Fuzzy Felts!

More felted yarn experiments!

Still time travelling...this was last Saturday afternoon!

30th June

Finally finished these socks on the 30th of June, so I'm only just a week behind on my blog but I've still got alot to show you.
It was a Regia self striping, and this was my first attempt at toe up and knitting two socks on circulars.
I used the Knitty Magic Cast-on for Toe Up Socks , I then did row below toe increases, this is one of my favourite methods of increasing, on the left slant of the toe (this is actually right of foot as you look at it) you knit the stitch but do not drop, then knit into the stitch below, and on right slant you knit into the stitch below then knit into the stitch.

For the heel I followed Wendy's Generic Toe Up Pattern, and wrapped the stitches twice.
I have given these socks away to my mum!

Catching Up!

I'm still on the catch up trail as far as finished work is concerned, so here is the finished superwash merino in the Twist and Shout colourway from Crown Mountain Farm, spun on the Turkish Spindle, and plied on the Joy.

This yarn still has a story of its own, I had all the skeins plied and skeined up on the niddy noddy, must have been about Friday the 18th May. Saturday morning I decide to give them a warm bath while I get dressed and go back to my soaking skeins only to find that the dark blue had somehow run and everything was a shade of blue, which although still looked pretty wasn't quite what I had in mind.

So I e-mailed Teyani from Crown Mountain Farm, and she was very helpful and spoke about a product someone else had used to remove colour, I think it was some kind of washer sheets you can buy, but not wanting to put this yarn through my unpredictable washing machine I went off to my local shop and bought myself some Dylon Colour Run Remover. You basically add this sachet of liquid to the water and soak the item in question in it for 20 mins.

After its soak again the water was an alarming shade of indigo, but it has restored the white highlights to a pale blue colour, and something I'm much happier with. None of these pictures really capture the true combination of blue, green, pink and purple in this yarn, but it's really soft and pretty and ideal for baby clothes.

What do I do with all this handspun UK Marianne? Good question, well I did a craft fair last week, it wasn't very busy due to the horrendous weather we had, but the one thing I did sell was yarn!

I'm going to tidy my knitting cupboard this week, and will be sorting all the handspun out and anything good enough to sell that isn't lined up for a project will be going into my etsy shop.

Now I've written it down I better get on with it!

I can see you all wondering about the cookie cutters...it's how I can tell which skein is which before I label them up ready to sell.

Blog Fodder

I seem to be a bit behind with photos queued and waiting to be uploaded to my blog but I've been worrying a bit lately that my lack of knitting content and my spinning obsession, may be a bit boring sometimes....look I made yarn, look I made more yarn, but I called my blog Freestylefibre for the simple reason that way back last September after only spinning for 3 months I knew making yarn was my thing.

So look more yarn...

BEFORE

This fibre started life as a deep purple unknown sheep fibre lurking in my stash, it isn't soft enough for much, but as the saying goes waste not want not, so I tried spinning it without carding, just by teasing the fibre into short lengths, and as I did this I raided my 'Treasure Box' of fibery bits and just threw them at the wheel as I spun. once finished I wound the yarn onto the niddy noddy and tied it with a cotton yarn every five inches.

Next I put it into the washing machine with a little soap and an old towel, and felted it. You do have to be careful where the yarn is tied when you take it out of the machine, as it does try to felt onto itself.

This process creates a strong felted yarn suitable for making bags!

AFTER

The Idealist - No Surprises!

Found this over on Marianne's Blog, No surprises here!

You Are An INFP

The Idealist You are creative with a great imagination, living in your own inner world. Open minded and accepting, you strive for harmony in your important relationships. It takes a long time for people to get to know you. You are hesitant to let people get close. But once you care for someone, you do everything you can to help them grow and develop. You would make an excellent writer, psychologist, or artist.

What's Your Personality Type?

Summer Holiday?

Our SP10 hostess is quizzing us again with a couple of questions, so I thought I would play along.

With the weather turning warmer, many of you are thinking of traveling (though some of you have just returned, you can play along). 1) What do you pack to knit? and 2) What do you hope to shop for?

Assume that you will be gone for ten days to someplace "foreign" that is known for having great knitting locations. (Bonus: Where would you go on a "knitting holiday"?)


