From the country that brings you ancient spindles and huge flocks of sheep...

I was going to post an entry with lots of pictures, but the blogger picture thing is being annoyingly slow, so I bring you this rant instead.

Once upon a time, I was an anthro major at Penn. (And by "once upon a time, I mean "until I graduated a week and a half ago.") Penn has a great museum of anthropology and archaeology. I basically lived there.

In the museum is an exhibit from Canaan, that has a lot of Bronze Age and Iron Age artifacts. There's even a model of a 3-pillared building, complete with goats, and a mannequin of a woman spinning wool on a drop spindle.

According to my advisor, who helped organize the exhibit, that mannequin costed the museum over a million dollars.

So here I am, in the land of wool-spinning artifacts, and I hit up a yarn store. And what do I find?

There's some cotton. There's some acrylic (like a whole store full...)

BUT ABSOLUTELY NO WOOL!!!!

No sheep for me. No alpaca. No possum. No yak. No bambo or soy-silk for that matter. It's all cotton and acrylic.

What the hell is wrong with this country?

And where did all the wool go?

They should just call me the Yarn Innkeeper*

(From 6/21, since now I have a good internet connection and it's letting me put up my pictures. Huzzah!)

I'm trying to be good. I really, really am.

As you may or may not know, I'm currently in Israel, awaiting the start of my excavations.


I had to pack minimally, so that I'm only lugging one suicase and not two. It worked. It also meant I had to choose small crochet projects (ie kippot) which would take a long time and would keep me occupied for the next 6 weeks.

As a reward for all the kippot I was going to make, I also brought some random yarns, just a minimal amount, to make some squares and stuff.






But then I went shopping, since there was a yarn store nearby. And got this:

Yes, it's acrylic. I know, I know. But there's really nothing else. Well, there's more kippah yarn. I might get that at the end of my trip, but for now I have enough kippah supplies.

I'm justifying it by the fact that I need to work on samples of my projects that I'm going to be teaching kids how to make this summer. And I can make other charity items. And it was there. And, well, it's yarn!


*If you don't get the reference, look up an artscroll chumash (first 5 books of the Torah) and see how they translate "Zonah."

Yarn woes

Is it just me, or does it suck when yarn gets tangled and you spend hours untangling it, only to realize you still have to cut it? Or when you're winding a skein of recycled silk, and it actually breaks apart a bit?

Both happened today. But my yarn will survive.

I wish I had shiny things to post. Hmm...


That's the tangled yarn, pre-tangleage.


That's my first kippah for a non-Jew. Random, but a fun project. And it took like no time at all.

I've also finished a blue scarf (same as the purple one, only blue and slightly larger) and a dishcloth/trivet/placemat that I don't know what to do with.

Aforementioned scarf

And now I'm making a second one.

Also on my needles:
Clapotis
The makings of a new kippah (which will take forever)
2 socks on 2 needles (well I'm still casting on there...)