I finished plying and setting the twist finally.
This is four ounces of BFL Superwash, approx. fingering/lace weight. I got approx. 340 yards.
I really love the colors and how it spun up. I’m not sure what it will be but I think it will be perfect for a baby jacket or hat and booties.
Posted in dyeing fiber
Some of these are BFL Superwash and a couple are Shetland. I love the new pastels.
Posted in dyeing fiber
This coming weekend (April 5th) is Open Studio Saturday at the Western Avenue Studios. Come and see the new gallery on the 2nd floor… and while you are there – stop by and see us in studio 306A. I should be there from noon until after 5pm.
I have some new hand-dyed rovings and some new hand-spun yarns available.
Posted in dyeing fiber, Knitting and Spinning
It so nice to see the results of a days labor. I love to see how the dyes look once all the fiber has dyed.
Posted in dyeing fiber
Happy Birthday Michelle!
Ya they look all innocent but they aren’t 🙂
Michelle learned to knit for her birthday – I expect we will be seeing lots of little fru-fru doggie coats in the future. hmmm – I wonder if there are patterns for Iquana sweaters – probably somewhere on line. LOL!
Everything I knit this weekend must be frogged – that is what you get for not paying attention. I did finish spinning and plying the Merino Cashmere from Spunky Eclectic (Dogwood colorway). It came out more brown than expected but still pretty. I need to set the ply and count the yardage.
I did get to the studio and did vast amounts of dyeing with Brian – but no pics yet.
UPDATE:
I got tickets for this years True Colors Tour in Boston – Cyndi Lauper, of course but the best surprise! The B-52s!!!!!
Although it’s been a busy week, and I have been knitting away, I got nothing to show for it yet. I have just been so tired for some reason. I cannot believe it’s just the hour we lost last Sunday with switching the clocks ahead for Daylight Savings Time. It is nice to come out of work with at least another hour or so of daylight to enjoy.
My current knitting projects include:
Swatching for the Veil of Isis Shawl. Finishing up the fingerless lace mitts, and starting the ‘other’ fingerless lace mitts that I hope to finish before Sunday’s birthday party. Harpy was right – the Orchid ones are definitely Memories yarn from Knitpicks and not the Artyarn as I previously stated – so much for lost tags. The “other” fingerless gloves are being knit from one of the STR sock club skeins from last year. It’s their silkie sock yarn and I don’t see the colorway up on their site. But is is very pretty, you will just have to trust me on that until I get pics of the completed project.
I finished and sent in my tax returns via e-filing on Monday. My refund was in my bank account on Thursday. NICE!
I am planning on spending the day Saturday at the studio doing some fiber dyeing. I have about 15 different colorways in my head (and written down) that I want to try. I might even try doing some pastel to medium color saturation too. I love the intense colors but I want to try to expand the repertoire so to speak. I’ve also been trying to move out of my color comfort zone semi-successfully this year. Using more earth tones and getting comfortable with the browns, oranges and golds. It’s still so easy to get sucked back into the purples, blues and greens that continue to call me like a sirens song.
This weekend there a lots of parties on the calendar, so tonight I am baking Irish Soda Bread to bring along. Traditional soda bread is rather tasteless and dry so I like to add the raisins (or currants) and caraway seeds to my recipe. I will not be adding green food coloring however. What is it with dyeing everything green for St. Patrick’s Day? Blech. Save your food coloring for the Ostera celebration and dyeing the eggs. Or even better wait until after the “Easter” holidays and buy the egg dyeing kits for .10 each and dye fiber with them.
I got an email from the Lowell Summer Music Series today too. So far they have an awesome lineup for Boarding House Park:
The Indigo Girls are coming back again. They were awesome last year. Some new faces this year; Taj Mahal, Robert Gray and Arlo Guthrie, just to name a few. I may have to by a season’s ticket this year. Stay tuned for more names to be announced.
I guess that was a little more than noth’n. Have a great weekend and be careful if you are out celebrating Saint Paddy’s Day.
Posted in dyeing fiber, Family and Friends, Knitting, Life
Cindy brought me a cone (2.2 lbs) of lovely ecru alpaca 3/10. We figured there is approx. 3600 yards of this soft creamy three-ply that is somewhere around fingering weight. Sure that is enough to knit a sweater… but I would die of heat stroke if I tried to wear an alpaca sweater. Besides this so wants needs to be a shawl (or two!). Which brings me to the decision part.
