Definite Signs of Startitis

I must be getting better physically, because I'm starting to get restless where knitting is concerned. I've got 3 patterns on my desk right now, I started a new project on Thursday that's almost complete, and I'm already planning my next project. Added to this, I'm not working on the large project that's been dragging on and on for months.

Unfortunately, two of the projects I'm working on (the large one and the almost done new one) are holiday gifts for readers of this blog, so I can't tell you anything about them. Except that they're both awesome. I can tell you about my next project.

Meet the Shawl Collared Cowl by Alana Dakos of Never Not Knitting. I bought this on Friday at Stash as a "hurray for recovery" gift to myself. I will be using my first ever handspun to make a cozy cowl for myself. I've never knit with any of my handspun, so it should be an experience.

Speaking of spinning, it's Spin Day down and Stash, and I'm going to grab my wheel and try to make a dent in the never ending carbonized bamboo from the Tour de Fleece. I'm not quite half way through it. I'll make sure to get an updated picture.

Tour de Fleece, day 23

This is actually a picture from yesterday. I helped a friend with yard work today and was too tired to spin.

Tour de Fleece, day 20

I've started spinning the last of my exotic fibers: carbonized bamboo (2 ounces).



It's spinning up to be probably a light lace weight once it's been plied. As it is right now I could probably thread a sewing needle with it.

Tour de Fleece, day 19

I've finished spinning my one ounce of crab fiber that I bought at Black Sheep Gathering.



I haven't counted the yards, but I'm guessing it's around 100 yards of sport weight 2 ply.

On to the next challenge!!

Tour de Fleece, day 16

I've been spinning every day, but I've been failing on the pictures. I do have one picture of the cotton/lycra in spinning process. Great googly moogly, cotton is difficult to spin. I've made some progress since this picture, but not much.

Tour de Fleece, day 7

I decided that my next Tour de Fleece spinning challenge would be some silk mawata (hankie). I picked the hot pink that I got at Black Sheep. There was a learning curve when it came to drafting, but I've managed to get that sorted out. However, if I spin too thin and the yarn breaks...well, the spun silk really doesn't like to stick to it's un-spun counter part. Luckily breaking is rare since the fiber is so strong. So far this is the thinnest spinning I've ever done.

The following pictures is the first three "sheets" of the hankie spun up. The whole hankie weighed about 0.3 ounces.

Tour de Fleece, day 6

I finally have a finished yarn to show. Well, I have two finished yarns because I finally got my act together with the camera and the sun.

1 ounce of baby camel, plyed back on itself. About 185 yards, light fingering/heavy lace weight. It turned out fairly nice.



Also, here's what I finished up at the start of the tour. 4.something ounces of BFL dyed by Dicentra, colorway Twig, Navajo plied. Each skein is about 180 yards. The first bobbin plyed up at about a DK weight, and the second one at a nice sport weight.

Tour de Fleece

I'm participating in this year's Tour de Fleece on Ravelry, and today was the official start. I'm part of Team TARDIS and am spinning up all of my "exotic" fibers. That means all of what I got at Black Sheep 2011 plus my 1.1 oz baby camel that I've had since the Newport Spin-In 2010.

Here's the progress that I made today. It's not as much as I'd like, but I had some technical difficulties with my wheel. After lots of trouble shooting I figured out that the bobbin I was using is broken. Also, I need to do what feels like over spinning to account for the short staple fiber and slippery fiber.



I'll probably be doing more frequent updates here during the tour.

Black Sheep Plunder

Dyed Silk Mawata





Organic cotton and Lycra (about 1.5 oz)



Carbonized Bamboo (2 oz)



Knitting themed fabric (1/3 yd)



Crab shell fiber (1 oz)



Also, finished May socks!

Whirlwind

Oh spit, I just realized that I forgot to take painting pictures, and the batteries in my camera are dead. Oh well, you'll just have to be entertained with the pictures I did manage.

First off, Damson is done!!!


I finished it Thursday and wore it Friday and Saturday. I got many compliments on it both days, especially Saturday at the Newport Spin-In. I'm still working on getting an action shot, which will now be more difficult with the dead batteries.

In order to prepare myself for Saturday's spinathon, I cleared off the bobbin I was working on. I've been working on the roving I got last June in Elgin after the wedding. I used the opportunity to try out Navajo plying. I do love a three ply yarn.



This is about half of the 100 grams of roving. This cleared up my wheel for a new spinning project. I got out a top that I bought at the store in town, dyed by Dicentra Designs. It's 4.1 ounces of Blue Faces Leicester (less-ter) in the colorway "Twig."

