Year of Projects – week 39/52

I have two finished felted objects I completed this week, and they have separate blog posts with further details. Felting is so quick to get a finished object, in comparison with knitting and crochet.

I added to my YOP list the felted lampshade, as that was a course I hadn’t expected. I loved it and have since ordered kits to make lampshades for every pendant light and lamp in the house!! Oh and I ordered quite a bit of pre-felt, both merino that I am used to, but also some British Shetland wool pre-felt that was slightly cheaper.
The felted tide clock was on my draft YOP list for next year, so I have moved it to this year’s list instead. It will be ideal for me deciding when to take our dog to the beach (and obviously collect more sea glass after high tide, before others get to it lol).

I also did a post about the Andean plying tool (Handy Andy). I forgot to mention on that post that the Andean’s used one hand to wrap around yarn in the same way, and that is called an Andean Bracelet. This wooden tool is a hand substitute.

Other than that I finished my fair isle hat. The first time I made a fair isle hat I had to give it to a 2 year old it was so small! Too tight with my floats! This is my 2nd fair isle hat and it is pretty loose fitting on my head, my gauge ended up being off, despite doing a swatch. Oh actually I think the swatch was just stockinette, not fair isle in the round. Perhaps just an over loose knitting stitch and super loose floats. Ylva and I went for a walk up the fields behind the house on the 1st day of Spring and managed to spot the first 4 lambs of the year. Once the sheep and lambs come down from the higher fields, into these lush green ones we won’t be able to walk up them.

I was debating about a pompom for this hat but have decided to go without. It goes quite well with this particular coat (I can’t possibly say how many purple or pink coats I have. It’s like asking a knitter how big her stash is lol!). I am going to try to make some fingerless gloves to go with it.

As this week marks the end of the 3rd quarter of our Year of Projects, it is time to snapshot where I am up to on my list. Some new things have been added and one deleted (as I have decided to keep my purple handspun for a larger project than a hat and scarf set). I have also tidied up the order of items in each section, so the outstanding items are shown at the bottom. As the days warm up I will be starting to do some dyeing practice, which is my least completed section of my YOP list.

Feel free to skip to the bottom where I talk about some new cast ons.

Wet felting

A picture of a Highland Cow ✅ wk 4
Make a fancy scarf or wrap using nuno felting ✅ wk 11 and wk 16
A case for my craft scissors ✅ wk 16
A coin purse ✅ wk 35
A pair of slippers ✅ wk 33
A loose casual waistcoat or top ✅ wk 37
Lampshade ✅ wk 39
Tide clock with sky and sea blends (moved forward from next year’s draft list) ✅ wk 39
A picture of my dog Ylva
A project bag using the plastic loop handles in my stash
Felt the edge of my hand painted autumn flowers silk painting, and felt a back – to make a cushion.

Needle felting

A picture of our parrot ✅ wk 37
A 3D animal…probably my dog Ylva
Make up some more bug related fairies…to go with my ladybird one

Spinning

Spin all the commercial fibre currently in my stash (for spinning not felting) on Ravelry @ date of posting! ✅

Perpetual purple merino ✅ wk 3
Plum merino and gold bamboo ✅ wk 3
Ethereal ether ✅ wk 8
British 56s ✅ wk 12
Shetland ✅ wk 24
Camel & silk ✅ wk 24
Corriedale poppy ✅ wk 24
Blue Faced Leicester ✅ wk 33
North Ronaldsay humbug (added to list and started wk 31) ✅ wk 33

Master chain ply ✅ wk 12 (Himalayan blend chain ply nice and smooth at joints)
Create a fractal spun yarn ✅ wk 24
Create my own wool and silk blended spin ✅ wk 29
Spin first batch of Samoyed dog hair ❇️ wk 6
Spin some tweed yarn ❇️ wk 29 attempt with silk flecks
Create an official (not accidental) art yarn

Dyeing

Dye some of the natural fibre tops and/or homespun yarn from my stash

British 56s ✅ wk 4 and 11
Over dye ethereal ether merino ✅ wk 6
Blue Faced Leicester ✅ wk 26
Samoyed Dog hair
Bamboo
Merino/silk blend
Merino/suri alpaca blend
Corriedale fibre
Portland

