Never before have I used one, but I found a nice palette generator to help me begin my first weaving project, and I must say, these tools are awesome! I have needed to go to the source of my inspiration, … Continue reading
Last in the Unspun For Friends series, knowing that really this can’t possibly be the end of it, for I’ve had too much fun.
I am thinking I should do some kind of drawing monthly, where winner gets a kit with UnSpun & lace pattern, for this was a very satisfying accomplishment to finish this four-part series. Watch this space as I develop that idea! One 50g skein of Unspun 1100, sourced from Wool of The Andes Sport in a pastel of yellow-green called ” Green Tea Heather “.
Knit Picks describes the color . . .
Green Tea Heather is a soft, muted light green with subtle warm undertones. Green Tea Heather work well with warm browns or try bright shades of blue to brighten things up with pop of contrast.
It is such a light green that its almost delicate, making me think the color of a pale icy marguerita!
Off on a journey to Arkansas from California, for Jane, as I am very grateful for her presence on my Ravelry group and countless test-knits. I am hoping all four recipients will have their fine lace yarn when I submit the pattern very soon. Thats me now, back to the last stretch of veils & variations.
As of this morning, this skein is bound for Australia!
As in previous several posts, Wool of The Andes Sport was the original yarn, and in a richly heathered green called ” Pampas “. Knit Picks describes their color . . .
Pampas is an olive green color that has a slight vintage tone. The variable shades of yellows, greens and touches of brown are similar to the prairie grasses and herbs found in the lowlands of South America called the Pampas.
I think of all the Knit Picks blended heathers , this is among my top favorites for color complexity. I see moss green and beige predominantly with flecks of emerald green, amber gold, and aqua blue!
It is a stunning color , a near neutral, but more distinctively beautiful in single plies than the four plies all together for the colors are then quite a bit less blended. I have made this skein for a knitting friend who has knitted gorgeous samples of some of my designs (as well as comments on this blog :: waves to Redshoes :: ) 550 yards of Unspun heading south against the clock at a rapid pace.
I have one more Unspun gift to make to finish my series : Unspun For Friends
Another couple of yarn cakes of super light-weight lace, bound for Ontario Canada! As in previous posts, Wool of The Andes Sport was the original yarn, and in the cheerful color ” Sprinkle “. Knit Picks describes their color . . .
Sprinkle is a blue violet color. The heathered strands show the beautiful color variations from a soft robin’s egg blue to a medium red violet giving it the overall look of dusty lavender.
The camera is so color selective, so I must describe what I see. I’ll add that I see flecks of gold which seem to give the color a tiny influence of beige… thus the ‘dusty’ appearance. I also think un-plying 4 strands lessens the homogeneous affect of the carded mix of ‘heathered’ colors, so the colors are just a little bit more striking. Photographing while looking down from on the attic ladder, my slippered feet, lavender shirt, and light brown pants ended up in the photo, and rather than crop that out, I am again surprised to find myself dressing for the occasion!
Absolutely gorgeous complex colorway, I am smitten. ” UnSpun 1100 ” I have named this transformation, as it is 1100 yards & 100 grams of singly ply very luscious lace-making stuff.
Already sent off and heading to Canada, and finished with two in the series of four. Two more of these UnSpun gifts to make, and then its back to the serious lace knitting for the upcoming pattern, but I am having a good break while making some nice yarn, so feeling really good about that!
You can see all four of this series in Unspun For Friends.
It snowed last night! Here at 2000 ft elevation, it is sticking, and temperature is cold enough to keep it a while. Oh, but there seems to be something nestled into the snow…
It is two cakes of finished UnSpun!
of which I mentioned in the last post .
A gorgeous blackish tealish blue, 1100 yards & 100 grams, this super fine lace weight is ready to make a journey to Hamburg Germany! You can see all four of this series in Unspun For Friends
And all is well in our snowy charcoal forest.
And Emma in her car, snuggled under a blanket with her squirrel …
She hasn’t a care in the world about the snowy cold!
Stash [stash] noun. 1. something which is stored secretly; hiding place; cache, as in excess of knitting yarn collected with good intentions to knit, but has not yet been knitted.
