MmmmmmONDAY Catch-up, Not Ketchup

As I've mentioned, I'm finding it hard to keep up with all the beyond-exciting things going on in Velma's World. OK, that's really only half true: keeping up is difficult, but I'm not sure how fascinating my life is; you be the judge.

Want some yarn porn? I've got your yarn porn right here, baby!


First of a brand new COLORBOMB yarn style: Tufty™ handspun art yarn! Inspired by the spankin' new how-to video Sit and Spin! by Jacey Boggs, aka Insubordiknit, Tufty™ yarns are sprinkled with tufts of fiber wrapped like little presents of love in the yarn. This one, 'Cheesy Poofs', is undyed Blue Faced Leicester (BFL) roving wrapped in a burnt-orange commercial boucle laceweight yarn, and peppered with Corriedale lamb locks dyed in shades of peach and orange. Playful, texture-filled yarn perfect for a small project.


Inspired by this photo, 'Poop de Peeps' is a Nubular™ handspun art yarn loaded with Wensleydale wool cocoons or nubs that remind me of 'poop' that Peeps might leave behind, nestled in creamy Blue Faced Leicester (BFL) wool singles. The yellow, green, blue, and pink cocoons were dyed with Easter egg dyes, while the ecru singles they are spun into is the natural color of the sheep it came from. Tons o' yardage here for a fun spring project.

Both yarns are available for sale in my COLORBOMB Creations Etsy shop! Thanks to fd's Flickr Toys for the mosaic maker and to Picnik.com for the photo editing!

I've also been experimenting with 'crazy carding' & spinning up some scrap fiber yarns. I made 2 last week: "Antidote to the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day" (above) and "Cat Barf, But in a Good Way" (below). Both are destined for my own personal stash, which makes me a very happy camper.


The story behind 'Antidote to TTHNGVBD' started on Thursday of last week. I was happily spinning away on the as-yet-unnamed 'Antidote', when I accidentally knocked my camera off the table next to my wheel, shattering the LCD! At this point, I was the proud owner of one very "ex-parrot" camera (read: deader than a doornail.) Now, bear in mind that for a spinner selling yarn on the internet, her top 3 tools are her wheel, computer, and camera - I was immediately thrown into a complete panic. No way to take pictures means no way to sell yarn!

After calming down & assessing the situation, however, I realized that my camera still takes pictures, I just can't change the settings (since I can't see the settings, you know.). So things aren't quite as dire as I originally thought. I think I can limp along with this camera 'til I can afford to buy a new one (sadly, fixing the LCD crystal will cost almost as much as buying a new camera; damned planned obsolescence.).

Thursday got a LOT better, though, lemme tell you. Big ups to KnittyDirtyGirl and HatDiva for their generous offers to help a girl out in her camera crisis. Both of them offered me their old cameras when they saw my freak-out on Twitter. Later, my attendance at my Fiber Guild's monthly meeting brought me a veritable landslide of goodies: I received a bag of silk warp scraps from Linda Hartshorn, loan of a needle-felting machine from Aunt Janet, 2 inkle looms from the Guild destined to be morphed by the Hubn into cone yarn racks for storage, and a free raw Romney/Dorset fleece from an HSU professor via Harry, our Guild president. Talk about a massive attitude adjustment! Thanks to everyone that helped turn my day around.

Saturday I participated in the Grand Opening/Ribbon Cutting of Kristy McLeod's new Hands on CRAFT space. What a great way to spend Valentines' Day! Their mission is to further traditional craft through education, special events, and materials supply; they carry COLORBOMB Creations yarns, so you know they have good taste. ;) Kristy was nice enough to invite me to bring Harry, my spinning wheel, and spin up an art yarn to add to the raffle in support of their crafting programs for kids. She provided a big ol' basket of fiber scraps and I let the kids pick out the colors that went into the yarn, which I dubbed 'Box of Crayons'. I had a blast spinning it up, and the recipient of the skein seemed really pleased with it. Wanna see pics of the event? Check out Autumn's blog post at Monkeyspinner. Theoretically, the Ribbon Cutting ceremony photos will appear on either the Arcata Eye Scene Blog or Terence McNally's Flickr photostream eventually. And as soon as I receive my copies of the photos of me spinning, I'll post 'em here, so check back soon.

This is what's on my bobbin now:
I'm spinning up the materials sent to me by woolthing from the Novelty & Art Yarn Spinners swap on Ravelry; you've gotta jump into the way-back machine for that one: it was last summer! (Yep, I'm a little behind. Sue me.) Romney/Rambouillet batts + Lincoln locks + silky silk so far, and I'll add thread & beads in the plying process. I'm spinning it up with the inspiration of these words: 'dreams', 'rain-spattered', and 'bicycle'. Here's the materials I've been challenged to spin in (click on the photo to be taken to an explanation of the swap):



In book 'news', I'm gonna go with "no news is good news". Seriously, I haven't been reading as much as I did last month. Feeling stuck in my progress on World Light. Ready to be done, but I'm only halfway through. Probably not a good sign in terms of a stellar review for me, eh?

Tags: yarn, handspun, COLORBOMB, art yarn