I love love love the blues in this skein and the way they swirl together when laid like this. Love. The colors are just beautiful. Even better, they were dyed by a woman who is practically my neighbor and is part of my spinner's guild and knit night! I had lots of fun with this kit and feel like I've finally gotten good with chain-plying on the wheel and fixing problems (like when the single breaks). Two braids (8 oz.) were dyed in complimentary gradients with the idea that they would then be knit into something like the Noro striped scarf.
The blue skein still needs its bath, you can see how much longer it looks than the green/purple skein. It'll spring back a bit after a wash. I'm thinking I might use my skeins for Lee Meredith's Waving Chevron Scarf, I like the shape of it, but I'm not sure how it'll look with using 2 colors instead of 3.
Copyright leethal, from Ravelry pattern page
I'll have to swatch and see. :) But that's getting ahead of myself. For now I'm just happy that I made 8/9ths of my Tour de Fleece goals! Even though I finished a few minutes past midnight, I'm still counting it! I'm sad I didn't achieve my extra-special-gold-star-challenge of spinning an ounce of my still-currently-unwashed fleece, but I just did not have a free weekend with good weather to do the washing. Hopefully one will come around soon. For now, yay for Tour de Fleece!
Every time I spin, I am delighted by the magic of plying. You take this weird, lumpy, wiry little single of spun fiber and transform it into beautiful, fluffy, real and usable yarn.
This is the BFL fiber I've been working on for Tour de Fleece. I spun the gradient-dyed braid worsted style and chain-plied it to preserve the color changes. It's about 270 yards of DK-ish weight (I always forget to measure wpi before I skein it up... woops). I love the way the colors blend into each other and am excited to see it knit up. This skein represents about half of my TdF goals. I've been spinning up the second braid of the gradient kit, as well.
I only have about 2 oz of fiber left to spin. That bobbin on the left is driving me crazy: I can't find the end of my yarn. The single broke during spinning and the end concealed itself most thoroughly on the bobbin. I was so frustrated I just started a new bobbin but I'm going to have to find the end eventually! Any tips? I already resorted to taking packing tape to the single and trying to lift the end up like lint. It didn't work.
Darwin approves of the new yarn. This is his stealthy "I look all innocent but turn your back for a second and that yarn will be mine" attack mode. Little devil.
I am happy to announce that while my spinning and knitting lately have not been very speedy, they have been fairly steady. I made a good bit of progress on my Tour de Fleece spinning, 4 oz of the BFL gradient kit I'm working up have been spun into singles and I'm ready to start the second half of the kit later tonight.
Ah, I love a full bobbin!
With all my home time taken up with spinning, my knitting has been fairly monogamous. I've only really been working on my travel knitting (sock) and meeting knitting (shawl).
CY Skinny Bugga
I'm still slowly striping my way through the Tour-de-Sock pattern from the last round. I was nearly finished with it last week but started the band of colorwork on the foot too late so it was all the way down near the toe and I hated it, so I frogged back. Nothing like making the sock foot slog last twice as long! It was worth it, though.
BMFA Socks That Rock Mediumweight
My sweet and spring-y Budding Lintilla shawl is nearing its end. That little ball on the left is the last of the original skein. I will continue through the end of it then use the additional leftovers that a couple of lovely Ravelers sent me to work the edging of the shawl. I'm excited to see how this will turn out!
Finally, I just wanted to say that I apologize for not being around to comment much lately. I'm working on transferring my blog from blogger to Wordpress as I dislike the changes blogger has been making and I want a fresh start. Much of my limited inside-time has been and will be spent on setting up the new blog for a little bit. I hope you'll come visit me at my new place when it's ready!
I hope you all had a great holiday weekend! Mine was very busy and full of sun, waves, and family (as it should be). It also involved a wonderful surprise as I found this little beauty waiting for me in the mail:
That's a handwoven wool shawl that I had entered a raffle ticket to win way back in March when I went to Woolapalooza at Drumlin Farm in Lincoln, Massachusetts. To say that I was excited and that I love this thing are understatements. It's fabulous! The tag doesn't specify what breed of sheep the wool is from but it is bouncy, lightweight, a little bit 'crunchy', and warm. The woven pattern is just gorgeous, too.
It reminds me very much of the mitered squares that you see in sock blankets everywhere. I love it and wish very much that I could thank the weaver personally.
