Wasted days and Wasted nights

Today was my 4th day off in a row. Here is a list of what I got done during that time. Friday I made an appointment with a moving company who will be here Wednesday morning for an estimate. I put some laundry away and did some grocery shopping. I also picked up an external hard drive to back up my photos on my various computers for safe keeping. Saturday I washed the bed linens and picked up the house and did the dishes and picked up my husband at the airport. Sunday we had a mover over to give us an estimate on moving then went to get a new cell phone for my husband and ended up finding out we need a new cell phone company. Our current company has no presence in our new state. Then we got a new router and our Yule gift to each other (one of those digital photo frames) and then we researched wireless companies in the area. Today I updated my Ravelry user profile and will probably update my online information this evening. Four more days at work and life really goes into overdrive. Time to pack up my life and relocate.

I originally had planned to take this weekend and do my big dying project and get my stuff up on my etsy site. I did however put my etsy site on vacation mode while I get ready for the move.
I think tonight I might take some time and go through my closet and make a donate pile. It will be a big pile. I might make a list of things to do.

I am usually more productive than this.

Life is moving too fast

Since I last posted my life has gone into overdrive. I have a new job that I am starting the first week in January, I am packing up and my husband and I are moving from sunny southern California to snowy wintery Wyoming! I'm going from a handcrafted house that we built to an 1889 Victorian. A town of 14,000 to a town of 4,000. And to answer the question that everyone seems to be asking.... yes there will be a guest room for visitors to sleep over. Glen Oaks Designs is leaving Glen Oaks!!

While my life is packed up in boxes I put my Etsy site on hold. I had been spinning in overdrive and have a banker's box over flowing with yummy scrumptous hand spun yarns. I also have four hand blended batts for my spinners. The batts are Merino/ Silk, Merino/silk/Mohair, Alpaca, Paco Vicuna, silk/ merino/polwarth. I have a collection of a dozen mini balls of blended fiber all spun up and two plied in various blends of silk, Merino, Mohair, Polwarth and Wensleydale. They will be sold as a set and are over a gram of fiber. I also have several larger mini balls with more yardage to them that will be at firesale prices once I get back up and running. The 50/50 Alpaca Mohair is spectacular. I will be posting these up on my ravelry site for any ravelry people interested in a preview. If you want to reserve something let me know. Speaking of which I have two pair of socks I need to put in the finish pile. And I have started a lace scarf that has only been frogged a half dozen times. This evening I frogged it to the cast on... I wasn't happy with a section of it.

I have a moving company coming on Sunday for an estimate, I have another on on Wednesday but after reading the website were people rate moving companies I am thinking of doing one of those "pod-like" you pack things- they drive it. We can put furniture in one, indoor thing in a second and outdoor things in a third. We will be having a huge yard sale with lots of new items some never used and still in their sealed packages ... I have a second breadmaker like that. We will be selling our home theater seating. I will hate to see that go. I spend many an hour with my feet up watching TV and movies knitting and spinning. Ok I don't recline while I spin. I do weave my viking chain while chillin'.

I will be closer to my sister for the time being. We never live close to each other - the fates just don't allow it. Of course this means she'll get that choice job in Chicago now. Our moving there seals that deal. I still will be making my appearance at the Tucson Gem and Mineral show. I can be mostly found at the 2Beadtrueblue show and the Manning House show. I will also be haunting the Rio Grande Catalog in Motion. I am am also making plans to go to a few sheep and wool shows maybe black sheep gathering. Who knows I might even make it back to SOAR.

So right now it's getting ready to get the heck out of Dodge. Actually I am moving closer to Dodge.

