Year of Projects – week 43/52

Knitting

This week has been mostly Elda cardigan knitting, as I really want to try to finish it before we go on holiday. I am concerned I am going to be playing yarn chicken when it comes to doing the Estonian braid section, as my yardage was enough for 3/4 sleeve version and I am doing full length sleeves! I just can’t see me wearing a shorter sleeve.

The indie dyer, Helen from Ripplescrafts, is doing a pop up shop in Inverness next week and she is bringing along her own leftover yarn from her own project, so we can see if its a good colour match. I may only be 200 yards short (if the pattern is correct). I had to go down a needle size to get gauge, does anyone know if that means I’m using more or less yarn? My brain won’t compute it.

I suppose I should have done the Estonian braid section first and then could just knit the sleeves to whatever is left…I’m part way through the first sleeve…I did start a brand new skein when I started the sleeve so I know how much I’ve used so far. Does that help though. I did think of a contrasting colour for the braid, but arrrggghhh perhaps it will be fine and I will have enough!?!

I have thought about not quite finishing the sleeves, doing the Estonian Braid and then if I need Helen’s leftover yarn it would be for both sleeve ends…so may have slightly different tones on the cuffs!

Oh my I am rambling! Anyhoo…advice welcome.

Felting

No felting this week!!!! I still need to dye some sand coloured wool for the other landing lampshade and the others I am going to whiz up some blended batts on the drum carder at felting group next Saturday (After the mad dash into Inverness to pick up Helen’s spare yarn and no doubt another skein of her yummy sock yarn.)

Spinning

Tiny bit of spinning this week, the colour is absolutely gorgeous. The colour on the fibre photo is more accurate to how it looks. After weeks of not doing any spinning it took a while to get back in the rhythm. The fibre is Falklands Merino and will be knit into a mini shawl/scarf. This is my first time using John Arbon fibre, he is vending at Fibre East in July which I am going to.

Weaving

I bought a 2nd heddle reed in the same size as my current one to try double weaving. It took me hours to warp it and to work out where to put my pick up sticks, then realised my sticks are a bit short, so I’ve ordered some slightly larger ones. These sticks, once in the right place enable you to weave the top and the bottom layers, so you end up with fabric twice the width than with one heddle. In my weaving book it says its easier to do than describe, and that’s from an expert. Perhaps next week I will have something a bit more to show you, so that you know what I mean, but on the photo below you can see the open side showing the top and bottom layers, on the left side its closed.

Other news

Since giving up work it seems my brain has retired, that or I’ve eaten too many hot cross buns and I am having sugar overload. Talking of sugar…I bought a 2nd hand copy of the Sugar Addict’s Total Recovery Program by Kathleen DesMaisons. I am a total sugar addict and already have liver problems from it, so I am determined to beat the addiction. I only started reading it on Friday night and on Saturday I ate a bag of chocolate buttons and 2 hot cross buns and we have pain au chocolate to have on Easter Sunday for breakfast!! So this isn’t going to be easy.

I am still enjoying listening to the Desert Island Discs podcasts…one of the guests asked for a blow up s*x doll to use as a raft!!!! I burst out laughing walking down the street listening to it and Kirsty the presenter was all erms and errs, first time she has been lost for words. Some episodes I’ve been walking along crying or smiling or laughing.

Today is my dog, Ylva, 11th Birthday. We took her to Glen Affric on Good Friday, where it was unusually warm for April. She has some yummy things for her birthday meals and a new squeaky snake that she had a good go at yesterday when she spotted it in my shopping bag.

Loch Beinn a’ Mheadhoin in Glen Affric was unusually low on water so we were able to walk out to one of the ‘islands’, where this photo was taken…she’s not very good at posing for photos and he was trying to get her to face me, but she wanted the treat in his hand! This is part of a set of lochs in a hydro scheme so may have just had a release of water.

Yesterday I did some vegetable garden planning for this year and discovered both water butts were empty! Usually they are full at the start of the year. The lambs on the farm behind us are finally being born, so every day we’ve spotted new lambs…but the streams that come down the hill don’t have much water in them and the farmer says he’s concerned about his sheep getting dehydrated as its so warm and there’s so little water. They don’t usually get sheared until June because its usually so much cooler here. Last year we had a very warm May which was unusual…now its an unusually warm April! I know there are far more important global impacts here to power, wildlife, crops etc., but my selfish gene does make me wonder how short knitwear wearing season is going to become if things don’t change. 🤔

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Andean plying tool aka Handy Andy

As previously mentioned, I won an Andean Plying tool from BritSpin last year. The tool has been handmade by a Mens Shed group in England.

