I had a wonderful day with my Mom......

Which doesn't happen all that frequently as she lives over 303miles/487km from where I live.  It so happened that I had the day planned and she came into town and joined me in shopping for some material and fibre.

First stop was to Fabricland which had a sale on quilting fabric 'buy 1 metre get 3 free'.  So I added to the stash.

 I went to check on the discounted bin which was 50% off, and found some pretty yellow floral material which I'm hoping to make a top for the summer.  We'll see.  All good intentions pave the road to 'you know where'.

We met up with my sister Jackie and went for lunch after material shopping.  I couldn't eat lunch fast enough as the Hand Weavers, Spinners & Dyers of Alberta were holding their annual conference in Edmonton this past weekend, June 1-6.  That's where my Mom and I headed to next.  Unfortunately I don't know what I was thinking, but I didn't take one picture! UGH!  Thinking back to it now I was too busy looking at everything that it never occurred to me to get the camera out.  Not like Robin from For the Love of Fiber.  She blogged about her weekend going to 3! fiber festivals.  She takes some wonderful pictures.  

Anyway the following pictures are what was added to the fibre stash from the HWSDA 2010 Conference.

 Beautiful sock yarn from Twisted Sisters & Company Fibre Mill.  They carry beautiful alpaca rovings, but what caught my eye was this chocolate brown sock yarn with a tinge of blue through it.  70%Alpaca/15%Nylon/15% Merino.  It feels wonderful, it's very sturdy for sock yarn.  So I cast on that same evening for Birch Leaf Socks by Nancy Bush.  Pattern can be found in A Gathering of Lace, produced by Meg Swanson.  

The silk bag pictured below is from Studio Celeste.  I immediately knew that it would be perfect for carrying around a sock in progress.  Studio Celeste is in the midst of developing a website so there isn't a link I can send you to.  They have wonderful silk fibres, and imported wearables.  They're based in Lethbridge, Alberta Canada.

 Four skeins of Studio Celeste's silk/nylon yarn.  I had a heck of a time picking these colours.  There were too many to choose from, but I'm hoping to incorporate some of these in a weaving project.

 Another booth which I had singled out was Homespun Haven, owner Sharon Wickstrom.  I've visited her shop at her home when I've been on holiday in Armstrong, B.C., Canada.  I've also caught up with her at other fibre festivals, but this is the first time that I really took a look at her weaving yarn.  So this time I picked up 1/2 lb of 2/8 Tencel in red, and blue.  Then 1/2 lb of 2/8 Bamboo in green and beige.  I'm hoping to design some sort of runner for a buffet cupboard with some of the colours that I've been gathering.  It's going to take me awhile to figure out how to combine several colours that compliment what's going on in the colour scheme of my living room.  So hopefully it won't take forever to figure that out.  Coordinating colours just seem to be an exercise in exasperation for me.

 Last but not least I finally cashed in on Knit Picks book sale last month.  Vogue Knitting Shawls and Wraps is a varied collection of 43 patterns.  Knitted Lace of Estonia by Nancy Bush has been on my list for a long time now, and not only are there some great patterns, but some great information of the history of lace knitting in that region of the world.  Finally I'm really looking forward to doing some hand-dyeing, and the Teach Yourself Visually book really has it laid out well for the 

beginner dyer. 

 The dyeing bug bit me when I saw these jars.  

 Funny how these things start.

It was a sewing kind of day today.......

I got started on a nightgown pattern I've had for awhile. McCalls's M5769. The material was also bought from Fabricland awhile ago. I generally don't gravitate to pink clothes, and there's not a pink to be had in any of my home decorating, but for me there's something comforting about wearing pink to bed. Go figure.This is the top half tomorrow I'll finish the bottom half...oh, wait I've got a dentist appt. tomorrow so hopefully Thursday it'll be done. In the meantime I found a new Sandra The Knitting Magazine which I'm happy about. This October 09 issue, which is only $5.25 Cdn. at Chapters/Indigo, is loaded with 32 patterns.

