Each to their own....

I've been doing quite a bit of spinning recently after my 4 month unintentional break from it over the summer.... and it's quite frightening really how quickly you loose your ability to spin consistently and finely..... well I found I did.

I was really enjoying my spinning and was pleased with my progress and that eventually I produced something that resembled a nice sock yarn :o) Then you read on different Ravelry forums that it's difficult to spin thicker yarns once you get to producing fine yarns. Then there's the chatter about it and you get to feeling (I felt this way) that fine even yarns aren't 'the thing' and are easy to produce bu t the challenge lies in thicker yarns and Art Yarns...

And so we came to the Tour de Fleece which I commited to taking part in and signed up to do something different that I would normally do. I opted for Art Yarns...

I bought some BFL Superwash from The Yarn Yard that Natalie was dyeing up especially for the Tour de Fleece.... when it came there was 3 small seperate braids of individual colours and 150g of a beautifully dark to light braid in tones of greys.... it was a dream to spin as always and my idea was to ply it with metallics and add beads and such likes.... I found myself starting in ernest but as I got nearer and nearer the end of spinning the fibre I found myself not spinning as much and thinking it's so beeautiful it would be a shame to spoil it... eventually I stopped spinning and for 4 months the bobbin sat almost complete apart from 2, 8" strips of fibre to spin... I just couldn't do it as I knew that then I would have to despoil that beautiful fibre... so I stopped spinning for what turned out to be 4 months....

Eventually I don't know what it was perhaps the 2 or 3 kind people who rav mailed me and 1 even rung me because I wasn't really posting and hadn't produced much spinning to see if I was OK or the fact that this bobbin kept 'glaring' at me every time I walked in the lounge but eventually I did finish spinning the yarn and just simply navajo plied it but all the time I was thinking it should have been an Art Yarn.....

So I think what I'm trying to say is that spin the yarns you enjoy spinning and using and don't feel forced into spinning other yarns that you've no interest in. Whilst I love some of the Art Yarns I see out there especially the coil ones, they're not for me... I couldn't see myself knitting with them... I'm not saying I may never do one but the time has to be right and at the moment producing a 3ply sock yarn and lace yarn and even the odd DK weight yarn is were I'm happiest... There's room for everything and to me a yarn of beauty is one that is evenly spun and beautifully plied....

Since then spinning has resumed normal service I'm pleased to say although it's taken approxamately 500g of fibre before I've got some decent sock yarn..... I've just spun up this (I don't need to tell you were it came from ;o) )


and turned it into this
I've just Navajo plied the 1st bobbin this morning and I've got 132m / 50g so we'll see what the 2nd bobbin produces later tonight....

I've also started some merino / tencel again a similar thickness... The braid came as 3 seperate colours so I'm spinning them that way and then I will traditionally ply them... I warn you now these are not my normal pick of colours.....

told you they weren't my normal choice of colours!!!!

These arrived from Canada yesterday for me and they are a set of 2 pitch Mini Combs made by Andrew Forsyth

They are strong but yet light and quite easy to use, although I will purchase a clamp or put it on my Christmas list as it would make taking the fibre off the comb through a diz a lot easier.... so I now have to make a date with half a Romney Shearling fleece that's been waiting since summer (washed I hasten to add) for these combs to arrive.... but they were worth the wait :o)

This also came for me this week, it's Falkland (one of my favouites) and it's called 'Plum Tree' and it's from a relatively new dyer here in the UK called Spindlefrog


On the sock knitting front I've finished Paul's pair of socks for Christmas and he hasn't even noticed me knitting them. I thought he deserved a surprise pair as I usually end up knitting a Christmas pair for him in front of him.... These have the elegant title of "Die Nachbarn 1 Spiralsonne und Mondhaus" are are as you've guessed from the Opal Hunderwasser 2 collection....


I've now 2 or 4 pairs of size 4's to do and complete a size 8 pair but I'm halfway there on that one ;o) am still uming and awing if to keep the green fairisle ones.... perhaps I will, as I've decided I'll wait until after Christmas to do my sock knitting for myself.... and just knit socks for others before then. I owe Paul and our frind Mike a pair as I bought them some handyed sock yarn last Christmas and haven't knit it up for them yet... that's not to say I haven't knit them any socks since....


