Spinning and Knitting Estonian Lace

Vacations seem to end so quickly especially if you have been looking forward to them for a long time! Last week, I took Thursday-Monday off of work and travelled over to Pendleton, IN. What is in Pendleton you ask? The Trading Post aka den of delicious fiber crack and yarn. The Trading Post hosted Nancy Bush and Judith MacKenzie McCuin for a class on knitting and spinning Estonian lace. Let me tell you right now, if you have a chance, take a class with these ladies. I learned so much! OK, back to me telling you about the weekend.

Thanks to Lucie, you will have pictures. My camera came out only once during the entire weekend and those pictures were awful! Thanks Lucie for letting me steal your pictures!

I drove over on Thursday afternoon with two ladies from my spinning guild. We had asked Susan, the owner of the Trading Post, where she would suggest to have dinner. She recommended Bonge's Tavern in a nearby town. She was planning on taking a group there so 10 of us met up for dinner. The tavern doesn't have menus per se. The waitress listed everything and everyone ordered from that. That dinner had quite possibly the best salad I've ever had. The blue cheese dressing was to die for. One of those dressings that you consider licking the plate just so you can clean up every drop. I ordered the chicken and really enjoyed it. What made the evening, though, was that dessert. (I'm making myself really hungry right now) I split a piece of chocolate and sour cherry deliciousness with a fellow classmate, Karen. Oh, that dessert was good. *Drool*

The next day, everyone arrived at the Trading Post and started carting our wheels and stuff into the shop. Susan has converted part of a barn and hay loft into her shop. I couldn't believe they had moved everything in there the day before! The color of the walls is so bright and cheery. She has put in a small kitchen which was really handy when we ordered lunch and baked pizzas in the oven.

The Trading Post

Isn't the kitchen cute?

Food was a theme for the weekend!

It was definitely chaotic moving everyone in! We fit 30 people plus stuff up on the second floor. After some tweaking and moving around, everyone settled down. Moving from place to place on the 2nd floor could be interesting but everyone seemed really patient with it all. We ended up doing the knitting sections of the class downstairs and the spinning upstairs so stuff wouldn't have to move around too much. This weekend was unseasonably warm for the end of April so you can imagine it was quite warm upstairs! Luckily, the wind blew steadily the whole weekend and we were able to open the windows to get rid of some of the heat.



Taking a spinning class with Judith is a very organic sort of thing. Sure you have times that she shows everyone something (you should have seen almost the whole group doing stretching exercises) but, the rest of the time, you are listening to stories of her life and experiences. If you can think of a job that involves the fiber world, she has done it. If you have a question about fiber, she can probably answer it. If you want a spinning technique explained and demonstrated, she can do it. Everyone said that they were amazed how much their spinning technique changed from Friday to Sunday. It was absolutely amazing!

Judith teaching

One of my sample skeins (I would have taken more pictures of them but they are all white and look the same)

Nancy brought the shawls from her book, Knitted Lace of Estonia, and shawls she purchased in Estonia. Talk about exquisite! You would not believe how delicate and intricate these shawls were. What really got me about them is that the Estonian ladies a) started knitting these just to sell to tourists and b) knit them on 9-10 inch straight homemade needles. That's right, 9 inch needles with 400+ stitches on them. Wow. I loved learning more about Estonia (who knew they loved Sweden so much?) and their knitting traditions. But I think the thing that interested me the most was how Nancy described discovering the Estonian knitting. She said that she came across some watercolor pictures while researching for another book. For her, it was like meeting her husband, you just knew it was right. Nancy said that she just wanted to learn everything that she could about the country and the knitting.

Nancy showing us a shawl

Nancy's swatches, mini shawls, actual shawls and knitting needles from Estonia

The whole goal of the workshop was to spin and knit up a sample shawl (i.e. a wee little shawl coaster) of an Estonian stitch pattern. Nancy had a couple of different options that we could do. Everyone chose one of the patterns to use. We were given some yarn to start out with so we could make the initial swatch. At the same time, we were also learning to spin finer and finer yarn out of a couple of different wools and wool blends. Judith had a Shetland/Rambouillet mix, Falkland, a wool (Merino? should have written that down)/silk blend, tussah silk and mulberry silk (Did I miss anything?). I ended up doing the Lily of the Valley stitch pattern which was a lot of fun and had a lot of nupps (think rhymes with "soups"). I loved the stitch and can't wait to knit a full shawl. This is my little sample.

My mini shawl

I met so many fun people (Hi, Kerry! Hi Lucie!), learned so much, and had such a wonderful time. If you ever have a chance to take a class with these two ladies, don't hesitate to sign up!

The spinning mojo is fine

I haven't been knitting much recently but my spinning is definitely not experiencing the loss of mojo. This upcoming weekend I'm going to a class in Indiana being taught by Judith MacKenzie McCuin and Nancy Bush about spinning and knitting Estonian lace. In preparation for the class, I've been working on finishing projects and cleaning off spindles and bobbins.

