It's a N-EWE Year!

Happy New Year to our listeners! We have finished projects including a huge completion for Marsha. We’ve started some projects, plus some discussion about a new e-spinner. Full notes with photos and links and a transcript can be found in the podcast section of our shop website: TwoEwesFiberAdventures.com Join the community on Ravelry or become a patron and support the show on our Patreon Page. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Subscribe on Android or Subscribe on Google Podcasts Episode 200 Q and A: To celebrate 200 episodes and over eight years of podcasting, we’ll answer your questions. Ask us about yarn, our lives, the meaning of life, Fibonacci, poodle grooming, or whatever… We’ll do our best! Send your questions to [email protected] or use the Ravelry thread, or DM 1hundredprojects or betterinmotion on instagram.  Marsha’s Projects:  Ben’s Sweater: Whoohoo!! His sweater is finished! January Blanket: Handspun Manx Loaghton, 3-ply aran weight, 1,460 yards. Decided to add one additional 15 stitch repeat so I cast on 192 stitches. I went up a need size to #9 and have knit about 28 inches. Noromania: Bought 18 skeins of Noro Kureyon (Aran weight) to make a blanket for Mark. EEW 6.0 Electric spinning wheel from Dreaming Robots. Kelly’s Projects: I finished what I set out in the last episode: the angel from the knitted nativity scene kit, a bumper for Minnie’s wool cat bed, and a warp for Monk’s Belt dishtowels. I started the Coloresque Wrap Erin Kurup using the Neighborhood Fiber Company rustic fingering gradient set Shades of Turquoise. This was a door prize from the NoCKRs retreat several years ago. I started this project as Stitches West knitting, but couldn’t follow the pattern in that setting and gave it up. Then I lost the yarn for at least a year! It is really more of a wide scarf than a wrap, but it might block out bigger than it looks.  I’ve returned to working on the spirit yarn mohair vest. I will have A LOT of yarn left over. I think I could have made a Garter Squish blanket. Monk’s Belt Weaving project: I am making dish towels rather than the placemats in the JST episode. I started with what I thought were neutral gray and brown and once they were put together they look a lot like lilac and orange. We talk a little about the way colors work in weaving and how the brain and preconceived ideas also affect the way we interpret colors.  Patreon Pattern Giveaway  A hearty, year-end thank you to our patrons! Your support has made our show better and our prizes more numerous. Message Kelly with the pattern of your choice ($10 or less). Thank you for your generosity. You’ve helped to build this community! Winter Weave Along October 1 - March 31 Transcript Full transcript available at twoewesfiberadventures.com Marsha  0:03   Hi, this is Marsha and this is Kelly. We are the Two Ewes of Two Ewes Fiber Adventures. Thanks for stopping by. Kelly  0:10   You'll hear about knitting, spinning, dyeing, crocheting, and just about anything else we can think of as a way to play with string. Marsha  0:17   We blog and post show notes at Two Ewes Fiber Adventures dot com. Kelly  0:22   And we invite you to join our Two Ewes Fiber Adventures group on Ravelry. I'm 1hundred projects and I am better in motion. We are both on Instagram and Ravelry. And we look forward to meeting you there. Enjoy the Episode! Marsha  0:42   Hi, Kelly, Happy New Year. Kelly  0:44   Happy New Year to you too, Marsha. Marsha  0:46   Yeah, this is the first time we talked I think since before the holiday. Kelly  0:50   Yeah. How's how's your 2023 been? Marsha  0:53   It's been very nice so far. Because I left New Year's Day for the beach. We went to-- Kim and I went down to the Oregon coast to Cannon Beach. And with the dogs, because the dogs needed a vacation from the stress of the holidays. Kelly  1:10   Only the dogs needed a vacation from the stress of the holidays?  [laughing] Marsha  1:14   Yeah [laughing] So it's nice. We had four nights down there. It was really fun. I don't know if you saw any of the pictures I posted but they had very high tides. So we couldn't really go to the beach in the morning like we normally do. We had to wait till the afternoon till the tide went out. So that was a little bit different. But it was fine. Kelly  1:34   I did see the one picture you posted where there literally was no beach. Marsha  1:38   Yeah, it was hitting the the rock wall they have along in front of the hotel where we were staying. And I actually thought, those really expensive, desirable homes that are right on the beach with a fantastic views? I don't know that I want to stay in one of those.  Kelly  1:54   Yeah Marsha  1:55   I liked being--we had a view. But we were not right on the beach. We were back. We kind of overlooked--It doesn't sound good, But it was it's actually fine--You sort of overlook a parking lot for the park. And so you're back at solid 50 yards probably from the beach, which made me--and we were up on the third floor which made me feel better. I don't think I'd want to be on one of those houses right on the beach. With the bedrooms on the ground floor. Yeah, not during this storm. And, and you're having storms down there too, right? in California? Kelly  2:26   Yeah, we weren't hit as bad as some of the surrounding areas. We but we've had--every time it rains we've had more than an inch, which is really unusual for us to, you know, to get that much rain at a time. We did have one day, it wasn't this most recent storm it was maybe a week and a half ago where the street flooded in front of our house, you know because of the slough, what used to be the slough, running through our yard and through the yards of, you know, all of the the neighbors. It comes right across the street, you know, what used to be the slough. You can see from above you know, it's comes right across our street. And so the street kind of dips down because of the the old slough having been there.  