Spinning Haze

I'm sorry for the long absence dear readers, last week sort of got away from me. I took what was meant to be a quick trip to see family for Easter. It turned into several more days than I had anticipated and I sort of flamed out on re-entry when I did arrive home.
The trip was great, I got to spend lots of time with my 3 year old niece and a small amount of time with my nephews and other niece but it was exhausting running after small children when I am not used to it and I am still fighting the cold my darling husband lovingly shared with me so I definitely needed the rest I took when I came home. For a couple of days there I barely even touched my knitting or spinning, I was just too tired to pick it up!
Now I'm back and trying desperately to get back into the groove but the dreary April showers we have had the last few days aren't helping. It's just chilly and gray enough that I'd rather tuck myself into bed with a hot cup of tea and a good book than do anything useful. I have found myself looking longingly over at my spinning wheel lately though.
Right after I finished my last spinning project, I decided I wanted to spin something finer than frog's hair again. (I'm really not sure why I do this to myself, I'm so not patient when it comes to actually doing it but I love the idea.) I dug out a lovely braid of fiber that I knew would spin beautifully. Zarzuela's Fibers January 2012 club colorway. It's been marinating in the stash for quite awhile but I just didn't get into the right mindset to spin it until recently. It's a lovely 75% BFL and 25% Silk blend in lovely shaded pinks and purples called January Haze. I think it will make an amazing laceweight but of course it's taking some time to spin.

I think it would really take less time to spin it if I actually spent some time spinning too.

Here you can see how fine the singles are spun and also the lovely shine this fiber has. I can't wait until it's finished yarn. It will be so lovely.
Again, that means I actually need to work on spinning it though, instead of just looking longingly at it. I think it's the name getting to me, January Haze. I've fallen into a Spinning Haze. Maybe? Or maybe not. Either way, it's time to get to work and get some spinning done so I can enjoy the yarn.

Knit Faster

Although I haven't been feeling too much love for the humble hand-knit sock lately, I have been working on my current socks-in-progress here and there. I don't think I even showed these to the blog yet.

Aren't they unusual? I'm not sure about how the colors are swirling down the sock but I love the colors and the yarn is soft, bouncy and wonderful. It's Nebula sock yarn from Ethereal Fibers an 80% Superwash Merino, 10% Cashmere and 10% Nylon blend and the color is Molly Ringworm from her Autocorrect series. This first one is almost at the toe and I honestly can't wait to knit the second one and wear these.
Never fear though, I'm still working away on my Wingspan shawl. I'm at the pink now! That's the last color so I'm getting close.

Honestly, I'm not entirely sure I'll have enough to do two more triangles and the last few edge rows. I'll just keep knitting until I run out I guess. If I knit faster, that means I'll have enough right?

Winging My Way

I was really trying to be good and not start anything new but last week, after finishing my Noro shawl, my needles felt sort of empty and odd (even though I have plenty of other things on the needles.) Since I was traveling to a conference where I would be in the car for about 2 hours and I wasn't driving, I needed something to knit. I have several plain vanilla socks on the needles but I just haven't been feeling the socks lately. I decided it was all right to cast on something new and I knew just what to knit.
This is really odd for me, I often flounder for several days deciding what pattern to knit with the yarn I'd like to use or what yarn to use with the pattern I'd like to knit. I often don't find a good combination and wander away to knit what's already on my needles.
This time it suddenly popped into my head and it just seemed right. I dug out the handspun Faux Cashmere from Sparktickes Dyes. It's a gradient in the colorway Jesse Pinkman from her Breaking Bad series. I had a lot of fun spinning this unusual fiber but I had had no idea what to do with it once it was spun. Some friends suggested Zuzu's Petals, I went so far as to buy the pattern and I like it a lot and I will knit it. It calls for a lot less yardage than I had though so I was afraid I would have to greatly alter the pattern to knit it with this yarn. Ultimately, I decided on Wingspan. The yardage was much closer to the 420 yards I had. I cast on and started knitting my triangles.

