Life is funny sometimes.  You see, there are lots of different ways to go about things.  Some people research, plan, make a business plan, get investors, and so on and so forth.

Then there is us.  We have a history of what I call slightly spontanious.  I mean it isn’t like we went from meeting to each other to a lifetime spent together in three weeks…er ok well maybe that was more than just a little spontanious.  Anyway, we have trouble with planning and all that stuff, we like to just DO stuff.  I think mostly this is a good thing, but it does stick a few humps in the road at times.

So Janurary marks an important time for Spindle and Wheel.  We are technically one year old.  How it was born, is I was trying to find some information on one thing or another.  Anyhow I was thinking, wouldn’t it be neat if all this information was all in one place, and neatly and well presented?  What if it was easy to find and had LOTS of pictures so you could really understand what was going on?  So I says to Beau,”Lets write a spinning magazine.” and he says in typical Beau fashion, “Ok” and so it went.

It took until May to organize all my previous blog posts and tutorials into the new location.  We also had the setup and all for the conent management.  We use Joomla to organize and manage our site, and EVERYONE should consider this, even for small sites because frankly it just makes putting and taking stuff up and down easy.  Anyway, so we published our first issue,  5 months after we got the notion to do it.  Now a year later we are trying to decide where we want to go, and do with what we have built.

Most of the contributions and active participants on the site are knitters, and so we have been contemplating adding more knitting stuff.  Not that we plan on going strictly to that, but really the bulk of people helping and reading are knitters, so we think we shall branch out a bit in that direction.

I also want to flesh out more of the tutorials, and add a few handfus more.  So part of these will be knitting tutorials, just the basics and some simple explainations.  Mostly becuase other sites have done it better than I ever could, but I think a basic run through of some techniques would be nice.  I would like to add some crochet ones as well.  So if you have any, want to write one, or have a blog post that could be used, please email me.  Of course any fiber arts tutorial would be welcome.

I only had nine posts in the last month and a half.  Like I said, BAD BLOGGER!  But there were 57 comments.  The winner of this month’s contest is:  comment number: 33

KSee 

that is such a pretty tam. Your roving colors are so pretty

Not that I picked it because it complimented my roving lol.  I just picked a few numbers, first 20, which was me, then 21 which was Beau, so then 33 and finally a winner.  LOL.

I have packaged up the prizes (I was still behind) and they shall be mailed quite soon.  I really am sorry winners, you just have to understand I am just now not throwing up everyday, all day…ugh.   Getting better, getting caught up.

So, if you guys could let me know, where would you like the magazine to go?  What would you do to make it better?

I really have been bad at blogging. I’m sorry about that..

We will have a new contest winner, but I will be waiting to choose one since I didn’t blog much last month, so I will give a few posts this month, and run the contest from the 15th.  I have two packages ready to send, sorry they are late guys, but they are really good.  Michelle’s package was very difficult, because she doesn’t like spindles, and she has her own Shetlands, so i had to really dig around for her package lol.  Ems was hard, because she lives in Canada, so I boxed it all up and got to the post and realized that I was going to have to pay A LOT to ship it.  More than the package was worth, so I had to find new stuff to send, and get a big envelope.  I have finally gotten some nice stuff together for both of them, and now it’s just managing to get to the post. So be patient girls, it’s coming soon, I’ll let you know when it ships!

Trying to get the next issue ready, and still dealing with life. Darn life, keeps interrupting things.  I have the next issue to get done, and frankly it looks like it will be late this time.  I just had too much to get done, and people were so busy over Christmas that they didn’t send much in this time.  SO if you have anything neat (Like a chicken shaped tea cozy ahem, Em!)  please send me an email, I would love to include that, and any other fun projects.  Also if you have posted any tutorials or interesting discussion on your blogs, I will often use those too, so let me know.  The worse that will happen is that it will be so good it will make me look bad.  We have gotten a big surge in traffic since the Knitty article published, and apparently since Knitty linked ot us, Google now thinks we are pretty darned important.   SO, this is a great way to get more readers on your blog, or on your website.  Enough about that, here’s why I haven’t finished the next issue…

Elizabeth my 5 year old had to have umbilical repair surgery, she had a slight hernia, so they closed it up because it can apparently grow over her lifetime and become dangerous later. So that was fun. She has recovered nicely and is running around like normal. She managed to milk two red dinners out of it. Her favorite food is Sweet and Sour chicken, or Lemon/orange chicken. Her appetite was quite subdued for about 5 days afterwards, so we were trying to get her to eat well. All in all it wasn’t so bad, but I am so glad it’s over.