Steps:-

Prep some fibre. (This is some merino and sari silk hackle blending practice.)

Spin a single on either a spinning wheel or spindle.

Wrap the single around the Handy Andy (in the specific way, YouTube videos are better than any written instructions).

Remove the top peg on the tool, so it now looks like just a loop of yarn and put the tool somewhere nearby (I popped it between my knees upside down! No smutty comments please lol.

Take both ends of the single and attach to leading line on the spinning wheel or spindle and spin in opposite direction to create 2 ply.

It will be a good tool for taking on holiday with my spindle. It is pretty lightweight and less bulky than taking a yarn cake winder, which is an alternative way of winding a single into a loop that you can spin both ends of.

It’s Mundane Monday today where I mostly do housework and chores, so this is just a quick practice.

If you’d like me to write more information on how to wrap the single then let me know in the comments.

Year of Projects – week 34/52

Knitting

I have finished Lintilla and wore it on a walk on Friday where I didn’t even need my coat it was so mild out!!! In mid-February!!!! I also wore it all day Saturday. It doesn’t unwrap itself which is great, even when I was walking and it was blowing a hoolie (Scottish for strong winds).

Some progress made on my Void shawl, but only a little. On the photo below I have included a black and white image so you can better see the pattern on Void. Also the marker shows progress since my last photo. It is hard to photograph as its a dark purple alpaca yarn. I still have just over 3 balls of yarn left….this thing gets so much wider each pattern repeat; I am not sure I will do it full sized. I was considering making some wrist warmers and then just making Void as big as the yarn that is left over…we will see.

I did a little more sock knitting and although I still have some concerns with it looking small I am sticking with the same pattern and needle size. I basically haven’t stuck to the grocery girls sock bash KAL at all…I am just going to try to do one pair of socks a month and they may well all use the same pattern! I am on the heel flap of the first sock. I should have split this ball in 2 so I could knit 2 at a time, I can’t use the centre pull for the other pair as I have seen too many yarn barfs on others’ blogs so I am too scared. So I will have to hope 2nd sock syndrome doesn’t strike. I think it is going to be tricky getting a perfect pair…but we shall see. As this is my 3rd pair using the Hermiones Everyday sock pattern, it is well on its way to being mindless knitting. I rarely need to look at the pattern. I have made some slight amendments that hopefully I will remember on the 2nd sock.

Spinning

I spun the merino, silk and mohair blend into a 3 ply (chain ply). It is much harder to keep a consistent width of yarn when woolen spinning from rolags. Before setting it, a quick check against my gauge showed the yarn as fingering weight in some places and worsted in others! Hey ho! It is still wet after setting it, so I don’t have a photo. Once it is dry I will measure it and take some photos for next week.

Other crafts

No felting or dyeing this week. I have spent some crafting time reading the Yarn-i-tec-ture book by Jillian Moreno. It is about spinning the yarn you want. I also have some editions of the Ply magazine to read and a blog post I found about tips on spinning sock yarn.

The only other crafting I did was to make some more sea glass stitch/progress markers. Some are already in my project bags, but these are extra ones I may sell at some point.

So it feels not as productive a week as normal, but I am learning from the book and articles, so it isn’t time wasted. I just wish I could read and knit at the same time, and apparently some people can spin and read at the same time!!! With this month’s Audible credit I have bought the Sherlock Holmes: The Definitive Collection read by Stephen Fry. It is about 70 hours long! This should help me be more productive around the house and garden than I have been watching box sets on Amazon Prime!

My weight has been creeping up and up over the last couple of years and I’m at my heaviest at the moment. So yesterday and today I climbed the hills behind our house. There aren’t any sheep in the lower fields at the moment, so Ylva and I walked up 5 steep fields yesterday, and today with my husband we did another couple of steep fields beyond…only to find when we got to the ‘top’ that in fact there were even more steep fields beyond! One day we will keep going and take a picnic. My heart rate was in cardio for a far longer time than walking the dog anywhere else, so whilst the sheep aren’t about I will keep climbing. Here’s a photo taken at the top of the 3rd field yesterday…when I didn’t need my coat! The water is the Cromarty Firth.

P.S. I found my non-slip gel, so slippers from last week are now in use 😁

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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.

