spaazliciousWednesday, February 15, 2006
It was a Pretty Good Day
Nick had the 13th and the 14th off, so I got to wake up next to the handsomest man in the world.
Jasper was picked up by his Mommy early on the thirteenth, so we only had three dogs to trip over while making coffee.
Sigh. I'd grown accustomed to his face.
We lounged around, bathed, went to the gym and ran and swam (ugh, the chlorinated stench that is that pool!), got lunch at Jamba Juice, came home, bathed, exercised, and I wandered off to do an assignment for my Entrepeneur Business class.
One of those assignments that make you feel kind of awkward and cheesy, "Excuse me, I'm in a business class and have an assignment to interview a local business owner...could you, possibly?" But Jane of Two Sisters and Ewe immediately said, sure, and we went back to their little office and it was great, she was very open even though I was asking questions about budget and business plan, stuff which to a sole proprieter type business is very personal (at least in the eyes of the taxman).
So, what I'm saying is, she's cool, yo.
Came home typed it up and e-mailed it off. Then...the UPS man came, hooray! Cookies from Nick's mom and drumroll...the first half of my order from earthues!
There's
Thankfully, one of the colors kits got kind of smushed during shipping so I felt barely guilty about popping it right open. The kits come with everything you need to make a rainbow on 60 pounds of fiber, and an instruction booklet and gloves. The volume of the kit isn't much more than that of a box of men's running shoes, but because their natural dye concentrates are so er, concentrated, it all fits into the box. I'm really stoked/chuffed/thrilled by all the possibilities, but I think I'll stop before I sound like an ad. It's probably too late.
Anyway, though this is the first half--I have a bunch of weld, cochineal and madder dyestuffs coming soon, along with a couple of indigo kits.
I'll end up having to change the Lanas de Libélula site around quite a lot maybe, because the dyestuffs will need a lot of information attached to them so people wanting to try natural dyeing can have a better sense of what proportions to buy and what to get to achieve the desired effects.
I was thinking about mordanting stuff tonight, but I think I'll wait 'til tomorrow night as Nick will be brewing tonight. He's made two batches of porter, and while he doesn't like the first batch (I do) the second batch we can both agree on as fan-friggin-tastic. So while we're running a fair amount and increasing our cardiovascular fitness, we may need sports bras for our beer bellies soon. It is a rich yummy beer, nearly chewy.
Anyway, after I rolled around excited in the package, Nick and I went to Coronado and had dinner with my Mom at the Coronado Brewery. It was kid central; the little buggers were running everywhere. The balloon man was there, and that guy, that guy, well he's frickin' cool. He really seems to enjoy making balloon animals and talking with the parents and kids, so even though we had to shout at each other to be heard above the infernal din echoing off the brick walls it was fun, because everybody was happy.
Really good onion rings and chili does that, I've noticed.
I knit maybe four or so rows on my sleeves. Yay stockinette.
Obviously though, I need to finish them today if I'm to have a hope in hell of getting this thing done, because the sleeves are a paragraph within something like five pages of pattern instuctions (half of that space is ads, but still).
Back to laundry, back to dishes, back to life...
(we're going to see Into the Woods on the 24th!)
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Jasper was picked up by his Mommy early on the thirteenth, so we only had three dogs to trip over while making coffee.
Sigh. I'd grown accustomed to his face.
We lounged around, bathed, went to the gym and ran and swam (ugh, the chlorinated stench that is that pool!), got lunch at Jamba Juice, came home, bathed, exercised, and I wandered off to do an assignment for my Entrepeneur Business class.
One of those assignments that make you feel kind of awkward and cheesy, "Excuse me, I'm in a business class and have an assignment to interview a local business owner...could you, possibly?" But Jane of Two Sisters and Ewe immediately said, sure, and we went back to their little office and it was great, she was very open even though I was asking questions about budget and business plan, stuff which to a sole proprieter type business is very personal (at least in the eyes of the taxman).
So, what I'm saying is, she's cool, yo.
Came home typed it up and e-mailed it off. Then...the UPS man came, hooray! Cookies from Nick's mom and drumroll...the first half of my order from earthues!
There's
- 3# natural indigo ground into fine powder,
- 2# fine sifted moroccan henna powder in 2 oz. packets,
- scour (I have a ton of soap, but Kathy of earthues convinced me to try theirs, specially formulated for the industry and all that),
- thiourea dioxide (for reducing the oxygen in the indigo vat),
- 2# iron--you can use iron different ways, in the mordant or in the dyebath, and you can paint it on afterwards. The latter two methods make it sort of a color saddener, the first method can deepen the value of the color ("e.g. osage turns from a medium lemon yellow to an olive green"). It also makes naturally dyed colors more lightfast.
- Alum acetate--a mordant for veg fibers,
- and (vegetarians look away) hide glue for the dye vat for use with protein fibers as the alkalinity can damage them (okay vegetarians you can look back now),
- and 10 of their very cool mehndi body paint kits,
- and three of the COLORS kits.
Thankfully, one of the colors kits got kind of smushed during shipping so I felt barely guilty about popping it right open. The kits come with everything you need to make a rainbow on 60 pounds of fiber, and an instruction booklet and gloves. The volume of the kit isn't much more than that of a box of men's running shoes, but because their natural dye concentrates are so er, concentrated, it all fits into the box. I'm really stoked/chuffed/thrilled by all the possibilities, but I think I'll stop before I sound like an ad. It's probably too late.
Anyway, though this is the first half--I have a bunch of weld, cochineal and madder dyestuffs coming soon, along with a couple of indigo kits.
I'll end up having to change the Lanas de Libélula site around quite a lot maybe, because the dyestuffs will need a lot of information attached to them so people wanting to try natural dyeing can have a better sense of what proportions to buy and what to get to achieve the desired effects.
I was thinking about mordanting stuff tonight, but I think I'll wait 'til tomorrow night as Nick will be brewing tonight. He's made two batches of porter, and while he doesn't like the first batch (I do) the second batch we can both agree on as fan-friggin-tastic. So while we're running a fair amount and increasing our cardiovascular fitness, we may need sports bras for our beer bellies soon. It is a rich yummy beer, nearly chewy.
Anyway, after I rolled around excited in the package, Nick and I went to Coronado and had dinner with my Mom at the Coronado Brewery. It was kid central; the little buggers were running everywhere. The balloon man was there, and that guy, that guy, well he's frickin' cool. He really seems to enjoy making balloon animals and talking with the parents and kids, so even though we had to shout at each other to be heard above the infernal din echoing off the brick walls it was fun, because everybody was happy.
Really good onion rings and chili does that, I've noticed.
I knit maybe four or so rows on my sleeves. Yay stockinette.
Obviously though, I need to finish them today if I'm to have a hope in hell of getting this thing done, because the sleeves are a paragraph within something like five pages of pattern instuctions (half of that space is ads, but still).
Back to laundry, back to dishes, back to life...
(we're going to see Into the Woods on the 24th!)
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