Uh yeah, I needed another hobby

Since I have oh so much time and never really enough to do, I have decided to try my hand at basketry.
You can all stop laughing now. I am doing this voluntarily, they have not finally come to take me away. Stop. Laughing.
After five weeks of great instruction with Irene (she taught me to spin as well, multitalented lady), this is what I have so far:


The start of an Appalachian egg basket (it's already been mentioned that those must be some big ass eggs), a little wall basket and two little rectangular ones. The tiny rectangle basket isn't quite done yet.
There's been knitting going on as usual. I've actually been working through some of the stuff I got at Madrona. It's been pretty much instant gratification knitting, hats, socks, bags, etc. I still have to get back to the spinning homework, but now that the cotton I have to spin up for dyeing in level 5, I don't have any excuses. And time's running out.


Must go spin and do research!

SP9 The Big Reveal

Sadly, I am frequently the one you all know. Gotta love the look on the non-tardy owl though, can't you almost hear the, "aw fer cripes sakes"?


My Secret Pal was Maggie. She disects seals. There are pics. No. She's not some sort of weird seal serial killer, she's a vet student. Her blog has lots o' pics. Go check it out. She sent me this great fibre from a local mill. It's mystery mill ends and the colour and feel of this stuff is wonderful. Once again I wish for touch'o'vision. I plan to spin it woolen to keep it fluffy and soft and make something fluffy and soft with it. No idea what yet, but I've been dying to spin with this stuff since it arrived and I haven't been able to because of other stuff that had a deadline. I've had to put it out of my line of sight (and feel) so I could stay focused and not be tempted.


This is the last of the vacation pics as I was unable to get a photo of the body bag coming off the ship when we landed in Miami. Now THAT would have been an interesting picture!
You'll just have to settle for the happy monkey and his new friend the stingray. I don't think I've ever seen the monkey so happy and relaxed. And I have to tell you guys, stingrays are the coolest things ever! They are incredibly gentle and the underside of them feels like velvet. The top side is a bit like elephant hide. This one was very happy to just be supported in our arms and look at us. This stingray place is on an atoll just off Nassau in the Bahamas. They have about ten female stingrays and breed them. The 'rays have all been debarbed and have a fairly large ocean pen to roam around in.
This was easily one of the neatest things we did on the trip.

To Whom it May Concern

Dear Sirs/ Madam,
Please add 4 to 6 hours to every day. As I am currently falling behind at approximately that rate, I think this would help me stay afloat.
I promise to not use any of this most precious "found" time for anything as trivial as sleep or say maintaining a thin pretense of sanity.
Thank you for your attention.