What's in Progress?

Like pretty much the rest of the planet, as far as I can tell, I've been feeling basically terrible for the last few weeks. When I last posted I thought I was beginning to shake it off but I was very, very wrong! A couple of days later I had the shivers and a fever and it's really only the last few days this I've been confident enough to say that I'm on the mend. If anyone else has been suffering you very much have my sympathy because UGH. So mostly I've just been pottering around doing a bit of one project here and a bit of another there when I've been feeling up for it.

In knitting I've been slowly beavering away on the Tauriel pattern by Josiah Bain. I was hoping they'd scratch the cable itch I've been suffering with but I've found they've been requiring a little more concentration than I've had to give recently. Now I'm feeling better they are going a bit faster so hopefully I'll finish them in a week or two. The yarn is Knit Picks Stroll Glimmer which unsurprisingly is a little glittery and is doing a lovely job of cheering the magpie in me right up.

In sewing I'm whipping up (in the very slowest sense of the phrase) another pair of jeans. They're a sort of stone colour, which is a bit boring for me so I decided to jazz them up a bit with some pink top stitching. I'm not regretting it so far. I'm just about to stick the zip fly in so there's not too much to do now.

I've also been spinning, finishing the spinning on a project that has seen me get married, become a homeowner, buy a spinning wheel and have 2 children! This has been spun from 2 batts from Shunklies in a colourway called Monsters Inc. I still need to ply so there's plenty of opportunity yet for more procrastination but I'm hopeful it'll be done this year.

Speaking of procrastination, I did immediately start spinning up these lovely batts while the other singles chill for a day or two. The plan is to spin the first one then ply the Monsters Inc and then I'll spin the second batt and ply them both. I'm really hoping that I can make the finished yarn as pretty as the batts are (Snow Glow by Nunoco), it was almost tempting to just never spin them and keep them to look at.

And today I'll leave you with this pair of Easter bunnies who have been having loads of fun doing Easter crafts this week. I'm loving that they're getting big enough for making little projects like these masks and I'm having great fun planning more things for them to do.

 

FOs: Spinning edition

It's been spinning central round here recently. With my sewing machines out of action and the enthusiasm which comes from picking up something that you haven't done for ages I've really quickly finished 3 skeins of yarn. I'm also most of the way through another 100g, but that's for a swap so that's all I'm saying about that today.

This is the fibre I was chain plying in my last post, all finished around four years after I started spinning it! Rather gratifyingly it's turned out to be just lovely, when a project takes so long from start to finish it would be so disappointing for it to be disappointing. I'm also pleased it turned out so well as the hand dyed top that I started with was really lovely and I'd have hated for it to be a bit meh. It came from FeltStudio's Etsy shop, which I can highly recommend, I love the colours and the fibre is always beautifully soft and open and fluffy. I've spun (and finished) this sparkly BFL blend before to make this hat and loved it just as much then.

A trawl through my archives found this photo of the top in 2011!

This yarn is much thinner than one however, I'm estimating it to be around a light fingering weight and I've got around 350m. Maybe some sparkly socks or something pretty for around the neck?

The South American fibre sitting on bobbins awaiting plying in the last post is also finished. At that point I had a second 100g awaiting spinning. I've now finished the whole lot, so that's nice.

There's not a whole lot to say about it that I haven't already said. I'm quite pleased with the way the colours barber pole together and the striping of the purple and orange strand is nice. Overall I think I prefer the purple sections and I'm considering dyeing up some more fibre in similar colours.

This yarn is around a DK weight and again I've got around 350m. I'm quite keen to try and squeeze out a little sweater for Lissy, but I'll definitely have to get going before she gets too much bigger or I won't have enough yarn.

While the spinning phase is continuing I'm really hoping to get my sewing machines up and running this weekend. I hate having a half finished dress hanging around as well as two more projects that are cut out and getting mixed up and sat on by my cats. It great when your clothes are all hairy before you've even made them! I hope everyone else has a nice weekend :)

 

What's in Progress - Craft Edition

As promised here’s a little rundown of what I’m working on right now.  Without further ado, lets go.

Knitting.  I’m working on a couple of things at the moment, I’d been trying to work exclusively on my Driftwood because it’s definitely getting a bit autumnal round here but I managed to misplace my 4^th and 5^th 5.5mm dpns which made life a little difficult.  I probably wasn’t looking very hard for them as Stu found one a few days later and then Felicity suddenly appeared brandishing the other a day later, but hey ho, I can get on with it now.  It gave me a few days to work on my super sneaky blankie project, which I am loving knitting and hating not being able to share for now.