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Year of Projects – week 32/52

Knitting

Well my 2nd pair of Hermione’s Everyday Socks are finished! I am honestly thinking why bother doing other patterns, when this fits my small feet so well (using 2mm needle). It is more interesting than just vanilla knitting (sockinette/K3P1 on alternate rows). The pattern was free on Ravelry. I love this yarn, in electric light it has warm colours and in daylight cool colours!

I can’t stick to the official Grocery Girls Sock bash KAL rules, as it says 1 x 6” leg pair or 2 shorties a month, and I just want to make 12 pairs of socks this year and don’t want socks that long. But this month’s theme is cables, so I may still have a go at some cable socks….or may just have another pair like these! Shall we have a sweepstake on how many pairs end up being this pattern lol!?

Void has soooo many stitches now (about 274 …kept losing count) and I am just finishing the 2nd ball of Rowan Lima yarn and there are 4 more balls of yarn to go (you stop at 404 stitches wide) and my head explodes with thinking how the heck this is supposed to be knit on one circular needle, my current needle is 100cm long and I think I’ll need to order a longer interchangeable cable to accommodate the stitches. The other issue is how long it takes to knit each row and its just going to keep getting longer….but then I really want it finished as its sooo soft and warm alpaca yarn that feels lovely and I want to wear it whilst its still cold. Progress since last time is shown by the marker. I also included a photo of the yarn close up, very unusual construction…but think of all that warm air it will trap…this is going to be so cosy to wear.

There’s been some people talking about yarn and needle elitism on Instagram, with many of the most popular YouTubers and Instagram account holders only buying very expensive, indie dyed yarns only for it to sit in a stash that may never get knit with. My yarn stash is relatively small and very mixed and this Rowan Lima yarn I bought for £3 for all 6 skeins at a local de-stash sale. I think Ripplescrafts yarn lasts really well and is my most used yarn, but I believe in trying to support Highland small businesses.

I do ooh and aaah at the beautiful colourways that lots of indie yarn producers post and I see phases of ‘must have’ yarns that you find everyone suddenly using and I’ll admit I was feeling jealous and if I was still working I would probably have bought but have no time to knit with. But as I have no income and I am spinning yarn myself and have a lot of undyed yarn to practice dyeing myself, I am on a yarn buying freeze! I haven’t bought any finished yarn since October. (Only yarn for dyeing.).

Regardless of how expensive or cheap a yarn is, if the finished object is practical and beautiful then what does it matter? I am interested to hear your thoughts.

Spinning

I continued to spin the brown North Ronaldsay wool, making more rolags and spinning them long draw (you allow some twist between your two hands whilst moving your hands apart and don’t smooth out the fibres, this makes a warm woollen spun yarn). I am definitely improving in this method, although I seem to get a sore left shoulder and right knee, as I am not used to this method or position yet! It is all spun and ready for plying into 3 ply, so I will show the finished yarn next week.

Felting

Just to explain, my slipper booties aren’t finished yet so no pic…more on why later. But after some comments last week I thought I should explain these were felted from Icelandic fibre tops and lined with merino wool tops, so no knitting involved.

You can make slippers by knitting them first and then felting them, but to me that seems a much longer process than just felting the fibre. Another option, if you’ve accidentally felted a wool jumper in the washer or tumble dryer then you can use that felted fabric to sew some slippers or gloves! I have seen YouTubers buying old wool jumpers/sweaters from charity shops/thrift stores and making pairs of mittens, slippers and scarf from one old jumper after they’ve felted it on a hot wash! Great if you are on a budget.

I did use half of my homedyed bluefaced leicester fibre to make a nuno felted scarf. Nuno felting is where you felt wool and silk together. On a blank white silk voil scarf I lay out the fibres in roughly vertical stripes one side and horizontal stripes the other and then put additional coloured locks, tussah silk and silk scraps. Then felted slowly to allow the wool fibres to go through the silk and felt together. The result is a very lightweight but warm scarf that can be worn on either side up.

I know what your thinking…these colours match my new socks lol!

The idea with felting is you lay the fibres in horizontal and then vertical layers, so that when they are wet the barbs on the fibre open up and start to lock together, then I use olive oil soap and friction from bubble wrap and tools made for felting. I can spend hours on Pinterest looking at the amazing felt creations people make.

There are so many amazing Russian and Belarusian feltmakers, I’ve watched a lot of YouTube videos of felting and even if I don’t understand what they are saying I can see how they are doing things. Here’s a link to my Pinterest wet felting folder with some ideas I’ve pinned, includes some of my own creations.

Side tracked!

