3KCBWDAY1 - Colour Lovers

Hi all, 

Today is the first time I'm participating in a thingymawhattum called... what it says down there in this here banner. 

It's a thing where bloggers all over the world share their thoughts on the same subjects for a week. Now my week is about to be interrupted by a Photographer showing up, so this may or may not be my only entry this year. We'll see. For now, I'll tell you a little something about colour and my craft. The Stash is a good place to start, it's the base of it all I suppose. I tend to pick a yarn or fibre of strong colours. There is a place for pastels and soft tones. I have some in my stash even, but it tends to stay there for longer than most (indefinitely).

There is more enjoyment for me, working with a strong colour. It doesn't need to be a bright, in your face colour, even though I do like those as well. Natural coloured fibre has a certain something to it. The colour is part of its being, not something added later (which doesn't stop me from dyeing my hair, obviously). 

So strong colours do it for me. It may have something to do with the way they brighten up my wardrobe. There nothing like a colourful shawl to lift the black-top-on-jeans-look, is there?

Windward - Heidi Kirrmaier

Tolovana - Marnie Maclean

Jeweled Cowl - Sachiko Uemura

Pea Vines - Anne Hanson

Rock Island - Jared Flood

Damask - Kitman Figueroa

Echo Flower Shawl - Jenny Johnson Johnen

Annis - Suzanna IC

WIP Wednesday: Unsprung

Ahhhhhhh

There's still something to show you! I haven spun anything since whenever I last told you I did. I guess the white merino/some-sort-of-plastic-mix is just not appealing enough for me right now. Soonish I might get the rescue wheel cleaned and fixed, so I'll have 2 working wheels to keep going. Maybe that will help.*

I'm working with my handspun Sound of Music, and as you can see by the state of that cake, quite a bit of it has found its way into a project. I think I named it Windswept. It's stripy and I'm happy I mixed the length of the colour repeats, as that now means it's messy striped instead of fixed and ruled by the pattern alone. 

It's an interesting pattern, which leads to a shawl/scarf shape by adding different triangles on top of one another. It's different all right, and adding a new triangle after every few repeats (except for the middle part, which has a whopping 13 4-row repeats) makes this stockinette and garter stitch pattern very entertaining indeed. 

Because of the simple patterning, it's really nice for a self-striping yarn. This yarn doesn't need much, because it already attracts enough attention on its own. As much as I love luxury brand or indie dyed yarn, there isn't anything like making something from something you already made yourself. Does that make sense?

Looks like Spring, right? Look closely, I did a little tricksy. Our mulberry tree gets chopped back every Autumn, or it will cover half the garden and the pathway behind that wall. *Some* people who use the path don't enjoy hacking their way through our tree on their way to *important stuff*.** It looks awful like this, but once it starts up, it'll be blocking my way out in no time at all. 

Spot that. That, dear reader, is not dew. It's rain. Good for the garden, yes. I understand that bit.

But it makes our Japanese maple look so sad! We've had a few nights of frost in a row, so I sure hope the leaves will perk up a bit when the temperature gets back to normal. Spring definitely seems unsprung from where I'm standing***

At least the vines are waking up. I thought I should mention that... priorities, right?

 *maybe not
** or whatever
***in full rain regalia, fleece jacket, wool socks, gloves, wool cap.

Simple Sunday: Breidag Highlights, day 2

Disclaimer: Not ALL of that is for me. And I took more pictures, non of which are decent enough to post here. I blame the camera. 

Fibre Friday: Breidag Highlights, day 1

WIP Wednesday: The Pretty

O Hai!

No I didn't forget you last week, I just didn't have anything to tell you and certainly nothing to show you. I do now, on both counts, so here we are again. Nothing much to say really, other than being excited about a new project, started just so I have something to show on the blog!

Secret knitting and everlasting spinning for others has left me less than enthusiastic about everything on the needles and the bobbin. Not that I'm not happy to make for others, but when things end up on a LIST and in QUEUES, something has to give. It took me 2 weeks to find something to use Sound of Music in. 2 weeks of bleh, coincidentally. I'm sure the 2 are related. 

Below some of the things that are good. Yummy good.

Homework

Millefleurs by Dutch Wool Diva

The start of a new something not for me

Sound of Music by Dutch Wool Diva and me

Stockinette 

Garter

I'll be out and about and surrounded by other knitters all weekend, looking for glimpses of Happy!  

Which reminds me, I need to do my knitting homework....

WIP-Wednesday-on-a-Friday: On Finished Things

Whoops, sorry I'm late again, but for once I was actually busy out of the house. 