The first thing I finished was a bamboo/wool blend I bought at A Wool Gathering fiber festival in Yellow Springs, OH late last fall. The roving was from Creatively Dyed Yarns. I absolutely fell in love with her roving braids and ended up buying three different 4 oz. ones, each with a different, interesting fiber combination. This one was 50% bamboo and 50% wool. Another was 70% wool and 30% seacell. The third was 40% wool, 20% silk and 20% milk protein. Choosing a color (and not blowing my budget all in one booth) was so hard.


I enjoyed spinning the bamboo mix up and it ended up being very fine.


To keep the color changes together, I navajo plied it. But I hate to say it, now the colors underwhelm me. Sure, I like them but they don't have the same beauty as the roving braid did.


I'm not actually sure what I'm going to do with this yarn. I definitely don't have enough for socks unless I was doing an anklet sock or some other short sock. Maybe another Morning surf scarf? The obsession with that pattern hasn't diminished yet. The bamboo and wool might make for a perfect summer scarf for work. Hmmm, I'll have to think.

My next spinning project has been on the spindle since July 08. I guess in the grand scheme of things that isn't that long of a time. I started spinning a silk cap for my challenge day during Tour de Fleece 08.


The silk cap was purchased at Maryland Sheep and Wool 08 as well as the spindle I was spinning it on. I'm pretty proud to have something from last May already spun up.


I have absolutely NO idea what to do with this silk. It is definitely lumpy and bumpy with thick and thin areas. Spinning the silk from the cap was definitely a learning experience. I'm definitely going to have to try it again soon.

Next up, one of my goals for April was to finish spinning up some of the dark brown shetland fleece I've been processing. I showed you guys some pictures of working with it a while ago.


I spun it up to a laceweight/light fingering weight. Did I measure the WPI? Of course not!


I started knitting with it almost as soon as the yarn was dry. I bought Nancy Bush's book about Estonian lace (huh, I wonder why) and really loved some of the shawls in there. Miralda caught my eye so I threw the yarn on the swift and wound it up. So far I'm enjoying the pattern but discovered some issues: a) The cast on number is off by +2, b) some of the charts are wrong and c) I really should swatch before I start a project. Take a look at Interweave's errata page or ravelry's page before you start.


Instead of swatching, I started the project with US 7s and merrily knitted the first two knit rows. Then I got to the lace and decided that it looked stupid. I also didn't know about the 2 extra stitches until I was reaching the end of the first lace row and realized that the charts and my numbers weren't going to match up. I decided to fudge that and just rip back to the center stitch, k2tog on one side and k2tog on the other side of that center stitch. After I was finished with that first lace row, I switched needle tips and kept going with US 6s. I'm being very blase about this shawl! But then again, I really didn't want to cast on the 300+ stitches again.

I've started combing the tan shetland fleece I got at the same time as the dark brown one. This fleece is from a whether (a gelded male sheep) and has an extremely long staple. He must be a large boy because the fleece is 7 pounds. I'm really enjoying working with this one. Before washing it in hot water, I let the fleece soak overnight in cold water. That got almost everything out and, when I washed it in hot water to get all of the lanolin out, the water was almost clear in the first soaking.

Those bookish ones of you might know about the annual Edible Book Festival. This festival is held around April Fool's Day each year since 1999. The premise is that you create an edible creation that illustrates a book, book title, or literary pun. The "books" can be anywhere from complex to simple (as an example I put together three cups of tea for the book...wait for it... Three Cups of Tea). It is so much fun seeing how different people look at books and come up with fantastic edible creations.

Last year at this time I was doing my practicum (aka library internship) at Denison University where they hold an Edible Books Festival each April 1st. My inspiration book was Pompeii by Robert Harris. My edible book was a red velvet layer cake in the shape of a volcano. At the top, I put a shot glass half full of unset red jello and lemon juice. When the judges came around, I added baking soda to the mix and *boom* we had lava coursing down the volcano. (Can you tell I really enjoyed making that cake?) I won the Best in Show and got a trophy and everything!

This year, I wasn't able to get time off to go to the event but I still wanted to make a book. I originally thought of doing the book Sushi for Beginners by Marian Keyes because it would be simple and my parents wouldn't have to worry about transporting anything complicated to the library. Then I flipped through the book, Hello, Cupcake! , and it was all over. If you've never seen this book, it is a fabulous cupcake decorating book. The authors of it really make you feel like you can make all of the designs in the book. They have one example in the animal section for a flock/swarm of monarch butterflies. Well, you can just see what happened, can't you?


I had noticed the day before that some of the grocery stores had melting chocolate in all sorts of different colors out for Easter. When I saw the chocolate monarchs in Hello, Cupcake, I knew I had my book.