My last day at work is Friday the 19th. That will be culture shock on multi levels. I have worked for the same company for a decade most of which from home. Now it's a new company and I'm going into work every day in an office and interacting with people and wearing clothes. Not that I did tech support naked because I didn't. I just didn't wear things that matched or that I'd wear out of the house. Not even to do gardening. I have been shopping. I highly recommend the LLBean lambs wool cardie. It's like a hug. I needed a hug so I got 3. The new office is not a high trafic office but jeeze recently I haven't really been around humans for almost 6 weeks since my hubbins has been up there already finding us a place to live and working his job. I even use the self check out line at the grocery store. I really don't interact with others. It will be what I call the "raised by wolves" syndrom. Me getting used to being a person interacting with other people. I think most of my job is self motivated and just getting things done. I work very well like that. And no more having to talk people into doing things they don't want to. No more getting yelled at just because the economy is in the twalette (spelled toilet) No more mandatory overtime because two people want to beat each other up. The down side is I just qualified for four weeks of vacation... I'm back down to 12 days. An upside is we are near about 5 spectacular locations where we have a timeshare. I can see weekend vacations will be more fun or is the popular term "funner"?

Well it's 3 am AGAIN!! I really need to stop doing this and go to sleep at a decent hour. I sleep better with Hubbins around. He should be here in 17 hours.

Knitting Therapy

I'm knitting again. Same 'ol same 'ol. It's been keeping me sane. I tried doing some wire work. I couldn't get it to do what I wanted it to. I spent a few days uploading to my ravelry page. Geeze that's addicting. I actually spent an evening photographing my stash. On one hand it was fun. On the other hand it's embarrassing. I was taking pictures of YARN. I still have to post my hand spun assortment. That's going to take some time. I was discussing with a customer today the fact that people in low tech crafts like knitting and crochet and spinning and all that use the high tech information superhighway to discuss their low tech hobbies. It's cool!

I was toying with working on Thanksgiving but the idea of having a day off over ruled. The Job is turning into a job so I cherish my off time. My world is a little upside down right now. The worse things get the better off I will be, but if they get better instead of worse then that would be bad. I guess that explains a lot.

The fish is doing much better. While I was at SOAR he had decided to jump out of his tank and flop around on the floor. He's big enough that my husband heard the thumping and rescued him and put him back. He was a little torn up but OK. A few days later his food got lodged behind some driftwood in his tank and he wore a spot on the end of his nose off. It was down to the cartilage and very scary. We started giving him some wound treatment in his water and he started to develop these bubble like blisters. I did some research on the condition and found that it was deadly and needed to be treated ASAP. So we did what the websites recommended and removed plants and supped up the bubbler to aerate the water and he's healing fine. His fat belly is all better, the wounds on his tail are gone and his nose is almost back to normal. In a few more weeks he'll be 100%. I raised him from a 2 1/2 inch fishy who survived two fire evacuations, algae bloom and now this. He's about 14 inches now. His tail fin is bigger now than he was when I got him.

My sister blogged about me.. I blogged right back at her. There we go again with the information superhighway.

I'm going to sign off I want to knit a few more rows before casting on some Z's. I haven't been sleeping well. Maybe I should try felting some Z's. I'd count sheep but I would be ogling fleeces instead of resting.

My Secret Plan for World Domination

If I told you it wouldn't be secret. However you will know it when it happens because you will start seeing my name everywhere and I won't be the only person typing it.

I carded 50 grams of a lovely Merino/ Tussah blend in a shimmering green this past weekend then spun it up into a lovely yarn. This upcoming weekend, if I can find that colorful blend I got in the grab bag at soar, I'm going to spin it up in a wolf style yarn and maybe throw in some Wensleydale locks and a spit or two of leftovers. It will be a true novelty yarn. I have been redesigning the popular Wrap & Roll jewelery designs that have become popular in the fiber crowds and am planning my own version that I think will take the concept up a notch. I need some new cutting edge stuff for Tucson which is coming up fast in 12 weeks and counting. Last year I had my trinket jewelery. I have some enamel demons to exercise and I will be rocking the viking chain. I want to do some PMC focal beads and maybe some charms.