Yeah, I do sometimes leave the house for reasons other than workity work work. Last Wednesday I went to see the try-out for Bavel Izz Music, a sort-of-local to me Night-of-the-Promsy-sort-of event with an eclectic mix of music, song and dance, of which I knew at least one participant. In a bid to get people to buy tickets to our (Nootwaar's) own show on June 16th (do YOU have your ticket yet)* I think it's important to guilt-trip other amateur performers by going to their shows. And, it's always a good night when you get to sing along with someone else for a change.  

Yesterday saw me working like a mad-woman, hand stitching my fabric postcard together so it could be sent today (which I did, hurrah!). Obviously I won't show you a picture yet, because that would spoil the surprise. But I was very happy with it, for a first try, so there we go. Depending on the Dutch and Canadian postal services, we may be able to see more soon...

Tomten the Third is finished and delivered, even if its tiny recipient isn't here yet. His or her auntie was very happy with my work, so it'll be a good present for her to give... I think the little ducks brighten the whole thing up, and it was a joy to knit. Oddly, this sort-of boring pattern of garter stitch after garter stitch row is the one and only think I ever made more than one of. 

If you don't have a pom pom maker yet, go and get one. It's all I do these days, pom pom making...

Well, and a bit of spinning. I think I overdid things when finishing the Sound of Music-edition I mentioned before. When everything hurts, you should seriously consider taking a break.

In my head, finishing the spinning and transferring the yarn to another bobbin to make nicer pictures is sort of taking a break, right? Behind it what must be a linen/silk sort of blend in a rich golden colour. Behold below some finished yarn. I mean, feast your eyes. No, really, just look at it, isn't it gorgeous? It's 550m, at a light fingering/2-ply lace weight so it'll become a nice thing for summer wear. It's nothing I would've chosen by myself, but I love it all the more... Even if I bruised my fingers spinning and plying it all...

*yes, I'm talking to you

WIP Wednesday: I Spy....

...with my little eye... something Blue...

Looking at my wardrobe, most of my handmade and bought shawls and most of my current projects, 'something blue' could be anything! Even the sky promises to be blue for a few more days at least, so the Spring sun gets plenty of airtime... I suspect we'll need to have a bit of rain at some point, or we'll get all of it on my days off I'm sure. 

Some sad news this week. Do you remember Tanit's Jacket, and how it was taking me to get anywhere? Last time you saw it, it looked exactly like this

If you remember the jacket, and have any clue about making anything by hand (crafting, cooking, you name it) you know that feeling. The feeling of a tiny little thought in the back of your head, getting louder only ever so slowly until at last, you can't ignore it any longer. You've checked, double checked, triple checked and checked all over again, until you can't deceive yourself any longer. 

In the case of the Tragic Tanit's Jacket the thought was thus: the button hole is on the wrong side...

I checked if I read the instructions wrong,* I checked for errata on the pattern website,** I turned and turned the WIP around and around to match the pictures on the pattern. I asked Mom. She told me I was right. I found others who knit the same jacket on Ravelry. At least one of them mentions the button holes being on the wrong side. I now know I'm not alone in either reading the pattern wrong or noticing the pattern is in fact wrong.

I frogged, and I frogged, and I frogged 4 balls of yarn. 

I guess there's a good side to all this frogging. I was wondering if I had chosen a size too large to start with, since I didn't do a great deal of gauge-getting, so now I'm knitting it a size smaller. If nothing else, there will be fewer stitches.

To make up for it (and because I really wanted something else on the bobbin), I spun, and spun, and spun and spun some more. You think you buy 100 grams of the stuff, but there's no end to a braid of Tardis fibre. I shouldn't be surprised, really. 

Here are the two full bobbins together. Now all I have to do is spin another 100 grams of white merino/nylon mix to make the third ply for this supposed sock yarn. 

Before I do that though, I get to do some selfish spinning. I love making for others, but sometimes, it's time for Me! Me! Me!

So when I got Tardis spun up, I quickly settled in to prep the latest instalment of Dutch Wool Diva in the colourway Sound of Music. I decided on very short and irregular colour changes, so I divided the braid into lots of narrow pieces.

I intend to ply it with some unknown fibre on a cone which I got a few years ago. I can't seem to find a cone with a label on it, but I'll try a bit before committing to it. I just thought they matched so well together!

I seem to fly through the little balls of fluff, so I expect it to be finished a lot quicker than most things I've spun this year. 

Finally, last week's budding leaf has grown into this already! It truly isn't winter any longer, the equinox was yesterday and people are still dumping rubbish amongst the daffodils. Not everything changes...

Keep knitting, touch wool!

*I didn't
**there weren't any