Placed an order to SSS (http://www.thesheepshedstudio.com/) this afternoon for more fantastic supplies.  I have a few yarns and dyejobs planned!  I'm excited for the fibers, as always.  I also recently ordered a new phone from Sprint - after a year in WA, I'm finally switching my service provider and phone number to local ones. 

Week two of school has begun.  I only got a little bit of yarn stuff done this weekend, and next weekend won't be much better as I will be out of town.  I'm going to work hard to get schoolwork *and* yarnwork done in the next 4 days.  Things are going to be busy at work, too, and I'm sure I'll have plenty of sore muscles to go along with it.  I'm actually really excited about this job.  I like actually using my body to do things besides sit all day long.  Loading packages for UPS is completely opposite, and so far I am really enjoying it! 

I will be moving a few items over from Artfire to Etsy in the next week or two.  I love that listing items on Artfire is free, but I am not seeing the same traffic that I am to my Etsy.  I also can't figure out how to renew items with Artfire.

Pictures of the new goodies to come!  I am also halfway done with the first sock from my Fiber Porn Sock Blend Batt, so that will be on here soon as well.

Mooooving.

Been on a househunt for the last few days.  It's been much, much easier than the last time I searched for housing - the second place I went to is somewhere I'm pretty much sold on.  I haven't worked on yarn or fleece in the last couple of days but I have lots of time tomorrow, since the househunt will (hopefully) be completed.  I'll be packing up my things soon, which will limit my fibery activities for a little while, but I'll get up and running again pretty quickly.  In the meantime, I've got school and work to tend to!

Today is the start of a new quarter of school (go 5th year of college!) and the first day of training for my new job with UPS.  I'm pretty excited for both, and I have a loooong day ahead of me.  I woke up earlier than I wanted, but I'm not sleepy anymore.  I should have time to get a little spinning done before I head off to class, if I get the rest of my morning routine taken care of. 

Here's the set of batts I carded up last night.  I'm spinning them into a sport-weight yarn, which I'll then knit into socks.  They're an amazing shade of midnight blue!

Reminder List

Things I would like to work on and complete in the near future:

*Create 16 more samples

*Create 5-10 new products for my shops

*Cut, pin, and sew 2 dresses and a shirt

*Finish sewing keyboards for quilt

*Spin a roving from the Black Sheep Gathering thick-and-thin; ply.

*Organize craft area (need milk crates for storage bins!)

*Weave placemats from old fabrics

*Begin better marketing

Custom-ordered Yarns

I finished up those yarns for my Etsy customer!  Here they are :)

Summertime in Kim's World

Since my last update, I've only worked on a few things.  I've been slowly processing the alpaca fleece for one of the ladies in my knitting group.  I also worked on one of the two yarns for a customer from Etsy; I plan to finish this yarn tomorrow and restart the other yarn after that.  I've got materials for a new dress, a quilt to work on, and lots of yarn stuff to do!  I also made two dropspindles and one of each in my stores  ( http://www.artfire.com/modules.php?name=Shop&op=listing&product_id=1616172 ). 

On top of all the exciting fibery things, my new school program starts for me in a week!  I'm ready to be learning again, to get another degree, and to be done going to school for a while.  I'm ready to earn money, pay down debt, and feed my fiber addiction.  It's going to be good.

Black Sheep Gathering

Shortly after my last post, I was notified that I had to move out of the place I was living as quickly as possible. Life has been a whirlwind ever since, and things are just starting to slow down enough to spend a proper amount of time crafting.

There's a knitting group that meets at one of the libraries here in town.  It's Wednesday evenings and it's a lovely group.  I really enjoy going.  So far I haven't missed a meeting since I started attending - I've been late and had to leave early, but no complete misses.  Of course now that I've said that I've jinxed myself and I'll miss one in the next couple of weeks!  There is also a group that meets Thursday nights at a LYS which I may start attending, but it's sounding like my Thursday evenings will be filled up next quarter with school.  

Speaking of school, I'm officially a college graduate.  I have a general studies AA.  I go back to school in 3 weeks to pursue an AS in Pharmacy.  It will keep me very busy for the next year or so, but I'm definitely looking forward to it. 

There will be a fiber arts show at a local gallery in August; the deadline for submissions is the end of this month and I am racing to complete a scarf so that I can have 3 items juried.  I have a week, which should be plenty of time, as long as I just take the time to sit down and make this scarf.  I am unsure of how it is turning out, though, and I might replace it with a yarn last-minute if it ends up needing to be frogged.   It would be very cool to have my work displayed, though!

I went to the Black Sheep Gathering in Eugene, OR last weekend (courtesy of my grandmother!) and wandered all the vendors.  I picked up quite a bit of great yarn material.  I also scored a pretty nice raw fleece.  I plan to make a step-by-step tutorial for cleaning a raw fleece; hopefully I can complete it before the term starts at my new school.

I also keep meaning to finish my quilt top.  I started to work on it last night but I was already too tired and I had to put it away after messing up the first seam.  The keyboards will be beautiful when they are done, but they are time-consuming and I'm definitely procrastinating it. 

Photos to come later!