Marsha  3:18   Right  Kelly  3:19   And so that part of the-- that part where the street dips down floods and the, you know, especially if the if the city pumps for the stormwater aren't working properly, then it really floods. Anyway, it got high enough that it went above the curb and was flowing into the old slough in our yard. And so I always like it-- Robert hates when that happens but I always like it because I feel like I'm capturing stormwater for my own yard. Like yay! Extra water! But this year he was worried about it because he said, you know, he didn't want it to he didn't want that water to undermine his his fence posts that he had put in and that didn't happen. It, you know, was nothing huge. But there was some water runoff from the street into our into our little ravine and that hasn't  happened in a in quite a few years. So so yeah, we you know we we didn't suffer much at all. We didn't suffer at all from the from the storm. But like the beach in in the Capitola area, one of the old beaches that I used to, you know, the beach that I used to go to when I was a kid, their whole parking lot is gone. Just destroyed from the from the tides. Robert was showing me pictures this morning. And he's been really watching the weather and you know he's got the Weather Channel and all the places that he used to look when he was working at the agency and needed to keep tabs on what the weather was going to be for their generator system case power-- case of power outages and the storm water. So they could predict and, you know, because the stormwater goes to the treatment plant. Yeah, he was really-- well, he has been sort of obsessing over the   radar and all that. Marsha  5:12   Well and when I was at the beach he texted me that about the light fixtures on the front of the house that I helped him put them up that one time I was down there. And he was-- he put some extra wire on them I think, to secure them because he was really worried about the winds. Yeah, the reason why you got those new ones is the wind had knocked the old ones, had damaged the old ones. So he was really worried about that. They're fine though? So far? Kelly  5:36   Yeah, yeah, they are fine. The only-- his rain gauge, which is a five gallon bucket, the one day that the wind was so so hard I looked out the kitchen window, and this white plastic bucket goes flying across the yard. Oh Okay! So now he's got, he turned our, we have a like a, you know, that teak side table. He turned that upside down, set the bucket inside of the four legs, and then propped bricks around the edge to both hold the table down and hold the bucket firmly inside the table. He's got that sitting outside to measure so he can kind of keep track of the rain. The amount of rain. I measure it by the amount that's in the dog dishes. So I have a 12 hour rain gauge, you know, feed the dogs in the morning and when I go out at night and feed them again I see how much is there. Yesterday, it was about an inch in the 12 hours. It was pretty steady. And not hard rain, but pretty steady all day. Until yesterday afternoon. Today, we have a break. It's really nice. It's um, I can even see blue sky outside. So there was one day that it was so gray. It felt like nighttime all day long. It was  super unusual for us. So anyway, yeah, that's what's been happening here. Aunt Betty had her second cataract surgery and it went all fine. So now we're good. So she's, she's happy. She's able to see. She had a follow up appointment yesterday. So that's all good. So yeah, my 2023 is going pretty well, too. Yeah, well, mine is going pretty well, because I had a nice trip to the beach. And then I'll talk about some other stuff when we get to projects. So should we jump into projects? Or? Well let me just announce about the episode 200 As long as we're stopping for business here. So we are currently on episode 198. Coming up on episode 200. And so we're going to do for episode 200 a listener q&a.; So we'll answer your questions. And we've got quite a few questions already between email and the Ravelry thread. But I put up a Ravelry thread where you can ask questions, or you can email us to us at Two Ewes Fiber Adventures dot com. Or you can message us, you know on Instagram, or you can use our website Two Ewes Fiber Adventures dot com. And there's a Contact Us page and you can use that to send us an email. Lots of ways for you to let us know what your questions are. And then we're going to answer them on episode 200.  Marsha  8:43   Try to answer! Kelly  8:44   All of them. Yeah. And I have been listening to some of the older episodes just kind of going back to refresh my memory about them. At first I was a little worried like oh I'm not sure I want to go back there and see how we sound. You know we weren't that bad Marsha.[laughing] I think we did pretty good. First. I just remember, I do remember when we first started, on every episode, Robert would go to work and he'd listened to it. Then the next day he'd give me a rundown. It helped us get better. I do have to say that it helped us get better. But sometimes it was not a welcome critique. [laughing] Marsha  9:29   Now do you remember? I'm kind of curious, like maybe I shouldn't even ask but I'm dying of curiosity. Like what were some of the critiques that that he would give? Kelly  9:37   He said I repeated myself, which I still do. When I edit sometimes I think oh Kelly, why did you have to say the same phrase three times while you were thinking of the next thing you were gonna say? He also said that I talk slowly. Like I'll be talking along at a normal pace and then he can tell that I'm thinking because I get really slow. So, stuff like that, you know. And then when we started actually recording together, he's like, You guys are much