A new spinning project was inspired by this month’s challenge theme in the Spindlers group on Ravelry: favourite places.
So much good in this
This special 50% merino/ 50% silk braid is hand-dyed by Mandie at Sheepy Time Knits, and was a door prize that I amazingly won at the 2013 String Thing event. With some more discipline to keep equally special spindles clear, I was able to leap to a plan of action!
The Plan
It was actually a half-plan. Off, I ran with the fibre & my 28 g Moosie to a spinning morning visit with my good friend, Margaret. We last saw each other sometime last year with one thing & another.
Even with every confidence in what my eyes can see of this braid plus Mandie’s known skills as a dyer, I was floored. It’s that open & fabulous to spin almost 4 years later.
Simply put, this is the best of its kind that I have been fortunate enough to spin. The spindle was hard to put down at Margaret’s – sorry if you were behind on your day!
For such a gentle gradient, I am tearing fairly fat strips of fibre consistently across the top. When that length of top was spun, I arrived at the second half of planning. Out came this 26 g Tabachek with a Lacewood whorl. The rhythm is to alternate spindles at the end of each width of top.
Current situation: favourite place deeply imagined
The inspiration place is again, Frenchman’s Cove in Portland, Jamaica. Specifically, where the river meets the white sand beach.
This image shows the rope swing. It was the best fun to swing off into the confluence of river and Caribbean Sea as children.
The plying ball is of the two singles wound together by hand. It is 27 g. So far, the plan is a good one. I go by feel for the lengths that I spin in each round. There was only a small amount left on one spindle after winding this plying ball. It is kept with the project, and off I went with clear spindles again.
With pauses for knitting, I am happily spinning along. Other Spindlers members have shared beautiful places with just lovely projects. It all adds up to a very lucky thing to be doing this month.
New family creating
Happy Family Day weekend, Ontario readers. Unless T returns from school with the missing Peace Fleece mitten, I may be back to the remnants with a purpose!
We have coughs due to colds, and our own outings may take a hit – be well!
The fall became a marathon almost as soon as I hit ‘Publish’ on the last post. With adjustments work continued. Writing, and updating the projects fell that far behind.
We are here now, year-end!
Winter is shaping-up
As much as I have missed sharing the work it has been a good test in many ways. With less time & energy, I worked on the things that mattered the most. Feeling that strength from the years of learning and practice was its own reward. Really.
The spinning has been lovely as these 3 projects quietly show.
Plying the CVM wool at last!
Since taking this picture, I have plied 4 skeins for a total of approximately 790 yards. It is all a conventional 4-ply spun on smaller low-whorl spindles from rolags that I carded.
Some locks are still in the bag but I knew this was getting to a level of angst. It turns out that the plying is no doldrums. I like this stage! There are 2 of the large balls left to be plied.
This Jenkins Lark spindle loves the quiet times!
The cop on my Lark is getting full again. It’s not everyday that I turn to this Chasing Rainbows merino/wool but when I have it has been good spinning.
There is no concrete aim for this yarn but I am going for a 2-ply. The colourway is Pear.
Spinning hemp a gentle way – Forrester bone whorl spindle, supported
This Forrester spindle supported in the calabash bowl is a master for de-stressing at the end of a long day. It is couch spinning plain & simple.
The 4 singles balls weigh 27 g together. There is another 59 g of fibre, so I am not ploughing through stash with this one!
Onder shawl is finished and awesome!
Leaving the door open for sharing T’s new knits later on, there has also been this Onder shawl by Sarah Jordan. It proves that I too make the cut!
See the Miyuki beads? Just enough to keep me totally happy.
The lace in Sarah’s design was wonderful to work – simple enough to not snag my rough brain, and with enough challenge to make my days melt into something better.
The slip-stitch rolling edge was novel for me, and I love how it keeps the stockinette body honest.
Yarn Carnival sure knows how to dye Peacock!
The yarn was extra-special to work with. This skein of Yarn Carnival’s High Wire 3-ply in superwash Merino was a gift from DB & SIL. They chose it for me on a visit to Austin, Texas. Neither knits, and I just loved using it!
Happy New Year from all of us to you!