Hmmm, a knitting holiday, my immediate reaction was to go to New York, I've never been to the US and I could take in the sites and visit some of the local yarn stores we read about, of course Habu would be top of my list of places to visit, and if I was really going I would have a long list of places to visit and things to see. I would probably be looking for something special or unusual like Habu's paper yarn, I like to think I'm quite a discerning shopper, I won't just buy for the sake of it, unless it's something I can't do without.

What would I pack? Well since there are so many rules and regulations about carrying knitting needles I would have a good book for the flight, and something small and portable like socks, and I couldn't travel without my spindle and some fibre!

Jo Grins and Bears It!

Remember that gathering of crocheted bits I showed you on the 25th April.... How can something so small take me so long to finish?


Anyway I've been tagged by Angie with the 7 Random Things Meme,which has been doing the rounds, so here is my best shot...



Well for starters sewing up knitting or crochet projects is not one of my favourite things, maybe that's why I love to spin so much....the finishing process for yarn mainly involves washing and then setting the twist, I find stitching up quite stressful and need to be in the right frame of mind.

I hate my belly button being touched, the feeling when somebody touches it, well its a strange expression but it goes right through me, makes me shudder to think about it!

I have 3 tattoos, the first one is a small heart on my right shoulder, I had it done when I was 18, by a man called Fat Bob at the local Tattoo parlour, the second is the Chinese symbol for birthmark on my right ankle (I was being ironic), and the 3rd and largest is a tribal symbol between my shoulderblades.

My short hair has been many different colours but the brightest colour it has been is bright turquoise, one of my friends said I looked like a troll doll, you know the craze for these bright haired little dolls which comes and goes. The colour itself didn't last very long as I didn't like the attention it drew, I like to keep a low profile, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.

My first driving instructor told my siblings I would never pass a driving test. I passed in 1998 after 20 lessons after not driving for 10 years, I've now almost been driving 10years! I love to drive too!

I ran myself over with my own car! My handbrake had broken and I was having to leave my car in gear, something I don't do as a rule. It was a frosty morning after a long night shift, and I was taking moving boxes to my car, as it was frosty I opened the door and stuck the keys in and started the car to warm it up, forgetting that the car was in gear, the car itself jumped up the curb behind it and started rolling down a grassy bank, only being stopped by the wire fence at the bottom, as the car rolled down the hill I let go of the keys superfast and went under the car door, I was only bruised but there is still a dent in my leg. Apparantly this was all captured by the security cameras where I used to work but they never did manage to get me a copy.

I am absolutely hopeless at establishing a routine, although I do manage to clean my teeth everyday!

So thats seven, I'm not going to tag anyone else because it seems to be covered in most areas at the moment, if you want to list seven random things just go for it!

Testing!

Yesterday afternoon I decided to try something different with the single of Suffolk fleece I had spun. I plied it with an unusual 'novelty' yarn that I had found in the sale at my local yarn shop. The novelty yarn knitted on its own is quite hard on the hands, almost a nylon twine with the long lash every few inches, so I plied it with the green Suffolk single that I had test spun for Rachel. I also added a few spots of merino fibre between the plies as I spun them together, it's turned the novelty yarn into a softer more interesting yarn, and I think it will make a nice decorative garter stitch band around a simple knitted bag!



The finished yarn is 21.58m (23.60yds) and is semi bulky at 7 WPI, I started to knit a sample up yesterday on size 5.5mm needles, as it was coming straight off the wheel, and it was looking good!

Spinning Around

Yes Marianne, it is all about spinning at the moment, this is the Superwash Merino from Crown Mountain Farm, in the Twist and Shout colourway, I just love to watch the colours dancing through my fingers!

As you can see I got some brightness in the loggia yesterday for a little fibre foto shoot!

I also forgot all about my 100th post which was the previous post, only noticed when I logged in to put up the new photos, I got a bit carried away but I love the way the colours change in this yarn, you can see more on flickr!

100th Post!

This is no way to wrap your Turkish spindle, but I just got carried away as the colours kept forming this mandala like pattern. I finished plying the Sunset fibre from Suzie Thursday night, but there hasn't been the right sort of conditions for photos just yet.

The back of my cardi has been blocking all day, and I've been spindling some new fibre up on the Turkish, I've done 3 oz since Friday, photos as soon as the weather brightens.

No knitting content, I'm turning the heel on my socks using the wrapped method, which I haven't done before and need some quiet time to settle down and get it done.

This week I'll be catching up with my homework for college!

Snippets!