I love it! I love the simplicity of it, it really makes the gradient shine and I'm enjoying watching the color slowly change from one to the next. It's easy to sit down one evening and get at least one triangle knit. I can't wait to get to the pink so I've been knitting it a good amount of time and really enjoying every minute.
It seems maybe I just needed a mindless shawl (with a little interest). Now my needles are much more content to wing their way across this shawl. 

Noro Finito!

Things have been a little bit crazy here. Last weekend I was traveling and sadly unable to get a whole lot of knitting done. I did get some movie-watching done and some wonderful time with my 3 year old niece. I even got to have a meal with my 17 year old niece. Being seen in public! Quite an accomplishment for a crazy Aunt.
I did manage to finish my Noro Stripes Shawl though. I'm so happy it's done. I had enough yarn to continue for a few more stripes but I wasn't happy with the color combination coming up so I decided to end it.

It hasn't been blocked and the ends aren't woven in yet, like I said things have been busy around here.
I also recently finished the first of my Cursed Cable Mitts.

As you can see, I immediately cast on the second in the hopes I would be encouraged to finish it but as the weather is warming up, I'm thinking these might have to take a short break. They really need good lighting to work on them too and I just haven't had that lately. I need to sit in my kitchen more, I get the afternoon sun there. Here's a close up of the cable.

Even with the better lighting here, you still can't see it very well but trust me, it's lovely. If it wasn't so lovely, I would be tempted to scrap these. I just keep struggling along with that cable. I also haven't woven in the ends on this first mitt. That's odd for me, I usually do that right away with something you knit a mate to but I just haven't taken the time. Hopefully this next week will slow down a bit so I can breathe (and weave in some ends)

Ennui

I'm still feeling some pretty big project ennui so I've really not been working frantically on anything. I do a few rows a day on this Noro shawl I've been working on for a long time and that's about it. It is pretty and springy but the rows are getting long and I'm ready for it to be done.
 
 It's pretty and stripey but also not very photogenic since it mostly looks like a big stripey blob right now.
 
See, blob. In case I haven't gone into details before; this is a simple garter stitch shawl knit with two different balls of Noro. Normally, I would use two of the same kind of Noro sock yarn but in this case one is Kureyon (70% wool, 30% Nylon) and one is Taiyo (50% Cotton, 17% Wool, 17% Nylon, 16% Silk) The idea is to knit a simple shawl doing two rows of one color and two rows of the other and watch as the colors meet up and change slowly. The yarn itself does (almost) all the work and the result is lovely.
I'm definitely getting close to the end, the two balls of yarn are getting pretty small but I have several more days work to do. I'll just try to enjoy the colors as I knit since spring has definitely NOT arrived here in Minnesota. We got a dusting of snow again last night.

Spring Fever

This month I've been feeling a little off knitting and spinning-wise. I just can't seem to settle in and focus on a project. So, when it came time to figure out what to turn in for Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup, I was at something of a loss. The Darling Clementine socks worked fine for Detention (a project started earlier that has not been finished, then gets finished during the month). Unfortunately, that doesn't count for your class and students are required (in order to keep their good student standing for sorting purposes) to turn in at least one class. I like to do at least two just in case there's an issue so last week I whipped out a couple of projects.

Here we have a handspun BFL Toilet Paper Cozy. (It's really a baby hat, just going incognito for the purposes of class turn-in.)
Then I also knitted this round dishcloth.

Nothing to write home about really. I've just been feeling sort of blah about dealing with complicated things lately. I think it's Spring Fever, despite the fact that Spring has not actually arrived. I keep telling myself to finish some things before starting new things too and I'm just not in love with any of my current projects.
These totally count as finishing things right? That means I can start something new? Like a little teeny sweater to match that baby hat? I have lots of yarn left.

Hello Clementine

Last night I sat myself down and told myself that I was about half a foot away from some finished socks and it was time to do something about it. So, I buckled down and finished my Darling Clementine socks.