more interesting when you're recording on the phone together. So.. Marsha  10:12   Yeah, I know, I think that changed the dynamic a lot, you know, when we started recording together, but I still listen to myself and every episode I'm critical of myself. Like, I can't follow my train of thought. And I, and I make so many mistakes too, in terms of when I'm describing stockinette, or garter stitch, or making the garter Squish, blanket. like, Ah, god, sometimes I listen back and I roll my eyes, you know, but anyway, we're just human right? Kelly  10:52   Yeah, you need to be kinder to yourself, Marsha. Marsha  10:55   Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, yes, I've been reading the questions, and I'm looking forward to answering them. Kelly  11:02   Yeah, it'll be fun. So do do. Send us your questions. And, you know, it could be about anything. So far, a lot of the questions have been about about our lives and our crafting and the podcast, that kind of thing. But, but yeah. Bring them on. Let's see. Marsha  11:27   All right. Okay. So projects. Kelly  11:29   Yeah, so let's go. I can go first. So last episode, I said, I had some plans. I did not have much knitting, but I did have some plans. And I can say that I did what I set out to do, I finished the angel from the knitted nativity scene. I did finish the star the knitting of the star. Now I just have to sew it. It's two pieces and then you sew them together and stuff it. So she's holding on to this stuffed star. So I didn't I didn't get it, but I haven't sewn it together and stuffed it but the angel part is done. I even washed her hair because the the yarn, the yarn that they had for her hair was wound around a cardboard. Most of the yarn was in little, little balls or cakes. And the yarn for her hair. I'm not sure why, was wrapped around a cardboard. And so where it wrapped around, it had like a kink. So her ponytails were very messy. Were curling all--just all different ways. And not curled. But like fish hooked, you know, like kinked.  Marsha  12:47   Yeah, yeah,  Kelly  12:48   The edge of that cardboard. So I wet the her hair. I had to wet it down twice. And then let her dry before before most of that came out, so so she's done. I've knit a bumper for Minnie's cat bed. And it's in there.  Marsha  13:05   Yeah?  Kelly  13:06   So, and I do know she slept in at least one night. During the real rainy days, she sleeps in the-- we have a house out there that I have a woven a wool woven pad in-- the one she used to have-- I put in there. And she sleeps in there when it's rainy, and she needs to really stay out of the rain or it's really cold. I'm not sure where she sleeps all the time, because she's not always on the front porch, especially since we got Beary and he barks at her. Although she doesn't--honestly I say she doesn't sleep there because of Beary. But Beary has been on the front porch coming in, you know, in the morning. And she has been under the car in the driveway on the porch in that same morning and walked up to him. Like, twice. So she's not really afraid of him. Although she-- I don't think she likes the barking. But she's not afraid of him. He's afraid of her. This is funny. You'll you'll get a kick out of this. So one morning, Robert had him and he kind of growled at her as she was walking towards him. And so Robert, you know, corrected him and said no. And so, and he was you know, wiping off his feet and stuff to let him in. And so Beary turned himself around and put his head in the corner of the porch. So you didn't have to look at her. Here's this big dog. He's really kind of afraid of her. He doesn't know what to make of her. And so since he couldn't growl or do anything wrong, do anything aggressive towards her. He had to just put his head in the corner. If you can't see her, she doesn't exist.[laughing] Yeah, so all of that orange wool is gone. And then I had to grab some additional coned wool from my weaving stash. And I knit with it for the rest of the bumper. So I got that done. And then the third thing that was on my list for before was to wind a warp for monks' belt. For the monk's belt project at the Jane Stafford Guild, and I did, I did that as well. And I'll talk more about that at the end of my projects. So I got all of that done. And then I've even returned to working on the mohair vest.  Marsha  15:33   Oh, okay.  Kelly  15:34   Yeah, that's what I have in my lap right now, what I've been knitting on, and I tried it on this morning. And so it's top down. And I have more than 12, about 12 inches from the armholes. So it's kind of at high hip length.  I want it to be longer so I'm I'm continuing to knit down but I'm gonna have so much yarn leftover. Maybe I won't, maybe once I put the ribbing and the the band on. I started with three skeins, I've basically got two balls, which is one skein that I am working on actively and then one skein in the bag  so I don't know. We'll see. So I'm continuing it. Maybe I should have made a blanket, because I think I'm gonna have a lot of yarn leftover but it's back on its-- back in the rotation. And then the other project, I started a new project knitting project. Do you remember the yarn I lost? The neighborhood fiber company gradients? Marsha  16:52   Oh right. Yeah, Kelly  16:54   Yeah. I think I lost it twice. I mean, I think I lost it, discovered it, said oh, okay, that's where it is. And then forgot where it was. And lost it again. I can't exactly remember. But anyway, it's 1250 yards of rustic fingering from neighborhood fiber company. And it's a turquoise it's called Shades of Turquoise. It's a turquoise gradient. And it starts with a really dark dark, almost black, blue, and then changed into a more true-- I don't know if I call it turquoise, I guess I call it turquoise. A more true turquoise. So there's two really dark skeins, then there's like this medium bright turquoise, and then there's two light turquoise skeins. So I'm doing the original project, I looked around for something else. But I thought you know what, I'm just gonna go back to the original project that I selected for this. It's called the Coloresque Wrap. And it's by Erin Kurup. I think her company name is remade by hand. And actually I met her at stitches. And I believe that this was a gift from her, this pattern. And so I started it one year. Right after I think the year after I got it. I started it for my Stitches West project, which was a mistake.  