Bluebells

I credit my Eureka moment when I was learning to spin to some lovely fibre I bought from HilltopCloud (WARNING if you visit this shop you will want to buy everything in it, the colour combinations are gorgeous). It is called Bluebell Wood and it is merino, shetland and sparkle (I'm not a massive fan of sparkle generally but this isn't overwhelming, very subtle and just right) and it is a beautiful mix of mainly blue with a bit of yellow and brown mixed in too.



This what the shop says about the technique used to produce these bumps of fibre:

A hand blended length of roving. I hand blend the selected fibres on a hackle, and then pull the blend off in to roving.
There is some variation in each little bump of roving, but this will create an unique yarn when spun. This way of creating roving makes drafting a dream.

It really does make drafting so easy and thats what finally allowed me to produce something resembling yarn. I spun about 30g of it before I went to my Spinning Class at Knit Nation, after my class I was able to produce a single that was much more consistent and much finer than I had been spinning before. I plied what I had already spun and this is the result:



I think it's about 30 meters and it's probably bulky/super-bulky weight. I'm going to use it in a King of Confidence cardigan.

This is the same fibre spun after my class:



It's much much finer. I'll probably use this for a shawl - possibly combined with something else, maybe striped, maybe not, I haven't decided.....

Naturally Beautiful

Yesterday I went to the Natural Dye Studio trunk show at Fibre Flurry

This is the sight that greeted my when I arrived at Knit Night. All their yarn is dyed using natural dyes (you might gather that from the name) and it's beautiful, lovely subtle shades and some more vibrant colours. My personal favourites are the semi solids but there are also some very lovely variegated skeins and there was such a wide variety of bases and weights, lace, sock and DK, there was lots of talk of hats, shawls and hitchhikers!

This lovely skein of sock yarn came home with me, its purple with just a hint of pinkness and I'm going to use it for the Solid Socks purple month in October

Knit Night was busier than ever due to the irresistible pull of the lovely yarn, I met lots of new people and I really hope they come again, one of the things I really love about Knit Night is seeing what everyone else is knitting, last night there were some amazing pooling socks, a lovely mustard vest and a lace weight cardi in the most fabulous green.

I had a chat or two with the Amanda and Phil, who answered all my daft questions with a smile on their faces, Amanda also had some of gorgeous pattens and samples on display - yet again I find myself longing to learn how to crochet......

These blankets were my favourites and if I could crochet blankets would be the first thing I would learn how to make.

My crochet blanket envy began when I saw the lovely blankets my Rav friend Tash has created:



These 2 are my favourites and one of these days I will sit down with my hook and really really try to conquer it! (Or maybe I will wait for one of the workshops taking place at Fibre Flurry)



(Also how cute is Tash's little girl holding the blanket for the photo????)

Knit Nation - Part 4 Lacy edgings and a snowflake in July

Ok this is the last Knit Nation post - truthfully I should have finished them all earlier but I got a horrible cold and the kids have been off school and lots of other excuses......

My final class on Sunday afternoon was Lace Edgings: Before, After and During with Franklin Habit. I think this was my favourite class of all. We started by adding lace edges to a garter stitch rectangle using mattress stitch and herringbone stitch and then by picking up stitches on the rectangle and knitting the edging on. My sample is a bit of a mess and there are a bajillion ends but I liked the results - especially with the mattress stitch.



Then we began to knit a Stupid Little Snowflake. This was the result, it is cute but more than that - it's clever.



It's really clever. The point of knitting this is that really it's a tiny little shawl, the lace edging is knit alongside the body of the shawl. I was intrigued by the possibilities of the concept but I needed to size it up to cement it in to my mind...



This is beginning of my Stupid Little Snowflake thinks it's a scarf, I'm using some Malabrigo Lace from my stash I had intended to knit for my Mother in Law so this will be her Christmas present - Yes, I said Christmas in August. Yes, I know thats ridiculous.