On my slippers…I have tacked the sole to the bottom, but need to properly sew them on, when I work out the right yarn to do that. I planned to finish them on Saturday, but we drove down to the Cairngorms National Park (about an hour south) and went for a walk around a frozen Loch Morlich in the snow. Nothing to do with YOP but thought I’d share some pics anyway 😀

It was only -5°C/23°F so nowhere near the low temperatures the USA has been getting.

Top picture is our dog Ylva on the lochside beach, the photo bottom left there are some people in the distance doing cross country skiing around the loch. We passed more people on skis than walking, so it is obviously increasing in popularity. There is hill skiing nearby too.

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.

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Year of Project – week 30/52

Well we have finally had some snow fall, all symptoms of my flu have finally passed and I am feeling good. I have re-signed up for Audible 3 month free trial and on dog walks I’m listening to Michelle Obama’s book “Becoming”, which means we have been doing longer walks to keep listening.

Fibre work

This week I had fun playing around with my blending board and hackle (that I got for Christmas).

I have done some test sheets of the Icelandic wool with sari silk, this is the fibre I bought to make a waistcoat, but if I don’t like the finish/feel then I will use the rest to make some slippers and use the tests as place mats.

Here’s a pic before it is felted. (I’ve made 3 and they are in a box with tissue between.) They don’t look much yet! Finished pics next week.

Below, is a close up of the subtle blues, greens and sparkles I combined using the hackle and then wet felted into a neck warmer. The sparkles aren’t showing on the photo (Note to self: I really must find a location for photographs that gets the colours and textures right at the same time!).

Anyhoo, those YouTube peeps make everything look so easy. So I struggled a little pulling the fibre off the hackle in one continuous length, perhaps I over loaded it, but finally found a rhythm. Like everything it will take practice.

I decided to trim the corners of my neck warmer template and then lay the fibres out in a fan shape at the ends to get the ripples (although again these aren’t clear in the photo). This was inspired by the BEAUTIFUL felted scarves and wraps that @Woolysquirrel produces and shares on Instagram and sells on Etsy.

On Friday I had another go with the hackle and seem to do much better at getting decent sized strips off, but towards the end it was harder and too thin to braid, so I just rolled those into nests instead. But definitely an improvement. It is quite magical how you can make a long strip out of short tufts.

Spinning

I finished spinning my rolags and did a chain ply as it was all on one bobbin. I like the final yarn, is green taking over from my pink and purple addiction? I am amazed how much thinner my yarn is than spinning using short forward draw, I thought it would end up chunky but my 3 ply is DK weight. I need to find an easier way to measure the length of yarn, I tape a measure to the kitchen worktop and measure 100cm and then wind into a ball and repeat. This ended up 80+ metres and took ages to measure and wind! The good news is that this is the first yarn I have spun that has the same ‘weight’ in all methods of measurement. For non-spinners this won’t mean much, but against my yarn thickness measure it showed as DK, the wraps per inch were DK and the Grist puts it in DK…so if all that makes no sense then trust me, it is an achievement I am proud of. Normally the measurements are all over the place due to lack of consistency in my drafting and spinning.

My next spinning challenge is to spin some sock yarn. I bought the online copies of last year’s Ply Magazines. I couldn’t resist as the winter edition has a lot about spinning sock yarn, so I have been trying to read (and understand) the articles. There’s mention of totally new plying methods, so I will do some practice trials.

Knitting

I haven’t done much knitting, mostly I have worked on is my Lintilla, as its soooo easy plus I’ve memorised the pattern…not sure I will ever memorise the rows on Void!

But if you spot the green sea glass marker (where there’s a large pool of purple) you will see in 2 weeks it hasn’t progressed much…perhaps I will switch back to Void as the thicker yarn feels like more progress is made lol! Do you tell yourself these things?

I had a change of pattern plan on my January socks as I was going to try my first toe up sock, but then decided to do my first knit 2 at a time of a pattern I have already done, but then remembered how quick my sockwunder needle is in comparison to magic loop and so….I have not yet cast on a pair of socks!

Organising

I have, however, been playing with my fibre (and yarn) stash, updating Ravelry stash details (unused 140 fibres and 56 yarns!) and thinking of future designs and uses of my fibre. I also realised you have to manually move your used stash to the Used Up folder, so I have done that. My storage boxes have been re-organised and I now have:

‘To be dyed’ box (fibre, yarn and silk scarves)
‘New commercial yarn’ box (excluding scraps)
‘Rainbow colours fibre’ box
‘Earth tones fibre’ box
‘Mixed fibres’ box (locks, silk scraps, nepps, cotton fibre, flax)
‘Special blends’ box (wooly blended roving and batts)
‘Bag of silk’ (dyed silk fibre and sari silk scraps)
‘Bag of alpaca fibre’
‘Bag of scrap yarns’
‘Bag of handspun yarns’
‘Bag of the yarn from frogged jumper last week’
Oh and some overflow small cardboard boxes of the World of Wool Fibre Club custom blends and other 100g blends I have purchased elsewhere.
Oh and I just remembered I have some shoe boxes with dog hair and alpaca that I drum carded!