Aren't they bright and sunshiney and lovely next to all that fresh snow? I continued the cable down the sides of the foot and while it is a lovely cable, I did not enjoy knitting it.

I ended up using a cable needle which seriously slows me down but dropping stitches every time and having to pick them up (repeatedly usually) made it not worth cabling without a cable needle either. I managed to lose the cable needle somewhere in my living room last night just before the last cable too. How do they disappear like that? It really is a mystery. I'll look for it later.
It's a good thing these are done too because I noticed something the night before last.

These are my handspun Whomp socks. They have a cable down the side of the leg. That's where I got the idea for these Darling Clementine socks as a matter of fact. They weren't particularly favorites but they were a little thicker, being handspun, so they saw a lot of use this winter. I could darn them or reknit the heels but the whole heel area is worn very thin on both so I think it's time to retire these lovely socks. Good-bye Whomp Socks. Hello Clementine.
(Never fear, I still have some of the Whomp handspun left so I could always make something else in the same colorway, to will remind me of these socks, and how much they helped keep my feet warm on this cold, cold winter. That is if I can ever bear to remember this winter.)

Stripe Kit

If you've been reading for any length of time you know that I'm in the Gritty Knits Merino of the Month club. Each month I get a braid of beautifully dyed Merino from the lovely Natasha and add it to my fiber stash. Sometimes, of course, it isn't my favorite colors but it's a club and that's bound to happen. I love the versatility of Merino and I really enjoy spinning it so I stick with this lovely, very reasonably priced club even though I often have more than 10 braids of Merino sitting around waiting to be spun at any given time. (That's probably a low estimate but I'm not going to reveal the truth about the stash.)
Every so often Natasha will use her lovely color sense and come up with an idea. Sometimes, being in the club gives us a chance to test it out for her and such was the case in January of 2012. I got this lovely big package in the mail and ripped into it to find...a Stripe Kit. It was 6 ounces, rather than the usual 4 and was in 2 ounce pieces. Each piece was dyed differently and the idea was to spin them and chain-ply for predictable, gradual stripes or alternate for a random pattern or anything else. The idea created a sort of stir in my Knitting and Spinning groups and lots of people spun 3 different-colored braids together. The results were gorgeous and I recently realized that I had never spun my Stripe Kit. It seemed like a great time to practice double drive on my wheel so I changed things up and got to spinning.

As you can see the three braids are very different, although the third one (on the right) has elements of both of the other two.

It was hard to get an idea of how they would spin up together though. So I dove right in and started. A traditional 3-ply all the way.

It turned out to be a very unusual yarn. It's all different and it's so hard to tell in the photos about the subtle shifts in color on each section of the yarn.

It's about a fingering weight but dense. Only about 420 yards from the 6 ounces.

Maybe here you can see a little bit better how the colors shift slowly in each part of the yarn. It's really unusual and I really can't wait to see how it looks knit up. I'm thinking after I finish some socks I have on the go, this might need to become some socks. Even though it's 100% merino, it has a nice tight twist and will be dense and tightly-knit so I think it will be okay. I'm not too worried, I have enough hand-knit socks in the drawer that I can afford to experiment a bit.

Slow and Steady

This week has been a little odd. I didn't feel that great for a couple of days and with the nice weather, (everything is finally melting!) I've been restless. I'm trying so hard to not cast on anything new but I'm not feeling a ton of love for any of my current projects either so I worked a bit on a few things and not enough to show off. 
One thing I haven't mentioned for awhile though is the mini spindle. I've been pulling it out for a few minutes' spinning here and there and I still really enjoy it. I'm spinning some absolutely amazing Into the Whirled fiber. It's Rambouillet in the colorway Captain Tightpants which is a Firefly reference. I'm really enjoying it and it's a nice break in between knitting.

The only trouble is that when you're spinning on a spindle like this, when you get stuck in the "boring" bits of color, you're stuck for awhile. I made it through this bit of brown now and I'm ready to remove the little ball the spindle has on it and start again. How exciting. It's a very slow process but sometimes with a lovely fiber like this, it's nice to take your time and really enjoy it.