Dye undyed commercial spun skeins

Cheviot chunky wool ✅ wk 6
Merino silk blend ✅ wk 25
BFL/silk blend
Merino bamboo blend

Knitting

Learn fair isle knitting and knit one of the small fair isle items in my queue ✅ wk 3. Try >2 colour fair isle ✅ wk 38
Make something with purple and gold homespun yarn ✅ (Hitchhiker wk 11)
Finish my Chimney Fire cardigan ✅ wk 14
Make my husband a pair of socks ✅ wk 18
Knit something Two at a Time ✅ wk 18
Make Lintilla scarf ✅ wk 24
Make my dad something for Christmas ✅ wk 25
Make a 2nd pair of socks for myself…as part of the Grocery Girls 2019 sock KAL I am going to roughly join ✅ wk 32
Learn herringbone stitch to make a neckwarmer ✅ wk 38
Knit (or crochet) all the scraps of left over sock and sport weight wool. ❇️ wk 12
Learn brioche stitch ❇️ (YouTube watching wk 13)
Make the shawl with my Rowan Lima yarn ❇️ (Started wk 26)

Crochet

Make an octopus for a preemie (cotton and hook arrived wk 13)
Make a jellyfish for a preemie
Get to grips with UK -v- US terms!

Sewing

Create a project bag and notions pouch ✅ wk 6
Make autumnal leaves cushion

On Thursday I finally cast on my Elda cardigan, but not much to show yet, I’m still on the raglan increase section. The wool is a blend of Bowmont (a Saxon Merino/Shetland cross) and Bluefaced Leicester (BFLj, so it has a slight Shetland woolliness about it, but softer and has a nice subtle sheen. I am enjoying it so far. The Estonian Braid sections are done at the very end, so at the moment its a very simple pattern.

On Saturday, the camera club had a trip up to Wick (almost the top of Scotland) to attend the Highland Challenge. An annual photography competition between the camera clubs in the Highlands (and Shetland Isles). The mainland Clubs take it in turns to host it and this year it was Wick’s turn. Wick is a couple of hours north of us on a single carriageway, mostly coastal road. Despite knowing I get coach (bus) travel sick I cast on a 4th pair of Hermione’s Everyday Socks to continue to knit on the coach there and back!!!

I made a mistake, when knitting on so little sleep and on a bus, so these are now a subtle variation on HES. On the plus side Dingwall Club won the challenge.

I wish the Shetland Isles would host the challenge one year, but at a different time of year…I’m thinking specifically to coincide with Shetland Wool Week lol!

Google map of where Wick is 😀

I have to keep busy to keep my mind from taking me back into depression, so please don’t compare your own outputs to mine. Everyone has their own things going on, including juggling responsibilities and some battling their own demons.

If you would like to see what the other YOP members are up to check out our Ravelry group for the links to their posts.

Edited with BlogPad Pro

Dornoch Fibre Fest

This year was the 10th Dornoch Fibre Fest, but my first time attending.

What a wonderful wee festival. Firstly I’ll share a bit about this beautiful wee town.

Dornoch is a beautiful town about 45 minutes north from me. The town centre is set back away from the sea front, with its beautiful long sandy beaches a short walk from the town centre. It has the Royal Dornoch Golf Club with 2 x 18 hole courses plus practice holes and even has a teeny tiny airport, which I have only ever seen model airplanes use.

Here’s a photo of me on one of the beaches at Dornoch last March.

It’s population is only about 1,300 so it is small, but in the summer it is busy with tourists and has a campground and caravan park, numerous B&Bs, some nice old hotels and a charming sandstone oldie worldie feel about the place. (Random fact – Madonna married Guy Ritchie at Skelbo Castle nearby!) I did manage to squeeze in a visit to Cocoa Mountain that sells the best hot chocolate. I had the vegan version with oat milk, but you can have soya milk instead. The vegan ones are dark chocolate. The regular cow’s milk version has white and milk chocolate. They drizzle melted chocolate all around the edge of the mug and drizzling down the side…and oh my its messy but sooo good.

Back to the fibre fest, which was split across 2 locations; a church hall and the social club.