Sewing.  I loved the New Look 6262 pattern that I made up recently so much that I’ve already gone back for round 2.  This is actually the dress that I originally planned to make but I couldn’t quite squeeze all the pattern pieces on the fabric.  Because the first dress was a little too roomy I’ve cut the smallest size this time and as luck would have it I have enough fabric for the slightly smaller version. Yay!  Progress on this has been entirely stalled  by the refurbishment of the dining room so it’s sitting by the sewing machine with only one side of the zip sewn while I wait for a power cable that will reach my machines.  Then I just need to whizz up the other side of the zip, do the facings and the sleeves and the hems.

Spinning.  Yes, spinning!  I bet you forgot I did that!  One of the main ideas behind the dining room redesign was so that we could make it really safe for the girls, allowing them the freedom to come and go from that room.  Up until then we’d had a baby gate at the door to the kitchen which blocked them from the kitchen and dining room.  So far it’s been great and I’ve found that they largely stay away from my wheel now it’s less of a novelty so I’ve really rediscovered spinning over the last few days.  That’s not to say that I haven’t had a few disagreements with disgruntled toddlers about whether they should be touching the spinny thing but we're definitely getting there.  Cassie and I have come to an agreement that she can touch any of the bits that aren’t moving and she seems quite content to sit opposite me with one finger on the back of the bobbin holder and Felicity has become a bit more wary since she stuck her finger in between the spokes which I was spinning.  And that folks, is how you prick your finger on a spinning wheel!  I’ve mostly been spinning up some South American fibre that I hand dyed a wee while ago, I’ve done the first 100g with 100g left, and that is just having a little sit before I ply it up.  In the meantime I’m plying some singles that I spun at least 4 years ago and has been sitting in my corner of shame ever since.

The fibre was a lovely braid of BFL and sparkles that I got from FeltStudio and I spun it up on one of my drop spindles.  I really loved the colours and didn’t want to mix them so I had my first stab at chain plying on a drop spindle.  Let’s just say that it did not go well but I was determined so I set about pre-chaining the singles so that I could add the twist in a separate step later.  Believe it or not that turned out to be really tedious and I did about half of it over a few sessions before I gave up entirely.  Fast-forward to yesterday and I finally realised that I have some beautiful yarn just sat there waiting to be finished and that I was stupid to keep putting it off.  I didn’t need to keep pre-chaining it, I could just break it off, run the pre-chained stuff through the wheel and then have another go at chain plying which turns out to be much easier for me using a wheel.  I’m so happy this is nearly done although I do feel intense shame at having it left so long.  And so, after barely spinning at all in ages I should have 2 skeins of finished yarn to show you in the next few days, how exciting!

An Actual Spinning FO!

It's been over a week since my op and I'm feeling pretty good now. I had a few days where I was pretty uncomfortable, mainly from the gas they inflated me with and once that was gone I've improved loads. Even so I was really grateful that my mum took the girls off my hands for the whole day both Monday and Tuesday. I missed them loads and it was a bit like I was looking for them the whole time, but still two entire days to myself? Hell, yes!

After having a long shower I put the kettle on, fired up Netflix and (very carefully) hauled my spinning wheel into the living room. There I sat and watched and drank tea and spun until I was done. No interruptions, no little fingers spinning the wheel from the other side and no demands to watch Frozen on repeat. I'll have to have surgery more often!

The yarn is pretty special, the fibre was sent to me from Canada by a lovely Ravelry lady as part of a swap. She's not a spinner but she chose brilliantly. It's a polwarth silk blend and is nice and squishy and the colours are perfect, just what I'd have chosen myself. I went for a 2ply so as to not mix the colours too much and I'm really pleased how it turned out. It fluffed out really nicely so it's a bit thicker than I originally thought it might be. I'm always aiming for as heavier weight as I can manage so this is a total bonus. I haven't got around to measuring all the vital statistics, but I'll do that soon so I can start planning what to knit. Spinning really is double the fun!

 

Spinning Wednesday

For the second week in a row I have an FO for you.  Quite frankly it’s about time because I feel like I have been plying this for months.  So here we are, 345m and 46g of 2ply merino tencel from FeltStudioUk.

This has turned out really lovely, smooth and shiny and the colours look great.  This was only half the top and I will start spinning the second lot soon, but because I like a bit of variety I started spinning this instead

 This is some top merino silk I got from Shunklies a little while back.  I decided to make this a bit stripy and found that if I split the top in a certain place I had two matching lengths with just a bit leftover that didn’t match anything.  I’ve therefore split that bit into four skinny strips and am spinning that separately, the idea being that I’ll have a little mini skein with much shorter stripes which I can use to accent the longer striping main skein.  Well that’s the plan anyway, who knows how it will actually turn out!