This Jacobus is how we know that T has very keen yarn instincts. He chose “River Daughter” from the SheepyTime Knits 2016 Middle Earth Club. This was after I refused his first choice of “The Nine, Merlon.”
T has loved Monkey so hard, and this is just one example of the games that they play!
This has been a year when knitting was the best way I found to say, “Yes, I think of you when you are sleeping. Go, check it out, kiddo!” Sometimes words are not enough.
Months! Unavoidably so but I have missed posting so much.
Be the change, Melvin. Be the change.
The circumstances of moving my studio away from this window, bringing down the guest room, painting for light, and generally growing into long-term plans have been very happy. It has been a long process with challenges and a ton of joy.
The first thoughts ran: yarn, knit, fall is coming
Naturally, knitting went into high gear as well. I bossed the Peace Fleece into living up to its worsted name for this Muddy Duck Pond Cardigan designed by Kristen TenDyke.
Taming of the aran weight to my purposes
Even on 4.0 mm needles my gauge led me to knit the 6 month-size instructions for a special preschooler. The ‘Kalinka Malinka blue’ colourway just pops knit this tightly. It also brought the yarn’s vegetable matter & guard hairs out for the plucking.
Second thoughts ran to the Sheepy Time Knits Strider yarn, actually worsted weight.
T’s handknits now also include 2 pairs of socks, and a set of mittens. He also has a kelly green hoodie on the needles that I am almost finished knitting: Kerrera for Kids by another favourite designer, Gudrun Johnston. The very first finished object was a handspun Mario the Artistic Rabbit in Targhee wool that is seeing its fair share of love.
As I knew it would, spindle spinning has been my chief creative outlet. The surprise was how strongly my sock knitting mojo returned. There is nothing like slaying a second-sock syndrome, and I am also learning from Lara Neel’s “Sock Architecture“. T, your toes have a Grecian shape & it was new to me.
While projects take longer to create & document they are more important than ever before. It’s all good, and with luck I will be able to weave in this guest-room-no-more space… eventually.
Yes, a captive ring Pushka!
This spindle is 1 of 2 captive ring Pushkas that brightened up some hard days. A friend’s daughter brought a good many back from her trip to Cusco’s market in Peru earlier this summer. I was harder to reach than usual, and am so thankful that she kept a few for me plus told me to also snag an extra-large plying spindle. Even more thankful because we now also have a small turned Pushka for T.
The fibre is Corriedale wool top, and I am spinning along with the Spindlers Ravelry group’s September challenge. The theme this month is Peru, and I am trying to spin 50 g of the top for a 2-ply yarn. Prepping my own would be more authentic but far less achievable for me now.
It’s a pleasure to touch base again. There have been quiet laughs about how my diary notes in the last post really took-off since March. For readers who have been patient, thank you.
Warm (i.e. wooly) congratulations to the flock that I wrote about in my last post! Laurie’s Little Lambs farm won blue ribbons in 2 categories of the 2015 Royal Agricultural Winter Fair fleece wool competition. Both are in the competition’s Down-type category (26-33 microns). It was their first year exhibiting, and I am very happy they got such stellar results!
Partial as I am to coloured fleeces, I had a moment when Bob showed me Norris’ clip. I’m so glad to see Norris’ name beside a first ranking in the Royal’s results list, and know how pleased Bob must be! His entries are both sure to be in high demand at the fleece auction this Sunday, November 15, 2015.
Well-deserved recognition for these Babydoll Southdowns!
Southdown is the oldest of 6 true or core Down-type wools. In “The Fleece & Fiber Sourcebook” Deb Robson & Carol Ekarius note that Southdowns are in records dating back to the medieval period from the South Downs, England. The area is along the English Channel in today’s Hampshire & Sussex counties.
The rare-breed status is ‘recovering’ by the Livestock Conservancy. Rare Breeds Canada’s 2014 conservation list shows Southdown as ‘vulnerable’ (101 – 300). Bob & Laurie do breed their registered Babydoll Southdown sheep for sales. It would be great to see the breed’s status shift up to the next category in Canada, ‘at risk’.