Handspun Half Pi

I could resist the siren song of a new project no longer and I had to cast something on. Does anyone remember this?

It's a 2 ounce skein of chain-plied Rambouillet from Cloudlover in the colorway Maenad. I love it so much! I finally spun the second half as well awhile back and reunited them recently. (Somehow they had gotten separated and I couldn't remember where one was when I had the other one. I should really try to be more organized or something.)
I decided it was begging to be knit into a shawl and I wanted something a little different. I decided on a half pi shawl. I dug out my Elizabeth Zimmermann books and took a look at the pi shawl directions and made some decisions about how to make it a half pi. I'm sure there are instructions out there, sometimes I just have to work things out for myself (read: the hard way).
Then, I knit.

I'm on the second skein already, (It's really hard to take a decent picture of a half pi shawl on the needles. At least, once it gets to a certain size it is.) I absolutely love it. The colors aren't quite like this second picture, they're more like the first. The only thing I'm running into; I want to keep knitting, I'm afraid it won't be a very large shawl so I've put out a call on the Cloudlover Ravelry boards for more fiber if it's out there. Otherwise, I may have to beg dear Natalie of Cloudlover to custom dye some for me. In the meantime, it's a lovely, fairly plain project (I decided against a lace pattern in the plain sections so the yarn could be the focal point) and I'm enjoying knitting (or purling) away while reading.
I hope you have a great weekend and get some wonderful, quiet time to knit!

Cursing the Cable

After taking a long, hard look at my current UFOs I decided I probably shouldn't cast on anything new unless I could actually finish something first. I have at least 4 pairs of socks, 2 shawls, a pair of fingerless mitts and probably some other things lurking around here.
Since it's still pretty cold I decided the fingerless mitts would be a good addition to my wardrobe this winter and even into spring so I dug them out and started working on them again.
The pattern is Cursed Cable Mitts, it was gifted to me by a friend who wanted a buddy to knit them with her. I'm totally going to call her out and say that I'm not sure she's knitting them anymore. Sorry Becca.
I'm knitting it slowly because I find the cable to be very frustrating.

I adore the way it looks (albeit hard to see in this photo) like a woven panel that runs the length of the mitt) but it's a lot of cabling and I was trying to do it without a cable needle. It turns out that for this cable, without a cable needle doesn't work for me so I dug out a cable needle. I promptly lost that cable needle and tried a spare DPN, when that didn't work, I went to another style of cable needle that isn't quite the same. I miss the other one.
Ultimately, I'm working on them slowly, slowly and I hope to be finished sometime before next Christmas. I'm not sure that I will make them as long as written in the pattern either although I would like them a little longer than my typical mitts which are barely past the wrist. We'll have to see how long my cabling patience holds out.

Handspun Ocean Waves

Tuesdays are for spinning so I can share my lovely finished Merino. I split it lengthwise and spun each half, with a little bit of predrafting, onto a bobbin.

They look pretty uneven but I was actually impressed that they came out within about 15 yards of each other. Not messing with singles to make more yarn always makes me happy. I waited the requisite overnight and plied the next day.

I absolutely love how it came out. Bluey-green and wonderful. There is some color variation but it's almost a semisolid which I really like and I'm not sure what it would like to be but I think it's lovely just as it is for now.

It's a pretty true, fairly even fingering weight. (There's always a little bit of variation with handspun and I think that's part of its charm. If it were perfect, it wouldn't be handspun.) The skein is 430 yards so it's a great amount to knit something lovely. I think it looks just like the waves in the ocean so although the braid is just called "January 2013" I'm calling my finished yarn; Ocean Waves.
I'm currently in a bit of a funk knitting-wise. I really don't love anything I'm knitting and therefore don't want to work on any of it. There may be some forced finishing or some ripping in my near future. I need to seriously dig through what's being worked on and what's in limbo and make some decisions. Then I can cast on something new without guilt right?

