Spinning and Winning

It’s so great to have another FO to blog about, and probably a shock to most of you that I’m posting so soon. Last post was knitting and now for spinning.

My wonderful friend Micki sent this lovely fiber to me as a “welcome to spinning” gift. I loved it when I saw it and loved it even more while I was spinning it.

hand dyed by: PigeonRoof Studios (etsy)
4.1 ounces corriedale
colorway: Dovecote

Spinning thin singles doesn’t seem to be a problem for me, so I did attempt to spin these singles a bit thicker, but staying consistent was more difficult than I thought it would be. Unfortunately there were some thin and thick spots throughout both bobbins of singles and I hoped plying would hide the flaws.

This is the first time I’ve spun yarn that when plied, gives a barberpole-like effect. If I would’ve known what I was doing, I probably could’ve split the fiber in a better way as to not have the same colored single occasionally end up plied together, but this is all a learning experience so it’s not like I’m disappointed. I think it looks pretty good for my fourth handspun skein of yarn.

After plying I checked the wpi (wraps per inch) and it was 18. After I washed, thwacked and hung the yarn to dry, it bloomed and ended up at 16 wpi.

2-ply sportweight
276 yards / 111 grams

Thus far, this is my favorite skein of handspun. I checked my Ravelry queue, and I think I’m going to make the Morning Surf Scarf featured in the current issue of Spin-Off magazine. I found another Raveler who knit the pattern in sport weight yarn casting on 26 sts with a size 3.25mm needle and only used 200 yards. I wonder if I cast on 36 sts if I’ll need more than the 276 yards that this skein has. Does anyone know how to calculate that or do I just jump right in and cross my fingers?

My latest yarn collecting came way by means of a contest. I don’t enter blog contests nearly as much as I used to, but this one caught my eye since it was for a skein of Wollemeise. I’ve repeatedly stalked The Loopy Ewe website during the “sneak-ups” to get my hands on some, but it’s all sold out by the time I get there. Thankfully Emma came to the rescue and put a skein of Wollmeise up as a prize for her blog contest and lucky me, I won.

yarn: Wollmeise Sockenwolle 80/20
colorway: Dani

There’s 574 yards in a 150 gm skein. Unbelievable! Thank you Emma for such a great prize

Laceweight Socks?

Just so you don’t think this is turning into a spinning blog, I do have an old FO to show you. It was started and completed within two days in the month of April. Behind a bit with my blog posting? Me?

I made it through three rounds of Sock Madness 2, and these are the last pair of socks I knit. By the way, I did make it through this round, I just chose not to continue with Round 4 since I was on vacation. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.

Pattern: Slippin’ Stripin’ Socks by Tina Lorin (Ravelry)
Yarn: Knit Picks Shadow: (1) skein Juniper, (1) skein Vineyard
Needles: Knit Picks Circular size 2.75 mm / US 2

Raveled Here

The yarn is laceweight. Yes, laceweight. There’s no cast on of 130 sts and size 00 needles because you are knitting with 2 strands of yarn held together, which in essence makes it fingering weight. The brilliance of the pattern is that you’re constantly changing the colorway of the 2nd strand of yarn. Not only does this give you great color variations, but will also hold your interest and attention. At least, it did mine.

For example, the ribbing is knit with 2 strands of colorway A, but for the next few rounds, you knit with one strand of colorway A and one strand of colorway B. After a few rounds of that, you drop the one strand of colorway A and add a second strand of colorway B. It goes on like this throughout the pattern and you have to pay attention to get the color sequences just right.

To make things easier on yourself, I recommend splitting your yarn skeins in half, although you can use the inside and outside strands of your skein to eliminate that extra step. Since I was knitting both socks at the same time (because I’m crazy like that), I had to split each of my skeins into these cute little yarn cakes. If you keep each socks yarn in its own plastic bag, it makes everything semi-manageable.

The designer was kind enough to release the pattern as a free Ravelry download, so I’m going to highly recommend you check it out. In fact, I may be knitting this again in the future and experiment a little with adding a 3rd or fourth color. I may even do it with handspun.

And before I forget, I’d recommend weaving your ends in as you go. I’d say trust me on this, but I think this photo speaks louder than words.

Even though I participated in Sock Madness for only 3 rounds, I must thank Carole and Hillary for putting together such a great competitive knit-along. Sock Madness 3 is scheduled to happen next year, so are any of you up to the challenge?