Happily examining a Babydoll Southdown fleece
While Bob showed me some of this year’s beautiful clip, Laurie graciously gave N. a tour of the farm. It was wonderful of them to have given us so much of their time, and in turn I showed Bob some of the tools that we use as spinners to prepare wool from scratch.
All pictures from this July’s visit to Bob & Laurie’s farm were taken by a very impressed N!
Laurie’s passion is with her birds
Olivia’s 2015 fleece
The lock strength, crimp, and colours in this fleece from Bob’s ewe Olivia were just so appealing to me. Olivia’s fleece was carefully rolled, and it was easy for me to see which end was up as it were!
Olivia, Babydoll Southdown 2015 raw wool
All colours are acceptable within the olde-type Babydoll Southdown’s breed standard. This is an advantage since as Deb Robson tells us in her Winter 2015 article in Spin-Off Magazine, “The Down Wools: quiet and unsung heroes of the fiber world,” the Down wools are mostly white. On page 71 she says,
The most reliable source of natural, non-white color within these breeds is the Southdown, of which there are at least three strains of varying sizes. The smallest, the Babydoll Southdowns… [is] the group from which you’ll most likely find colored fleeces.
Cleaning my Babydoll Southdown wool
Using the Unicorn Power Scour for this fleece was a big improvement in terms of steps to lanolin cleaned locks. We needed to repeat cleaning for E’s white ram fleece when we used original blue Dawn detergent last fall.
Melvin takes up his happy place
Try as I might there was no separating Melvin from Olivia’s wool as I worked on cleaning. This was still the raw wool, and he does deign to move when told that it’s needed for washing.
Locks from Olivia’s Babydoll Southdown fleece
The pigment shifts evenly across the fleece’s locks. The butt end of the locks is consistently lighter with a darker tone above. The locks are strong – it’s simply a colour shift with no break following the line.
A preliminary test with a new-to-me set of Meck paddle combs confirms my idea that the colour blends very nicely if I alternate the lock orientation when charging the combs. One small 2-ply skein shows as a heathery blend of the colours that I love, and could possibly over-dye.
No matter what this will be an interesting fleece to process as a spinner! My hunch is that the yarn could have a warm lilac undertone. I can plan around any colour inconsistency, and am not even married to a single large project for this fleece.
This fall’s colour
I never dreamed that agreeing to mentor E would help evolve my work in this way. Now that we are in this eventful late fall, I am excited about working with an incredibly soft & unique wool. That it’s also come from an award-winning year for Bob’s flock is just such an added reward. Hopefully, I can show E how the multi-coloured fleece compares to hers soon!
Looking forward to being blown away by the fleece auction’s competition for the prize Babydoll Southdown wool! Will you attend, local friends?
This is not typically a fabulous month but the past 4 or so weeks have exceeded all August expectations.
Attribution & laurels: N
We celebrated Emancipation Day, August 1st with family. There were a lot of new nephew cuddles, and good times with his parents. We stayed with wonderful friends. Their windowsill shows all of my travel spinning of Wensleydale.
The people of New York were rather taken-in by my carob Turkish Delight spindle by Jenkins Woodworking.
Sweetening the travel pot
There was also quality time aka aeroplane knitting with a baby gift for our this-week born new cousin in Toronto.
Gidday cardigan set for baby G!
This cardigan is Gidday Baby pattern by Georgie Hallam. Can I just whisper, “Gidday pattern!” This was a July 29 – August 9th pleasure of knitting with stashed Sirdar Baby Bamboo yarn.
This is an awfully sweet yoke. My main colour is #122 with the contrast in cream. The hat was just as fun to knit and is Louisa Harding’s striped beanie hat. My copy of her Natural Knits for Babies and Moms is much loved & heavily used.
But I digress.
Attribution: N
We were well-fed, and soon got over for baby’s first museum visit. The crowds! It’s hard meeting an infant’s needs in those crowds but our new parents did a fine job, and he was pretty cheerful.
At my special request, attribution: N
Search engine diving shows this dinosaur as Colossochelys the Pleistocene turtle but I am not sure in retrospect. We were at the American Museum of Natural History.
