Ashley Olsen?

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

you spin me 'round like a record, baby

So there's my first two skeins of crappy handspun, made entirely by me, with the use of some really, truly bad, very nearly illiterate instructions that came as a part of my Learn to Spin kit. How bad were these instructions? Well, for a start, they were for a bottom-whorl spindle, and the kit came with a top-whorl spindle. A bad, barely-finished top-whorl spindle, but eh, it was good enough to get me hooked, and bad enough that I am highly unlikely to ever deal with the company I got the kit from again, particularly since the kit took a long-ass time to get here, and they didn't respond to my increasingly-frantic e-mails. However, I found some clear, concise spinning instructions, as narrated by an adorable child, who, alarmingly, seems to be much smarter than I am, which had me up and spinning within five minutes. Not spinning particularly well at first, mind, but at least I understood what I was doing horribly wrong.



A close-up of my crappy yarn, which I swear to god, in parts isn't bad at all, and if it weren't overspun so badly here and there, wouldn't really be any worse than, say, Point Five. It's rustic. Yes, rustic. And its destiny is surely as something felted, but dudes! I made yarn! And I am going to make more, oh yes. And I am going to get a decent spindle, too. This is less a case of a poor craftswoman blaming her tools than it is a simple desire to have a genuinely beautiful spindle. Beautiful tools inspire me, just as beautiful yarn does. And maybe a beautiful spindle will keep me from buying a wheel before I'm good enough to justify it, because that's where this is headed, you know. Today a spindle, tomorrow a wheel, probably after that, sheep. OK, probably not sheep, but this fibre arts shit is addictive. Knitting is merely a gateway drug.



And there's some real yarn, as bought for me for my birthday, by my darling. The sock obsession continues, with skeins of Schaeffer Anne, Cherry Tree Hill Supersock, and Fleece Artist, all of which are beautiful and feel lovely to the touch. There are three skeins of Alchemy Haiku as well, which will eventually be made into a shawl for me, once I find a pattern I like, although, frankly, I'm tempted to just whip out the stitch dictionary and try to come up with something on my own, since I sort of know what I'd like, and just haven't seen it anywhere yet. A new pair of Addis and some Clover Takumi circs, and a pile of new wool tops completed the wondrous birthday present, and frankly, if my birthday presents are this good, getting TOTALLY FUCKING OLD, OLD, OLD isn't so bad.

this is not happening

I am thirty-nine today.