20 Jan 2007

Drop spindle

Diane spinning with her drop spindle. Cool!

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posted by tangelled angel @ Saturday, January 20, 2007 0 comments

9 Jan 2007

One Year today!


It is a milestone.

It is a marking of the passage of time.

It was a year ago today that I stumbled into the blog world, taking ever decreasing faltering steps, and finding new ways to express myself, through my knitting, photo's and the web.


During that year I have had 356 comments, and since I started counting my traffic, I have had 7,928 visitors.


I started looking back to see how many items of knitting I had blogged about (there have been several unblogged items), and when I got to 7 Hats, 1 cafetiere cozy, 2 curly wurleys, 2 bags, 2 tea-cozy's, 1 winter muff, 4 scarves, 1 wrist warmers, 1 pair gloves, 2 facecloths, 1 pair socks, 1 pair fuzzy feet, 1 pair bootees, 2 pairs of baby socks, and 1 shackle cuff...... .......I stopped.

I had only reached April 06 at this stage, from January 06.

That's 29 items in 4 months.

Wow.

I must take some time to really go through and see what Ive done in the full year.


This year, I'm going to be a bit more selective in what I knit.


I'm going to knit for ME, that's my goal this year.


There are several patterns in the offing that I'm just dying to cast on for.

Some of them are larger items, like the Bridie cardigan from Anna Bell that I have swatched for and have sitting waiting for me to start with.
I probably should swatch for that again to make sure my tension is still the same.
(The pattern is not available at the moment on her site, but I have heard that it will be added at some stage soon.)
Some of them are smaller items, from books like Mason Dixon Knitting, Knit 2 Together, and many magazines that I have earmarked patterns as to do's.
Of course, there are always the baby knits, which I will be doing this year again....2 more coming up...and there are items also that I've wanted to knit for people that I will be doing, but I will be focusing on challenging myself a bit more.
If you look at the items I've listed above, they are almost all fast knits, almost instant gratification. I need to start something that I know I'm not going to get finished in a week, or less, that I know that I'll be a bit more challenged to commit myself to.
Of course, this will lead to more boring posts...like- look here's the start of a sleeve...a week later- look here's another part of a sleeve, or if I'm getting it- here's a complete sleeve!
I'm sure that I won't fall back on just having one item on the needles at the one time though, I probably will have that quick knit(s) ongoing at the same time.
Can't see one item only on the needles now, can you?!
Oh, can't forget that I've also learned to spin in that year, bought my spinning wheel and have sold some of my homespun on ebay!
Woohoo!
To celebrate, I'm now going to have a cup of rooibus cirtus tea, from Suki Tea and then tonight I'm going to join Holly at her knitting group. See a bit of the world!

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posted by tangelled angel @ Tuesday, January 09, 2007 7 comments

13 Dec 2006

Spin In

So Holly and I were invited to a spin in at our spinning teacher Juliet's house, where we would meet up with several other spinners, all there for the same purposes. We were supposed to bring along some food items, and I had great plans, which were foiled by my bf getting some urgent calls into work as we stepped foot inside my door after coming down from his place.
It takes 45 mins approx to get from his place to mine, so it meant a quick grab of spinning wheel and some fibre, and a stop in at a local shop for supplies.
Holly brought some great grub though, including a yummy cinnamony oaty apple dessert.



So, Juliet had asked us to have some single ply ready, in order to learn how to navajo ply.
I used some koolaid dyed galway cross, love these colours.
My spinning wheel is doing a great job of posing outside on my bf's balcony eh? vain thing.





Juliet showed us how to navajo ply almost as soon as we sat down and got ourselves comfy.

Mary in the meantime, showed us how to use long draw to spin.

I had tried this with Juliet when learning to spin, but I'm rather lacking in the hand-carder front, and these are needed in order to make the rolages which are used for the long draw, so I havent been able to practice this method since.




These spinning wheels are gorgeous, aren't they? Mary and Peter had been using them until the long draw teaching session.






Juliet had some fabulous silk blend roving that she was preparing to spin. The photos don't do the colours justice.There was a carding and rolage making factory going on here!



While a bit of handspindling was also going on











Holly tries out the navajo plying on my single ply, as there was a difference in thickness betweek both our spinning, mine was finer. I wasn't too sure that I liked the navajo ply to begin with, it was like learning to spin again, bulky and uneven, but I think that I was treadelling way too fast and this impacted on it big time. When I slowed down, I stopped treadelling and then remembered to treadle and went fast again. I got home that night and tried it again, and produced a nicer result and tried it again the next night, just using up ends on the bobbins. I'm a lot more confident with it now and it does give a nice finish.
I'll have to take a photo of the finished product and post it here again. Its like my first attempt at spinning, a bit all over the place. The pointy outy bits in the photo above are mine, not Holly's! She was very good at it.
Meanwhile, we have another photo of my elfy pointy hat, just cos I like it so much!
You can see the shaping at the top in this one, and the amount of yarn left over from the skein.


Before you ask, yes I have worn it, when and where I can, and yes people have stared at me.
Some people can be so rude, tee hee hee
;-00




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posted by tangelled angel @ Wednesday, December 13, 2006 2 comments

25 Nov 2006

Dublin in the rare ole times

Its been a busy week for me.

I've started a new job and I've also been mysteriously struck with Isobel's cold, even though I haven't seen her for a while. Hmm, do you think these things can be passed on over the internet?? So I haven't really be on form for blogging much.


I have been knitting though, but not a lot, haven't really felt like it much lately can you believe. I think a lot of it is due to starting new projects (despite trying to finish WIP's before doing this) and trying to get gadge several times and then giving up and moving onto something else. Not giving up exactly, just not having the patience to do it there and then.
There are also certain projects that my cats have a field day with, for example if I knit with straights they go mad for the end of the knitting needle, take it as a personal attack.

