MonkeyFeet

Well, I promise you I have been doing lots of knitting, it’s just I don’t have much to show! I’ve finished my shawl now, I’ve called it the Maya Shawl, and it just needs blocking, photographing, and writing up – I’m going to try and do that tomorrow. I’m very pleased with it and am feeling quite smug, though whether anyone else will like it is a whole different matter!

Before I go into the photos, I must tell you that if you haven’t already – check out John Martyn’s music. If you like the style of Nick Drake, you will love John Martyn. I heard his song ‘Go Down Easy’ on the radio on Thursday night – it came on as I was about to turn off the ignition in my car, and I had to leave it on to listen – I was mesmerised. Seriously, check it out, his guitar playing is incredible and his singing is dreamy.

Anyway, here’s the fibre…

Merino from Shunlies, and alpaca from Shunklies. Both beautiful!

Merino/soy silk from Warratah Fibre Crafts/Moggle/Megan – it’s the only one I’ve not spun yet (it’s pre-drafted and ready to go though!)

And I forgot to take a photo of this in it’s fibre state, as I spun it about half an hour after recieving it!

It’s alpaca/shetland. Really, really soft and bouncy, and a little hairy. An absolute dream to spin! I know it looks ropey, but it’s really not! I adore the natural colour. It’s amazing how beautiful grey can be.

This is the alpaca from shunklies, again, this was a dream to spin (I nearly wrote knit there, out of habit!). What I liked was it’s smoothness, the fibres slid along each other as I drafted, really nicely. It’s produced a lovely, hairy yarn!

I have spun the merino from shunklies too, but not photographed it yet, and I think my SD card in my camera has broken so I will get a new one asap. Problem is, I don’t have a card reader on my PC, just USB ports, and my SD card folds back to transform into a tiny USB disk (hope that makes sense!). So I’ll have to find another one that does the same, because I can’t afford a card reader at this point. Ugh!

Anyway, below is some BFL  fibre that I dyed and spun. It looks weird because it came out dark, so I lightened it in photoshop, so the colour’s more true, but it looks strangely foggy.

And finally, check out this rag! I decided to have a go at wet felting and instead of just doing a flat piece, I decided to get in there and make a bowl. Hah! Well you can see what happens when you jump in at the deep end with these things – you end up with a right mess! I’ve given it to Holly as she’s one of these dogs that likes to carry around things like towels, socks, knickers etc at all times (she falls asleep with them in her mouth!). She’s having fun with it, and there’s bits of pink fluff all over, much to my parents’ disgust!

Don’t worry, it’s not put me off, I intend to master the art of wet felting (and needle felting) – it just might take a while!

Well nothing exciting in the knitting. Well I say that, my design’s nearly charted out and nearly all knitted up, except I’ve no idea what edging I’ll do – I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. But it doesn’t look much different – just bigger. Same with my other stuff!

So here’s the spinning….

Bluefaced Leicester:

More Bluefaced Leicester:

Merino/Silk.

I’m particularly attached to the final one. It’s really goldy in real life, it’s really soft and squishy, and I love the way it just looks like gold rope. Having said that, I’m really, really attached to the other two too! Having said that, the top two are for possible sale. The bottom one isn’t as there’s only 62 yards.

I’d better go, I need to get this shawl done and charted.

PS. Cheers for all the lovely comments that you guys are always leaving me. I do try and answer them all!

I AM trying to keep up with the posting, honestly!

I’ll try and keep the writing to a minimum, because somehow, in the short space of time since I last updated, I have a gazillion photos to post again.

Here are my Monkeys, done in Bambino, in Inca colourway, which I absolutely adore. I love wearing these socks, and they match my pink and black trainers

I did the no purl version. I totally love them!

On a change of heart, I don’t like these socks below! I don’t like the yarn, it’s cotton and wool, and is really drapey and has no bounce. They are ok to wear but weren’t much fun to knit to be honest. I’m actually seeing if I can sell them on etsy or ebay – I’ll keep you updated! I’ve put a high price, and if noone buys them I’ll gradually bring the price down.

Here is some stealth knitting I started. I’m designing a pair of socks (as if you hadn’t guessed what it was!), they’re cabled, and I’m trying out my knitpick harmonies with them – they are going really nicely so far.

I’m doing them in Manyana, the merino/tencel sock yarn, in Cornflower.

More stealth knitting! This is the shawl I’m designing. You can see it a bit. I’m going to design the edge when I get to it. The silk is a dream to knit with, it’s (obviously) really soft and goes well on 3mm needles.

My next WIP, this is a sideways scarf in various colours of Mirasol Miski and Sulka. Again, these yarns are so dreamy and soft and hairy. I’m hoping it’ll be big enough to wear as a stole, but if not it’ll be a very snuggly scarf. It’s my TV knitting, which is why, given I rarely watch TV, it’s coming a long very slowly!

Ok, I enhanced my fibre stash a bit last week.

