A Little More!

Here is the silk/merino mix so far, 200g

I have 50g left to spin, but I'm trying something a little different with this last bit, although I had a bit of a disaster with some felted bits I put in the washing machine earlier this week, this accident may actually turn into a blessing.

Still beavering away on the cardigans, almost there, and I cast on for a sock with some Posh Emily which will probably get frogged because its pooling like the devil!

I've also been the lucky winner of a couple of competitions lately, the first arrived this week, a lovely package of some Colinette cotton and viscose mix, a yummy soap and a fluffy pen, from Angie at Jazzy Crafts, I just havent got around to taking a picture, but thanks Angie!

The Yarn That Time Forgot

Ok so maybe time doesn't forget, I just havent had the time, and its been getting to me, so last night I made two more bobbins of this pretty merino/silk mix. I was hoping to get it onto the niddynoddy today so I would at least have something new to show you on my blogiversary, but it wasn't to be.

I was also fed up of the sight of me in that capelet, anyway still knitting sleeves for the toddler cardigan, and now I'm off to wind my yarn.

Shake Your Pompoms!!

One Spiderweb Capelet, ready for delivery to its recipient! This pattern started life in the book Stitch & Bitch Nation by Debbie Stoller, although the pattern as written in the book is complete tishtosh, and even if you cast it on and carefully follow it religiously 3 times without making any mistakes, it basically won't work out. You will basically get so many stitches you won't know what to do with them all, and it will look nothing like this capelet, or the picture in the book.

Now at this point if the garment was for me I may just throw it across the room and give up, then again who wants to beaten by a Spiderweb Capelet.

Anyway it's not for me, and not one to be beaten by a mere capelet I called for re-inforcements in the shape of Heather who has just moved to her new blog home. Heather is a whizz with numbers, knitting and patterns, I could see what was wrong, but I didn't know how to fix it.

The yarn is Wendy Allegra in the shade Flora, it's a nice soft alpaca, polyester, acrylic. I think I knitted it on 10mm needles, and used less than 2 balls.


It not something I would wear, and apart from the problems it was a nice little knit, although my favourite part of all has to be the pompoms.

Unfortunately progress on the toddler cardigans has been halted by a complete *£#! UP, oh yes indeedy, they were both blocked and ready to finish. I was visiting the friend who's daughters are going to be wearing these cardigans at the weekend and just held the largest one up to see how the size was, and oh b*gg!r, I've only gone and knitted the wrong blinking size, it was a size too big, doh!

So that was frogged and I am about to re-knit the sleeves. I've also now got a full complement of arm measurements for both girls, just to be on the safe side!

Ok it's been over a week, but there's not much to see here....

Ok well there was that, that is 306g of 2ply handspun aran weight Shetland fleece, which I purchased at Woolfest, which does beg the question, how much weight does a fleece lose in the washing process, it was 400g when I bought it!
There was quite a bit of vegetable matter in this but no matter, and you may not be able to quite see but I carded scraps of multi merino in, to add a little colour here and there, actually if you click the photo you can just see the different colours.

Apart from that I have 2 cardigans, that need blocking and a capelet near completion.

There was NO knitting on my needles, apart from sampling for an idea for a design for college, and so I took this to be a sign to knit a couple of blanket squares for Flo's Miner Blanket Project.
I'm just knitting good old garter stitch after a couple of false starts trying fancy stuff which didn't work out.

It's taken me a little while to really GET the point of Ravelry, but I was looking for a skein of sock yarn yesterday and found a couple of gems lurking in my stash, one being 6 skeins of Noro Iro, so I fast tailed it over to Ravelry to have a look at what other Ravellers had been doing with it, priceless, and plenty of ideas to mull over. I'd really like to start getting the stash sorted and up on flickr and Ravelry soon, but as usual so much to do...so little time!

On a Whim and a Wheel

So here it is revealed at last, my new wheel. I decided on a whim after a whole year of spinning that my traditional wheel, although perfectly functional. was taking up too much room. What I really needed was a small wheel, like my little 'Joy', but also a wheel that could be fitted with a Jumbo Flyer for bulky spinning.

I've always liked the custom paint job on Natalie's little Kiwi, and after a couple of enquiries, the decision was made, here she is:

kiwi pukapuka

(noun) little spotted kiwi, Apteryx owenii - smallest kiwi with brownish grey finely mottled or banded horizontally with white and now found only at Karori Sanctuary and a few predator free islands such as Kapiti and Tiritiri Mātangi

I've been giving her a test run with some merino silk mix that I bought at Woolfest, and to be honest I absolutely love her, I love the double treadle, the simplicity of the design and obviously there's the small detail of the paint job!

So excited...

I'm so excited because you will find these...

among other recent yarns, for sale here

I'm also pretty excited because I have a new spinning wheel, and it's almost ready, after several coats of varnish, for me to put it together.