Apparently the Saturday was extremely busy with people queueing to get in and out of the church hall. I was booked on a Fair Isle course on the Sunday morning so I was lucky to be there on the much quieter day, where I really got time to look at things and pick yarns with patterns in mind.

Our fair isle skills course was taught my a genuine Shetland Islander, Janette Budge Instagram link.
Ravelry link .
Her mother taught her to knit and it was interesting hearing her talk of the days when everyone was knitting and it just wasn’t right to sit idle in the evenings. And about how when knitting fair isle jumpers for the fishermen they would need to catch all the floats in the arms as the fisherman took little care of their jumpers, but they still lasted well. Also she explained that there are still people in Shetland that make jumpers for mountain climbers and about famous climbers of Everest wearing Shetland wool jumpers, ideal for their warmth but very lightweight. She said nowadays she hand-knits the yokes but mostly the plane bodies are machine knit. She was also telling us about the yoke bag course she teaches and had a lovely example and explained it was a great way of testing a yoke pattern before starting on a whole jumper. I’ve taken this image from the Shetland Wool Week website of her course. One year I will go along but the Shetland Isles is a flight away or overnight ferry and accommodation is expensive during wool week due to demand.

The course at Dornoch was a bargain, only £25 for 3 hours and included 3 colours of Shetland wool. (Loch Ness Knit Fest courses were £45 and you brought your own wool.)

We were making headbands, but mine is too small for my head (my fault as I should have gone up a needle size when she suggested). Anyway, I will sew one side and pop some felt in the ends and it’ll be ideal as a DPN project holder, ideal as I have my northeasterly blanket strip that can go in it. So here it is before its sewn.

I was using some of her enormous length double knitting needles and she lent me her ‘knitting belt’. This is a belt with a leather pod on it with holes in and stuffed with horsehair. You put the other end of your right working needle in it. It worked well and stopped me stabbing myself in the arm. Overall I will stick to very long circular needles and magic loop, over enormous DPNs.

After the course it was time for some shopping and I had 3 projects in mind…a brioche hat, a brioche shawl and a chunky jumper.

From the Bunloit Woolery stand I bought 6 skeins of the blue for Such a Winter’s Day“; jumper. I had planned on getting one of the yummy oatmeal type colours, but then thought about dog hair and grubby cuffs on a pale pink jumper I have, so went for this lovely blue. The pattern called for Worsted Weight, but others have used the same Aran weight yarn for it, so I should be ok.

The bottom 2 yarns are to try Brioche Knots hat. They were so helpful and patient with me trying to work out what would work. (My lovely hand-carved niddy noddy is carved by them.)

From Cookston Crafts I wanted to get some yarn to make some socks and a brioche shawl, both to go with my Chimney Fire teal cardigan. After my previous post, an Instagram and Facebook survey it is unanimous that my brioche shawl will be made with the middle ‘Emerald’ ‘60% merino, 20% silk and 20% yak and ‘Crathie’ 60% merino, 20% nylon and 20% alpaca. So it should have that hint of luxury, warmth and durability. I haven’t fully decided on a pattern, but I am thinking about Tributary which I managed to get when it was free when launched. The top skein I’ll make some hermione’s everyday socks I suspect.

Skybluepink I bought 3 x 100g blends of 67% Bluefaced Leicester and 33% Shetland. Ok so I couldn’t resist the purple!

Kiki’s Craft Corner I bought some Polwarth to try spinning and a couple of bags of Shetland to try to spin some yarn to dye for more colour-work projects,

Last but not least, from Travelling Yarns I thought I should buy a hat kit to make use of my new Fair Isle skills lol. So I bought the Copper River Hat pattern kit which came with these lovely colours.

The problem is where is all this new stash going to be kept? I was thinking about buying another big plastic box and then thought a good alternative would be to this week knit up some quick bulky yarn patterns to make some room hahaha!

How I will find time to garden, do laundry, walk the dog or do housework with all these new projects added to my already large Ravelry queue! All I can think is “Thank goodness I am not going to Edinburgh Yarn Festival”

Year of Projects – week 33/52

I saw on another blog they were doing ‘Finish it February’…with the aim to complete as many Work in Progress (WIPs) as possible. I liked that idea and so I have tried to finish some projects off. (Including clearing out junk.)