Marsha  18:22   Yes, I remember. I remember you working on it. Kelly  18:26   Yeah, I'm not sure if I had been a little further along when we went to stitches, I think it would have been okay. But it's it's a striping pattern. So as you're using two colors, and it's a striping pattern that has you doing stockinette and then one pearl ridge and then stockinette and then one pearl ridge. And so I was having trouble with that. And then I was also having trouble with the-- it's trapezoidal. So you're knitting together on one side and making one on the other side, knitting in front and back on the other side. So it's going kind of out of slant and like a trapezoid. So that was an issue. Remembering to do that was an issue. And then it has, it's not really a big edge detail. But it has a little edge detail to keep the edges nice and tidy. And that was giving me fits. So I had to-- I came home and it was such a mess that I just ripped it out. But now it's back on the needles and I've gotten a fair ways along I think I'm maybe at about 20 inches. Maybe a little longer than maybe closer to 30 Marsha  19:43   Do you have a project page for this?  Kelly  19:46   Yeah, I just put up a project page but I don't have a picture yet. Marsha  19:50   Okay, oh, let me look here. Oh, here it is. I see. Kelly  19:52   Okay, and then it has lace. The pattern has these stripes and then it also has lace sections. And so it gives me the opportunity to use the colors. And it's kind of--the pattern is nice because it's kind of set up, I mean, they have the pattern, she has the pattern set up where you just follow the pattern with your colors. But then she also has a page in the, I think it's in the pattern, or maybe it's on--also linked on the pattern page. But she has a page where you can do your own color design.  Marsha  19:53   Mm hmm.  Kelly  20:01   And so she has like the template of the of the shawl or wrap laid out. And then she talks about, you know, how you can figure out which colors to put where and, and it does talk about how many grams of of yarn you use for the lace sections, although I added a repeat, so mine won't be following that exactly, you know. The next lace section I do, I'll have to weigh my yarn and then determine how much yarn I need for one of the lace sections. So I've got two lace sections in here now with the striping pattern in between. And I liked the lace section. So I think I'll do more of them than is in their original pattern. Because I kind of liked that. I haven't done lace in a long time. It actually looks kind of like the lace that you have, like little V pattern Chevron.  Marsha  21:19   Yeah, in my blanket.  Kelly  21:21   Looks very similar to the lace in your in your blog. Marsha  21:24   Nice. Well, I'm, I'm interested to see a picture of it posted. But this is a nice looking shawl It's pretty. Kelly  21:32   So I've just been choosing colors along the way trying to keep you know, kind of the gradient idea going from dark to light, but I have the contrast stripes. So I've got you know, sometimes I have two medium colors together in the stripe, sometimes I have the darkest with the lightest, or colors just a couple or one or two shades away. Since I have five colors, I have a lot of choices. And it's coming out nicely. It's looking right now like it's not going to be more than just a wide scarf with stripes and lace combination. But maybe when I block it, it'll be a little bit wider. The original pattern called for I think was about 12 inches wide. And then I added an additional repeat of the lace because I wanted it to be a little bit wider than that. But I didn't want to make it so wide that then I wasn't going to have enough yarn. I wasn't sure how that was going to work. So I'm moving along on it and enjoying it. It's giving me, it's giving me two projects on the go that are knitting projects. So and then I have my my weaving project.  Marsha  22:43   Okay, and let's hear about that.  Kelly  22:45   So I'm making-- I decided with the monks belt that I wanted to make, of course, dishtowels. The project for the Jane Stafford guild is placemats. So at first I was a little worried that maybe it was a weave structure that wasn't a good choice for dish towels. But I found a dish towel pattern in a book I had bought years ago and it was monks belt and turns out it's exactly the same draft as what's in the Jane Stafford guild, which is basically the Marguerite Porter Davison, you know Weaver's bible of stitches. This Monks belt draft is not anything, you know, it's not anything new and improved or you know, combined with other things or whatever. So I'm basically following the information from the episode of The Jane Stafford School of weaving TV Guild and also following the pattern from this book. But the book has only two dish towels in its warp and I put on enough for six dish towels I should have enough for six dish towels so I have a little bit of room to play which will be fun. I did want to talk a little bit about color choice. Because I had decided--I thought I would make dish towels for Sarah for housewarming gift, my niece. And for my mom for her trailer. The new trailer is sort of gray and brown. The floor is tha-- a lot of people have you know the gray like wood floor now is kind of popular? And that is