I'm also very excited about Bigsock, I've almost finished bits of the blog and my nearest and dearest has been getting the website ready...at the moment Bigsock is here and we found these great photos here look how big and colourful it's getting!

This is the project that has been taking up alot of time out in the garden, it actually looks a bit darker than this at the moment, as we finished putting the roof on yesterday, although I can't take much credit for all this work, I'm really just the builders mate!



It will be a store room, office and shared studio space when it's completed.






I actually got the button stitched on last night, now I just need to get it into the post. The pattern itself is Sirdar, the yarn is Rooster baby alpaca and merino. I'm on the sleeves of the largest of these at the moment and then I've got one more to knit.

A while ago Marianne awarded me a rockin girl blogger, along with a fabulous roll call of more than 25 other bloggers, she's a star, of course, and more recently Angie has awarded me a second Rockin' Girl Blogger award, so whilst basking in the glory of such a prestigious award, I must remember to thank all of you for making it possible, there are so many people I would like to give awards to, a part of me doesn't want to start singling people out, so I'm not going to, but then I got to thinking it feels nice when someone gives you an award, so it's not fair for me not to pass this on, but well it is stressing me a bit which is silly, it is only a bit of fun isn't it, so here goes

Kerrie I don't know how she does it all!

Woolywormhead For work above and beyond the call of duty!

Fiber Café Best Supporting Actress

Florence Knitingale Best Comedy

Seahorse For being a culinary goddess, I imagine her to be an elegant knitting Nigella with quirky taste!

Finis!

What a relief it is to finally be able to show you my finished Vogue cardigan! While I was quietly painlessly, sewing the button on Friday morning I felt a bit silly for letting something so simple stop me in my tracks. The superslim sleeve tops? yes they are a bit snug for my liking, but there's not much I can do to rectify it, apart from knitting 2 new slightly wider sleeves, and considering how long it's taken me to actually complete, the knitting itself was finished Easter, and I've just checked my blog archive to see I actually blocked it May 9th...ok here it is August 6th, perfect timing for cooler Summer evenings!

Ok so the first baby cardigan...is just waiting for a button, just maybe ready and posted by the end of the week!

Still plenty to be cheerful about, look at the abundance of kind words and lovely blog friends I've made, thankyou all for your lovely comments on that last post!

Reasons To Be Cheerful, part 1

Sometimes it's good to stop and smell the roses, and I've been rushing around of late trying to fit everything in.

Yesterday Peri was counting her blessings, she spoke about the book Simple Abundance and about making note of 5 good things in your life or that happen everyday, now this is not a new thing, I do recall having to do something similar in one of the tasks of the Finding Water book, but it's something that gets buried by a busy life.



When I read Peri's blog post I was all fired up to atleast try and find five things everyday for a week, to be cheerful about, only 35 things in total, didn't seem too difficult, but looking wearily back on my day today maybe I need to keep notes as I'm sat here racking my brains to come up with 5 things.



1. I finished the work of art for the exhibition, and got them handed in on time.

2. I managed to escape for a cup of tea with a friend today.

3. It wasn't too hot.

4. I got to watch the 3rd episode of Heroes last night...nevermind about episode one and two!

5. Fillet steak for tea!



If I'm actually going to keep this up for a week, it could get even worse, I might have to keep my cheerfulness private, either that or just eat my own words.

The above picture is a work in process of the work of art which I submitted for a group exhibition that opens Saturday, Keith took some photos of the finished piece this morning and they are on his camera.

This is 200g of Blufaced Leicester Superwash, I really wish I had a before picture of this fibre as the colours were quite scary, until I started spinning.

Finished yarn, always a reason to be cheerful!

Lovebox!

It's not often a whole week has gone by without a post from me, what can I say, I've been collaborating on a project in the garden, and although inbetween times I have managed to dye 800g of fibre, it's like watching paint dry...waiting for fibre to dry. I did get 200g of superwash bluefaced leicester spun, I was quite unhappy with the colour of the fibre, so I didn't take any photos, but now that it's spun, it looks completely different, and I really like it. It's just resting on the bobbins at the moment waiting for finishing.

On the knitting front I have 2 garments waiting for buttons, I have got the buttons ready, but I'm still dragging my feet, I'm ashamed to say!

Last Sunday was a much awaited trip out to the Lovebox Festival in Victoria Park, London.

1st up on the main stage were Nouvelle Vague, unfortunately after a great start, the girls went off stage and we had a couple of slow tracks, which was good, but they must have run out of time and the girls just came back on to say goodbye, quite disappointing.

This is 'Charming Steve' who was keeping us entertained between acts! You can read about Steve antics here.

