Postcard: Spinning Samples – Knitted

For more information on the samples read TomofHolland’s post on Wool Types and Heather’s post on her Fibrary. More photos on Flickr.

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Knitting and Spinning from 2013

I find it useful to write a wrap up to see what I made in the last 12 months. It looks very impressive this way.

Project 1: Wild Color Hunter Mittens

Yarn: Made from hand-spun. The fiber was purchased in 2011 at New Hampshire Sheep and Wool from Mad Colors in the Wildside color way. I spun using my Bosworth’s mini making a 3 ply light weight fingering yarn.
Needles: 2.75 mm
Pattern: Self designed
Finished: Feb 2013

Project 2: Touch of Silk 3 ply skein

Yarn: Hand-spun from silk cap from Touch of Twist in Blue
Spindles: Sinlges Jenkins Kuchulu; Plied: Bosworth mini
Finished: March 2013

Project 3: Twisted Stitch Socks

I don’t actually have a finished photo of these, even though I have been wearing them fairly constantly when the weather has been cold enough.

Yarn: Mountain Colors Crazyfoot in Portland Rose
Needles: 2.75 mm
Pattern: Self designed with a knit two (twisted approximately every 3rd row) purl 3 rib
Finished: April 2013

Project 4: Red Pei

Yarn: Abstract Fiber Alto in Red
Needles: 3.5 mm
Pattern: Pei by Michele Wang
Finished: May 2013

Project 5: Dyeing and Carding Jacob

Still working on the fleece I bought in 2010! This is hopefully the last stages of fiber prep and spinning:

For TDF 2013 I dyed and blended secondary colors.
For the rest of 2013 and going into 2014, I spun/am spinning singles on my Sunflower Breeze spindles.
Hopefully the yarn will be completed by the end of 2014.

Project 6: Silkie Pear Drop Shawl

Yarn: Sheepy Time Knits Silkie in Berry Pie colorway
Needles: 3.5 mm
Pattern: Pear Drop by Ysolda Teague
Finished: August 2013

Project 7: N. Ronaldsay Singles

Fiber: Colored from Liz Lovick; Natural from New Lanark Mills
Spindle: IST
Finished: August 2013

Project 9: Mostly Hebridean Yarn

Spindles: Wingham Spindle and IST Spindle
Yarn: 3 ply mostly New Lanark Mills Hebrideanroving (with some silk, banana silk and other stuff tested on spindle).
Finished: August 2013

Project 9: Marin

I’ve since been sent enough yarn to redo the corner but I kind of like it being a different color. One of my Doylestown friends calls it my Clorox shawl!
Yarn: La Drogourie Surnaturelle in Cape Horn (mostly)
Needles: 3.5 mm
Finished: Sept 2013

Project 10: Shortening socks originally knit for Mum

No pictures. But Mum’s feet were 1″ longer than mine and I couldn’t bear to give these socks away. So I have adjusted two pairs and still have one left to go.

Project 11: Pei for Jessica

Yarn: Sheepy Time Knits Polwarth and Silk DK in Wonderflorium
Needles: 3.25 mm/US 3
Finished: October 2013

Project 12: Christmas Washcloths

When my brain really isn’t able to work, I found wash/dishcloths very soothing. I must have made five or six different washcloths.
Here are two:

Also one Nanayaya dishcloth takes me about 90 -120 mins. So I do it during meetings!
Yarn: Lily’s Peaches and Creme
Needles: 4 mm
Patterns: Various

Project 13: WWKAL 13: Erica Hat

Yarn: Sheepy Time Knits Panda Worsted in “Am I Blue” (merino and silk)
Needles: 3.75 mm
Pattern: Woolly Wormhead’s 2013 Mystery Knitalong, which turned out to be Erica
Finished: December 2013

Project 14: Dreaming of Shetland Shawl

Yarn: N. Ronaldsay Singles (Z spun) dyed by Liz Lovick.
Needles: 3.5 mm
Pattern: Shetland Handpaint by Donna Drachunas in Dreaming of Shetland
Finished (sans blocking): Dec 2013

Project 15: Dad’s Cardigan

Yarn: Garnstudio Drops Delight in Green-blue (colorway 16)
Needles: 2.5 mm
Pattern: Self designed with extra space in the back for widower’s hump
Finished: Dec 2013, with help with sewing in zipper from SIL

Ongoing but Unfinished Projects

Project 16: England Sweater

Working on the sleeves. Then I have the front steek to open up. Buttons with band up the front.
I only work on this project in England, so I might not finish it this trip!

