broadcast, have even said I'd go to Las Vegas with the Bear (major geek conference) if I could just see them. Well, they actually came to Canberra, that forgotten capital city, and put up their tent right in front of the Library. Every act was amazing, even the clowns, and I generally don't like circus clowns. We were about 5 rows back but on the side. The only act we missed, therefore, was the Triple Trapeze which is designed to be appreciated by the centre of the house. And of course what I love are the costumes, all fringes and iridescent fabric and strange protuberances. I was afraid my jaw would remain permanently in my lap. I was so right that seeing them live would be something beyond the TV experience. This show was Verekai which has now moved on to Melbourne. I was especially taken with the spectacle of the tent gone black to be filled by tiny moving lights, no doubt provided by placing lights on performers in black. To those who have never seen lightning bugs, it must have been doubly special. I tend to think my dislike of traditional circuses originated when my mother and I were witnesses to a show in New York when I was young where a tiger turned on its handler and while I haven't retained any overt fear from the event, I just don't care for circuses. Of course, my father dragged us to Venice, Fla, to see Ringling Bros. every year and I couldn't make him care that I really don't like watching elephants, clowns and dancing ponies.

The Imp was tres naughty and slipped out the front door and took off at night thus activating a search and rescue operation. She didn't go far, as I expect she was surprised to find it dark outside. I very carefully prevented myself from panic and once she came out from under the cars she was easily scooped up. One cannot tell a Burmese the she has no road sense, or for that matter any sense of real danger. All instructions are not to let Burmese out on their own but ir's hard to tell her that.

I did more garden cleanup on the weekend and didn't tax my hands overly. We harvested one watermelon, about soccerball sized. I don't know whether it will be yellow or pink inside.

I finally got the Bear measured since he's off the size charts despite losing a bit of weight. I plugged the numbers into my sweater software and spit out a plain jumper (nothing "fussy" for him) but it will be knit out of hand-spun from Bendigo's readi-spin in the colour "red tweed" which is a darkish red with royal blue flecks. I am spinning more BFL, cleaning the filthy fleece, and have temporarily ceased knitting everything else but the Opal socks.

My DVD trial sent me 21 Grams first which was an interesting film and I do like Sean Penn. Tonight it's Ocean's 12. The TV networks are flooding us with re-runs so help is needed. The Bear subjected me to The Legend of Zorro which reveals to his mental age for watching movies.

Once again mea culpa. This has been a very uncomfortable week. I have had on-again off-again IBS* all week, sometimes meaning I just felt uncomfortable and bloated, sometimes meaning I needed to be within a few yards of a toilet. It is still there but I am trying to ignore it since it shows no signs of either going away or seriously interrupting things (I hope). I say hope very strongly as we have tickets for Cirque du Soleil this afternoon and I do NOT want to be heading for the ladies in the middle of a performance, but stress, even "good" stress, can really ratchet IBS up. I used to get it like clockwork every time we went up to a Swannies match just because I was excited. I also forgot to take my meds Thursday night which meant yesterday I had nausea, headache and prickly pain due to withdrawal from my antidepressants. I recently learned that the gut has many times more serotonin receptors than the rest of your body and an SRRI or lack thereof could easily affect the actions of the gut.

My usual reaction to felling like crap is the crawl into bed. Just for 5 minutes. no, 10. Maybe 30. Why don't I take a little nap? Whoops the morning is gone. So goes my life, lost in sleep, not necessarily because I'm "tired" but just because I want to push the painful world away for a little while. It works and sometimes I even feel better when I wake up but I rarely do all the things I have "planned" for whatever time I have available. Housekeeping is the first to go, hence the dust bunnies multiplying and the fridge needs a thorough clean (that I will do this long weekend). To my North American pals, Australia has a 4 day long weekend over Easter, given Good Friday and Easter Monday as public holidays. I find this very strange because there are the usual pronouncements of separation of church and state and there is none of the standard "God Bless America" type sloganeering by politicians. I am convinced the holiday remains as an excuse to eat all the chocolate one can, since chocolate in many forms is everywhere at this time of the year and they don't dye Easter eggs, and so we can have one last holiday (it's also school holidays) before winter arrives.

This also means we are on holiday from weaving class and since the instructor is also taking personal time after that we have 5 weeks without weaving class. Last week we played with different kinds of weft: fuzzy, shiny, boucle, anything including wire. It was a lot of fun and gives the mind lots to ponder. I am to bring in my inkle weaving next class which might prompt me to warp it again for my next band. We will do double weave next week which intrigues me in my design to weave a blanket from hand spun on a 30" wide loom. Then we go into projects, and I know I want to weave a red and white "dress" scarf in either twill or a colour-and-weave pattern. I might use some hand spun in the process.

I have knit nothing but socks and have almost finished the first of the 2 Opal blue socks. I plyed off another bobbin of BFL and am ready to spin some more. I continue my wrangle in trying to source Shetland from the US with many breeders eager to sell to me but refusing to believe that there are special laws regarding importing to Australia. I found a very promising site last night only to find they were in Canada and the thought of adding that to the equation made my brain hurt.

We watched Casino Royale on DVD last night and I am not fond of the new James Bond. Yes, he has a gorgeous body, but his ears stick out and I don't find him sexy. It also seemed that a requirement was that he run really fast. The opening titles were an absolute delight tho and so clever. The idea of 007 playing poker and not baccarat though. I mean really. I have been watching season 5 of Alias which for some reason our local network declined to air, so I had to buy it on DVD. I'm glad I also bought Gilmore Girls on DVD because we didn't see that either, even a shortened season or out of order. I signed up for a mail-order DVD rental service to watch DVDs I know the Bear doesn't want to watch but I do. So far they have mailed me (but they haven't popped out the other end) Ocean's 12 and 21 Grams. His tastes are those of a 14 year old boy so if there is subtlty or nuance or a love story (without car chases) he isn't interested.

