Latest Bits

These are some shell and crystal stitch markers and a skein of beaded blue faced leicester yarn. Now I have yak to ply and skein up as well as silk to dye. This is fun!
Have a happy, busy day.

Latest Yarn

Emeralds & turquoise, violets & boysenberries, infused in black. Outrageous, playful, colorful, enigmatic. Vibrating life force in each and every feather.
Description: An ever so slightly heavier version of our silk thread. Still thread-like, just a step up from cobweb.
All measurements are approximate.
Content: 100% Silk
Weight: 3.5 oz / 99g
Length: 1,125 yds / 1,028m
Gauge: laceweight

The picture and above text comes from Blue Moon Fibres

I have been looking for the perfect yarn to do an Icarus shawl for about a year. I have bought one or two but for some reason they just didn't look right or feel right. I don't know, one of those funny annoying things. I am hoping, however, that this is it. Silk and plenty of it in a beautifully dramatic colourway and due to the bird like name - Rooky- rather appropriate I feel.

Finished project - Mobius collar

Christmas yarn leftovers.

This is a very chunky jacob plied with finer merino. It is incredibly warm but not really suitable for next to skin wear as the jacob is a bit coarse. Anyway, there was not enough left after Christmas gifts to make even a scarf but I don't like just leaving tiny skeins lying around, they just get in the way. So a mobius collar it is. I wear it when gardening or chopping wood as there are no ends to get untucked and trail in the way.

It is Love

Ebony circular 26" circular needles, size 4.5mm

Christmas is coming...hint, hint.
(Sometimes V reads my blog. It is worth try.)

You know you're a knitting fool when...

I watched Breakfast at Tiffany's today. And what caught my eye? Holly Go-lightly's fractured brilliance? The luminous script? The diamonds? George Peppard? (not really, but pretty eyes) The New York setting? Yes... all these things but what really made me sit up and take notice was Audrey Hepburns knitting technique.

Oh deary me...

My foot is hurting man!

Natural Jacob top, spun chunky

I haven't spun in any amount for such a long time and then I go and spin up about 250g of Jacob in one evening. Destined for a good wide scarf for Carol, I'll probably have enough over to make a Christmas present for somebody else as well. So spinning for about two hours and then plying it up takes a bit of doing and my poor ankle is not used to it anymore. We'll see how I am tomorrow, Church and dancing should shake a few of the knots out of the the old tendons there!

I had forgotten how soothing spinning is for me. Todd watched me work up an afternoon's spin, about 50 g of parrot acrylic in single lace weight and he made a comment along the lines of that it was so monotonous that I really would be happy working in a factory - well...yes. I have worked in a factory in the past and I enjoyed it very much actually. But there is more to it with spinning. There is the regularity, the rythm, the chance to make good or foul up with every turn of the wheel ( always a knife edge with me) and the wonderful fact that it occupys the hands and part of the mind, leaving the rest of the mind to sort things through without the rest of the thought processes getting in the way. I have never prayed with a rosary, but I should imagine the methods are similar. I pray a lot when I spin. That probably helps with the calming influence too I suppose.

Lily's cardi

This pic is of a cardigan that my mum knitted for Lily, Eden has one also , but that needed a wash almost immediately. I thought it was so cool I had to take a photo of it and boast...

Look what came in the Post!

Wow! Goodies. A poetry book, Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, obviously an American classic. Could it be the American equivalent of Under Milk Wood? There is Knit picks lace weight alpaca silk in a stunning colourway, and it has such a fab name too - Happy dance - in't that cute? A handmade bookmark and stich markers (which I would not have known how to use if it were not for Nicole's timely advice)

Just beautiful, thankyou so much Nicole.

Listen to this

Jonathan Swift Somers

After you have enriched your soul
To the highest point,
With books, thought, suffering, the understanding
of many personalities,
The power to interpret glances, silences,
The pauses in momentous transformations,
The genius of divination and prophecy;
So that youfeel able at times to hold the world
In the hollow of your hand;
Then, if, by the crowding of so many powers
Into the compass of your soul,
Your soul takes fire
And in the conflagration of your soul
The evil of the world is lighted up and made clear -
Be thankful if in that hour of supreme vision
Life does not fiddle

I think this book will be a pleasure, I'll go through it slowly, like a box of chocolates.