There's been a hum of activity around here this week, so I thought I'd just show you some snippets of what's been going on:

On the floor

I've finally started blocking my Vogue cardigan, it's only been sitting around since Easter, that's the fronts and sleeves you can see, just the back left to do. I do have a bit of an issue with the sleeves, according to the pattern the measurement around the upper arm should be 11 inches, now I dont have Jennifer Aniston upper arms, but they're not bingo wings either, but mine clock in at 12 inches, I've blocked the sleeves to this and hope that they might give a little bit, or this cardigan could be winging its way to someone with skinnier arms than me.

On the spindle

I've been spinning up the fibre that Susie gifted to me in the Knitters Treat Exchange.

On the Joy

I'm test spinning some Suffolk lambs fleece for Rachel

Something for the Weekend!

The postman came with a package from my SP10 this morning, and what a package it is.

If there is one yarn company in the whole wide world that can always excite me to the point of drooling, Habu is it. I only saw their yarns for the first time last October at Alexandra Palace, but I was entranced with their tiny little balls and cones of silk and steel wool then, and still am.

So how lucky am I this week to get a package with two cones of 100% silk, in this fantastic shade of green, this stuff is very special, and will be taking pride of place amongst my stash awaiting a special project to do it justice.

This other thing you see is called Tangle, its a fabulous little thing that I haven't come across before, but great fun, you can just play and twist and turn, it's so sculptural, I've been trying different arrangements of it this afternoon, and seeing what kind of shapes I can make, seeing how tall I can make it, but keeping it balanced, just bending it around, perfect for fidgety children and restless knitters!

Thankyou Secret Pal!

Thankyou all for your birthday wishes, it's been a bit of whirlwind week, and I'm getting to grips with a new laptop, which is very nice but I'm not really technically minded, anyway as you can see I have managed to upload a photo. Maybe that's not such a big deal but dh has updated my photo cropping programme, and it doesn't make as much sense as the old version I was using. I only know how to do certain things and end up with 3 different programmes running at the same time. My favourite programme for doing things is Corel draw, simply because they give you a sheet of paper, aslong as I've got that sheet of paper I know where I am, but if I'm in Corel and I need to crop something I have to take it to Paint Shop Pro, then take it back to Corel draw, computers can be so frustrating, or is it us, misusing them or not instructing them what to do that's the problem!

Anyway Mayday came with more sunshine and the postman bearing gifts from my Knitters Treat Exchange Pal, Suzie, this is a fantastic, well chosen package that Susie has put together for me. There are some really quirky ideas in Knitscene, and its not a magazine I have seen, there's also this beautiful handpainted merino fibre, and the 2 balls of wool, you're absolutely right Susie, you can never have enough wool, there's the junior mints, simple perfection, and how did Susie know about the facial scrub....I was trying some foundation with a Clinique beautician Saturday, who was telling me I needed to use a facial scrub and this Mint Julep arrives, I tried it out this morning and it does make your skin feel so tingly and fresh.

All in all it's a fabulous package and I've really enjoyed being part of this Knitters Treat Exchange, thankyou so much Suzie!

As it is my birthday today, we drew the birthday competition this morning, there were 5 correct entries, and Neo had the job of pulling a name from the hat....drum roll please......the winner is Sheila. Who guessed correctly that I was number 16. Did you notice how odd the numbers on that photo were, there were 6 combinations of 6 and 7, which were 6,7,15,16,42 and 43, with a 5 (32) in there for good measure. I was born at home in house number 7, and I know its a lucky number for some, I like to think its lucky for me too.

Ok here are some pictures...

I was born at home and was a much longed for baby for my mum and dad, my older sister Jackie is 12 years older than me, although she would have liked a little brother...but had to wait another year for one, musn't forget to mention the younger sister too! As you can see I was quite a bonny little thing, I was born with dark hair but by 1972 it started getting lighter.

And eventually I ended up quite blonde, in this school photo I would have been about 5, I love the blue dress, I'm not sure whether my mum or Jackie made it but I do have the same fabric in pink and yellow, waiting for a special project, in my fabric stash.

Thanks to everyone who took part in the competition and everyone who visits and supports me by commenting on the blog.

Works in Progress

Can you see what it is yet? maybe I should have put a ruler in for scale, I've still got the Vogue cardigan waiting for blocking, but I've been busy with other things and having a little dabble with amigurumi too!

I wasn't happy about having nothing on my needles, so I printed out the Knitty magic toe up cast on and started my first toe ups, this is my first time knitting socks on circulars, and I couldn't see the point of knitting one sock and then the other, now I've worked it all out although can you spot the deliberate mistake!