More Stash, Simple FO

Thanks to one of my wonderful blog readers, (anyone want to fess up?) they clicked on one of The Loopy Ewe links from my blog site, and then set up an account and purchased something. The Loopy Ewe gave me a credit for that, so of course I spent it (and then some). Now in my fiber and yarn stash I have a little more fiber:

The Dyeing Arts
100% Superwash Merino Wool
4 ounces
colorway: Mother of Pearl
lot: 041408

And a little more yarn

Rio de la Plata: Sock Multicolor
colorway: SP32
437 yards of fingering weight
According to the tag, the colors in this yarn are Wood Thrush, Crimson, Posy Green, Chestnut, Indian Teal, and Black. Personally, I just like that it looks handspun.

Dream in Color: Baby
colorway: Gothic Rose VB340
700 yards of lace weight

I have a few project around here that I’m tying up loose ends on, so in the FO department, this is all you get for now.

Project: Be My Dishcloth by Kristen Patay (Ravelry)
Yarn: Lily Sugar ‘n Cream Solid in Cream
Needles: Knit Picks Circular 3.25 mm / US 3

Of course this would look much better blocked, but to distract you from that, I’m going to send you off to Kristen’s Ravelry design page to check out her other dishcloth patterns. There’s not many there so I sure hope she adds more to her collection soon.

Although this dishcloth is cute, I must say I have favorites and they are this one and that one. In fact, I liked them so much, I kept them for myself. Anyone care to share their favorite dishcloth pattern?

Handspun – 2nd and 3rd time around

What to do? What to do? Write a blog post, or read all the blog posts I’ve neglected for the past 2 plus weeks? I suppose if I haven’t commented on your blog recently, and you’re reading this post, you’ll know what I chose.

I was going to post a few days ago, but somehow right before I hit the publish button, the entire body of my post (with photos) completely disappeared. The title was still there, but the entire body of the message was blank. Completely blank. Such a shame, because it was even an interesting post about socks knit with lacewieght yarn. When my sanity returns I’ll rewrite it, but for now I can only try to distract you with my very own handspun yarn.

What started out as this:

Fiber Source: Carolina Homespun
Fiber Content: 100% Corriedale Wool

Has now become this:

100% Corriedale Wool
2-ply
384 yards / 60 grams
Laceweight

Don’t let the photos fool you though. There are so many ends in this skein, it’s embarrassing. Since I’d heard so many stories of beginning spinners over-spinning their yarn, I ended up under-spinning mine. I quickly realized this when I was plying and the singles kept breaking over and over again. It’s quite infuriating. Believe me, I didn’t let that mistake happen again when I picked up this:

Fiber Source: Paradise Fibers
Fiber Content: Ashland Bay Multicolor merino wool top
Colorway: Forest
Weight: 4 ounces

And spun it into this:

100% Merino Wool
2-ply
400 yards / 98 grams
Fingering weight

This time there were no breaks in the singles so the plying went very well. The singles weren’t quite as even as the laceweight yarn, but I was attempting to make my singles a bit thicker. Maybe I should just stick with very thin singles and 3 ply everything. This skein is obviously far from perfect, but for skein number 3, I’m not unhappy.

And contrary to proof on my blog, I have been knitting. All the sample knitting has been completed and is in the designers hands. Both samples will be photographed for books coming out next year and one of the designers even said my knitting is superb. It doesn’t get any better than that!

Fiber Friends

Remember when Carole sent my that wonderful “welcome to spinning” package? Well, the welcome wagon has hit again and this time I received a package from Micki. I must confess I was half expecting to receive a package from her. She’d spun this beautiful pink, gold and white yarn and commented that she didn’t really like it. Of course I volunteered to take it off her hands and so she came up with a swap idea. If she sent me this yarn that she’d spun, then in the future I’d send her a skein of yarn I’d spun. It sounded like the perfect plan.

But when the package arrived, it was kind of fat. How could this only be one skein of yarn? Well, it wasn’t.

The first thing I found in the package was this beautiful fiber from Copperpot Woolies. It’s a fluffy and soft 4.2 ounces of merino and the colorway is called Beyond the Realm.

Next came another stunning fiber from PigeonRoof Studios. It’s got amazing color variations and is 4.1 ounces of corriedale in a colorway called Dovecote.

Last, and best of all, was Micki’s very own handspun, but this was not the handspun we’d agreed on for our swap. This handspun is made from fiber made at Crown Mountain Farms. This makes it especially precious because the Sock Hop Yarn from CMF is what started my interest in spinning. This is 360 yards of fingering weight 100% superwash merino (111 grams) in the colorway Good Vibrations.

Micki has only been spinning for about 6 months (if that) and this yarn is perfect. No, really it is. As soon as I can spin yarn that looks this good, then I’ll fulfill my end of the swap. Is a year or two too long?

