New Beginnings and Ice Cream

In this post I want to talk about two main things, ice cream......and new beginnings.

New Beginning 1.

My friends are expecting their first baby. This is a picture of the two pairs of socks I finished. These were both mostly done at least a month ago, but I just kitchenered the toes a couple days ago. These socks are for those two of my friends as they become parents. I've been sneaky - claiming that the pair for the dad is for my stepdad for Christmas (they have the same size feet) and that I needed the soon-to-be dad to try them on - even said so on my podcast to throw off suspicion. But I was really using him to make sure that they would fit him. I just thought it was fair that he finally get a pair of socks, after all, his wife has received several, and now his soon-to-be son has 4 pair waiting for him. So, these will go to the future mom and dad. My small way of well-wishing for their family.

 New Beginning 2.
This is a pic of a pair of socks. I ripped out the toes - the first time I've really done that. The reason I'm doing this is because the socks did not fit my step-dad at Christmas. He never told me that about the multiple pairs of socks I'd made him, apparently most of the pairs I've made him have been "close enough" but this pair was just too far off. So, I'm making these from last year fit him by making them longer. I figured that as long as I was going to make them bigger, I may as well make them more fun, so I'm making the toes out of another yarn. Let's hope someday I actually finish this. I'd like to have at least two pairs to mail to him before it gets cold.






New Beginning 3.
This is The Fiboreum. My husband named it that. You can call it my studio. Now, you may not have known this, but this room used to have a different configuration and a hideous paint job. The paint job was silver accent paint as the wall paint on 3 walls and one dark magenta wall. With the mirrored closet doors it was.....well....a lot to take in. Now, thanks to one of my friends, it's a lovely sage green. I've been so excited to have a room I can actually stand to be in that I've been industrious. You can see my dummy for costuming that I've been re-doing. It was a shop dummy - about a size 0 - so i needed to change it to match me. It's close.  In my chair you can see the start of......

New Beginning 4
A new fleece to spin. 
This bobbin shows how it looks on the wheel. It's a very distinguished fleece. That means, it's got grey in it. It's either a brown so dark that it looks black or a true black. I'm not sure which. It's absolutely gorgeous. However, the issue is not that it looks bad, the issue is that it isn't very soft. Don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely in love with how it's spinning up and I fully intend to use it. I'm just not going to use it in any pattern that requires me to have it next to my skin.

 And here's how it looks in on the storage bobbins. This is 4 oz of it, the first 2 days of spinning it. I took the picture in full sunlight in hopes that I could convey not only the color (I got close, it's darker than this) and the shine. The shine is what makes it looks lighter in the picture than what it is in reality. Looks at how lovely it is spun up? So crisp! Very low halo, and the tiny hints of whitish grey which give it an added dimension of color.



and ICE CREAM!
I finally bought the book: The Perfect Scoop. It was highly recommended by my friend Jasmin and my friend Lorien, two women who know ice cream and are foodies. After trying a number of the flavors that Lorien has cooked up, I was sold. After the book came, I found that I had a bag full of lemons off my friend's tree. So I made Lemon ice cream. This is what it looks like - a nearly white with tiny yellow flecks in it. The yellow flecks are 2 lemon's worth of lemon zest. The recipe says to blend/food process down the lemon zest until it's no longer discernible, but I think it looks so pretty like this that I left it partially intact. I'm hoping that spending the time working from home while I take care of my husband will give me a little extra time to make ice cream now that I won't have my commute. I've been working longer than normal hours, though, so no promises.