Handspun and WIPs

Today I've got some pictures of handspun yarn! Always exciting.

First, a couple small skeins of handdyed laceweight. The colours you can get with food colouring are really fantastic, I'm so pleased with how these came out. This was the first time I've dyed the roving and then spun it.

There isn't enough yarn to do much with, so I'm going to try making knitted jewellery with these. I really love the lace necklaces people make, and I've been meaning to try it myself for a while now.

As you may or may not know, I'm fond of taking yarn apart and respinning it. I had a bit of bulky yarn that was blue, green and two shades of purple. I separated it into colours, and respun it into two singles, a blue-green one and a purple-purple one, then plied those.

I like the yarn I spun much better than the original.

I tried to make a tam, but I ran out of yarn too quickly.

I really don't want to go buy more yarn. I think my options are to finish it with a contrasting colour (something plain though, maybe black? It's already pretty colourful.) or take it apart and make a toque instead. I'm leaning towards the second option, but I really don't know. Maybe it'll go into the unfinished projects bin and I'll forget about it for a couple months.

I mentioned a couple posts ago that I was going to try making socks.

Well, I'm trying. There are several things that have come up, and there's no way my socks are going to match now. First problem:

Wtf. There is no way these are the same dyelot. I feel so betrayed! The dyelot on the label was the same!

Second problem:

How did this happen? Dramatic tension change? Was I just really nervous for the first one? I just don't know. Maybe I can block them to the same size? (This seems unlikely but I'll try anyway.)

Sigh. I guess it will be sort of ok. Listening to the Robot Pirates helps a bit.

Good news though! I finished embroidering needle sizes onto my circular needle case! It's on my wall above my bed now, terribly satisfying.

For someone who is obsessed with knitting and yarn as much as I am, I appear to have a severe lack of scarves. This is madness!

I started a lace scarf last night. I've had this yarn forever, it's really lovely, I am so excited to be using it at last.

Woodstock Fleece Festival Part 2

What a horrible week. I was going to rant about the fleece festival (rest assured, I still will), but I ended up with four assignments and a midterm due this week, severely cutting back on my internet time. I've hardly had ANY time to craft this week, it's super upsetting!

But on to better things.

That is what I bought at the fleece festival! I might have got a liiiittle overexcited, but it was my first fibre festival and I just couldn't contain myself. Plus, it was (almost) all really well priced! I haven't quite worked out what I spent yet, I've been avoiding thinking about it. I might have spent all my grocery money for November. Well, if I run out of food I'll just go to everything on campus with free food, that's the best way to deal with that problem, right?

Now I'm not going to go on (and on, and on) about everything I bought, but I have to share a few special things.

I WON this! I had my eye on it when I entered the raffle, and it was still there when I won! So so so so exciting. The price tag said $50, crazy eh?


This is really cool, it's two skeins of different fibre dyed to match by Fleece Artist. I don't have any fixed plans for this yet, but it was too nice to pass up! One skein is merino, the other is "angel hair" - 70% kid, 30% nylon.


These are also fleece artist, lovely laceweight purple! 66% Mohair, 24% Wool, 10% Nylon. I got one dyed straight purple, and one that was varicoloured with sections of the same purple, I'm planning on using them for a lace shawl, because I am sort of in the mood for a lace shawl.


4oz of border leicester locks. They have fantastic texture and colour variation!


This bag is a pound and was $10. For dyed wool! Oh man! They had all these bags with different colours and you got to pick your own, it was super exciting. I also got some bamboo-merino blend from here.


I got a new spindle! It has a really wide whorl, and it's pretty heavy. I really like the grain of the wood that's visible! I actually sanded it down a little because the varnish was a little bumpy in places, but for $22 I'm definitely not complaining!
The fibre is merino-viscose, and I am entirely in love with it. It drafts beautifully, is wonderfully soft, and I love how it's dyed! I'm going to spin it all into a lace/fingering weight single, and make something lacy with it.