Looking all innocent cuddled up together


Its easier to knit with dpn's or circulars as a result, although I do confess to preferring knitting with dpns and circ's anyways.

I think the lack of knitting is also down to wanting to knit so many items at the moment, the list I have in my (forgetful) head is just getting longer and longer at the moment. Some of the items I'm wanting to knit are small quick items like Christmas decorations, and some are a little larger and some again are larger still. I recently became the proud owner of the Mason Dixon Knitting book and also Handknit Holidays and I think I want to knit almost every item in both of them (slight exaggeration going on there, can you tell?)

I have been doing a little bit of spinning though
I am very happy to be able to tell you that I have listed and sold a couple of my skeins on ebay recently! That'll go towards starting to pay off the credit card debt.....or maybe just the knitting related credit card debt even......what I'm I saying, its all knitting related practically!!


I have just started spinning a batch of the Blue faced Leicester fibre that I got from Jenny and Warren at Craftspun, and apart from the fact that I have to lock the cats out when I'm doing it,(they like it too) and the fact that its so fine that it leaves little particles all over my trousers, I'm really liking it. Its so much softer than the fibre I usually use which is lovely to work with, not that the other fibre isn't nice, its just different and a different experience to spin. Its similar in feel to merino but much easier to spin. I'm spinning it up in its raw colour and will then dye it I think. I'm going to ply the first batch together (I like plyed) but may try another batch and not ply it
Oh, what are these photo's all about? This is the River Liffey in all its glory. To the right you can see the Ha'Penny Bridge and the the left is O'Connell Bridge. Just thought they were nice sunny wintery pictures. Jim Bob up above there is one of the seagulls that frequent the boardwalk. His name isn't really Jim Bob, you know, I'm only kidding... ;-)

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posted by tangelled angel @ Saturday, November 25, 2006 3 comments

5 Nov 2006

Knitting and Stitching in Dublin city

I was stuck in work until 4.30 on Thursdayy and the other girls were living it up in the Knitting and Stitching Show in the RDS.
4.30 came and out the door I flew, battled the traffic across the city, got a very handy parking space around the corner from the RDS and then I was in.
Phew. Made it!
Met up with the knitty girls upstairs outside the Weavers Spinners and Dyers Guild (of which I am a member!) where Juliet my spinning teacher, was also giving a spinning wheel a test run.
First off was Cheryl's hair, which is lovely, second of all came the news that Sharon is moving to the other side of the world for a year! To New Zealand, land of the finest wool!
We caught up for a while, then came the slow process of trying to move towards the door, as Isobel had to get to dinner with friends, and Cheryl and Holly were on the way home, after being all day at the show with the guilds.

Holly's drool worthy yarn
Myself and Sharon stayed for a while, perusing the fine yarn at the show.
Then Sharon left me to the evils of my demon mind, telling me that I just HAD to buy this and HAD to buy that....and that all of it would be put to good use.
Okay, I did buy yarn, I admit it.
BUT all of it was towards an intended (victim) person.

Some of the yarn I bought, of which only the Rowan tapestry is actually for me,and no SP stuff here neither!

Okay, the blue faced leicester roving I got isn't actually classed as yarn...yet, but I had to have it. Demon mind.
I got yarn for my secret pal
I got yarn to make wristwarmers for my Dad, as he thought mine were a great invention and actually requested a pair!
I got yarn to make some items for some members of my family and of course I can't really say at the moment...
I got a couple of other items that are destined as presents also.
So there you go, more stash enhancement, but NO, they will all be used by chrimbo!!
Jenny and Warren from Craftspun didn't mind me stopping by for a chat and then coming back to have another drool over their yarn
Lisa from This is Knit was having a great time meeting up with all us bloggers also. Can you see the fantastic Clapotis hanging up? Lovely and soft, this was done by knit-wit herself who was too shy to get into the photo.



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posted by tangelled angel @ Sunday, November 05, 2006 3 comments

30 Oct 2006

Spinning like a mad woman

Its been quite a while since I posted about my spinning on this blog.
August to be precise. Can you believe that?

Its not that I havent been doing any, I have, just havent been posting.

This will rectify that!

If you remember, I posted about the Madder and Safflower dyed Galway Cross that I carded together, to get this lovely combination of colours.

This is what it looks like spun up



I love this combination.

I got great yardage from this lot, which was half of the original seperate colours that I dyed. Now I will have to card together the other half and spin that up too as the more I have of it the better!

This is one of the koolaid dyed Jacobs fleece that I spun


I took a part of the fleece that had a lot of the black in it and only a small amount of white, and carded it together so that it was blended together, then dyed it. I loved the way the colour turned out in it. unfortunately I only dyed a small amount of this so I only have the one skein of it, and I spun it so thinly that I used all of the roving in order to get a good yardage on it.


I think it really needs to be plyed with something, so I may have to see if I can dye up another lot of Jacobs to match it.

What else, well I have been doing a lot of trials and testing with other roving that I've either dyed, or using straight from the fleece after carding. As I'm still a leaner spinner, and dyer, all of this is good practice for me.

70/30 combination of Jacobs and Galway Cross dyed with koolaide


I certainly have a lot of fleece to be practicing with, and I want to get my hands on some blue faced leicester after seeing what Holly did with hers.

She is bringing it to the knitting and stitching show in the RDS and I'm a bit jealous of how good she is (hear that Holly?!).

I have a very small amount of blue faced leicester that I got on ebay one time, so I may have a go at that before making the decision to buy more as I have tons of fleece to spin with as it is! I know who can supply me with some also....which makes it even more tempting..yikes!

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posted by tangelled angel @ Monday, October 30, 2006 4 comments