I thought I had really hit the jackpot when I found the World’s Most Perfect Yarn: Numma Numma Doppio. It’s incredibly soft, yet also very sturdy; great to knit with, and it smells wonderful. 70% superwash merino, 20% cashmere, 10% nylon. It’s not only almost impossible to get because it sells out in a matter of seconds, but it was recently announced that Numma Numma would be on haitus until next year. Well, crap. Now what am I going to do?

Make my own, that’s what. I dyed up some superwash merino in this nice, uneven gray-blue color and mixed it with undyed cashmere & nylon. I ran it through the carder twice to blend the fibers a bit more evenly but still retain some color separation so the yarn will have a heathered coloring. I’ve got 5 ounces in this color and 5 more in natural ecru (which was MUCH harder to card, because undyed fibers don’t like to stick to carder teeth). I can’t decide if I should spin each one into 2 balls for a couple pairs of socks, alternate colors and navajo ply for a striped yarn, or spin each separately and ply them together.

I am also debating on whether the time has finally come to (temporarily) remove my chunky flyer from the traveller and put the normal sized one on. My last attempt at making a sock-weight yarn was FAIL and it ended up being super-duper chunky despite me spinning thinner than I ever have before. Here is the resulting pair of slippers, which are comfy but a bit too warm to wear much in Texas:

Oh my gosh, right as I was typing those words, I realized that my feet are freezing and I went to put them on. Ahhhh… I love merino. I’m going to sleep with these on …for approximately 13 minutes, at which point I will realize that my feet are boiling hot, I’ll throw them off carelessly and they’ll be carried away by a cat, who will gnaw them to a pulp overnight. Talk about a rockin’ Friday night.

High points of this week:

• I started my figure painting class and I really like my teacher.
• The site has been getting some extra traffic thanks to my awesome Knitty review.
• We got 10th row tickets to see Louis CK in September. <3
• I got over 600 patterns classified in the Ravelry Search Party, so I think I have a semi-decent chance of winning one of the ultra-super-fabulous prizes.

Low points of this week:

• Lawn man accidentally broke a window on my car. (He told us right away and offered to pay for it, so it definitely could have been worse.)
• The power supply on one of our computers went kaput and emitted a horrible toxic smell.
• One of the companies I buy some of my best Angelina colors from (silver hologram, and the electrics) is going out of business completely. (I guess this explains why my last few calls and emails have gone unanswered.) I am scrambling to find a new place to buy from, but it’s Friday afternoon and no one is working.
• I managed to score 3 balls of Numma Numma Doppio at the last update, only to have my money refunded because the yarn was defective.
• I threw my back out (yes, AGAIN) a couple of weeks ago. I was starting to feel better, but standing up for 3 hours in painting class last night put me right back to where I started. I guess I should find a chair next week.

Hooray! Knitty.com gave me a rave review in this issue’s Fiber Fiesta. I had sort of forgotten I’d submitted (given up hope), and then the orders magically started rolling in. My class tonight was cancelled due to flash flood watches, so I got to stay home and card more batts. I just put 10 more Firecrackers in the shop and I’ve got wool for 16 more drying in the bathroom.

Plus, I had carded several extra batts to match the colorway I submitted, so those are now available as well.

I’m so flattered that Knitty’s test-spinners had nice things to say about my babies. I got all 4’s and 5’s on the ratings, and all three spinners commented on how the fiber was softer than they thought it would be. That reaffirms my decision to use only merino & BFL in these batts rather than a lower quality wool.

I am now having a little celebratory Fiesta of my own. I have no tequila; just white wine… but I’m pretending there’s a sombrero on my head. I think that counts.

Here’s a scan of the big skein. The looong teeswater locks are definitely my favorite part of this yarn. I got about halfway done prepping the pegboard for my art piece; Hopefully I can get it the rest of the way done this weekend.

I’m starting a figure painting class tomorrow at Art League Houston. I haven’t done anything like that since art school, so I’m really looking forward to it. It inspired me to look up my favorite art teacher on Facebook. (Fingers are crossed that she accepts my friend request. I’ll be so heartbroken if I get rejected.)

My first couple of sessions with the Majacraft Aura were not as successful as I had hoped, but tonight I sat down and everything magically made sense. I’ve got the hang of the foot pedals and tensioning, both of which are very different from my Traveller. I’m still not crazy about the wire rings the yarn has to travel through; they catch and make me have to hand wind the sequins, but other than that, it’s pretty awesome.

I spun my little heart out tonight and filled up a bobbin: TEN OUNCES on the nose. It’s made from 3 bags of carder scraps and embellished with 10” teeswater locks, angelina blobs, English Leicester locks, sequins & beads. The skein is so monstrous; it will probably take a week to dry. I thought it was appropriate to spin a yarn on my Lexi-brand spinning wheel, block it on my Lexi-brand yarn tensioner, and it will eventually be made into an art piece mimicking Lexi’s nailed wall-art from the Lillehammer show.

Here’s the quilt I made for my sister-in-law’s new wee one. I used a Moda Jelly Roll in “Authentic” and a log cabin-style pattern. I really loved this fabric when I bought it, especially the ones that look like newsprint. I had gotten tired of looking at it after all the sewing, but now that the finished product is all put together, I love it again. The only thing I would change if I could would be to put a thicker batting inside it, but my machine isn’t built for that.

My quilt teacher told me to do the outer binding by hand, but I cheated and used the machine. (The kid would have been graduating from high school by the time I got any hand-sewing done.)

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I had intended to do a blog post about my new Doppio gloves, but I plan to submit them to Knitty. They have a clause that submissions can’t have been shown anywhere else on the internet prior to publication, so they will have to remain a secret for now.