Sampling the Wayfarer

I've been making some decent progress on the projects I currently have on the needles. I finished the sparkly black handwarmers for the choir-mate and they are living with her now. You can't see the sparkles a whole lot but I promise you they are very sparkly. If you'd like more information on them, you can see the project page here. I basically put the whole (very simple) pattern in the project notes.

Please ignore the large amount of recycling behind me. The husband keeps promising to take it out.
I also finished the socks I was knitting for a church buddy and they are living with her already. Remember them from last week?

Well, they're finished and gone now. I forgot to take a finished picture of them though.
I'm working slowly on Christmas projects and I'm doing a sample knit. An online friend works for Made in America yarns and put out a call awhile back for sample/test knitters. I agreed to do a sample knit and I'm working away on it. She sent me a couple skeins (two because we aren't sure if one will be enough) of their fingering weight yarn; Wayfarer. It's a beautiful yarn and knitting up into the Brigit pattern beautifully. The color we decided on is called Meadow and it's a lovely bright sage green.

You can see how lovely it looks in the cables (on our fresh, new snow).
Made in America Yarns grows and processes their yarn here in America and they make lovely stuff. This Wayfarer is 100% wool fingering-weight yarn, the skein is 3.5 ounces and 382 yards. The yarn almost looks like a tight cotton-like twist at first but it has a lovely bounce and it's knitting up quickly and beautifully.

I can't wait for these lovely socks to be done because I think they're going to be wonderful! Of course they have to make a trip back to the mill for a photo shoot but then they get to come live with me again. Very exciting!

Overconfidence is a Killer

This time of year those of us who craft for the holidays and have started early may start to get overconfident. I know I suffer from that every single year without fail. Just because I have a couple of things done and tucked away and have made good progress on almost all the other items on my list, does not mean that I should go ahead and throw additional projects in there.
Case in point: The socks I have started for a friend's birthday. To be fair, I didn't know her birthday was coming up and when I found out I decided to knit something for her but really? What was I thinking? The other night I was looking over my holiday crafting list and thinking about what projects I had left. I realized just how much I had left. Maybe some of it can get done quickly and easily but a great deal of it cannot. Therefore, I should also not have added the handwarmers I somehow got talked into knitting for a choir-mate. I'm also knitting a sample for a company but I don't have permission to talk about it and haven't received the yarn yet anyway so I will not be sharing that right now. What exactly was I thinking?
So, please enjoy this photo of socks that are partially finished (pictured with my new Jessalu Grinch Project bag, I highly recommend you check it out! They are her limited edition holiday print this year!)

I'll just be over there in the corner planning how little sleep I can survive on for the next month. Pay no attention to the soft sobbing. (Maybe it's not quite that bad, yet.)
P.S. Although the pattern looks a lot like No Purl Monkey it's actually Dragonfly socks and the yarn is Gritty Knits nom in last month's Nom of the month color: Aloha.

Faux Yarn

For the second Tuesday in a row I have actual spinning content. Don't hold your breath that it will continue.
Sunday afternoon I napped a whole bunch so when the handsome husband went to bed, I wasn't tired and I stayed up spinning. I finished the second bobbin of the Sparktickes Dyes Faux Cashmere. That was perfect because it had the opportunity to rest overnight and be plied the next day. I'm terrible at waiting to ply. I want yarn right away when I'm that close.

The first bobbin is on the right and the second bobbin is on the left. Doesn't it look like there's a whole lot more on the second bobbin? Really I had to break the yarn once and wind a small center-pull ball, plying from the outside and inside before joining back to the bobbins again to keep the colors gradiating at the same time. The bobbin that had more of the medium blue? The first bobbin. Then when the one bobbin ran out, again the first bobbin had more, I had to wind a second center-pull ball and ply from both the inside and outside to finish off that first bobbin.
I'm really happy with how the finished yarn turned out though.
 
 Here it is wound onto the Niddy Noddy. (I apologize for this picture. It was really gray and I had a hard time getting a decent photo. I tried to fix it so the yarn looked right but it made the rest look ridiculous.) It came out to be a very well-balanced skein and now that I know the yardage (430 yards) I'm thinking that I may do some kind of simple shawlette rather than a cowl because it's really too much yardage for a cowl. As I've said, I'm not certain it would hold blocking so I think maybe something very simple like garter stitch might be a good idea. I haven't decided yet. It maintained it's softness in the yarn and has a sort of smooth slickness that I think will make it a fun knit. I'm not sure that it will have a whole lot of give in the knitting either. It may knit more like a cotton.
Unfortunately it's going to have to wait for awhile to be knit because I'm smack dab in the middle of Christmas Knitting right now. The other day I stepped into our local Wal-mart and there was a big sign saying: 38 Days until Christmas. It was like a panic attack smacking you in the face! Since I have several bigger projects this year, I'm getting started early though so I can hopefully stave off the last-minute crazies.
In the meantime, I'll be over here with my 87 cast on projects knitting frantically. (It's really not that bad.)