Maybe it doesn’t sound very organised but everything is easily accessible as the bags hang from the wardrobe (closet) rail and boxes sit on the wardrobe floor. So rather than buy another big storage box, I need to get more blending and then felting or spinning done to stop the need for these overflow boxes! I have at least 200g of fibre that comes each month and I need to be exceeding that in usage each month, or cancel my subscription….but I LOVE when a new box arrives! I get more excited than a kid opening Christmas presents.

Other

After reading a fellow YOPers blog last week I did some research into the discussions regarding white supremacy and diversity in our knitting and crafting community and I am working my way through the ‘Me and White Supremacy’ workbook that is available for free download. I almost thought I didn’t need to do the workbook because I have a diverse group of friends, but now I realise I did need to do it.

It is challenging my thoughts and opening my eyes and I will keep working through the remaining days of the workbook. I still remember an episode of Oprah from nearly 30 years ago about racism and them talking about things like ‘nude’ coloured pantyhose or tights as we’d call them in the UK and ‘flesh’ coloured things all being for white skin tones. Even the other day I noticed in my Ravelry stash some ‘flesh’ coloured wool fibre…that’s what it was called when I bought it last year. But that’s white person flesh colour! Subtleties like this are covered in the workbook and it really makes you realise that racism isn’t always blatant. I am thankful to this community for discussing the issues and raising awareness and notice Ravelry now have a discussion thread and I noticed on Instagram I am now seeing recommendations of blogs from people of colour. I am not following anyone out of tokenism, but on the same basis as I have already operated…if they post beautiful images that inspire me then I follow them.

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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.

Wet felting

A case for my craft scissors ✅ wk 16
A picture of my dog Ylva
A loose casual waistcoat or top ❇️ (Wk 23 Bought black icelandic top to use)
A project bag using the plastic loop handles in my stash
A coin purse
Make a fancy scarf or wrap using nuno felting ✅ wk 11 and wk 16
A picture of a Highland Cow ✅ wk 4

Needle felting

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 (dye it first)

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

Dyeing

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

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

Also, over dye ethereal ether ✅ wk 6

Dye undyed commercial spun skeins

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

Knitting

Finish my Chimney Fire cardigan ✅ wk 14
Make my husband a pair of socks ✅ wk 18
Make my dad something for Christmas ✅ wk 25
Make something with purple and gold homespun yarn ✅ (Hitchhiker wk 11)
Make up a matching accessory set from my perpetual purple paradise homespun yarn
Make the shawl with my Rowan Lima yarn ❇️ (Started Void wk 26)
Make a 2nd pair of socks for myself
Learn brioche stitch ❇️ (YouTube watching wk 13)
Learn fair isle knitting and knit one of the small fair isle items in my queue ✅ wk 3
Knit (or crochet) all the scraps of left over sock and sport weight wool. ❇️ wk 12
Knit something Two at a Time ✅ wk 18

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

Edited with BlogPad Pro

Year of Projects – week 25/52

Knitting

The vanilla socks are finished and I’ll post a photo after Christmas, just in case the recipient reads my blog!

I started on the hat for my husband, using the corriedale fractal wool I spun (as shown in last week’s update). I am using a pretty simple ribbed pattern, as I think the yarn colours would blur an intricate design; plus cables work best with 3 ply, not 2 ply. It seems a long while since I have knit something with a worsted weight yarn and larger needles. So this photo is just one day’s progress, so should be finished early this week and I can do some selfish knitting.

$Allistar’s fractal hat$

The stressful situation I have been dealing with for a long time is finally over…so to treat myself I have bought some interchangeable needles. I prefer wood or bamboo needles, so opted for KnitPro Interchangeable needles in sizes 3.5mm to 8mm. And they perfectly fit in the opening flap pocket of my circular needle case I made! Perfect!!