In knitting news, I actually have been knitting. Unfortunately, I’ve been sample knitting for designers so I’m unable to share any photos until the patterns are released.

The one thing I have been madly working on since returning from vacation is this beautiful stole designed by my friend Laura. I’m honored to once again be asked to test-knit it (or did I *tell* her I was test knitting it?), but it was until yesterday that I noticed this:

When I put the two shawl ends together, one end of the shawl is much lighter in color than the other end. Obviously one skein of the Malabrigo got a lot more of the deep blue than the first skein I used. Drat. I’m not ripping back though. It’s going to be a design element.

Bay-kay-she-on

I wonder if the locals in Mexico enjoyed hearing me attempt Spanish as much as I enjoyed hearing the locals attempt English. My favorite word was vacation. When pronounced by a local, it sounded like “bay-kay-she-on”. I probably will forever refer to our vacations now as “bay-kay-she-ons”.

We had a full eight days of fun in the sun in San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas on the Baja Peninsula in Mexico. We rented a unit from an owner at the Coral Baja Resort which was recently acquired by Wyndham. We stayed in a one-bedroom unit with a full kitchen and living room, although most of the the time we were only there *sleeping*. Fortunately for us, the other family members staying there had the penthouse, so that ended up being the indoor hang out spot.

Day 1: Lets just say that I started off vacation by ending day one worshipping the porcelain god. On the upside, here was the view from our balcony I got to see the following morning:

Day 2: One of the water pipes for the pool burst, so most of the day was spent in the sun waiting for everything to get fixed. Luckily at 3pm everything was in working condition, just in time for the arrival of my step-daughter, son-in-law and grandkids.

Day 3 & 4: Nothing beats two days at the pool basking in the sun, drinking margaritas, and playing in the pool. I even managed to get in some sample knitting time under a big umbrella to keep me cool.

Day 5: Even though the guys got to spend many hours golfing, that afternoon we hung out at Santa Maria beach. I love this photo. I think my step-daughters family is so cute… even from behind.

Day 6: We drove into Cabo San Lucas and spent that day at the Mango Deck Beach Club at Medano Beach. Initially the local vendors that come up to you every 5 minutes asking you to buy their *junk* are annoying, but after a few beers, margaritas, and shots, you don’t really care anymore and somehow you are convinced to buy stuff. We definitely came home that afternoon with our fair share of t-shirts, hats, and silver jewelry.

We also participated in a competition called “Name That Movie”. The DJ would play 3 seconds of a song and you’d have to guess what movie it was from. The winning movie was guessed by yours truly (Dr. Zhivago). Of course, when the prize winning bucket of beer and tequila shots were delivered to our group, hubby and I were off checking out the Arch and Lovers Beach on a jet ski. Unfortunately FMS had reared its ugly head that day and even with a *little* bit of alcohol, I only felt well enough for a 10-minute ride. Thankfully our 3-yr-old grandson is fearless, so he finished up my ride with his grandpa.

Day 7: The guys were off again by themselves early this morning to try their hand at fishing. When all was said and done, we had 2 Tuna, 4 Halibut and 1 Red Snapper. Since the penthouse had a BBQ on the patio, we had quite the fish feast for dinner and the men were all smiles that they *provided* dinner for the evening.

That afternoon when they’d returned from fishing, the resort had a beer drinking contest and not only did my step-daughter beat out her husband, but she beat out everyone and won! Her daddy was so proud.

Day 8: For whatever reason, we got a late start and only got to spend a few hours at Chileno Beach.

This beach is by far the best in the area and we collected lots of sea glass, saw tiny black crabs climbing the rocky areas, and wished we’d had time to snorkel. There are a lot of amazing fish to see in that water and we will definitely make this beach a must-visit when we return to Cabo in the future.

In the afternoon we went shopping at the town closest to us, San Jose del Cabo. We had a great time going through all the shops and was caught off guard a bit by all the Dia de la Muerte items for sale. I know it’s a big part of Mexican tradition, but it was still a bit surprising. Mixed in with the local downtown shopping area, was the Mission of San Jose del Cabo Anuiti which was founded in 1730.

But our best find of the day was the Tropicana Inn. This is a beautiful hotel and restaurant with absolutely amazing food. The grandkids were fascinated by the lobster tank in the center of the restaurant, but only the eldest was brave enough to touch one.

Day 9: Today was my son-in-laws 40th birthday, (so weird that he’s a year older than me), so the morning was spent at the pool and the afternoon was spent in Cabo San Lucas for shopping and dinner. He requested to have dinner at Mi Casa, the same restaurant he and his wife ate at when they came here for their honeymoon.