This was my particularly indulgent purchase. I'd told myself NOT to buy any yarn that was more than $20/skein, but this was so EXACTLY my favourite colours, and it felt soooo nice, and the stall took credit cards....
I have no regrets. The fact I only bought one is a credit to my self-control.

Even apart from all the gorgeous fibre, the fleece festival was thoroughly enjoyable. After I'd spent all my money I wandered around with my new drop spindle and chatted to people. So many people who love fibre in one place! Wondrous. I'm going to start saving for next year RIGHT NOW. Well, maybe after I've saved enough for this one yarn I really want...

Fleece Festival Part 1

Oh man, I just got back from the Woodstock Fleece Festival, and I am completely exhausted and penniless but I just had to post about how WONDERFUL it was!!! *happy sigh*

More about it later.

Data Entry

Since my physics assignment didn't take all that long this week (unlike last week, oh man), I spent most of this evening entering my yarn into ravelry. I have a lot of yarn! I only got through 2 milk crates worth, and there's already 41 different types of yarn now. If you are the sort of person who's interested in this sort of thing (and god knows I am), you can check out my stash page here.

I really have to share this awesome yarn with you:

SPACE KNIT

That's right, SPACE KNIT. I love it! It's this shiny nylon/cotton blend that I'm pretty sure came from a dollar store, but I got from Kadie when she moved back home. I don't want to knit with it, I just want to frame it and put it on my wall. I just cannot get over how awesome this is.

I discovered today that I can needlefelt my dreads! It only really works on bits that are sort of overlapping, not on lumps, but it works pretty well. As long as you use a thimble and don't stick the needle halfway into your thumb.

Ow.

I've been listening to this song on repeat for the last fifteen minutes. Does anyone else like to saturate themselves with songs, or is it just me? I just love the Dresden Dolls (I have all the sheet music because I'm a giant nerd like that), they have been my favourite for something like five (six?) years now. And I'm 22, so that's A LONG TIME, GUYS.

Ok, time for dinner or bed. Or both? Or...neither? That can't be right.

Making a case

Until today, my knitting needles, crochet hooks and miscellaneous bits have been kept in a drawer that gets put wherever there's space for it. It has been VERY DIFFICULT to find anything, and I've been meaning to make a case for ages, but haven't gotten around to it. Well, yesterday I finally go around it it! Here is before:

And after:

It's so exciting! I haven't sewn anything in AGES, so it's a little wonky, but it works and is colourful, and that is what counts. My sewing machine got jammed half way through, and wasn't sure what was wrong, and I got rather upset. But then I went to THE INTERNET, found this site, which had the manual for my machine to download (for free!), and it told me what to clean. And it worked after cleaning! Who would have guessed! So I made that first container, but it didn't have space for my circular needles, so I made this as well:

And after:

It's a bit too long, but better too long than too short. I'm going to embroider needle sizes on each section, but it's going to take a while since I haven't done any embroidery since I was about ...twelve? I've already had to unpick one number.

My hat is progressing! I've had to frog bits of it, but I really like how the colours work together.

If you ever have to do colourwork, I thoroughly recommend a colourwork thimble:

It keeps everything so much less tangled! It is really quite wonderful.

Plans

I just finished reading Sweater Quest, by Adrienne Martini and it has inspired me! First of all, it's a great book, it has a great flow to it, and I read it in a couple days because I couldn't stop! I totally recommend it. It inspired me to work on more interesting/challenging projects. I've made a few shirts and a sweater before, but now I want to learn Fair Isle...not on the same scale as Martini, I'm going to try a hat first. A wander through Ravelry came up with a few patterns I liked; atm I'm leaning towards Tracery Tam, but still considering Joni, Midnight Sun Tam, Floppy Fairisle Hat, or Star Flower Tam. Too many choices! The Fornicating Deer Chart definitely deserves an honourable mention though.