Needle case — Colour is wrong on this photo…but you see the perfect fit

Felting

This week at my felting group I did some needle felting instead of wet felting for a change. I used a ball of wet felted samoyed dog hair I made months ago (these parts were too rough to spin). I then needle felted a picture similar to one I had noticed on Pinterest. I just need to sew a loop on top and hang it on the tree. It is very lightweight.

I also made some replacement pictures for a couple of Christmas frames I had. These are clearly mice who have been tucking into too much Christmas cheese!!! Especially the one on the left (she’s hanging a stocking on a toadstool…in case it isn’t clear.

Dyeing

Well you couldn’t make up my numptiness! I thought I would dye a skein of merino silk blend yarn. The idea being to test the different coloured landscape dyes I have and see how they turn out. So I carefully mixed the colours, put in little pots, kept the pots of dye in the same order…..then when I finished I packed it all away having not written notes about what colours I used where!!!! Doh!!!

The same day I also dyed my Shetland homespun yarn that I finished the week before. I used hot pink, raspbery and opal blue colours and Oh my goodness I love this purpleness! And this will be another hat for me! You can’t have enough purple hats!

Oh and for regulars to my blog, I have now finished watching all 12 seasons of Bones. It was easy to have on in the background without needing to watch the actual screen, so I could still be productive. Now to start watching Christmas movies!

Edited with BlogPad Pro

Year of Projects – week 24/52

Spinning

As we are approaching the half way point of the year of projects, I reviewed my YOP list and ticked off some things. I had been a bit vague about what I planned to spin during the year, so have updated my YOP page and will snapshot the progress when we get to week 26, like I did week 13.

After much indecision about what wet felted item I would make with my corriedale wool in poppy colourway (that was a prize from the Tour de Fleece), I instead decided to use it to create a ‘fractal yarn’. On the picture below you can see the original fibre, I then split it in half; one half (a) is split into the different shades and the other half (b) is split so it has each colour in each strip.

On bobbin 1 I spun (a) so I started with all the burgundy then all red and then all greens (BRG).

On bobbin 2 I spun (b) so spinning each of the multicoloured strips, starting with the burgundy ends each time.

I then plied the 2 bobbins together and that creates a fractal yarn. If you want 3 ply you would split the colours in 3 ways, e.g. bobbin 1 BRG, bobbin 2 BRG BRG BRG and bobbin 3 BRG BRG BRG BRG BRG BRG.

I love the end result and look forward to dyeing some fibre myself to give it another go. This handspun yarn will be used to make a ribbed hat for my husband. He has green eyes, so it should suit him well.

I also finished spinning my Shetland wool, transferring what was on my spindle onto the larger amount on my spinning wheel. I set it and then remembered I am going to be dyeing it so probably didn’t need to soak and snap it before dyeing. Ah well! Once I have dyed it I will post a photo!

My camel and silk handspun yarn is dry so that is all labelled and ready to make something with. It is the softest yarn I have ever held. Has anyone just kept hanks of wool to cuddle!? It is soooo soft to touch I love the feel of it.

Hopefully in this photo you will better see the colour differences between standard and chain plying…the colours on the chain ply are more evident (top and bottom hanks). I haven’t chosen a pattern for it yet, something to go against my skin for sure!

Knitting

I have cast on a new pair of socks, this time just a vanilla pattern, in the hope I will have them finished before Christmas! I decided to cast on 64 stitches with my 2.5mm sockwunder needle and so far it looks a much better sized sock. I can’t believe how fast I can knit a vanilla sock with this needle, highly recommend for speed. Next on the needles will be the fractal spun yarn hat. My Lintilla has been temporarily parked, I thought I could try alternating between projects but the socks have a deadline so are getting all my focus.

Felting and fibre craft

I have mentioned my fairies before, but thought I would post a picture of them all hanging, so you know where they live! Also I ordered a couple of empty baubles from World of Wool and popped some sparkly fibre in them and hung them on the real Christmas tree. They are very hard to take a photo of and you’ll notice a reflection of Bones TV show lol! I am already on Season 10!

Finally, I was inspired by @Gilliangladrag Instagram to make a fibre christmas pudding. I used milk protein top for the brandy sauce. If you need a few moments of joy each day then I recommend following @Gilliangladrag and watching her daily stories. She owns the Gilliangladrag Fluff-a-torium shop in Dorking, England. Unfortunately, I live hundreds of miles away so haven’t been, but have bought her fibre blends and some other bits from her online shop.