I rode out with Kelli and got started spinning up "Twig." I had every intention of not purchasing more fiber, since I have plenty and I haven't really been spinning. That's why I brought the Dicentra roving. It's pretty and exciting with the color changes, so I would be less tempted than if I had just brought the green from above.

My resolve lasted for several hours. Then I found the Danger Zone. It was a bin of little one ounce baggies of luxury fibers for $3 each.

Sigh.

I walked away with two ounces of a silk and camel down blend. I took the Dicentra off the wheel, put on a fresh bobbin, and got to work (cause it doesn't count if it goes home as yarn, right?). I spun up the first ounce on Saturday, started the second, finished the second on Sunday, plied it back on itself for a two ply, wound it off, and counted. I ended up with 188 yards of the prettiest yarn I've made yet.

Here's one ounce of the fiber:


The first ounce spun up:


And the finished yarn:



It really does look just like spun gold, and yes, my arm hurts from patting myself on the back. Two ounces in two days, plus I've got the spinning bug again, so my fiber stash should start to shrink.

My resolve returned right up until the last half hour of the spin-in. That's when I found the mawata.


What is mawata? Another name for it is silk hankies. Individual silk cocoons are stretched out onto a square frame, and then individual layers can be separated and spun into silk yarn. I bought one ounce, which gives me a surprising amount because silk is such a light fiber. I'm looking forward to playing with this.


And finally, my SpillyJane Camilla mitts keep marching on. I'm having fun doing the colorwork, and feel more confident about doing the Whale Watch Hat (ravelry link) from New England Knits.


Just one more thing to add. Mom sent this to me, and I'm in love. Too bad I'm in such a small place (and can't bolt things to the wall).

I'll Just Make One Myself

I've been searching for a watch. Yes, I do frequently just use my phone or ipod as my clock, but I'd rather have a watch. Especially when I'm doing observational research at the edge of the touch pool and the aquarium and there are rambunctious children around. That just has "ends badly" written across it.

I've tried on several watches. I've tried on metal bands and leather bands (no plastic bands!). I've tried on smaller watches and larger watches. *sigh* I hate them all. The men's watches are too big, and the women's watches are somehow insipid to me. And all the bands either pinch or itch or scratch...it's bad all around.

I've come to the decision that I'm going to have to make my own (non-insipid) watch. I can get watch faces of various shapes and sizes at the bead store in town. I'm thinking of knitting the band in a wider cuff style, and having an overlay bead strap. That way I have sparkle without the irritation of the beads right against my skin. I'm going to use a nice plant fiber yarn so that it's cool in the summer (probably cotton or bamboo).

Of course, I'll probably be done with my touch pool observations before I get around to making a watch band, so don't hold your breath.

I do have crafty news with pictures. I finished my first plied bobbin of the brown alpaca that was a gift from a spinning buddy. It's mostly sport weight, and I have tons more roving to spin.


I used my swift for the first time when I wound the yarn off the bobbin. I wish I'd remembered to take a photo of the full bobbin. I filled it so full I thought it was going to explode!



I soaked it last night and hung it outside to dry this morning, and it's well balanced and ready to be added to the yarn stash.

In that last picture you can see the shawl that I bought this weekend at the clothing consignment shop downtown. It was on clearance. It's a lovely, lightweight cotton, and the dots that form the flowers have been individually tied before the shawl was dyed. It's going to be lovely to wear this summer.

Alright, it's time for me to find a snack and start to wind down for the night. Until next time...

The Story of a Fleece

Sorry it's been 20 days since the last update. I've been busy busy busy this last month with thesis work. I've gotten my proposal written and accepted by my committee, however, so I'm right on track and was able to take a vacation-at-home during spring break (tomorrow is the last day :-( ).

On the knitting front, I've finished the right front and back of my Hot Pink and Vintage and started on the left front. No pictures, though. My Damson shawl is in a long term time out until I can stand to unknit (stitch by stitch) 6.5 rows. Don't ask, it's still too painful.

Spring is continuing it's march forward. I caught this little ladybug on the green of the daffodils in the back yard.


What I've really been spending my time on, though, (besides the thesis stuff) is my spinning. Here are some better pictures of my first yarn that I discussed a couple posts back.



















It's wonderfully soft and sproingy.

I also finished my second yarn, which I started spinning just before the winter Olympics started. My consistency in weight improved with this yarn. It's going to make a lovely something, probably modular in garter stitch to showcase the colors.



But my big project has been my fleece. My alpaca fleece. I got an alpaca fleece, fresh off the alpaca for a steal (it was going to be burned!!! Who burns alpaca fleece?!?!?!). It's a first shear (as in, the first time this alpaca had ever been sheared) so there aren't any guard hairs to worry about. It was incredibly dirty from the dust baths this alpaca had enjoyed. Wanna see it?


