Monday 19 May 2008

Fibre is good for your diet, isn't it?

On the knitting front I completed DH's socks. My favourite pattern to work Lana Grossa Meetings (7740), this is the 4th time I've knit this pattern and the 4th different colourway.....

I've cast on another 2 pairs so I've Lana Grossa Bosca on the go (I'm starting my Christmas socks early this year) and Opal Magic which is for BIL's birthday at the beginning of June; I'm part way through the leg of the 2nd sock, so it's looking promising.....

The Heartland shawl is very nearly there I had a big push yesterday on knitting it, and I'm over halfway through the River of Life Edging, so hopefully next blog post will see it finished and blocked :o)))

And last but not least on the knitting front, do you remember the red & yellow sock yarn in my previous post? I said I'd given it to my friend Ann (blogless) to knit, well look what she did with it...... proudly presenting the Sunset Socks...

Hasn't she done a great job of making virtually matching socks... I think it's more down to my inability to split roving in half lenghtways evenly and my spinning skills that the pattern has gone astray on the foot of the 2nd sock..... To save you scrolling back down the fibre was my February/March fibre (BFL superwash) from The Yarn Yard Fibre Club.

I apologise now to everyone who isn't a spinner and isn't interested in spinning or looking at graphic images of fibre pron, as the rest of this post is spinning orientated....

Not by design, but I ended up with quite a bit of fibre arriving just in the last week or so.... The following 3 rovings are from The Yarn Wench and she was having a sale, so what could I do but participate? Serves me right I came in just over the £18 import on purchases so I had to pay the VAT & duty as well as the Royal Mails £8 handling charge; that bits gets me riled every time!!!

This is Chroma 2 - Falkland
This is Speckled Egg 1 - Merino


This is Sweet Pearl 2 - Falkland


Then my fibre from the The Yarn Yard Fibre Club arrived, which is gorgeous and is 50% Merino & 50% Tencel.....

Finally as I wanted to take part in the May SAL on Spinner Central on Ravelry (OK I've been looking for an excuse to order some roving from Amy)... I ordered some roving from
Spunky Eclectic so I might as well make it worthwhile, so I ended up with :

M*A*S*H - Wool blend

Monkey Farts - Superwash Corriedale (DH can't get over the name ;o) )

and finally the reason I ordered the rovings, 'Joshua Tree' in South African Fine...

Now the Joshua Tree has since been turned into this:-

and finally in to this.....

A respectable first attempt at lace weight 636m / 100g & 28wpi & 6tpi (I used the 11.3:1 ratio on my Rose)

Now my only decision is what to make with it.... I've considered a few options but either I haven't sufficient yarn or my yarn is a bit thicker than a few of the patterns. I know that doesn't matter but I don't want to run out of yarn and would like a reasonable sized shawl... I have however decided not to include Swallowtail in the list having done 3 already I thought I'd go for something new. So far I have

  1. Spring Things
  2. Shetland Triangle - E Clark
  3. Flower Basket
  4. Forget-me-Knot
  5. Hyacinth Lace

I would like to have done Laminaria but I don't have sufficient to do the larger version and I'm not sure I want to do the smaller version..... Anyone got any other suggestions?

I think I've waffled enough.... I'm a way for the Bank Holiday weekend, so I hope you all have a nice weekend and that the weather is good, but seeing it's a bank holiday I doubt it ;o) but we can live in hope...

6 comments:

fleegle said...

Those black and white socks are lovely, as are the red and yellow ones. Although I don't spin anymore, I did appreciate the eye candy! And your laceweight handspun is impressive!

Kai said...

Love both pairs of socks, but the sunset ones are BEAUTIFUL!

*ogles all the lovely fibre*

I love the laceweight you've spun up, it's a gorgeous combination of pinks and greens.. very subtle.

I like the Flower Basket shawl.

Soo said...

Wow - that laceweight is lovely. I've recently taken a fancy to Spring Things (Clarabelle did a lovely version in seasilk) so I'd add that to the list.

Valerie said...

The Joshua Tree yarn is lovely...great work! My vote is for the spring things shawl....I may have to have one of those myself!!

Anonymous said...

Ooh, lovely fibre and the pink yarn is just gorgeous!
I'd say shetland triangle or spring things shawl.

Anonymous said...

I've like the Forget-me-Knot lace shawl, or if you have Evelyn's book you could use the chart in there to figure out how to use your yardage. Your Heartland Shawl really came out nice.