Which shawl? I have about 20 of them in my ravelry queue and at least 4 lace and shawl books at home. Right now I’m thinking either the Victorian Lace or the Golden Nugget . But then there are so many beautiful lace shawls in the Victorian Lace Shawl book and the Folk Shawl book and the list goes on and on.
I just had to swatch a little bit up last night and it’s just lovely. Whatever it turns into it’s going to be gorgeous.
I finished my Noro Socks – no fancy pattern just my plain vanilla sock pattern that fits nicely and shows off the colorway. I soaked them and they are now hanging up to dry. I sure hope they get softer with the wash. That is what everyone says. I’ll have to be careful they don’t end up in the washing machine, I am pretty sure they would felt and that would be a complete bummer.
Dye day this weekend! I cannot wait I have lots of stuff to dye. Keep your eye out for new stuff in the etsy shop soon.
Posted in dyeing fiber, Knitting and Spinning, Life
I know time flys, but I didn’t know it was a warp speed.
There just are not enough hours in the day to get the stuff done I want to get done. Of course having a nasty chest cold that causes your back to go out because of the hacking cough sure put the brakes on getting a lot of stuff done.
I was actually feeling pretty good for having made it to the first of the year with out a bad cold this season. But then I had a brain lapse and allowed the Teenager to invite a small group of friends over for New Year’s Eve. Ya right! The small group of friends turned into about 15 teenagers. I kept making rounds and checking them on a regular basis and all appeared fine. I would randomly smell the contents of soda cans and only found one that had to be dumped down the sink – no one fessed up to it being theirs.
But once they figured out there wasn’t much they were going to get by me they settled in, playing Guitar Hero and other video games.
Last week we had a great dye day, with Brian and his brother, and Christine. I didn’t get to take a lot of photos – since I had forgotten to charge my camera.
But I did get this one of Brian’s brilliant idea for dyeing self striping yarn. I think he used Martha Stewart’s pot lid organizer. What a cool idea.
Guess what else I did?
My sister, my niece and I took our annual trek to Webs for their end of year sale.
I got 40 balls of Laines Du Nord CashSilk in a camel color, 20 balls of Jaeger Matchmaker, natural color, 20 balls of Debbie Bliss Aran Merino Silk (natural colorway) and 2 skeins of the new Noro sock yarn.
Normally I don’t make new year resolutions, but I am going to finish a sweater for me sometime this year, and I also really want to spin and knit a shawl for myself.
Posted in dyeing fiber, Knitting and Spinning
Yes, I have just started a new etsy store with my sister. She is a weaver and dyer. I am the spinner and dyer of the rovings.
Come and check it out here.
Posted in dyeing fiber, Knitting and Spinning
What a blast we had, hanging out seeing friends that stopped by (hi Brian, Kali, and Abby!) It was so much fun and I cannot wait to do it again next Saturday. So if you didn’t get a chance to come by last weekend, definitely try to make this coming weekend. We will have more wine and munchies and my friend Alicia will be there selling some of her gorgeous jewelry too. And again, for the knitters enticement – it’s in the same building at the Classic Elite Hub Mill Store 🙂 But before you stop there, check out my hand-spun and some of the other fiber artists in the building. There is so much amazing stuff. I will also have some dyed rovings for spinning.
Unfortunately I have no photos because DD took my camera out of my purse and forgot to return it so no pics from this past weekend 😦
I just got some new colors in and I ordered some super-wash merino blended with tencel roving to dye so I will be doing some more dying this week and I promise to take pictures. I’m also spinning up a new colorway I dyed last week. I’m calling it Watermelon Tourmaline – just gorgeous!
I’ve also decided to do Fiber Dyeing Studio Timeshare/Classes. For $20 a day you can come and use the studio space to dye. You bring, your own fiber, dyes, crockpot and we’ll have the tables, sinks, and space to make the mess. If, you don’t have dyes, you can use mine for an additional materials fee of $15. If you don’t know how to dye – come and we will teach you. I use Washfast Acid Dyes, with vinegar then the dyes are set with heat, either in a crockpot or steamed.
Right now I have some space open for dyeing on Dec. 29th so if you are interested zip me off an email. – lchantler at gmail dot com.
I am also doing some custom color dyeing for needle felting – wait to you seen what I am working on now! I can’t tell because it’s a prezzy for my sister.
I am almost finished with the smoke ring. I’m finishing off the picot cast off now and will try to get that blocked this week too. Then I just have the other Lenore sock to finish and the Broad Street mittens to complete. There is a light at the end of the holiday knitting tunnel!
Brian got some of the colorway that I am also spinning up – check out what his done!
Tangled and Warped 