How The West Was Spun

Spinning Friday: Kandinsky Batts

Thanks to our snowstorm last weekend, I had some quality time with the spinning wheels.  I finished up the Kandinsky batts from Lori's Oceanwind Knits' Fibre Club.

The original batts looked like:

I spun this up as a 2-ply, attempting to keep the color blocks pretty distinct, and I think I mostly succeeded.  The batts were a blend of dyed Corriedale and merino wool, and silk.

I wound up with a total of 256 yards/3 ounces of fingering-weight yarn (approximately 15 wpi).  I varied my spinning technique while spinning, as the russet color and the green were Corriedale, which needed more of a worsted-type control, whereas the blended section in the middle, I could spin more with a backward draft style.  There were a few sections that had a bit more silk in them than others which I had to stop and open up a bit, as they wanted to try to draft in clumps, but this was handled pretty easily.  I spun the batts (and there were 2 equal ones in the club package) from russet to green.  I stripped the batts each into 5 more or less even pieces, so as to be sure to keep the beginning and ending colors distinct.  The middle sections blend more, but that's sort of to be expected, as the fibers/colors in this section were more blended to begin with.

 

The colors, I think, are truest in this last picture, and give you a sense of the progression of the colors throughout.  I thought this might be pretty as a leaf-patterened lace scarf, sort of a spring to fall thing, although having just finished my other scarf, I think this will need to marinate a while, as I'm not quite ready to deal with slogging through another scarf at this point.

All for now....

Stop the Presses!

I feel sure the entire knitter's blog universe is well aware of the Red Scarf Project.  You are, aren't you?

Everyone reads Norma. But just in case you maybe missed her post, what with the holiday festivities for Thanksgiving here in the US, the Red Scarf project is really in need of some more scarves!

The deadline is December 15th, but I checked with Norma, and she says it's okay if they are a coupla-few days beyond that.  Now, today is only the 3rd.  I feel SURE you have a skein or two of DK or worsted yarn, and it doesn't even have to be red, lurking in your stash.  Go look right now - I'll wait here for you.

See.  Told ya.  I knew you would.  Me too.  So even though I had a lot of project knitting planned as per my WIP post, I'm setting all that aside and I've got my scarf on the needles. 

Here's hoping you can find a few spare knitting moments to get yours on the needles too!

All for now....
 

WIP Wednesday: December 2, 2009

Project #1:  Loppem Cardigan

I'm zipping along on this.  I have finished the cabled portion of the body and added the sleeves.  I'm up to the first 2 rows of the neck yoke, and my next step is to add the bottom buttonhole.  I finally ordered buttons, and since they are hand-made, thought I'd better wait to be sure I've worked the buttonholes the correct size, to prevent any more frogging than I have to.

Goal:  If my buttons arrive in time, I'm going to try to finish this up.  I just have the yoke left to knit. 

Project #2: (New!) Pink Crush Socks

I'm going to tackle another UFO once my sweater is done, but I decided I needed a pair of socks on the needles.  These are from The Joy of Sox book. The original pattern is "Blue Crush", but since I'm knitting these in pink... well... Pink Crush it is!

The yarn is FiberOptics merino sock yarn, in the colorway "Honeysuckle Rose".

Goal:  Knit down to the heel flap.

All for now.

FO: Flutter Scarf

Geez - finally!  Took me 10 months to knit this?  So say Ravelry, so it must be true.  Anyway... D is for Done, as a college prof used to say.

 

Project Specs:
Pattern:  Flutter scarf by Miriam Felton. This is a great first-time lace project.  There's really nothing here that's difficult.  You have to pay a bit of attention to the M1 increases for the ruffles, but the rest is a lot of repetition of 4 rows to make the lace/eyelet pattern.
Yarn:  My handspun, a 50% merino/50% tencel laceweight, single-ply.  The original roving was from Funky Carolina in the "Waterlilies" colorway. I am totally enchanted with the subtle color shifts in this and I sorta thought the ruffled edging reminded me of the edges of the lilypads.
Needles:  Size 3 US
Mods:  None on purpose - oops.  I did 55 repeats of the pattern on each end, rather than 50, as called for in the pattern.  Wound up working out just fine.  I had plenty of yarn, and I like the added length.
Notes:  As usual, another nicely written pattern from Mim.  The little details, like the swooping shape of the increases for the ruffles, really make it for me.  Easy written directions plus charts.  I'm quite happy with the yarn as well.  I spun the singles without a ton of twist, to keep the yarn soft, but it wasn't splitty to knit with.  It has a fantastic drape to it with the tencel component.

 

I liked this fiber blend enough, I'm thinking of spinning it up similarly for a few other lace scarf patterns I like.  Not anytime soon, mind you... but when I get a hankering for another scarf project.

All for now.....
 

Digger Here - Checking In!

Dear Sam and Bhen:

Boy!  I am having so much fun.  Bet you guys are gonna be jealous when you hear all the neat stuff I've been doing in the last couple of weeks.

This weekend, I went to a gaited horse clinic.  We worked on flexibility, but y'all know, I have no problems with that!  They call me Mr. Pretzel!  The trainer said I was a really good boy which I knew already.  I had some trouble cantering, but I think it's because we were in an arena.  I hate arenas.  Hate em.  Maybe Cindy will let me try out on the trail next time.

Friday, I hosted a BIG trail ride with 50 horses.  I didn't really like the crowds, but I still went out and had a great ride all around Phoenix.  Whew - it was hot though!  I still have on my winter coat, but this place is like summer all the time!  (Ha ha, Bhen, I heard you got more snow this weekend!).

My favoritest day tho was the day Cindy and I went to the obstacle course/clinic.  I told her I really didn't need any practice.  I was an expert in obstacles, but she said I had to prove it to her.  So of course I did.

Here's me totally rockin' the bridge.  Pfft.  I've done like a gazillion of these before.

And then we went and walked around these pole things.  I've done that before too.  I know how to watch where my feet are supposed to go.  I told her this was all way too easy for me!

 
 
Then, I got to drag this neat piece of PVC pipe along the ground.  It made a weird whistling noise, which scared some of the other horses, but it didn't bother me.  In fact, even when it wasn't my turn to work with the pipe, I wanted to try to chase it.

Finally, we did my favoritest thing - the "car wash".  Boy, I love hangsy-downsy bits.  I just pushed my nose right thru that and kept on walking.  A lot of other horses wouldn't even try it without being coaxed, and I told Cindy we should go over and show them how to do it right, but she told me we shouldn't make the other horses look bad, especially since a bunch of other people were making a big fuss over what a good boy I am.  Several of them even told Cindy they'd snap me up and take me home with them, but I think I'm gonna stick with Cindy for a while.  She told me that we could go to the police academy training course in January for another obstacle clinic - but this one's got smoke and explosives and other scary things - so I'd better stay with her so I can go do that!

 

That's it from here guys.   I'm taking a break for a few days, but we are doing another trail ride next weekend!

Love, Digger