Much, much to do
So this might be a short post, but I’ll see what I can squeeze in.
First up, Rhinebeck. Rhinebeck, as always, was a whole lot of fun. I bought some yarn, and some fiber, but I was really nice to my wallet and only bought 2 skeins of yarn, and 6 total ounces of fiber. I’m quite impressed with myself.
The first skein is from the Oasis Farm Fiber Mill booth. It’s a lovely 3 ply, two of the plys are a dark (almost navy, but not quite) shade of blue, with the third ply dyed a very light blue. It didn’t come with a tag, and I can’t find it on their website, but from what I can remember it is around 200 yards, 100% wool, and it seems to be about a worsted weight. I’m thinking that this is destined to become a hat and mitt set for me.
The second skein is 665 yards of 100% sport weight alpaca, from Times Remembered. They don’t seem to have a website, but from what I can gather off a quick google search they have a store in Slate Hill, NY. So, if anyone is around there, it might be worth looking into. That is also a blue, but this time an ice blue, almost white/extremely light grey in color. Destined to become a large and cozy lace wrap/stole, probably designed around a winter theme, possibly ice or snow.
The temperature has plummeted in the past few days. Making it very hard to get out of bed in the mornings, and making me wish I had a few more large warm shawls to wrap up in.
The first ball of roving came from Hatchtown Farm. It is 2 oz of 100% Coopworth in a blend of what seems to be a natural dark brown, and a natural cream, just a few shades darker than white. I’ve never tried Coopworth before, so I’m excited to try this, but it’ll have to wait until I get my current project off my spindle, the wool/silk blend that I last talked about at the very end of this post. For now though I’m very content squishing it every now and then.
The last of the purchases was 4 oz of wool fiber from Spinners Hill. 2 oz were in a blend of browns and greens with some reds and yellows sprinkled here and there (much prettier than it sounds). This I spun into a thick n thin two ply, mostly ranging from light worsted to fingering weight, if I had to guess. I’m thinking I want to knit a toy out of this, but I’m not quite sure. The second 2 oz are a very deep and dark, but still slightly, slightly variegated purple. I think I’ll spin this finer and possibly make a hat or some gloves from it.
Well, that’s all I’ve got time for now, but the text post will include what I’m currently knitting, and what I’m finished knitting. Plus some more stash enhancement, and maybe (it depends how soon I get to posting) the announcement of a new set of patterns. Yes, set of patterns (I’m excited). The Crisscross caps booklet (talked more in depth about here) has gone into testing, and is turning out very well so far. Fingers crossed that it continues to be smooth sailing.
A Crazy Number of WIPs
It’s been awhile since I’ve updated, but despite that there has been lots of knitting going on. The sky is overcast this afternoon, so some of the pictures might not be the best, but either way, here we go.
Beginning with two finished objects.
Both Leaves and Snakeskin, as well as the second Birdy Shawl are off the needles. Leaves and Snakeskin is knit out of STR lightweight in Gail’s Autumn Joy, and the second Birdy Shaw is knit out of STR mediumweight in Dragon Dance. Both of these projects simply fell off the needles over the past month. Looking back I got the yarn about a month and a half ago, and both of these were finished a week or so ago. I still need to write up and format these patterns, but both these patterns are towards the top of, a rather long list, of patterns to get ready for release.
Next up, two recently cast on items.
I’m a few rows past the ribbing on what will end up being a tam. In this tam I’m playing with the idea of combining color work with lace. This idea was inspired by the amazing Susan at A Few Stitches Short of a Full Row, and her combination of color work and cables, in the Tom Bombadil tam. The final tam will have a band of sitting birds (back birds on a blue background), and then a crown of soaring birds done in a lace pattern. I’ve never knit a tam before, so don’t be too surprised if you end up seeing this get ripped back a few times.
This project is something that I cast on yesterday, and has taken top priority at the very tippy top of the pile. It’s a shawlette that will be sent to my aunt who has recently gone through some very serious medical stuff. She is now out of the hospital and back home, but still not herself.
When I was designing this I wanted a very simple, very easy to memorize pattern, that would knitting up quickly. Knit on size 10s and in a thick and thin handspun, I wanted a pattern that would let the yarn dominate, but still have enough interest to keep my attention. This should be done within the next few days, and then some sort of project rotating regularity will be re-introduced.
This is the blanket that I talked about in the last post. I’m about 3/4 done with the main body, and then I have the border to knit up. My goal is to release this blanket pattern (tentatively being called A Study in Blues and Browns), a long with the pattern for A Study in Grey sometime in the last week of August, but we’ll see what happens.
Both Que Sera and Icy Fields have seen some action but not huge amounts.
I’ve started the right front for on Que Sera, but haven’t really worked on it in awhile. Though that might change soon, because I have the yarn and pattern for Liesl lined up to be my next “not original design” project.
I’m two or three rows away from being done with the Waves and Shields portion of Icy Fields shawl, and will probably spend at least part of this evening finalizing the charts for the next section.
For the next few weeks I’m going to try regularly updating every Sunday, in hopes of not going almost a month with no updates again.
After looking over this post again, I’m just realizing that I have a crazy number of projects on the needles.
Holly
Mail Day
Yesterday I got a delivery from Blue Moon Fiber Arts.
The skein on the left is STR lightweight in Gail’s Autumn Joy, and the skein on the right is STR mediumweight in Dragon Dance. Gail’s Autumn Joy is destined to be a semi-lacy scarf inspired by snakeskin, and Dragon Dance is going to be knit into a second Birdy Shawl, with a very much more updated pattern and chart.
With the arrival of these two skeins I have a basket full of yarns to swatch. So, I’m planning on spending a large chunk of tomorrow first fighting with the printer, and then swatching, because other than Icy Fields and Que Sera (which is currently being ignored) I don’t have anything on the needles. So here’s two more Icy Fields photos.
In this photo is a little closer and you can see more of the stitch definition. I’ve knit another 4 or 5 rows since I took the picture and hope to finish up the last two rows of the current repeat tonight.
And this photo explains why 2 rows before bed tonight will be an accomplishment.
Icy Fields is a stole, and it is knit flat, although in the photo it kind of looks like it’s in the round. It is constructed so that you cast on length-wise, knit one half of the main body, pick up the stitches from the provisional cast on, and knit the second half of the main body. Then you pick up the stitches around the outside and knit outwards, finishing either with a crochet cast off, or a knit on border, I haven’t decided which. It’s progressing slowly but consistently, so long as I don’t force myself to work on it.
Something progressing much faster on the other hand, is Belle.
I finished both singles a few days ago, and started plying this morning, but I don’t have a picture of the plied yarn at the moment. Hopefully this will be done within the next few days, and then I can wash it plus a few other skeins I have lying around.
In other news, Climbing Trellis is up and on Ravelry. I’ll be posting about it, and putting a link up on the sidebar, within the next few days.
My modified 10kH is going amazingly well. I ended up working on it for 13 and a half hours this week, which is making me feel better about the weeks that I kind of slacked off right after school ended. But I will end this post here and go work on Icy Fields.
Holly
