Fiber Friday: I finished the shawl

Remember the shawl I started a few weeks ago? I finished it a few weeks ago and blocked it this week.  What a lovely shawl it is,  if  I do say so myself.




Made with 300 plus lace weight yards of Alpaca/silk purchased at Alapcas of Wildcat Hollow in Eskridge, KS.  It was lovely to spin. I love, love, love the natural color.

WIP Wednesday: Another Shawl!

In 2010 I knit and crocheted 10 shawls. as a part of the 10 shawls in 2010 forum on Ravelry.  I had a blast doing too.  In 2011 I needed a break making shawls.  How many shawls does a gal need anyway?  I'm ready to make a few more.




Since I've finished up spinning the lovely Alpaca/Silk fiber I bought while at Yarn School last year.
415 yards of Lace Weight Yarn.




I decided I'd hook up another South Bay Shawlette by Lion Brand.  Out of character for me  I know but I'm not going to dye the yarn.  I want to let the natural color shine here and I could use a natural shawl.

It's Magic

Blocking is magic when you are making lace.

Before


After:


Close Up:


This is my Plume Shawl which I fondly call 7 0f 10 not 7 of 9. I wish I could call is 7 of 9 because that's the kind of geek I am. But I'm making 10 shawls this year and this is the 7th one. It's the 3rd one from my own handspun yarn. 560 plus yards of single ply and hand dyed with acid dyes. I am very pleased with it even though I had to frog back and adjust. I crocheted to the the last row of the edging and came up short. So I frogged back to the 2nd row of the pattern then started the lace pattern but only did 3 triple crochets. ch2 3 triple crochet for the the first edging row. I followed the pattern for the second row.

The Lasagna is in the Oven

So I thought I'd share the finished hat I made with the yarn I dyed a few weeks ago. At first I knit it way too long so it kind of flared and the cast off was all wrong too. Confused? It's a top down hat. I used Jeny's Amazingly Stretchy bind off but it was just too stretchy. So I frogged back a few rows and tried the knit two together through the back loop cast off and that also looked wrong. So finally I did a loose basic cast off.

Fail:

Also a bad photo. It was raining that day and lighting kind of sucked.

Ah much better....


And oddly last a work in progress photo to show the stitch.

Oh yes, I'm dyein' please believe me....

I started with this yarn here:

It's some of my bulky handspun. I actually dyed the fiber for this yarn some time last year. I kind of felted the fiber. So I carded the semi fielted fiber and spun it up.


(this photo is totally off in color)

I added the yarn to my dyeing Crockpot along with a few gluggs of vinegar. I squished it a bit to make sure the yarn was socking up the vinegar water. There's just enough water in the pot plus a little more to cover the yarn. After the water temp reached 140 deg F I added the dye. About 2 cups of water with one teaspoon of neon purple food coloring.

Here's how it looked soon after adding the dye liquor:

When It got to 180 deg F it cooked for about an hour or longer. I let the yarn coo off in the pot before rinsing it. I was very patient and waited for all the dye liquor to soak in. The water was clear when I removed the yarn. It bled very little dye when I rinsed it.

Ahhhh a natural light photo, so much better.



I like how the dye struck on the fluffy bits of yarn. It has kind of a heathered look to it. Stay tuned for future hat.

Chirp, Chirp, Chirp.....

I have lots of miscellaneous bits of handspun leftover from projects as well as the bits of unplied singles.



I decided to make some bookmarks inspired by the Birdie Decorations here

Shawls - Lots of them

I've been yarning lots of shawls. So many that I joined the 10 shawls in 2010 group on Ravelry. So my list of shawls to make keeps getting longer and longer.

Shawl One: Ultra Traveling Woman


Traveling Woman by Liz Abinante
Did extra repeats of the horseshoe pattern and could have done more. I had over an ounce of fiber left.
Ultra Alpaca Fine - Love the feel of the yarn but it's splitty. So I 'm not sure if I would buy it again.
US 6 needles




Shawl Two:


All Shawl by Doris Chan
Changed up the edging. I replaced the pineapple border to the shell stitch. I like this shawl but I'm not sure it's my color. They yarn is super soft.
Cascade Heritage Paints and Solid - Used up what was left from my Dreaming of Spring socks.
I/5.5 mm hook






Shawl Three: Red Wine Saroyan


Saroyan by Liz Abinante
I did a few extra pattern repeats in the middle section.
US 10 Needles
365 yards of Cascade 220

It's really soft and squishy but it's more like scarf in style so I don't know how much I will use it. I find I really like my triangular shawls as scarves as they stay on and looks pretty too.