Firstly I got some beautiful fluff from Warratah Fibre Crafts – you’ll probably know her as Megan or Moggle. Here shop is here: http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6078723 but if you go buying make sure you leave some for me as I’d love some more next week! :p

I got Sugared Violet, which is BFL,

And Amethyst which is BFL and Shetland.

They’re both really lovely to spin, I really enjoyed myself with them, though I’m not sure my spinning skills (ha!) did them justice!  Those above photos are courtesy of Megan – thankyou Megan!

I got a bobbin from each hannk of fibre, so four bobbin fulls, two of each colour all together.

This is my first purple singles.

Here’s the first skein all plied. The second one is thinner, and is going in my shop (to fund more fibre!).

There are only 92 yards in that skein, but 162 in the second skein

I also got some from P&M Woolcraft, I ordered it a couple of weeks ago, and it came last week.

Undyed BFL:

Dyed BFL – they asked what colour and I put “pinks or blues, surprise me” – expecting solid pink or blue, and I got this beautiful lot!

And this is merino/soy silk. If you saw the purple and turquoise handspun I did, the purple singles were the same as this fibre. It’s beautiful, I can’t wait to spin it up!

I dyed the new yarns. Firstly Maya, which is a chunky baby alpaca, ridiculously soft and luxurious. I’m going to be designing something that only needs one skein, in the meantime, I’ll be dyeing some soon (need to order first!).

This is Zeus, which is a loosely plied Organic Merino (extra fine!) 4 ply weight. It’s really soft and smooth. Not machine washable, so ok for socks, but probably best for a small lace project (there are 400 yards per skein). Again, I’ll be ordering some soon.

This is Zeus’s big brother – Jupiter. It’s the aran version of the same organic extra fine merino. I’ll be designing for all the three new yarns – I’ve stashed these three skeins for myself to design with.

Oh these are yarns I already have, but I dyed them last week (I didn’t realise I had some skeins left undyed).

The almerino I’ve renamed Samba, because Rooster have an almerino already, and although it’s descriptive, I thought I should probably give it a more original name!

Kettle dyed, Sweetheart:

Kettle Dyed, Lucy:

kettle dyed, Cornflower:

So, I hope that wasn’t too long! A couple of things to put on etsy, then back to Darcy for some quality spinning time

I finished it! There are a couple of small mistakes, but hopefully you can’t see them!

I’m really pleased with this shawl. I don’t actually like green. Well I didn’t. I do now! It looks amazing when worn over a black top as it really shows off the stitches.

When I cast this off, it was really small. I mean it was about less than the length of two A4 pages (well, an A3 page). It really was very disappointing, and it was really frilly and straggly looking, to be honest I thought it looked awful.

Anyway, I soaked it and started pinning it out, and this thing just kept stretching. I can’t believe how much it’s grown – it’s about three times the size certainly more than double – it’s just a bit longer than my arm span.

I’m really happy with the yarn, which is my own Forte laceweight, it’s really soft and fine and has a good sheen. This baby was done on 2.5mm needles and I’m really happy with the guage, though it took about 2-3 hours to cast off! I’m a slow knitter at the best of times!

In actualy knitting hours, it didn’t take that long. In terms of months/weeks, it took a while because I was away for ten days halfway through.

Anyway, here’s my latest handspun as well. It’s a definite improvement on the last skein, and I love the way the merino is strangely smooth.

And finally, I’ve got a bunch of new yarns on the way – organic merino sport weight, which will be lovely for lace projects, organic merino aran – these two yarns are really soft, proper merino, if you know what I mean. Also I’ve got chunky (about aran weight) baby alpaca, which is unbelievably soft, it’s just so snuggly and I want to cuddle it all the time (being a saddo like that). And finally this below – it’s called Tikal, and it’s organic cotton and tencel sock yarn.

Anyway, I’ll leave it at that! I’m spinning up some beautiful, really beautiful fibre from Moggle/Megan, so that’ll be my next post!

See, I said I’d update more often didn’t I!

Here’s my next handspun. It’s definitely more even but still has some fluffy chunks. I spun two bobbins’ worth of singles, and plied them on Darcy this time, instead of on the spindle. Obviously it was much quicker, but the problems was that it took up three full bobbins to ply it all….

It’s Bluefaced Leicester, which is slightly rougher in fibre form than merino, you can definitely tell the difference. But it spins up nicely, and is soft enough to wear next to the skin.

Here’s one of the knots I had to tie, because I had no idea how to join it up I kept the knot quite small but it’s there alright! I’m going to see if I can work out how to join it up without knotting it, otherwise I’ll be making very small skeins for the forseeable future!

I was really naughty and bought some fibre from Megan yesterday – her shop is at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6078723 - that link. I didn’t intend to buy stuff, I was being nosey really, but her fibre was so beautiful it jumped into my basket. Luckily I sold a few skeins of yarn today, which kind of made up for it!