*Irritable bowel syndrome

My apologies for the lack of posts this week. After my effort last Friday I reported in the last post, I foolishly tried to do it all again on Sunday and crashed on Monday. Tues I woke with a sore throat and cough and stayed in bed to make sure I didn't miss weaving. I slept a lot and tried to regain some ground. I worked both Thursday and Friday to make up some time and came home both days and hit the bed for a nap. My legs of course hurt quite a bit even when lying in bed which is so frustrating.

Last week's weaving class included attendance at a slide show on West Timorese textiles which was very interesting as many of the styles of fabric that I had seen to date I assumed were embroidered, but are really woven using some very complicated techniques. Pictured is a woman weaving on a backstrap loom as all their hand weaving is done and the colours she is using look like they are all natural dyes. I bought a shoulder sash similar to this but smaller and it was only $50. All natural and lots of the classic red/brown colour that is typical of Timorese textiles. This week we got into twills on our own weaving session and it was quite a breakthrough. We also had an introduction in how to read weaving charts which had always been a mystery to me. Then I promptly screwed up the first difficult chart I hit and couldn't figure out what I had done wrong. Read vertically instead of horizontally. Duh. And part of the chart that I had always tried to figure out turned out to be treadling charts and tie ups. Since I have no treadles with this loom, they are irrelevant. I might try making a rug out of roving as a small project when my loom is set up. Still waiting for the Bear to put my warping frame together but he has still not fully recovered his energy from his bout of cellulitis. He takes a lot of naps and goes to bed early.

Round One: Repeat last match, with the Weagles winning by one point. Frankly I'm surprised the Swans got that close as they were very disorganized, missed many opportunities especially kicking straight. I thought the margin would be much bigger but they did manage to claw the score back. The Swannies always seem to take several weeks till they are all on the same page. Too many short handballs in the back line ending with a long kick that frequently the Weagles picked off easily. Spida proved useful but I don't think is totally integrated into their mindset yet. Mick tried hard and seemed very frustrated. The commentators said the team was fully fit at the start of the season which is not usual but their problems were mental not physical.

Other things of note: we have signed papers for transfer of title for our land and all that remains is sending money to various folks and the land will be ours. The Bear photocopied a cadastral map from a book about the old days in the Bendigo region which shows our block with 2 shafts on it. Wonder if anybody found any thing for their digging. I have had my annual sauce/jam/chutney sale at work and cleared $190 for charity and have only a couple of jars left over. My charities (in links) will be getting some money. I am still not knitting but have been working on the filthy fleece. I wound off a bobbin of plied BFL which if it turns out good enough, I might use in my weaving project. I also had a go round with the folks in the US who are processing fleece for me. Wooly Knob finally got in touch and I told Matt what Australian Quarantine wants and he's trying to figure out how he gets the required "official government veterinary certificate" on wool scouring which nobody has heard of. Meanwhile I have claimed 2 Rambouillet / CVM cross fleeces from Nistock Farms, and Matt has gone out of his way to coordinate the processing and shipping. I may add a couple of Shetland fleeces to the list while I'm at it. Or California Red. So much wool, so little time...

Not only is it raining here, it rained on our land this week! Or at least in the nearest "town" all of 5 km distant. Big belt of rain and another expected today. It's amazing how fast it greened uo here after we got rain so I am hoping there might even be a puddle in the dam. It was so nice to see our land listed on the real estate agent's website with "SOLD" under it

I must admit I am processing the filthy fleece again. Not all of it; some did go out as compost/mulch. But it is incredibly soft so I saved what looked like longish bits and am combing with my dog comb before it goes throught the drum carder. This is a case of where I really wished I had a reliable and not pricey processor. It seems that everyone is having the same problem as me with the US processor. Lack of communication doesn't do his reputation any favours.

Yesterday after I got about 2" of split ends cut off my hair, I came home to do some serious gardening which, as usual, involves digging out couch, which is a kind of lawn grass that spreads by runners. It is as pernicious as perrenial rye grass is in Ohio. And it's everywhere, including places I can't use herbicide on, like my strawberry patch and asparagus bed. The only thing that makes it pause is application of undiluted herbicide, and then it will just sprout from somewhere else. I have learned that 2 sprigs of couch next to each to each other are probably from totally unconnected parents. So I dug and dug for about 3 hours and then came in, had lunch and slept. Today my arm and hand are sore. If it doesn't rain tomorrow I'll dig some more.

I think I'm going to give up knitting. Or stick to my comfort zone (simple patterns with unusual yarns). I have tried to knit the cotton tape lace jacket and couldn't keep the lace right through a single 12 row motif. By row 5 I had mysteriously lost a stitch. Knitting lace in cotton did not help me see what I was doing; it just made it harder to do the stitch manipulations required. And I was halfway down the foot of my Opal socks when I realized I hadn't turned the heel. My brain seems unable to cope with anything demanding concentration. I enjoy spinning so much more. I think I'm going to measure the Bear and start on his new jumper which is out of handspun so I will finally have something to show for my efforts. Why can I do the most complicated cables without raising my blood pressure, but lace just floors me. Is the FMS lack of short term memory, or fibro fog? Maybe I should try another thing I've never done like Fair Isle. I've got about half a bobbin of plied BFL I could wind off and dye. That would lift my spirits. Or knit something small so I can have at least one FO. (Socks don't count as FOs because they are a neverending progect-in-progress)

Someone had this quiz posted to a spinner's group. I can't remember if I have taken it before, but I came out as Shetland wool. I know I took one about knitting needles and came out as bamboo and both are pretty spot on.

I am feeling sorta cranky today, which must be a good sign as I have been miserable for 3 days straight: pain everywhere, fatigue making me take long naps every day, etc. I figure this is catch-up for all the stresses in my life in the past fortnight so I won't panic or get depressed, but I'll get cranky instead.

