Spinning Hair of the Moe and Locks

It's been a busy spinning week. This is some awesome 50/50 mohair and wool that I picked up at Maryland Sheep and Wool from Persimmon Tree Farm. I spun it into balanced singles and I plan to knit a small shawl or wrap with it. It's beautiful fall colors so I will save it for later on in the year. The mohair is very soft and bloomed nicely when I washed the finished yarn. I have to say this was one of the easiest rovings that I have spun. Wish I had picked up more of it since it spun so fast I was disappointed to be done with it.

These are some really nice dyed locks that I picked up at a fiber shop while we were in Maine. The locks were a little matted and still had a good amount of lanolin left in them. After fooling around with them and the flick carder, I decided to spin some novelty yarn rather than to fight with tangled locks. I was surprised and happy with the yarn, it's very nubby and has curly locks sticking out here and there. It should make great edging for a hat or mittens or maybe a bag.

A Fiberous Trip to Maine

I gave in to my lobster craving, I couldn't go another day without it! Andy and I drove 800 + miles up to Maine to visit my family and eat some very yummy fresh sea food. Our Honda Civic got 47 mpg on the way up, we only stopped once for gas, hit the liquor store in NH to stock up (no sales tax and cheap liquor) and were in Kittery, Maine eating at the Weathervane in less than 12 hours. I had a lobster BLT and Andy had a fried seafood platter with haddock, scallops, clams and and shrimp.

That's Andy on the left, me in the middle and my brother, Sean, on the right. You might be wondering why we are all waving at the camera. It's just a thing we do. It started on Sean's trip to VA a couple of years ago. Now we all take pictures like that wherever we go. It drives my mom nuts! :)




Here is proof that I will touch nearly anything, sad but true. It's a fish skeleton found at Ferry Beach in Saco.










On the way to North Conway, my mom spotted a church tag sale so we had to stop. I picked up this very cool spinning wheel lamp and the handwoven basket in the picture below for a great deal. The yarn came from a couple different shops: Rosemary's in Cornish and Knit Wit's in Portland. Both shops are great and have totally different yarn's. They both also have great service.


To the left is some mill end Alpaca/Merino that is super, super soft. Purchased at a shop in Portland. Below is the store front for Rosemary's.





No trip anywhere is complete without stopping by at least one sporting goods store. We hit Cabela's in Maine, LL Bean in Freeport and North Conway, Sports Authority in South Portland and (a drum roll please) Bass Pro in PA. I am a good fishing wife. Andy was told once in a parking lot of a fiber festival that he is a "good fiber husband". I have yet to hear the end of that....















To the left is the Portland Waterfront a view from Commercial Street. I used to work in Portland at Key Bank and parked right near where this picture was taken.

Below is the the LL Bean boot:











A couple of baby star fish from Ferry Beach. They were all over the place.

Overall we had a great trip. I was really sorry to come back to Virginia. New England is so wonderful, many different places to visit all within an hour or so of each other. We did notice that the economy is worse up there. With outrageously high gas prices, tourism (one of the main sources of economy) is really low. This is the first time I can ever remember not having to wait in line's anywhere including at the toll booth going into Maine.

Dana had asked for a list of things we did, so here goes:

Kittery: Weathervane (see above), Banana Republic, Van Heusen, Liz Claiborne and Eddie Bauer

Sanford: Mardens which is a must go to discount store. They have clothes, fabric, yarn, fishing goods, shoes, furniture, basically you name it they got it!

Cornish: Rosemarys, two antique shops.

Gorham: Dinner out with mom at the Garden for some awesome seafood, I had twin lobsters, Andy and mom had baked haddock with lobster stuffing - yum!

North Conway: Horsefeathers Restaurant for a lobster roll, the 5 & 10 which is the oldest shop there, Christmas Tree Shop (this is where your goodie came from Dana!), and a couple of outlets.

Portland: Amato's for a real Italian sandwich. There is nothing else like them! And Knit Wit's.

Freeport: LL Bean, the Moose Shop, a very cool bead shop, and the Rockport outlet.

Westbrook/Portland: The Full Belly Deli, this is the most awesome deli. It's New York style and they have been in business for close to 20 years. If you are ever in the area this is a must eat at place. We also ate at Tortilla Flat one night with my friend Robin. It's in the same area and they have some great Mexican food not to mention the Sangria. I have to say neither one of these restaurants has changed for as long as I can remember. They both have great food, and great service. There are not many places you can say this about.

Spare Time Knitting

How much time does it take to knit? Some people say they don't have the time or patience to knit. Most of us are busy with everyday life; work, household chores, grocery shopping, bills and all that "fun" stuff. Lots of knitting can be done in the spare time we may not realize that we have. Yesterday, I headed off to the doctors office with the sock in the picture to the right just cast on and one row of ribbing done. When I left, nearly two hours later, there was 4 1/4" of knitting accomplished. I'm not super happy about having to wait to see the doctor for an hour and forty five minutes, but at least I got something done during that time. Just think of how much you could knit while you wait in line at Walmart, the lines here are sometimes twenty minutes long.

The yarn from the sock was gifted to me by Dianne. It came from Rock Creek Yarn and is really nice to knit with.

My friend Linda knits in the car whenever we take a road trip. No matter what happens, she calmly knits away. One road trip we were on a divided highway and a car came racing towards us in the wrong direction, Linda never missed a stitch. It turned out to be a high speed chase and we saw a line of police cars following on the other side of the highway.

It's been a productive week, I finished the rotating rib socks, which are a gift for my mom. They are knitted out of AC Moore yarn (gasp!) Marble and the color is lavender. Mom lives in Maine and thick socks are a must for the winter.


















This is the Vogue Sideways Cardigan, finally off the needles.