A Little Celebration Cake

I made a cake to celebrate how well my Swing pattern has been received on Ravelry.  I mean, I made a SOUTHERN style cake (which means it's unnecessarily gigantic) to celebrate how well my Swing pattern has been received on Ravelry.  Coconut.  4 (count them!) layers of sweet yumminess!

 And there's so much cake that I wish I could invite you all!  Thank you to the lovely ladies who have indulged in a purchase of Swing this week!  You are much appreciated!

And in the "What's New" category, while speaking of Ravelry, I am now a Yarnie in Ravelry, so Ravelry members can check out the yarns in my Etsy store via Ravelry.  How excited I am! 

Happy Thursday to all!

WIP: The Great Alpaca Experiment

One of the many things on THE LIST this summer was to learn to do everything with fiber from the point where those locks hit the shearing floor to the point where it is a finished, knitted product.  So, I know it's WIP Wednesday and I should be showcasing whatever knew knitting project I have begun, but this is really my big WIP for today.  (I did cast on for another test-knit of Swing--which seems to be making a nice little splash at Ravelry, by the by.)

Exhibit A:  The newly sheared alpaca, weighing in at 2 ounces.

Exhibit B:  The Wash Cycle

(in the kitchen sink using a few drops of lemon dish soap, hot water, and yes, a salad spinner!)

Exhibit C:  The end of the wash cycle (This alpaca is a Georgia alpaca, thus the red-clay water.)

Exhibit D: Rinse Cycles 1 & 2 (also with hot water, no soap, a little vinegar for rinse #2, and a salad spinner)

Exhibit E:  The Spin Cycle (via $2.98 salad spinner from Walmart) You can probably see the crud left in the sink post rinse cycle.  I learned to do 2 wash cycles and 2 rinse cycles after the first batch.

Exhibits F & G:  Drying Time (Alpaca is taken from spinner and spread out on a screened frame--in the bathtub!)

And for the Grand Finale:  Look how pretty it is after it has been carded!

And then I carded it with a little soy silk because alpaca fibers are short and soy silk fibers are long and the combo makes it much easier to make some yarn, and the result is a--so far--single ply strand that feels like I've spun clouds into yarn!  It's so awesomely soft!

Eventually I will dye it--thinking I might try a vegetable dye like beet juice--and it's killing me not to dye the fleece, but this was/is a great end to THE LIST as I head back to teaching the kiddies at the high school.

A Few Really Good Things

My last full week of summer vacation (insert sad face) has had some ups and some downs.  Let's focus on the ups.

1. I finally found the buttons I had been searching for and finished Swing. The pattern is now available at Ravelry, Shopit.com, and Etsy.com for $6.00 (US).  Check it out!
2.  Audrey's Country Crafts is giving me FREE advertising for my Etsy.com store for the entire month of August, so go there when you finish reading and show her some love!
3.  I started to clean, card, and spin that alpaca fiber that I bought at the beginning of July, and though it has been a labor-intensive process because the alpaca lady's fleece was full of tiny wood shavings that had to be removed by hand, I added a little soy silk and it spins up beautifully!!!  It's going to be like wearing a cloud when I have enough to knit with.  I'm very excited! (and there's some of the carded roving for sale at my Etsy shop).
4.  I was invited to be a guest blogger at Chubby Cheeks Thinks during the month of August (how cool is that!), so check out her blog and show her some love, too!
5.  The pattern for Swing is all but done and should be available on Monday.  I've already gotten some emails about it, so that makes me super excited, too! 
6.  I finished up all but one of the sewing projects that I had been putting off this summer.  The last one is a table cloth of sorts for a table in my classroom, and I will have to measure it when I go to my "retreat" with the principal. One cannot have too much of the school colors in one's classroom, you know.
7.  My husband managed to finagle an 8 ft. cardboard cut-out of Johnny Depp as The Madd Hatter for me yesterday.  It's going up in my classroom.  Originally, I was given permission to paint a mural on one of the walls in my classroom to display state standards for the classes that I teach; but then I was told that I would be getting a smart board, which is a good thing, and I had to give up on the mural idea.  So, since my wall space is now limited, The Madd Hatter is going to, with purposeful irony, be the figurehead of the state standard.  (insert wry smile). 
8. Finally, with the exception of a lace scarf and a pair of fingerless mitts for myself (those will be next week's one-day project) with my new Suri (alpaca) Merino.  Allow me to show off the man gloves that I've finished for Honey for cold weather motorcycle weather.  Already he's put in an order for another pair for Boy Scout Camping, which they seem to do A LOT of in the winter--like every other weekend, for Heaven's sakes!  I modified the Cigar pattern that I found in Ravelry--increased the needle size, didn't make full fingers, but increased the finger lengths and the length of the glove post-ribbing.