In catching up with various blogs, I have hit a number co-incidentally which recounted the blogger's introduction to the needle arts. So here goes mine (change channel if not interested). I started sewing as soon as I was old enough to hold a needle and made clothes and quilts for all of my dolls by hand (I had 1950's Madame Alexander dolls) and graduated to making all my own clothes and then on to quilts. My mother taught me embroidery, quilt-making, and attempted to teach me to knit and crochet. For the last two I knew how to make the stitches but not how to follow the encrypted patterns as printed in magazines. When I was growing up, there was a big box (like a box a washing machine might come in) in the attic and whenever anyone in the house made anything, the remnants went into the box so that when you needed something for quilts or doll clothes, you could dive into the box. We also spent many summer vacations on the coast of Maine with the closest city being Bath. There was a department store there which, besides having the novelty of those pneumatic tubes that whisked money from the cashier to the central office, sold off-cuts from a factory that made women's housedresses. You will date yourself instantly if you remember when women wore housedresses. These off-cuts were perfect for scrap quilts and all our quilts were scrap quilts and all made exclusively by hand. I looked down my nose at those who made quilts on the sewing machine until I moved here. I can no longer hold anything in my hands either firmly enough nor long enough to make hand piecing possible. When I went to grad school I continued to make quilts but sold the tops mostly as extra income. I was never fond of quilting process. I still have the quilt my grandmother made for my 12th birthday and the 2 "grandmother's flower garden" pattern quilts from my parents' twin beds. I still want to make quilts when I have more time; another project for retirement but somebody else will do the quilting. I also did dyeing, both the hippy tie-dye and some basic but large scale (dress fabric lengths) batik. When I return to it today, all the technology has changed but I still love it. My mother took up knitting after I left home and I still wear jumpers she knit for me in the 1970's. Aran jumpers never go out of style and when cared for lovingly can last forever.

I also did counted cross stitch until it became boring and needlepoint, which I still love but rarely have time for. Spinning followed knitting and knitting was inspired by my mother-in-law and BFLB, who also led me into the Alladin's cave of the Fibre Gods. Once you've fondled fibre in its unspun state and realize you can make yarn as you like instead of what the market thinks you want, it's very hard to resist spinning. It might have something to do with being surrounded by sheep. I always visited the sheep pavilion at the Ohio State Fair but those were largely meat sheep and there were a few weird ones (four horns?!) in a little side display as spinners' sheep. Now that I am learning to weave I can't wait to use up lots of hand spun and I want to try and spin every fibre know to woman.

So what about this sounds cranky? Reading that somebody has taken up spinning because they want to make "art yarn", those balls of underspun candyfloss, bead coated, ribbon festooned junk I hate. It's like saying that I've taken up oil painting based in the inspiration of my toddler's finger paints. Obviously, from what I have written above I've a long history in the textile arts and I have pretty traditional tendencies and standards. I would always aspire to be the best I could, not to aim low at lumpy unusable blobs of wool. It has been my experience that most if not all of the great abstract or even semi-abstract painters could paint a perfectly formed and rendered piece of representational art before they started experimenting at the edges of the medium. You have to crawl before you can run, but apparently some people are going to be content with never getting past crawling. Oh, well, it's their own time they are wasting and I'll steer clear of those practioners of spinning.

We had our weaving class last week and we actually wove 4 whole inches and I made houndstooth checks! How thrilling! I know I wove much too firmly but I kept thinking I was making something that looked like finished cloth even though I well know that cloth fulls when washed and I have left no room for it to expand. Still have erratic selvedges. I am spinning what I've carded of the filthy fleece, and it's a shame it was so filthy and I couldn't afford decent processing of it because it is really soft and pale grey with a luster sometimes visible between the lumps.

This part of what the postie brought me today. On the left is Heartstrings Beanstalk top pattern, which looks challenging due to my problems with lace. It never seems to stop me from buying lace patterns, just knitting them. I started on the Katia top and remembered why I don't knit with cotton and now include cotton tape in that category: my hands hurt after too many k2tog and k1slpsso. On the right is Sarah James Slip Stitch flower top which can be knit in different weights of yarn. Both came from the Knitting Zone in super flash speed, along with some Katia Mississippi 3 which will be cotton sock yarn. I got black (can you imagine! No fair-isle faking bright colours! Black) and neon green. I read on Grumperina's site about her search for cotton sock yarn and she has the same requirements as I do: fine weight so you can wear normal shoes, not hiking boots, and that they stay up, thus eliminating Fortissima cotton which has no memory and just sags. I have been knitting cotton & wool blends for summer socks but a real cotton would be great. It was hard to find Mississippi 3 in anything but bright variegated colours, but I've got lots of bright colours so a solid is a novelty. It is a cotton acrylic blend and I cannot tell whether it will sag or not. I'll try ribbing. I am wearing the socks I just knit today.

I've knit two whole rows of the Katia jacket that requires about 5 repeats of the lace motif. I discovered it is designed to be shaped at the waist. I am not yet confident of my body shape to knit it with a distinct waist shape, and it's an open lace jacket any way. I'm not got to struggle to remember to decrease and then increase for something that is designed to be worn open over a T shirt or singlet (tank top).

The filthy fleece is being spun so I can see whether any of the stuff I didn't use as mulch yet is worth processing (combing and carding). It is very soft and quite lustrous when I hit a good patch, but there are lots of lumps and bumps and noils as well as VM. I'm going to try and ply it quite firmly to gain some control over its fly-away nature and see. I am spinning superwash on one of my spindles with very long colour changes. I might have to learn one of those special plying techniques to maintain the colours, or wing it and get mis-matched plies.