The Filati Edition 38 Fall/Winter 2009/10 has 44 patterns and I couldn't resist the green cabling on the front cover. I've never seen this magazine before and was blown away by the photography and the layout. If you're a lover of the earthy green tones this edition has a total of 11 different sweater patterns dedicated to that colour.

The Interweave Knits Weekend has jacked it up a notch in this edition. Or is it just me? There's several patterns that I'd love to start right NOW! ;) The cutest being the Whirligig Shrug. How cute is that for a little girl!! I like that they've included a couple patterns for the guys as well, and one in green too!In the mail this week came a new order I placed at Elann. Peruvian Sierra Aran colour: Deep Forest, 80%Highland Wool/20% Alpaca, 50gr=83 m/91yd. I ordered this on Nov.11 and received it Monday Nov. 16! That's just phenomenal! I've never had an order delivered that fast which now puts the pressure on. I have a pattern picked out from Cables Untangled by Melissa Leapman.This is the closest to the actual colour of the yarn I could get. It's quite dark with some flecks of red. I thought it'll be nice for this Man's Tweed Pullover pattern. I like how the sleeves set right up to the neck.

After spending last week laying around recovering from a flu bug I was in the mood to bring out my bread machine, and make some cinnamon buns. Don't ask me how flu = cinnamon buns, it just does. Anyway I haven't used the machine for a looong time now, and I wasn't sure if it was going to work properly. Either way I had a hankering to do this for awhile, and I had made sure I had fresh ingredients on hand. Well the dough had risen to the point it was lifting up the lid of the bread machine, and of course I forgot to take a picture, but here's evidence of baking.....Time for tea...ttyl :)

Busy Busy Weekend........

In between working on the basement I managed to get some knitting done.

Also some spinning was managed. The 80 merino 20 silk fibre from Aurelia is finally done, and I'm navajo plying. I stopped in at Fabricland and picked up some material to make a kitty and scotty dog stuffed animals. Just a little something for DD and Nathan. DD is missing the kitties at home here, and is desperately wanting a pet of her own in Vancouver. She has terrible allergies and I'm thinking somehow maybe this will alleviate those withdrawals of not having a kitty to cuddle. The Scotty dog will be for Nathan. Just because :)

Next came the books I ordered from Knit Picks. They have a book sale going on until November 4 and I couldn't resist. In Cables Untangled, there is some awesome patterns, and reference to cable stitches. Interweaves Knitted Gifts, is wonderful! There's several patterns I'm wanting to knit up, but one in particular 'Ballet Flats' by Marta McCall. Also if you are a Fair Isle Knitter Alice Starmore's book is an awesome reference book as well it has some wonderful timeless patterns.

Saturday was our 25 Wedding Anniversary which was spent out at a concert with some friends. It was different as the kids aren't home anymore and weren't with us to celebrate, but we had a great time anyway. The next day Sunday was our turkey day. The plan was to have our Thanksgiving around 6:00pm but when DH brought the turkey up in the morning something was off. I mean really off. I kept smelling something, and in the pit of my stomach I was hoping what I was smelling wasn't the turkey, but it was. Bugger. I ended up phoning Costco as I bought the thing only the day before from them. Costco's good that way with returning things, and they told me to bring the turkey back with my receipt and I'd get my $ back. Turns out that a half hour before I got there another lady brought her stinking turkey back as well. So I don't know what was going on with the fresh turkey's from Lilydale. After standing in line up there we ran to Superstore and got a frozen turkey, and Thanksgiving supper was served at 8:00pm instead. With a great bottle of Chenin Blanc from Quail's Gate everything tasted great.

Monday was DH's 52 birthday. Again just the two of us celebrated after a day of working in the pit called our basement renovation. Some progress was made after we did a major backtrack with the insulation. We ended up taking down all the framing which we just finished doing to put in pink rigid insulation to bring up the R value to 20. One of those things that we had to do so there'd be no regrets later on. My camera has this neat feature to take panoramic pictures. (Click to Embiggen) Framing is just about finished. Next comes hooking the electrical back up, and then drywall.