Mission: Steek

Hey, remember this?

I didn't make it to our group steeking event at knit night the other night so instead I had to do it solo. I decided I would document it though. That would make me feel like someone was there with me, helping me through it. I had knit the cozy and it was all ready.
Next, the pattern (Steek this Coffee Cozy) called for you to crochet your steeks.

I did that part. As you can see, I used a contrasting color of yarn. I thought it would help but looking back I would use something a little less contrasting. Just in case it would show on whatever it is I would be steeking. Or I would machine-stitch it.
Next of course is the scary part. Taking a scissors to it! Eek!

Whew! So far, it seems to be holding together. I think I may have done this right.

Next you pick up stitches on the side and knit that ribbing. Then do it again on the other side.
Then you have to sew down your steeks.

Steeks sewn down. All that's left is blocking and buttons. I blocked first and then sewed on buttons.

Vintage buttons from my button bin.

Tah-dah! I am not sure about how it came out. I feel like the steeks where sewn down are a little lumpy. Maybe it's just me but I would be very careful of that if it were a garment. Otherwise, it was a fun project and got me to do something I would not normally have undertaken.
Plus, now I have an adorable new coffee cozy. If you need me, I'll be over here drinking out of my to go cup even though I'm at home in my pajamas.

Snow Day Spinning

Tuesdays are for spinning and I have been spinning. After I finished the Gritty Knits Merino in Cracked I briefly thought about digging out some other projects I'm in the middle of spinning and finishing them up. It's just so wintery here that I ultimately decided I needed some color in my life.
I went stash-diving and came up with this.

This blueish green Merino from Gritty knits was calling to me so I started spinning it last week. We got lots of snow Sunday night and I decided I deserved a snow day after being busy last week with the fish fry so I settled down, got caught up with the current season of Downton Abbey and spun most of the day yesterday.

I'm thinking it will be a simple two-ply and I'm not really focusing on making it anything but fairly even. I'm enjoying letting go and letting it be what it likes.

Winter Hope with Sunshine

I feel like this winter with its terrible, bone-aching cold and excessive snow has made everything harder. I have no desire to go outside. At all. I have no desire for human interaction. I just want to snuggle up in my cozy bed and stay warm as much as is possible. That of course is not realistic and then comes a beautiful day like today. The sun is shining brightly, the temperature has risen to the point where snow is actually melting and my heart is soaring. It doesn't mean I don't need some color this winter though. Color works so well in my knitting that it seems natural to knit something brilliant, eye-searing and bright.

Over a year ago in the nom of the month club I received this unusual skein. It's called Darling Clementine and since I'm not much of an orange person, I wasn't sure what to do with it. I started and ripped it several times and ended up deciding around Christmas time that it would be socks and that was the end of it. After finishing my holiday commitments I cast on and started knitting away. The other day I finally finished the first sock (somewhat delayed by an addiction to my spinning wheel and also to the wrist pain plaguing me last month) I feel like this project has gone on for a long time. It hardly matters though, I'm loving the results. A little unusual and I'm not sure what I will wear the finished socks for but they'll be there, in the sock drawer, reminding me that the sun does come out sometimes.
I also have a little plan for something else. Earlier my local knitgroup and I were discussing the fact that most of us had not tried steeking and were interested in the technique. We decided a low-commitment project would be a good idea so we found Steek This Coffee Cozy and decided those of us interested in trying out the technique would each knit to the point of steeking and get together for moral support and cut our knitting to bits! Our scheduled cutting party is our usual knit night, February 19th. I finished the main knitting last week.

I made a few changes and I'm so happy with the result, I can't wait to get it finished all the way! I used color A (Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in Peapod) for the ribbing and the 'pop' color on the fair isle chart. I used color B (Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in Marina) for the background of the fair isle chart and color C (Patons Classic Wool Merino in Aran or undyed) for the other fair isle color. I didn't use the 5 colors called for and I really love my result so I'm going to stick with it. Now I'll just count down the days until we cut. Eep! That's a little bit scary.