After a few mishaps (who knew you couldn't add liquid food coloring to melted chocolate?) and broken wings, I had a whole bunch of different wing sizes. I decided to make all of the wings and antennae the night before and to put everything together the morning of the event.


Those brown dots are mounds of chocolate that set the wings on with frosting and more melted chocolate. They helped to prop the wings up and look like the butterflies were fluttering. I'm acutally surprised how quickly everything came together. Once I did a couple of sets of wings, everything was much easier. The same was true of putting the butterflies together. Once you did a few, it was simple. Well, some people might say my version of simple is a little skewed.


Dad took my cupcake platter over before the festival/tea was to begin. I managed to get over to the library over my lunch break and got to see the other edible books in person. Everyone was so creative! If you would like to see the other entries, follow this link. Here are a couple of my favorites:

The "sand" is actually raw sugar and the scrolls are made out of phyllo dough

Aren't they cute?! The artichoke is a wolf!

And my absolute favorite. . .

Isn't that funny?! I love the tail. It makes me laugh hysterially.

I had to run back to work before the judging and passed Dad on my way out. He stayed for the judging and eating (who wouldn't?!). The sly guy didn't call me to tell me anything about the results. He was out on an ambulance run when I came home before riding and then was at a meeting until 9:30. It turns out that I had won. . .



. . . Best in Show!


**Eta: I'm glad I didn't do Sushi for Beginners because it turns out another person did that exact book. She made her "sushi" out of rice krispie treats, fruit roll-ups and candy fish. Her's turned out so much better than mine would have. Every time I look at the picture I crave sushi!

Combing Shetland

I thought you guys might like to see some pictures of processing that Mocha Shetland fleece I mentioned a couple of blog posts ago. I invested in a set of Alvin Ramer mini combs a short while ago. Combed fiber seems to spin so much better for me than carded. If you are ever looking for mini combs, take a look at the Ramer combs. He is definitely a craftsman! He even created a holder for the combs that is easy to pick up and safely stows the sharp tines so you can't injure yourself.




The diz was created by drilling holes in a necklace disc thingy that I found on etsy. When it isn't in use as a diz, I do use it as a necklace. It's really nice because that means I haven't had a chance to lose it yet. I haven't figured out how to get a continuous strip of combed top so instead I've been making little balls of top.

You would not believe how soft this stuff is. I can't wait to spin some up!

In which I sound like a farm extension agent

The spring is a really bad time to be all resolved about not buying another fleece. I mean, shearing just started. (I'm betting at this point all of you can guess what happened.) Julia, a woman in my spinning and knitting guilds, sent out a message to the spinning guild saying she sheared and had fleeces available. I was going to resist until a) I remembered that Julia coats her sheep, b) she has CVMs and Cormos and c) I saw the pictures. I mean, how can you resist that? (Sorry, everything is sold now.) This one is the one I bought. I seem to be going through a dark fleece stage.

Romeldale/CVM or California Variegated Mutant is a very interesting breed of sheep. According to the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, "The Romeldale is an American fine wool breed, and the California Variegated Mutant, or CVM, is its multi-colored derivative. Both the CVM and the Romeldale are unique to the United States and are endangered." Romeldale sheep are usually white in color. The CVM emerged when lambs with color started showing up in the Romeldale flock and then Glen Eidman, the original breeder, started breeding for that color mutation. If you would like more information about the history of the breed, this website is very good. The National CVM Conservancy reports that there are fewer than 500 registered CVMs. Interestingly enough, as the sheep gets older, its colors become darker rather than lighter like most other breeds. Julia also said the fleeces get softer. Keep in mind, sticking your hand in one is like petting a cloud (albeit a cloud with hand softening lanolin but you get my point) so it is hard to imagine how the fleece could get even softer. ***eta: I just listened to the 18th episode Yarn Spinner's Tales podcast from August '08 (I'm catching up!) and she mentioned the CVM/Romeldale in her sheep breed segment. It was a very informative segment because she also talked about spinning from prepared top as well as processing a pound of raw fleece. She also had more information about the breed history than I've written here.

Cormos are another interesting breed. They originated in Australia and are a cross of Corriedale and Merino. The breed's name is also a mix of Corriedale and Merino. These sheep are soft and have a micron count of 17-23. What's a micron count you might ask? Well, get ready for a slightly technical discussion. Listening to Yarn Spinner's Tales and researching for this post has definitely been informative. This blog has a very good post about micron counts and Bradford counts. I'm going to be quoting from it for the following information. "One micron is equal to 1/1000 of a millimeter. This means that if the micron count is being used as the system of measurement, a lower number means a finer fleece." Bradford counts, on the other hand, "measures the fineness of a fiber by determining the maximum number of 560 yard skeins that can be spun from one pound of combed fiber." To me, that one seems a little bit more problematic/objective.