The big act of the day for me were Hot Chip who were on at the very civilised hour of 3.30pm, this is us waiting at the front.

When they came on it was a bit worrying to see that there were only 3 members instead of the usual 5, but with a little help from an old friend of the band, they put on a fabulous show, and halfway through the set a fourth member put in an appearance!

Later in the day The B52's played an incredible set on the Main Stage. It's completely surreal, 21 years later to see a band like the B52's, who were an 'art school' favourite, and still be able to Dance This Mess Around!

A great Summers Day out, and the sun shone too!

Cooked!

These are my 'cooked' muffins, all plied and ready to go, I love the way the two original co-ordinating fibres have turned into two co-ordinating yarns, the warmer set of two balls, and the cooler set with a bit more blue. This is a supersoft bulky yarn, one of the bulkiest I've made so far, at 6 wpi (wraps per inch).

Fondant Fancies

I've just plied all these muffins and as the sun was still shining I managed to get them washed and they're drying outside.

The fair on Saturday went very well, I sold 2 cushions, a bag and quite a bit of yarn. I met Tusa, and her beautiful happy baby Elizabeth. Infact I think Tusa was my first customer of the day, and she bought the Crown Mountain Farm superwash to knit a baby surprise jacket for Elizabeth. I was quite surprised to see my felted yarn dashing off my table too, so I shall be making some more up, and I was also asked about running some Spindling Workshops and 1 to 1 Tuition!

I do have a picture of my stall, well I will have, I happened to venture out with my camera minus the card, always useful, but my friend Erica did have her camera and took some photos and will be sending them on.

I have just put my name down for a small Craft Fair over in Rye on August 4th, I'm just off to flickr to print some moo cards, as things are going so well.

Thankyou to all for stopping by and making comments and for your continued support!

Let the sun shine!

Here is the grey half of cloudy skies merino that I dyed up myself, I did a little experiment with this fibre. People are always asking me about how quickly you can spin on the wheel compared to the spindle, and although I knew the wheel would be a little faster I was curious about how much faster, so I divided the roving and did the dark grey on the wheel and the light blues on the spindle, I can spin an ounce to the thickness I was aiming for in half an hour on the wheel, and it took 45-50 minutes on the spindle, so really not much faster at all.

The light blues are actually much paler in reality, but my camera was having trouble with blues as always!

I finished weighing, measuring and labelling 33 skeins for the fair this morning, actually that light blue to the left is the same one as above all labelled and ready to go.

It's been a great exercise getting all of this yarn ready, I'm a bit lax about weighing and measuring as I finish yarn, so only 8 of these actually had cookie cutters attached, but from now on I will keep better records as I finish my spun yarn, and attach the labels. Also on the plus side is now I've got them all finished if they don't sell tomorrow they will all be ready to list in my etsy shop.

Fibres in waiting and more spun stuff!

I am desperate to get my hands on this giant batt, but for the moment am havingsatisfy myself with just opening the hobby cupboard and taking a look. I love the mixture of subtle colours but especially that shot of lime green at the end. It's a merino/silk mix purchased from Winghams whilst at Woolfest.

This second roving is also a merino/silk mix from P & M Woolcraft

So everything is on hold this week, while I finish my homework, and prepare things for a fair in Worthing on Saturday. I did manage to finish a baby cardigan, and my friend Astrid finished sewing up my Vogue cardigan for me and has also offered to do any sewing up I need in future. I really enjoy the knitting but I don't like putting things together, she likes to see a project come together in the sewing stages. Both finished items are awaiting fastenings, especially the baby cardigan, I actually finished it at Knitjam last Wednesday, and the baby is a week old today.

This is the silk hankies I had dyed here and was actually spun up and finished pre Woolfest, the black and white have mixed together to give it a wonderful silvery sheen!


This is 30g of merino 2ply spun on my baby Bosworth, last week, and plied on the Joy, about 72 metres, 27 wpi.

This is 30g of silk, again spun up on the baby Bosworth and plied on the Joy. It was lurking in my stash, from Ally Palace last year. I just wanted to try out spinning some silk fibre as oppose to the hankies that I've tried n the past. It's slghtly finer than the merino and therefore is about 116metres. I'm not sure if I like the colours though I've lightened the photos so you can see but in the actual skein it's more subtle, I just feel it's a bit dark, and dreary, especially for July.

I'm now waiting for some Tussah silk top, that I dyed last night to dry. The scattered showers aren't helping. Where is the sun we were promised!

THINGS TO DO:

• Get fastenings for cardigans and do photos, blog it!
• Take photos of cloudy skies
• Draft next lot of silk hankies
• Finish labelling and pricing for the fair Saturday
• Finish homework for knitting course on Sunday

And last but not least my invite for Ravelry dropped into my inbox this morning, something else to do...but may help me keep track of everything eventually!

