Madrona Rocks

Ahhhhh, Madrona! A feast of fiber and classes, spinning and friends. What a long weekend! Peggy and I went with Linda K and Sandi on Thursday, not for classes, just for shopping and visiting. We bought stuff. It was all good stuff, too.

From Heidi Parra of Artful Ewe
660 yards of fingering weight
Merino-Bamboo-Nylon

From Crown Mountain
16 ounces of Corriedale Pencil Roving

From Blue Moon
Socks That Rock medium weight
Nodding Violet

and 70% Merino 30% Kid Mohair
in white/gray/black
with pink and blue highlights

We went back on Saturday
for visiting and
The Blogger Lunch!

Left to right: Mossy Cottege ~ Ryan, Rose-Kim Knits ~ Jessica, Weebug Knits ~ Marti, Katie ~ who reads many blogs, Feral Knitter ~ Janine, Yin & Yarn ~ Denise, Spinning My Life Away ~ Vanessa (in from Florida), and standing in the back is Yarn Girls, They Do Get Wooly ~ Rebecca and Peggy.

Thanks to TMK for the photo!

Next year we're hoping to have an actual legitimate blogger meet and greet and will be needing a committee formed to plan the event. Maybe a lunch on Saturday...with signage or name tags...

Artful Ewe

Details

Fiber: Purchased from Artful Ewe in Kingston, WA last November, 2006. 50/50 superwash merino and alpaca, dyed by Heidi Parra with Mother MacKenzie's Miracle Dyes (non-toxic and environmentally friendly and available at Artful Ewe) and bonus: Heidi and Judith MacKenzie will be in Tacoma today and through Sunday for the Madrona Fiber Arts event at the Sheraton. They're sharing a booth in the Market. Come. Get some fiber and some dye!

16 0unces spun between December 15th and January 20th.

3 hanks for a total of 1250 yards at approximately 14 wpi, also known as sport weight. That's enough for a vest! I've never spun enough yarn for a whole vest before...this is cool! Or I could make a really big shawl, 'cause I need another shawl....

Waves in the Square Shawl

Details:

Pattern: Waves in the Square by Sivia Harding

Knitter: Peggy, between November 30th, 2006 and January 16th, 2007.

Yarn: 12 oz hand spun and hand dyed 100% merino yarn from Sandi Soreng.

Comments: I didn't knit the last 40 rows of the pattern because the shawl was big enough by then (pattern called for lace weight and I used sport weight) and I used the lace edging from the Field of Flowers Shawl by Evelyn A. Clark instead of the garter edging as written in this pattern. Including the lace edging kept the delicacy of the shawl going and the garter triangle inside the edging mimics the garter border down the fronts.

Photos taken outside the Snohomish Library in Snohomish, WA on January 20th, 2007 with an Exilim by Casio, a digital camera. It was late in the afternoon on a mostly cloudy day.

Fiber For Socks

8.2 oz of 66%Mohair/34% Merino

Spinning

Spun and plied but not yet washed

The rinse water was about this color
after the fiber was removed.

A 30 minute soak in hot water and Wool Mix*,
a no-rinse wool wash.
It actually is this much whiter.

Details:
Fiber purchased from Sarah Anderson's booth at the St. Distaff Day annual event, in Mountlake Terrace, WA., hosted by Area 2010 of the Northwest Regional Spinners Association on January 6th, 2007.

I spun it at what I hoped was fingering/sock weight and ended up with 18 wpi after washing, which plumped it up somewhat. 8.2 oz turned out to be 7.5 oz spun, a total of 470 yards plus a little sample hank. I finished spinning and washing on January 12th.

I will update later on the dying of this lovely yarn and the knitting of it into what I hope are socks (which is why I bought it) but could be a shawl (because I need another shawl.)

*Wool Mix, formerly available through local yarn stores from Baa Ba Joe. When Joe closed his business the stuff went on sale and Peggy and I bought as much as we could afford. It's a fab wool wash, not only for raw and just-spun fiber but for finished hand knit garments and socks. It's use for felting can't be beat. It's the only thing I've used for years and when my stash runs out I hope there will be another product on the market as good as this one.

s~NOOOOOOOOO~w!

Last night the weather forecast was for a "trace to 4 inches". I think we got that. Enough is enough. It's suppose to snow in the mountains. That's what they're for.

I've said it before: MAKE IT STOP!

Pre-dawn snowfall

Dawn and still snowing

Daylight and barely snowing

10:50 a.m. Snowing AGAIN

11:50 and still it snows

11:50 a.m. Snowing in the back yard

This is Seattle. This is sea level. Stop, already.

January 11, 2007

Daybreak. More snow. Oh yippy.

Pretty, isn't it? Please make it stop!

Another Swallowtail Shawl

Because I must do as Peggy does:

Getting started

Lifeline at point where Lilly of the Valley pattern

would begin if I knit as given in original

Pre-blocked but finished knitting

Blocking close-up of Lilly of the Valley
Blocking on towels

Indoor natural light
Finished and indoor with natural light
Finished and outside in natural cloudy light

Spinner/Knitter: Rebecca
Pattern: Swallowtail Shawl, design by Evelyn A. Clark
Source: Interweave Knits, Fall 2006
Fiber: Corriedale X, hand dyed by Baa Bette's Fleece
Source: The Bellwether, purchased March, 2006 at the Whidbey Island Weavers Guild Spin-In
Treatment: Spun in April, 2006 on my Betty Roberts Russian Olive wheel and then I chained the single and ended up with a fingering weight yarn, 667 total yards.
Shawl knitting began on Dec 26th, finished January 7th, 2007
Beads: #6 seed beads from Stash (Yes, I also have a bead stash. Your point?)
Finished measurements: 31" Neck to point, 64" tip to tip (32" each tip to neck)
Changes: I used a size 8 needle. Because I had enough yarn and didn't want a lot left over, plus I like a big shawl, I increased the first pattern by 5 more repeats, a total of 60 added stitches, 30 each side of the center marker. The next 2 patterns are ten stitch repeats and fit right in. The third pattern is a 6 stitch repeat so needed slight modifying at the beginning and end so that the repeats line up as they should ~ no big deal, really.
Notes: You may notice the radically different colors, photo to photo. It was impossible to maintain the actual color of the fiber, but the one that comes closest is the Finished inside with natural light.