We’re having a ridiculous winter so far.  Second warmest December on record,  and January hasn’t been much colder.  Not enough snow to really do anything fun in – the kids are annoyed.  And the walk to school in the pouring rain probably didn’t help.  We’ve only had to shovel three times so far.  It’s almost time to start planning the garden and it feels like we haven’t even hit winter yet!

It’s also been weird because I’ve been a single-project-knitter since last November.  That’s not like me at all.  I usually have a bunch of things on the go because I’m fickle, and different things lend themselves to different situations.  I like a sock for my purse for unexpected waiting times when I’m out and about.  Something larger for evenings at home.  Something lacy.  The occasional hat or mitten.  But it’s been nothing but socks since November.  Remind me that if I’m going to make a ridiculous pronouncement like “I’m knitting everybody socks for Christmas” ever again, that I shouldn’t wait until November to really get going.  Yeesh.  Anyway, I finally got the socks sent out on Saturday (yes, Astute Reader, that means I missed the 12th day of Christmas by a long time.  In my defense, I had them all finished by January 7th – I just didn’t send them off until last weekend.  Which isn’t much of a defense, now that I think about it) I’m knitting socks now (late Christmas/birthday present for someone I’m not related to).  And after those are done, I have plans!  Oh, yes!  A sweater!  A bunch of these!  Some hats and mittens!  No socks!

However, in the interest of documentation, here they all are.  If you are an adult member of my immediate family, avert your eyes until probably Wednesday…

In order of completion:

Pattern:  Angee, by Cookie A from Sock Innovation. Yarn: Shoppel-Wolle Zauberball.  These were for my mom.  Excellent pattern, beautiful yarn.  I actually finished these last fall, but didn’t finish tucking in the ends until about a month ago.

Pattern:  Leyburn socks, by Erin over at pepperknit.com.  Yarn: Patons Kroy Socks 4-Ply.  Those were for my stepdad.  He picked the colour – he wanted the socks to match a sweater his mom had made him years ago.  This colourway somehow manages to defy camera focus.  No matter what I did.  Magic!  The pattern was fine – I was just a doofus and kept second guessing the pattern, and making dumb mistakes, and not taking notes (actually, I never take notes.  I always think I’ll remember what I did, which would be fine if I ever did, and didn’t have to count the rows and stitches on the first sock to make sure the second matches.)  They turned out a bit big (my stepdad has feet about the same size as mine!), but not so bad, I don’t think.  After reknitting each sock twice, I just couldn’t face up to doing it again, so I hope these work.

Pattern: Wanida, by Cookie A., idem  Yarn: Koigu PPPM.  For my sister-in-law.  Another genius pattern by Cookie A.  Second time making these, and still a pleasure.  And I love this yarn, so, overall, a win.

Pattern: Earl Grey, by Stephanie at yarnharlot.ca  Yarn: Koigu PPPM.  For my dad.  Nice pattern – simple enough to work up quickly, but with a little cable to keep your brain from turning to goo.

Pattern: Sunshine, by Cookie A., idem (am I using that right?)  Yarn: Koigu PPPM.  For my stepmom. Pattern was brilliant.  The colour of this yarn (somewhere between what you see in the two pictures) made me very happy. And made Zebula a little covetous.  These win the prize for having been knitted the fastest – six days.

Pattern: Earl Grey, as above.  Yarn: Tanis Fiber Arts Blue Label.  These got restarted a couple times – I couldn’t figure out which pattern to make, and settled on Earl Grey again, both because they’re nice and they work up fast.

Cheesy group shot:

I’m almost done with my Chrismas socks.  I’m kinda banking on the fact that Christmas is 12 days long and ends on January 5th (or 6th, depending how you count), and should have these all sent out before all the Christmasness is over.

Our holidays have been very quiet this year.  It’s been just us this time.  I like to stay in town on alternate years, and none of my family made the trip down.  In between merrymaking with lovely friends, we ate lots of cookies, Christmas dinner was simple but delicious, and the kids have been in a happy state of Wii-induced catatonia since Christmas morning.  And Hanukkah was late this year, so in addition to all that, there were latkes!  It’s been good!  And I had three quiet days at work, which were nice too.  It’s going to be hard to transition back to my normal life where I don’t spend entire days munching on chocolate, knitting, and basically sitting on my butt.  And where I get exercise regularly.