Now, you might be wondering, OK, what does this all mean? Well, it gives you an idea how fine the CVM and Cormo fleeces from Julia's flock are. Merino is a good comparison because many people know what that nice wear-next-to-your-skin fiber feels like. The Merino is known for its fine, soft fleece and "has a Bradford count of approximately 60-70, and a micron count of about 24-18." CVM has a Bradford count of ~60-64 and a micron count of ~22-25. Cormo has a Bradford count of and a micron count of 17-23. My Shetland fleeces, on the other hand, have a Bradford count of 50-60 and a micron count of 20-30. The Jacobs have a Bradford count of 44-56 and a micron count of 28-39. Before the Jacob felt soft but I'm guessing that, after working with the CVM, it is going to feel extremely scratchy!

Oops

I remember back in 2007 when I said, "I'm not taking up spinning. I can just see the fiber stash growing exponentially and taking over the house." Silly me. I mean, I was only thinking about prepared roving. I hadn't even considered the fleece stash and how easy it is to acquire *cough* 4 fleeces. Well, 4 sheep fleeces. I'm not counting raw mohair or alpaca. Though the alpaca really shouldn't count because I have less than a pound of it and the mohair shouldn't because it is is only 2 pounds. See I don't have a problem. Not at all. Nope. Not at all.

raw Jacob Fleece

raw mocha (aka dark brown) Shetland fleece

Combed mocha Shetland fleece

raw light tan Shetland fleece (this monster is 7 pounds!)

raw dark gray/black alpaca (only a couple of ounces)

Raw mohair fleece (2 pounds)

But then spring shearing started. . .

To be continued!

Obsessive much?

I've been dreaming of the Morning Surf Scarf. I liked the pattern (here it is free) when I first saw it in Spin-off but didn't think much about it. Then I started spinning up this BFL and it was the absolutely perfect yarn for the pattern. So perfect that you really couldn't find a better yarn anywhere. I didn't dye this specially, the colors just patterned like this.


I was originally intending this yarn for socks. The plan was to divide the yarn into 3 equal sections for a 3-ply. I was going to weigh the fiber but then realized the batteries for my scale were completely dead. So I ignored the 3 separate sections and just spun all of it up and navajo-plied it. Once I was finished with the yarn, I decided I liked the navajo-plying a lot more for this dyed roving. It kept the colors together which really made the yarn beautiful.

I'm just amazed how thin this yarn is. When I checked it on the WPI gauge, it said the yarn has 18 wpi. 18! That is technically a lace weight yarn. Now, I think that is a little off because I might have pulled the yarn a little tight in my enthusiasm but the yarn is definitely a light fingering weight. I had 385 yards of this, hopefully a good amount for a scarf.

Now, I should know better than to start a pattern when sick. I mean, really, nothing good comes of it. The first time I cast on, I couldn't get my numbers correct for the life of me so that first attempt was ripped out. I started again and, this time, the numbers worked and everything was going well until I decided I didn't like the fabric and wanted to go up a needle size to a US 5. More ripping. I started again with US 5s and the correct numbers and flew along. It went so quickly that I had about 5 inches done by the time I went to the knitting guild meeting the next night.

I knit all through the meeting a little bit at home afterwards. The following morning, I looked at the scarf, looked at the remaining yarn and went "Huh. That doesn't look like there is enough yarn left." I weighed (after finding batteries) the yarn, 2 ounces left. I weighed the scarf, 2.25 ounces used. I looked at the scarf length and said, "That is going to be the shortest scarf on the planet if I keep it the same width." So once again, I ripped. Seven inches of scarf was gone in minutes. Ugh.

Once again, I was strong of heart (and high on cough medicine!) and cast on with fewer stitches, US 5s and the correct number of stitches. A couple of days later. . .

. . . I have a finished scarf! I absolutely love the way the colors patterned up. There is only one section near the end where the colors weren't as vibrant and didn't quite pattern up like the rest of it. That is something, though, with which I can live. I hate doing scarves but I loved this one. Go figure.

Pattern: Morning Surf Scarf
Source: Spin-Off Summer 2008
Yarn: My handspun 100% BFL, 18 (ish) WPI, Navajo-plied
Needles: US 5
Notes: <3 this yarn and pattern combination. No modifications to the pattern. Cast on 66 stitches.

Sew many FOs

Hehe, I couldn't help myself. It always amazes me how quickly sewing projects can go. Sometimes they don't but this project definitely did. A couple of weeks ago, I purchased oilcloth by yardage and in finished project form from two etsy sellers, oilclothaddict and RickRackQueen. RickRackQueen has finished projects and some lunchbag kits. I bought a lunchbag kit which comes with enough material to make 2 bags. The lunchbags she was selling with contrasting side panels really looked striking. So when I bought the kit, I decided to get complementary fabrics in order to do the same thing. I also got some pre-made sandwich bags; one trio of which complements the lunchbags.


