Just a quick Friday post heading into the long weekend, because a couple of things are done, and I’m like a kid with a new drawing wanting to show everyone.
First, the final spinning tally for this year’s Tour de Fleece.
Backroad Hats
Some time ago, Michelle over at Widdershin Woolworks asked if I would test knit a new product for her. Michelle mostly dyes spinning fibre, but she was thinking of adding yarn to the shop, starting with a 100% Targhee worsted weight. Now, I don’t work a lot with variegated yarns, but I was happy to give it a go. After a few tries, I came up with a stitch pattern that I think looked good with her dyeing style, and tried it out as a hat. (You can see my full swatching notes here.)
The lazy Tour
The Tour de Fleece* has come around again, and I’m sort of participating, in a half-assed kind of way. There’s a lot going on Chez Cusser, including eleventy dozen shelves to finish and put up, a pile of designs to get out for the fall/winter season, and an ongoing search for ways to use the ridiculous amounts of fruit & veg I keep bringing home from the farmers market. (It’s as though I forget there are only two of us, and himself is not a huge consumer of produce. No matter how good and healthy it is, I cannot eat every fruit and vegetable produced within a 50 mile radius of this city, and I should probably stop trying.)
Given the general crush of things that need doing, and the fact that I’ve had enough stress in the last year without adding to it voluntarily, thank you, I’ve decided that this year will be the Tour de Slack. My sort-of-goal is to spin this Shetland top for a blanket.
Out the other side
It has been an interesting spring here in Cusserland, I can tell you. We had moving and injuries and illness and the sort of concatenation of crappiness that tests a person’s mettle and makes one profoundly aware of the difference that good, kind people can make when you’re neck-deep in it. Even knitting didn’t help. Things were dire, indeed.
Slowly, slowly, the storm waters are subsiding, and as they do, I realize that almost without me knowing it, my hands have been making things. In the occasional stolen moments — a few rows before bed, a couple of rounds in a waiting room — these projects have quietly progressed until this past weekend I knit the last stitches on three projects in as many days. Three! It felt like the sun coming out. It felt like an omen of good things to come. I may or may not have done a bit of a victory dance. What did I finish, you say? I’m so glad you asked.
Jazz, baby, jazz
Huzzah, hooray, I’ve got a new pattern out today, and since people really liked the pattern release sale for Firenze, I’m doing it again for this one.
The Jazz Age Mittens are inspired by the fabulous geometric designs of the Art Deco period.
Knit first, ask questions later…
…is the approach I went with for the next Christmas project, which is why there are two hats in this post. Always ask the parents, people. It’ll save you grief in the end.
A while back, a dear friend sent me some merino sliver, all the way from New Zealand, which spun up into a pretty, soft, red and pink yarn:
Now, I may not be a big fan of pink, but The Ever-Growing Niece loves it. Loooooooves it. Pink, pink, pink, the brighter the better. I knew who this yarn was going to. Continue reading
How can we learn if we don’t sometimes fail?
I’ve run into a problem.
My first handspun socks, the product of the Great Shetland Experiment, are experiencing severe structural failure. Barely past their first birthday, these beloved objects are wearing out, and quickly. I darn, I patch, I try to save, but as soon as I do, new holes appear. The same thing is happening with another, newer pair, too. Since I made these socks from the yarn up, I’ve only myself to blame, so I’d better figure out what went wrong. Continue reading
Blanxiety cure
Remember this?
It’s the blanket I started for my nephew, Galactus, Eater of Worlds. Well, I took Jacqui’s excellent advice and blocked it, and it still looked wrong. That pattern with a plainer yarn or that yarn with a plainer stitch — either would be lovely. That yarn and that stitch together were just too much fancy all in one place. Perfect for a shawl, maybe, or the bottom of a summer top, but for a baby blanket? No. I started again. Continue reading
Sastrugi, revisited
Some time ago, I designed a blanket as a wedding gift for my cousin. She lives in the frozen tundra of Edmonton, and I wanted the design to reflect that landscape. (Okay, it’s only frozen for half the year, but when it freezes, it doesn’t mess around.) I wanted something simple but elegant, in a neutral colour, that was lightweight (for shipping) but warm (because did I mention the winters up there?) I came up with an afghan in white Suri alpaca and blue alpaca/silk, with a broadly spaced cable pattern that looked like ripples in the snow.
E. Elliott Knits 