Psst

After a week of flu, sneezing, coughing and general not-well-being my children are back to school, my husband is back to work and it is raining. I love this ambiance, in my region in France it does not rain very very often, so I am in osmosis with a time which seems to be suspended, a certain melancholy is floating in the air, I’m listening to Chaz Knapp, someone I discovered via PostSecret, his music was used for the video.

These are moments most precious for me, because, as an introvert, this is my plug to regain energy, to calm down after hectic days. And it is always followed by regained inspiration for creation.

Christmas knitting

Christmas knitting is flying off the needles. Or that should be; the first attempt finished with my decision to keep what was intented for my MIL:

Ysolda’s Scroll Lace Scarf from Whimsical Little Knits 2. The border is handspun from the july installement of Spunky Eclectic’s Fibre Club. It is my first navajo-plied yarn, and I’m very happy with it.  This video from Sarah Anderson gives a great explication of how to N-ply.

The green yarn is Alchemy Haiku. I don’t wear green and I did not like mohair, but this yarn had me instantly under its spell and I did not regret. It is beautiful and soft to wear, and I think my MIL will get one of my two Just Enough Ruffles instead

My daughter asked for a pink version of this sweater, in which I will happily indulge.

My son will get one or two knitted toys, I have yet to decide which one.

Happy knitting to everyone!

P.S. I’m linking to patterns and other things because I like them, not because I’m payed for it:-)

Well, I learned

…yesterday, that my mother suffered a slight stroke (luckily without permanent harm)

…today, that my grandmother died.

Today is my son’s 8th birthday.

And I have a bladder infection.

What is one supposed to do?

Watch this, of course:

Some knitting

When I browsed the latest Knitty-issue, I instantly liked the Renaissance sweater.  I choose some Araucania Atacama from my stash and am happily knitting along:

A very easy and quick knit.

More spinning

Some spinning has been going on this summer. I combined some “cupcakes” from stefknits on Etsy with one ply Spunky Eclectic 50/50 Merino Tencel blend in “Rocket Pops” and one ply Louet Superwash Wool undyed, and got, what I’m calling the “Pastel Trilobite:

I think I’ll make a simple ribbed scarf from it.

Another SIP (spinning in progress):

On the left the august installment of Spunky Eclectic’s fibre club (Zombies), which I will ply with each one ply in merino, in the colourways “Deep Turquoise” and “Lilac” from shunklies on Etsy.

Spring and Autumn Twist

I finished the second “seasonal” plying and am quite pleased with the outcome.

I’m planning to knit a bag with it. This month’s Spunky club shipment is in green, orange and yellow I think (I shortly looked at the spoilers on Ravelry, haven’t yet got mine), and I decided to spin this one in singles, as it will be a perfect match for the bag straps. Good Karma

NEWLY SPUN

I hesitated how to use the february-shipment of my Spunky Eclectic fibre club, and when I got the mars installment, I decided to combine the two. To assure some calm to this blend of yellow-orange-red on one side and the mars-Myrtle-mix on the other, I added some solid Corriedale in bordeaux. I’m very pleased with the outcome:

To ply, I made a rather simple Lazy Kate installation:

Three bobbins on a stick, held by two chairs. Cost: nothing, efficency: priceless.

I still have half of each Spunky-colour left, which I will ply with a solid pink Corriedale.

The fun never ends

MY CABLES

I finished “My Cables” at the beginning of the month. Once the sewing started, there was just one sleeve and both side seams to be done. I got a little distracted by the handspun and put the sweater aside.

Then, for the Easter weekend, I had to get up at 6 a.m. for a competition where I was volunteering. I thought: wazzad? (because it was early). As I soon found out, “zad” was wind and rain. Sweater-weather. Finished-sweater-weather. Not I-could-pretend-it-being-a-poncho-weather. So I skipped breakfeast and started sewing those missing seams at 6 in the morning. At 6:30 I had a finished sweater, a rumbling stomach and was ready for the day. There was a smile on my face that did not leave me. Happy I was!

TWI-DELIGHT

It’s been quite a while since I finished spinning my first Spunky-shipment.

I made two 2-ply and one 3-ply skeins.  I will use them to knit a hoody in blue and brown with using the handspun to set some accents.

I already started with the 3-ply, which is used as a front-pocket:

I actually already have reconnected the pocket to the front. It was such a pleasure to knit my first real handspun! The rather irregular texture, the colour changes, the softness of the merino… just can’t get enough.

I call it “Twi-Delight”,  because the colourway was named “Twilight”, and, well, delight there has been to work with…

Then there has been a surprise release in the spring Knitty, and I really want to knit this pattern, the “Target practice” sock, with this yarn (Fly Designs Lace Wing Socks in the Fire-colourway):

I think I won’t have trouble finding the target.

I DO KNIT

With all this new fibre passion I did not talk once about my actual knitting. Because knit, I do. My latest “coup de foudre” was a very nice cabled sweater in” Sandra” from octobre 2008:

The pattern calls for LANA GROSSA Eco, which I substituted by Bingo from the same manufacturer. Despite the same yardage I had to shorten the number of repeats. And that is before washing; the last item I made out of this yarn gained 20% in length after a short bath!

Nevertheless, this yarn is very squishy, and from time to time I just have to hug the already finished back and front, which are patiently waiting for the sleeves:

Mmmh, love those cables…