Project 17: Never-ending Blanket

Project 18: Abbysilk

Fiber color is Fade to Pink
I also have some Autumn on a Thread’s Thru Time Tiny Turkish.

I have other spinning and need to get better about recording my hand spun. I do label it all and keep small samples.

Tour de Fleece 2013 Day 6

I made batts yesterday by blending two colors together using my drumcarder.

In the picture above, the top row is the original colors, and the next rows show the degree of blending. I stopped after blending three times.

Alpaca

Tour De Fleece 2012

When the Tour de France starts next Saturday, spinners from around the world will be cheering on the cyclists by getting out their spindles and wheels.  These spinners challenge themselves to be better spinners by creating extra special, to them, yarn. This is called the Tour de Fleece and is on Ravelry.  I will be one of the Tour De Fleece spinners and have set myself several goals as I am a member of several teams.

As a member of Team Suck Less I am going to suck less at hand-carding and get Marta Jacob’s fleece carded up as much as possible. This has been hanging over me since last year’s TDF!  Team Suck Less is sponsored by Friend’s of Abby’s Yarns, an awesome group of very supportive Ravelry members.

As a member of Team Black & Beyond with Fleece Fiber Source Book, I have a fiber sampler challenge.  For this I will spin some new to me fibers. In particular, fibers I purchased last month at All About Ewe: Babydoll, Romney, and Dorset-Corriedale X.  If that isn’t enough I have some llama, yak and alpaca to try.

I am also a member of the Peloton, with walking with my spindle while spinning as my challenge.  I especially want to spin on my Jenkins Kuchulu Turkish Spindle which I purchased earlier this year.   Look isn’t the Kuchulu sweet:

As part of my training, I carded the fibers for my fiber sampler challenge and got my arms all good and ready for carding Marta Jacob.  Here are my puni-rolags, which I made after carding by rolling over a spindle shaft.  Here are the three fibers:

L-R Babydoll, Dorset-Corriedale X, Romney

I also cheated a  little bit.  I have got into hand carding so much that I didn’t want to stop.  So I started on Marta’s fleece mentioned above.  I have quite a lot of her fleece to card and I do want to get it done this year, so I carded the light gray fiber and started on the mid grays.  I did all the darker colors last year.

Marta Jacob Puni-Rolags in Light Gray

Tour de Fleece 2011 Round Up

Ooof. I think I am spun out for a while.

Top LH corner: Jacob from Marta – gold batts, mid dark singles, white batts, white yarn 3ply and 2 ply
Top RH: Mad Colors: Wild Side
Middle L: Fabulous Fibers: Summit
Middle: Drying Shetland fleeces
Bottom L + Middle: Drachenwolle
Bottom R: Dad’s cardigan

—
If you remember I had goals. So how did I do?

Goal 1: Prepare lots of Jacob. I got about 100 g carded and a further 20 g waiting for the carder. Still have a long way to go before it is all finished.

Goal 2: Wash fleeces. Thanks to members of Team Suck Less and the FOAY group on Ravelry, I found out that my water is not hot enough to dissolve lanolin. So I had to change my methods and rewash the first few lots. Despite that I am only 3.5 mesh bags away from finishing the second fleece! For this fleece I got fancy and sorted out the fiber into different categories:

Where:
A) Least compacted and long clear locks
B) Back like A but compacted
C) Sides are slightly dirty and not as soft as A or B
D) End of legs – very compacted and not soft
E) Worst, as in dirtiest, locks. Fleece was skirted which means the really nasty bits were already removed.

Goal 3: Spin on my Trindle every day. I span every day but not always on my Trindle. I did, however, spin all the fiber I intended for the Trindle.

Goal 4: Knit Dad’s cardigan. Unfortunately, the last few days have been too hot too knit a thick cardigan but before the heat dome arrived I finished the left sleeve and I’m about a third into the right sleeve.