We had a morning tea and the Library this Monday to celebrate the completion of the conversion of all our manual serial check-in records to our online system so that users now can tell with better detail what we hold. I worked on the project when we did the Australian part of the file, but went off on other various projects when the overseas titles were attacked. I am still doing clean-up work on retrospective material but in monographs instead of serials. There is so much stuff to do in our collection and I am the only one doing clean-up. Currently this involves authority work (making sure name and subject headings are correct) and moving Australian material shelved in the overseas collection to its rightful place in the Australian collection. It quite often opens several cans of worms to do either so I am not afraid of running out of work. Lots of old Library friends (people who had retired) showed up for the tea and it was so nice to see some familiar faces. They all commented on my new shape; I am at the stage of saying when is enough? I'd still like another 5 kg minimum, and be able to maintain that, before I go out and buy new clothes.

The Bear is sentenced to be at home for the rest of the week and he is taking afternoon naps. He says antibiotics make him sleepy which not something I've ever encountered but everyone is different. My legs hurt a lot nearly all the time and I don't know any cure. I have my normal Bowen therapy this afternoon but weaving class is back tonight where we will be doing a lot of standing again.

He's back and so am I. Now on oral antibiotics, the Bear has returned, a bit diminished and tired, but much healthier than a week ago. I managed a lot of sock knitting and am picking up the gusset in the first of the blue Opal socks. I like longish legs to my socks and normally knit to 8" before doing the heel flap. At home I have 2 fat bobbins of BFL, and have cast on the back of the lace jacket. I have discovered to my dismay that my diet now means that many of my favourite (and not very old) sweaters no longer fit. I have a short-sleeved top knit of Classic Elite Avignon (cotton and silk) which is now a tent on me. Most of the winter jumpers I don't think will be as disastrous but I just knit the Avignon last year. We did grocery shopping on his return and there is much fish and Lean Cuisine in his future as well.

A couple of trips into my past popped up this week. I happened upon the book displayed to the right when looking at Lark books on weaving. In the first half of the 1970's I was in graduate school at UNC-Chapel Hill and a frequent visitor to the potters of the Seagrove area. I have several pieces left and maybe will try nagging ex-husbands to get some more back, although some of the most striking pieces (a vivid red-orange ashtray) are long gone. I have a frog-skin green Jugtown vase, a teapot signed Seagrove pottery and a jug with lid signed Z. Teague that used to hold my sourdough starter in NC. I looked up the Seagrove of today and found their website but they seem much more upscale than they were in the '70's with people doing crystalline glazes, which are one of my favourite glazes and one I collect, but must have the Coles turning in their graves. I didn't see the Coles on the list of potters on the website, but they were definitely not upscale and I remember poking around in their dusty sale room. I had at one point a set of avocado green stoneware from them but I know it didn't cross the ocean with me. I still pick up pottery when I see something that I like but it has to be special now and I still look out for crystalline glazes and copper red if I can find it. There are many pieces in this book now in various museums and I have a few bits that are of the same date and lineage, although at the time I was buying functional pottery and not "art ceramics". I still refuse to buy "things" made out of pottery that have no possible purpose or heritage. My one exception is a large (ca. 18" long) porcelain egg with the most glorious glaze on it. The movers managed to crack it in the ride across the world but I kept it (high on a bookshelf where nobody can see the crack) because its presence comforts me.

The second thing that popped up was rediscovering Laurel Burch after many years. I found bags she designed in an online yarn shop and was thrilled to see current work by her. I have since found her home page and now know from other online resources that she has a rare medical condition which presumably has interrupted her career. I am ashamed to even count how many pairs of her earrings I own and now I have discovered a whole new array of vibrant, colourful images. Of course I love her cats, but her other designs of a more abstract nature are just as attractive to me. I am of the opinion that you can never have too many earrings so I see some new ones in my future.

We apologize (again) for the brief interruption in regularly (ha) scheduled broadcasts. The Bear is in hospital with a staph infection in his leg. This has happened before in a much more serious way involving an abcess and much ickiness. I will be busy going to and from hospital while trying to keep myself together. FM people need support and he is my support. I have been trying to convince a diabetic that he must be careful about his health without much success. Let's hope this scared him. On top of the real estate stuff it has been a bit too much stress and stress is a really bad thing for FM people. The real estate thing has progressed with down payment made and now in the legal contract writing state.

I thought it might be nice to post something fiber-related, just because I seem to have neglected that side of things lately. At right is my next knitting project, a lace jacket out of Katia Ideas Jeans which is a tape of cotton & viscose. It is a free pattern at Elann. I think I bought the tape at the previously mentioned shop that sometimes carries Katia. A big leap into a new kind of yarn that I've never used before, and lace which I have had problems with. I figure with the weight and cohesiveness of the tape I should be able to see what I'm doing. At left is a spindle carrying case I bought online and I can't remember where. If someone is madly in love with it and would like to buy one, contact me and I will poke around in various files. It has a beautiful covering of an Oriental-feeling bird print, and edging is in a gold print and it has a green tassel on top. I think it's great for carrying around spindles and is certainly large enough to hold fibre and a noste should one want to.

Next below is my latest spindle from Viking Santa on eBay. The corkscrew shaft makes it very easy to spin and it has all the other things I like (notch, suitable hook. I am sorry to say that the Reeves spindles are driving me nuts and until I can tinker with the hook and the slippery shaft I am giving up one them. I have lots of other spindles that do what I want them to do but I thought I should support an Aussie

wood worker. Unfortunately the design of the spindles seems to be driven by the spinning techniques of his wife who likes them as they are. I haven't had much luck in convincing her that they don't work for me. If I could swap out the hook and roughen up the shaft, they may work OK.

I also finished the cotton/wool blend socks which are displayed below. Charging ahead with The Next Socks I cast on some blue Opal that is sorta mottled sky blue with the occasional darker bit and the occasional almost white bit. I have finished the ribbing at the top and am into the body of the socks.