Everything we ate and drank were complete perfection from the homemade corn tortillas

to the huge margaritas that are the best I’ve ever had. And believe me, I’ve had my fair share of margaritas during my life.

Not only was our son-in-law given birthday “cake” for dessert, but they also poured a shot of I-don’t-know-what down his throat and then shook his head a few times.

It was a wonderful evening of good food and drinks with family and I’ll never forget it.

Day 10: That morning we spent watching the grandkids play in the pool, and that afternoon we found ourselves saying goodbye and headed off to the airport.

It was a wonderful vacation, but I must say I missed my dogs, my home, and my spinning wheel. So if you don’t see me around the blogs for a few days, you know where I’ll be.

Fly-By Post

I just wanted to give you all a quick post to remind you that I’m leaving on vacation (in 6 hours) for ten days and I may or may not have internet access. If I do, I’ll probably tease share with you a photo or two of the beach or a tropical drink or my toes in the water. If I don’t, then things will be pretty quiet around here or awhile.

That reminds me, my airplane knitting will be this lovely skein of yarn.  If you like knitting with laceweight yarn, or are interested in trying it, you must get your hands on some of this. It’s Malabrigo Lace and if you’ve ever knit with Malabrigo before, I promise you’ll love this just as much … maybe more. Each skein is 470 yards / 50 grams and although I know The Loopy Ewe carries it, they didn’t have the colorway I wanted, so I purchased mine from Twist. I recommend both of these places without hesitation. They really know how to put the customer first. This particular colorway is Taureg and I’m using it to test knit another stunning stole design by Laura. I’m so lucky.

Fabulously Felted

I’m so late in getting this post out, but things are crazy here. I’m leaving for vacation Friday morning and since I lost 25 pounds since last year at this time, none of my summer weather clothing fits. I’m not complaining about having to shop for clothing in a smaller size, it’s just that since I have 15 more pounds to go, these will just be in-between clothes, so it kind of feels like a waste of money. Money that could be spent on fiber.

Pattern: Felted Clogs by Bev Galeskas
Source: Fiber Trends
Yarn: Knit Picks Wool of the Andes; (2) skeins Black Cherry Heather, (4) skeins Gray Heather
Needles: Knit Picks Options 9.0 mm / US 1
Ravelry: My Clogs

After seeing Lynda’s fabulous clogs, I decided it was finally time to felt mine. I’d knit them in November, but didn’t have any clue how to successfully felt them, so they sat with the other UFO’s that I’m trying to ignore. I didn’t want all my hard work to be ruined by doing something stupid in the felting process. I sent Lynda an email to find out if there were any special instructions for felting things that must fit on your foot. Unfortunately it was as I expected and I had to try on the wooly wetness of my clog a time or two (or three in my case) to insure I didn’t over-felt it.

I tossed them both into a zippered pillow cover, filled the machine with hot water and let them agitate for 10 minutes. This was most definitely not enough time, and I returned them to the agitation cycle for another 5 minutes. I then noticed that one was smaller than the other, so I left it out and put the other one in the machine for a few minutes. When I checked it, that one was the perfect size and the other one was too big, so back in it went for 2 minutes. Perfect! I did find out later however, that when felting multiple pieces of a project (such as TWO clogs), each item should be put in a separate bag. This helps them felt more evenly as mine had not in certain places that I will not point out. I formed them to my feet (more or less) and set them out to dry for two days.

I had no idea they were going to be as comfortable as they are and the double sole makes them very cushy. I wouldn’t hesitate to make a lot more of these for family and friends.  I most definitely won’t have trouble figuring out holiday gifts this year.

By the way, don’t go to WEBS to check out their annual anniversary sale, you may end up finding something like this on your doorstep a few days later:

(Click on photo for link to Flickr with all the yarn information)

Friends and Frenzy

A few weeks ago, my wonderful friend Carole surprised me with a package of rovings and a sweet card welcoming me to the world of spinning. The roving I noticed immediately was this one:

This is 100% Wool (label doesn’t say what kind of wool) from Knit One Spin Two. Although the natural BFL I showed in my last post was easy to spin, the bright green color of this roving could be seen clearly which makes it perfect for the beginning spinner. I know personally how much it helped me spin more consistent singles. I’ve only spun one bobbin of this and I think I may use it a practice to try Navajo Plying.

Also included in the package was 4 ounces of this amazing merino/bamboo fiber hand dyed by Spunky Eclectic. The colorway is Walking on the Sun, and it’s even more beautiful in person. I haven’t spun it up yet, because I’m not sure how different spinning the bamboo fiber will be. I’d like to have a bit more practice with the BFL and Corriedale I have in my fiber stash so that I don’t waste a bit of this.