the flooring in the trailer. They don't have carpet they just have the grayish wood flooring and then, you know, kind of brown upholstery and stuff so I thought okay, I'll do neutrals. And I know Sarah, as much as she loves color, is more along the neutrals line for stuff in her house. So I thought okay, this would be good. I'll find some neutrals. So I grabbed-- you remember the yarn that you got me the Swedish yarn that you got me from the goodwill? The weaving yarn came in a bag-- there was a red and a green and a gray. Marsha  25:07   Oh, right. I didn't know it was Swedish but oh yeah, I remember getting that. Yeah, Kelly  25:11   I think it's I think it's Swedish. Anyway. Okay, I took one of the--I decided to use the gray out of that. And then I used one of the cones I have of the Sally Fox Fox fiber, which is a brown is called Sienna, Sierra Sienna Brown. And you know, the color crayon color of Sienna?  Marsha  25:31   Yeah,  Kelly  25:31   Kind of a rusty brown-- a yellow, yellow or orange toned brown. So there's that. And then I saw-- I put those two together. I was like, okay, yeah, this is what I'm going to use it's going to be nice and neutrals, gray, brown. I have a little bit of black. I have oh, I have this other cone of this variegated black and brown yarn that I bought thinking I would knit a linen shawl that I never a lace shawl that I never did. So I got that out. I got them all together. And I wound them. You know, this is great! Neutrals. And the gray looks purple. And the brown looks orange. When you put all those colors together... Marsha  25:38    So interestin! Kelly  26:20   next to each other, you can really tell that this is a gray that leans purple blue, like bluey purple, like a lilac color. It sort of leans lilac. And this brown, of course, leans very orange. And because those were such, you know, because purple and orange are such contrasting colors. I think they're what complimentary colors maybe. Right? It really, it really makes them look like they're--it's purple and orange. So it's okay, it's not the neutral that I was going for. It's really pretty. I really like it. Not sure they'll go to the intended recipients. It depends how. depends how they come out-- what I think once I've got them off the loom. Once I've you know, put other colors in the weft because that tones things down a little bit too. So. So we'll see. Marsha  27:20   I'm just going to interject here about color and weaving. You made me some towels that are actually red, white and gray. And I swear that gray is green. And I think it's because, and I always I use them at Christmas time because to me they look like Christmas color. But it's not green. It's gray.  Kelly  27:40   Right.  Marsha  27:41   So I don't know it's so interesting Kelly  27:43   That same gray? I'm using as a weft color. Okay, and against the other ones. It looks blue. It's like a slate blue. Yeah, Marsha  27:55   yeah. And I have to say in the towels, it doesn't look like Christmas green. But it definitely looks like a green to me, like a forest green. Kind of.  It's not I know, it's I know, it's gray. But Kelly  28:10   Well, and those are the same those. That's the exact same warp as the napkins in the trailer. Okay, yeah. And in the trailer, to me it it reads as gray. Not green, but in the house, it really did look like, it did look green to me, too. Yeah. So it's very interesting. choosing colors-- it's fascinating. I really think it's really an interesting thing. And then and then the thing about weaving that doesn't happen in knitting. Is that optical blending, you know, you get a lot more of the optical blending in weaving because the, I want to say the pixels are so small, right? When you're weaving, your yarn is going over and under each other. The dots of color are about the size of the yarn, unless you're doing stripes.  Marsha  29:05   Yeah.  Kelly  29:06   Whereas with with knitting, your dots of color, the smallest they can be is really a stitch. You know, I mean, even if you're doing mosaic stitch where you're trying to blend optically blend the colors, doing mosaic knitting or slip stitches, where you're trying to optically blend the colors. You're not going to get that kind of blending so much with knitting so it-- Yeah, it's it is kind of funny. And then one last thing about these is the  patterning in them is coming from the color that I'm using for the weft. So I started with a weft of an even deeper rust color. And then a black and then that slate, that slate color that you think looks green, and that I have thought looked blue and I I, I was like, okay, yeah, this will be a good, this will be a good color progression, you know, and I'll just repeat this color pattern. And then I took a picture of it this morning and put it on Ravelry. And when I looked at the picture, I went, Oh, the black and the gray look like the same color in this picture. I think I need to take out the black and go rust, or rather, take out the gray, the slate that I just started because I don't have that much of it. I mean, I have less than half an inch. So I think I'm gonna take that out and go rust, and then black and then rust and then slate. I don't think I want the black and the slate next to each other because they look too much like the same color. Not enough value difference. So anyway. It's one of the things I love about weaving is the the color play that you can do. And I'll do--you know with six towels, I'll get into a lot. So yeah, my purple and orange dish towels. [laughing] I think something--some parts of color also have to do with what color you think something is. That color, I haven't actually looked in I don't know, if it even says on the label what you know, a color away name. I think the label is in Swedish. So I don't know if it says a colorway name. Or often weaving cones just have a color way number. But I wouldn't be surprised if the color name was lilac. And because it was just in a bag with a red and a green. And I can't remember what color it was with. But anyway, the color it was with made me think it was gray. And because I thought it was gray. It looked gray. You know what I mean?  