That's a regular size laundry basket, for reference. I tried cleaning it in it's natural state, but the dirt was all trapped up in the locks. I ended up borrowing a drum carder from a friend of mine.


I carded all of the alpaca (a two day affair that left my right shoulder and arm sore) and knocked a lot of dirt out of it (plus picked out large stuff by hand). Now it looks like this:


It's just about doubled in volume, and is even softer now. It is cleaner, but still has dust and some vegetative matter in it. I tried washing some of it yesterday, but it didn't work well. I think at this point the best thing will be to spin it and wash it as yarn to get the rest of the stuff out of it.

The wheel in my last spinning related post is going home today. It was a loaner from a friend who was recruiting for the cult of spinners. Now that I'm hooked, I found a great deal on craigslist for a wheel of my very own. It's smaller and more portable and fits much better in my tiny space.


The woman I bought it from had left the bobbins full so I inherited that. I wound it off so I can work on my own yarn. Like this:


This is some lovely brown alpaca that was a gift from a friend of mine. I've got positively tons of this roving, so I should get a good amount of yarn out of it.

That's all I've got for now. I've got to work on reorganizing (again) my yarn stash so that it seems to take up less space.

A Doozy of a Post

I've been busy since my last serious post. I had a cold, I've been working my tail off on my thesis proposal (my adviser is reading it now, so I have a day off), I finished up the knitting olympics, and I've been trying to at least break even with the domestic housework of everyday living.

First off today, I'll cover what I've been knitting. I lost my teal sanddollar hat (very sad, still not over it). I decided to shop the stash for something to make a new hat. I don't have anything that will do for a new sanddollar, but I did find 4 hanks of discontinued Elsebeth Lavold Angora in Burgundy Red. I dug around my patterns and decided on Pauline, which is a lovely little bonnet. It took me all of about 2 evenings to make, even with the applied I-cord (my first time). This was the first of my Ravelymics projects.


I've gotten lots of compliments on it. I was worried about the gauge, which was much looser than I usually knit at, but the angora yarn bloomed beautifully. It's soft and silky and very warm.

The bonnet only took one and a third skeins of the yarn, so I then cast on for Snapdragon Flip-Top Mitts for my second Ravelympics project. These took more than a week to make because the pattern was more clever than I was. But I finally got them done and they are also warm and soft and silky, and my knitting group thinks they are adorable. It is much too warm these days to wear such warm mitts, though, except late at night while driving.


The loops on the tips are supposed to go with buttons on the cuffs to hold the flip top down, but i have no idea what buttons I want, and the flip tops do stay down on their own fairly well, so I'm not worrying about that.


I finished these the Friday before the end of the Olympics, and I knew I couldn't get my third project done, but I decided to get as far as I could in the remaining 2 days. The third project is Damson, made in a lovely yarn that I got as a gift. It's a two ply 50/50 wool/kid mohair that was done up in Lancaster, Texas. It's so soft and lovely, and I love the earthy colors.

Here's where I was early Saturday morning.

And here's where I got to by the end of the Olympic games on Sunday (well, the end of the closing ceremony). I've since gotten farther, but it looks pretty much like the above picture, but more bunched up, so I haven't photoed it.

On Tuesday this past week I also got out my Hot Pink and Vintage and worked on it for the first time in ages, but I haven't photoed it. I'm hoping to have it done before the world comes to an end.

Next up, we've been having some wonderful weather lately. Yesterday was so nice I had all of my windows open, and the door, too. Things are starting to bloom, and last weekend I was inspired to get out my camera and take a short walk around the neighborhood. Here's a small selection.





































The last one is newly sprouted rhubarb. I just loved the texture of the unfurling leaves.

Finally, since the weather was so lovely yesterday I took the opportunity to work with my spinning. I decided to do some plying, since I had quite a bit of spun fiber on two bobbins. The problem was that I had no lazy kate (which holds the bobbins so they don't fall over while plying). What to do? I found a chunk of styrofoam in a box that I've neglected to deal with since November, got out a short set of US size 8 knitting needles, poked them up through the styrofoam and voila, instant poor girl's lazy kate.


So I plyed away, merrily turning my singles into a nice two ply yarn. Yes, there are areas that are thicker, and areas that are thinner, but for my first ever spun yarn I really like the way it looks. I got 2.5 bobbins full of plyed yarn. And, with the lovely weather, I've been able to hang it outside to dry in the spring air.


It's soft and sproingy and perfectly balanced for all it's thick-thin quality. Now I just have to decide what to knit with it.

Now I'm going to sign off. Until next time!