What about the other things mentioned in the last post? We have met with our bank and finance has been approved and we are awaiting the $ to hit our bank account. We have made an offer on the land which was accepted by the vendor so we will need to transfer funds as soon as all the financial institutions get sorted. It would be more excited except I am very tired (my legs have been hurting a lot) and I spend time making spiced pear jam this morning. I have to admit it tastes pretty nice but you could put cinnamon, cloves, and ginger on just about anything and I'd eat it. This used up almost all the pears on hand and quite a few had resident worms eating from the inside out so the overabundance of pears was deceiving. The weird part was that the ones left out of the fridge were in better condition than the ones in the fridge. It is also 35C when the weather gurus said it would "only" get to 31. The other attitude dampening is that the Bear is unwell. He feels sick enough that he took himself off to the doctor on a Sunday. I worry so about his health and his weight but he seems oblivious until something like this hits him.

Our weekend away was very productive in the sense that we found a block of land that is a) suitable in size and conformation, b) convenient to our rural town of choice, and c) we can afford. This photo will do nothing to reveal its location but shows the grove of mature gums where there is a perfect house site. It is not far off sealed road, 15 minutes to shops, etc., has a robust tenancy by kangaroos and lots of birds and no water, but then nobody has water these days. I see lots of rainwater tanks and electrified fencing in my future to keep garden, roos and potential cashmere goats from interacting in any undesirable way. It was so quiet and peaceful there. Now we have to do all the paperwork involved in buying land.

Last night Canberra had a storm which we noted as "we're having another thunderstorm, it seems." When I ventured out this morning I found drifts of hail still lying around, half a hillside had attempted to move down the slope, and there was extensive damage in the city and to the university so there is no weaving class tonight. Rats. We were going to actually start weaving tonight having completed warping the looms last week despite being interrupted by another thunderstorm when lightning hit the Art School building and set off the fire alarm. This stretch of repeated summer evening thunderstorms is not the norm for Canberra and it makes the next day steamy which is also not usual. It makes zucchinis turn into blimps overnight and I finally made what I am convinced is my last batch of sweet zucchini pickle relish yesterday but I haven't made the pear jam yet. I was just too tired before we left to do it. The pear are cooling their heels in the fridge, so maybe Friday.

I spun enough silk in the car going to Victoria that I had to wind it off onto my nostepinne and I was surprised at how much there was on a Bosworth featherweight. I am down to the toe of the second summer sock. We went to Bendigo Woolen Mills and I got a huge cone of neutral coloured wool for weaving and they had bags of singles in various colours for prices like 50 cents which might be fun to experiment with. I also bought a cone of 3-ply fuchsia for weaving. As soon as I can convince the Bear to assemble my warping board I want to warp my loom while the experience is fresh in my mind. I think my project once we have done the learning part of the course is going to be a red and white twill wool scarf. I have a standard issue fan scarf, but I'd like something a little more dressy that I can wear every day. I am hoping my newly svelte body now fits into my leather coat since my lovely lambswool tailor-made dress coat seem to have been attacked by moths despite being bedded down to moth balls.

While we were away we missed the first round of the pre-season competition which the Swans promised to lose (to the Bulldogs) and they did. This week they are playing Richmond here on Saturday so we shall have to think about that. I have so much stuff going through my head regarding work (I have been volunteered to do a test of doing authority work on two different systems and time taken), the land purchase, various household tasks that need addressing (ironing), the garden and its needs, and all the textile/fibre stuff that is always running through my head. In addition it is getting ready to storm again so I better sign off.

I'm going to say some heretical things about some people who have reached cult status in the online knitting community. I am speaking of Lime & Violet who are among The Most Linked To podcasters around (I used to have one of their buttons on my page). *WARNING* This is a personal opinion only and should not encourage anyone to flame me. I find their podcasts inane. I sometimes find myself far into their chatter and there is no knitting content at all. They seem to find whatever the other says as hilarious and dissolve into fits of giggles, and I'm sorry I don't see what's so funny. You had to be there? I really don't care about the husband's out of tune ukulele or the creepy sales person. It's supposed to be about knitting. I know one of them has breast cancer. You know, I know an awful lot of women who are much closer to me that have breast cancer (or worse) and I don't feel the need to go into gorey detail. My mother died of breast cancer so you cannot say I don't care. Brenda has so far the only knitting podcast that I find worth the effort. You can tell she's thought seriously about the content of her podcast and doesn't sit in front of a microphone gabbling and giggling. She's gone through her own health issues but has kept the background info out of the podcast and on her blog (which has lots in it as well). I have my health issues as well, but then I have a semi-unusual condition and I am not here to toot any horn, but to communicate with people I know. Any others who are interested are welcome but I try to keep the private information away from fibre talk which is supposed to be the main topic here.

Therefore, I will not go into details about where I will be going on Thursday through Sunday except it involves our potential tree-change to country Victoria. My main concern is getting the Bear to actually make a decision about anything. Two Libras are a bad combination for making big decisions! I am taking sock wool and my silk spindle. There has been so much going on here that I am really tired and need a re-group. Having waited till the last minute to decide to actually go hasn't helped. I made blackberry jam last night and even indulged in a bowl of berries and cream. Before we leave I have another batch of pickles and some spiced pear jam to create before the fruit goes soggy.

A note on what passes for a LYS. I went to it to buy buttons for J's cardigan. It is the local branch of one of the major chain of fabric and general sewing and craft items. They added knitting materials not too long ago but their range is limited, and aside from their own labelled yarns, they usually carry Katia. On this trip, as usual, half of their bins were empty, a lot of yarn was on sale and every single bit was acrylic. There is also some yarn at the back of a local (very small) department store which carries both the basics (Patons, Cleckheaton, etc.) and some fascinating Italian yarns at fantastic (i.e., yikes!) prices. I try to regularly trawl their sale bins to pick up bargains, but I am not buying yarn. Read the button.