Riverside Park, Manhattan Attribution: N
It was such a short but packed trip. I came home with craft books from the Strand Bookstore, a new-to-me set of Meck Russian paddle combs, and wheels that are now on my Mighty Wolf loom. The best part was having such a blast welcoming nephew, F. I think he likes me.
The Learning Curve – bead embellishment
Before & after our trip, I participated in a 4-part guild workshop on bead embroidery with William Hodge of Armure Studios.
Carried away? Bead embroidery
It felt like jumping back into the childhood sandbox of embroidery with crazy bling. Fun but also greedy for time to do even these small amounts. I will never begrudge a handmade bead embroidery work its price again. It’s joyous but where does the time go?
Well, I did hear, “Start simply,” but couldn’t stop.
Each participant had her own approach. Mine was to follow the instruction about total bead cover and the ’80s patterned fabric.
The faux pearl bead to the right has special comedic value. It, ahem, moves of its own volition.
William shared many pieces in his personal collection from different cultures as well as his own work. It was fabulous, and I was glad for the breaks between workshop parts.
It was just perfect having the Naked Craft exhibition on at the AGB while taking this workshop. The bead embroidery pieces by contemporary artists are astonishingly beautiful but I also saw the raw commitment – eye-strain, materials, design, time.
Finishing my thoughts
With thanks to PAKnitWit who ran the aptly named ‘Shawl for All’ knitalong, I used all 756 yards of my superwash merino dyed by Southern Cross Fibres.
Diminishing Returns Shawl in my handspun yarn
This was 8 of 9 designed sections in Sarah’s Diminishing Returns triangle shawl. I used 3.5 mm needles, and loved each second of this relaxed me-knit.
It’s an elegant & simple concept. You move through stockinette & garter stitch blocks that reverse roles. Just right for a strong gradient like my Sugar & Spice 2-ply yarn but the design is very versatile. I hope that others will use handspun yarn to make this pattern too.
The knitter gets to keep a lid on the purl stitches as the triangle grows, which I appreciate. The top-down triangle adds 4 stitches every other row, and that grows quickly!
Treating myself to the handspun goodness
Also appreciated? The length on my arm as the shawl crosses. It’s just how I like a shawl.
Squooshy is also good
The home for this knit along is the Knit Wit group on Ravelry. We had a good lead time for blocking & also taking these pics. As I told the group, this one will see lots of wear in the cooler weather.
Spock sock!
New socks of unusual size (9″ circumference) are off the needles! As soon as I saw Turtlepurl’s post for her Live Long & Prosper in this self-striping pattern, I had to get it for N. It is a 75% superwash merino/ 25% nylon blend, and I used 2.25 mm double-pointed needles.
Spock socks in the wild
He is smiling in this picture, and approves of the finished socks.
The columns of stitches are just paired slip stitches passed over knit front & backs. Easy to work, and perfect for other plane trips this spring.
Belated baby gift!
The last finished thought is this version of a Telemark 2.0 pullover that I made for our baby cousin in Montreal. It was a nail-biting use of more from my Sirdar Baby Bamboo yarn stash.
Is the placket reading as weird to you as it is to me? It might be a comprehension problem on my part but I did try to follow the instructions as written there. It has been on its way this week, and I hope they like it.
A Jenkins Lark!
Spindles are on the front burner again. Next month I will lead a guild workshop, and I am preparing the materials. It’s a full 4-part introductory workshop, and we will go from first steps to plied yarn. It’s my first formal teaching, and I am so excited.
In my down-time, I can play with this tulipwood Lark spindle by Jenkins Woodworking. Luckily, I missed 2 others for sale last week because this was offered in Ontario. Quick flight, no foreign exchange issues, and I love the tulipwood!
The Delight in the travel collage above is 5g heavier at 28 g. Its arms sit low on the shaft (the Lark is mid-shaft), and are approximately 2 cm wide x 8.75 cm long. The Lark’s arms are a slim 1.25 cm wide x 9.5 cm long. The slighter profile is great for winding-on, and will hold that much more of a cop is my guess.
Over the past month, I have been helping as captain & riding along with Team Spindlers 2015 in the Tour de Fleece. It’s been amazing & a big honour – I started with this team as a rookie in 2010!