This blue mandala of stray sock yarn is getting a makeover, as is a lot of my stray yarn. As mentioned in previous post, I am working on a little something to submit so that gift-knitting will be made just a little easier for those of us with too much STASH. No point in getting any more for this one, as it is a stash promoting sort of design for both handspun and purchased, otherwise somewhat misdirected yarn, and in many weights
Meanwhile, Emma and I are hunkering low in the shade here, as Northern California temperatures rise to scorching hot. Oh, ho hum. Emma has a growth on her front leg which the vet has finally decided should go, so early next week we’re going back to the vet for a quick surgery to get it taken off. Wish Emma well everybody, in case I don’t post again until then.
Its going to be hot weekend, but there’s a crazy chance of rain. I can’t remember last time I experienced a rain in August. Wouldn’t that be just magic!
Listening to political news on NPR a lot these days while I knit, feeling a bit unsettled as trouble swims below the surface. However, here in my wooded hermitage there is no trouble, only this blithe little ball of yarn, in shade of dusty pink, that I made myself! Um, well, that is … I un-plied it myself !! I ‘made’ it from a ball of Knit Pick’s Palette which is a 2-ply fingering weight of Peruvian wool, while mending dozens of breaks from impossibly sticky teasing twists that were a frustrating occurrence of un-plying, washing, and hang-drying to set the tension ~~ and then I finally got the whole ball of lace-weight here ready to go. Having tossed a few grams worth of knots, I have about 45 grams & 420 yards of some seriously fine lace single ply ( see all posts about unspun)
What is really fishy , is what is forthcoming!
Wee Hearts in nine different Fair Isle Hebridean 2ply colors! Actually this hat is a study on one of Alice*Starmore’s colorways , a colorway from her design “Mary Tudor” from her 2013 second edition of Tudor Roses , using her own yarn, as sequenced in the chart. You could say this hat was a colorway test for Mary Tudor Cardigan, although I did change some colors around from the chart, because of a mistake I made. I really came out of the study with a better understanding of how the blending of foreground color changes against background color changes can be in modern Fair Isle.
Now I am wondering, do I have time for one more? Not really, I must be on to Autumnal Sweaters!
I went into town this morning, and stopped into the local yarn shop, and there was a new batch of yarn in, which I just couldn’t resist. Rowan Purelife “Revive” : 36% recycled silk, 36% recycled cotton, and 28% recycled viscose. Beautiful apricot pink and clay tweeds, which will suit my coloring well, as I plan on making it into a ‘striped’ Altitude Lace Cowl, and for moi ! (Ahem… once bought and brought home, I can never resist a good ol’ yarn photo-shoot, as yarn makes such nice portraits.)
As of a few days ago we’ve had the presence of some interesting clouds hovering! Today I swear, it rained a few drops, a few gorgeous wet drops, and threatens to rain some more…
June is a lovely month. Transitional, mostly unpredictable, mild, beautiful, and cheerful. I even love the word, so cute, and yet rather ancient sounding… “joon”.
I have decided to not write a pattern for the halter tops I mentioned in last post. Just too much uncharted territory to deal with, as I have so much to get busy with in the knitting, and my non-knitting life too. So the cotton tops will be a pure & simple yarn tasting and summer treat for my nieces ~~ with no agenda. ( Wow, ‘no agenda’ sounds like I was let out on summer vacation! )
That is it for this post, more a clearing of slate and in a lovely mood as June unwinds into summertime, so soon to be here.
I have been colossally distracted in a major yarn tangent in recent days.
I’ve been going through my ‘stash’ (that is yarn which is in one’s possession, otherwise free to use at whim), and over-dying & having a bit of fun.
But this particular little project was super fiddly and a major study in “un-spinning”, using my spinning wheel, ball-winder, swift, and dye pot. On my spinning wheel, I literally unwound the 3 plies of a bulky-weight very soft 100% alpaca yarn I had, while at the same time winding them into 3 separate balls. I splice-joined the 3 single balls into one skein, and then attempted to relax the energized ‘singles’ with some simmer-dying. And relax they did!
Even the spliced joins were completely invisible when I wound and re-wound on to the swift. Ever-so-slightly felted made a terrific halo (fuzz) when the final product was skeined.
178 yards and 66 grams, of extremely soft alpaca single ply yarn, now ready for a delicious soft lace cowl. I would think this would classify as sport-weight. I am frankly amazed at this result, and my eye is wandering through my stash now, with ideas to deconstruct. 
