Fibering heaven

Last year for Christmas I asked Santa John for a drum carder.  He told me to order what I wanted, and I started looking around at different models.  The one I really wanted was an Ashford carder, but they are about $700 new and it's next to impossible to find them used.  I was getting ready to bite the bullet and buy one new when my mom fell, and all plans for anything fell to the bottom of my attention span.  Fast forward to last Friday night.  As I lay in bed, unable to sleep, I decided to get onto craigslist and see if any drum carders came up.  And as luck would have it, someone had just posted a drum carder on Thursday.  However, it was part of a complete setup, and the seller was not splitting the lot.  So, for $775, I walked away with the drum carder (Ashford, as I had wanted); an Ashford Traditional spinning wheel with spinning stool, jumbo and standard flyer and bobbins; carding combs, niddy-noddy, drop spindle, yarn winder, spinning books and magazines, and 3 garbage bags of wool.  I'm like a kid in a candy store.  I now have a spinning wheel for each of my two permanent houses.  And with the drum carder, I hope to bring some wool here to Missouri (where I have a top-loading washer) and start prepping some roving.

The seller lives outside Springfield and was going to be gone for Thanksgiving, but she was traveling to St. Louis today, so we met in Lebanon and traded.  She got a whole lot more room in her car, and and envelope with cash, and I got a lot of fiber dreams to get started on.

More shawls

I have discovered I love knitting shawls.  I don't know why, but I do.  I have a lace shawl on the needles right now, and recently finished these two.

I find self-fringing a fascinating (and frightening) adventure.  This is a pattern called Fringed Benefits, which I adapted by using 3 stitches at the edge for self-fringing instead of the 5 the pattern called for.  The reason I say this frightening is because you bind off all but the end stitches on each end, then unravel and tie off each row of un-bound stitches.  I worried a great deal as I began this.  And believe me, I tried it on a test-knit before I attempted it with the finished project!  This shawl was made with 3 balls of Bambool (I guess you got that is a bamboo-wool blend!)  Since 3 balls made a shawl that is 48" tip-to-tip, I think I will try again with the one ball I have left, and make a shawlette with it.

I absolutely love knitting with bamboo.  I love the softness, the drape, everything.  So I made another shawl, this one with Caron Spa yarn that I got on clearance for $2/ball.  Since it took 3 balls to make this shawl, I think the $6 was money well spent!

This pattern is the Firefly yarn Dayflower Shawl.  I made the end and short row shaping with one ball for each end, and used the third ball to add shoulder-to-shoulder width in the full depth of the pattern.  It is 72" long, which provides plenty of length to tie in front or drape long.

My own designs, start to finish

I finally got it together and have begun to knit with my handspun yarn.  The earwarmers below are from my early efforts at handspinning, and are knit with a pattern of my own creation that is listed in earlier blogs.  The earlier pattern is for worsted weight, and I adapted it for the chunky weight that these yarns turned out to be.  The yarn was spun from 4 oz each of Mountain Meadow roving.

Long time, no blog

Haven't been here in almost two months.  Wow!  But I have spent a lot of time knitting, mostly charity things.  The church group that I knit with donates prayer shawls to the VA hospital and hospice here in town, so I have knit a couple of long rectangular shawls.  These are a simple chevron pattern that is perfect for car knitting, which is where one of them was done.  They are 55 inches long and 17 inches deep, and are knit from 3 skeins each of Caron Simply Soft.

The other charity project that I participate in with my church group is hats for babies and children.  Last year we donated over 500 hats from preemie to adult.  The hats were made for church members, kids at the Boys and GIrls Club, and those served by the homeless shelter and domestic abuse shelter.  I have discovered my new favorite hat, that can be made in any size simply by changing yarn and needles.  The pictures below are from sock yarn (preemie hats), sport weight (baby hat) and worsted weight (kids and adult hats.)  The pattern is called Aviatrix, and is on Ravelry.  It is simple to memorize, and quick to knit.  I used up leftover yarn from my mom's Red Heart stash to create solid/variegated hats. 

Not new, but ...

... still worth a look, I think.  In 1987, I cross-stitched this map of the U.S. for a dear friend of my mom's.  When she passed away a few years ago, her family were thoughtful enough to remove it from the frame and return it to me.  I have to get it framed so I can display it somewhere.  It was a ton of work, and deserves to be seen.  The stitched area is 30" by 20".  I remember being very frustrated trying to get all the state lines to count out!