Knitting

The pattern for Lintilla advises to start the rippled edge when you have 25% of your yarn left…but I couldn’t be bothered walking a few yards to the kitchen to get scales and try to do some sums and estimate how much my needles weigh etc etc….so, when I’d done as many repeats as Martina’s pattern example I figured that will do and any spare yarn can go on my Northeasterly blanket or some contrasting heels and toes on future socks. So on Thursday I started the final edge ripple pattern. This photo was taken before bed on Saturday night and I still have quite a lot more ripples left and then the tip to go. I must admit I am pretty sure there are a lot of mistakes on the end edge ripples, I kept mixing up which stitches I was doing, but it’ll be fine once its on and it should be bigger when blocked.

I also made some progress on Void and my new longer cable arrived which makes my needles 150cm long, so should be ok to finish it. No photo as the progress isn’t obvious and I need to switch the needle over to be able to stretch it out.

I cast on a new pair of socks, this time with West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4 Ply, in wood pigeon colourway. I haven’t used this yarn before and did I bother to knit a swatch to check gauge? Of course not! When I finished one cuff I showed my husband, and he thinks its way too small…I agree it looks much smaller than my ones I have made using the Ripplescrafts sock yarn. So they are on hold at the moment whilst I concentrate on finishing the shawls.

Spinning

Lots of spinning related activity this week.

I plied the brown North Ronaldsay yarn and set it. Mostly traditional 3 ply but a small amount of chain plying done on a bobbin that had a fair bit left. I really should perhaps weigh my bobbins before plying, to get them more evenly loaded. I think I may keep this yarn for having a go at weaving with, or perhaps crochet some circles to put under plant pots around the house. I like the rustic look, but not sure in a garment…this shade of brown is definitely not my colour for clothes. It is 138m long and worsted weight.

You may have seen, in my previous post, the scarf I wet felted with half of the Bluefaced Leicester fibre I had home dyed. After some thought I decided to spin the other half into 2 ply yarn. I did short forward drafting, so it was really smooth and shiny before I soaked and snapped it to set the ply! Now it has fluffed up, or I think bloomed is maybe the technical term!?! I am hoping once it is measure I will have enough length to do a hat, if not then I will make some wrist warmers instead…so they can be worn with the scarf I made.

It isn’t measured yet and is very uneven 2 ply, but hey ho who cares when the colours are so pretty!

I made up some rolags, using the Sugar Plum merino/silk blend fibre from World of Wool and some homedyed Mohair. The intention being to take them along to the Highland Guild meeting to spin them. On Thursday when drafting this post I was thinking I can’t be bothered to carry my spinning wheel to the meeting and maybe I would take Void and knit instead. In the end I went without any gear briefly and chatted to a couple of ladies and then headed home to clear out junk from the garage loft.

Felting

My slippers are 95-100% finished! That makes no sense, you are probably thinking. The thing is, they are finished except me painting on some dots or squiggles with the non-slip stuff I bought at Loch Ness Knit Fest. The only problem is, I have no idea where I put the bottle of stuff!! Doh!!! So I will have another hunt for the bottle at some point and if I don’t find it then I will just wear the slippers and try not do any crazy dancing in them on the wood laminate floors lol!

The urge to felt another scarf hit me, so I used the rest of the Winter’s Kiss fibre and some dark green bamboo fibre, I got from World of Wool’s fibre club box. This is definitely a Christmas/Winter scarf, it has such a lovely sparkle to it, which hopefully you can tell from the bottom right photo. I also scattered various silk waste in pale and dark greens. This will go with the others, as potential sale or gift items. Colours and sparkle are stronger in real life.

Edited with BlogPad Pro

2019 Project List

Although I am following the Year of Projects year, which runs from July, I thought it would be useful for me to jot down a list of things I’d like to achieve this calendar year.

2019 project list

2018 Summary

I started 2018 on sabbatical from work and finished the year having resigned, so I haven’t done any paid work all year. But what I have done is work on my creativity and what a wide range of projects I have done!

So this post is a summary of the things I achieved this year (and some memorable highlights).

