As the Wheel Turns

I spent last weekend at a friend's cottage, working on my summer spinning goal. While there I managed to turn this gorgeous seacell/merino batt I bought last summer

into this

I've spun nearly one full bobbin and still have about half of the fibre left to turn into singles. Once that is finished, it will be time to ply. I'm thinking I'm going to Navajo ply these singles into a worsted weight yarn. I should end up with about 300 yards if all goes well. That would be enough to make a cozy scarf or a nice pair of mitts next winter.

While working away on this, I realized how little green has made its way into my craft projects. I have some green yarn stocked away in the stash but I don't think I've ever knit anything that had green as its main colour. Seems bizarre given my general love of all colours.

Up next, my summer knitting project that is *eep* almost finished!

Dizzy

Things have been busy. Too busy. To counteract the disorienting feeling of chasing one's tail for weeks on end, I decided to wake up at 7:00 am one fine Sunday morning and get some spinning done.

These are the first 2 completed skeins of what is lovingly referred to as NBO, short for the "Neverending Blue One." I cling to the eventual hope that one day there may be nearly enough yarn for *gasp* a whole sweater.

I suppose it would help if I found more time to sit at my wheel now and then. Perhaps a challenge for next month.

A more wordy post to come in the not-so-distant future. Have a wonderful Wednesday!

Have you seen the new Knitty?

Once upon a Super Bowl

Last Sunday I was talked into attending a Super Bowl party. Knowing that I lack the "enthusiasm for televised sports" gene, I decided to start a new project that would give me my own little dose of the fun. Enter the Tulip Baby Cardigan.

It's perfect. Fast, easy, pretty, lots of colour, and nice yarn. I've had this kit in my stash since last spring. Now that I have more than a few close friends expecting it seems like a great time to knit it up.

Before falling off the metaphorical goal bandwagon, I managed to accomplish some long forgotten spinning.

The yarn is just over 140 yards of worsted 3-ply, made with 2 plies of Superwash merino top (these singles) and one ply of a merino tencel blend. There should be about a sweater's worth of yarn if I ever get finished. I'm not too sure about the colour since it is darker than I had originally anticipated. We'll see what happens after a bit of swatching before I make a firm decision either way.

Lucy is almost finished. I have about 16 more rows and a bit of neckband knitting to do. Then it's on to weaving in the dozens of ends, buying buttons, and grafting the underarm join shut.

I tried it on over the weekend and it seems a bit small. I think that a good blocking will give me a bit more room, especially since the yarn is superwash. Failing that, I suppose I'll have to cut back on the Mini Eggs.

Kusha Kusha also featured prominently this weekend and a fair amount of progress was made. I have just over a hundred more rows of stainless silk left to knit and it will be finished.

Love the way that this is turning out even if the slippery stainless silk rows are a bit of a pain to knit.

A week and some ago Nicole tagged me for the book MEME. Funny thing was that I had grabbed the book I was reading to see what my answer would before I realized that she had tagged me. Thanks Nicole!

The rules are as follows:

Go to the current book you are reading, on page 161, and copy down the 5th sentence:

“I can almost hear it.”

From Sweetness in the Belly by Camilla Gibb, otherwise known as my book club book for February.

Thank you for your comments on my last post. They made for a perfect re-entry.

New Ground

Boy do I ever feel out of touch with the blogging world! Things have been very busy this past week and a half. Between family, convocation, the bar admissions course, and a weekend away I haven't had any spare time.

There has been some progress on the fiber front but I warn you it's limited. Up first there is a convocation gift from my grandmother...a washed fleece.

I'm not exactly sure how much this puppy weighs but it seems to be a reasonable size (read: it isn't overwhelmingly large). Also included in the photo are some lovely student handcarders I purchased for the occasion.

Here's what my first carding attempt looks like.

Has anyone done any carding before? If so, do these rolags look like something I might be able to spin at some point? This whole process is a bit of a mystery to me.

I also started swatching for Stephanie Japel's Cable-Down Raglan, featured in the Spring '07 Interweave mag. The yarn is from Oceanwind Knits. I love the way the colour varies from a baby blue to a deep ocean blue.

Before you judge me too harshly for starting something new while neglecting all of the other lovely projects in my knitting basket look at these.

They're progressing, I swear! I still have a bunch of foot left to knit but I have high hopes that these socks will come off the needles later this week with Icarus to follow shortly thereafter.

Pretty

The family arrived yesterday to attend my convocation (later this afternoon). When my mother showed up, she brought me a parcel that I've been eagerly anticipating. It's the prize Nicole sent me from her Birthday Blog Bash, and can I just say yum, yum, yum!

I am in love with those stitch markers! They are delicate and beautiful. The yarn is KnitPicks sock yarn in a colourway called Cape Cod. It's so smooshy and colours are lovely together, I can't help but bury my face in it every now and then. The other half agrees since he's already decided that the yarn is destined to become "socks he can wear to work". Thank you Nicole, I am touched by your generosity.

In other knitting news, these last few days have also seen the end of Chart 3 on the Icarus front. The calculator says that I'm 77.7% of the way through this beast. The rows are starting to drag a little so it will likely be a few more weeks until this beauty comes off the needles.

On the (neglected) spinning front, the wheel and I have made up after a long hiatus. This is the (almost-full) first of two bobbins of singles. I can't decide if I should ply this bobbin now or spin up the second bobbin of singles first. I'm really excited to see the end result, but am also afraid that I won't be able to keep things consistent if I stop now.