Hearts and flowers

Found a really fun crown-out lacy hat pattern called Coeurs et Fleurs (Hearts and Flowers).  I love doing lace, especially in a pattern that won't be a lifelong commitment to get it done!  This one is knit in Ella Rae worsted weight superwash wool in colorway slate. It is a deeper color than the picture.

I have been working on small projects in between shawls and hats for my mom's caregivers.










I have finished another shawl, bringing me to a grand total of 6 shawls and 2 hats for caregivers since mid-April.  This one is Passione Amarosa, knit with one ball of Patons Lace.  I literally had one inch of yarn left after I finished the picot edge and got the ends woven in.  But I guess a miss is as good as a mile!

Finally found the perfect pattern for this yarn

There are two types of yarnies in this world:  The ones who pick a pattern and then find the yarn, and the ones who love a yarn and search for just the perfect pattern.  I am in the latter category.......I cannot resist buying yarn, so I just buy as much as I can get of any yarn I love, so that I'll have enough when the perfect project appears.  With this yarn, I found some at the Tuesday Morning store in Fort Collins and some more at the store in Lincoln Nebraska.  I ended up searching 3 other locations where I didn't find any.  When I finished my search, I had 6 balls, so I got on KnittingParadise and asked if anybody had some.  A wonderful woman said she had bought 4 balls because she really loved it but didn't have a pattern in mind, so she sold it to me at her cost plus shipping.  And it turned out to be just enough yarn to finish the Cuff-to-Cuff Sweater on the Red Heart website.

Sentimental stitch markers

I was going through my grandmother's jewelry box and found a few dangly earrings without mates.  I brought them home and got out my jewelry pliers and got to work.  1 jump ring and 1 lever-back earring change a dangly earring into a stitch marker.  These can be used for both knitting (around the needle) or for crochet (open the lever-back and hook it around the stitch/row you are marking.)

Finished with shawls for a bit

I finished two shawls in 8 days.  These are for my mother to give as gift to caregivers, and I must say I whipped them out in record time.  In the interest of full disclosure, there's no counting or pattern involved in either of these, so that could explain why they finished so fast.

Boneyard shawl

 Multnomah shawl

And now that these are both done, I can move on to other projects in the bucket list.  Ah yes, another day, another pattern!  Getting up the nerve for a Kaffe Fassett vest.  Wish me luck!








 

Experiments

I enjoy doing knitting for the Boys and Girls Club of Cheyenne, the Wyoming Childrens Home, and the homeless shelter in Cheyenne.  It gives me a chance to try new patterns, or to experiment with patterns and stitches.  The following experiment turned out so well that I decided to write down the pattern.

I LOVE the star stitch.  Easy to do, with lots of visual interest.  So I incorporated it into a pattern for earwarmer / headband.  The close-up of the stitch should illustrate why I like it so much.

Star Stitch Headband/Earwarmer

Joanna Perkins

Supplies needed:                    Worsted weight yarn (less than 150 yards)

                                                Size 8 needles (gauge is not particularly important)

                                                Large decorative button

Star stitch:  Purl 3 together, do not remove from left needle, wrap yarn around right needle, purl 3 together again, then remove the three stitches from left needle.

Kfb                       Knit into front and back of same stitch to increase

K2tog                    Knit two stitches together to decrease

K2togTBL             Knit two stitches together through the back of the stitches to decrease

Pattern:

Cast on 7 stitches.

Row 1, 3               Knit across

Row 2 and even rows through row 20     K1, Kfb, K to 2 stitches from end of row, Kfb, K last stitch.

Row 5 (WS)         P3, *P1, star stitch* once, P1, P3         (11 stitches)

Row 7                   P2, *P1, star stitch* twice, P1, P2        (13 stitches)

Row 9                   P1, *P1, star stitch* 3 times, P1, P1     (15 stitches)

Row 11                 P4, *P1, star stitch* 2 times, P1, P4     (17 stitches)

Row 13                 P3, *P1, star stitch* 3 times, P1, P3     (19 stitches)

Row 15                 P2, *P1, star stitch* 4 times, P1, P2     (21 stitches)

Row 17                 P1, *P1, star stitch* 5 times, P1, P1     (23 stitches)

Row 19                 P4, *P1, star stitch* 4 times, P1, P4     (25 stitches)

Row 21                 P3, *P1, star stitch* 5 times, P1, P3     (27 stitches)

Row 22 and 24     Knit across

Row 23                 P1, *P1, star stitch* 6 times, P1, P1

Continue Rows 21-24 for approximately 12”, then begin Row 1 of decrease pattern on RS row.