SP10 Revealed!

Yesterday morning the postman delivered my final SP10 parcel...and look at the lovely goodies inside, 2 contrasting skeins of Fiberspates laceweight silk, just the right amount to knit the most gorgeous stole pattern you can see in the background. It's called Hanami, and represents the yearly Japanese tradition of viewing cherry blossoms.

Just have a quick look over here for some close up photos of Hanami, it starts with a beaded cast-on, then the basket weave symbolizes the friendships and interweaving of our lives.

'The second half of the stole is dedicated to the cherry blossoms and the reminder they give us of the beauty of life. As anyone who has seen cherry blossoms blow in the wind can tell you, they make a beautiful pink and white cloud of blossoms. Starting out with just a scatter of blossoms, they get thicker until at the end of the stole, there is a full cloud of blossoms. The second end of the stole is finished with a simple, flirty ruffle that is reminiscent of the delicate blossoms themselves.'

What a gorgeous and clever pattern, and a fabulous gift to end SP10!

Mustn't forget these pretty little stitch-markers, and the best surprise of all is finally getting to find out who my secret pal is.....those keen eyed among you may have seen that nice little card in the picture, I'd like you all to meet Jon the Easy Knitter.

I really can't thankyou enough Jon, THANKYOU! you've made my first venture into SP very special, they've all been lovely, well thought out gifts, I can't wait to cast on the Hanami, but need to finish a couple of commissions before I do. I do hope you've had fun picking them and I havent been difficult to buy for. I'm going to enjoy observing your venture's in spinning, knitting and dyeing, now that I know where to find you, and I'd really like to come and visit the I-Knit group one day, just to say hello and thankyou in person.

Wonderful Woolfest

Thursday saw us drive to the Lake District for Woolfest, we arrived at our secret * B & B destination at 4.30pm, it was raining about as heavy as I think it could and you couldn't help but think of other bloggers coming up who were camping, because the weather was horrendous.

Friday I spent my first full day at Woolfest, quite alot of the time I felt like I was walking around in a daze with so much to see, and do. My first purchase was a 2nd hand Jumbo Flyer for my Ashford Traditional.

I obviously bought a little bit of fibre, it was my first chance to see and feel different breeds of sheeps fleece, and I came away with a little grey Shetland, which was baby soft. I chose some pick and mix colours from Wigham Wool, and bought a huge multi coloured batt of merino/silk. I bought some alpaca noil, just for blending and some rugmaking tools, a prodder and a hooker! Some bags of sari silk waste, again for blending and some stripey merino silk roving.

I also had a go at 'Longdraw' spinning with the Guild of Longdraw Spinners, something that will take a bit of practice quietly at home, not at a big fibrefest with people watching!

I also bumped into a couple of other bloggers for the first time, I recognised Celtic Memory Jo, from the photo on her blog, she just happened to have an armful of cones at the time! I also saw Ambermoggie, Wye Sue, and Woolly Wormhead struggling to get around, not because she has a poorly leg, but because everyone kept stopping her in her tracks to chat!

I also met a few new people at the Spin-In Friday night, I met Freyalynn, and I sat with the Eden Valley Guild of Spinners Weavers and Dyers, who were very welcoming and friendly.

Saturday morning started wet again, and we set off for a drive around the surrounding area, to take in the scenery. We got all the way down to Sellafield, the site of the Uk's first nuclear power station. It had been raining quite heavy all morning but just as we arrived and decided to have a look around the visitor centre, it got even heavier.

We drove back to Cockermouth and dh decided to go back to the B & B, I decided to make second visit to Woolfest, and made a couple of extra purchases. I bought some lovely sockstuff from Freyalynn, and a Bosworth featherweight spindle, I'd seen quite a few people using these top whorl spindles, getting them spinning on they're thigh and decided to give it a go.

Saturday evening was dry and Sunny and we took some photos on the way back to our B & B.

* I'm having to keep our B & B a secret, because I would like to stay there again for Woolfest 2008, shhhhh.

This is my Bosworth, I've been spinning a little merino laceweight, but I have also bought some Tussah silk to dye and spin, just wish it would stop raining!

Cloudy skies!

I like the blues in this first batch of fibre, I actually dye 100g at a time in a microwave steamer.

I found a second microwave steamer in a second hand shop, so I usually prepare the second batch while I'm waiting for the first to cook. I'm not trying to make them exactly the same, although this second batch is not quite what I had planned, but it will still compliment the blues, whether I ply them together, or keep them seperate.

These last two, are my favourite dye experiments so far, I can't wait to get spinning them up, maybe later this week, I've still got that cardigan kicking around, the sleeves are in, just the side seams and sleeve seams to go, might even see if I can finish it off this week, now it's there in writing I better go and see where I left it.