We are 165 members strong. The spinning projects are a fabulous mix from returning spindle spinners, and those who are new to the craft.
My main focus is keeping the ‘fleece’ in Tour de Fleece! This California Variegated Mutant wool (link takes you to my last update post) was being hand-carded & spun on 4 low-whorl drop spindles when it started to go on breaks for long stretches.
This was the status at the start of the Tour: 4 plying balls of 4-singles each, and more on the spindles themselves. The front spindles are Andean turned pushkas from the CTTC, and the others are Andinas by R. Leach.
Plan of Action
For most stages of this Tour, I have carded 2 (or 3) rolags per spindle, and then rotated through until each is all spun-up.
Never one to obey rules that he can’t completely understand, Melvin has found his way into some of my update posts. This incursion happened for Stage 6 after I left the room to get a glass of water. He’s quick.
Focus has paid-off, and I have broken into other spinning projects when much too tired to lift the hand-cards.
Stage 4, Tour de Fleece 2015
A 5th plying ball at Stage 6!
Egyptian Cotton for Stage 9 in-couch spinning
As at Stage 10
Stage 11 with yak/merino/silk blend on Tabachek mini spindle
Less fleece at Stage 13!
Stage 15 and forward
Sharing has also been with spinners in the Guild, and another unofficial wildcard, the Canadian Yarn & Fibre Market group on Ravelry.
It’s been a wild Tour, and I am looking forward to the last half of this week into Paris. For all who love spinning while they spin as much as I do, a big, “Allez!” from me to you for after our gap day!
Whichever stars have aligned, we are in the midst of much change. A lot, actually. Only one fell to be met with knitting, and it is the happiest of them all!
He is now just over 6 weeks old, and oh, joy I am an Aunt! The design is Welcome to the Flock by Julia Farwell-Clay. All variations of this sheep cardigan are adorable. It was so much fun scrolling through that I did it twice!
My version is knit heavier than the pattern suggests. The yarn is Diamond’s Luxury Collection fine dk-weight yarn in superwash merino. With 3.5 mm needles, I got 21 stitches & 26 rows per 4″.
The substitution made for yoke changes. The single row of sheep ends with a 7-row open heart in black. I added a 3-row peerie from Alice Starmore’s Book of Fair Isle Knitting (page 49) into a 1-row peerie pattern.
Handspun-worthy boy
It wasn’t all blue but nearly so! How could I not spin for this? Seriously.
This Targhee wool top is from Corgi Hill Farm, and was spun in just a few days at the end of March. It was 5 oz/ 140 g in her “Frozen Fjord” colourway. Spinning was on the Watson Martha in double drive on the larger whorl for a 2-ply yarn of 382 yards.
Some gifts are just a joy to make. A first Mario the Artistic Rabbit by Jenna Krupar in Noro Silk Garden yarn went to my cousin’s 2 year-old this Christmas. This second version used approximately 130 yards of the handspun Targhee wool.
Needle-felting for a tail with kid mohair locks was my favourite part. The new parents agree, and are keeping the toy well out of their dog’s reach!
Indefensibly perhaps, I knowingly went with these mis-matched button eyes. Let’s chalk that up to character.
Give the baby a vest!
Maybe you are starting to see how my hands were a little full with the baby knitting?
Shopping the stash resulted in a lot of ends to sew in! This is a pattern from Sirdar’s baby bamboo knits pamphlet 323B. After some other tries, I decided on this as the best colour sequence:
A = Neutral: col. 141
B = Dark blue: col. 150
C = Kelly green: col. 122
D = Light blue: col. 138
It was all going fairly swimmingly (literally – four colours to juggle) when I realized about the square armholes. They ought to have been shaped… With a shortage of yarn & patience that mistake took it to a very preppy level.
We are planning our trip to meet this little one & celebrate his birth in person. It means a second short trip in 2 months but will be more than worth it!
The clematis is in full bloom now but you see, I was thinking of posting in June but just got swept away by all the things.
Some gifts are just a joy to make. A first 
Indefensibly perhaps, I knowingly went with these mis-matched button eyes. Let’s chalk that up to character.