Oilclothaddict has oilcloth by the yard and fat quarters in fantastic colors and prints. I got a couple of fat quarters and one yard of fabric. One of the fat quarters was this print which I absolutely love.


It's already been used up :)


I've finished 4 lunchbags this evening and cut up materials for 2 more. I'm a wee bit obsessed. Is it too soon to have your Christmas gifts finished? Sewing is wonderful for finishing things quickly.

These sandwich bags are all mine! Anybody else watch Psych?

The UFO that will never end

So remember how I was gushing about picking up and finishing old UFOs? Yeah, my Hey, Teach! cardigan is doing very well to kill that enthusiasm. Oh, and the Valentine's Day socks, too. They aren't helping. Let me tell you about my knitting "woes."

My Hey, Teach! cardigan (or what I'm calling my Hey, Librarian! ) isn't actually that old. It was started in September but got put aside for socks in October, a sweater in November, and Christmas presents in December. I actually got pretty far on the sweater before it was put down. The back and fronts were all finished. I had even started on the ribbing at the bottom of the sleeves. All I needed to do was to knit the sleeves, block everything, seam, and pick up and knit the button bands and the neckbands. Putting it down like that makes it sounds like a lot to do but the bulk of the work was finished.

As written, the pattern calls for cap sleeves. Now, cap sleeves have the benefit of not very much knitting (so right now that looks like a distinct plus!). But I really don't find sweaters with cap sleeves to be very wearable because they don't keep my arms warm at all. I also don't like full length sleeves because my forearms get too warm and I'll just push the sleeves up anyway. So that means 3/4 length sleeves are the way to go. Another Ravelry member had already figured out the math for the 3/4 length so I was all set for my modifications. After picking it up again, I realized I had the wrong number of stitches on my first attempt at the sleeves. I frogged that, knit my sleeves and blocked everything. After that, I could see that I made a mistake in the lace pattern of the fronts. It was right across the bust line so the mistake would have driven me crazy. I ripped back and reknit. Blocked the fronts again then got ready to seam.

buttons for my Hey, Librarian!

I seamed up the sides and got pretty good at mattress stitching (though the first attempt at it was distinctly NOT good). I realized having the sides sewn up made it difficult to set in the sleeves. Having it flat would make things much easier so I undid the side seaming. When everything was flat, I realized there was no way that my sleeves were going to fit easily in the shoulders. The sizes just didn't match up. If I decided to sew the shoulder and sleeve together, the fabric of the sleeve would be pulled too tight. I tried holding the sleeve together to see how it would be on my arms and they are fine until you get to the shoulder. At that point, they are a little snug. Ugh.

Yesterday, I decided to ignore the sleeves for the moment and to concentrate on picking up stitches for the neck band and button bands. I watched Chuck and Heroes and got all of that done. Well, until I decided I didn't like the look of the last bind off stitch on the neck bands. So I tore back the bind off and the last row. I slipped the first stitch of the last row, knit it and bound off in pattern. Slipping the first stitch seems to make the last bind of stitch look much cleaner. I'm happy I went back even though it meant more time dealing with fiddly things. While I was going back and finishing things, I wove in ends at the same time. One piece sweaters don't have as many ends. Just saying. After that was all done, I blocked the neck band and the button bands.

This morning, after blocking, I bit the bullet and decided to frog the sleeves and start them again in the next larger size. If they don't fit after all of this, I'm going to scream. Oh, did I mention I could only find one of the sleeves while I was frogging? Normally I try to do things two at a time so I don't get bored with knitting two of the same things and so that they will be the same length. Well, one of the completed but soon to be frogged sleeves was hiding under an afghan. I thought, "Forget it, I'll find it later. I'll knit them one at a time because if I don't feel like I've made progress on this thing, I'm going to throw it across the room!" I got pretty far on the one sleeve before leaving for work this morning. It would be great if I could block it tonight but we'll have to see.


I'll have to tell you about the Valentine's Day socks later. I don't know that I can deal with that much knitting angst!

A very late gift

I finished the alpaca socks for my friend last night. Talk about a belated gift! I hope she enjoys them!


The Dove socks from New Pathways is basically a vanilla sock with a purl diamond on the center. This picture is atrocious but you can see a little bit of it. Taking pictures on a dim morning inside doesn't make for fabulous pictures.


I'm just amazed a) how quickly these socks took to make and b) how quickly projects go when you actually work on them instead of hiding them under piles of yarn. I started them on Feb 16th and finished them yesterday on the 21st. I don't think I've knit a pair of socks so fast since I was in school with 3+ hour classes in which to knit. I think this pattern will be a nice addition to my plain vanilla sock patterns.

