Okay, I was in a bit of a state the other night, so I may not have been perfectly clear. The evil fiend shown below is none other than a nefarious member of the
Tineidae family of moths... THE WOOL EATING KIND! The ones that eat wool, and one of which calmly waltzed out of my Sheep Tote last night, are uniformly buff colored and about half an inch long with similarly small wings. Here is a better photo
I have gone into full lock down and sterilization.
All animal fiber has been bagged into brand-new ziplocs in hopes of depriving any little monsters of air. The freezer is stuffed to the brim with as many bags as I could fit for the first batch. According to research around the internet, the thing to do is freeze for 72 hours (preferably in a chest freezer, but I don't have one so am using the "set the freezer as low as it goes and don't open it for the whole time" method), then warm to at least 50F for a "short time" which I am going to interpret as a day, and then freeze again. Switch out the yarn and repeat. In addition to lack of air and freezer temperatures, the thermal shock is really supposed to do them in.
I didn't see any holes in the tote, so hopefully I nipped this one in the bud. I didn't look all that carefully, though, since it is going to be felted. I believe that any infestation would be limited to the three grocery bags of yarn that were just sort of out, but there has been a fair bit of moving yarn in and out of cupboards, so I'm not taking any chances and just doing it all. Wish me luck.
*Note, there were a number of sites that helped me, I think the best summary of the course of action is at
http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/ipm/schoolipm/chap-7.pdf
Oh God! Oh God!
What do I do?!?!
Okay, here's the story with Tricot. I started this as my second or third sweater in 2003 immediately after the pattern came out. I finished the body and started work on the sleeves. I was so excited that when I had to rip out the sleeves since they would have fit around my waist, I blocked the body pieces (there was some sizing difference) and sewed them together. I tried it on that night in the bathroom of the restaurant that Purlygirls was meeting in at the time. It fit amazingly. I was so impressed with myself, I couldn't believe how good it made me look and what fabulous fashion wear I could make. Of course the pieces were a little too short...
I reknit the sleeves several times (I'm pretty sure there were gauge issues). Finally I got to the decreases and saw on closer inspection of the body that while I did all the decreases the same, they weren't what was specified in the pattern, and I had some trouble reading what I had actually done. I had to rip the sleeves again, and eventually shoved it into a basket somewhere. I picked it up again some time last year and restarted the sleeves, but abandoned them after only a few rows.
Recently, I began the sleeves again. I had to start twice or so, but that's life. I am better now at reading my knitting, so I was able to mimick the decreases. I continued the decreases farther up the body and sleeves this time to make it longer. I tried it on. It's too short. Not just from the armpit up like I remember from before, but also from the bottom to armhole. At the moment, I am blocking it as nothing has ever been blocked before (of course the blue ran in the soaking, darkening the green, but I'm telling myself that's actually a good thing). If this doesn't work I probably need to just start over. I guess I could maybe knit a few inches and then graft them on... damn I wish that a) I didn't want this sweater so badly, and b) I could picture this yarn as anything else.
Remember
Tricot? I started it when it was published. Well, one of my New Year's resolutions was to finish it before it becomes a three-year project. It has... not gone well. Actually, you know what, I don't think I can talk about this yet. Instead I'll leave you with the results of
an incredible time-waster I discovered last night (free registration is required):
So, remember how good I was at the WW sale? Well, I went back on Sunday morning to pick up a McMorran Balance and... had an accident:
5 skeins Dianna, a skein of , 2 skeins Rapture (all a dollar each), 1 skein Jaeger Silk, and a *gigantic* bag of denim cotton. I'm afraid I may really hate spinning that, but I'm taking a cotton spinning class in June and at this price I can always sell it on eBay if it's horrible.
Oh, and if you were interested in more/higher quality photos and information about the sock pal socks I received, check out
Monica's blog today.
**Upon further research (driving over the bridge and reading the sign) it seems that the Fremont Bridge is not closing completely, it's just going down to one lane each way preventing busses and trucks.
In two weeks the Fremont Bridge is closing for A YEAR!!! All my busses will be rerouted! Insted of walking out my door and onto a bus I will have to walk quite some distance up incredibly steep hills to get anywhere! That's it, the final straw. The PhD is just too hard now. I'm quitting and going home.
Yesterday was the annual Mother's Day sale at Weaving Works. Look how good I was!
The red isn't even from the sale, it's a birthday present for my mother-in-law I picked up at the Fiber Gallery after realizing the WW sale had no good, basic yarns for sweaters. They did have a fair bit of Jo Sharp Desert Garden and Soho Summer, but I don't want to make a person use a heavy, splitty, cotton for their first sweater.
The clearance portion of the sale has yet to live up to the wonderous extravaganza it was when I first went 3 years ago (were absolutely no colors of something decent discontinued? Really?), but the rest of the sale has gotten better. Even books were on sale! That doesn't really help me much, since between my employ at the Fiber Gallery and my mom's at Barnes and Noble I can get a much better discount on anything, but I was impressed. You can see that I took advantage of the 10% off spinning supplies and picked up a few bobbins. The roving is 8 oz of corriedale, and the beautiful green is 8 oz of a really nice bamboo (I believe it's called Bambu). The little package is a set of knitting-themed coasters, and was my prize for being first in line (let's hear it for inconvenient bus schedules!).
Last night I came home to find a wonderful package on my doorstep - my sockpal socks have arrived! They're absolutely amazing:
The colors are a big brighter than in reality (they're more jewel toned, ie perfect), but you can see better photos on
Monica's blog. The really incredible part about these is that she designed them just for me. On her blog she referred to them as h&g, which she explained to me stands for Hansel and Gretal. You can see the path they followed (complete with breadcrumbs!) through the forest on the sides. She even designed the trees herself! These socks are so cool, and I am so touched.
I recently (well, when it came out) became completely obsessed with Leigh Radford's new book
One Skein
. This is very dangerous, because when they're just one skein projects, you feel like you can just sneak them in and it won't really just into your knitting time at all. I mean, it doesn't really... just a little...
So far I have made the bath puff and bag from Aloo for the shop and this adorable baby bolero.
I pretty much plan to make everything in the book.