Ok, sorry the yarny post is waaaaay overdue, what with the venice post and that. So there’s absolutely loads, I’ve tried to section it. And I promise I will try and update far more often in future, the posts are small and manageable. Promise!

Well hopefully there should be a gellery full of photos below this. It should show a small selection of the yarn I dyed when I got back from holiday. It includes three different sock yarns – manyana (new name for the merino/tencel which I always thought was a mouthful!), BFL/Nylon sock, and bambino. There’s also the silk laceweight, and the alpaca/silk/cashmere laceweight.

They should hopefully appear above! Anyway, if they do, they should be enlargeable if you click on them!

Last week, Julie at knitting sold me her wheel. I’ve named him Darcy, and he’s wonderful! He’s an Ashford Traditional, and I’m really enjoying using him.

As you can see below, my spinning is really rubbish! The one below is merino/soy silk, it was lovely to spin and I love the colours, despite it’s fluff and chunky and overspun bits.

This one’s a bit better, it’s merino for the blue ply, and merino/silk for the purple ply. There’s about 64 yards here, it’s still really chunky and irregular, but an improvement.

I’ve spun a load more today, of undyed BFL fibre, and it’s so much more even than the previous two. My main problem is joining fibre to the leader, but I’m getting there. I’m going to finish it tonight and ply it tomorrow, I’ve not plied on my wheel yet so am going to try it. I’m worried though because my bobbin will only fit hald the amount I’ve spun on, so it means breaking it into two skeins and I don’t know how I would join them together if I wanted to – which I would like to ideally. I’ll have to find out and do some experimenting!

Anyway, Pixie, aka Denise put me to shame with her stunning spinning, which she’s very kindly sent me because I liked it so much:

Beautiful isn’t it! I’m going to do a small lace project with it.

So, talking of people sending me things, check this out:

It’s my swap parcel from the UK Swap group swap, from my pal, who I know is called Alicia, but I don’t know her Ravelry ID yet. She’s done absolutely amazingly, she got me stuff that is just perfect for me, and stuff that I wouldn’t have bought myself because I’ve not really come into contact with it before, if that makes sense.  She mentioned that in the process of buying for me, she developed a taste for the natural fibres that I’m so obsessed with, and I’m really pleased to have influenced her into these beautiful fibres   I have to do something to thank her, that’s for certain.

Among the stuff you can see some handmade, beaded stitch holders, knitpicks harmony DPNs, beautiful fabric, purple beads (already mostly used!), a thimble, a folder with patterns in, a handmade card, and of course the yarn!

Artesano 4 ply:

Mirasol Miski (already in use!):

Artesano Inca cloud:

Mmmmmmmmmmmalabrigo! -

Knitpicks laceweight:

More knitpicks laceweight:

Lamb’s Pride wool/mohair.

Seriously Alicia, I can’t thank you enough. You must have a big heart and you’ve clearly put such a lot of thought into getting stuff I would like. 

Enough gushing from me!

Here are my finished projects….

Forest Canopy from hols, done in Mirasol Miski (I should get shares in them!!):

It’s very heavy (500g), and very very warm. I think it may be a Christmas present for someone

And here is a simple scarf I did in two shades of Colinette Point 5, maroon and er, mulitcoloured. It’s actually a feather and fan pattern, making it not too dense and ridiculously warm. It mixes the stripes up more too. It’s not that long, so I put buttons on so that I can use it as a big snuggly cowl.

But here is a real cowl! It’s called the Snowstorm cowl, and is my first design of my own It’s nothing complicated, just a simple cable pattern. The garter edges make it ruffle, but you could do one with ribbed edges as well. It’s done in my own DK Almerino, in the Ocean View colour, which I really love.

Here’s my Monkey. This one’s now finished and I’m on the second one. I absolutely love the yarn with this pattern. It’s my own Bambino in Inca and I am so, so pleased with it! It’s so soft and has a good subtle shine, and I can’t wait to wear them! They are on the back burner a bit though because………….

……….. of my Laminaria! This has taken priority because I need to get it blocked before my parents are back from hols, otherwise there’ll be nowhere to block it (ie I can’t use the lounge).

It’s going well, though I’m stuck at the moment, and hoping someone on the AY forum will save my bacon. I’m just going onto the edge chart number 1.

And these are my plain knitting project, for TV knitting. Thing is, I haven’t turned the TV on at all in the three weeks I’ve been on my own – I’ve watched the sopranos when OH has been round, and that’s it. So they’re coming along very slowly! I did knit the cuff of the second one while we spent 2 hours driving the 5 miles of the illuminations last night (after fish n chips – yum!)!

And finally, my stealth knitting. The yarn’s my silk (Nirvana) laceweight, in Aztec colour, which I’m very happy with. The project is lace of some sort. I am knitting it up at the mo, but for part of it I’m going to decide what happens when I get there.

All going well, it will look good and be my first (successful) lace design.

And that’s all for now! I seriously will try and update more frequently from now on. Honestly!