I Knew I Was Having a Slow Year….

Posted on August 11, 2015 by Rayna

I really had no idea how little I had accomplished from a crafting standpoint until, on a whim, I looked at my FOs for the year.

Considering I have, for the past several years, completed in the neighbourhood of 25 knitted projects over the span of the year, I’d say calling this one slow is a massive understatement.

I have, to date in 2015, completed exactly five projects. This is unheard of. I should be at a minimum of 14 by now, if I were on track for a “usual” year. And in fact, two of these five are not even officially in the FO list because they have not been blocked and photographed.

Now, in my defence, there are other things I have been doing from a creative point of view.

I am in the midst of a sooper seekrit project that I cannot talk about for another while yet.

I have taken up hand dyeing and have dyed up about 20 skeins (plus a single braid of fibre) this summer…plus I have more undyed yarn winging its way to me as we speak.

I have done some spinning (although no plying and as such have also added almost no spinning FOs to my list, either!). This is a lovely indigodragonfly braid I started for Tour de Fleece (don’t even get me started on how badly I did in keeping up with TdF this year! Downright embarrassing…)

I took a sewing class, although, if I am honest I haven’t done a whole lot of that either.

And I sure as heck haven’t been blogging!

I wonder where my year has gone….? Looks like I am going to have to get a severe case of finish-itis if I am going to make any progress this year at all.

The other option, I suppose, is to stop forcing it and just craft when I feel like it. That’s a valid lifestyle choice, right?

Exciting Times!

Posted on August 18, 2014 by Rayna

These past few months, my creative brain has been in overdrive. I credit some of that to hanging out with the multi-talented Shireen. Spend a few evenings creating new things with her, and you start dreaming of what else you can accomplish.

In the past twelve months, just from a fibre standpoint, I have dyed some of my own yarn and fibre. We started off with just experimenting with fabric dye, but since then I have played with acid dyes and have created some spin-able and knit-able pieces. And I sincerely doubt I am done yet.

I have picked up spinning again and gotten surprisingly good at it, if my spinning teacher, Leslie is to be believed (and I believe she is). In fact, she even thinks a couple of my skeins from Tour de Fleece should be entered in competition. Took a while for my ego to come down off that one, let me tell you!

I have gotten a loom and done a limited amount of weaving. That is the activity that logistically is hardest to do just anywhere due to the need for a prop for the loom, so it tends to get ignored when I am deciding what craft to pursue in the evenings.

I have also self-published my first sock pattern. Admittedly, it started out as a tool to help Shireen knit her own socks, but it was still a fun exercise and it encouraged me to keep going and create more designs.

All this is in addition to the (obviously decreased) knitting that I have been doing. Since both of my parents have jumped on the “we love hand knit socks” bandwagon, and my husband has also decided that hand knit socks are something he was missing out on, socks have been practically the only things I have actually been working on. In fact, I just finished my first pair for hubby and he loves them! (More on that and my second pattern release soon!)

I have had several other patterns floating around in my head, based on somewhat of a theme; two of those have made it onto needles and one of those two is a bit behind schedule, but picking up again now. I am enthused about that one for a number of reasons, none of which I can really talk about at the moment.

All that being said, changes are coming, and I won’t lie; I am pretty excited about them!

Is it just me….?

Posted on August 5, 2014 by Rayna

Or does summer crafting just seem to go a lot more slowly?

Admittedly, this summer in Toronto is uncharacteristically cool…but I still can’t seem to find the energy to do much in the way of, well, anything, to be perfectly honest.

I have been doing bits and pieces of a scarf for my mom, and last week I cast on a hat in MadTosh Vintage for a colleague at work. He has proven himself knit-worthy by wearing (and gushing repeatedly over) a cowl I made him last year.

Watch Cap in Madeline Tosh Vintage in “Baltic”

I did put a new braid of fibre on my wheel – a braid of SweetGeorgia BFL in my favourite of her colourways, “Stormchaser”. (I also have this colourway on Tough Love Sock which I will eventually get to.) I am alternating this with a bobbin of the Humpspun that I started during Tour de Fleece, and my spinning progress seems to be much slower. That is to say, it seems to take a LOT longer to get through a braid. This might be a symptom of finer spinning.

“Stormchaser” BFL

In any case, I am not even through the “fractal” half of the braid yet. But I love the colour so much that I don’t care how long it takes. I want this on every base!

So even though this looks like I am doing a lot, I am really not. My heart’s not really in it and when I am too warm, my energy is just tapped out.

Maybe this boredom is what’s feeding my start-itis that I am fighting, quite valiantly, I might add. Something to consider. What do you do when summer is here or your mojo is just plain out of whack?

Tour de Fleece 2014 Draws To A Close

Posted on July 28, 2014 by Rayna

I have officially completed my first Tour de Fleece.

