A Holiday Wreath

I've been obsessed with knitting itty bitty holiday ornaments to decorate a holiday wreath. Faith's blog and seeing her super cute sock advent garland was all the inspiration I needed to get started working on my ornaments. Aside from feeling that I was knitting with toothpicks and feeling like I was all thumbs while knitting them, they really were pretty quick and easy.

I added some holly berries and a few clever ornaments that I purchased at Shadyside Farms and voila! A knitting themed holiday wreath that will decorate our home for years to come.

Amelia

So where have I been? Working on the never ending Amelia sweater. Other than a sock or two this has been my main project over the past few months. The twisted rib pattern in this sweater almost made me think of quitting mid sweater. But then I thought maybe a pointier needle would help. So I ordered a size 7 Knitpicks Option circular needled thinking the pointier needle would help with the twisted stitches. The needles did make knitting this sweater more bearable and helped me get through it. I'm happy with the way it turned out and think it's my favorite sweater so far. Just in time for this cooler autumn weather.



Some modifications I made were not knitting the waistband and doing only 1 inch of garter on the sleeve cuffs.

What's next? I've also been working on my first toe up sock. Well the first one where I've actually finished one sock that is. Hopefully I'll have some pics to show you soon.

A Festival of Fiber

Tim, Logan and I attended the Michigan Fiber Festival yesterday. My plan for the fiber fest is arrive early to avoid the crowds. This year I think everyone had the same idea because of the heat and humidity. Needless to say the barns were crowded with lots of fiber enthusiasts looking for deals and inspiration.

My first purchase was some Falkland wool top from Winterhaven Fiber Farm. Logan picked out the color for a new winter hat.

Next Logan spotted some Opal Harry Potter yarn. I thought I would knit some socks for him, but he has other plans and wants me to knit him a Hedwig.

Next I came across some washed wool Romney fleece from 3 L&S Farms in lots of beautiful colors. I decided that the silver gray was beautiful. I love wool still in the lock formation but not the washing part. I can't wait to play with this wool on my new wool combs.



Logan's favorite part of the festival was the barn with the rabbits. He got to pet one and decided he wanted to take it home. No, that didn't happen. I did get a picture of a gal combing the rabbit. At first I couldn't tell if there was a rabbit in there or if she was combing a ball of fur :)


The last purchase was some buffalo blended fiber batts which I've already started spinning and half is done. Not as soft as I would have expected but it should make a nice, warm winter hat when finished.


It was great to see some fellow Ravelers there too. Amy (Asemumma), KaRi (CoggieTM), Deborah (Wasunwinning), Trish (BammerKT), Tim (Teejtc) and Bethany (BethanyG). Wished I would have taken more pics at the festival, but my camera was buried underneath all this fiber. I can't wait until next year when I hope my hubby may be a vendor and we can stay all weekend :)

Campfire Socks

Camping brings back great childhood memories. My family always camped every summer. Sometimes we took longer trips like to Yellowstone Park and then other times shorter trips to Mackinaw or Higgins Lake. Now we've carried on the camping tradition with our kids.

Our most recent trip was to a campground where the kid's favorite thing was the big jumping pillow. They jumped all day. Tim and I tried it but it was very disorienting and not like a trampoline at all. Oh well, the kids had fun on it anyway.

I think my favorite part of camping is the campfire. The kids try to roast their marshmallows to perfection but usually end up starting them on fire. I started these socks on a recent camping trip and a good part of them was knit by the campfire. The pattern is the garter rib socks from the Sensational Knitted Socks book.

While our camping is done for this summer, the sock knitting continues. The next pattern I'm gearing up for is the Glynis socks from Cookie A.'s Sock Innovations book. The cool part is I actually know someone with that unusual name.

Ooooo Shiny

I've kind of lost my knitting inspiration lately. Not sure if it's just the busy summer, hot temps or what so there's not much progress to show on the knitting front. Luckily the spinning has been going well and I've just finished spinning up a merino tencel blend from Susan's Spinning Bunny.


I love the way it's so shiny and smooth -- perfect for summer spinning and knitting. I spun this into my first 3 ply sock yarn. I've Navajo plied before but never did a true 3 ply. I've heard that a 3 ply makes a really strong and long wearing sock yarn. We shall see. Hmmm, now to pick the perfect sock pattern -- any ideas?

Adventures In Wool Washing

So the last time I purchased a raw fleece and the difficulty began, I swore I would never get a raw fleece again. It's kind of like childbirth, it's painful during the delivery, but once you see that sweet little baby face, you forget all about the pain. Processing a raw fleece is kinda like that.

The fleece is a beautiful, crimpy Cormo fleece.