Ok I've told you too much. No really! You know how superstitious I am! That and it's 1:30am and I need to be up tomorrow for work. I really need to drag my @$$ out of the house tomorrow after work and go grocery shopping and send off a FedEx package.

Well time to cast some zzzz

And Then There Were Two

I finished my latest pair of socks and am wearing them. I even broke out my Birkenstocks today to show them off. I still have a fun filled evening planned. I am going to break out the drum carder and blend some Polwarth and Bison down and spin up some yummy warm yarn to knit a hat form my hubby. I am pretty good with hats. I can usually do one in a day or two. It should be fun. I need to start spinning again. I need to make jewelry. I need more hours in the day. On the other hand since I got back from Pennsylvania I have actually been sleeping. I'm still tired but I have been sleeping.

I've signed up for some business development and sales classes. This hopefully will give me some focus and direction. Not that I don't have focus and direction but more is better. In fact right now I am going to change direction and focus on making some Polwarth/ Bison blend fiber bats.

Really... I haven't been slacking!

I know I promised live reports from SOAR but I had no idea I would be so busy!! That is one jam-packed week!I learned a ton and brought back two sheep worth of goodies and will be putting new items upon Etsy soon. I will probably de-stash some fiber and I will be dye some yarn and roving soon. But don't think all I've been doing is sitting around fondeling my fibers I am midway through a new pair of socks. They may be interupted by a hat for my husband. I am currently pondering the possibilities for fiber blends to create to maximize warmth and durability. I'm already planning on sending him out with the monkey paws. He'll be spending a few weeks in the mountains working. It may not feel like it down here in Southern California but it's fall in some parts of the country. I have pictures to prove it!! My sister said they had two feet of snow last week in Wyoming. Luckily it was just after they left for their trip down here in the sunshine.

SOAR was a blast. It you're a fiber geek it's like a who's who of spinning, knitting, weaving and other wooly pursuits. I made some new friends and some new business contacts and plan to go again although it might not be until 2010. SOAR is going to be in Taos New Mexico. I have a timeshare there which makes accomodations free. Plus it's driving distance - no airplanes!! That makes the whole thing affordable.

Well it's late and I'm tired. I'll leave you with some pictures of my hand spun hand knit stuff and my new sock(commercial sock yarn) that should tide you over for a few days.

I finally made it!!

After more than a decade of spinning I finally did it. I made it to S.O.A.R.. I have been spinning since the early 90's and have read Spin-Off magazine for longer. Every year I would read about their Autumn Retreat and dream of going myself. I almost made it last year but finances and not being able to get the time off of work kept me away. One of the other years I had a chance to go it was going on Halloween. I don't miss Halloween. This has been my first chance to go and possibly my only chance so here I am !!

The trip out to Pennsylvania was nice. My BFF M and I flew out cross country changed planes in Philly and hopped the puddle jumper to Scranton where we rented a car and drove to the Poconos and found our hotel which is about 15 minutes from where S.O.A.R. is being held. The first night was a little rocky. I won't go into gore details . I must say I was surprised at the layout of the Wilkes Barre Airport. The rental car pickup was so close to the baggage claim I left M to fish for he luggage while I rented the car and still made it over to the luggage claim in time to snatch my bag . That's convenience. The drive down wasn't bad. It sure is pretty around here.

Today we went exploring a few little towns around here. We found a fabulous fruit stand where they have wonderful apples, banana bread and pumpkin bread. We also had lunch at a local brew pub. If you ever find yourself out in Tannersville PA be sure to stop by the Barley Creek Pub and order a Chicken Mcshea!!

Tomorrow is our first day of workshops. I am looking forward to seeing everyone. I will take lots of pictures and post them for everyone to see. If I get some free time (which I might) I will post some new things on the Etsy site. A few items have fallen off of the page and need to be replaced. Thursday we are going to find some LYS and LBS. Why not check out what the locals do.

Lastly Oh My God the fall color is breath taking!!! I'll try to capture it on digital but I don't think it will ever be as beautiful as it is right now.