I have lost it

My knitting I mean. I put cobweb down somewhere and I cannot for the life of me remember what I did with it. Honestly, you turn your back to get your housework under control and the crafting projects go into a fit of the sulks and wander off! What's a girl to do?

I must,must, must finish cobweb before I have another attempt at icarus. I fried my poor tiny mind last time and what a waste of effort.

Still, I dare say cobweb will turn up somewhere where I am least expecting it. The airing cuboard or somewhere. Until then, well, there is always my beloved louet, waiting patiently in the corner, starting the first sweet notes of the fleece singer. Cuddly falkland, silky blue faced liecester and fluid humbug jacob. Hum along...spinning day anyone?

Icarus

Cast on!
Chart one,
here I come.
At last!

More Cobwebs

That cobweb made me think about the pic I took ages ago of my cobweb shawl that I am attempting from Victorian Lace Today. Here it is. I reckon a spider might live in it if I paid her enough and gave her a blanket to keep out the draughts from the random holes that are not actually in the pattern, but yet are there in my version.
Every other knitter I know would rip this back to the beginning, but I know enough about myself to know that if I ripped this little sucker back I can kiss the shawl goodbye as I would never have the heart to start again. So, it is my Persian flaw cobweb shawl. Reminding me (as if I were not already amply aware) that only God is perfect.

Icarus Update

And my Posh Yarn arrived this morning too. Off to the library tomorrow to enlarge the Icarus chart and then I'm off!

Huzzah!

Cobwebs Everywhere!

I will post a pic just as soon as I can. V has swanned off with the reader, I hate it when he does that.

Anyway, I have done - get this- 34 rows of a lace pattern. I saw a finished example of the Cobweb shawl from Victorian Lace Today over at the Daily Purl and as I could not be with the one I loved (Icarus) I thought that I could love the one I'm with and there we go.
[NB No, mine does not and will not look like the beauties you will see at Purl. But I don't expect them to - which is just as well really.]

And yes it is a very simple pattern so far ( I think it gets a little hairier as you go along) but the miles of purl and YO's are building my confidence that I might actually be able to accomplish this.

I am certain however, that any experienced knitter would weep in pain at seeing me knit. I am torturously slow and awkward. Can't hold the yarn properly, have difficulty getting a purled stich on the needle when I want to knit the darn thing. So I hope you understand what an achievement it is for me to get this far, let alone still be excited at the thought of continuing to work on it. It is the rubics cube all over again - I once gave myself open blisters trying to solve that thing, I worked on it all day and I still didn't do it. My mum eventually confiscated it but thats another story. She's not here now to rip the needles from my claw like grasp and I will get it done or die in the attempt *maniacal laugh*

Okay, back from the alternate reality now and I'm off to tackle the real thing (yes spider spun cobwebs) that are decorating the little room.

Have a successful day

The Plot Thickens

Off to Ponty today to pick up an ashford and a few drop spindles on loan for the Blaenavon Festival. There is an interactive session in the morningand the cast will be doing all sorts of things that their character might do as part of an everyday working life in Blaenavon in the 1840's. I will be doing a spinning demonstration and letting folks have a go themselves. I thought that I could make up a few spinning starter kits - a drop spindle, some carded wool and a leaflet and sell them for a couple of pounds.

The photo is of Blaenavon Iron Furnaces, heavily mentioned in Rape of the Fair Country.

It means that I have to get going with carding up the old shetland fleece that I've got in my stash but at least it will mean a huge free space in my wool cuboard. I might have a go at dying up some of the mixed white that I have as well to add for a bit of variety.
I do so love a project all planned out.

Also the new book that I ordered came today. What with my Icarus kit taking such an age to arrive - it's been a month now and still no sign - I thought that I would go surfing round some lace knitting blogs and saw a stunning example on The Daily Purl from the Victorian Lace Today. It looked so wonderful that I just succumbed to temptation straight away and scooted over amazon and Bob's yer uncle. And here it is...lovely, lovely stuff.

So off now for a quick cuppa and a long look at knitting art and who knows... maybe I'll have some stuff of my own to show soon. I'll have to get this festival out of the way first though. Tunnel vision has started to kick in!