Pink for October

Breast Cancer Awareness - Think Pink

Pay It Forward

Pay It Forward
I've been reading about the Pay It Forward exchange on a few blogs, and finally decided to sign up on Gilraen's blog. Here's the deal:

It’s the Pay It Forward Exchange. It’s based on the concept of the movie “Pay it Forward” where acts or deeds of kindness are done without expecting something in return, just passing it on, with hope that the recipients of the acts of kindness are passed on. You all know I’m already a PIF type of person. So here’s how it works. I will make and send a handmade gift to the first 3 people who leave a comment to this post on my blog requesting to join this PIF exchange. I do not know what that gift will be yet, and it won’t be sent this month, probably not next month, but it will be sent (within 6 months) and that’s a promise! What YOU have to do in return, then, is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog.I will send to anywhere in the World as long as it doesn't involve space travel ;)

Hats for Age Concern on Innocent Drinks

This is 100g merino handspun hand-dyed yarn that I spun and dyed as one of my first projects, finally now I have found a use for it!

10 little hats that I knitted over the last couple of days, I found some small bobbles in my local remanent shop which I think just finish the hats off. Every bottle with a hat on has 50p donated to Age Concern when they are placed on Innocent Smoothie Bottles, they can be found at Sainsburys and other participating stores. The hatted drinks will be on sale from November 7th -21st, so look out for them and get buying the drinks! Click here for the website, patterns and progress.

Silk Yarn

The singles spun up. The caps weighed the same but it looked like I had spun a lot more onto the top bobbin but when I plied them the yardage matched with about 20cm left over on the top bobbin!

27g of silk caps spun into 242yds of a gorgeous sea coloured varigated 2 ply hand dyed, hand spun yarn, at a guess because I forgot to check before winding into a ball I think it would be fingering weight to heavy laceweight. I always seem to have a lot of dye come out when setting the twist even though after the initial dyeing I washed the caps until the water ran clear, maybe I am abit heavy handed with dyes as I like strong colours!
Any suggestions for a small project in which I could use this silk?

Silk Cap Preparation

After almost all of my first week of annual leave spent mostly indoors as there was sooooo much rain we finally had a really sunny, hot day of gorgeous weather so I sat in the garden separating and thinning 1 of my silk caps the bottom one from the previous post, so silky and shimmery in the sunlight although these photos are taken indoors.

Ready for spinning!

This is a full bobbin of the roving Iris gave me as part of the Knitters Tea Swap 3, I hope they do another, it was fun. This must be about 2-3oz of roving from the 8oz she gave me.

Batt Swap & Silk Cap Dyeing

After moving house about 3 weeks ago I have started to settle in, hence the reason for lack of postings!

*******Read on about the batt swap******


I have random dyed 2 lots of silk caps by sprinkling some dyes across the silk caps and having sealed them in ClingFilm, then I microwaved them for about 10 mins as our microwave is only 600watts! Now waiting for them to dry and them to give them a beating, as the fibres have stuck together abit.


These are some batts I made before moving, they weigh approx 390g together and are a combination of 80%merino/20%soy silk, 80%linen/20%silk noils, variety of different colours of alpaca. There is at least 60g in each batt, they are light and airy and wonderfully soft, all being heathered shades of similar colours.


************My offer is I would love to try spinning some Buffalo Gold fibre to make the Unisex Double Moss Stitch Scarf with Optional Scalloped Edging shown below which takes 2oz of buffalo gold fibre to make, but the only supplier to the UK has stopped trading so I am finding it very difficult to locate and buy any of the fibre. I realise 2oz of the buffalo gold down is very expensive so I am looking for offers, if anyone would like all of my batts (the ones shown below)to spin I would be willing to swap them for at least 1oz of buffalo gold roving, please contact me Rachel.spinning@virgin.net and make me an offer************

Closeups of the 5 batts seen in the photo above.

Spinning wool

A fleece from a friend of which I have spun a 2ply yarn weighing 147g, and of about 15 wpi. This picture is a bit darker than the acutal fibre colour. Loads of fleece left to spin!