I also want to make socks! I haven't made socks before, mostly because I'm not really a big sock person...I tend to wear thick tights or nothing. But I think knitting socks is something I should know how to do, so I picked up some orangey-greeny sock yarn from Michaels, and I'm going to use Knitty's Universal Toe-Up Formula.

I've finished a couple more hats, which I'm happy enough with, but not really excited about. I'm going to take them to Rare Funk sometime next week...I meant to take hats this week, but I had a whole bunch of assignments to catch up on, and couldn't seem to find the time.

This hat is crocheted, I started it about a year ago, but only just finished it. I've made a similar hat before, I really like the spiral pattern. Acrylic single-ply yarn, it's really soft and I like it! It does pill a bit though.


This one is 100% wool. This is the first hat I've knitted, and I didn't use a pattern (of course) so it's a liiiiiittle wonky...but still wearable! I am reasonably pleased with how it turned out.

Next I'm going to see if I can make red and aqua look good together. This could be interesting, here's the yarn I've got:

It will at least be distinctive.

I also got some colourful tape for hula hoops! It's actually hockey tape from the sports store, it's cheap and colourful and I got a whole bunch of colours. So now my hoop has a few different shades of blue on it, so exciting!

I'm making a couple more hoops for friends, which is exciting, I've made back the cost of the materials already. Not sure if anyone else wants to buy hoops from me, but I still have pipe left over, so possibly I'll just make myself some different sizes.

In dumpster diving news, I found 21 tubes of watercolour paint the other day.

They were all in clean packaging, I don't know *why* they were thrown away. More free stuff, I guess, but still. No wonder everyone hates north america.

I'm home for thanksgiving this weekend, and I found some yarn bombing! I wish I'd had a camera with me, but no. In true London, ON fashion, it had been burned by someone...wtf?! It looked like it had been nice before...

Many Exciting Things

I had a terribly productive day the other day. I made a hula hoop! A proper one that is appropriately heavy and large. I can already do a few things (none very well) but it is SO MUCH FUN.


It's (sadly) only black because I only had black electrical tape, and I couldn't get the duct tape to wrap evenly. BUT I found this site, which has all manner of wonderful shiny hoop tape! Yep.

If you want to make a hoop (and you should, it's super easy and they are so much fun), this was the tutorial I used.

Adhering *ahem*...closely to my "hat-a-week" goal, I have finished another hat. It looks like a pumpkin! A stripe-y pumpkin.

I know this picture is just dreadful, I'll take another one tomorrow in decent light, but I was just too excited!

Michael's store brand "Charisma" acrylic chunky, which is actually not bad! It's soft and has a nice stripy pattern. This is actually the first hat I've knitted, all the others have been crocheted. It didn't turn out perfectly, but I like it well enough.

I ran out of yarn two thirds of the way through, so I had to run to Michaels to get more, and (of course) couldn't resist peeking in their dumpster, even though it was raining. But it was worth it, because I found YARN (omg!), acrylic paint, a label punch, and a bunch of glue.

Speaking of yarn, I found this terribly dangerous website: Yarn Find. It is a buy/sell/trade site for yarn....ohhhhh my.

I guess I haven't posted stuff in a while, so here are some more ATCs:

I am in the midst of rediscovering how intensely wonderful Pop Rocks are. Like, oh man. I am actually having dreams that involve me buying massive amount of Pop Rocks. It would be slightly unsettling if it wasn't so AWESOME.

Also, I got asked for drugs the other day! We had to do projects for a class and I ended doing mine on harm reduction approaches to drug use (ie, I handed in TRIP flyers), and then we had to talk about them in class. Then after class a nerdy awkward frosh guy came up and said "Excuse me, do you have any marijuana?" It was really cute! I don't sell drugs, but lolz.

Exciting as this post had been, I have to end it now. Why, you may ask? Because I have to get my hoop on, bitches. And go tell the people who live above me to stop jumping on their floor.