Well, it was a huge amount of work, but its done & dusted and I’m very proud of such an alluring result. That’s me on a beautiful day, I should be knitting socks, but sometimes distraction is good for creativity!
See all posts about Unspun !
I love knitwear and yarn photography, and this grey stack of alpaca with stretching shadows, shows the month so well! Recently getting a down-pour of rain, rain, rain, washing all that is bad in the world away. Life is good.
If ‘rascally’ could be a word to describe yarn, I would say linen yarn is very much so. Crisp, unyielding, stubborn, and relentlessly tough stuff, linen has a great appeal to me… oh such like rusty found things, or uncushioned old benches, or crackled old earthenware. I love this stuff, and wear it constantly, year round.
Even winding it off the swift, into a ball , it has a mind of it’s own…rather messy in appearance, not laying in unison with other strands, wrestling it into a ball, as it tried to be a cube, was a task in and of it’s own!
I will tame it. It may take ten cycles in the washer & dryer along with a load of white towels, but it will soften and be every bit as wonderful as my favorite linen shirts.
This yarn however, is only 46% linen. I bought it to dip my toes into the feel of linen, for I do have 3 skeins of navy colored 100% wet spun linen waiting to be knit up. It is also 42% recycled silk, and 12% wool. It is Shibui “Twig” , and there is 190 yards of it. I am going to be sampling this lovely summery linen blend with my Una Cosettina pattern , as I have gone quite on a tangent today.
I am putting down Snowmelt gaiters for a short while, let them sit on a table for a few days. What is the rush anyway? I am my own competition , I feel suddenly today like having a little play time, so here I am yarn tasting again, going to pour myself a tall one of what I consider the perfect Northern California yarn!
I just picked this up from the duff of the forest floor. I nearly stepped on it while knitting along my woods path. In the woods we have a lot of robins , year round, so occasionally one finds a little shell cast aside, just like this, a stark contrast of blue shade against brownish tones of the leaves on the ground. Had I a camera with me I would have done well to photograph it against its natural setting, but I didn’t, and so I collected my little prize into my knitting bag and brought it home to photograph on some white linen.
This color blue, a greenish blue, is such a beautiful color, and I have it now here as reference when examining hues, if I may be forgetting what it looks like. Let it etch into my color memory, for I want to find a way to knit this color!
I dropped in on Urban Yarns in Vancouver BC this last weekend, being that we were visiting Jeff’s sister who lives very near. I have not visited all that many yarn shops in my few travels, but those who know me, knew this visit was completely and totally necessary, so I was escorted to Urban Yarns, and found myself wandering about in a lovely yarn shop, just a couple of blocks away from the home of my sister-in-law.
There I took in the atmosphere of a true Vancouver Yarn Experience. I got to see & touch yarns I’ve long been curious about as well, such as New Hampshire-made Harrisville Designs “Watershed” , “Highland” and “Shetland” yarns and of those there was a lot! The Harrisville Design yarns recently was on my hunting list, but when there at Urban Yarns my mind went totally blank and I had Yarn Shop Freeze ! After wading through some other mainstream yarn shop brands, the lasting thought to ponder before I left was . . . ‘which yarn is the single-most Vancouver Experience’ ?
I was led to rather large display brands of Vancouver hand-dyed yarns, many which I could have chosen, but the most of the most that I would take home with me (even though it is to be found in my own LYS) was a very Vancouver yarn ~~~ Sweet Georgia Merino Silk Lace. Not a thrifty purchase, not by a mile, but it was ‘hand-dyed’ only down the street, and sold right there at Urban Yarns, right there on Highland Boulevard.
I must regret one thing if not spending more money on more truly Vancouver yarns, and that is I did not have time or fore-thought to visit the place ‘just down the street’ where the Sweet Georgia Yarn people are busy hand-dying & skeining up their yarn. However, Jeff did buy me a very luxurious gift of rabbity-soft 100g skein of Merino Silk Lace (omg, Jeff bought me yarn!) Here it is, untwisted and sprawled across a late afternoon sun-beam . . .
With all of this ultra fine smokey grey silky yarn, I am now on a mission of discovery of who and what a knitter becomes when introduced to such delicate stuff, 765 lavish yards of slate grey merino/silk lace yarn ~~ which by the way, I will be winding off into a ball soon, by hand, with only the help of the backs of two chairs. On to new lace horizons!!!