I hope your holidays were/are good, whatever you celebrate!

None of that excuses the lack of posts, though!  I was shocked when Mom-of-Dr.-Thingo chided me during her last visit  for not having done a Hallowe’en post with the kids in their costumes.  I was sure I had!  But, no, my last post was just before Hallowe’en, showing off Zebula’s Gryffindor tie (it still tickles me that I made it.  And now it’s been integrated into the play pile, and resurfaces often).  Which means I haven’t posted for nearly two months.  It feels like not much has been accomplished in that time, so this post is as much to reassure me that, no, time isn’t just running away with me, as anything else.  Though I do feel like a bit of a show-off with these sporadic posts.  It all looks more impressive when I put two months’ worth of stuff up at a time than it really is, honest!

All right – this is not a Whining About Not Having Any Time blog, it’s a Stuff I Made Blog, so let’s get to it!

This one’s for-Mom-of-Dr.-Thingo:

Optimus Prime costume purchased at Shopper’s Drug Mart with years of accumulated Optimum Points.  Hermione costume made with tie from last post, robe hastily assembled from an apron pattern, and chopstick wand (not in photo).  I’m surprised the robe was wearable at all (the neck was a little big).  The Gryffindor badge is printed out, ‘laminated’ with packing tape, and sewn on.  Unfortunately, the robe made a trip through the washing machine a couple of weeks ago.  The packing tape remained intact, but the badge inside disintegrated into zillions of little tiny bits of paper.  Oh well.  Easy come, easy go.

There was this:

That oddly-shaped thing is a doggie sweater, knit for a friend’s dog, in exchange for her delicious canned goods.  Best garlic dill pickles around, as well all kinds of other goodies! I even got to see its recipient wear it for the first time, a little bewildered at that thing on his back.  It’s a little big for him now, but he’ll grow into it, just like a furry toddler.  And, unexpected bonus: it also looks like a Doctor Who monster.

Aside:  I’ve been watching lots of Doctor Who lately.  I’m kind of in love with David Tennant.  I know they’re going to kill him off any minute now, and it’s making me sad.  Which makes me feel ridiculous.

I’ve also managed to finally get a shot of Dr. Thingo in his new sweater.  Supermodel shot:

Closer-to-reality shot:

He seems pretty happy with it, which made the endless sleeves worth it.  Sewing in the zipper wasn’t as bad this time around.  I’m either getting better at it, or my standards are getting lower.  I suspect it’s the latter.

Speaking of zippers, and sewing, I finally cut the fabric for the roman shades I’ve been planning on putting in the living room windows.  Well I cut the fabric about a month ago.  The fabric that I bought in October.  Of last year.  I bought some hardware last month too.  The shades should be completely finished in five years or so.

There was one large project that I won’t talk about that took a bit of time, but the recipient hasn’t received it yet.  Which is silly, because it’s been done for three weeks.

And socks.  Oh, the socks!  Next time I decide to make all the grown ups in my family socks for Christmas, I will start on December 26th.  Pictures after they’ve been sent to their respective feet.

Happy Whatever You Celebrate, everyone!

**edited to fix a typo.  Thanks, Jorge!**

Why a tie, you ask?  This year, I told the kids I wouldn’t be making their Halloween costumes, as it’s been busy and I have a concert to sing two days before, which means many evening rehearsals.  So we went looking.  The prices are crazy!  So I ended up getting Vorlon a cheap Optimus Prime costume from the drugstore (and using up a bunch of Optimum Points that I’ve been accumulating for about 9 years).  Zebula wanted to be Hermione from Harry Potter.  I decided that for the ridiculous price they were asking for what essentially boils down to a poorly made polyester robe and a tie, I could make a bunch of costumes, so I caved.  She and I went to the fabric store.  I got an end piece of black broadcloth, two small pieces of red and gold and a frog to keep the robe closed (why is it called a frog, anyway??).  Total cost of materials, less than $10.

I got the red and gold stuff because they didn’t have anything stripy to make the tie.  So I made stripy fabric by reducing my quarter-yard pieces to 2 inch strips and sewing them together.

Having all those seams ended up working to my advantage – I didn’t need to use any interfacing to stiffen the tie, which saved me some measuring and cutting.