Marsha  31:52   Yeah, yeah. And I think that I'm looking at the gray, red and white. And I think it seems like Christmas colors. So I'm reading it as green because red and green are Christmas colors. I don'tknow. Yeah. Kelly  32:08    It's like once your brain locks on what color you think it is. That's what color you see until something comes along to shock you out of that thinking, like, oh my god, this is purple and orange. Marsha  32:25   Okay, I'm going to look up your picture because you said it's in Ravelry.  Kelly  32:29   Yeah, in the weaving thread. Marsha  32:31   Oh, but here on Instagram, too. Did you post it?  Kelly  32:34   Yeah, I posted an Instagram  But I didn't have much of the weaving done when I posted on Instagram. Ravelry is a better picture, will be on a more recent picture. I don't know if it's better. The more recent picture is on Ravelry. So just an interesting thing, how color works. And how your brain tells you things that aren't really true. Marsha  33:03   Funny, huh? Well, should I talk about my projects and I don't want to interrupt. Are you done? I don't want... Kelly  33:09   No I'm I'm finished. That's enough. You'll hear more about this project. Since it's six towels. It'll be okay. It'll be going for a while. Marsha  33:17   Oh, okay. Well, I have big news. Yeah, I did not finish it between Christmas and New Year's but at the beach I finished Ben's sweater. It is done.  Kelly  33:30   Yay.  Marsha  33:32   Yay. And I will not relive the whole thing. But I did. I think the last episode, I don't remember. I honestly I don't even remember where I was with the whole thing. But I did rip out both sleeves back to the elbow and re knit them with fewer decreases. And I came home from the beach yesterday afternoon. I got home around 4:30 or so. And the first thing I did was wash and block the sweater. Kelly  33:58    Nice.  Marsha  33:59   So it's drying. And I've a few ends to weave in. But I'm calling it done.  Kelly  34:05   Nice.  Marsha  34:05   Yeah. So and it blocked out really nicely. It grew a little bit which is what I wanted. And so I think it's going to be... I'm just glad I'm done. So I'm starting off the new year fresh. So that's all I'm gonna about to say about the sweater. I don't want to talk about it anymore. Done. I'm done. And I will say and a story I will say I finished it at the beach. Now I don't remember now what day it was I finished it and when I bound off this, I finished the first sleeve before I went to the beach and then I finished the second sleeve at the beach and bound off the cuff. And this I was getting like: 10 rows, nine rows, eight rows and seven and getting more and more excited and this huge weight has been lifted off of me by having that done. It's like this is a great way to start the new year. It's done, so I'm excited. So anyway, I worked on my January blanket. And I have knit about 28 inches of it. And I really like it. I think it's turning out really nicely. It feels great. Because it's handspun kind of woolen spun is what I tried. So it has, it's very light. But yeah, it's very nice. And this is really nice yarn. It doesn't. It's a woolly yarn, but it's not harsh at all. It's just super nice. I really like it. Kelly  35:39   It looks really pretty. I like that solid color. I mean,  we've both done so many blankets with you know, colors changing all that. But that is a really nice look  that one solid color with a nice lace pattern. Marsha  35:57   Yeah. And I love the color of this. It's --I never know what to call it. It's sort of Carmel Cafe Au Lait. Yeah. The color of Milk in Tea. I don't know. Kelly  36:11   Yeah, I would say I would say Cafe au Lait  is a good way to describe it. Marsha  36:17   The color of a little brown dog? I don't know. I don't know. Kelly  36:23   It's a little lighter than Orkney. Right? Marsha  36:25   Yeah, yeah. I'll just interject. I remember, I probably have said this before in the podcast, but I worked with a guy who was in a Cajun band. And so he knew a lot about Cajun cooking, because he always would go down to Louisiana. And so I asked him if he had a recipe for gumbo. And you start with a roux, and you cooked the flour and oil together until it was the color of an old hound dog. And I, we worked together and I went up to the receiving area where he worked. And I just on a piece of paper, I wrote down his recipe. And that's what I actually wrote down: cook the roux until it's the color of an old hound dog. So this is like the color of an old hound dog, I guess. Anyway. Anyway, so I'm really enjoying knitting on this. And then, I think, I guess I mentioned in the last episode, because I had it here in the show notes that I bought the Noro Kureyon to make the Noro mania blanket for my brother and I gave it to him for Christmas. And he's thrilled with it. So I'm going to cast that on. You know, as soon as I finish this blanket, I'll start that and do a little figuring about what size I want to make. But my big news is I have a new addition to the the the yarn and  fiber family, which is I bought an electric spinning wheel. Woohoo! and so both Kim and I bought the the it's called the electric eel or the e w 6.0. Technically, from dreaming robots. And I'll talk more about this at a later date. But I we both they arrived in the mail, and we didn't unbox them until we got to the beach and set them up very easy. We watched the tutorial they have on the dreaming robots website. And so we set them up. I should back up and say our inspiration for buying these was our friend Dagmar. She bought one a while ago and she