We have also been running the cold and flu marathon. All the kids and I have both had stomach flu and colds. December and up till now have been constant. That’s how it goes in a larger family though. Even Beau caught a cold this time, which despite his denial is rare. He is now recovering, while the rest of us caught it back at the beginning of Dec, so that’s how long it took him to catch it. Now we have all had it, and gotten over it, so hopefully cold/flu season will come to a close for the Jackson family.

Beau took my sweater too. I was knitting a sweater for Teresa, but now Beau is knitting a sweater for Teresa. We were in the waiting room for the surgery, and he of course didn’t bring any knitting. I of course brought four different projects, you know, so that I had just the right kind of knitting to do for my state of mind. You never know what kind of knitting you will want to do in a situation like this. You might want a difficult lace pattern that will keep your mind busy, even if you botch it. But then you might just want to knit as fast as you can and not think about anything at all. So, I couldn’t just leave him to sit there and stew over his poor little girl going into surgery.

So I gave him the sweater. He’s doing quite well, although his gauge has loosened up a little too much the last 10 rows or so. I am trying to decide if he should pull some of them out, because it really isn’t a big fit problem, but the material at that point is starting to look a bit sloppy and won’t hold the wind off as well.  It was supposed to be a straight up sweater,not sloping.  I knit them straight for the girls so that their skirts are accommodated without stretching the sweater.  So it was pretty much the right size at the pink stripe, a little big for growth.

What do you guys think? I don’t want to tell him, rip it back unless it really needs doing, he really doesn’t want to rip it back. But on the other hand there is a lesson to learn, and an important one. Better to rip back 10 rows now, then have a sweater that you aren’t happy with later.  He seems to think that the sweater will shrink or that he can felt it, but I think this is a bad idea.  It really is beautiful though, and he’s doing an excallant job.  I am not trying to pick on him, I just don’t want him to be mad at me later if it needed tearing back.  Even worse I don’t want to be mad at myself, because I am such a jerk about these things.

See, it doesn’t look too bad, this way.  I don’t know what to tell him to do.  If I tell him to rip, which is my gut feelings, he’s going to be annoyed.  If I tell him not to, then he’s likly to be way annoyed at himself and me.  Mostly I just had to have such a pretty little sweater not come out just right.  This is an EZ yokeless sweater, a perfect beginners sweater.  I love this pattern, but I’m concerned if he doesn’t correct this guage thing, where it can go.  For reference, the stitches above the pink color work are snug but loose (about perfect imo) on size 7 needles.  The last row fits easily on size 10 or 10.5 needles.  SO it is a big change.  I am thinking that he needs to learn to control the guage, and look at his work every few rows so that it stays on track.  Maybe I’m being overly picky, or to hard on him?  I am a perfectionist.  But then, it really isn’t too many rows, only about 5 or 10.

You can see the change better in this picture.  His knitting really is so good for this stage, and this is a perfect project for him, so I don’t want to discourage him, but I also don’t want the sweater to not fit or look right.  So you guys can help us to decide what to do with this project, and then we can feel better about the decision.

On my knitting, I have almost finished the fingerless gloves.  Pics of that soon.

Poor Em, she’s waited so patiently. Now in my defense she didn’t exactly make it easy for me, since she makes her own spindles, so not much point to sending her one of mine eh?

I am assembling her package tonight though, and I think I have gotten something nice together for her.

I’ve been a little busy, as you know I submitted an article to Knitty, and it would seem that it is to appear in the Winter Issue which should publish soon. I am very excited about that, because it really is one of my better articles. I’m pretty proud of it.

The month has turned and I also need to choose a new prize winner. And THIS months blog contest looks like this, we had a total of 49 comments from 7 posts for an average of 7 comments per post. I really didn’t post much this month, but the good news is, that we beat the last months average of 4.7 comments per post. THANKS GUYS!!!! It really means a lot to me to hear back from you, and connect with you here on the blog.

So this months winner is:

Comment #45

Michelle

I knew goat milk had that nice, simple, much-easier-to-digest protein but had no idea that sheep milk was constructed the same way. I think I’d rather milk a goat, though. Bigger teats, less fiber….

No I didn’t pick this one because it contained the word “teats” lol. How I choose is I have Dominic pick a number between 1 and 49 in this case. So Congratulations Michelle, you are this months winner!!! And Em will be getting her packet soon, as I am feeling a bit better now.

On to important news. I finished one of the fingertip-less gloves for Christlyn. She is really a dear person, and was VERY excited about the possibility of not freezing her hands on wrecks this January.