I cut the tie out of the resulting fabric, and followed this tutorial.  Voilà, tie!  I really liked making it, which is surprising, since it’s almost entirely hand-sewn.  I must be getting more patient in my old age.  If it hadn’t been for the fact that I basically had to make the fabric, the process would have taken less than an hour.  If you need a tie, let me know.  I’m making the robe using the pattern from last year’s pioneer girl apron with some crazy modifications.  We’ll see how it goes.  Time’s running out fast!

After all that, last weekend Vorlon rediscovered his Bat Guy (it’s not *exactly* Batman…) costume from last year, and has basically been living in it when he’s not at school.  ”Why couldn’t you have just been that again this year?” I asked.  ”Because that’s what I was last year!”  Silly me.

I’ve been knitting a lot, but on large things, so there’s not an impressive list of finished things to show you since last month.  I am nearly done with Dr. Thingo’s sweater.  Remember the Sleeves of Death?  That were taking forever because I had to make them longer?  I made ‘em too long.  I measured Dr. Thingo about a half-dozen times to make sure, I measured the pieces, I assembled the sweater.  But I had him try it on after I sewed  everything all up, and it was too long.  Way too long.  Like, roll-up-the-cuffs-twice-and-it’s-still-too-long too long.  I don’t know.  I think it’s the way I measured him.  Not making that mistake again.  After some time in the in-progress basket, where it could think about what it had done, I took it out again, removed the sleeves, unraveled them both down some, and will reattach them.

While the Green Albatross Sweater was in time out, I made this:

I test knit it for a friend.  It’s a secret.  All I can tell you is that it’s ribbed.  I really liked working on it, and it fits well.  I’ll put up real pictures when I’m told I can.

I whipped up a little scarf for Zebula.  She loves it.  From the book Sock Yarn One Skein Wonders, it’s the Autumn Rose Neck Wrap.  Crocheted out of some Tanis Fiber Arts Blue Label Fingering Weight, in Aquarium.

And I made this pillow for a fellow choir member who got married a couple weeks ago (congratulations!!).  She was furiously knitting on a beautiful red Rock Island Shawl to go with her dress a couple weeks before, and I asked if she had other knitting left to do, and could I help.  She immediately produced a breathtakingly beautiful skein of blood-red Wollmeise (same as the shawl) and said “Can you make a ring pillow?  Basically, a hexapuff, only larger.”

The picture doesn’t do the red justice.  Now I know what all the fuss about the Wollmeise is about.

And there was a birthday party (Zebula turned 9!).  The usual, lots of giggling girls, much running around.  Cake.  Cupcakes this time – nice, but nothing too exciting.  We had a beach theme, so I had some dressed as sand dunes, and some with little marzipan fishies on top.  I loved the fishies.

No progress on Christmas socks.  And that’s all I have to say about that.

I was having lunch with the lovely and talented Kim last week, when she ribbed me for not blogging in so long.  So here I am.  Maybe someday I’ll graduate from just giving you a quick collage of stuff I’ve finished, but I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you…

I made this for my lovely yoga instructor, because it’s a bad pun (Pattern is My So-Called Pidge, by Kerry Newbill):

One of the kinds of yoga she teaches is Kundalini.  Dr. Thingo calls it the Yoga of Self-Punishment.  I call it Transcendence Through Repetition.  Basically, one repeats the same movement for a long time (10-15 minutes sometimes), while often incorporating breath of fire.  At first, it feels a little like torture.  Eventually, you stop needing to consciously make the movement, as your muscles just take over, and your head is free to wander.  I like the places my head goes in those conditions.  Anyway, the poses in this practise are called kriyas rather than asanas.   Baby alpacas are called crias.  The yarn for the cowl is baby alpaca I spun a couple of years ago (scroll down a little).  Get it?  Cria/Kriya??!?  Yeah…

Then came July.  I got to go to Portugal with Dr. Thingo, which was fantastic.  We hadn’t been on a vacation alone together for three years.

This is me on vacation

Portugal is beautiful, and the weather was fantastic the whole time we were there.  Hot, but not all muggy and gross like it is here.  Hilly.  Old (we went through ruins that dated back to the Emperor Augustus).  I thought my weak knowledge of Italian and even weaker knowledge of Spanish would get me by in Portuguese.  I was mistaken.  But I managed to get my point across when needed, got lots of rest, did a huge amount of walking uphill both ways, and ate lots of fish.  While away, and during the flights there and back, I got a couple of shawls done.