Bullet keys

🧦 knitting (unless noted as crochet) 🌀 spinning 💦 wet felting 🗡 needle felting 👩🏻‍🔬 dyeing

🖼 drawing 📷 photography 💎 sea glass

🏕 camping trip 🏡 holiday cottage\B&B 🎫 concert 🎟 show

January

🧦 Alpaca lace scarf, poncho and red fingerless mittens

📷 3 credits at camera club

💎 sea glass and Pooh bear pendant

February

🧦 arm knit throw and finger knit cushions (with mahoosive acrylic), Crazy sexy wool hat

🖼 sketch of Ylva

📷 Bolivia Audio Visual show

March

🧦 really warm hat, quick and bulky mittens, Allistar’s alpaca hat, purple fingerless mittens, big wool colour hat for Elaine, 2 x cable headbands, rasta fasta hat, swirly squishy hat,

📷 came 4th in Annual Mini Comp., 3 acceptances in Annual projected image and 2 acceptances in Annual Print comps and Flamingo on Salar de Uyuni included in Club’s submission in Highland Challenge.

🏡 Isle of Skye holiday cottage and day trip to Raasay

💎 sea glass pendants

April

🐈 Dice died aged 16 years and 5 days.

🧦 chunky basket (crochet), cat hats for Merri and friend, drinks cosy and cathedral hat

💦 dusty pink handbag

💎 sea glass wind chime

👨‍👧Dad visited

🎟 saw Hamilton musical

May

💎 sea glass pendants

🏕 Dunnet Bay

🌀 bought spinning wheel, carders, niddy-noddy and fibre stash and acid dyes

🧦 hitchhiker scarf

June

🏕 Sango Sands and Clachtoll Beach

🌀 landscape rolags to 2 ply, purple and red scraps

🧦 my 1st socks, ipad cover, business card holder and 2nd hitchhiker, dog poop bag holder

💦 rose and blue circular needle case and soap bars

July

🌀 Tour de Fleece spinning purple merino and gold bamboo, ethereal ether, some British 56s, perpetual purple

💦🗡 highland cow

🧦 fair isle hat, 3rd hitchhiker, started chimney fire cardigan, alpaca cowl for Allistar, coffee cup cosy

👩🏻‍🔬 British 56s wool

🏡 Met up with Elaine in Kinlochleven

August

🏕 Orkney camping

🎫 🏕 Belladrum 3 day concert

🌀 samoyed dog hair, ethereal ether, home dyed British 56s

💦 purple wool and silk scarf

🧦 still knitting cardigan

👩🏻‍🔬 cheviot bulky yarn

September

🎫 🏕 Jocktoberfest 2 day concert

🏡 Loch Sunart holiday cottage

💦 turquoise wool and silk scarf and tiny purse for sister, rose and blue double pointed needle roll case, attempt at nuno felting

🧦 glasses case, crochet dog poop bag holder and finished Chimney Fire cardigan

October

🌀 Brit Spin in team ‘more enthusiasm than skill’ Shetland

👫 visit by Annie and Michael

🧦 Allistar’s socks, cheviot 3 set (hat, cowl & mittens), 2 at a time fingerless mittens

💦 green and red wool and silk scarf for Annie

🎫 saw Turin Brakes in concert

November

💎 sea glass progress markers

💦 suri alpaca and silk scarf, stripe scarf for dad

🌀 finished camel and silk blend

🧦 started Lintilla and dad’s socks

🗡 autumn sparkle fairy

📷 came 2nd in annual Portfolio comp

December

🌀 poppy corriedale fractal, finished Shetland

🧦 finished Dad’s socks, poppy fractal hat for husband, started Void shawl

👩🏻‍🔬 dyed BFL fibre, merino/silk blend and Shetland

🗡 Christmas bauble, mouse pictures and Christmas pudding

(I don’t remember which month but I also sewed a project bag.)

Selection of 2018 completed objects

Year of Projects – week 26/52 Half way!

This is a longer post than normal, as I am doing a snapshot for the half way point and have had quite a busy crafting week.