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Year of Projects- week 22/52

Having taken a break from the problem sock situation this week, I started to knit “Lintilla” pattern from Martina Behm (designer of the hitchhiker shawl which I’ve done 3 versions of). This is my first pattern with wrap and turn stitches and in the variegated yarn from Ripples Crafts I really like it. This is sock wool with some nylon in, so this isn’t going to be a cosy fluffy scarf/shawl, but it is ideal for practicing new stitches and should last well and stand up to lots of wear.

At felting group this week I made a present, which will need to be posted on here after Christmas. I am really pleased with it, no idea what the fibre was, as it was out of my stash I bought with my spinning wheel.

I had some time left over so used some black suri alpaca fibre and sari silk to make a thin scarf. It is very thin in places but its lovely and soft and has lovely drape to it. It is hard to photograph to do it justice. It was an experiment really, but a nice result.

I have been working my way through episodes of Bones on Amazon Prime, whilst doing a lot of spinning. This is the baby camel and silk blend I have mentioned before. The smaller (bottom) skein was Navajo plied (chain ply) and you can see (hopefully) that you get separate sections of colour rather than just the barber pole type effect you get when you ply 3 bobbins (which is how I plied the larger top skein). I’m only just over half way through spinning it all, so I am hoping to get a decent sized item out of it when its finished….what that item will be I am not sure yet. The colours are subtle and again not photographing well. The weight is DK-ish, i.e. worsted and sport weight in places!

I thought I’d post a wee photo of my Shetland spinning on my spindle, so I can check progress.

Making things definitely lifts my spirits, so it has been a better week. Oh and I have managed to sell some kitchen gadgets and a game. My Christmas presents arrived this week…I will wait until Christmas to use them, but they are fibre related so I am looking forward to trying them out after Christmas. More on them and their outputs in the new year!

There’s another felting group in mid-December, so I need to have a think about what I’d like to make then, perhaps do some needle felting for a change.

Edited with BlogPad Pro

Year of Projects – week 12/52

Not strictly on my list, but I made a new seat for the chair I picked up on Gumtree (like Craig’s List). I cut various layers of thin laminated wood we had in the garage and covered it with the old thin padding and fabric which I took from our old sofa, which I also used for doing up my granddad and grandpa’s old chairs. Next year I will likely strip the paint off it, but I want to use it for spinning for a while, to see if its a keeper! I had been using a dining room chair which is a wee bit too high and causing hip pain.

I signed up to the World of Wool fibre club (like I don’t already have enough!?) and my first box arrived this week. It had a small amount of grey Herdwick wool, pineapple fibre tops and 150g custom blend of merino and sari silk which I decided to do a sample spin, chain ply and knit a small sample. I really like how it spins and knits up, when its done I probably will make a larger shawl from it, we shall see. My box also had a notepad and pen, which I’m going to use for tracking my felting projects, seeing as Ravelry doesn’t include felting. In Ravelry I have created a dummy handspun project, where I can assign fibre used for felting to it, so that my fibre stash leftovers are showing correct weights. (Hopefully that sentence makes sense to readers with Ravelry accounts.)

Himalayas (custom blend from World of Wool)

I mentioned last week I had made a scarf for my sister, I also made a wee purse too, but forgot to photograph it properly. Unfortunately it didn’t arrive in time for her birthday, which is very disappointing. None of the pictures are really showing the true colours. I started off with a silk hankie stretched as long as I could and then wool and silks were layered. It ended up thicker than planned and so I maybe used too much wool fibre or may have shrunk it too much trying to get the silk to stick, but this was my first go at nuno felting. I am still getting a lot of movement in the silks, so perhaps I need to leave them longer after wetting, before I start rolling.

On a previous post I had shown a wet felted bag with flap that I made, which has become home to my circular needles…so I decided to make a matching roll one for my double pointed needles. The top picture maybe looks weird as it was on my sofa seat but then rotated 90 degrees…it is a long rectangle.

I have added to my YOP list ‘to knit (or crochet) all the left over bits of yarn. I had thought about making one of those sock yarn blankets made up of wee diamonds of sock yarn. After searching YouTube for videos to make diamond shapes I messaged the Crazy Sock Lady and asked her, and she explained they are made from mitred squares and so finally I found some ‘how to’ videos and had a go! And another go and another one!! They are addictive when you have a bunch of scrap wool next to your chair! I also knit a cover for my phone and a wee dog poop bag holder.

Look how well my poop bag holder goes with the trim on my dog treat bag!!! Hehe!

And finally I started to knit one of the arms of my Chimney Fire cardigan (not that I have finished the body yet). To protect the body whilst I am knitting the sleeves with DPNs I used a circular tray, so its kind of like a Lazy Susan…every time I finish one DPN I spin the tray!