This is an Acanthus Shawlette, by Caroline Wyborny, made from Shall We Knit’s Willow Street Silk.  The pattern is good, though the pattern chart is a little hard to follow, and once you’ve done the lace border, the stockinette crescent basically knits itself.

And then I made another Citron, which was my backup project, in case I got through or totally gave up on the above Acanthus.

Sorry about the end-of-my-arm shot – couldn’t be bothered to set up the timer.

I’ve made three of these so far, and I’ll probably make more.  The constant stocking stitch is perfect for vacation knitting, and knitting while keeping the kids entertained on the train.  And I like how it sits on your neck.  I think the next one will be in fingering weight, rather than lace weight, for something a little larger and more shawly.

I also made this in July:

It’s a Hana-Bi shawl, by Katherine Matthews (mine is the only project for this pattern in Ravelry!  I win!)  I have mixed feelings about how this turned out.  The pattern was impeccably written, and I like the beading, but this yarn (Malabrigo lace), while squooshy and delicious, is too busy and detracts from the lace pattern.  I think I might make another one with either a plain yarn or a more monochromatic colourway.

And, after months of it sitting on my dresser, needing only for the ends to be tucked in and to be blocked, this Itasca Scarf:

I offered the four scarves/shawls above to the person who drives me to choir as a thank you for doing so.  I had originally intended to give her the Hana-Bi, but figured since I had a pile of finished items, she may as well pick something she really likes.  She ended up picking the Acanthus.  So now I’m up to here with scarves – maybe I should start wearing them more.

I finished some Christmas socks for my stepdad, but discovered that he has much smaller feet than I thought, so they will be reknit (no pictures, as there is a non-zero possibility he might read this).  However, I finished some socks for my mom without incident (ditto about pictures).  I used Zebula’s feet to measure – how crazy is that?  She needs to grow into her feet or she’ll look like she’s walking on snowshoes all the time as an adult.  I also finished this for EcoMonkey:

But it needs buttons.  Which is the kind of bottleneck around here that guarantees she won’t get it until she’s 16.

And I finished this cardigan (Tempest, from Knitty, by Anne Weaver).  I never did put buttons on it, but I think I’ll leave it that way – they would probably gape when I closed it up, so it can just be an extra layer when I’m chilly.  I think I showed this, unfinished, in my last post, but somebody asked me for a more finished photo.

I’ve been working on a sweater for Dr. Thingo.  He has really long arms.  I’ve done the body.  I’m working on the sleeves, and doing both at a time, and they’re stuck in this time-space distortion where I knit them and knit them and they don’t get longer.  If anybody knows how to get out of this, let me know.

This was commissioned by a friend whose mother-in-law had started it, but couldn’t finish.  The pattern is by Tivoli Spinners, from Ireland.  I believe the yarn and pattern were purchased on a trip to Ireland years ago.  Unfortunately, I gave it back, and the pattern, without ever taking note of what pattern number it was, and I can’t find it online.

I did not enjoy this project.  I mentioned it in a previous post: it hurt my shoulder to knit it, as I think the yarn was a little thick for the desired gauge.  I didn’t like the combination of stitch patterns.  But I will say that the pattern itself was very well-written and detailed.   It took me far longer to finish than it should have.  But it’s done, it was very well-received by the person who commissioned it, and I’m movin’ on!

Since my last post, not much knitting was finished.  I just didn’t feel the love.  I needed to get this sweater done, and I felt a little guilty working on anything else, so I didn’t really knit at all.  Things picked up in the last few weeks, though.  I did make a blanket for a Seattle friend’s new baby.  Another Baby Shane Blanket, with Tanis Fibre Arts yarn.  I loved working on this one just as much as I did the first one.  And, I just realized, by going back in the archives, that I never posted a picture of the blankie I made for Ecomonkey last year.  So here they are, in chronological order.

Different colour scheme.  I loved them both.  I’ll probably be making more of these – the pattern is very compelling, and the yarn is lovely.

The women in my choir had a very intensive week of concerts with the KW Symphony at the end of May, during which time I made a large portion of this:

That mess of stuff (yes, more Tanis Fibre Arts yarn.  It’s my favourite lately.) is a Tempest Cardigan.  All that’s left is to finish casting off the buttonband and collar, and making a lower hem.  I bought this yarn in the early spring when it was super dreary and cold and it makes me happy when I knit it.