Lucy is also progressing. Part of me is starting to worry that I'll run out of yarn since my row gauge is slightly off. To compensate, I've irrationally starting knitting one of the sleeves to get a better sense of how much yarn those will eat up.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend.

Spin City

Remember these rovings?

I've finally figured out what I'm going to do with the one of the left-hand side. It is a Lorna's Laces roving in the Seaside colourway. After seeing this waaaay back, I decided that this roving would be perfect stranded together with another merino/silk roving that still needs to be spun.

Here's what I've managed to accomplish so far on this project. Needless to say this is a long-term/post-exams sort of project.

Once this bobbin is full, I plan to Navajo ply it to shorten the colour changes and then get started on a second bobbin of singles.

Belated FF (sort of)

One...two...skip a few...I meant to post this last week but I went home and my parents only have dial-up. Good news is that in two weeks there has been much in the way of finishing. Most notable is the shawl for my grandmother. Perfect timing since her birthday is today and this month's Project Spectrum colours are blue, grey, and white. The shawl ended up being comfortably large, making it the perfect chill chaser. Most exciting is the fact that I ended up using all but two yards of the yarn I'd spun.

Here's a photo of (most of) the completed shawl. If you look closely you can see my toes, included for scale. I'm really pleased with the way the striping worked out. I wasn't sure what to expect from the finished yarn since this was my first real spinning project.

Project Specs:
Evelyn A. Clark's Leaf Lace Shawl.
Needles: US 9 Denise
Yarn: 623 yards of my handspun
Started: October 2006
Finished: February 1, 2007

Here's a better photo of the pattern detail after the shawl had been unpinned and worn. I love the tweediness of the yarn. The colours are truer here.

One final look.

Onwards.

Finishing Fridays

Long time no post. The last few weeks haven't given me much knitting time. I started this blog to motivate me to shrink the stash. I started off with 67 projects, 14 of which were on the needles. The stats at this point are not looking promising. I have 75 projects in total, 13 in progress. Clearly the original plan was flawed. To deal with this and to compensate for my general avoidance of completing finishing work, I am instituting Finishing Fridays. This means that every Friday I have to do some sort of finishing: whether it's sewing buttons, weaving in ends, sewing seams or whatever else needs to get done.

This Friday's accomplishments:

The plying for grandma's shawl is finished. Here's a blurry closeup.

And the finished product (with a standard pair of scissors included for scale):

Many hours of spinning has left me with about 625 yards of two-ply, light worsted yarn. I've started to swatch for the shawl and so far it's knitting up beautifully. The thrill of knitting my handspun has yet to wear off.

I also knitted Calorimetry using the wool/silk I spun up last month. What a great project! A quick day of knitting and I ended up with this:

I love the way the colours in the yarn interacted with this pattern, moving from light on the edges to dark in the middle. Lots of people have posted about the finished product being too big. I opted not to modify the pattern and am very pleased with how it turned out. There is enough fabric to cover most of my head without being unnecessarily large. It is the perfect thing to help me through the cold snap we've been having the last week or so. Here is a closeup of one of the buttons I sewed on today to finish this project up.

Last but not least, I made the felted tote from One Skein. Another quick knit, made from Lamb's Pride Bulky in a colour called Wild Violet (a little darker than in this picture). I finally got around to weaving in the ends and doing the seaming. Next it's into the washer for a quick felt, hopefully I'll get that done when I go home next weekend.

Now it's off to stand in line at the Lululemon warehouse sale.

Marathon

If nothing else the last few days have been productive on the spinning front. I finished the singles for the shawl.

Now it's time to ply.

Small and Big

Instant gratification anyone? Feeling a little overwhelmed with the number of projects on the go and general life stress, I decided that finishing a lingering project would help turn things around. A few hours later and I had a funky knitted ring. A great way to use up those little bits of yarn I can't bear to throw out.

I've also been doing some spinning...

Lorna's Laces 10 oz Pencil Roving in Seaside and Tahoe that I picked up here while on summer vacation. Inspired by this, I decided that I wanted to make a handspun shawl for my grandma out of the purply-blue roving. Here's how the first bobbin is going so far. Wish me luck.

Lesson learned

A few months ago I was perusing (onlookers might have described it as ravaging) the fiber stock at the yarn behemoth down the street, in desperate search of some Fleece Artist wool/silk roving to try out on my new Lendrum DT. There was only one lonely little braid. Its very bright, high-contrast primary colours were not at all to my taste but I was desperate and I somehow convinced myself that I needed to take it home. My mistake became clear after the yarn buzz wore off. Ashamed of my lack of restraint, I buried the fiber in my stash, never to be seen again. Alone it waited, encased in a plastic prison, while I gave it names like "clown paint" and "circus horror."

Needing some instant gratification, I reluctantly pulled it out and began to draft. Nothing like a quick night of spinning to teach me the error of my ways as the mistake turned into this

and then into this

I am smitten, a woman obsessed. This is quite possibly the most lovely yarn I've ever spun. It's perfect: the colours, the blending, the squishiness, the sheen, everything! It is 105 yards of worsted weight, 2-ply, silky woolly goodness.

New rules to live by: trust your yarny instincts and never judge a roving unspun.