Arrggghhhh! On Saturday evening I realised I had missed some of the arm decreases and I’m a bit further on than the image below so don’t want to rip out rows, so I have made a note of what I did and a plan for remaining decreases to get me back on track, so as long as I do the same on the other arm I should be ok. At least there’ll be no struggles to get my chubby upper arms in the sleeves 😂

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Year of Projects – week 11/52

This week I wanted to tidy the sunroom and dining area, which meant dealing with the fibre hanging around, waiting to be drum carded. I have borrowed the carder from my felting group, so need to return it at the end of the month.

The first half of the Samoyed dog hair has now been washed numerous times and drum carded and comes to 118g (4.16 oz). The other half has been washed and has been drying most of the week, so I will card it next week. There is still a whiff of dog about it, but once spun it will need washing again and hopefully that will work. I started pulling guard hairs out, but lost the will, perhaps as I spin I will try to pull out any very thick ones.

I also drum carded some brown alpaca, this is just a small amount from a much larger bag of alpaca fibre I picked up at a de-stash sale. I am not enjoying processing raw alpaca fibre…it is just soooooo dusty and full of vegetable matter (vm) that I dread processing the rest. I thought I would see what its like spun and then decide about the rest. I got in a mess with trying to create a rolag (see pic), so folded the other as a batt, and have separated them in a boot box with acid free paper ready for spinning.

I also drum carded this black fibre, I picked up in a stash with my spinning wheel. I am not 100% sure what it is, given the lack of grease, the amount of dust/vm and the softness, I think it is alpaca. The staple length varies but is mostly pretty long with odd short fat curls, which could be from its head? I am not an expert in fibres, but alpaca is my best guess. This photo is only a small part, there’s actually 119g of it now carded….similar amount to the white Samoyed…so I could try a humbug inspired ply (does the US have humbug sweets/candy!?!?!) Or I could knit something with black and white stripes?!

Onto more fun things I have done…

I finished my 3rd Hitchhiker scarf (albeit with some pattern variations shown on my Ravelry Project page). I love this pattern because I have memorised it (not hard, its just 8 rows repeated); you easily can tell where you are, so you can squeeze in a row when you have a few minutes; and you can make the scarf any size you want, so ideal for homespun yarn you aren’t sure how much there is. There is something pretty very cool about making something with yarn you have spun yourself. This is the first garment I have made with my homespun yarn and now the evenings are getting colder I will have a chance to wear it!

I have purchased some more of Martina Behm’s patterns, so will post details of those when I have done them. They call for fingering weight so its something to aspire to achieving in my spinning.

I finished spinning and made 3 ply yarn from my early dyeing attempts of British 56s wool. I had spun 2 bobbins of singles a while ago, so did 3rd today and then plied. What was left over on one bobbin I chain plied and feel I am getting better each time.

On Thursday I wet felted something for my sister’s 50th, but I won’t post the picture(s) yet, as its not her birthday until next week!

Other than that I have been knitting my cardigan….suspect I will be saying that for many weeks! If only I had chosen a stockinette and not American moss stitch and cable pattern!! Ah well!

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Year of Projects – weeks 9 & 10/52

Not much done…in fact nothing on my YOP list, but I have expanded my stash, which was definitely not on my ‘to do list’ oops!

But whilst in Orkney for a week, you HAVE to buy some wool from the rare North Ronaldsay sheep, which eat the seaweed on the coast of North Ronaldsay and Isle of Auskerry, which are the only 2 places they live. So when I say ‘some wool’, what I mean is…

Enough undyed wool to knit a jumper (6 balls in Seal Grey and 1 in Slate Grey)
Enough dyed wool to add some interest to the jumper or for accessories
Enough fibre (in 3 different natural colours) to spin goodness knows how much more yarn

Oh and…

some silk hankies and silk in colours that will go on the scarf I am going to make for my sister’s 50th birthday (hand dyed on Orkney)
And while I’m at it I may as well buy 200g of sari silk because it was too beautiful and reasonably priced not to..despite having nothing to do with Orkney!!!

Hopeless!!

Anyway, I did manage to knit a bit of my 3rd hitchhiker scarf, using home spun yarn and did some spinning of one of my first dyeing efforts.

If you are interested in seeing some pictures of Orkney, please check out my Week in Orkney post.

British 56s spinning — British 56s spun from first dyeing and drum carding practice

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Wet felting

Needle felting

Spinning

Dyeing

Knitting

Crochet

Sewing

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