So all in all tour de fleece 2011 was a success.

TDF Day 2

I have finished flicking and carding the Jacob I dyed yellow. My goal this week is to flick 200 g of white so that on Saturday I can dye fiber to make a color wheel.

MD398 is not clean enough so tomorrow I am going to rewash the locks I started yesterday. Combing was tough because the fiber was so greasy. I should also look for a source of power-scourer just in case more washing isn’t enough. However, spinning the top was lovely. I adore spinning Shetland wool and sometimes wonder why I bother with anything else.

I washed some of Pippit – I need a better way to take the locks from the fleece as last night it was too late to unroll the whole fleece so I just grabbed the nearest loss bits. However, I think it was the back leg as it is covered in VM. The fiber washed up nicely; I used lower temperature water, more soap and and extra rinse at the end.

I still have a few hours and hope to spin with my Trindle and knit on Dad’s cardigan.

Tour De Fleece Day 1

Knitting 2010

In 2010 I attended the UK knit camp in Stirling University and was lucky enough to have classes with Lucy Neatby, Jared Flood and MaryJane Mucklestone.  I visited New Lanark Mills, went on a boat on Loch Katrine and toured the Famous Grouse distillery.   I went to Maryland Sheep and Wool and I taught classes at Knitter’s Day Out. I took a beginning [wheel] spinning class at the Mannings and bought my first fleece.  Needless to say I bought yarn and fiber while at these events. Oh I also did some knitting too.

I started the year knitting Mum a pair of mittens using Anna Zilbourg’s Turkish stitches:

For the Winter Olympic Challenge I knitted a Baby Surprise Jacket:

At the beginning of March I finished my top down adaption of Vivian:

And later on that month I started the first project knitted from my own hand -spun and completed it with no yarn to spare in May:

I knit Mum a fun pair of socks so she could be comfortable and think about the garden at the same time:

I knit a Baktus for Lisa:

I practiced some Orenburg lace making samplers:

For my guild I tried double knitting with two colors and made a washcloth with a heart which I gave to my friends Jessica and Robert:

I also knitted two pairs of hunter’s mittens (or should that be Huntress’s). The first pair were part of a workshop at my local LYS and I made them delibrately too big for me. I then decided my hands were cold and I was bored of this so I made myself a pair. Here is one of the first pair:

I knit myself EZ Green Sweater in purple Ultra Alpaca:

For a colleague at work I knitted a baby jacket in the same yarn with the same buttons as the BSJ:

I completed the second project from my hand-spun. This time a gorgeous Abbybatt became a gorgeous scarf:

Finally I have four pairs of socks without photos.

• Our guild had a knitasockalong and in November I finally finished knitting my Fiesta Feet.
• I knit myself a pair of “in your garden socks”.
• I knit Mum a pair of socks based on conifer trees.
• I knitted my brother (size 13 US feet) a pair of socks in cotton. The yarn was self-stripping and my proudest moment came when my sister-in-law commented that the stripes on each socks matched.

I am vaguely impressed as that means I completed sixteen different projects in 2010 or 23 if you count each mitten, sock and Orenberg lace sampler!

FO Friday: First Handspun Knitted Project

Shell Scarf

 

Project Details

Pattern: Adapted from Gail Tanquary’s Fan Shawl.
Yarn: Hand spun
Fiber: Susan’s Kitchen FiberArts BFL Groovy
Needles: US 6/4.00 mm
Started: March 18 2010
Finished: October 20 2010 if you count blocking

Comments

I finished knitting my Shell Shawl back in May, but did not have the space to block it as the spare bed was covered with boxes. Even though the boxes have been gone from the bed for a while, I only found the time to block it last week.

I purchased the fiber at Sock Summit last year directly after Abby’s intro to spinning class.  After all she had said to buy something that you love and want to spin.   I spun the fiber with both a Saacht Hi-lo and a Wildcraft Chillis spindle as they have the same weight.  The singles were chain plied to maintain the colors.

Shell Close Up

 

The shell patterns were adapted from Gail Tanquary’s Fan Shawl.