The Week that Would Not End is Finally Over

Last night I finally turned the heel on the socks I've been knitting for my stepfather for Christmas and realized they were a full inch too long. Yup, that about sums up my week. Thankfully it's now the weekend and I can have some time with the handsome husband and tomorrow some adorable critters.
Tonight is the Knitter Movie night so I'm hoping to head to that, spend some time with my knitters and watch a campy movie (Edward Scissorhands) and dig out another gift that is long due to be worked on.

Yup, the Cool Beans socks are finally coming back on the radar. Don't worry, I'm also going to bring the socks that need to be ripped back to fix them. I'm not sure I can knit two-color socks while watching Edward Scissorhands.

Spinning Faux

It's been awhile since I did a Tuesday for spinning and that's partly because I haven't been doing a whole lot of spinning lately. I'm working on a very unusual spin. I purchased a braid of some faux cashmere awhile back because I had heard about it faux cashmere and had the opportunity to feel it in person at Shepherd's Harvest Festival, it was so soft and I had heard it was unusual to spin so I was excited to try it. I found an online friend who was selling some in her shop and picked up this braid of Jesse Pinkman, Breaking Bad Series from Sparktickes Dyes. It's a light braid, about 3 ounces and dyed in a gradient.
 
The end is a bright pink, then a sky blue into a deeper royal blue. It's very vibrant and the faux cashmere seems to take the dye really well. I undid the whole braid and split it into two the long way and I'm spinning it onto two bobbins to be two-plied.

This is the second half. As you can see, I've moved from the pink onto the light blue. It is definitely an unusual fiber to spin, very slippery so you need to move slowly and add lots of twist. What stalled me with this for a good amount of time is that I was unsure what I would ever do with it once it was spun. It's a fiber made of nylon so it's not a traditional wool fiber. Does it hold its shape well enough to be lace? It's soft but will it fuzz up? More information was needed. I think it might become a cowl, maybe a Zuzu's Petals (which was recommended to me) but I still haven't decided for sure.
I think it will come out to be a light sport weight when it's finished. That depends on whether it puffs up when washed after spinning though.
That's not all that I've been spinning though, I actually scored a wonderful spindle destash awhile back as well. I got an Enid Ashcroft Mini Turkish spindle made of Cocobolo wood.

Pictured with my favorite coffee cup for scale, you can see how small it actually is. I really love how small and portable it is though and I'm currently spinning Into the Whirled Rambouillet in Captain Tightpants which I managed to score from a destash a long while ago. I love how it's coming out and I love that spindle-spinning it means I get to spend even more time with it. You really can't tell all the colors that are in the beautiful fiber from that picture though.

This gives you a little bit more of an idea, although it's not a great color picture. It has reddish pink, yellow, brown and blue. They blend together in such a beautiful way too. It really is a lovely fiber to spin.

Duluth Recap

I've been so terrible about blogging lately. That's partly because I've been spending more time doing actual knitting and partly because real life stuff seems to get in the way. I finished my lovely Monday Morning Cardigan in time for our Knitters Duluth trip but neglected to get some wonderful pictures of it and it deserves a nice photo shoot so I will save that for another day.
I also am so close to finishing Morticia I can taste it! I finished the last beaded row on Halloween and at 11 pm decided to opt for sanity and not stay up trying to finish the bind off. It's still not done but I want it to be finished so I need to get back to it soon! Since it's not blocked, right now it looks like a tangled black blob but I can assure you I will bore you to tears with it once it's really done.
Meanwhile, let me distract you with some photos of our wonderful trip and memories of great times.

The view from our hotel lobby was wonderful, that's Lake Superior out there. They had some lovely couches set up where we sat and knit.

There we are, taking over the main floor of the hotel. There were a total of thirteen of us that went. It was so much fun. I got to order real gluten free food in restaurants which was such a treat!

Pizza Luce was one of my favorites, of course!
Some of my lovely friends brought us treats. Buttons with cookies attached. Or the other way around.

