Spinning, Dyeing, and new lizards!

I'm officially an AWFUL blogger. Considering the infrequency of my posts and all. Don't think anyone's reading but me though so I don't suppose it really matters :)

I dyed up some superwash merino this past week. I've started spinning it into fine singles to ply into a two ply fingering. I'd like to use it to knit a pair of gloves for fall.



I also have two new members of my family! I adopted two leopard geckos at our latest MHS meeting. They're so cute! Here's a pic of Matt holding them.



Oh and here is a new pic of Kenshin in all his spikey glory:

Some fresh top to spin

I'm been going fiber crazy lately. I bought some superwash "pencil roving" from fiberoptic on etsy. It's SO gorgeous (the colorway is superstition). I've been spinning it and was struck with a mad craving to make my own version on merino to spin up too. I have a small obsession with green and a fondness for aqua and purple so here's what I came up with:


I just can't wait to spin it up! I think I'd like to use the superwash to make a vest. This may become.... Well... A purse or something?

I obviously have no idea yet. XD

Spinning Again

Well I've brought out the spinning wheel again. I've decided to get a bit more hardcore about it and try some plying and color blending. I naturally spin about a sport weight yarn so I'm thinking a two ply of that will be very nice.

I usually spin straight from the roving (for merino and wool silk blends). I've had carders for a while but I hardly ever use them. I had some rovings of some dyed green wools. So I'm now making some green mix rolags to spin up some pretty green variegated yarn. I ordered some more merino roving as well and I have acid dyes so I'll be making some fancy dyed roving of my own soon. I'm very excited!

I'll take some pictures of my current batches soon.

a little bearded dragon tangent

I've been really distracted from my normal crafty hobbies lately. I'm getting a Bearded Dragon (an Australian lizard) and I've been intently planning and constructing his future home.

Bearded dragons get up to 24" long so they need a fairly good size enclosure 2'x2'x4' is recommended. So... that's what I"m building.

Currently it's in the staining phase. Here's what I've learned thus far:

1. Sketch-Up is the BOMB!
2. a power sander is a gift from god
3. in projects like this expect to visit Lowe's or Home Depot daily
4. Things always cost WAY more then you plan for.
5. Read the putty CAREFULLY before applying. If it warns that it won't stain evenly LISTEN!
6. Slate is really pretty ... and if you're lucky you can open the boxes and mix and match to get just the best ;)
7. There are MANY kinds of grout.
8. Boys like to play with electricity (but at least it means I don't have to do the wiring)

The BF and I went to a "rock store" and got some really great rocks for decorating the enclosure (termed a Vivarium) and I'm also planning to make a stump like climb for the little cutie.

Here's a picture of the dragon I've got on hold!

A little workaround for stretching silk while painting

Traditionally when doing Yuzen painting on silk (or many of the other silk techniques) you'll see Japanese artisans using flexible bamboo rods with pins on either end to stretch along the width of the fabric. These are called Shinsei.

Me being me I didn't want to order some and wait (though you can get them from: Maiwa Craft Supplies) and I wanted to Be able to determine the lenths I wanted myself.

Well I was at "Scale Model Supply" a local hobby store and they had styrene model building supplies called "Plastruct" I grabbed some about 4 mm square and flexed it a bit. It felt resilient yet flexible. I decided to give it a shot.

I didn't really want to mount pins on the end as I have a habit of scraping my arm along pins that are pointing up at me. I decided to try the reverse idea. I heated a pin to red hot and quickly jabbed it down into the end of the Styrene. It cooled very quickly and didn't make it real deep into the rod (this is good). After it stopped being hot I then stuck the rod under the fabric and placed the end where I wanted it. Then I took some map pins (they're much shorter than normal fabric pins) and poked them in the ends. TADA! Poke free silk stretching!

Here are my lame-o diagrams:

The Yuzen Project - Stage.... Experimentation and the Acceptance of the need for a steamer

So I've been using "Dye-n-Flow" by Jacquard so far for my Yuzen project. I"m very pleased with many aspects of it but because it is still a "paint" rather than a dye it has a stiffening effect on the fabric. It also diminishes some of the natural sheen of the silk.

So... I'm thinking I need to try some silk dyes like Jacquard Green Label instead. (I feel the money running from my pockets).

If I use those dyes I'll need to steam set them. -sigh- I was hoping to avoid this but.... if the choice is figure out how to steam or have stiff yuzen then I'll figure out steaming.

Being who I am I can't bring myself to pay $300 - $1000 for a steamer when I'm sure I could figure out a way to make it. Also being me I don't bother figuring anything out for myself until I make sure no one else has already done the hard part :)

After about 5 minutes on google I found this FANTASTIC tutorial for making your own steamer!

The only snag I see is finding somewhere to set it up where the massive amounts of steam won't be an issue -eyes the garage- I'm hoping I can find a decent size burner at Goodwill or something as mine would have a heart attack if I asked it to do that.

I'm PSYCHED! Yipee for new project :)

And So It Begins

Hello my name is Annie and I am a craft-a-holic.

I guess that could be broadened to a "make-a-holic." I love making stuff.

My interests in the area of "stuff-making" range quite a bit but here's a quick run down of some of the more recent projects:

Yuzen Dying (aka silk painting)
Tsumami Kanzashi (Hand folded silk hair decorations)
ABJD Sewing and Face-ups (Asian Ball Jointed Doll related crafts)
Hand Kimono Sewing
Paper Piecing Quilting
Civil War and Elizabethan Costuming
Cosplay for Sci-Fi and Anime Cons
Screen Printing
Knitting
Crochet
Origami
Kimono Design

Yeah... kinda a geeky bent to it all huh ;)

The reason I decided to start a blog is that I've had to really hunt to answer some of my questions on some of these topics and I thought it would be good to post some of my trials and errors, alternatives, and discoveries to help others!

Wooohooo. Lets get craftin'