Knitting

Finished Object

I finished my husband’s latest hat. Two by Two pattern by Anne Gagnon, available free on Ravelry. As my husband has a large head I increased the needle size. I hadn’t actual measured the length of the yarn I had spun, so I was getting a little nervous and started the decreases early, but it still fits. I could probably have done a couple more rows but that’s the problem with bottom up hats. Playing yarn chicken is stressful. (Which reminds me to find a simple toe up sock design for the 2nd pair for myself.). The fractal handspun Corriedale has interesting subtle colour stripes. He says it isn’t as warm as the alpaca hat I knit him, using Anne’s Ribs n’ Cables design, but he likes it…I think.

Cast On

I started knitting a shawl this week with my Rowan Lima yarn. It is unusual yarn, as it isn’t plied, its like one long crochet chain, but in worsted weight! It’s 84% baby alpaca, 8% merino and 8% nylon. It is purple! I am so predictable. I bought the yarn at a de-stash sale 6 balls for only £3 total!!!! It couldn’t have worked out better though, as it is a perfect match for a really warm hat I knit with some purple alpaca yarn I bought in Cusco, Peru! The pattern I have chosen is Void by Melanie Berg.

This pattern has brand new stitches I have never done before (LT2, RT2, kfbf and bundle). I mis-read how to do an LT2 (left twisted) stitch and got my knitting in a knot and frogged it 5 times!!!! Eventually I viewed some YouTube clips and finally realised where I was going wrong. With the lack of memory and soft drape that alpaca has I am not sure this is really the right pattern for it, but I am going to stick with it and see how I get on and can always re-make the pattern with a different yarn choice in the future.

Oops!!! On Saturday afternoon I realised I made a mistake a couple of rows back but with the complicated stitches I tried tinking it back but failed, so I have now popped a marker in the spot I need to create a new stitch. With my rubbish memory I will no doubt forget where the mistake is, like I did with the cardigan I knit. Also it’ll be hidden by my hair when worn, if I grow my hair longer lol! I will get it back on track later today.

Lintilla is still parked at the moment, but as Void requires a bit lot of concentration I may pick up Lintilla when I need an easier project.

Advent

My husband bought me a yarn advent calendar, which arrived late, so I had a binge on opening the little parcels. They are art yarn singles and until they are all open I am not sure what I will do with them. Here’s a snapshot of the colours so far. Suggestions are welcome, as I haven’t made anything with art yarn before. I did think about making some mini mittens as an advent for next year, but uncertain how much yarn I will have. I have found a cute pattern called Smittens, so may try that and see how it goes.

Dyeing

This week I dyed 100g of Blue Faced Leicester fibre and wanted to try some different colour combinations in heather colours. I used my landscape dyes from Kraftkolour in Fern (green), Ice (turquoise) and Raspberry (deep pink) and a touch of Ashford hot pink dye. I pre-soaked the fibre in some citric acid, gently squeezed out excess water and then applied the colours in stripes both neat and mixed in pairs (landscape dyes only). I then rolled in cling film and steamed for a bit. Some pink escaped into the water so I later soaked up the colour with 25g of mohair. Once the dye bath was exhausted I put the BFL fibre back in but this time without the cling film and directly in the water…just to be certain the hot pink had enough citric acid contact to ensure it set. The landscape dyes already have setting agent in it, unlike the Ashford.

Of course I love the results…what’s not to love about something with shades of purple in. #purpleaddict

Not sure whether I will use it for wet felting or spinning.

Christmas

I would like to wish all my fellow YOPers and anyone else who follows or stumbles across my blog a Very Merry Christmas. My MIL and parrot arrived today and most food shopping was done. Tomorrow they pick up the turkey, trimmings etc. and then we just need to get another Christmas pudding (yep we’ve already eaten one!) and some Christmas cake (which usually lasts to Easter!) We played cards this evening and probably will most evenings, so I am not expecting much progress to report next week….but now follows my half way update.

Other than The Grinch I still haven’t watched any Christmas Movies yet!!! I watched the 4 seasons on The Killing this week, definitely not Christmassy! Will put Elf on when I do some ironing later today.

Half Way Point in the 8th Year of Projects

So already we are at the half way point of the Year of Projects! Although it’s the 8th year it has been running, this is my first year. At 13 weeks I took a snapshot, so here’s my 26th week snapshot.

There are 50 items on my list and I have completed 24 and made a start on some others, so I am pretty pleased with my progress.