Finishing craziness

I don't know what has gotten into me. After that post the other day, I've been pulling projects out of the UFO black hole I mean, "basket." I finished my Waves of Plum scarf from my own handspun. I dug out the Hey, Teach! cardigan I was making for myself. I even restarted a pair of alpaca socks for a friend. I'm also considering pulling out the Valentine's Day socks after I finish the alpaca ones.

I love the way that the Waves of Plum scarf turned out. It is fantastic. Because my handspun is heavier than the laceweight the pattern called for, my scarf is a bit more like a mini stole. I love it. Have I mentioned that I like the result? Because I do. The color is fantastic and I love the beads at the ends. The only part I really don't like is the way I joined the two halves together. My grafting is all uneven so I think I might rip it out and regraft again. Or maybe just make sure I wrap the scarf in a way so that you can't see the join. Hmmm.

The Hey, Teach! cardigan has been languishing (wonderful word that) since September. I finished the back and the two fronts pretty quickly but was held up on the sleeves. I picked everything up again and was able to get the 3/4 sleeves finished in an evening. Then I blocked everything on towels on my floor, a process my cat loved. I took all of the pieces to the knitting guild meeting on Monday as a way to encourage myself to seam it up. Now I remember why I don't like knitting sweaters in pieces. Seaming is definitely NOT one of my favorite things. The side seams are wonky looking and the sleeves are something I really don't want to talk about! Earlier in the day, I had a horrendous migraine and had to go home from work. After taking an Imitrex and sleeping for 5 hours, I still had a headache but felt human again. In hindsight, that probably wasn't the best situation to be seaming pieces together. Let's just say I'm glad I also took the scarf in order to weave in the ends and the alpaca socks. After seaming for a little bit, I wove in the ends (except for the ones where you graft things together) and got a few rounds in on the socks.

A new member came to the meeting on Monday which ended up having fewer people attend than normal. I met her at the yarn shop last Sunday when I helped her with her Mobius bag. In the course of conversation I found out that she is a librarian, too, and even runs her own small CSA. I wish more people had been there Monday and hope she will come back next month, too. It's nice talking librarian stuff with someone else.

On Sunday, I unearthed a pair of socks (yum, alpaca!) which were supposed to be for my friend *mumble mumble last year mumble mumble*. They were originally a pair of Snicket socks from the now defunct Magknits. There were a bunch of minuses being applied to this pair: the marker which told me where I was on the chart had fallen off, my friend and I have the same size feet but they wouldn't even pull over my foot, and the color and the pattern were definitely "meh" together. So it was definitely time to frog those. Instead, I decided I needed a relatively plain pair that I could get done quickly and which would look good with the color. It is a mix of green, blue, purple and brown which was flashing like crazy with the Snicket pattern. So I decided to pull out the New Pathways book and cast on for a pair of Dove socks. The migraine must have been lurking on Sunday because I definitely couldn't count my stitches per inch correctly. The number I got was absurd the first time I counted. It was something like 10 stitches per inch and I definitely wasn't using that thin of yarn. So rather than counting again, I just kept increasing (these are toe-up socks) until I reached the number of stitches I normally use for socks for myself (60 sts). In three days, I've knit the feet, turned the heels and am 2 inches into the leg.

The sock is mostly a plain vanilla sock with a purl diamond starting on the instep and going up to the leg. The diamond pattern hides the increases on the top of the foot. You increase one row, knit one, and do the purl pattern on the third row. I'm wondering if that is why this pattern is going so fast. I keep thinking, "oh, it's only a couple of rows until I can see the pattern grow some more." On the foot, the increases naturally make the diamond grow outward. On the leg, you have to keep track and keep shifting the purls towards the inside so the top comes to a point. For a plain vanilla sock, it's amazingly good at keeping my attention. For a long overdue project, that is probably a good thing.

I'm considering using this same sockitecture to make the Valentine's Day socks (the red and pink ones). Recently I've been using the Riverbed sockitecture where the increases are on the bottom of the sole. This sockitecture has the increases on the top of the insole. If I do yarnover increases, there will be eyelets in the shape of a v. On the leg, I could have more yarnovers make the top of a heart. Would that be too much? Hmmm. I can definitely see my next project taking shape.

**I just realized that this is another blog post without pictures. I'll try harder to take some! The weather and my work schedule haven't been cooperating at all!

UFOs

I've been in a startitis/finishing mood recently. I know those two really don't go well together but, trust me, it does in this case. I really, really wanted to finish up my pair of Serpentine Mitts because the house has been cold recently. There is nothing better for typing on the computer or knitting in the living room than fingerless gloves. Well, maybe turning up the heat. These fingerless gloves were definitely an on-the-go, don't-have-to-think-about-it-at-all kind of project. When I finished them, however, I didn't have anything else on the go at the moment. Then I looked at my project pile (theoretically there is a basket in there somewhere under all of the knitting totes) and realized that was a lie. I had plently of projects on the go. There were even some in there that were mostly finished or well on their way to being finished.