Yes indeed socks are meant to soar on 2 circular needles, I wasn't paying attention this morning and managed to knit both onto one needle, doh!

Gratuitous cat pic, just because I felt like it, Keith thinks I've lost my mind because I've started collecting Willows fur, just wait until my cat loving friends start to collect they're cat fur and send it to me too, completely barmy.

Doodle Magic

Well it's been a week of finishing homework for my C & G course, and not much knitting or spinning going on either. The art work has been fun this time, and I just want to show how a simple doodle can be transformed digitally into a pattern, that could be used in any crafts discipline aswell as knitting.

This is one of 6 small doodles in my sketchbook that I had done a while ago with a view to making a lino cut for printing, but it was also ideal for the contour lines exercise we had to do at college last month.

This is the same doodle simplified into contour lines and coloured in.

And this is what happens when you start to play around with it a bit, by cropping it and mirrororing it in a repeat pattern. This is one of six doodles that I have used in this way as part of my homework.

I can almost see this last sheet translated into some kind of lace edging!

The blog has been a bit sluggish of late, but I'm hoping to get back in the swing of it this week, I'm almost up to my 100th post!

Who's That Girl?

There was no getting away from the fact that I have a birthday coming up in 2 weeks time, so to celebrate this auspicious occasion I am holding a competition. I am offering up a skein of Posh Yarn, Lucia sock wool (30% cashmere 70% merino) in colourway 'Chortle'. This is an earthy blend of pale green, ginger, pale blue, and terracotta, since I am born under an 'earth' sign....all you need to do to win is pick me out of the line up above, just leave your answer in the comments, all correct entries will be entered into a draw on the 30th April. If no-one gets it right I will enter everybody into the draw and I am happy to post where-ever!

Marianne had this Birthday Calculator up on her blog this week:


30 April 1970
Your date of conception was on or about 7 August 1969 which was a Thursday.

You were born on a Thursday
under the astrological sign Taurus.
Your Life path number is 6.

Life Path Compatibility:
You are most compatible with those with the Life Path numbers 3, 6 & 9.
You should get along well with those with the Life Path numbers 2, 4, 8, 11 & 22.
You are least compatible with those with the Life Path numbers 1, 5 & 7.

The Julian calendar date of your birth is 2440706.5.
The golden number for 1970 is 14.
The epact number for 1970 is 22.
The year 1970 was not a leap year.

Your birthday falls into the Chinese year beginning 2/6/1970 and ending 1/26/1971.
You were born in the Chinese year of the Dog.

Your Native American Zodiac sign is Beaver; your plant is Wild Clover.

You were born in the Egyptian month of Epipy, the third month of the season of Shomu (Harvest).

Your date of birth on the Hebrew calendar is 24 Nisan 5730.
Or if you were born after sundown then the date is 25 Nisan 5730.

The Mayan Calendar long count date of your birthday is 12.17.16.13.2 which is
12 baktun 17 katun 16 tun 13 uinal 2 kin


As of 4/15/2007 1:46:31 PM EDT
You are 36 years old.
You are 444 months old.
You are 1,929 weeks old.
You are 13,499 days old.
You are 323,989 hours old.
You are 19,439,386 minutes old.
You are 1,166,363,191 seconds old.

Celebrities who share your birthday:
Kirsten Dunst (1982) Jeff Timmons (1973) Carolyn Dawn Johnson (1971)
Michael Waltrip (1963) Isiah Thomas (1961) Carl XVI Gustav, King of Sweden (1946)
Jill Clayburgh (1944) Burt Young (1940) Willie Nelson (1933)
Cloris Leachman (1926) Eve Arden (1908)

Top songs of 1970
Bridge Over Troubled Water by Simon & Garfunkel I'll Be There by Jackson Five
Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head by B.J. Thomas Close to You by Carpenters
My Sweet Lord by George Harrison I Think I Love You by Partridge Family
Ain't No Mountain High Enough by Diana Ross American Woman by Guess Who
War by Edwin Starr Let It Be by Beatles

Your age is the equivalent of a dog that is 5.28336594911937 years old. (You're still chasing cats!)

There are 15 days till your next birthday
on which your cake will have 37 candles.

Those 37 candles produce 37 BTUs,
or 9,324 calories of heat (that's only 9.3240 food Calories!) .
You can boil 4.23 US ounces of water with that many candles.

