A Finished Shawl

I finished my shawl at last. It's all blocked and dry so here are pictures, links and details:

Pattern: Lilac Lace Shawl

Yarn: Handspun merino from commercially combed & dyed top

Fibre from Wingham Wool Work

Colour: Yorkshire Rainbow

Wheel: Ashford Traveller

Spun very fine singles for a lace weight 2 ply yarn

750 mtrs 123g. (shawl used 747 mtrs)

Finished shawl (blocked) measures 200 cm wide x 110 cm deep at centre point.

Here's my wee Dora peeking round the corner

















I'm very happy with both the spinning and the shawl pattern. I would knit this pattern again, it's ideal for hand spun yarn. I didn't have quite enough yarn and knew I would run out ~ so on the pattern charts I worked row 203 then moved onto row 211 and did the maths to re-align the pattern repeats, this gave me a seamless transition into the final pattern band (for the points).

I've started making sample cards for all of my hand spun yarns, I never used to bother keeping records but I really think it's quite important to do so. It enables me to refer back to how I spun a particular fibre, the finished yarn weight, meterage etc. I use large luggage tags and attach a sample of the single I'm spinning and a mini skein of the plied yarn along with the details of the fibre I have spun:

I also finished off my crochet sock yarn scrap blanket:

It weighs 880g and measures 170cm square, a labour of love considering I'm no crocheter. I used a 2.5 mm hook and tried to stick to brights and bolds:

So now I find myself left with all the neutral toned sock yarn leftovers~ I'm thinking there may be another blanket in due course!

More Hand Spun Sock Yarn

I have been busy spinning another batch of the Corriedale/Nylon sock yarn:

I spun 100g of fibre into fine singles then Navajo plied it for a 3 ply strong sock yarn.












I dyed it my favourite colour, a variegated purple!

320 metres. I think this may become a pair of Simple Skyp Socks for myself.













I've also been spinning some Perendale fleece. The locks were washed with wool scour in a mesh bag, after drying I quickly flick carded them and spun up 2 bobbins of singles. I did a 2 ply yarn this time:

250 metres of yarn, it still needs soaking and drying but I'm hoping that it's going to be a sport weight yarn.











Perendale sheep were developed in Palmerston North, New Zealand by crossing hardy Cheviot rams over Romney ewes. Perendale clip is low lustre and crisp to the touch.
Fibre diameter: 30 - 37 microns
Staple length: 100 - 150 mm
Fleece weight: 3 - 4.5 kg

A good fleece looks bouncy and will feel crisp. The higher bulk fleece has better shape retention and higher insulation properties. If you add a little more twist than normal you will get a rounded and hard wearing yarn, it's also excellent for Navajo plying.

You won't be able to produce a typically smooth and dense true worsted yarn with this fleece as it tends to poof up, capturing the air within the yarn. If you use the worsted technique you will produce a different type of yarn with all the worsted strength and durability, but with reduced weight and added warmth.

Perendale also makes an excellent woollen yarn which will produce a light yet bulky yarn.

Finished Hand Spun Socks!

Finished these last night and I was going to block them, but to be honest I really don't think they need it:

See the teeny tiny ball of leftover yarn? That's 6 grams ~ I was cutting it fine but I weighed the yarn before starting (93g) and after knitting the first sock so I knew I had enough - although as I got to the toe on the second sock I did start to doubt my calculations. All came right in the end though!

More Hand Spun Socks!

So, do you remember this skein of sock blend yarn that I spun and dyed a while back?

I over dyed it to make it darker so I could knit it into socks for my Husband - he wouldn't wear a lighter colour:

I'm really happy how this dye job turned out, a nice semi solid deep blue.
The pattern is Simple Skyp Socks. It's a simple 2 row pattern that looks more complicated than it is.

I have seed potatoes to plant today, as much as I would love to sit here knitting socks, sadly I can't!

Finished Hand Spun Socks...