had it at NoCKRs retreat. And I was really interested in it. And when I knew she was going to be meeting us at Black Sheep, I said to Kim, you need to come and check out her spinning wheel, this E spinner because I think because Kim has been adamant she was not going to get a spinning wheel. no, right, just stick with the drop spindle. And I could tell when she was watching Dagmar that she was very interested. So anyway, we had fun. Our four days down there of just playing with the spinning wheels. It was interesting. I had some polworth that I had bought years ago I don't even remember now where I bought it. So I was practicing with that and she also had polworth That was dyed. And so she was practicing with that and it is really interesting to just to spin the same fiber but one's dyed and one's not dyed, how they're different. Because the the technique of dyeing, the roving, it gets a little stuck together kind of. Needs a little bit more pre drafting that has to go on than with an undyed fiber, I think. But they're really, they're great wheels and I think they're really well designed. He's thought of everything. And we also-- it does not come with a battery but you can order a battery that so then it'd be great for...  Kelly, if I go to the trailer rally again, I would actually be able to be easier to transport this to California on a plane or whatever or in the car. And then I don't need to plug in, I can just spin off the battery. So it's going to be great for all kinds of situations. But it is funny, Kim was sitting at the dining room table practicing and I was sitting on the sofa and had the wheel sitting on the coffee table. And underneath the coffee table there was another little shelf and I kept pushing on that shelf with my foot trying just to treadle-- stop the wheel, start the wheel. That was actually amusing to me. I kind of thought wow, this is so nice. I wonder what it's going to be like when I go home and spin on little Herbie. And last night I spun for two hours or so while I watched the news and whatnot. And I love little Herbie. I have not given up my complete love for little Herbie. I love treadling. But this is this is a really nice, it's gonna be great for taking to the beach.  Kelly  41:02   Yeah,  Marsha  41:03   taking to your house, taking to NoCKRs because it's so portable. So I have to thank Dagmar for introducing us to it because it's been great. It's really fun. So I'll report more on it came in, I think gonna get together this weekend to practice a bit more, and I might record a little bit get some of her thoughts, too.  Kelly  41:21   Oh, that'd be cool. Yeah. Marsha  41:23   Yeah, I'll do that. That would be good. I have to say I thought about-- I thought about recording when we were at the beach. But honestly, it was kind of fun just to get lost in it and not have to think about talking about it. Kelly  41:37   Well, you'll have more to talk about once you've been working with it a little bit longer, too. Marsha  41:42   Yeah. It's interesting though, the bobbins. On the website, they say they hold eight ounces of fiber. And so I'm interested to see. I'm spinning up a four ounce skein. And it's, it's about half full. So I'm gonna see if it'll hold the eight ounces. That's, that's a lot. Kelly  42:03   That is a lot. Yeah, it's kind of a double edged sword. It's sort of like ink-- with the fountain pens when you buy ink. So, you know, there are some people who are real big proponents of you know, the ink bottles that come, you know, 50 milliliter, 60 milliliters 80 milliliters, you know, these nice big bottles of ink that you get your money's worth, right?  Marsha  42:32   Right.  Kelly  42:33   The problem with that, or the other side of that double edged sword is that you have all of this ink and then if you want a different color it's hard to justify buying. Well. For some people, it's hard to... for myself, it's hard to justify, I guess, if I were further down this, this rabbit hole, I could have a whole large stash of over 200 inks like some people do. It really ...but it's difficult, it's more difficult to justify buying another bottle of ink in a different color that looks fun and that you want, when you have, you know, 50 60, 70 milliliter bottles of ink that are big. And you don't even use-- I think one time we were talking, I said that it takes like 10 milliliters. It doesn't even take one milliliter to fill most of my pens, I was way off there. So you know, if you're using less than a  milliliter every time you fill your pen, and it takes me a couple of weeks for my pens to run out if I have a couple of pens inked up at the same time. Like not a lot of ink. Right. So so the bobbin.. Marsha  43:50   Yes! Kelly  43:50   Oh, go ahead. Marsha  43:52   Well, I was gonna say if I I'm spinning just a natural colored cream.  Kelly  43:56   Yeah,  Marsha  43:57   yarn or fiber. It's gonna... and eight ounces. That's days of the same thing. You know, so I know what you're saying is you can't... like it's having a smaller bobbin and you get to change a lot. Kelly  44:10   Right? You know, right. And that's part of what I-- that's part of what I like. I mean and you could even spin two eight ounce bobbins if you had 16 ounces. You could spin two eight ounce bobbins and then ply those two together like you could be working on cream colored yarn for what felt like Ben's-- a Ben's sweater worth of time. [laughing] Marsha  44:37   Well, and also Kelly, I'm just going to add this in there too is that I before I went packing for the beach, getting the wheel and getting you know the first thing you pack when you travel is a knitter is all your projects, right? And so I was like what fiber am I going to spin and so I found I had this polworth and me being me, I didn't buy one skein I bought three packages of four skeins each.  four ounces? So how many?  