My button says Knit Happens and I pawned the cookie off on someone else since I could not eat it.
Saturday we went to the yarn store Yarn Harbor, which is a great shop. I highly recommend checking it out if you'll be anywhere near it. I just couldn't decide what I wanted so I got the nerdiest souvenir a knitter could buy (probably).

A sock blocker key chain. Yes, it already has a sock on it. Then we headed over the bridge to the new Three Irish Girls dye studio.

 We got a tour and did some blanket seaming. This is one that was already done. Isn't it lovely?

Then it was back to the hotel for more knitting with a great view. We got to see a big ship come in.

The horse-drawn carriages that take people on rides by the lake.

And in general we had a really wonderful time. I had so much fun that it was bittersweet to come home.

(The lift bridge as pictured from our hotel parking lot.)
Since being home I've also started some things.
I've been using some Gritty Knits Merino of the month, often when the colors don't call out to be something specific, as a palate cleanser in between other spinning projects. I have been saving up the skeins. At first I wasn't sure what I would do with them but eventually I decided to knit the Mitered Crosses Blanket and after some math, I decided I had enough to at least get started and I knit my first block.

I love how it turned out and I have started the next one already. It's a great mindless in-between knitting project too! It does have a ton of ends to weave in so that is already done on this block and I will be weaving them in as I go so it doesn't get overwhelming.
I started one other thing this week (I've been resisting, you have no idea!) a pair of socks. These are being knit out of Deborah Norville Serenity Sock Weight yarn that I got a long time ago on sale at JoAnn Fabrics. The yarn is a Wool/Bamboo/Nylon blend and I'm finding it an interesting knit, even though it's plain stockinette socks


Don't start to panic but these are Christmas knitting. They're for my stepfather and I decided to get going so I don't get so panicky as we get closer to Christmas but the sad truth is; it's already coming, get started now.

It Has Sleeves

I took a quick break from my current projects to knit up something quick to turn in for the Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup. I had been wanting to try something similar for awhile anyway so in just a couple of days I whipped up this Starfish dishcloth.

I have a friend who we call Starfish and he's been frustrated with everything lately so I gave it to him to cheer him up, now I just need to turn it in for a class in the HPKCHC group.
I've mostly been working away on my Monday Morning Cardigan though and I love how you can actually see the progress now.
 
In the picture you can see where the skeins change but it's much less noticeable in real life and I like it quite a lot. You can't really see how far I've come though, how about now?

That's right! It has sleeves! I'm working up the yoke now. I took a short break from the body and knit both sleeves, then finished the body and last night I attached them and started working the yoke. I like it so far, although the rows are really long with the sleeves attached so I'm really looking forward to the decrease rows. Our knitter trip is coming up this weekend so in just a few days, I'm not sure if this will be done or not but I'm looking forward to trying. I'll also be processing some apples this week that my lovely husband brought home from my Mother-in-law. I'm so looking forward to the smell of delicious apple pie filling cooking and then canning. It's gonna be a great week!

Completed Contest

The husband brought home some cold germs last week and lovingly shared them with me so my knitting and spinning and general doing anything motivation has been really, ultra low. I started my October Vesper KAL socks but haven't been bothered enough to take a photo of them yet, I am working on my sweater but it doesn't look like it yet. All these things add up to nothing interesting to show here.
Yesterday the sun was actually shining and I actually felt motivated to do something but instead of taking all the wonderful pictures I've been planning and posting them here, I cleaned the house. Don't get me wrong, it needed it but it does not make for good blog fodder.
Instead I might as well share the yarn I spun for the Blog Contest from my 400th post. My lovely winner; Jenna said she would like a 2-ply sport weight to knit a shawlette. I did my best to oblige.

I got close to 400 yards and even though it plumped a little when washed, I think she should still have about 350 yards or more for her shawl. I'm really happy with how it turned out and I hope she loves it.

The colors were soft and subtle enough that where they barberpoled, it still looks soft and lovely and subtle. I definitely think I need to look for Falkland to spin more often.

Chicken Fashion Show

I'm sorry for the long blog silence. I have spent a good deal of time lately dealing with some family things that have come up. I did manage to attend an amazing knitting event that I'd like to share though. A chicken fashion show!
We found a pattern for chicken sweaters on Ravelry and some of our knitting group volunteered to knit them up. Another lovely knitter volunteered her lovely laying hens for the show. We all gathered together and started off with some knitting time and delicious soup.

Thankfully the rain stopped so we could have our outdoor show. We had all the fashions ready.

The models were a little nervous at first.

First came Lily in her Argyle.