I got a wiggle on with the socks last night and got them finished off.  I soaked them for 15 minutes and gently blocked them overnight. I'm really happy with them and enjoyed the whole process:

The socks took 75g of the merino yarn. There are more of these socks in my future, I can feel it!

Handspun Socks.... Same but Different!

Carrying on from my previous post, I decided to knit socks with my hand dyed superwash merino that I fractal spun:

I'm surprised at how they have turned out, how the colours shift and that the two socks are so different yet they go together nicely as a pair.

I'm almost at the finish line with these, the yarn has been beautiful to knit with and it gives me great satisfaction knowing that a week or so ago this was a bag of undyed combed merino top and is now almost a pair of warm and smooshy socks.

I decided on plain socks as I wanted to show off the colour play rather than go for a fancy pattern. Sometimes with handspun it's best to let the fibre/yarn do all the talking ~ less is more.

Finished Sock Yarn!

While at the craft fair this morning I had the time to finish plying the superwash merino I've been spinning this week. It just needs a good soak in a warm bath and it'll be ready to knit. I'm really happy with how this colourway turned out:

340 metres of fingering weight yarn~fractal spun, it's destined to become socks.
Now the bobbins are empty I will have to decide what to spin next. I think it may have to be the purple gradient superwash!

Spinning Superwash Merino

I hand dyed a batch of superwash merino a few days ago. I love how it takes up the dye. If you were to dye some merino alongside some superwash with the same dyestock, same method, they would both come out rather differently, I know because I have done it.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take a pic of the fibre before I started drafting and spinning, so here's a pic of the fibre all ready to spin:

I'm spinning this as a fractal yarn.
I split the fibre in half lengthways and spun one half of it onto one bobbin. I divided the second half into three lots lengthways and I'm now spinning those three lengths of fibre onto one bobbin, starting at the same colour every time. Then they will be plyed together for a 2 ply yarn!

The first bobbin.














On a sad note, my beautiful dog Ruby passed away yesterday.  Life already feels so strange without her presence. Ruby has been part of our family since she was 6 weeks old and she was 14 years and 9 months when she passed. A very good age for a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.
Ruby and my 2 Son's grew up together. We are all so saddened by her loss. It's a case of keeping myself busy (as always).
A dog is for life, but unfortunately only for their life, not ours. We have many happy memories of her. She would have been 15 on Christmas Day 2015.

Ruby at 12 weeks old.

Ruby, photo taken yesterday morning. She passed away in the afternoon. Rest in peace my little Princess.xx

Dyeing Fibre & Yarn

I've been messing in the dye pots again:


A knitter's Paintbox, Part I
Merino Superwash High Twist Yarn
Fingering weight
Gradient dyed
Part 2 & 3 coming soon!

Nor' Wester
Merino/Bamboo 80/20 blend
150g

Purple Rain Gradient Set.
Superwash Merino
100g











The lighting in the photo's is not so good but the colours are showing pretty true to life.

I've also been busy sorting out stock, packaging alpaca fibre and dyeing a few extras for a craft fair on Saturday. I plan to take my spinning wheel and hopefully get in a couple of hours spinning time.

Dyeing Combed Top~

A productive day so far, in pictures:

Polwarth, 160g

Polwarth, 125g

Merino, 25g knots

Merino & Bamboo Fibre, Bambino, Meriboo ~ Dyeing Fibre for a Gradient Yarn

I bought some natural 80% merino 20% bamboo fibre to see what it would look like once dyed. I wanted a gradient colour scheme:

I've dyed this blend in a yarn base before but never as combed top. I'm in love, it's squishy and soft and I love the way the bamboo takes up the dye differently to the merino. I'm planning on spinning a laceweight 3 ply yarn. Really loving these pinks and purples at the moment.