All It's Cracked Up To Be

I've been more focused on spinning lately and I am pleased to report that I finished my Gritty Knits Merino in Cracked. The braid was split lengthwise and then drafted a bit to loosen up the fibers but I spun it to be what it wanted. The singles were somewhat marled so I thought I would probably end up with a somewhat tweedy-looking yarn. I think I was right. I finished the singles Monday evening and waited until Tuesday to start plying. Since I had errands to run yesterday and it was knit night, I couldn't ignore all other responsibilities and just spin but I finished it today.

Doesn't it look wonderful? All ready to be wound into a skein and that's just what I did.

This picture it a little dark but lovely just the same. It's about 350 yards so as I predicted about a sport-weight. I really like it and I've already soaked and twacked it, it's drying now so I can knit with it as soon as the mood strikes. I'm not sure what it wants to be yet but it's probably not going to sit in stash long, I'll be knitting it soon.
I also finally finished up the baby sweater I was knitting for a friend's baby. She was due in January and I held off on finishing the last little bit but once the baby was born I finished the knitting and blocked the lovely little thing. For some reason I just set it aside though, I didn't sew the buttons on. Since I was going to see the lovely little thing and her fabulous mama at Knit night, I sewed the buttons on yesterday and whisked it off to her. I hope she loves it!

I think it turned out pretty cute! It's Gritty Knits nom in Brazil and I knit it into the Maile baby sweater. I used the free version. A few notes: I would have liked a little more info about what weight of yarn she used, I think she probably used more like a sport weight, I felt like mine was really floppy while I was knitting it but I came very close to gauge. Also, if I ever knit it again (which I might, it was mostly a very cute pattern) I would do something different with the sleeves. When she has you attach them, you hold ALL the sleeve stitches on the needles and I had a really, really difficult time with it until I got a few rows in. I would say maybe hold a few stitches on the body and the sleeve and graft them later? Up to the knitter but I really did not care for the struggle with it as written.

Not Plan

After finishing and blocking my sort of epic Holden Shawl (I have decided mine is really too big to be called a shawlette) things have been a little slow. I can't seem to get back into any of the projects I had going before and I don't really want to start something new again so I've been spinning.
I started with this braid of Merino from Gritty Knits.

I got it in the Merino of the month club awhile ago and it is not my usual colors at all but I adore it. It had browns and tans and a bit of pink and some dark, deep browny black. It was so unusual that I wanted an unusual kind of yarn. I split the braid in half lengthwise and drafted the first half. I'm just spinning it how it would like to be spun and plan to chain-ply it when I'm done with it.

I just finished the first half and it's got lots of spaces where the singles are marled because two colors came together, I think it's going to be a very unusual, almost tweedy-looking yarn. I'm enjoying a quick and fairly easy spin too, no agenda, no ultimate plan but to make pretty yarn. Sometimes it's fun to let go and not have a plan.

Picot Love

I have been trying to finish up some projects and not start new things quite so often because my UFO bin is getting a little out of hand again but every so often, you just have to listen to your quiet inner voice. Sometimes it's just not quiet at all and in this case, it shouted.
With the way my wrist had been feeling I was really trying to go easy on the knitting to let it rest but since knitting is my normal resting state, it was difficult. I finished spinning my blue laceweight and I was working on finishing the spinning on a sweater quantity of brown wool. It's turning into lovely yarn but I was thoroughly sick of looking at it and I decided I needed a new knitting project. As soon as my brain settled on the skein of handspun I had in mind, I knew it needed to be a shawl and I needed to start right away. I even tried to quiet that little voice and dug out a shawl I had been working on and tried to work on that. It would not be stilled.
I had struck upon what I thought was a great idea. Awhile ago, quite awhile now that I think about it, I had spun a skein of merino. It was chain-plied and lovely colors in almost a gradient and I had been so excited to knit it into a shawl. Then, distracted by whatever projects I had going at the time, I tucked the skein into the handspun storage area and forgot about it. When I struck on the idea of knitting it, I also struck on the perfect pattern. Holden Shawlette. I have it in my Library from back when it was free but it's been updated, improved and is now a purchase pattern.
I cast on and started knitting. My wrist started feeling better and I just kept knitting. I was getting close to starting the edge pattern and I just kept on knitting. Then I was on the edging and I still just kept on knitting. Last night, I finished.