Little did I know how greasy and dirty this fleece would be. I purchased some special wool scour just for scouring raw fleece and it just didn't cut the grease. Two washes and several rinses later and the fleece was still sticky from the grease and still dirty. Yup, I even used original Dawn for multiple washings adding almost boiling water, all without success.

Then I heard the host of the Manic Purl Podcast talk about using Tide Free to clean a fleece. No fragrances, no dyes, no phosphates -- I had to give it a try.





Wow what a difference! My fleece went from a dingy light brown to perfectly white. See that yucky water. To think that all that was in the wool. And the grease? Completely gone. It still took a couple of washings and lots of rinses to fully get the fleece clean.

Here's the result after flicking.



Ahh, nice white, flicked locks, ready for spinning. Yeah, it almost makes me forget about the pain.

So the birthday madness around here has settled down now. Three birthdays in one week is crazy but fun. Here's the awesome camera my hubby and boys got me for the big day.



I love how easy and complex it is and that it can fit in my purse. It's even going to get it's own knitted Malabrigo sock cozy to protect it.

I'll probably go crazy for awhile with posting lots of pics. This was taken with the foliage setting.




I think it will probably take me until my next birthday to figure out all of the cool features. Thank you Tim and boys -- I love it :)

The Little Boy Who Loved Hand Knit Socks

My little guy loves hand knit socks. I knit his first pair a few years back and they have been well loved, worn beyond their prime and outgrown months ago. He would wear them even when the heel flap stuck out on the bottom of the foot because they were too small now.

My oldest son doesn't care for hand knit socks thinking Lorna's Laces sock yarn wasn't soft enough -- seriously! So I frogged his pair and re knit them for my little guy in the camouflage colorway. I couldn't let that $20 sock yarn go to waste!




And so the socks will be well loved, worn lots and outgrown soon :)

The Never Ending Socks

Do you ever have a project where you don't seem to make any progress and it seems to last forever? This was that project for me -- the Eleanor Socks. The pattern was easy enough and I love the kettle dyed effect of the handspun yarn, yet I just wasn't feelin' it. Well they are done now and I am super happy with them and equally happy that I can now cast on a new project!

Easter Eggs and Wool

The little guy and I decided to dye up some Easter eggs this weekend. So, with an egg dyeing kit, some vinegar, a dozen eggs and an eager little boy, we dyed up some very colorful eggs.

When we were finished, I thought, why let all that dye go to waste? I brought out some superwash merino I dyed up awhile back that I thought was pretty boring.

After soaking it in some water for awhile, I mixed a few of the colors together to get a purple and then used the green and blue as they were in the kit. My favorite dyeing method is using an old roasting pan and laying the wet fiber in the pan. Then I just poured the dye on the roving.

Cover and bake at 325 degrees for 20 minutes and voila, some very colorful fiber.

Mystery Solved and a New Sweater

The mystery socks are now solved! I was able to carefully remove the i-cord bind off on the sock and then do a 2X2 ribbing instead. I even like how the ribbing lines up with the cables -- how lucky! What I later learned from a Ravelry forum is that when you do an i-cord bind off you shouldn't snug up the stitches when you return to the beginning of each row. If you're doing i-cord for say a bag handle then you do want to snug up the stitches. Good to know for next time -- lesson learned.



I recently started spinning and knitting for a new sweater, Mr. Greenjeans. I spin a little and then knit a little, to help keep me from getting bored. I've just spun up about half of the pound of merino I dyed and I'm starting the cable and rib bottom portion of the sweater. This is going quick. I love the one piece construction (no seams) and the fact that I can try it on as I go.



Today was a rainy, snowy mess. The kids and I decided to go to what we call the "big library". It seems like everyone else in town decided to do that too as it was packed! I browsed through some knitting books but didn't really see anything super interesting that I already hadn't checked out before. But I do have the book Spinning and Weaving with Wool on hold at the other branch of the library. It's a book that was recently reviewed by Meghan on the Stitch It podcast and peaked my interest. Lots of DIY stuff in this book and you know I'm a DIY kind of gal.

New Blog, Same Me

Due to some technical difficulties, my old blog is no more :( Glad you found me here, while I get used to the Blogger interface.

So Clue 4 (the final clue) of the Mystery Sock came out and I really enjoyed knitting the sock up until now. It's pretty enough and was interesting, but after knitting clue 4 it won't go over my heel -- uggghh! That darned I-cord edging is the problem -- not enough give and stretch. One option would be to knit the I-cord on a larger needle, but I think I'm going to work just a 2X2 rib and play it safe.


So I'm off to frog the edging, try to pick up all of the stitches and reknit the edge. Maybe a glass of wine is in order first.