So each package has has four pieces of--hanks of roving, okay, and each one is four ounces so Kelly  45:24   so okay so you have 16 ounces in a bag and you have three bags? Both  45:40   Three bags! [laughing] Marsha  45:42   I'm like that but I do know, I as I say I don't remember where I bought it-- if I bought it at Black Sheep or if I bought it at fiber fusion. I think I bought it at Black Sheep because I don't I don't-- I did not buy it in the marketplace. I remember I bought it from the person with the sheep. Like out in the barn?  Anyway, I bought it and so I bought three bags and there's four skeins in each bag  Kelly  46:05   and it's  all undyed and each is four ounces it's all undyed, natural white.  Marsha  46:12   Yeah, I am. I'm slightly insane. Kelly  46:16   Well, it doesn't all  have to be one project.  Marsha  46:18   Oh, you know me. I always buy a sweater quantity of something. I always buy a big quantity or something. So I don't know what-- I don't know what I was thinking Kelly  46:25   It's a little more than one sweater. Marsha  46:29   Yeah, I know. It's another blanket. Kelly  46:36   Now you're gonna become known as the person who always buys a blanket quantity. Marsha  46:44   Yeah, so I don't know what I'm going to I've just I've I didn't even spin four ounces. Kelly  46:51   It's about like if you bought a fleece and sent it away to be processed. Right? A small fleece and sent it out to be processed.  Marsha  47:01   Yeah, no, I'm just a little insane. Kelly  47:03   I kind of learned my lesson from this six pounds of CVM. Well, I won't say I learned a lesson because I'm pretty sure I didn't. But I do remember being really sick of it by the time I was done, yeah. And I in fact, I found a little scrap of roving from that CVM fleece this summer while I was cleaning up, I found a little bump of it. And I think I ended up putting it. I might have put it in the felting box. But I honestly I might have put it with the stuff that I used to compost. I might have just said you know what? I'm done. I'm totally done with you. And I want this out of my stash. Totally. Not even a little scrap in the felting box. I think I did end up composting it. I mean, it was less than an ounce I think ,but still. Marsha  48:00   Yeah. I mean, I in my defense I have to defend myself just a little bit is that I did buy this early in my spinning life. And when I was in you know new spinners, new knitters, new crocheters, new Weavers, new spinners. anybody new to something, you get all excited about it, and you think you're never going to see any fiber ever again, this is your only chance to buy. And so I yeah, I went a little crazy Kelly  48:27   Well, and you go through it fast. If you're really if you're really spinning, especially when you're a beginner and or if you're making yarn that's thicker, you do go through roving, you can go through roving quickly depending on the, you know, the type of thing you're spinning, but you can go through quite quickly because I remember doing a swap that was 24-- I had to make 24 skeins, each of them two ounces. So that's 48 ounces. So what? That's three pounds, right? So and I remember telling myself at the beginning if I just spin this three pounds, by the time I'm done spinning three pounds of wool, I'll be a good spinner. And, and I cranked through it one summer, you know, just spinning for this. For this swap. It wasn't all the same type of fiber. But I gathered together--basically gathered together three pounds of fiber and and spun it for this for this swap. So you do go through it fast. Yeah, you're a newer spinner and, and I could see why you would think okay, I need more because I'm just a four ounce braid just takes me no time at all. You know. Marsha  49:21   Basically I really love the wheel. I think it's a great investment just for traveling just because there's so many times I've not been able to bring my wheel to visit you because we're to the beach and I have to I'm all engrossed in a project but then I can't take it. Kelly  49:53   That's nice. I'm excited to see it. Marsha  49:55   I have to say we have to finish because my ear pods are failing and the right one is run out of charge. So let's keep moving here before my earbuds fail. Kelly  50:08    Okay,  Marsha  50:10   what else do we have to talk about? Kelly  50:11    Anything else for your projects? Marsha  50:13   Oh, that's it. That's all I have.  Kelly  50:14   Okay, so the only other thing we have to remind our patrons about is the Patreon  giveaway. This is our year-end, thank you to our patrons for their support of our show. And so they should just let me know, email me, email or message me on Ravelry with the pattern of your choice $10 or less, and I will get that pattern out to you. I just want to thank everyone who supports us on Patreon. And if anyone would like to join the Patreon supporters, the link is at the top of our show notes. And it's patreon.com forward slash two ewes and you can become a patron of our show. But yeah, get your get your information to us and we'll get you your pattern choice. Marsha  51:04   Yeah, so thank you. All right. I think that's it, Kelly.  Kelly  51:08   I agree.  Marsha  51:10   I have to go cuz you're fading in the left. You're fading in my left ear now. So okay, I think we talked to we talked too long before we started recording. Kelly  51:19   Right, right. Marsha  51:21   Okay. All right. Well, we'll talk in two weeks. Kelly  51:25    In two weeks. Yeah. Marsha  51:26   All righty. Okay, bye bye. Kelly  51:29   Bye. Thank you so much for listening. To subscribe to the podcast visit Two Ewes Fiber Adventures dot come. Marsha  51:37   Join us on our adventures on Ravelry and Instagram. I am better in motion and Kelly is 1hundred projects. Kelly  51:44   Until next time, we're the Two Ewes doing our part for  world fleece. Transcribed by https://otter.ai