This would have been my Yarn Along:
I'm reading The Sleeping Beauty by Mercedes Lackey. So far I'm enjoying it more than the previous book in the series. This is good. I'm knitting the February Lady cardigan. Yes, look at that bandwagon! I've jumped on!
I finished my other cardigan - well, minus buttons and button loops. I wasn't able to get pictures yesterday due to the rainy weather. And.. er.. the spinning.
This would have been my Crafting On post:
Yarn spun (shocking, I know!) from the Colonial top that I dyed recently. I'm thinking about using the green for a birthday gift for the Elf. And maybe offering the rainbow-esque as a giveaway or just sending it off as a surprise for someone.
B actually asked me to make something for him. This does not happen often (or at all, really). He wanted a sleeve for his new tablet. He picked the yarn from my stash and I crocheted it in two days (using a D hook on worsted yarn is stupid, stupid, stupid - but created the right kind of thick-and-cushy fabric he wanted). This picture, and the one before, are of just-washed things. So the colors are off.
This is what I did yesterday (in addition to washing the above):
A wonderful lady that I knit with on Fridays brought me a bag of alpaca to play with. She carded it on a drum carder and produced a very fluffy batt. I was too afraid to dye it that way. I didn't want it to fall apart or felt (any ideas on how to handle this in the future?). I did find a youtube video about using a diz to make roving out of it, so that's what I tried. It was still too fragile for my liking, so I skipped dyeing it. It was a little weird to spin - lots of curls and crimp and maybe some lanolin still in it. But once I got the hang of it.. wow! Fun! It was also my first time plying. And now, I love it! I'm not sure if I can bring myself to dye this lovely off-white/cream with bits of light brown yumminess, though.
Did I say that I fell in love with plying? Because.. I am totally in love with plying. This is what was left of my rainbow-esque Colonial. It looks better off the bobbin and I'll take pictures once I get it off the niddy noddy.
So yes! This is what I've been up to.
I am totally loving your addiction and want to get hooked too! How awesome are you with spinning and plying!
ReplyDeleteOh, I haven't forgotten the buttons, just wanting on a husband to be in town long enough to run the tile saw for me!
Well drats, that should say waiting on a husband, [was that a Freudian slip? :) ].
ReplyDeleteI love the excitement coming through about loving your spinning; I love it too and it makes me smile to see others have so much fun with it.
ReplyDeleteI've never dyed alpaca but would think it's easier to dye as raw fibre before carding or the resulting yarn because of the softnes and lightness to the carded fibre. Lovely as natural colours though.
I was just thinking of emailing you to see whether you had fallen into a hole. Ha! Sounds like you are having way too much fun... (your enthusiasm is contagious -- gorgeous yarn!)
ReplyDeletexo
enjoying all the lovely photos of your fiber! You just keep spinning that gorgeous wool because I like looking at it :)
ReplyDeleteVery pretty yarn!
ReplyDelete~Have a lovely day!