Shawl Four: A nod to the gods shawl


Three-cornered Scarf by Ruth Hollowell in Intentional Spinner by Judith MacKenzie McCuin
US 8 but I wish I had used US 10
Used all but a small bit of my Wenslydale handspun single
I love how this turned out as the colors transition wonderfully.

The fiber before spinning:


Spun Fiber:




Shawl Five: In the Dark


198 Yards of Heaven Shawl by Christy Verity
I used more of a sport weight yarn than the worsted yarn called for in the pattern. Hence I used about 288 yards of my very own black merino handspun yarn. I also omitted the edging rows using some else's mods from Ravelry.
US 8 needles

The handspun yarn:


A bad photos of me wearing it for scale:


Five done and five more to go. I have one on the needles right now and the yarn for one more.

A recipe for handspun hat and mittens sort of...

A little bit of this fiber:

Windspun Fiber Shetland and mohair blend

and this one:

Shetland

Spin it up on the wheel you get this:




Then get it on the needles:


Then knit and knit and knit, round and round you go. I used the House Mittens Pattern from Charmed Knits. Then finally I get this:


Find more on my project page on Ravelry.

Hand Dyed and Spun Scarf

Lacy Baktus pattern, If you get your google on you should be able to find it online or a search on Ravelry. My handspun corriedale and hand dyed yarn about 3.6oz.

The yarn:

Neon green and neon purple 2 bottles each. Then overdyed green section with 1 iceblue koolaid and 2 of lemonade. Overdyed the purple with 2 grape I think. I'm not sure why I used so much dye with this. I'd like to try this again with less dye.

I really like how this turned out. I used too much dye as it's tuning my hands pink while I knit.

The yarn in it's undyed glory after being washed and whacked:

This is some of my first handspun yarn that I successfully plied, about 358 yards.

Hand Dyed and Hand Spun Mittens for Me!

Lowder Colours Farm Teeswater X

2 ounces - approx. 60 yards
I really like this fiber but the batch I got was either very compacted or somewhat felted because it was hard to draft. It still came out soft and would like to try it again.

Dyed with neon pink and neon blue fool coloring, 1 tsp of blue and 2 of the pink. I now wish I had done 1/2 tsp of each. I dyed it with another larger hank of yarn which turned out more purple, see below. This turned out cherry red, kinda like I use cherry kool aid.

Started with 6 cups water and a glug of vinegar in the bath with the yarn got up to 120 degrees then added yarn. Heat until 180 deg. for 30 minutes. Let cool down then rinsed.

Dyed with neon pink and neon blue fool coloring. 1 ts of blue and 2 of the pink. I now wish I had done 1/2 ts of each. I dyed it with another smaller hank of yarn, see above, which turned out more reddish (kind a like I use cherry kool aid) This one is more purple.

Started with 6 cups water and a glug of vinegar in the bath with the yarn got up to 120 degrees then added yarn.

Yay ! My very first pair of handspun and hand dyed mittens. All for me!

I used up every last bit of the yarn and a tiny bit from another skein in my stash. Since it was purple you can hardly tell. This yarn also turned my hands a bit pink but not quite as bad as the other yarn. It will be interesting when I wear them for a snow fight.

I did a twisted rib for the cuff. Used the pattern I found here. It’s also called a yarn over cable. The pattern is a multiple of 5 sts. I did 8 repeats so I cast on 40sts. Then followed Ann Buds basic mittens. My knit gauge was 6st/inch. I think I followed the pattern for 7st per inch.

Icelandic Kitty Bag

This gray Icelandic fiber:



Spun up into this yarn:

About 300 yards of fingering/sport yarn that is. I spun up about 150 yards of black Icelandic yarn as well.

Then I used just a part of that to make this Tapestry Crochet Kitty Bag.


Specs:
A Perrrrfectly Wonderful Tapestry Crochet Kitty Bag Pattern
D/3.25 mm Crochet Hook
About 2.5 oz of the yarn total.
I did a reverse crochet edging with the gray instead of carrying the yarn together as the pattern said because I love reverse single crochet. I still want to line the bag. When that's done it will hold my spinning tools.