I also started a thank you shawl a couple of days ago.  This is for the very nice lady who drives me to choir rehearsal every week.  This will eventually be a Hana-bi shawl, in Malabrigo Lace yarn, complete with beads.  I love making lace!  I’d do it more, but I hardly ever wear it…

Milestone:  Vorlon turned 6 a few weeks ago.  So I am officially no longer the mother of small children.  We had a birthday party for him that mostly involved a bunch of little boys running around in the back yard.  Vorlon requested a Millenium Falcon cake.

Sure, if I were a professional, this would’ve ended up on Cake Wrecks, but I think it turned out pretty well, though I had some serious doubts when I was at this stage:

And finally, a shout out to my friend Carrie, who competed in her first (and almost certainly not her last, given how she kicked butt!) triathlon yesterday.  When this lady sets her mind to something, she goes for it, no looking back!  Great job, Carrie!

I finished the bartered afghan for Sue this weekend:

The weather this weekend was dreary, and seeing the wildly coloured finished product made me happy.

Just goes to show you that no matter how crappy the weather gets when you’re expecting it to get better, spring eventually comes.  There’s a life lesson in there, I’m sure, but I’m too busy enjoying the sunshine to go looking for it.

Another sure sign of spring – I have inflated my bike tires, and taken it out for a spin.  It was lovely!  I’m too much of a weenie to bike in the winter, though I have many hardy friends who do it.  The fact that I don’t ride in the cold means that I always come to the nice realization in the springtime that all my errand-running and commuting can now happen in 1/4 of the time.  I love my bike!

There’s still not much going on, knitting-wise.  I’m plodding away on the same old stuff, and getting a fair amount of spinning done, so I thought I’d talk a little about a crafty side-road I took last winter.  It all started with this website (warning: if you are offended by rude language, this is not the site for you).  Dr. Thingo found it, and decided he absolutely needed to have one of them for his office at work, and could I please make it for him.  Now, I don’t generally like hand sewing. I don’t do it well and all I want, when I start, is for it to be over.  But, seeing as how all the projects on that were fairly small, I said I would.

Action shot!

Turns out, I really liked doing it!  I was shocked!  I wanted to make another one!  So I went to Michaels.  Trouble with cross-stitch is that, generally, the patterns are pretty awful.  Well, I shouldn’t say that.  Just not to my liking – lots of angels and flowers and bible verses.  Not really me (probably why I love subversivecrossstitch.com so much), though I must admit I kind of like the simple, sampler-type ones.  But, I found a book of bookmark patterns, and made one for Zebula.  She loved it!

Then, melted_snowball, having seen Dr. Thingo’s, asked if I’d make him one, so I jumped at the chance!  And may have accidentally bought a pile of patterns from the website.  This one’s modified from the original:

I love the frame he picked!  And THEN, Vorlon wanted a bookmark too, so he picked this one:

the creator of this pattern is clearly not familiar with Roy G. Biv

I like the tiny giraffes.  And it looks like I couldn’t avoid the biblical stuff after all, though Vorlon has no idea what the significance of the picture is.

Here’s the thing I have discovered with cross-stitch:  there are hundreds of available floss colours. Which means that, even if you already have 20 different colours, you won’t have the ones you need for any new project.  So you have to get more, because clearly you can’t use Soft Shell Pink when the pattern calls for Soft Rose, duh.  And then you have to keep track and sort them all.  So I purchased a little organizer box.  So I’m kind of committed.  Just what I need – another hobby.

But then the craze blew over, and I haven’t made any since.  I think I’d like to, though.  I find it very pleasant.  It’s kind of like painting for people who have no artistic talent.  You start with a blank canvas, and as long as you can count, you’re set!  But I find cross-stitch kind of like crocheted lace doilies.  I very much like the process of making the thing, but not really the thing itself  - I can’t really see myself plastering the walls of my house with samplers and landscapes and subversive sayings (though there are a few of the latter I’d like to make!).  So if you want something cross-stitched, let me know!

* That was the best pun on ‘cross’ that I came up with.  I’m open to better suggestions, if you have ‘em.