This was originally knit for the rooster who was then dispatched because he couldn't get along with the lovely ladies but Lily pulled it off. She did seem to have some trouble tripping on it during her "runway" walk though. Her feet kept getting stuck.

She did look lovely strutting her stuff though.

Next, Benetta was bedazzled!

She kept trying to eat the beads off her sweater but she looked lovely doing it.
Finally Margaux came out in her flowers, joining the other lovely ladies.

They sure do look lovely don't they?


And in the end? No one was any the worse for wear.

Although their sheep did think we were a bit odd.




 Overall, it was a very fun time and I'm so glad to have such great (if slightly odd) knitting friends!

The Sweetness of Socks

As much as I love a good sweater knit and I'm enjoying my sweater knitting a great deal, I don't always have the mental capacity for a long row like that. Sometimes I just need something smaller, more portable, more wonderful.
Enter: The knitted sock. Anyone who has read this blog at all or knows me in person knows how much joy I find in knitting socks. I am rarely without a sock project and the few times I find myself without one, I don't know what to do with my hands. I almost exclusively knit them when out and about and do not hesitate to whip out a sock and knit a few rounds anywhere. In line at the grocery store, waiting for a train, almost anything.
Lately I've been pretty obsessed with Vesper self-striping sock yarn. I love how soft it is to knit but it gets even softer after it's washed. So far all my pairs have worn really well (although I only knit my first pair last October so that's not very long-term yet.)
This year I've been participating in the Vesper Socks KAL in the Vesper group. I am loving choosing a skein of Vesper to knit each month and earlier this year, it encouraged me to buy a few skeins so I was sure to have enough to make it through the year. I'm yarn/fiber dieting now until my local knitting group's retreat weekend in Duluth and it kills me a little bit each time she posts that new colors are going up. (I have barely contained myself when it comes to Sweater Vest and honestly, I'd love to collect all the pretty colors.)
I have consoled myself by knitting Vesper that I already own. This is Dragon's Blood. I honestly wasn't too sure why I decided to buy it but I'm so glad I did. I really love how these look.

Despite my misgivings about how close in color they are to last month's socks, I'm not finding myself dragging my feet on them at all. I've finished the first sock and I'm working away on the second now. Right on schedule and if I focus on them for the weekend, I could probably finish the second sock.
I'm doing another toe-up sock pattern. This time the toe-up sock with Slip Stitch Heel (scroll down to help and download the Sock Templates.) I can't say why I've been drawn to toe-up socks lately. It's not as though I'm trying to use up as much yarn as I can but I don't mind them toe-up with these patterns and I'm actually enjoying them so onward I knit! Maybe it has actually converted me to a toe-up sock knitter. Only time will tell.
In the meantime, I'll just be over here with my stripey socks.

Actual Knitting on a New Sweater

This may sound silly but I've been spending my knitting time actually knitting lately. I decided to cast on a sweater and I'm working away on it in the hopes that I can actually get it done in a reasonable amount of time.
Since I finally finished Spoke, I felt like it was okay to cast on a new sweater  I recently cleaned up the stash also (which is really still in-progress, it's not completely organized) but I discovered I have quite a few sweaters worth of yarn. That makes me want to get to it!
I thought about the swatch I knit awhile ago. A nice, big swatch and I dug it out. I knew it was too loose so, as crazy as it sounds, I knit another swatch. I also washed it and laid it out to dry before making a decision about my sweater. My gauge wasn't perfect, it didn't match the intended gauge exactly but it was much closer so I did a little math (I know, this whole story sounds like some other knitter doesn't it?) and figured out that by casting on a smaller size in the pattern, I would get the intended size of finished object. So I did.

I'm knitting the Monday Morning Cardigan by Laura Chau and I'm loving it! The body is cast on at the bottom, you knit upward, with waist shaping, and then knit the sleeves and join it all together. I've really focused on it the last week or so and I'm making good progress.

I love the slipped stitch pattern too. For one thing, I think it can be slimming and it's fun to knit. The wrong side row has more knits than purls so it goes fast and the right side row, while it's mostly purling is broken up enough that it doesn't drag. The yarn I'm using, Arucania Nature Wool, isn't super soft to knit with but when I washed the swatches, it softened up quite a bit so I'm really looking forward to having this finished sweater.

I Think it's an Illness

Lately I've even surprised myself with my ability to focus on a project enough to get it done, it's almost eerie.
That is to say; I've been very good at finishing things lately. I finished my Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief. I knit this out of handspun and used a smaller needle than the original pattern called for because I was using a thinner yarn.