Since the first day, I have been inspired by the stunning yarn that Micki has been spinning on her Lendrum wheel. She has been enabling helping me by making recommendations of where I can purchase beautiful rovings to spin. Within the matter of a few days, my doorstep was no longer being graced with packages filled with yarn, but with packages of rovings from Paradise Fibers, Wolly Treasures, and Crown Mountain Farms. I’ve already started spinning the fiber from Paradise Fibers, which is 4 ounces of this beautiful Ashland Bay merino top in the Forest colorway.

Photos of the other rovings will be shared as I spin them, but for those of you who don’t want to wait, check out my Flickr Spinning Set.

I know it’s hard to tell, but lately there has been more knitting going on around here than spinning. The problem is, I can’t show you everything I’ve been knitting. The only project I can show you is the beautiful blue blob which is another test-knit for my friend Laura. The project doesn’t have a name quite yet, and there will be two other knitters joining in, but since I was waiting for my sample knit pattern to arrive, I cast on and knit this as quick as I could. I’m only halfway through the stole, not including the border, but I have to stop now and work on the sample knits so it will look like this for a few weeks I’m afraid. By the way, this is Malabrigo Lace yarn in Taureg, and it’s every bit as soft as the Malabrigo worsted in my stash. Do you know how tempting it is to knit lace undergarments in this?

The knitting items I can’t show you are my sample knits. I met the designer at TNNA and told her I’d be thrilled to test or sample knit for her and after some email correspondence that followed, she agreed to send me a sample to knit as a trial to see how well we worked together and more obviously how well I could or couldn’t knit. When she received the first sample knit she said she loved it and asked if I could do two more for her this month. I feel so flattered and lucky to have this opportunity, and it has given my “cute knitting hobby” some credibility with family and friends since now I’m being paid to sample knit. Unfortunately for you, there will be no photos until the designs have been released.

So currently I have two sock samples due by the end of this month and I’m trying to get them both finished before next Friday when I leave on vacation for 10 days. I’ve also made it to the next round of Sock Madness and the next round starts tonight. In fact the email with the pattern should be arriving in my inbox at anytime. Oh crap, that reminds me, I’ve got to go wind those skeins of yarn which might take a minute or two or twenty since this round is a pair of socks in laceweight yarn in two different colorways. Yikes! Don’t even get me started on how much house cleaning, vacation preparation, emails, and voice mails that are being neglected. Aren’t you surprised I found time to squeeze in another blog post so soon? I’m still in my pajamas though if that gives you any clue as to what got skipped today so that a blog post could be written. You’re all worth it.

You spin me right around

About a month ago, my beautiful spinning wheel was christened when I had my first spinning lesson from Lori Lawson of Capistrano Fiber Arts. Lori made me feel at ease instantly, and since I’d practiced treadling slow and steady for a few days, the only thing I really had to pay attention to were my hands. I’m not sure how to describe the feeling of spinning yarn other than to say it was magical. I was a bit surprised that it felt semi-natural, like it was something I had done before. The only thing I can equate it to is the feeling you get when you do something that you learned many years ago, but haven’t done in a long time, like riding a bike. At first it feels a bit awkward trying to remember about the balancing and steering and pedaling, but after a few minutes of riding, it all comes back to you. That’s what spinning for the first time felt like to me.

I credit most of my ease to Lori, because I really believe that if you have good equipment and a good instructor, you’ll learn a lot quicker and easier. Lori is an amazing instructor and after seeing her beautiful dyeing, spinning and knitting, I knew I was learning from a master artist. In fact, if you’re looking for beautifully hand-dyed fiber (yarn and roving) or handspun yarn from her hand-dyed roving, check out her etsy site.

At the end of my first day of spinning, I had this:

And at the end of the second day of spinning, I had this:

And then, when I filled another bobbin and plied them together, I got this:

Fiber: BFL (Blue Faced Leicester) in Natural
2 ply
330 yards
90 grams

It’s obviously not perfect, but it is my first handspun so I’m proud of it. It’s also not quite thin enough to be sock yarn, although it is close. I have no idea what to do with it though. Right now it’s sitting on the bookcase attached to my desk. For those of you who spin, what did you do with your first handspun? What do all of you knitters think I should do with mine?

And before I forget, I’m going to try and post a couple of times this week and next to try and get caught up. I have so many things to show and tell you, but if I don’t get them all posted here before I go on vacation in 10 days, they’ll probably never get shared.