So I splunked around a little and came up with my Waves of Plum (aka Waves of Grain) scarf that I started back in Sept. 2008. I was almost 45-47% finished with this project when it went into the UFO pile and can't come up with any good reason for having put it down. I guess another project distracted me with its shiny newness and this little scarf fell by the wayside. The construction of the scarf is interesting because you knit one half, cut the yarn, knit the other half, and graft the two together. I'm a little nervous about the grafting part. The Ravelry KAL will be a help with that.

I'm making it out of my own handspun from a merino/tencel blend I got at Maryland Sheep and Wool. It has just a few beads at the end which catch the light. My handspun has more yardage than the pattern called for but I'm going to keep going until I run out of yarn. It's been really fun working with my own yarn. The merino makes it super soft while the tencel gives it an almost silk-like glow.

At this point, I finished the first half and am well on my way to being finished with the second half. I need to dig out my yarn scale and see how much more is left in the ball of yarn. It's amazing to me how much progress has been made after having not worked on it for so long.

After digging through the pile, I even more projects that are mostly finished and are only waiting for me to work on them again than I even thought. There are 2 pairs of fingerless gloves in there. There should be a backstory on these pairs. With projects like these, I like to work two at a time if I can so I don't get SSS (second sock syndrome). These pairs were both supposed to be Christmas presents in 2007 (possibly?).** In order to make myself finish them, I knit one in one yarn and one in another at the same time. Then I cast on for the other "pair" when I finished with the first two gloves. This plan obviously didn't help me finish the two pairs.

Another problem I was having was the fingers I put on the first "pair." There were so many ends to weave in that I just got discouraged. I also didn't keep track of how many rounds I did on each finger so now I can't replicate it on the other "pair." The new plan (after the Waves of Plum scarf is finished) is to rip those fingers out and do an inch of 1x1 tbl ribbing like the cuff of the gloves. This will also make for MANY fewer ends to weave it. I'm estimating that there are 2 short evenings' (or 1 long evening) worth of work left in these gloves. I only have to finish one more pattern repeat on the second "pair," rip back the first "pair"'s fingers, knit 1 inch of 1x1 tbl ribbing on all of them, and do the thumbs on all 4. Then I will magically have 2 pairs of gloves finished. And a pair of my US 1 circs back.

There is a pair of Valentine's day socks in Koigu I started on Valentine's Day 2006 (maybe? possibly? I know I was home sick that day) and which haven't even been entered into Ravelry. They have little purl hearts on them and are pink and red stripes with white heels. I'm thinking of tearing them out (oh the ends!) and starting them again but using spit splicing. Also the stripes are more like 3/4 of an inch of pink then 3/4 an inch of red. I'm thinking of maybe 4 rounds of pink, 4 rounds of red. I'm also thinking of making them with white toes as well as heels. Hope the red and pink don't bleed. Also, I probably won't do the little purl hearts. It will be obvious enough that these are Valentine's socks.

What else did I find? A sweater jacket ! I really loved the look of this sweater. The designer reverse engineered a sweater she saw on the show Bones worn by Temperance Brennan, a forensic anthropologist. I finished the sleeves first because I thought they would be the most boring part and the part most likely to stall me. Ha!

The designer did something really interesting with the body design. You start with the back and knit 6 inches of bottom ribbing. Then you put a number of stitches on each side on holders and knit the remaining live stitches in stockinette for the rest of the back. After you are finished with that, you pick up the stitches on the holders and get to work with your cable needle. The cables are diagonal in a v-shape when you sew the fronts and the back together. It looks fabulous in the design. It also started looking fabulous in person until I couldn't read patterns suddenly and messed everything up. Rather than taking time to figure out what was wrong, I put it back into its tote back and buried it deep in the knitting basket. Oops. This blog post is making me itch to get back to it though I should probably finish the smaller, almost finished projects first.

Like another project I just found even though they are in plain sight on my chair (albeit covered in dry cleaning), the Clessidra socks! Yes, I was working on these in October. I finished the intricate legs on these knee-high socks and only have to turn the heel and knit the feet in order to be finished. Why in the world did I put these down?! The feet are easy! There is only cableing on the instep, none on the sole! These socks are probably 3-4 evenings of work versus the 2 weeks of work on the legs. What was I thinking when I stopped working on them?! Curse you, magpie tendencies, getting distracted by shiny new projects! I really should finish some of these things. At least I have plenty of projects to work on.


**Don't worry, I gave the recipients something else.

Excited!