I've been doing more than just basking in the glow of unexpected woolen finery, however. I've been working on spinning up my own but of beauty, too:
I'm making steady progress on my June Pryce Fiber Arts gradient-dyed BFL kit for Tour de Fleece. I started with purple, have progressed through the purply blue, finished the blue, worked through the blue-ish green bits, and am now beginning the final solid green third of the braid. I am really loving working with BFL wool. It's been light and lofty to spin and as a longwool has a nice silky hand while remaining very soft. It's also the first fiber I've been able to spin worsted-style successfully, letting the twist pull just from one end of the top. I've always had to spin top over the fold to get a consistent single (not sure why, it always felt like it got 'stuck' in my hands any other way) but with the longer, silkier fibers of BFL I haven't had any trouble drafting in the more controlled worsted style. I've found my spinning groove again and am excited to see how this plies up!
I'll admit: I knew this would happen. Signing up for both Tour-de-Sock and Tour de Fleece which co-occur over June & July... there was no way I'd keep up with both plus regular life. No way, especially since it's summer when I limit my inside-sitting-down-time. My 3rd TdS sock is about where it was on Friday, with some more of the foot done. I've decided not to even cast on the 4th TdS pattern because it involves about a million beads and I'm just not that interested in it. I'd much prefer to finish one of the pretty pairs I've already begun. And my Tour de Fleece spinning? Well...
I forgot. Totally. In my mind, the thing started July 1st. Nope! I'm 2 days behind before I've even started! To make it worse, the last half of June was so rainy I have yet to get around to washing my first fleece, which consitutes a portion of my TdF goals. Since it's my blog, I reserve the right to amend my goals:
Spin for at least 15 minutes every day (which I will begin tonight!).
Extra-special-gold-star-challenge: Wash, process, and spin 1 oz of wool from my first fleece.
That's still a hefty 9 oz of spinning to finish over the next 3 weeks so I'll be very happy if I complete it.
Would you like to see why I totally forgot about the TdF this past weekend?
Love. That. Shirt.
I was too busy fawning over spending quality time with my nephews, Liam and Logan, 2.5 years and 2 weeks old, respectively. And with those adorable faces, can you blame me for forgetting to spin?
Something very simple has been inspiring me lately.
Ahhh, the humble spindle. I feel like I haven't spun in ages-- in reality it's probably been more like 6 weeks, but that's pretty long! There has been much talk of spinning on blogs and Ravelry lately and man oh man is it getting to me. My fingers are itching. My wheel is waiting. My spindles are dropping. Yes, I'm joining the tour.
In a previous post, I had mentioned how I wanted to spin a little every day starting in June. Well, turns out my spinner instincts must've been buzzing because June 30th is the start date of 5th annual Tour de Fleece! The idea is to do something awesome and challenging, perhaps not quite as awesome or challenging as a crazy long-ass bike ride, but cool nonetheless. The main guidelines are as follows:
Spin every day the Tour rides, if possible. Saturday June 29th
through Sunday July 21st. Days of rest: Monday July 8th and Monday July
15th. (Just like the actual tour.)
Spin something challenging on the challenge day (usually the toughest
high mountain stage: this year, it’s Stage 18, on Thursday, July 18th,
when they climb Alpe d’Huez twice).
There are a few others but those are the big ones. You can join teams or not, spin a little or a lot, whatever your personal goal/challenge might be. I joined a team of fans of Verdant Gryphon yarns, even though they don't sell any fiber, just because people on the VG boards on Ravelry are always so fun, friendly, and knowledgeable. And there are prizes, always prizes. As we all know how I love to plan, I've been having fun thinking up things to do. Unsurprisingly, I have a few ideas.
Spin for at least 15 minutes every day (which I will begin practicing starting tomorrow because I already said I would).
Extra-special-gold-star-challenge: Wash, process, and spin 1 oz of wool from my first fleece.
Yeah, you heard me: my first fleece! IF I mange to get to the farmer's market before my yoga class today, I MIGHT be able to get a hold of a Southdown fleece for a pretty reasonable price. I've never used Southdown wool before but I'm itching to give this whole fleece-to-spun thing a try and don't mind practicing on one I'm not totally invested in. For those keeping track, I've planned to spin 12 oz. of fiber in 3 weeks. That's 4 oz, or a typical braid of fiber, every week... while simultaneously knitting a boatload of socks. And trying to fit time in for designing. And, you know, work. And life. This is my way of declaring: I am pretty crazy and all of these plans will probably never happen so please don't be too disappointed when the beautiful socks and fabulous handspun yarn that live in my head don't quite make it to the blog. A girl's gotta dream, right?