So this pair, knitting with 100% alpaca in about a worsted weight, is luscious to say the least. I mean they are a REAL treat on your hands. So soft, silky, almost naughty feeling lol. They feel so good it almost seems like you must be doing something bad, but nope, nothing wrong with wearing luxury gloves. Not the best pictures in the world, but it gets dark so early now…

I have gotten some feedback, they are just a smidge thick for the right hand, which she uses to start IVs, so this one she thinks will work just fine for the left hand. Which in a way was a real bummer, cause I was thinking I could keep this one, and just make one like it for me…

Christmas is coming, of course I have scads of mittens to make before then. Elizabeth and Teresa both need mittens, and they have to be colorful and all. I dyed yarn for two pairs for a friend’s children who happen to be about the same size, coincidence, uh NO. So here is the first one:

So colorful, hand-dyed yarn knitted up into two adorable mittens, does it get better than that? Can I suggest that you all take some scraps and knit a few of these this year and give them to the local homeless shelter, battered ’s home, or other charity that hands out warm things to children in need? These knit up over a movie (well each mitten for me) and they don’t use much yarn. I will be publishing the glove and mitten pattern for all of you to use freely as soon as I can. I also took some pictures so there will be a tutorial too.  I really want to encourage everyone to make a few of these and give them out.

So, happy mitten knitting, and congratulations Michelle.

I really love making mittens. I always just make the thumbs stick out the sides, because well, thumbs just sort of stick out the side, and I find these more comfortable than the strange thumbs out of the palm mittens. I hang my head in shame, but that’s how I feel about it.

I forgot the contest! We had 67 comments, and 12 posts from last month, and that is an average of 5.5 comments per post. We have risen from an average of 4.7 comments per post, with 10 posts and 47 comments last month. So I have posted more, and you have commented more, and everybody is doing better right?

But you’re more interested in who wins a prize eh? Well it just so happens that comment 35 is the winner:

Em |

Very nice prize! That orifice hook/ply checking tool is really neat!!

No, it didn’t win because it complimented the orifice hook lol. I just figure out how many comments there were, and randomly chose a number between one and the number of comments for the month. Dominic supplied the number 35 this time.

So, Em, send me an email with your name, address and all that jazz, plus a wish list, or whatever you need/want, and we’ll get your prize made up. Bear in mind we can’t give you a new drum carder lol, but you are more than welcome to try!

Congratulations, and I will be trying to post more guys, but with morning sickness, and Issue 4 breathing down my neck, plus Dr office visits and all that, I’m busy as usual. I do think maybe the sheep are done breeding, only one left. One less thing.

I joined this fun project/movement

Have you seen the movie Pay it forward? Haley Joel Osment’s character comes up with a simple idea to change the world. Give three good deeds, the person who receives it must pay it forward. An easy thing but so difficult. Somebody has taken this idea and turned it into presents. It’s fun to give gifts. I read about it in \ I tracked it back about 15 blogs (note: I didn’t actually do this lol, your supposed to paste this text in though :P) and it is interesting to watch how it’s spreading. You can be a part of this if you promise to:

“I will send a handmade gift to the first 3 people who leave a comment on my blog requesting to join this PIF exchange. I don’t know what that gift will be yet and you may not receive it tomorrow or next week… but you will receive it within 365 days, that is my promise! The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog.”
You can be a part of this, just leave a comment here. You can mail me your adress.

The idea is that I will send out 3 handmade gifts, to the first three commenter. BUT if you choose to accept the gift, then you will need to send out three gifts on your blog… So you get a gift, but you also have to send some out, so it’s sort of like a swap or something. Anyway, I thought it was really cool, so I joined it, and now I have three small gifts for the first three comments. (If you don’t wish to join, you may still comment, just indicate in your comment to exclude you from the Pay It Forward Contest.

Well, so Issue four is shaping up, but my camera is dead as a doornail.  So I’m going to do the best I can, and hope for the best.

I got my thank You packet sent FINALLY and I also got Nikki’s prize sent, sorry Nikki!  I put in some extras to make up for it.

So I’ve caught up a little, at least on mailing.

So issue 4 is coming along, but day before yesterday my camera broke.  I have a “Protection Plan” which basicly means, “We will fix or replace it, but only in a couple three weeks or so.”  Of course when you BUY the plan it sounds a lot more like “Oh if it breaks we will fix or replace it immediately.”  I don’t think I will be buying a camera from anywhere but a small shop in the future.  Anyway the pictures are just what I had around, and are relevant or not, but fun to look at.

So I have two scarves done, don’t need to explain the lack of pictures do I?  I am working on the design for a Fair Isle Beret, toasty toes, knitted puppets (Dominic’s design, cool huh) and a bunch of 0ther stuff I probably won’t be able to finish on time.  Dominic finished his hat, and it is adorable, but again, you know why there isn’t a picture, stupid camera people.