I'm so happy with the result though! I got 4 total eyelet rows and a full set of increase rows before the edging. I also knit an extra two rows in the edging to make the most of the yarn. I have just a small ball of this lovely handspun left.

I love the size and shape of this shawl as well as the colors. I'm such a purple person and it goes so well with my personality that I see it being a huge staple in my winter wardrobe. As a matter of fact, I intend to carry it around with me at all times. It's perfect to wrap around your neck if you're just a little cold or need something to accent your outfit. This yarn was handspun out of Cloudlover 80/20 Merino/Silk in the Ligeia colorway. I chain-plied it and came up with over 500 yards. From the beginning, I knew this lovely purple would be great as an Age of Brass and Steam and I'm so happy it's done and I love it as much as I had hoped. (The colors in the photos today aren't the best. I blame the grey and rainy weather, check out my edited Flickr photos if you're interested in what these really look like.)
I've also been focusing very well on my sock projects. Don't worry, I'm not done with those Vespers I posted about the other day, although they will now be my main focus, instead I focused on a pair I had hoped to turn in for the Harry Potter House Cup.

May I introduce the Ostrich Fantasy socks. I dug out all my nom from Gritty Knits last weekend and chose a skein to knit into a pair of socks. I originally thought to enter them into the Solid Socks group as well because their sponsor for September is Gritty Knits but a reread of their rules told me I needed to match the color they chose for the month as well as make them solid to semi-solid although I can't double-dip by turning them in the Harry Potter group and the Solid Socks group, I'm still thrilled to have them done. I chose the most recent nom of the month; River a very nice semi-solid greenish-blue and while I thought the pattern was quick, it was not easy. There was some finagling to get it to work out, it did not work with the directions as written in the pattern. There was also no chart; even after creating a chart for myself I still found I had to change a couple of things to get the stitch count to work out. While I enjoyed it, I won't be knitting these again soon. I think a good blocking of these socks will help the pattern to even out and hopefully make them a little easier to get over my heel. There's a little struggle with that at this point although they fit very well once they are on. For full notes about the modifications I made to this pattern, you can check out my project page on Ravelry.
See what I mean? All the finished things are a bit odd. Don't expect it to last. I've started a new shawl on the needles used by the Age of Brass and Steam and I've swatched for a sweater. I also have plans for a hat. I should really go wind that yarn and decide on a pattern as a matter of fact.

A Short Week but Lots of Progress

These short weeks definitely throw me for a loop but I have been making some progress on things.
I had made a sweater pact with a friend to finish our sweaters before Labor Day. I realized it was sneaking up fast so I dug out the sweater I was working on and got going. The design is Spoke and for the most part, I enjoyed knitting it. I spun this yarn from two 8-ounce braids of Frabjous Fibers BFL in the Chocolate Cherry Colorway. I actually ran out at the last and used about 10 yards from a different skein of handspun for the bind-off and button loops. To be honest, I should have read the directions more carefully before I started this sweater. It has a lot of ribbing which was not the most fun to knit and I wasn't all that pleased with the way the front, which on the pattern page comes all the way across, does not come all the way across. I love it anyway though and rather than sew it shut as the pattern calls for, I crocheted button loops and sewed on 11 buttons! So they would go all the way around the circle part.

Overall, I'm very happy with how it came out.

I finished it up on Sunday meaning, I did finish in time! My friend sadly did not have enough time to finish her sweater. Maybe now that the weather is turning colder, she will be motivated. I definitely feel; now that this sweater is done, it's time to cast on another. I'm thinking of that lovely purple swatch from a few months back. 
I also worked on my Vesper KAL socks. I knit these for the month of August and finished them partway into September. I believe on the first, although I did weave in the ends the following morning.

As I've said before, I knit these toe-up with Wendy Johnson's Toe-up Gusset heel. I will be very interested to see how this heel wears. The colorway is Monet's Garden and I like it but I'm not in love with it, I love my Vesper socks though and I know these will get lots of wear as the weather turns colder.
Of course I had to figure out what colorway to cast on for September and settled on Dragon's Blood.

It seems a little similar to the Monet's Garden (with the chartruese replaced with orange) but the purple is more plum than purple and the pink seems a little lighter so hopefully I won't get bored with them. I started these toe-up again and I haven't decided what heel I will work just yet. Since I just finished the toe increases, I have some time to decide.
I love a plain sock knit so much. Especially while I'm reading and as I've started rereading the Harry Potter books, inspired by the Harry Potter Knit/Crochet House Cup, I should have lots of time for that!