Vortex Crafting

-21F air temperature and -50 wind chill.  School was cancelled for the past couple of days, and I chose to hunker down in the house and cook, clean, sort and most importantly craft.

I am trying to dedicate myself this year to finishing as many long ignored projects as possible.  One at a time.  If I no longer like them, or think that they will not fit, I am prepared to frog them, no matter how far along.  Last year I did fairly well at starting to attack some of these projects, and I must admit that it felt really good.  Not only does it clean up my crafting space, but clears up unwanted craft baggage.

First I decided that I needed to finish this shawl.

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I started it in the late summer of 2015, and was moving along nicely.  That is until I ran out of the handspun yarn.  Being a gradient, I needed to order an additional 2 braids to finish it.  While waiting, I lost focus, and had little time for spinning up the yarn needed.

Here is where it has sat for over 4 years, I am ashamed to admit.  The color is Thistle, a gradient by my favorite dyer, Fiber Optic.

So, while it took a bit of re-education, I finally spun the additional 2 braids over the past couple of weeks, making great progress while housebound.

Plying will happen tomorrow, I tried it tonight, but without adequate light and patience, I gave up.  I will have to learn to finesse my Jensen spinning wheel again.  Then, I had to find the pattern, as it was separated from the project (what a mistake, I always think that I will just be picking it up again in a day or so), luckily I had blogged about it here so know that it was the Pulelehua shawl.  Butterfly in Hawaiian.  Surprisingly I had purchased this pattern, which is unusual for me to not just knit something from a book that I own.  I am now anxious to ply the yarn and get this finished.  The pattern is gorgeous, which I am sure is why I chose it.

My other project the past couple of days, has been to finish this picnic blanket and napkins.  This was left when a friend of a friend passed away; all it really needed was the binding sewn on.  Of course I had to relearn how to do the mitered corner, as it has been years since I have sewn on a quilt binding.

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And here is always a helper at hand, wanted or not.

I have a couple of more free days before work and reality set back in.  This has been a nice respite, and I am happy that I am focusing on being productive with the time.

And staying toasty warm inside.  Hope everyone is safe in this cold weather.

My Best Model

My beautiful Granddaughter.  I made several sweaters for her before she was born, and this Baby Surprise jacket has proven to be my DIL’s favorite.  I need to make a Totem for her next.  I also have some Dale of Norway Fair Isle sweaters in the waiting to take out next time we visit.

The hat pattern has received several inquiries.  It took a bit of sleuthing, but I finally found the pattern.  It is a Dale of Norway baby book #129

And the pattern is #12908

Here she is in the baby surprise jacket when she was a lot smaller!

Wisconsin Sheep & Wool Revisited

Finally, after a 4 year hiatus, I was able to return with Dan to the Wisconsin Sheep & Wool Festival (why do people always want to get married on this weekend?!).  We drove up and back in one day, something that we are not going to repeat, it is so much more enjoyable to stay overnight and not have the nighttime driving.  It was a long day, but fun.

 

Sheep judging, interesting as always

 

There was a different sheep shearer than we had seen in the past.  Amazing how docile the sheep get when put on their backs.

And we got to see a new sheep breed being introduced to the US, Valais Blackness, a breed from Switzerland.  Look at that fleece!  Apparently it is a coarse wool, I wonder if it is like Churro sheep.  This was the hit of the fair for breeders.  They are so cute also.

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We also watched the sheep dog trials, which is so fascinating.  I am not sure how they train the dogs so well.  My photos were not great of that event.

And then, on to the market.  The first year that I went to this event in 2010, the market overwhelmed me.  I was a brand new spinner, taking my first class up there, and picking up my first wheel, the Ashford traditional.  That didn’t stop me from ogling over other wheels at the fair.  There were several vendors selling wheels, and so many with big bags of beautiful fleece and roving that you could buy in whatever quantity you chose.  By the next year, I had my eye on a Jensen wheel that was on display at the fair, and finally got it that winter,  I still love my Jensen.  The Traditional was sold right after I got the Jensen, and I still have my Ashford Joy for traveling, both great wheels.

The market, while still occupying both of the large barns, was different.  There were the weaving and knitting and dyed fleece, but much less emphasis on spinning and I only saw one vendor with 2 big bags of roving.  That was a bit of a disappointment for me.

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Fiber Optic, my favorite dyer for roving was there, as they have been for the last several years.  I hesitate to admit how much of her roving I have in my stash waiting to be spun up, so I was not looking at that.  However, I have never knit with her sock yarn, and this seemed like a good time to purchase it, especially after my Clown Barf experience.  The owner, Kimber Baldwin, has a degree in Chemistry, and a great sense of color.  Plus, if you don’t like the outcome you can call her and return it!

Their yarn seems to be more popular now than the roving.  One day I will make it down to her shop, which looks amazing.  I purchased yarn for 3 pairs of socks.  the deep red/brown color is what Dan chose for himself.

I have already wound up the multi-color.

My purchases also were for my Ravelry birthday twin, and then a new book for myself:

It is a lovely book, and I looked through it thoroughly.  Happily adding it to my stitch dictionary collection.

 

 

Izumi

On December 19th, my beautiful Granddaughter, Izumi was born.  We were fortunate to arrive the next day and to stay near her for 2 weeks.  Ours will be a long distance relationship, coupled with sharing photos and videos, Skype and visits as often as feasible.

Last Fall I had made 3 sweaters for her to give at the baby shower.  One of them was this Elizabeth Zimmerman Baby Surprise sweater.  This was knit with my handspun yarn from a few years ago.  I love how the thick and thin yarn worked out on this.  And the square buttons were the perfect touch.