Your birthstone is Diamond

The Mystical properties of Diamond

Diamonds are said to increase personal clarity to help one see things clearly as well as be straight-forward and honest. Supposedly, the higher quality the diamond, the better it is supports these qualities.
Some lists consider these stones to be your birthstone. (Birthstone lists come from Jewelers, Tibet, Ayurvedic Indian medicine, and other sources)

Opal, Quartz, White Sapphire

Your birth tree is

Walnut Tree, the Passion

Unrelenting, strange and full of contrasts, often egoistic, aggressive, noble, broad horizon, unexpected reactions, spontaneous, unlimited ambition, no flexibility, difficult and uncommon partner, not always liked but often admired, ingenious strategist, very jealous and passionate, no compromises.

The moon's phase on the day you were born was waning crescent.

You can try the birthday calculator for yourself here

Whirlpool

I started spinning this new yarn last Sunday, I've decided to call it Whirlpool, its a merino, alpaca and cut silk mix, plied with a rayon thread.

I've also been invited to join The Weekend Whirls, a group for spinners, soWhirlpool was aptly named for my first posting over there.
Initially I couldn't come up with a name for the yarn...but felt compelled to name it. On the flipside I was thinking it doesn't need a name, its just yarn, you don't need to call it anything.

The blues and greens were still asking for a watery title, I even tried hanging it from the ornamental fountain in the garden for photos, but cascade or waterfall just didn't fit. I do believe the yarn starts to speak to you as you spin, some of the other skeins I've spun have whispered to me or a picture has come into my head. Although apart from asking to be named, I only have 120g so this yarn is asking for a small project.

It seems slightly ridiculous to me that I havent actually knitted anything with my handspun yet...although I've come to realise that I don't 'spin to knit'. I was very interested in Anne's question about Why Do You Spin over at The Weekend Whirls.

I spin because I love to spin. It fills some craving deep inside me, mixing colours and textures to create something new. At the moment I am feeling my way around different techniques, which is why I like to make small batches. As an artist there's almost a battle between making a yarn practical and pushing the boundaries into new territory art yarns, and I'm still in the experimental stage, but always my main adversary is finding the time, but I firmly believe weekends are specially for spinning, and weekdays too!

Stop me if you think that you've heard this one before!

Our SP10 Hostess has asked us to answer the following questions...

1) How old were you when you learned how to knit?
2) Who taught you?

I think I must have been about 6 when I first learned to knit, I was in the Brownies and we used to knit squares for blankets for Oxfam. I never did any casting on or casting off, mum would have been there to do that bit, I don't even think I learnt to purl at that time, just good old garter stitch squares. A combination of Brown Owl and mum would have taught me.

I don't think I did much knitting then apart from the requisite squares, until I was 12, and the knitting fashion at the time was to knit with one large needle and one small needle to give a lacy effect, I fell in love with a jumper pattern and asked for the yarn which was a fuzzy emerald green and black mix for my birthday. I don't recall how much of it I actually did by myself or how much mum had to help with it.

scribble part 2

I took my new Turkish spindle to the 1066 Spinners monthly meeting this morning. I spent last night practicing the Andean plying technique, with the three small muffins I had made, and then after spinning a fourth mini muffin this morning I demonstrated the technique for Mary and Linda.

The front ball is the plied Corriedale pencil roving, the other 3 balls are all merino tops, I've just been mixing and making rollags in shades of blue and purple merino to co-ordinate with the Corriedale.

scribble yarn

Some people start out with a spindle, which I think is a great way to try the craft of spinning, before the rush and push of treadling a wheel. I want to become proficient with a hand spindle so that I can confidently and competently demonstrate this ancient art, and maybe capture the imagination of others.

Yesterday morning a special package that I'd ordered arrived. As you all know I can spin on a wheel. I have a couple of homemade top whorl spindles, but I just hadn't got to grips with them, not to be defeated I went to Wanda and Ed at Jenkins Woodworking and treated myself to a Turkish drop spindle. If you've tried to spin on a top whorl and don't feel like you're getting anywhere, it may just be the spindle, not you. As I have now found the right spindle for me is this Turkish spindle, it's a work of art, perfectly balanced and I love the way it makes a little centre pull muffin, ready to ply with another.

I was feeling a little down in the dumps earlier, but I was also keen to have a go with the Turkish spindle. As I spun a little pencil roving, Neo was doing a little drawing, I decided it would make a fitting background for my spinning as he was using exactly the same colours.