Pictures!

My blog has been my own diary of sorts, but I'm ready for people to see, so I thought I would add more pictures. Since I share the digital camera with my husband, and it mostly resides in his home office downstairs, I don't use the camera too often. However, my lazy ass is realizing its not really that inconvenient to find it and use it myself. I somehow can move to take a cute picture of fatty but don't take the effort for my knitting.

Here is a picture of part of my disorganized craft center:

It has a total of 3 sections, greatly enhanced by my husband's great score off craigslist, that gave me more shelves, the cabinets on the bottom left and the drawers on the bottom right. I did have all my books organized by type, but after we took care of 2 fish tanks and kept them here, I never put my books back in order. Another item on my to do list.

With it being Labor Day weekend, I thought I would do something fun for myself since I blocked the Flower Basket Shawl (pictures were over exposed) and finished the awful repair job. I started winding a 24 yard loop to make my own self-striping yarn. I have a loom that isn't getting used because if I unfold it, we would have very little floor space in our bedroom. However, I thought I would use my warping board for this experiment. Here is the beginnings of the winding process:


I had to restart a couple times. It's been so long that I forgot how to use the board. Typically when you warp you want to make a cross so that the threads stay in order. I was trying not to do this because I wanted one continuous loop. Unfortunately, I made a cross even though I checked at one point, but I was able to push the cross out. I forgot that keeping an even tension throughout the winding process helps immensely and would just let go. If you see in the picture, the end is wrapped around the peg a couple times so I can maintain tension.

Here is the finished photo:


I ended up tying figure 8 ties every 2 yards and may dye it tomorrow if I have time. Not sure if I'll use Wilton's cake dyes or Kool-aid. I'd love to use real dyes, but don't have the space to have pots and utensils dedicated just for that. Also, I so seldom dye that it doesn't seem worth the investment. I know a lot of people say kool-aid and food coloring is light fast/wash fast, but I'm not convinced. Well, I guess we'll see in a couple years.

This morning I brewed the FC+ Harar, and my husband actually liked the C+ we had yesterday better. That completely surprised me. The C+ was roasted 2 minutes less than the FC+, I might try a roast right in between the 2, it might be optimum. Then again, neither roast was really rested enough.

We went to Coffee Klatch tonight just to hang out, and I was surprisingly a little disappointed with my latte. I'm not a big espresso drinker, but I do like my latte's strong. Rather than asking for an extra shot, I asked that they not add too much milk. The woman at the register told me then I should order a cappucino, but I told her I didn't like a lot of foam, to which she looked completely confused. She then asked, "well then the cup won't be full", uhm, yes, that is ok, that is what I'm asking for. Even though the cup was only about 2/3 full with the right amount of foam, I couldn't really taste the espresso. A little disappointed, but I didn't feel like being high maintenance and let it go. I think I'll just get an Americano next time with the extra shot.