Friday, June 19, 2009

Spinning

This is some BFL that I bought from Wheeldale Woolcraft. I got a50g of the dark blue and 50g of the variegated light blue. I spun them then plied them together (had a bit of the dark blue left so I Andean plyed that using my home made cardboard Andean plying tool).

I've never spun BFL before and bought these tops so I could try it out. I have to report that all the stuff I've read about it is true. It was fantastic to spin; very easy to draft. I'm not absolutely sure what I'm going to make with it. I've ended up with over 400yards of the variegated and just under 100 yards of the dark blue at about twenty WPI. I'm considering using it for weaving rather than knitting, but I'm not wedded to anything in particular as yet.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Just in time for Wimbledon

I've been stuck on the reception desk at work for the past two days rather than out driving because I have had a recurrence of the tennis elbow that I had last year. Unfortunately this time it doesn't seem to show any inclination to go away. So two weeks ago I told the transport manager that I wouldn't be able to drive my run (can't do the unloading). Then when they couldn't find a cover driver I said I'd drive but I'd need someone with me to to the unloading. We managed this for two weeks but then they got a cover driver so I'm stuck back at work still trying to avoid lifting things.

I hadn't done reception before yesterday but once I'd got the hang of the switchboard it was okay. I had a bit of paperwork that I could get on with and I had trusty Ravelry to dip into when I got particularly fed up. One certainly gets to see what's going on in the place; who's talking to who, and who takes the most cigarette breaks. I miss being out on the road though (my run was particularly easy this week, only eleven drops and nice weather. Typical!). I'm probably going to be doing some price comparison work tomorrow and next week I'm starting a project monitoring and improving supplier compliance on goods into the warehouse. One of the good things about working at SUMA; once they cotton on to the fact that there's a problem with your normal work (which has taken a bit longer than it could have) there's plenty of opportunity to do something different.

I'm a little bit concerned that although the original damage may have come from lifting heavy stuff, knitting and spinning may not be helping matters. still, I'm not getting actual pain whilst I'm doing either so I could be wrong.

On Saturday I went to the Piece Hall in Halifax to meet up with other Yorkshire knitters from Ravelry for World Wide Knitting in Public Day. WWKIPD coincided with the Halifax Gala and a food festival which was also taking place in the Piece Hall, so it was quite busy. The weather was fantastic (got a bit sunburned) and I think that everyone enjoyed themselves. I know I did. We decided that it would be fun to do something similar again so we may be having a picknit later in the summer. I have to admit that I didn't get a great deal of knitting done; I'd taken the socks that I'm knitting (Glynis from Cookie A's "Sock Innovation"). I'd finished one of the pair and had just started the second. Unfortunately this is the stage at which I think I know what I'm doing so I kept going wrong. In the end I gave up knitting and just nattered instead.