orange and blue

Not too much to report over here at Chez Crafty. I'm in the middle of cleaning and organizing my home office and studio. Even though I feel like I've gotten rid of a lot of stuff, or correctly filed stuff and have bags of paper to recycle, my space looks worse rather than better. Probably because I'm only half done. But good things have turned up. I found some great books I forgot about. I took my grandma's 1960's Singer 600 to get a turn up and to fix the thread tension, and I'm back in business today. I can finally sew button holes on ribbons for the bunny sweater and maybe for the tangled yoke sweater. We'll see how crazy I get.

And a bit of knitting going on:


I made some Fetching mittens out of my own handspun. I'm so smitten with them and proud as punch. Like I had a yarn baby or something.

And spinning!



Here is about 2 ounces of Romney wool from Fantom Farms - probably worsted weight.



Here is 3.7 ounces / 360 yards of Cormo wool from Foxhill Farm. Maybe socks? It's so squishy soft!

Birthday mittens for Mom to be revealed soon!
happy weekend all!

photo shoot - finally

There were a bunch of knitted goods all stacked up waiting for a sunny day and a photographer. I decided to settle for a photographer, an overcast day and a tripod, since it's supposed to snow yet again tomorrow. Anyway I bring you - finished knits!



Hooray! Finally finished the Tangled Yoke Cardigan. It kept getting bumped in line for Christmas knitting and store samples, but I managed to finish it up over New Years.






Pattern: Tangled yoke cardigan in Fall Interweave Knits by Eunny Jang
Yarn: Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool - 7 skeins of color #114
Needles: 3's and 4's
Mods: I made the body about 1 inch longer.
Notes: I think this pattern is a great combination of interesting knitting and elegant design. I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out, although it seemed to take FOREVER to knit the cable because you add so many many stitches. I'm curious to see how the silky wool will hold up. I'm hoping it keeps its shape - so far so good.



The noro striped scarf is done! Still needs to be blocked though.
Pattern: BrooklynTweed noro scarf
Yarn: Silk Garden Lite - 4 skeins, 3 colorways
Needles: 5's
I cast on 40 stitches for a longer and skinnier scarf. It's about 5" wide unstretched and about 7 1/2' long.



Elliott also scored a Karma Cap for Christmas. He picked out the yarn himself!
Pattern: Karma Cap from www.smariek.blogspot.com
Yarn: Malabrigo worsted in burgundy, one skein
Size: Large
Needles: 7's
Mods: changed top decreases like Brooklyn Tweed
brooklyntweed.blogspot.com/2007/10/cap-karma.html



He's also sporting a scarf I knit him for Christmas a few years ago.
Pattern: here and there cables scarf from Scarf Style
Yarn: Renyolds Odyssey - 8 balls - can't remember what colorway
Mods: Didn't change a thing.

I got some spinning for show for next time and some pretty fiber I got with my Christmas money.
wheeee!

odds and ends for $20

Hey peeps!
I have a finished tangled yoke sweater to show, but unfortunately my photographer is sick. As soon as mr. e recovers, I'll post some photos. Until then, you'll have to make do with the following odds and ends:



I've had a small pile of Noro Silk Garden Lite laying around just waiting to be turned into one of those cool stripey scarves and over the holidays I cast on and stuck it in my knitting bag. It's essentially my vacation knitting, it's so mindless and wonderful to see what color combinations randomly happen. The noro colorways are brillant as usual and I'm excited to wear this one. I'm making a skinnier version that I can wrap around my neck a couple of times for more color action.



On the car ride to Michigan, I whipped out this simple seed stitch scarf out of my first batch of handspun. It's pretty lumpy bumpy but it was fun to knit with yarn I made myself!



I've also been doing a bit of spinning - this is Spunky Eclectic's wool blend in the vineyard colorway.



And this is what's on the wheel currently - cormo wool from Foxhill Farms. So nice to spin!



I'll leave you with a shot of the birds. We had Pedro the conure and ms.b the parakeet staying with us over the holidays. We've never had all three parrots together and pretty quickly it became clear that Pedro and ms.b had a little summer camp romance going on. Syd was clueless about the whole thing. Unfortunately Pedro returned home and ms.b is a bit sad to have lost her man.