This is a Dorset fleece from the Suffolk Show 2006, spun into a 2ply yarn, weighing 202g and approx 14/15wpi. This was a massive fleece so I also have alot left over to still spin. This is the washed fibre, compare with the post from yesterday to see the difference in colour!

Spinning with wool & Bamboo

This is the roving from Iris, just started to spin this, fine laceweight, lovely variated colours and very soft.
This is 100g Bamboo Fibre from Wingham Wool Work (UK), I have now to spin another bobbin as I will make a 2 ply yarn.

This is a fleece I got from the Suffolk Show last year, initially I spun straight from the fleece as it was so clean and easy to handle but had the rest sent to a fibre mill to be processed because the fleece with the lanolin was not very nice after a few months. This is before washing, it was very yellow and extremely greasy! More to follow.

Knitters Tea Swap Parcel Arrives!

A very big thank you to Iris for her very generous parcel with loads of goodies in, she really seems to know what I like so below are photos of what was in the parcel.

This is a skein of shrink resistant lace weight merino - 100g = 1375yds, many packets of Kool-Aid for creative dyeing and a pattern for the Fiber Trends Landscape Shawl & Scarf.

This is Ingeo Yarn, a skein is 1.75oz = approx 110yds made from the yellow kernel of the corn not corn silk - this is produced in Iowa.
Many individual sachets of teas, 2 pack of Gong Fu Tea - Lemon & Hibiscus and Prince of Wales (from Iowa). Also the 'Star of Persia' tea with ruby sugar crystals.

3 packs of Soy Nuts, I have already eaten the zesty barbeque flavour (we don't have these in the UK and they are delicious), also there is chocolate and roasted/salted.
4 ounces of 70% Alpaca 30% silk from Huacaya Moon,
This is a natural varigated colour.

Good old PG Tips and a bar of French Lavender Soap from Two Rivers Soap Company. A pretty cloth in a lavender shade comes with the soap which has a very natural wonderful smell.

And finally 8oz of a wool roving, very soft to the touch and really my style of fibre!

Thank you Iris, this has been an amazing swap, with really unexpected kindness and generosity.

Sirdar Shrug

This is the finished Sirdar Shrug using Blur yarn in 'Indigo' shade, it took just over 3.5 balls of yarn, very soft and warm! I have chosen to donate it to Claudia who is doing a cycle ride for the National MS Society. Go and take a look at her blog, donate some money if you wish and look at all the generous wonderful prizes people have pledged to help raise funds for the National MS Society.

F O

This is my finally finished Baltic Sea Stole the pattern is from Fibre Trends and I bought the pattern from Get Knitted. I used Rare Comfort Jo Sharp Kid Mohair, also available from Get Knitted in the colourway 'Cello'. I bought 10 balls and used 9.5, as I slightly increased the length of the stole to use as much yarn as possible. This has taken me months of occasionally knitting a few rows, but being my first lace project I really like the result. The pattern was very repetitive but I now realise this is what lace is about. Some of the lace patterns are so pretty I will be venturing into more challenging patterns, which one to choose though, there are loads of shawl patterns I love, any suggestions as to what to do next?

The Sirdar Shrug is next on the needles, pictures to follow

Spinning

This is a 2ply, approx 260yds, 12wpi yarn. 1 ply is of soy silk and the other of random dyed Suffolk wool. The yarn is quite soft as the soy silk balances the roughness of the Suffolk wool.

Spun freebie by Kat

Spun by Kat, the parcel got all the way to America! She has spun 2 lots, one being navajo-plied and the other thick and thin singles. Thank you to everyone who has participated with the spinning as I am really impressed with all the spun results, this is a really positive result, keep sending in comments and photos please. Kat both are very pretty, I particularly like the navajo-plied one!

Spun freebie by Jo

Pictures from Jo, the fibre sample looks gorgeous and I really like the combination of the eyelash yarn with the spun wool. Stats - 7 wpi, and 23.6yds of fibre goodness. I am now researching possible websites to sell my wares from, does anyone have any tips/ideas on the best type of site to sell fibre from e.g. Etsy shop, Mr site website etc?