I am pretty happy with how it went, overall. I didn’t spin as much as I had hoped. Actually that’s not true. I spun more than I thought I would at the start, but after finishing a whole braid in my first 8 days, I had thought I’d get more done.

However, it seems that spinning progress got a lot slower in the second half. Maybe because I spun less, time-wise…maybe because the fibre was different and it just took me longer. I am still not sure.

In any case, I turned a 115 gram braid of merino bamboo into 300 yards of gorgeous yarn,

Colourway: “Cast On Couch”

and a 62 gram braid of merino cashmere into 230 yards of delightful squooshy-ness,

Colourway: Flamingoes Are Not Munitions Experts"

Colourway: “Flamingos Are Not Munitions Experts”

and I made some headway into a third braid of camel/silk.

Colourway: “I Am A Drinker With A Spinning Problem”

I spun indigodragonfly only…being their team captain and all. The only untouched indigodragonfly fibre I have left is some merino/seacell…but I have 300 grams of that so I am keeping that until I figure out what I want that to become.

I will keep on keeping on with the Humpspun…and maybe alternate that bobbin with some other fibre that has been languishing in my stash. I am looking to learn some woolen techniques and I may have to break into some batts for that.

Tour de Fleece: Rest Day 1

Posted on July 15, 2014 by Rayna

It popped up on my calendar today that this is the first of the two Tour “rest days”. We don’t spin our wheels when the riders don’t, so to speak. I had not planned to actually take a day off today, but I think I will because I am getting some aches and pains in my right hand. Considering how much time I have spent at my wheel these past 10 days, I suppose that should not be surprising.

My current project is another indigodragonfly fibre. This one is a camel/silk blend, creatively named Humpspun, in a colourway named, “I Am A Drinker With A Spinning Problem”.

Humpspun Fibre

This name might be more a propos than I care to admit. This yarn, when finished, is going to be a great many things. It’s going to be ultra-soft, and very warm. It’s also going to be very pretty, with some blue-green silky bits strewn in amongst natural/beige coloured camel fibres.

Know what it’s not going to be? EVEN.

I have been spinning this fibre for a few nights and my relatively inexperienced hands just cannot get the hang of drafting this. At. All.

Single Progress after 3rd day

I am fairly certain this single runs the gamut from laceweight to worsted, depending on where you look. I am not sure if this is just a “harder” fibre to spin, or if it’s different from the usual merino or BFL blends I am accustomed to. But in any case, I suspect this is going to take the rest of the Tour to spin because I am spinning way more slowly than with the PandaBaa and I can’t spin as long because my hands hurt.

I am still loving working on it though, now that I have decided to let it be what it wants to be, and I think the yarn is going to be lovely and original when I am done.

Which is to say, “lovely and original” sounded much nicer than saying “it will look like it was spun by an untrained four year old who drafted with her left foot”.

Spinning FO: Indigodragonfly PandaBaa

Posted on July 14, 2014 by Rayna

Two years ago, I started Tour de Fleece, armed with nothing more than a few braids of fibre and my Houndesign spindle. I got about 9 days in, and a few things came up, and that, as they say, was that.

Two years later, with my trusty Lenrdum wheel, I decided to give it another go, and while I was at it, I thought I’d head up the indigodragonfly TdF team. I had a single braid of PandaBaa (merino/bamboo) and if I managed to finish that one, I figured, I had another couple I could work on. Truthfully, I was not really expecting that to happen, but a girl can hope.

PandaBaa in “Cast-On Couch”

I had not at all figured on the addiction-inducing properties of this fibre. So soft, so lustrous and it, as I have said before, drafts like butter. I had half the braid done in the first weekend, and then spun the other half over the next four days. Plying always takes longer than I think it will (this is in no way aided by the fact that I have had to ply my last two skeins twice) so I saved it for a peaceful Sunday morning activity.

Finished Single

There’s a saying…”Man Plans. God Laughs.” I am guessing he had a mighty chuckle at me yesterday morning.

After the recent success of plying from both ends of a centre-pull ball, that seemed like the most reasonable way to go. I wound the single off the bobbin and settled in, not knowing the horror that awaited me.

Ready To Ply!

This time, something went horribly awry, and even now I can’t say what exactly. The strands doubled back on themselves and each other. They got twisted and tangled, and the strands were almost sticky….keeping them apart proved to be impossible and in one case, no matter how hard I tried, scissors were required. The air was positively blue from the language that erupted as I’d untangle one bit, only to hit two more.

The only thing we could see that would work would be to have the ball spin so that the strand on the outside never had a chance to wind itself around the middle one. My darling husband was good enough to hold the ball, slowly turning it to keep the strands apart while I plied. (As I write this, he is busily trying to invent/MacGyver something to help me with this in future. If he fails this will NOT be a method I am idiotic enough to try again. Fool me once….)