Guess what! I've signed up for a class at the end of April with Judith McKenzie McCuin and Nancy Bush in Indiana. It is going to be a three-day spinning and knitting Estonian Lace class. Can I even tell you how excited I am? I absolutely love the Estonian lace book Nancy Bush just published. Keep in mind, I haven't actually seen the book myself but I love the pictures posted on Grumperina's blog and on ravelry. Hmm, must purchase book before class so I can get it signed. Must also purchase Judith's new spinning book. Hmm, looks like that one is coming out in March.

One lady from town just took a class with Judith in North Carolina and said it was nothing like she has ever done before. She learn so much but it didn't even feel like you were learning, just absorbing information. She also said they spun from 9 in the morning until 10:30 at night with short breaks in between. She told me that the class has improved her spinning 200% and she feels like she can do so much more. I'm very excited!

So at least there is one exciting thing in an otherwise depressing future. Sorry, not to be morose but work has been difficult the last few days. I'll talk about knitting instead!

I've been on a mitten kick apparently. I've been working on that pair of glove/mittens for my cousin. They are mostly finished and are just waiting for their ends to be woven in. I hate weaving in ends with a passion. I have a confession to make. Some of the socks I've finished DON'T have their ends woven in so it is like I have a small sock tail. Really, I'm just lazy.

Drying socks and mittens in winter
(Click on picture for my Flickr picture with notes)

The mitten part of the glove/mittens

And then the fingerless gloves of the mitten/gloves

Anyway, back to mittens. When I finished that pair, I decided I really wanted to make a pair of riding mittens. Now, when you ride English, you have the reins going through your pinkie and ring finger and up across your index finger, being held down by your thumb. Regular mittens don't allow you to hold the reins correctly but they do keep your fingers warm. So I decided to keep using the Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns and make myself a pair. I just slapped on a pinkie from the glove pattern and did the rest of the fingers like it was a mitten. I think my thumbs are a little short but, eh, I can rip them out again and reknit them. The whole pair took me 2 days (!) to finish even with sleeping and other non-knitting activities mixed in. The afternoon I finished them, I broke them in with their debut ride. The horses sniffed the sheepy wool quite vigorously but the dogs didn't really seemed interested. It's possible the horses thought they were going to get treats. Knowing them, that was probably the case.

Mom keeps saying they look like the Lambchop puppet.

I'm now working on a pair of fingerless gloves. Well, that's a lie, I was working on them before the glove/mittens and the riding gloves. I knit a 4 inch cuff on them but then paused to finish the other handwear. I've just gone back to them now. They are Serpentine gloves, a free pattern. Last night, I got through half of the chart as well as teaching myself to cable without a cable needle. (It's lost somewhere or stuck in a project. Guess that could be considered the same thing at this point.) This morning before going to work out I put in another 6 rows of knitting. It's amazing how quickly something can go when you, oh, I don't know, work on it! I can't decide if I want to keep these gloves for myself or if I should be a smug little knitter and put it in the Christmas gift pile. I love the Mountain colors sock yarn I'm using for it. That little bit of mohair really keeps your hands and/or feet warm.



Oh, did I tell you about the felted mittens? Ever since the LYS had a class on felted cabled mittens I've been really wanting to make a pair. I didn't take the class but I got to see all of the lovely results. So I bought (I would use stash yarn but I don't have any feltable stuff that would work) some Cascade Tweed in a brown. See, I've also been dreaming about making a pair of those mittens in this yarn. I could just see them in my mind. When the unfelted mittens were finished, I tried them on and started laughing hysterically. These things were HUGE. I mean, going down to your elbows kind of huge. I felted them once and the mittens came out slightly smaller but not much. Yesterday morning, I threw them and some other things I wanted to felt in the washer and went to work. When I talked to Mom later, she said they were the perfect size. I never thought that would happen. They just seemed too big! I'm going to give them to Mom because I never really wanted the mittens for myself. I just really wanted to make them. Ah, the lure of cables, bobbles and mittens. It was too strong to resist.

I also knit a small bag out of my Jacob handspun for the spinning wheel. I'm hoping to put all of the little accessories like the plying tool, wpi tool, oil bottle, etc into it and hang the bag on the wheel. This bag is also supposed to be felted but the first felting run only made it get fuzzier and a tad bit smaller. I also plopped the bag into a pot of dye Mom had going in order to dye some of her shirts to a light blue. Her dying attempts didn't work out well so I used the rest of the dye. I wasn't expecting much change to the color of the yarn because the yarn is so brown but parts are lighter brown. Those parts did pick up dye and the whole thing has an almost bluish-grey look to it now. I'll throw it in the washer whenever I have another load of towels and sheets to do.

Apparently I've just been a hive of mitten-making and felting activity! I really should finish the Hey,Teach! (aka Hey, Librarian!) I put down back in October. Hmm, wonder if I can catch a sweater making bug. But I really want to make the Lily of the Valley shawl instead. I have just the right yarn for it. . .