Here's how I did it:
Divided the fibre into 5 x 20g lots and soaked in cold water + 2 tablespoons of white vinegar.
Mixed up some red, blue and black dyestock.
Pink = 1 teaspoon red dye
Mauve = 1 teaspoon red + 1/2 teaspoon blue
Lavender =1 teaspoon red + 1 1/2 blue
Purple = 1 teaspoon red + 2 blue + 1/4 black
Black/purple = 1 teaspoon red + 2 blue + 1 1/2 black

It's a beautifully sunny Spring Monday here in Selwyn, I even managed to get a couple of hours out in the garden - weeding, tidying and mulching, the work outside never ends whatever the time of year.  These little beauties are springing up all over the garden ~Trilliums. I love everything about these:

The colours of the Trillium inspired me to dye this Polwarth:

I mixed up the deep purple red, yellow and green to match the shades in the flower and painted it onto the fibre, once the dye had exhausted I poured on some other random colours I've had sitting around for ages, this is a great way to use up all your bits of dyestock that are lurking about. It's often surprising how the colour turns out.
This is 200g of NewZealand Polwarth, all ready for spinning into a very very colourful yarn.

Tarndie Polwarth ...all finished!

I managed to sneak in a little extra spinning time over the last week and got the Tarndie Polwarth finished:



All the skeins together

Natural ~ 95 g, 326 mtrs

Chocolate ~ 50g, 182 mtrs
Grey ~ 50g, 180 mtrs


Beautiful fibre that was an absolute pleasure to spin. The finished yarn is a fingering weight and is N plyed, it's a nice and soft bouncy yarn.

Emptying the Bobbins & Tarndie Polwarth

I spent a few hours today plying and emptying some of my bobbins, I love the feeling when I have empty bobbins. Then I finally finished the batch of Halfbred that I started such a long time ago, and plyed up the last bit of the Shetland that was left over:

Halfbred, 446grams, 1425 mtrs, hopefully a sweaters worth of yarn.

Shetland, 984 mtrs, 350 grams














My next spin (starting in about 5 minutes) is going to be this beautiful fibre that I received recently from Australia, it's Tarndie Polwarth. 100g white, 50g grey and 50g dark chocolate. I'm looking forward to spinning this and I like to spin Polwarth by putting a lot of twist into both the singles and the plying as it can poof up considerably when soaked/washed.

Making lampshades......

Yesterday I made a drum style lampshade with a fancy pom pom edging, it proved to be much easier than I thought it would be!

I will post a step by step guide on how to make these next week - I need to buy another set of rings.












I also finally finished spinning and plying some fibre that's been on the wheel since last year, terrible I know:

80g
Gradient spun merino
heavy laceweight
'N' plyed
720 mtrs

It's a beautiful day, making me want to get out in the garden and start planting, but it's way too early for that. Spring is almost here, the daffodils and crocus' are in bloom:

Spinning....again

Time goes by so quickly, it's quite a while since I posted here - my life has been very busy to say to the least. More home renovations, taking on more hours at the day job, family visiting from overseas, family emigrating from overseas, it's all been happening and it's been difficult to find any time to enjoy any crafting - only in the past couple of weeks have I had any 'me' time. So what did I do? I got the spinning wheel out of course.

I bought 100g of sock blend combed top, undyed, here's what I did with it:

I spun a very fine single then 'N' plyed it for a springy, soft and bouncy strong sock yarn.










After a visit to the dyepot:

350 mtrs of sock yarn, I enjoyed spinning it more than I thought I would. The fibre is 80% soft corriedale & 20% nylon.











Then I worked on spinning a small amount of merino that's for a challenge, I had 21g of it and spun it the same as the sock blend:

135 mtrs of lovely soft merino. Just got to decide what to make with it now, there's also a small skein of romney that I spun to go with it~

45g, 280 mtrs. 'N' plyed.








Now I'm working on finishing up some spinning that's been on the wheel for a very long time, I'm about halfway through spinning very fine singles as a gradient yarn. Once the singles are done they will be 'N' plyed to keep the colour changes nice and clean. photo's will follow of my progress.