Birthday, spinning, FO!

Today is Wednesday, spinning update day and I actually have a FO to share - plus it's my birthday so I'm having a great day.  I took today off work and planned to spend it pottering around making bits and bobs and maybe doing some shopping until Stu got home from work.  Imagine my surprise when he woke me up with breakfast in bed this morning after secretly getting the day off work himself.  He even got up at the normal time and went off to the supermarket to get breakfast bits and flowers and make it all extra surprising.  I think he may be a keeper!

So, not much time for making stuff after all, but I did get to do some shopping so it doesn't matter.  I'm currently working on this

This is from the first of the purple karmic delight batts which I am now working on because I finished up with the pink ones - tada!

She was sitting still, I can't help myself!

I love how this ended up, it's really rough and ready and a bit knobbly but it is soft and pretty and I'm really proud of myself. The skein is 30grams and 98m long.  I'm hoping that the purple will spin up just as quickly so I can make something nice and stripy with them.  I'm thinking maybe a nice slouchy hat?

Wednesdays are for spinning

Once again it’s time for a weekly spinning catch up.  Due to the glorious sunshine we have been having we have spent most of our time enjoying the weather with friends and family so I haven’t really done much of anything.  However the forecast for this weekend looks incredibly dreary and wet so hopefully I should have some time to create something worth blogging about.  This week I have mainly concentrated on two projects, the first of which is the sparkly BFL which is now ¾ spun.

 The plying ball is now looking nice and big and I’ve just started work on the last little bit.  You can't quite see but  I have put quite a substantial stop on the top of the spindle, the whorl of this particular spindle is particularly slippery and even with a one strand stop the leader still slips once the cop grows a bit.  I’m hoping that using three strands will do the trick.  I’m thinking I may have to get Stu to cut a notch in it once I’m done with this batch, I was hoping to avoid it but I think it will make things a lot easier.

My second project is a new one, which is exciting!  I got a new spindle, another Enid Ashcroft from this eBay store.

 Of course I had to start a project on it immediately, just to check it spins nicely so I dived into my little fibre stash and decided to try the little batts I got from KarmicDelight on Etsy recently.  I’d yet to try spinning a batt so I felt quite intrepid.

 All in all it’s going quite well, I’ve spun the first batt and have just started the second.  I plan to spin each of the pink batts separately and then ply them all together to make a 3-ply and then follow suit with the purple batts.  Because the batts are a total mixture of fibres and I guess because I’m not used to batts, my spinning is less consistent than it has been.  This is actually really good for me as I slowly learn to embrace the slub!  I’m hoping that this will become a slightly textured yarn with a bit of personality – at this rate I think I should actually find out quite soon – watch this space.  Oh, and the little Easter egg?  I was looking for little balls to wind plying balls around but all I could find was eggs, they do the same job though.

Spinning Wednesday

Just a quick post today as I have done next to no spinning this week.  So without further ado.....

I'm well along on my third spindle full of the sparkly BFL.  After making a plying ball out of the first and second spindle full I've decided to just keep adding to that ball until all the fibre is gone and ply it all in one go.  I did test ply a little bit of it and was really pleased with the results.

It's nice and soft and ever so slightly sparkly (believe it or not!)I'm really looking forward to having it all done.

I've also started spinning the merino/bamboo/soybean I got a couple of weeks back.  I've not done much but it is spinning nicely, it makes a strange sort of sound when I draft it a bit like paper tearing but very quiet.  It's interesting, but not off putting.  I've split the top into four and I'll be making 4-ply with it.

Well that's it folks, next week I should have a new spindle and therefore a new project on the go.

Spinning Wednesday

Now I’m finally getting around to actually doing some knitting I’ve decided to just dedicate Wednesday’s to talking about my spinning.  Because I have so many projects on the go I very rarely actually finish anything so I think just one weekly update is quite enough.

So what’s been spinning this week?  Mostly I’ve been concentrating on a second spindle full of the sparkly BFL from FeltStudio UK.  I could see the end of the section of fibre coming closer and close and with 2 staple lengths left to go – disaster!  The piece of yarn that I use as a stopper when the spindle has no notch (tutorial here if anyone’s interested) snapped and I discovered that the edge of this spindle has no grab whatsoever and I could not get spinning at all.  I’m sure someone more experienced knows what to do for the best here, but because I’m planning on chain plying this I’m just going to wind it off as if it were finished and ply it as it is.  I’ve got another 50g of this to spin so I’ll add the last little bit to that and try to stop twitching every time I think about deliberately making one skein bigger than the other.  Yes, I have issues (don’t even ask me about people who purposefully wear odd socks!)