It’s spring!  Well, it’s supposed to be spring, but we got nailed with 26 cm of snow last Wednesday, so all the nice little tulip and crocus shoots got buried, as well as my general springy good mood.  Really, it was depressing.  And it was so cold for a week that things just started thawing again yesterday.

I started my garden during March Break two weeks ago, and only about a third of the stuff has sprouted, so I’m a little worried.  I might have to start again with newer seeds.  Also depressing.

But life isn’t all gloominess!  No, I’ve been exercising my butt off (let’s hope that’s more literal than metaphorical)!  Well,  you know, relatively, compared to my usual couch-potato self.  I’m swimming 1.5-2km twice a week, and going to a spin class and a kundalini yoga class once a week, and stretching a lot in between because something is sore pretty much all the time.  It feels good.  My pants fit better.  And except for the crazy early mornings, I feel very energetic  most times.

It’s been fairly unproductive, knitting- and crochet-wise.  Just not feeling the love, lately, though I like all the stuff I’m working on.  I’m nearly done the crocheted afghan I made for canned goods – all that’s left is joining all the squares and dealing with all the ends.   The commissioned aran sweater is also mostly done (just one sleeve, joining the pieces and the buttonbands and collar left).  I started a sweater for Dr. Thingo.  And I’ve finished everything but the blocking on a scarf I made out of TFA yarn.  I haven’t really taken pictures of anything except one poncho I whipped up in a day, upon request for a chilly baby:

A baby poncho pattern by Drops – I modified the neck to make it a turtleneck.  I used some sock yarn from the stash, three strands at a time.  Modeled here by Beary (we’re good at original names around here)

What I have been doing a lot of is spinning.  After I sold my wheel a few weeks ago, I was all eager to get a new one.  On a trip to Toronto, I went to Lettuce Knit (lovely store – check it out when you’re in town)with my friend, as she said they had wheels there.  I found out they rent their wheels for a week, to be able to try them out.  Which is an excellent idea, but not practical, so I might go back.  I did end up picking up a large spindle, for plying, and Respect the Spindle.  It changed my whole outlook on spindle spinning, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since!  And spinning.  I experimented a little:

On the right, are three skeins of Lofty Fibres out of a colour called something like Sunshine Through Clouds.  I wish I’d kept the label – I really like the colour and will get more if she ever makes it again.  It’s BFL and lovely.

For the one on the left, I tried to make something bulky using my old, light spindle (top-whorl).  It pretty much failed – the spindle just couldn’t handle that much yarn at a time.  Plying was a nightmare.  It’s what prompted me, in the end, to get a bigger spindle.  The one in the middle was also spun on my smaller spindle, only much finer, and it worked better, but for the plying.  The one on the right, I tried to do at the same weight as the one in the middle, only with my bigger, heavier spindle, and it worked much better, especially for plying.

Then I decided to see what I could make of some coopsworth I’ve had lying around for ages, on the bigger spindle.  The results were lovely!

It’s the brown one – that’s the colour of the sheep it came from.  The yarn isn’t very soft, but I managed a nice, even DK weight.  The large spindle is a convertible one (it’s one of these hi-lo spindles (4″)- I just haven’t taken my own picture yet), so I decided to try it as a bottom-whorl for that brown fluff.  I like it, but I dropped the spindle so many times, I dented my floor in a couple of places and deformed the hook that is meant to be used when it’s a top-whorl.  So I’ll probably only be using this spindle as a top-whorl.  However, I have a turkish spindle on order from here, so I’ll be playing some more with bottom-whorl spinning.

Then I made this:

More Lofty Fibres top, this time in Rusty Paint Bucket.  It’s a wee bit fatter than fingering weight, but I can probably make it work.  Spun on the little spindle, applying some new techniques, and plied on the larger one.  I’m very pleased with it!  I managed to squash the whole 100g onto the spindle (something I probably could never have done on my wheel).

It looks just like a yarn radish!  I plied it all on the big spindle, and while I did manage to make it all fit, it was difficult at the end – I should have just accepted it and made two skeins instead of just one.

Obligatory super-close-up:

I think I’m going to stick to the spindles for a while – I have another braid of the same colour top which I’m spinning even finer, and that turkish spindle on order, and a bunch more fibre in my basement, which should keep me busy for a while.  Plus, I can buy at least 10 spindles for the price of a new wheel, so that gives me a little latitude.

And I promise another blog post soon.  My honour depends on it!!