I have sock yarn ‘on my brain’ and in recent many weeks have been trying different brands in a sort of comparison & contrast project ~~ in a Sock Yarn Tasting ! I even accidentally (well, almost) designed a new thing in the process of fiddling around with sock yarn (more on that later). Although my Sock Yarn Tasting has been a great source of entertainment for myself, and I actually do feel a sense of earnestness to convey my thoughts on the matter . At the very least, in the process of comparing I’ve settled on my favorites, and better yet, answered my curiosity as to why.
I have knit On The Trail , a whole lot (it’s what I do) , also while waiting for pots to simmer & the kettle to boil, while watching tv, while talking on the phone, while reading, and even sometimes in between sets at gigs, so my knitting is always hanging on the chair back. So, while my hands have gotten a bit sore from all of this knitting, I am pleased with the small woolly mountain of knitteds which I am producing. Soon I’ll be off to Vancouver for Jeff’s family reunion of sorts and you can be certain I’ll be packing up my menagerie of socks-in-progress to take along, and excuse myself for being entrapped by the knitting while in others’ company, returning hopefully with a pair or two to add to the growing stack of socks I am squirrelling away for the gift-giving holidays.
I am just am so filled with a sense of giddy & calm pride, as I have found knitting socks to be my meditation. Ahem, okay, so here’s my observations so far of the superstars of sock yarn market which I am sampling : Madelinetosh “Tosh Sock” , Malabrigo “Sock”, Shibui “Sock” , and Sweet Georgia “Tough Love Sock”~~~ all knit up with my Penny Candy Socks pattern with size 2.75mm – US 2 circular needles (two of them).
As Shibui Sock & Madelinetosh Tosh Sock seem to me about the same thickness, I knit them together in stripes because they feel nearly identical in thickness, though the Tosh Sock is a tiny bit more ‘firm’ , they are thicker, and even a bit fluffier.
Ginger Lime Chews Penny Candy Socks, details on Ravelry HERE
I observe that the fabric of Tosh Sock & Shibui Sock produced is more substantial, and would be great for a slightly thicker pair of socks but as this is so, I might only wear these socks with the roomiest of my shoes. Great for hiking boots, great for Dansko Clogs which tend to fit a little roomy anyway. (Note to self: get another pair of Dansko Clogs !) but not so great for my dressier shoes. Soft, plush, firm.
* * *
Next in the line-up, Sweet Georgia “Tough Love Sock”. This yarn is indeed a tough yarn. So much in fact, that I suspect the slight lack of elastic properties of the yarn effected the gauge, as the same number of stitches on same needles as I knit the others, the Sweet Georgia socks turned out really very large by comparison ! I stopped at one sock, not sure how to proceed, for these would indeed be tough socks and big enough for a man, I just couldn’t think of any men I’d like to give orangey red lace-bordered socks to. No offense to you men who would love them, I just wasn’t in the mood to make the second sock, so I will post the photo of the one.
I think I might have to compensate with this yarn’s properties, to knit the next size smaller with them and see how that works. ((also notice that the two colors were so alike, melting into each other a little too much , that seeing the stripes was insanely difficult)).
* * *
Finally, for the kind of socks that one would easily slip into one’s favorite shoes , that is, shoes worn regularly with store-bought socks, the finer fabric of Malabrigo’s fine fingering-weight “Sock” wins out. Mostly for it’s soft resilient and lovely elastic feel, but equally for the rich colors in each hand-dyed skein. I have to say also that I have a real penchant for “oh so fine” knitting these days, and it’s fine-fingering weight that I seriously am in love with.
My Penny Candy Socks and Pretty Little Things Gloves are designed with Malabrigo, and I’m more than happy with the slightly delicate character of the fine fingering yarn with its superwash easy-care and softness of touch. In fact, I feel like hoarding every ‘solid’ color of Peruvian-made Malabrigo yarn, and happily knitting Penny Candy Socks for everyone I know.
Blueberry Gumballs Penny Candy Socks, details on Ravelry HERE
It is a goal of mine to knit for next holiday season, as there’ll be no hitting the shops in a bug-eyed panic to find something meaningful. Because basically, it can’t get much more meaningful than hand-knit socks knit fresh only months previously.
I’ll end this yarn tasting with more Malabrigo yarn on the needles, in murky green and clear blue. This photo was taken early this morning, as the stripes began to colorplay . . .
Socks in progress, details on Ravelry HERE