Other than that, I am making slow progress plying the first 50g of the merino tencel from FeltStudioUK.  It turns out that plying bores me so I have to do it in small batches.  I’m thinking that chain plying will go faster for me because it’s a little bit more involved.  I’ve started chain plying this black/white/grey merino but I’m going slowly because my toilet roll middle got all squished and it’s making things a little difficult.  I think I may have to pinch the toilet roll holder from the bathroom and see if that helps a little.

And, finally, because I just can’t keep myself away from Etsy I now have some new batts to spin.  Look how pretty they are.

These are from Karmicdelight found here.  They are lovely little batts, each around 0.5oz with loads of interesting stuff in there.  Alison is an absolute pleasure to buy from and showed a genuine interest in what I was planning to do with her batts.  I can’t recommend her highly enough.

Green

Before Blog Week started I figured that with a week off from talking about my current projects that I would have loads to share once normal service resumed. This was always going to be wishful thinking, but that is my favourite kind of thinking. Due to my seriously irritationg, but all emcompassing need to be working on all the things at once I've made baby steps of progress on everything, but finished nothing. Except for this:

It's the pink sparkly yarn which I proclaimed was nearly finished here back in february. This was not entirely a lie, I did in fact finish plying the yarn, I skeined it and washed it and became the very proud owner of some incredibly squiggly yarn. I think to describe it as a wee bit overplied would demonstrate a complete misunderstanding of the word 'wee', so another go around the spindle was deemed necessary. Obviously I had to wait a couple of weeks, just to make sure it wasn't going to magically unply itself a bit, but eventually I just got on and did it myself. Even now this yarn is still very tightly plied, but I don't have the heart to stick it back on the spindle a third time so it will have to do. There is just over 100m there, not sure on the weight yet.

Other than that, I have just begun to ply the first half of the merino tencel. I'm plying this a lot more loosely than the pink stuff and have no doubt that this will therefore be totally underplied. Hopefully by lowering my expectations this will turn out better than I hope!

And because I don't have enough on the go I have also started spinning some new fibre I got from World of Wool last week. It's an intriguing blend of merini bamboo and soybean, which I have to say looked way more purple on my screen when I ordered it, but apparently the world wants me to spin green yarn and who am I to argue.

Catch up

I’ve not had much time for blogging recently, which is a real shame, but with 80 days to go until the wedding there seems to always be something else which needs my attention.  For this reason I am really looking forward to Knitting and Crochet Blog Week at the end of the month, loads of  info here if anyone wants to join in.  This is particularly great for me at the moment, because having set topics to write about and knowing them in advance means that I can prepare for the posts in the shorts lulls in wedding preparation, rather than finding time to sit down and write a whole post in one go.  It does mean that I should really make sure that I am completely up to date with posts about my current projects, because it will be a week of writing about other things.  So with that in mind, this is the current state of all my spinning projects

Stripy black, white and grey merino, chugging along slowly

The sparkly bfl from FeltStudioUK, nearly 1/4 done and loving the sparkles

Merino tencel from FeltStudioUK, now on the second ply. this is sooo shiny

My knitting projects are all mostly hibernating, except for the wedding shrug which is growing slowly, I haven't taken a picture because it is still a white rectangle, just a bit longer than it was before.

And for the biggest project of all, the wedding, I have now purchased bridesmaids dresses and my shoes, my lovely lovely shoes!  The bridesmaids dresses are a rather surprising shade of blue – surprising in that I don’t really do blue and I was just so sure they would be pink.  Hey ho, best get off and rethink the flowers!

Small triumphs

Last weekend was crazy busy, I even took Friday off work and still felt like I had no time to sit still and just make stuff.  My wedding shrug still looks like a rectangle – albeit a slightly longer rectangle than before – and I still have many spindles half full of singles with no friends to be plied with.  There is one exception though,

 This is a teeny tiny skein made from that little bit of green fluff that came with my FeltStudioUk the other week.  I’m really pleased with it, even though it is only wee.  I didn’t bother to measure it and I haven’t checked to see what weight it is yet, but it looks like yarn and seems nicely balanced so I’m happy.  The more eagle eyed among you may notice that I’m posting about this finished yarn, yet I have made no mention of the sparkly pink stuff that was so very nearly finished a few posts back.  Well, I finished plying it, washed it and then it became very clear that my plying had been a little overenthusiastic.  A little trip back round the spindle to remove some of the plying twist is very much in order.  However when it is done I shall have just over a hundred metres of sparkly loveliness and I have most certainly learnt an invaluable lesson about plying twist.