It was neat to look at my weather pixie under an umbrella with lightning in the background and she's exactly right at this moment. It is actually raining, although not hard, and the thunder woke me from a nap. The Bear of course can sleep through anything. I have been so tired and, aside from laundry, house and garden work, I haven't really done much to speak about. I finished one of my cotton blend socks and cast on the second. I bought buttons for the cardigan. I have almost finish filling a bobbin with BFL but am worried that I didn't put enough twist in it because of its long fibre length and that when I ply it it will not be as firm as I want it.

My weaving class was great but it goes so quickly. I was totally surprised when it was 9PM as it didn't feel like it had been that long. There are 3 of us as beginners and two others doing ikat. We each have a loom and are warping a 6" wide warp in 3 colours (mine is predominantly red, surprise, surprise). The instructor, Monique, walked us through measuring the warp on each warping board, then showed us our to put it on the loom back to front. We all worked together and by the time we got to my loom, the three beginners did it all by ourselves. We were threading the heddles when time ran out. One of the ikat students who had already done the course said we were way ahead of where her class was. I think it's a case of repetition will make the process second nature and you won't have to think about where to put the warp, but right now there's a lot to take in. I've also looked at some of my weaving books and there is some variation in how you do some of it, and it's the principles I want to learn so I can take them back to my loom. I have already started thinking about what I want to do for my class project and have ideas for placements, scarves and other things running through my head. I have decided that the filthy fleece is no longer worth the effort and what I haven't carded and washed is going into mulch. I've got loads of beautiful spinnable wool, so why waste time on this?

We went blackberrying again this morning and got a much better haul, although I fell twice. Neither fall was a bad one altho I dropped berries on the first one and the ants beat me to them. However, it did make me feel increasingly unsteady. My vertigo has been bad lately and that doesn't help when you are foraging around on the side of a hill sourrounded by prickly bushes. If you step in a hole or on a branch that breaks, you have no resilience to correct your balance and you go down. But we got enough to make jam with some to spare so I won't complain. We may go back in a fortnight to do some more. I think The Bear is agreeing to go to Bendigo this Thursday but he still hasn't committed. It's our best chance yet to get some land that looks good at a price we can afford, but all I can do is nag.

I spoke too soon about the rain passing. We did have a downpour and I got very nervous about not hearing gurgling in the downspout behind my bed and The Bear nobly went out in the rain up a ladder (which he hates) to make sure the gutters were clear. The tree surgeon comes next Tues and I'll arrange a roofer to clean things up after that. I had horrible visions of our new ceiling disappearing from water damage again.

On the fibre front, I have only spun BFL and knit socks. I figure if I continue the cotton blend socks at my current rate I will get wearable socks before it turns cold. I was briefly tempted by an ad in one of the fibre lists for cut price llama fleeces (somebody with 150 llama and alpaca fleeces to offload!!) because I can't find a processor who will make the transaction possible. I have been unable to raise Wooly Knob for quite some time about the state of my fleeces that they are supposedly processing so I am hardly going to send them more. In spite of my vow not to buy more fibre I had to console myself with some llama roving instead. I think I will take some of the hanks of handspun in natural coloured wool and knit a jumper for the bear. It is chunkier than the usual 8-ply which means those oceans of stocking stitch will go faster. I think I am going to knit the red tweed into something for me but I haven't decided on a pattern. Is this the time to try a top down? Side to side?

There was an article in last week's Bulletin about the wool industry and (among the other things mentioned below) about the bounce back of the wool industry in some parts, the picture was painted that farmers are hedging their bets with sheep these days and breeding sheep that can be sold as reasonable meat sheep as well as producing wool. Dual purpose sheep have a better chance of turning a profit than wool only. Interesting sites I found were the Australian Wool Testing Authority and The Australian Stud Sheep Breeders Association which has some breed photos, a history of wool in Australia and other such stuff.

Speaking of the land, we are heating up on the search for our future farmlet/nature preserve/market garden. We may take off to Bendigo soon avoiding Weds nights! Because.....

Tonight (!!) is my first session in the learning to weave course at the ANU School of Art and I am simultaneously very excited and more than a little nervous. What if I'm hopeless? What if I can't see well enough to actually do anything? What if I'm just not up to a 3 hour class? I intend taking a nap this afternoon and have done nothing more taxing today than cleaning the bathroom, doing 2 loads of laundry and changing sheets.

I have gotten some encouraged emails about my blog and I thank all of you who read it. It was never really intended as being an authoritative source on anything but I'm glad some of you find it at least interesting.

Here we had all the signs of a good rain. Lots of thunder, dark clouds, a heavy rainfall cell on the radar a few clicks away and we got 5 minutes of rain and now the sun is out. There's still distant thunder so here's hoping it turns into more than a sprinkle.

I woke up this AM with a leg (the left of course, my "problem" leg that is an inch longer than my right) in agony. I thought it was all joint but as I lay there and tried relaxing and analyzing it, I felt muscle tightness as well. Too much standing yesterday when I cup up veggies for another batch of pickles? Whatever, I am not going to make pickles today. They can sit in brine another day without any problems.