I've also been knitting something with my handspun but I will have to make you wait until a certain friends birthday has passed ;o)

The Shame of it....

not blogging for the last few weeks that is, I've really no excuse for not posting, it isn't as I've been sitting on my hands since my last post... I just couldn't seem to motivate myself to blog :o( anyway rather than do a massive post with what I've been doing and buying... I thought I'd start with a small post and not over tax myself and set blogging progress back!!!

So we'll start with the knitting that keeps me sane and just gets picked up and put down as I feel without guilt... the socks....

I completed these for my friend Mike's birthday at the end of August; there a rather nice denim blue colour and are Opal Fantasie 1912. As always with Mike + Socks they went down well, as apart from myself & DH, Mike is the biggest beneficiary of my sock knitting and to quote him the other day "I can't remember the last time I wore shop bought socks"... this is the type of friend a knitter should have ;o)

Days later off the DPN's came these Regia Galaxy 1557 (Ocean) these are for SIL for her birthday in October... I am being organised this year!!!

Now despite being nearly finished this is my 1st ever toe-up sock so just to prove it's toe up I thought I'd take it's photo on the needles.... I've been after trying to do one of these for ages, in fact probably since the beginning of the year but I just couldn't master the Turkish Cast On until through a blog of a blog I came across this post by FluffyKnitterDeb which just made the light bulb click on for me with this cast on....

I really wanted to do a toe up not just to add to my repertoire of skills but because the yarn is my own hand spun Superwash BFL "Splash" from Natalie of the The Yarn Yard. I've already knit a pair of socks from my hand spun and sweated all the way from top to toe so I was determined that as I'd spun the yarn into two balls for two socks I was going to do a toe-up sock so at least as long as the foot was knit (Size 10) then the amount of yarn could determine the length of the leg... so I started with the smallest ball. I should have enough yarn left for another 3cm of rib....

And for the final sock round up this is the start of my 2nd pair of socks towards my Christmas knitting and is Trekking 84 - a very unimaginative name for a very pretty yarn with a very big pattern repeat but as this is only a size 4 you will not see all the patterns in one sock before the yarn repeats; if my memory serves me right there is only 2 full patterns repeats on a 100g ball with a 3rd partial repeat!!!

And finally to lace.... the Spring Things... I have to say I've not been inspired to knit this and the first section has been a labour and certainly not of love... I have plenty of handspun but I can't face doing anymore repeats of this first pattern to make the shawl bigger... I have 80g of yarn left and I started with 100g... so by the time it's finished I will probably have enough left for a Swallowtail or a Forest Canopy or some other simple shawl... I wish I'd taken the gamble now and done Laminaria with it!!! Ah well hindsight is a wonderful thing as they say...

I'm pleased with how my first handspun lace yarn is knitting up though... but the shawl isn't going to come out as big as the pattern stated, but never mind....

I will be back soon, with other my other yarn related exploits....

Heartland...

Here as promised, at long last is the completed Heartland Shawl....

The design is by Evelyn Clark and was the winner of the 2006 Buffalo Gold/ Wild Fibers magazine creativity contest.

The fibre is Buffalo Gold # 4 which is 90% de-haired bison down/10% “buffalon” nylon. It's very soft to knit with and is a gorgeous chocolate colour. I used 4.5mm needles as stated in the pattern and did 5 repeats of the bison tracks pattern before starting the River of Life edging. I ended up with 12g of fibre out of the initial 186g.

Once I managed to get a reasonable amount of time to knit it I enjoyed knitting the shawl. The completed shawl came out 72" across the top edge and 36" down the spine.

As the kit was a birthday gift from my friend Mike in 2007, this one is mine to keep; and will be only the 2nd shawl I possess, as all the others are given as gifts...

Anyway here are the photographs.....







On the sock knitting front here are the completed Opal Magic 1040 socks for BIL's birthday... I've now started a couple of other pairs of socks to keep me out of mischief...


I've also made a start on a 2nd pair of Marvelous Mitts and am toying with casting on Spring Things shawl in the next few days with the lace yarn I spun....

Halfway there...

I will appologise now for the lack of photos in this post, so I'll keep it short & sweet.

