Indigo and Organization

Our trip to Florida and Mississippi was a huge success.  We had great fun.  We taught three classes and were inspired by knitters, crocheters, weavers and spinners who traveled to those shows from across the country.  The spinners in Destin, FL are goofy and funny and incredibly talented.  We have a huge new stock of towels and scarves woven by our friend Charlene Schurch.  They will be appearing on the website soon.  Charlene is an energizer bunny when it comes to weaving.  Her talent and output are both amazing.

Patsy Engelhard's Knit 1 Oxford is truly a home away from home.  It's welcoming and cozy and full of talented people who always inspire me to knit more and try new things.  My current project is knitting a cowl using two yarns that are knitted continental style with one hand and English style with the other.  It's hard work training my left hand to do something completely differently but I'm sure I'm building synapses in my brain that will keep me from dementia as I get older.

We had cold weather and rain during the two weeks we were gone but no rain on days we were traveling although we did pack up in Oxford in the rain.  No snow or freezing conditions at all.  There was one year in Florida that the walk from our condo building to the main hall was treacherous with ice.  I'm thrilled to not have had that problem again!

I've finally gotten the trailer completely unloaded and am working through getting everything put away.  My odd organizational thing kicks in at times like these and I feel the need to rearrange furniture and fix every single thing before it gets put away.  Its all good in the end but it does mean that the process of getting the studio put back together takes three times as long as it should.  Do I really need to re-tag all the hand spun yarn that has the old style tags.  No, I don't.  Bit it would look really cool if I did.....

Instead of dealing with the chaos in the studio the past couple of days, I've been working on my indigo vat.  The weather has been glorious with temperatures in the high 70's and lots of sun.  Perfect indigo weather. I always forget how long the process takes to get the vat ready.  It's a delicate balance that only works well if left time to equilibrate.  Like wait an hour for the vat to settle?  Seriously?  Patience is not my thing.  Tuesday I started about lunch time and managed to get everything dipped once by the time it got dark.  Yesterday I started about the same time but was more efficient and got most of the yarn dipped two more times.  I'm thrilled with the color!  The front came through last night so while it's sunny and bright today it's much cooler than it has been.  I started earlier this morning and the vat is just about ready.  I only have two more skeins of yarn that need to be dipped twice and four t-shirts.  The t-shirts were an after thought on Tuesday so they were dipped right at the end when I was running out of indigo in the vat.  I just ignored them yesterday in favor of getting lots of yarn done.  Today I'll get them done.

Isn't the boucle wonderful?  I can't wait to play with it.  I think it'll be the weft paired with a Merino wool warp for some lovely scarves.