Shrugging off the crazies

I'm still not really sure where my camera cable is so it's back to the crappy phone cam pictures.  Not ideal but I have actual knitting to share and no matter how beautifully I attempt to describe what is essentially a white fuzzy rectangle, I think a photograph is a much better medium.  So this is my wedding shrug in all it's white, fuzzy, rectangular glory.

So far I have done 4 repeats of the 21 needed for the main body of the shrug.  Each repeat is essentially 26 rows of stockinette with the odd short row thrown in for fun so this is fairly mindless - i.e soothing balm for a wedding addled brain.  For clarification the short rows are actually for shaping, not just fun!  They ensure that this piece forms a flat ring, like a running track, rather than just a loop, helping the garment sit nicely round the shoulders.  Now, I think I may have mentioned that I was knitting this in white with little silver sparklies, however when I tried to add the project to Ravelry I began to suspect that this was not the case.  I could find no such yarn in my virtual stash, there was white Kidsilk Haze and pale blue Kidsilk Night (with silver sparklies) but no white and sparkly.  So I went back to my actual stash and found that there was indeed some non sparkly white in there which when placed next to the sparkly stuff I was knitting with......

showed that I had indeed made a mistake.  The whiteness just makes the yarn I had been using look a bit grubby.  It's a very subtle difference, but I think I would have been so disappointed when I tried it on with my dress.  Thank heavens I had only knitted 30ish rows when I noticed.  So I've started again with the correct yarn, lets just hope I don't change my mind about my wedding dress and have to start again with a whole new colour!

In non wedding news, I have been spinning.  Having freed up a couple of spindles I started spinning both of the new braids I got the other day.  They both contain fibres I've not spun before and I'm enjoying the differences.  The merino tencel blend feels almost elasticy when I draft it, it's quite strange but I love the shine of the yarn I'm spinning.  The BFL is not so different to what I'm used to but I'm enjoying working with it, mainly because it's sparkly!

The ones at the front are the new ones.  I'm thinking I may need to find a bigger jar for my spindles!

Stress

I'm not one for stress, I don't enjoy it and I don't thrive off it like some so I try not to do it.  Yesterday the world seemed to have other ideas and I'm stressed about being stressed about things I don't want to stress about.  Marvellous.  However, while all around me were demanding answers about wedding cakes and cars and flowers and all manner of other matrimonial fripperies I had new fibre to play with.  Thank heaven for sheep.....and Etsy!  Cue terrible phone pics - I really need to find the cable to charge my camera!

So pretty...this is a merino and tencel blend which is so soft and smooth I kind of want to sleep on it and the colours are just irresistible.

This is BFL with sparkles, I've only spun merino so far so I thought I'd give BFL a go and these colours are fantastic - even if they do remind me of a shell suit I have in the 80s.  These are both by Daniela of FeltStudioUk and I can heartily recommend her.  The braids came so quickly and she has so many colours to choose from, plus she slipped this in my package too:

I don't know what fibre this is and I would never choose greens to buy, but it is so lovely that I started to spin it immediately - despite needing to finish plying the sparkly pink merino.  Oh well, I guess the heart wants what it wants - and right now any distraction can only be a good thing.

Exciting!

Even though I have been spinning since New Year, I haven't yet made a proper complete yarn to speak of.  Although I did spin a small sample and ply it (blogged here), that one doesn't really count.  As I've bought and made more spindles I've been starting more and more projects and ended up with loads of spindles full of singles, but no finished objects.  Given that this is the way I manage my knitting projects as well, this really shouldn't come as a surprise to me and I probably shouldn't try to fight it.  However, I have actually finished two matching singles and started to ply it last night.

I think I was so enchanted by the sparkles that I was spinning in with this that I just got on with and it will now be my first finished yarn, despite being the fourth one I started.  It's probably only about 20 grams of yarn, so just a little skein, but I already love it, my first born yarn!

A new spindle arrived yesterday, bought from this seller on eBay.  I like it a lot, it's pretty and spins nicely  for a long time.  The fibre I'm spinning on it is the lovely bright merino I got from Shunklies recently.  I've split it in half and I'm going to spin 50g as is, all the colours mixing together and for the second 50g I'm going to try and split the colours up a little and try and preserve some of the bright colourfulness of the top.  And maybe I might sneak some sparkles in there too - for motivation you understand!