I rounded the 2nd corner the other night on the VLT shawl so I can officially say I am over halfway :) I have a feeling I am going to be a little bit short of yarn, but I checked a few months ago and the supplier still had some of this dyelot available.... I may however, pull my swatch back yet if it's that close!

On the sock front I have nearly finished the 2nd Opal Rainforest 2 'Bee' sock and I have started on the Regia Kaffe Fassett Landscape 'Caribbean' sock which is looking nice; I much prefer the landscape to the mirage pattern just more interesting.....

I have started another lace project for a friend's birthday two weeks today.... so no pictures I'm afraid as I know she reads my blog, so tough Anita ;oP and no it's not another Swallowtail....

Got your sunglasses....

you'll need them ;o)

I completed them on Saturday, just in time for tomorrow, not sure if I can lay my hands on any Christmas paper to wrap them though as despite knitting Christmas gifts, I'm not really geared towards Christmas yet!!!

The Swallowtail is growing and once I've updated my blog, had a nosey round the internet while I finish my cup of tea I'm off to knit some more on it. I still haven't decided if to do more repeats of the budding lace pattern... I worked out if you want the maths to work with the following patterns then you need to repeat the budding lace pattern in multiples of 5, so instead of doing 14 repeats I'll need to do 19 and I'm not entirely sure if I will have sufficient yarn. I have 48g and the last Swallowtail took 36g.... Mmmm not sure what to do, but have 2 pattern repeats to work on it yet!!!!

I still haven't done anymore on the VLT border, from tomorrow I'm going to aim to do at least 5 repeats per day and it should be finished well in time for Christmas....

On the SIL front I think I'm going to go for the Honeybee stole, I like Wings o' the Moth but I think SIL is definitely more of a rectangular stole than a triangle shawl person, plus I've already bought the pattern for it.....

Steamers in Ultramarine III

Sounds a very grand title, but is in fact my latest completed pair of socks......

I had a bit of a nightmare with these... as you can see I like my socks to match and halfway down the leg of the 2nd sock (and these are size 10/12) just were it starts going blue/red the yarn didn't!!! It wasn't joined the pattern just went from a little bit or red/blue and then straight into white/red/black a good inch and half further down the pattern.....

I ended up winding off the yarn and going to the next pattern repeat and then as you can imagine I was paranoid all the way through the rest of the knitting the same thing might happen again and/or I ran out of yarn.... as you can see I made it with virtually a full pattern repeat left and the bit I cut off in the middle.... I have never been so glad to finish a pair of socks especially as they are a gift and I am being paid to knit them.....

On other knitting front Scarf with No 20 border is no more..... the Swallowtail is progressing and I have done wait for it 5 repeats on the VLT Sampler shawl... photos will follow I promise... I do feel loads better now I have ripped back the scarf and started on the border....

I am still pondering over SIL's stole, I think she would prefer a rectangular to a triangle otherwise I may consider Fleegles suggestion of Wing-of-the-Moth-shawl by Knitspot, so at the moment I am still leaning towards Knitspot's Honeybee stole....

Progress of sorts....

I haven't really done much of anything recently, I just feel weary and it seems to have taken all my time to get through everyday stuff... on the lace front I still haven't tackled the border on the VLT stole and this is as far as I have got with the Scarf with No 20 edging from VLT which is supposedly for SIL's birthday on the 8th October.... it may become her Christmas present yet!!!!

It's Knit Picks Alpaca Cloud in colourway Tide Pool Heather and I am working on 3.75mm needles still a little big in my estimation so you can imagine what I thought when I tried it on 4.5mm first!!! I've seen other people work with a smilar weight yarn on 4.5mm needles and it looks fine, mine just looked awful and I've a pretty even knitter on straights......

On the non-lace knitting front my first socks are progressing well and should be finished reasonably soon, I hope.... the first is Opal's Hunderwasser "Steamers in Ultramarine III" and is a size 10 for a friend's daughter....

The 2nd pair is Opal Prisme for a Christmas gift which have to be finished for the beginning of October as she's off to Spain for Christmas, but at least it's only a sixe 4!!!!

Despite not being a popular pattern in the UK and a very unpopular colour, everyone who's seen me knit these thinks they're wonderful!!!!