Don't the colors look great? I had more than the called-for 400-450 yards so I kept going on the pattern.

The edging was bright blue. (I manage to run out of yarn too and finished the picot bindoff with some other blue handspun, the epic laceweight as a matter of fact. I think it matches fine and came out lovely.)

Then at 1 am I blocked it. I pinned out almost every single picot to make them look right. I pretty much hated the picots while I was knitting them. I pretty much hated them while I was pinning them but now? Now, I adore them! I think they make it look fancy and beautiful. I love the look of this shawl and the (much more subtle in person) shifts of color. I can't wait to wear it everywhere and I plan to.
I was also really surprised that it came out as a large as it did. I only had the one 4-ounce skein which was about 600 yards but it's huge. I love that about it too.
It seems like it was a pretty quick project. I started it less than 2 weeks ago and it's finished now. I didn't even really have the time to blog about it earlier. That little shouting voice in my head telling me to knit this? You were right, I'm so glad I did!

Let's Start Documenting

I finished plying my lovely blue yarn and I've forgiven it almost everything.



After washing it's pretty well-balanced and it came out to be about 850 yards. I'm pretty happy with that.

I am doing better with my wrist but I'm still going fairly easy on it so I've been focusing on doing more artwork. I've missed it so much and it's wonderful to be getting to it! I joined a group on Facebook called the Documented Life Project. (The challenges are also posted on robenmarie.com so even if you don't have Facebook, you could still participate.) The group recommends using a Moleskine yearly planner and then they provide weekly prompts. I started out using my lovely giant notebook that I use for everything but quickly found that it's not realistic to use as a planner anymore. It's gotten so stuffed full and bulky that I really can't carry it everywhere any more and so I was considering options.
Then the magic happened. Someone in the lovely Documented Life group offered to send someone a Moleskine planner that she had purchased. She didn't really go into if it was extra or if she decided to use something else but it was meant to be. She sent it to me.

It's slim and sleek and lovely. I'm very excited to get going on using it and getting caught up on the weekly prompts. I may decorate the cover, as so many lovely others have done, or I may not but I will be updating here with information about my take on the weekly prompts. I can't wait!

The Trouble with Laceweight

Spinning warms my heart and I find my lovely wheel is rarely allowed to sit empty. Even if it's just a few minutes break here and there, I love having something on the wheel to spin for a bit.
The trouble comes when you get ambitious of course. I've had a hankering to spin a lovely laceweight and I finished the first bobbin the other day. Then I spun and spun and spun and thought about how sick of this lovely bright blue semi-solid I am but I wasn't done yet so I kept slogging along. Finally, finally I finished the second bobbin.

My love for it and excitement at the prospect of something lovely and blue and possibly lacy was almost restored. I mean, check out the gauge of those singles.

That's an American Dime for scale. You can't beat it.
I'm usually not one to wait the required time to ply but I wanted lovely yarn so I forced myself to wait. This morning when I woke up for no reason at the utterly awful hour of 6 am (when you have no reason to get up that early why would you?) I could resist it's siren song no longer. I would just ply it up quick....
Anyone else see the flaw in that logic?

It's not quick. Plying laceweight takes a long time. A really, really long time. A "movie marathon" length of time. I'm ready to be done but as you can see, I'm not done. There's a long way to go and real things I would also like to get done today.
We'll see if the real life things get done. Who can resist laceweight? (I'm starting to think about exclusively spinning bulky two-ply. I don't think it will take though, this yarn will be lovely and renew my desire for lovely, tiny spinning to accompany lovely, tiny knitting.)