FO: Anatomy of a Shawl

I found slightly over 5 oz of this hand dyed BFL in my stash that has been there for years! The bright Spring colors begged to be spun and knit.

My husband takes one look at wool rovings and calls them "sheep guts". Well, these sheep guts had a great time on the spinning wheel. Here is a single ply on the wheel.

For those nonspinners out there, it takes two of the above to ply together (twist in the opposite direction that it was originally spun), to make a two ply yarn like below. From the 5 oz of roving, I spun aproximately 470 yards of two ply yarn to make the skein below. The yarn was between a DK and a light worsted weight.

Then I tried several shawl patterns. I wanted to make a simple shawl that would show the effects of the yarn and make the most of the yardage. I decided to knit "La La's Simple Shawl" pattern from Ravelry on size 10 needles to make it lightweight and lacy. Here it is resting in one of my knitting baskets.

I knitted about 460 yards of the skein and made adjustments in the pattern to finish it with a nice edge due to the length left of my yarn. I was quite pleased with the results and will definately try this pattern again. The finished shawl is approximately 66" across by 31" in length. The shawl is lightweight and oh so soft and cozy! It is a surprise gift for a friend who wears a lot of pastels. Hope she likes it!

Well I'm back to my wool stash to see what else I can play with! Happy spinning and knitting!

Just Catching Up: A FO

Remember this? I was seeing stripes in previous post...

AND I was reworking a few skeins of Noro salvaged from a scarf into this...

Which grew into this....

It's been finished for quite some time. I just needed to catch up on my posting of it. It is a simple neck down raglan cardigan with seed stitch borders. The yoke is Noro Silk Garden colorway 224 and the body is merino Shepherd's Wool Great Lakes colorway. It is a warm and very cozy sweater which I will look forward to wearing next fall and winter.

Emergence of Something New

Slowly, the leaf unfurls into the first warm breath of Spring.

Patiently the lace reveals it's beauty in the sun.

Cautiously, new growth breaks thru the ground.

Boldly, the lace claims its presence.

I've Got The Blues!

With Mother Nature being fickle with rain, snow, 60 degrees, 20 degrees... it would be easy to get the blues waiting for flowers to bloom. However, I am still in nesting mode and happily spinning and knitting away. As soon as I get 5 buttons sewn, my latest sweater will be making its' debut here along with a new scarf or two.
Until then, I am shopping my stash once again and reclaiming/reusing yarn. I have 2 skeins of an unknown indigo dyed fingerweight from a long time past purchase on Ebay that has never found a purpose. The blues and greens of the Mega Boot sock yarn lured me at first sight. I started a simple garter stitch shawl over a year ago with them. However, it was relegated to the time out closet due to the striping of the yarn. I just didn't care for it. Then I saw the simple garter stitch shawl that Yarn Harlot was working on and had to look up the pattern "Shawl That Jazz" on Ravelry. It calls for a DK weight. WHALAH!! The indigo dyed fingerweight and the sock yarn became instant friends! I think the sock weight was just overjoyous to be let out of the closet again! So for our next trick...let's see what a striped, marled sock yarn and a multi-toned indigo dyed yarn can create together in simple garter stitch! Let's see...cast on almost 250 stitches and knit, knit, knit!

Sharing a Smile

When I woke up this morning, the kitchen was full of three huge bunches of these and a homemade chocolate cake with chocolate frosting! (I've never met ANYTHING in chocolate that I didn't like. Haha.) What a way to start the day! When I first saw the balloons, I was grinning ear to ear and said, "How wonderful! All the colors of flowers without the worry of keeping the cats from eating them!" Thanks, hubby and kids; love you so much!

These made me smile so I wanted to share that smile with you.

Another year older (yes)...wiser? (remains to be seen)...but definately HAPPIER!! Here's to the coming year...it's going to be great!

Serenity

New Leaves?

Blue sky...

Moss celebrating a sudden thaw...

New leaves...