I thought I'd take the opportunity to sit on the bed and get my spinning logbook up to date. I bought a lever arch binder, page protectors, and card stock at Officeworks and had put a few entries in. Today I dumped out the bag of locks of fibre and started trying to recognize them. Hmm. Went to the yarn stash to take samples of finished wool. Gosh, I have a lot of handspun and boy have I improved. There is plenty for another 2 jumpers for the Bear and I also am looking at yarn with different eyes regarding blending yarns. Turns out the 3 skeins of Noro match my 2 skeins of Dragon Hair and another I can't remember now. I cut samples of spun yarn and matched them to baggies of fibre. Some I have the spun yarn and the original fibre but I am totally lost about where and when I bought it. Probably the majority came from Bendigo or online but from whom I can't say. I must get better at documenting things because there really is a progression in my spinning and now that I'm spindle spinning and doing exotic fibers it's even more important. BTW, wound off another cop of camel down last night. Am busy knitting socks while deciding whether to try and squeeze in another summer thing for me or start the Bear's next jumper. The socks are a Regia cotton/wool mix in cream with stripes of yellow, green, and rust.

The cleanup yesterday involved getting more pamphlet boxes sorted out, and covered in holographic red book covering paper. They make kids here buy their own books at school and therefore they can put sticky Contac-paper like stuff on them. Most of what was available in Officeworks was Bratz and other kids' stuff so I was stuck with red and silver holographic. After years of doing pamphlets at the NLA, I have LOTS of pam boxes.

The sweet young lady across the street seems to have moved out and the guys are in cleaning it up. I will not miss her, her screaming at her kids, her kids crying all the time, her various men in their hoonish cars with loud stereos. The turnover is really fast over there. I don't think anybody has been there over 6 months.

I finally finished the door-stop sci-fi I was reading (Kevin Anderson', Saga of the Seven Suns) and have started Peter Corris's latest Cliff Hardy which will then be mailed off to a friend in the US. BBB is still His Majesty's Spanish Flock.

Finally, the fabled cardigan for J is finished (except for buttons). It was knit from a wool/acrylic blend called Volcano, and I had no idea what would happen when I knitted it because in the ball, you can't tell that these colour changes are going to happen. The changes are made by changing the colour of the second ply of the main colour, not variegating the whole yarn. It was knit from Very Easy Very Vogue and is called the seed stitch ribbed cardigan. The ribs do a few funky things along the way but otherwise it went pretty quickly and I have it done long before cold weather arrives. Unfortunately J's schedule is tied up in baby-sitting for grandchildren right now so I haven't seen her in a while. She specifically wanted pockets and these were a cinch. I may use the same technique sometime else. Nothing dramatic about it, just that you knit the first stitch of the back of the pocket and the first stitch of the pocket opening together so there are no gaps or sags.

After all the doom and gloom regarding the Australian wool industry some good news at last. There has been rain in some of the woolgrowing areas of Australia (not around here but somewhere!) and wool prices are up. The medium wool is selling better than the superfine. I was astonished to find that 75% of the superfine wool clip goes to Japan mostly for men's suits. The cold weather in the Northern hemisphere doesn't hurt either. Apparently the figure quoted by me and many others of a farmer committing suicide every 4 days is an old one and is no longer true, although there is still an issue with depression. We have had a few very high profile men admit to depression (the W.A. premiere (i.e., governor) resigned citing depression) so the message seems to be going out that it's OK to admit you are depressed and there is help available.
I Here is what I have been spinning on the Roberta: a pound of Blue Faced Leicester and I absolutely love it. It's amazing how what is technically a longwool Can be so soft. It also has that longwool luster to it. I can't anticipate how it will bloom when plied and washed but I am hoping for sock weight (as if I needed another sock yarn). My sock yarn box is overflowing and I can't even get the lid on. I neglected to mention that seamstress extra-ordinaire C made me a DPN storage roll that is long (tall?) enough to store my DPNs in their containers. I had bought one that looked snazzy and it was, but it also assumed you would remove all your needles from their packets and put them naked into the slots. I have like 4 pairs of no. 1, 2, 0, etc bamboo, wood, and casein DPNs and I'm not going to shove them all in one pocket and hope I don't lose one or mix them up. On on Bossie featherweight I am still spinning camel, the one at work is spinning coral coloured tussah silk, I am spinning green something wool on my Reeves spindle which I really wish had a shepherd's hook. I just bought a Viking Santa spindle on eBay after rave reviews in the spinning community. It looks cool because the shaft is a corkscrew. The Reeves spindle really has problems with the cop slipping down the shaft. Too slippery I think.

My dear Bear bought me the first 3 seasons of Gilmore Girls on DVD. I am watching season 2 on cable most nights but even tho I've seen them all I just love the series. Wish I had a mum like Lorelei. And I gave in and bought the 2 seasons of Dead like me which I only discovered on cable almost at the end of its viewing cycle and it was gone. When I was in the bookstore yesterday I saw a book on Seagrove pottery and jumped back 30 years to the days of trips from Chapel Hill to Seagrove to buy pottery. I still have and use some of it on a regular basis. I must be the only person in Canberra who would know what this stuff is. But I bought it on Amazon for half of what the store was selling it for. I don't have any of the salt glaze anymore; I don't even know which ex-husband has it. Apparently it's collectible now. Had I known that I would have treated it more kindly. But I had a lot of ash trays which I certainly didn't keep.

I do some of my best thinking while doing things like ironing, brushing my teeth, etc. I have been thinking about the whole issue that has popped up in my various groups under the guise of wool vs acrylic, allergies, organic wool, etc. There was a brief article in one of the papers this weekend about the illegal logging industry in Indonesia, a lot of which ends up in Australia. I had already wondered how that much teak could be produced to end up in outdoor furniture at "bargain prices" in Sydney. Chances are it was illegally harvested by a logging company who offered cold hard cash to subsistence farmers who didn't particularly care what the strangers did, at least not until their woodlands were gone.

