Late Snow

I'm plugging away on the tricksy sweater today, and haven't yet cast on for the posie cozy. To avoid more photos of endless brown stockinette, I'm going to turn to my spinning for help. I made several batts a couple of days ago, after reading Yarn Harlot's post about feeding fiber into a drum carder sideways. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one, who put down her tea and made a mad dash for the drum carder. After a few experiments, I've discovered that this works for carding, but not so well for blending. While I was up in the spinning hole, I discovered some other experimental batts I'd made out of tussah silk. I thought, in a mad scientist sort of way, "What would happen if I threw all of these experiments together?"....



I'm naming them April Snow. I loathe a late frost, but a little bit of late snow is rarely as damaging. I think these look just like a new lawn with a layer of popcorn snow. The photo is not doing them justice. That green is a two tone electric kelly green. I would show you a photo of what they look like spun up, but frankly it's in an ugly duckling sort of phase. I'm planning on a two ply, one ply solid dark green, the other April Snow. So instead of the prepubescent yarn, I'll show you another photo of a series of batts that I blended for long subtle color transitions.



I used four shades of green merino top, and a little angora. Again, the photo is way off. They're much less yellow in person. I was thinking of this hat. I'm not sure if I'll actually use it for a hat. More than likely, I'll make some mitts out of it. It's almost spring, but I'm not giving up on my winter knits just yet.
I'm noticing a huge difference between the color of my pictures, and the color of them after they've been compressed for the blog. I'm going to see if I can fix this, or if maybe my tech support husband can fix it for me.

A Very Little Bit of Sky

About a month ago I received a small package of scoured kid mohair. After a bit of sorting and carding, I ended up with two piles, a very small pile of locks, and a very big pile of fiber for blending. I'd been interested in trying to learn how to spin the locks (with some other carded fiber) into a bit of novelty yarn. I've never been a big fan of the novelty yarns. They're just not my bag, but I love learning new things, and I really wanted to do something with those perfect little white curls.
I started out by blending about 70% baby blue merino wool, with about 30% white angora. As I spun the single I added in the locks here and there. The end result was much better than I could have expected. I'm new to spinning, and I'm still so astonished by the fact that I can make yarn, that I tend to baby my little handspun treasures. I know that in a couple of years the magic will probably have worn off, and I'll scoff at my early efforts. But life is short, and I'm going to revel in this part of my relationship with spinning........ now, let's get back to the hat. After staring at the little ball for a month, I finally screwed up the courage to make something with it. Here's my "Summer Sky Baby Hat".

It's not quiet done. I'm still searching for a couple of bird buttons to complete it. There seem to be no shortage of babies in my life, so I'm sure it will find a good home as soon as I get my hands on some buttons. I think Etsy may be the answer. I need to do some button snooping.
There's actually another baby hat that I made out of my first attempt at Navajo plying.


There's something a little sad about this hat. It's been living in the bottom of my knitting basket for a couple of months now. I'm not sure what it's missing, maybe some knitted/crocheted leaves, or possibly a little felt mushroom. I just don't know.

First Steps and First Flowers

So, I don't have a lot of knitting to talk about today. We had a slow sunny day, spent eating fig cake with friends. The baby began walking on his own, and as if that wasn't enough, I saw both violets and crocus poking up from the ground. The closest I can get to dragging this blog back to knitting, is to give you a picture of some new handspun in a very spring like color. It's three colors of merino blended together with some white angora. I think it likes my chair.

Medieval Extra

My husband's birthday is always too close to Christmas for comfort. This year I was caught with my proverbial pants around my ankles. Being a knitter I tried to salvage the situation with a woolly offering. This year, my husband is going to get a custom spun, custom knit, sweater pattern of his choosing...a masterpiece. We've been debating the sweater in question for years. He hates cables, yokes, sleeves without cuffs, and embellishment of any sort. The color must be something that will blind me with it's dreary manly monotonous blah. Miles of stockinette stitch awaited my already heavy needles. To try and salvage what I thought was going to be a very, very boring part of my knitting life, I turned to Elizabeth Zimmerman. I'd been wanting to try her devilishly clever sweater formula ( found here ) for years, and so, with pattern approved, we went stash diving. I have bags of beautiful wool, in all sorts of colors, but my sweet husband went for a pile of old brown Corridale from my early spinning days. No doubt, he thought he was saving me some time. It's a bulky yarn, a bit over spun, and not all the skeins are the same weight of yarn. "Are you sure?", I asked him. He was sure. This was the perfect combination of pattern and wool.

I'm not so sure. I had pictures of a softer, finer, tweedy creation, something that was understated, yet elegant. He has promised to wear this sweater at every opportunity. It's going to be a sort of billboard, advertising my knitterly love. I'm deeply conflicted. There is a part of me that likes to show off. It's not a small part. The part of me that likes to show off is in a fight with the part of me that tries not to care. It's his sweater. He loves it, and yet, yet....it's reminiscent of something from the set of a period piece about the ravages of the plague. This over spun brown bag with a slight halo is one for the ages. It's never going to wear out. I know in my bones that he'll wear that thing every day, and it will only grow stronger from my secret desire to destroy it. This might explain why it's taking me so long to finish it. Every time I pick up the needles it practically knits itself. EZ's pattern is making for a perfect fit, and that sneaky medieval evil sweater has already grown a body and a very long arm.
I finally plucked up the courage to show it to my knitting group. There was a brave silence, before people began with the gentle encouragement. They are truly a lovely bunch of ladies, but they are liars, every one.