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So, on New Years day, my daughter-in-law and son brought Izumi to visit at our Air BnB, and she was sporting this sweater.  I think that the colors look beautiful on her.

It has plenty of room to grow into, but worked perfectly on a 2 week old.  It makes me happy to see her in it.

I know that every parent/grandparent thinks that their baby is beautiful, but she is just gorgeous, and has been since birth.

And here is the proud Papa.

Gorgeous Gradient

I finished spinning this gradient from Zebisis Designs a couple of weeks ago.

This was the final product, 850 yards of 2ply, 3.5 ounces. On the skein winder the colors really show well :

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It was cool when I washed this so it sat to dry on the bathroom radiator.

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And, it sat skeined up like this until today.

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It was time to wind it, and now I am looking for the perfect pattern.  I really want a rectangular scarf/shawl so that each color will take up approximately the same width.

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The colors show really accurately.  What I cannot show is how incredibly soft and squishy this yarn is, the 50% silk not only makes the colors vibrant and saturated, but gives a sheen and softness to the yarn.

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The perfect pattern search is on, no applied border, that way I can keep the colors intact. Any suggestions?

Thistle

After sitting for many months on my spinning wheel, most of the winter in fact, these braids finally got finished. The color is Thistle from Fiber Optic.

When the plying was done, and I pulled the skeins off the skein winder, this is what they looked like:

Notice the green, which was the first spun, twisted the most upon plying.  Not to fear though, a nice hot bath, some snapping and hang in to dry produced a very beautiful yarn.

Total yardage: 1,070.  I thought that my spinning was very fine, but this seems to be my usual as of late.  At least the colors were a perfect match from braid to braid, and I had very little left over on 1 bobbin.  My thought is another faroese shawl, or perhaps something long and lean.

Rainbow Groove

This morning I woke up to several inched of surprise snow on the ground, and only a couple of days after the first day of Spring!  Not happy.  So, this bright post will remind me of what is sure to be around the corner: colors and flowers and sun.  My knitting and spinning has been on a total Rainbow groove, I originally called it a rut, but my friend Andi from SnB said that there is no way that rainbows are a rut.  Is it my desire for spring, or just need for more color in my life?

First I knit with this amazing yarn, Monkey socks in progress.

Which inspired the purchase of this fiber:

Which prompted me recently to go to Knitterly Things, and look at her beautiful self-striping yarns, they have been on my radar for a long time.  So, my splurge included this Vesper Sock yarn, I was originally going to get another rainbow, but opted for a more serene color palate:

And, while I was there, these mini wee-skeins called to me to be knit up into something hopefully creative…

And for a true rainbow, I am making the Dot socks from the Vogue Sock Knitting on the go:

Here is my cuff, using JaWoll Sock yarn for this:

And to be totally forthright, as I was organizing and cleaning my stash today, I forgot that I had purchased this last fall at Wisconsin Sheep and Wool from River’s Edge Fiber Arts…

Happy Spring everyone!

All done but the buttons

I have finally finished my first handspun and hand knit sweater using Woolgatherings fiber.  The process from fiber to sweater was fun.  I first spun the variegated as a 3ply,

Then I ordered and spun 2 plys of eggplant and one of rust as my semi-solid contrast. My problem here was that my spinning was not as fine with the semi-solid as it was with the variegated. After that, and a couple of false starts with patterns, my friend Jane suggested the February Ladies Sweater.  It was the perfect match.  I was able to most of my semi-solid to maximize the length.

Then I needed to choose buttons.  These were the 2 choices that I had on hand.

Even though there is no green in the fabric, I think that it made the best option, pulling out the other colors.

Problem is that the buttons are a bit too heavy for the drape of the sweater.  I will be on the lookout for something similar though.  The 3/4 length sleeve is just right.  If I were to restart this sweater I would have fractally spun the variegated so has not to have the long concentrations of pooling.  That said, I do love the colors, and the fibers were a dream to spin.

 

Two Nancies

After a weekend at Vogue Knitting Live, our local yarn shop Knit Nirvana hosted Nancy Bush and Nancy Marchant on Monday evening for show and tell, wine and book signing.  Nancy and Nancy both showed examples from their books in a mini fashion show.  I forgot to take my camera, so consequently these photos are with my cell phone, I took more of people’s feet than anything else!

Nancy Bush is the Estonian expert; lace, socks and history.  She is a great teacher I have taken classes from her in the past.  Some of these models I have seen prior, but always so worth seeing again.  These are mostly from her book Knitted Lace of Estonia:

Nancy Marchant is the Brioche lady.  I was not familiar with her, or her books, but as I was leaving, the thought came to me that I had knit a Brioche hat, and sure enough it was a Nancy Marchant pattern from the Vogue Hats book. 

 

Brioche is essentially Fisherman’s rib, but with a pattern attached.  Consequently it is very soft and squishy, warm but light weight, and most importantly reversible.  This was made with 2 very different handspun yarns.  I like the purple side facing the best.

Here is Nancy showing one of her lovely scarves.  Apologies again for the very poor photo.

She has her first book,  Knitting Brioche that was previously published,

and a new hot off the presses one that was at the store.  I gave the copy I had in hand to someone else, always other opportunities.

 

Nancy M also has a Brioche scarf in the upcoming Holiday issue of Vogue.  Applying Brioche to lace knitting.

A couple of her scarves were with gradients, which got me to thinking….

Just for Ria

I was going to title this Baby Ria, as that is what we all called her this summer on vacation.  But, she is no longer a baby, and that is a title that I think that she would like to not have carry over.  So, I finally finished the sweater for Toddler Ria, and sent it off last week.  It arrived, and I received a lovely video of her trying to put it over her head.

 

Totem jacket with handspun yarn…