90 or so minutes later, the yarn was plied, but I could see, like last time, that it was too loose for me to be happy with. So after some coffee and pancakes (yes, I was also stupid enough to try this un-caffeinated) I settled in with the plied bobbin and ran it through the wheel again. I mutter as I do this, but I have to say, for the second time now, the second pass made all the difference in the world. Actually, since the last skein had already alerted me to the fact that I ply loosely, I suspect that this one would have been tight enough the first time if not for the unanticipated snags I hit, as the closer I got to the end, the more nicely plied the yarn was already.

In the end…just barely shy of 300 yards. It looks like fingering weight but might be sport – I haven’t had a chance to do a WPI test on it yet. But no matter what, I absolutely love it. So soft and squishy and such lovely colour. I am seriously contemplating using it to warp my loom and then wefting with just a plain natural colour lace or fingering weight to keep the colours from being obscured.

And now back to the Humpspun I started last week.

Tour de Fleece Progress

Posted on July 8, 2014 by Rayna

Tour de Fleece after Day 3. Five eights of the braid done. At this rate, I'll be starting a new braid by the weekend!

Tour de Fleece after Day 3. Five eighths of this indigodragonfly braid done. At this rate, I’ll be starting a new braid by the weekend!

The Tour de Fleece is underway!

Posted on July 5, 2014 by Rayna

My indigodragonfly PandaBaa is all ready to go! Come join us!

Let’s get spinning!

Canada Day Weekend FO: Spinning Edition

Posted on July 3, 2014 by Rayna

Some evenings, spinning is a lovely, relaxing way to wind down after a long day. Since I picked it up again in May, I have been finding knitting time dwindling and spinning time increasing…which is a bit of a problem since really, I am just creating more yarn. But I digress.

Since May, I have spun up three separate braids, and this one is the first that I would consider luxury, ie that is something other than straight merino or BFL. This braid of 80% BFL and 20% silk from Friends in Fibre has been calling to me with its lovely blues and purples for a while now, and I thought it was time to spin up something truly yummy.

Friends In Fiber BFL/Silk in “Blue Moon”

After watching Felicia Lo’s Craftsy class called “Spinning Dyed Fibres” and discovering that the braid had lovely long runs of colour, I decided on a fractal spin. This is a process whereby you split the braid lengthwise down the middle, and then spin one half as is to get the afore mentioned long stretches of single colour. The other half is then split lengthwise as many times as possible and spun up one after the other. This creates shorter runs of colour, and then the two are plied together. Real results are only visible once the piece is knit up and I haven’t gotten that far yet.

After plying on Saturday, I Tweeted this picture:

First run at plying

One of my followers, an avid spinner, commented that it was pretty and I asked her if perhaps the plying was too loose. I have a tendency to overspin my singles with the knowledge that the plying will take some of it away, but it seems I am a bit overcautious with the plying. “Fluffykira” kindly suggested that I run it back through the wheel – something I wasn’t actually sure I could do – if I felt it wasn’t plied tightly enough. She assured me it would be fine and that I could just soak it again afterwards and all would be well! I can’t say how grateful I am to her. After 45 minutes or so, and an episode of Battlestar Galactica…this was the result.

After a second ply…

Next time I will know not to be quite so judicious with the amount of twist I am adding. Because frankly, having to re-do all this a second time was a bit of a pain, even if it was totally worth it in retrospect.

Finished skein

Next up…indigodragonfly PandaBaa in “Cast On Couch”. This gorgeous red-purple colourway in merino/bamboo will be going on my wheel for Tour de Fleece! In fact, indigodragonfly has entered a team into the festivities. Come join us on Ravelry!

Spinning FO: Blooming Bougainvilla

Posted on June 26, 2014 by Rayna

Remember this?

Last week I decided that the spindle spin I had started during Tour de Fleece two years ago was never going to get finished unless my Lendrum got involved.

I am pleased to report it’s all done! And it turned out remarkably well, all things considered, although it’s not as even as my most recent spinning.

The Woolee Winder I purchased is a miracle worker. I easily got the single onto a single bobbin.

The Finished Single

Then on Monday evening, I “Shireen-plyed” my yarn. This is a name I have given to a faux-Andean plying method that Shireen came up with last week. 4 oz of single is a bit hard to Andean ply without cutting off circulation to your fingers, so Shireen wound it into a centre-pull ball, and then plied the two ends of the ball together. A small downfall to this method: towards the very end, the ball collapses and gets a bit tangly. The up side? You never have mismatched single from having two bobbins that don’t quite match. In this case, I did it to ply older, thicker, spindle spun yarn with newer wheel spun yarn in an attempt at consistency.