I know we are supposed to "think globally, act locally" but there are so many issues at play here in so many different environments that acting at all seems counter-productive. How were the sheets on my bed dyed and what happened to the wastewater? Was my semi-antique Moroccan carpet made with child labour? Am I contributing to pollution by eating watermelon that was grown on irrigated and over-fertilized land? What happens to the drugs I take once they pass through my body (one of the one I pop like candy for pain is not metabolized at all) and go into the sewage system? Those Christmas ornaments I bought were made in China with labour that was not paid what we would call a living wage. Do we in the first world have the right to tell anybody else how they should live? So much of my life revolves around computers, the one I'm typing on, the one the Bear is using which also is the network hub, the one I use at work that produces data which is then available to people around the world. I live a digital life with digital friends and look for land to buy and books to read and music to load onto my iPod through this package of chips and discs and displays.

Consumerism drives our economy and in some cases makes it possible for those Chinese labourers to get a better quality of life than they originally might have been sentenced to. The Indonesian farmer may now buy a TV and either be lulled into stupidity by the dren we (first world) feed to the airwaves, or they might have their minds opened to the simple knowledge about a world other than their own and who know may spark an impressionable youth to act on what he/she perceives as injustice and the need to make us know the things he sees. If we are lucky he won't become a potential Islamic terrorist, but will "merely" take on the Indonesian loggers or the government (goodbye now!) in an effort to tell the world about what has happened to his corner of the world. Will people stop buying teak furniture in Sydney or even ask if the timber was obtained legally? Will we ask about child labour and fair trade and pollution when we make purchasing decisions? I didn't when I bought sheets recently but all of this puts an incredible load and responsibility on each consumer that I wager even Peter Garrett doesn't exercise every day. Those of us suffering chronic illness, or worse, a potentially fatal illness, know how hard it is to get through a single day without adding asking all these questions at every turn.

Even if I could produce all our food, our clothes, get off the grid for power and water, live without computers (not in this household), read books from the library instead of buying them online, would it make a difference? Even if my entire city (350,000) could do that (not possible in this landscape) would that have a impact on what we are all collectively doing to our planet? Now that the major powers have finally admitted that climate change is real, is it too late to make a significant difference? Some say yes; some say no.

There seem to be an awful lot of question marks in the preceding paragraphs. That's because I have no answers. I can comfort myself in knowing that I have skills in growing things and making things that truly twenty-first century folks do now. But that isn't going to matter at all if the system completely implodes. If I lose my pharmaceutical supply, I might as well be dead because, even if I make through withdrawal, I will be useless physically. The kind they used to leave out on the ice to die. Just some cheery thoughts for your Sunday sermon. But do think; it's the only advantage we primates have over the rest of life. We got us into this mess, maybe we can think our way out.

I have made a rather rash promise to the Bear that aside from the fleeces currently being processed (I hope) at Wooly Knob I will buy no more fiber this year. Oh. Does that mean I can't got the wool show in Bendigo? Hmm. Some negotiation will be called for. The declaration was prompted by the postie bringing me a package consisting of 8 oz of CVM (California Variegated Mutant). See photo at right. It feels middling in softness and is sort of milky tea coloured. He was fascinated with the idea of mutant sheep but they look pretty normal to me. I started spinning on the Roberta again last night after picking up the gazillion stitches needed for the button band on the cardigan (I am being naughty and doing it before sewing the sleeves in so it won't be so hot and/or heavy in my lap). I have no buttons yet but hope to remedy that tomorrow. What I started spinning was Blue Faced Leicester and I think I'm in love. I'm so glad I have 2 pounds of undyed roving, plus some hand-dyed, in the stash and a whole fleece being processed because this is seriously yummy fibre. Long staple with a slight sheen to it and so very soft. Not at all what I have come to expect from something with "Leicester" in its name. Given the length of the staple I am able to spin it finer than other things, or maybe all that practice on spindles has helped. I don't know and don't care because I am in love.

Since we are now in Feb., I started re-visited the real estate agents for the Bendigo region and I found a few potential blocks of land, but I stress few. Most of the vacant land was lots in new subdivisions with town water (which is not such a good thing in Bendigo as I think they are on level 7 water restrictions). We need to go over the atlas and find the names of towns in the areas we are interested in and not hope to fall on them through a Bendigo based real estate agent. I have been saying at least once a day to the immovable object that this year is not too early to buy land if we find some that fills the bill.

My wasp-stung finger is better (not very red or hot) but still somewhat swollen. There is thunder but we had thinder all day yesterday and no rain.

Knitter's review (link to the right) has a news article this week about a new show at New York's Museum of art and design (another thing to add to my list of places to visit) called "Radical lace & Subversive knitting" This show apparently includes the knitting done on telephone poles (by Dave Cole) with heavy machinery which was illustrated in one of the back issues of either Knitters or Knits. I would love to see the whole show and I hope somebody out there in blogland goes and reviews it further. I found the KR review interesting because of the interaction between knitters and non-knitters. Some of this stuff is very mind opening and some is just why? to me. The miniature mittens are a rare feat but why? This all goes back to me traditionalist, pragmatic side.

I am at a distinct disadvantage today and should get off this machine immediately because of the wasp sting. I got bit right on the knuckle of my right index finger and it is quite swollen and sore. Better than it was yesterday, but I react badly to insect bites in general. Not allergic-type reactions, but more swelling and pain than most people; insects who can bite find me instantly and bite me. Since I have been exhausted all week, I should take a nap anyway. I have a painted ceiling and a cleaned rug so now all I have to do is pack up my bits and pieces and get the carpet people in to measure for new.

I finished the Bear's grey striped socks (they are so boring I won't take a picture) and have cast on some Regia cotton for me that is cream with stripes of yellow, green and red. I hope I get them finished before winter sets in. If anyone cares, I have healed my iPod and submitted to the automatic update feature of the latest version of iTunes which I'm not sure I like (I am a control freak in disguise). Said automatic update feature gave me no option to update stuff that had been added via the main computer and therefore I lost all the old stuff. I have been gradually reloading it but be warned out there iPods can die or get seriously ill causing wiping of their memories. Be prepared.