I STILL haven’t heard from Knitty, I had been warned, but you would think they would know three months later if they wanted it or not.  It only bugs me, because it is a REALLY good article, and I would LOVE to publish it.  ARRRG!

ok, this post is getting boring, here;s a doily pattern from Issue 4.

This was knit in fingering weight and came out quite large, about 24 inches in diameter.  It is very lovely.  I still have to figure out the chart, it is based off an old public domain pattern.

  This is Francis.

On a personal note, (going to be a long and probably boring story about colic and breast feeding)  I am pregnant with baby #5, so right now we are trudging through morning sickness and moodiness.  Here’s the deal.  Once the baby is born, I go on a VERY restricted diet.  No eggs, no milk, no soy, and no peanuts.  Milk AND eggs AND soy is rough, however, with Baby one, and two they screamed for hours a day, The Boy screamed only for about 4 hours.  The Girl screamed for over 10 hours a day and ended up on medication for irritable bowel.  So Baby 3 came and I learned that eggs and peanuts could trigger colic in breastfed babies.  (I knew about milk and tried that with baby2)  That baby was happy, with hardly any colic, as long as I didn’t eat any of that stuff.  OH look, a chicken…

Ok, so then William came along, and again, very little stomach problems or screaming on the diet.  SO where am I going with this?  It stinks on ice to live on that diet, and I hate it.  First of all the only condiment you can have is fake butter, ketchup, mustard and bbq.  Not so great with some things, like uh tuna.  No dessert pretty much, as practically all baked goods have milk or eggs in them.  (I can make a pie, but it’s not as good as usual)  In my previous pregnancies I was always on this diet for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Anyway, enough of me being whiny about it, I think I “may” have a solution out there in the yard.  I’ve been reading about sheep’s milk.  Sheep’s milk is a premeir milk used for cheeses, but it is also good for drinking and cooking.  Most importantly the type of protein in sheep milk is very easy to digest.  It is much less likely to cause upset stomach or gas, because the protien chains are very short and simple.  So maybe I could use sheep milk???  We’re going to find out it would seem.  This is my little “Flour Girl”.

This piece is called, Le Grande Menage, flour on hardwood and throw rug, by Teresa Jackson

Beau also got into Ravelry, his username is WBJ and I have been on there for some time as SpindleAndWheel I didn’t think about it, or I could have been spindle, and he could have been wheel.  Aint that cute?  hee hee.  ah well.

So that’s whats going on, heres the short version:  busted camera, puking editor, Beau on ravelry, want to milk the sheep, knitty won’t email me, got two scarves done and my packages mailed.  Oh yeah and the sheep seem to be starting to get down to business.  One had quite the tail end hairdo the other morning.  So, 4 down, 5 to go.  Excuse me, oh wait you didn’t hear that, oh well, I’m pregnant, and I can’t help it.

Off I go to enjoy my nausea.

Ok, so Nikki has waited very patiently for her prize (thinks).  What with a suprise visit from the Mother in Law, so hurdles and flaming rings to hop through, it’s been well, difficult.

The bright side is that I finally completed Nikki’s prize and here it is, for your viewing pleasure.

Nkki will recieve a stone whorl spindle (bottom whorl), a orifice hook/ ply checker tool, a wrist distaff, four stitch markers and 2.6 ounces of delicious Merino/soysilk blended batts.  This prize is valued at about $55 - $60.

Thanks Nikki for commenting.  Lurkers, it’s not too late to get in on this months prize.

Now I am very pleased with everything for my own personal use except the wrist distaff.  I am not sure I like using it.  It works, but I  haven’t ever used one, so she’ll have to give us the verdict on how nice it is.

The orifice hook/ply checker tool is just WONDERFUL!!!  You can thread your wheel with it, and when you have spun some, you hanf it on the singles, and let the yarn ply for a few inches.  Then you can see if you need to add more or less twist.  It will also help you keep your twist consistant.  I am really nuts over these.

And just in case Nikki wanted to slobber over a close up shot of her goodies…

So in case you don’t know, each time you comment, you are entered into the contest for this months prize, which will be similar to this one.  So on Nov 1st, I will randomly select a new winner from the comments list.

Lastly, I have several spindles and some sparkly fiber to add to the shop this weekend, since so many people requested it.  I’ll try and get some pics up of that soon.

Well we now have a winner for the first month’s prize.  I am assembling the package, and will post a picture of all the lovely goodies our winner, Niki will receive.  You can check out her blog here

So we begin a new contest, with each comment, getting entered into a random drawing for this month.  The more you comment, the greater your chances of winning.  You can only count one comment from each post however.

Thanks for reading, and Niki, you need to email me so I can get your address.  allena at spindleandwheel dot com