Row 1 and odd rows through Row 17      K1, K2togTBL, knit to last 3 stitches, K2tog, K1

Row 2                    P4, *P1, star stitch* 4 times, P1, P4     (25 stitches)

Row 4                    P1, *P1, star stitch* 5 times, P1, P1     (23 stitches)

Row 6                    P2, *P1, star stitch* 4 times, P1, P2     (21 stitches)

Row 8                    P3, *P1, star stitch* 3 times, P1, P3     (19 stitches)

Row 10                 P4, *P1, star stitch* 2 times, P1, P4      (17 stitches)

Row 12                 P1, *P1, star stitch* 3 times, P1, P1      (15 stitches)

Row 14                 P2, *P1, star stitch* 2 times, P1, P2      (13 stitches)

Row 16                 P3, *P1, star stitch* once, P1, P3          (11 stitches)

Row 18                 Knit across                                            (9 stitches)

Row 19       ##      Knit 4, BO stitch #4, Knit 3                    (7 stitches)

Row 20                 Knit 3, CO1, Knit 3

Row 21                 Knit across

Bind off all stitches

## Row 19, Use a one row buttonhole if that is your preferred method, and eliminate row 20.

Sew on button, weave ends in and trim.

NOTE:  If doing this pattern with chunky/bulky yarn, you can use appropriate size needles, end increases with Row 17 (just do the number of repeats for the stitches on the needle), do the Row 21-24 repeat until the headband is ready for decrease and end with a P3 start row, then pick up the decrease pattern at Row 10.  This keeps the offset pattern in effect.

Shawls, prayer shawls ..... and prayers

In my previous post, I noted that I am busy knitting shawls for my mom's caregivers at Missouri Rehabilitation Center in Mount Vernon.  I finished the two prayer shawls for her favorite personal attendants, and have moved on to the shawls for the wives of her two favorite physical therapists.

The prayer shawls were done in Lion Brand Homespun in the Trinity Stitch.

The first shawl is almost done.  The yarn is Caron Simply Soft, and the pattern is the Multnomah Shawl, recommended to me by Gerry, who was absolutely right about it (as usual!).  This is a go-to pattern for not having to really concentrate on the knitting.  Although it is technically a shawlette when done with a sport weight or sock weight yarn, I opted for worsted weight to make a complete shawl size.




 
I decided for all of these shawls to knit them in easy-care yarns, since I won't be around to recommend laundering instructions.   I have one more shawl to make, and I'm thinking about the Boneyard Shawl for it, also in Simply Soft in variegated colors.  It's another no-thought knit, which should be good for more car time.

So that covers shawls and prayer shawls.   Now for the prayers.  My mom went home on June 28, but she and my dad decided that she would get more therapy if she went temporarily to a nursing home that offers therapy, rather than using home health therapy 3 days a week.  She has gone to West Plains, so John has called friends to ask them to check up on her and stop by for visits.  We pray for further improvements in her medical condition, and gains in her ability to do more of her own personal care.

Long time between posts

I haven't blogged in a couple of months, because my fibering habits have been altered.  On April 12, my mother fell and damaged her spine.  She is now a quadriplegic, and is coming home from the rehabilitation center after being in hospitals and rehab for 12 weeks.  John and I have been back and forth to Missouri for me to be with her at the hospital and rehab, so my knitting is not of the complicated or time-consuming nature. I now am carrying mindless knitting with me, and doing it while waiting for therapy to get over, or while sitting in her hospital room chatting.

There are a couple of exceptions to this.  I have been carrying along with me the Tree of Life afghan.  It was a Knitting Paradise knit-along, and I couldn't resist.  It actually knit fairly quickly, and the pattern was intuitive once I learned to read the vines and leaves.  It was supposed to be a crib blanket, but it's big enough for a full-sized afghan.  I haven't decided what to do with it yet.  Maybe someday I'll adapt the pattern and knit a bedspread with it.  It was that much fun!

I also finished (finally!) a pair of socks using Liat Gat's toe-up heel gusset that allows you to add extra room in the instep.  That's really important to me, because my instep is so high that I can't get my foot into a short-row heel.  I always carry socks with me for waiting room knitting. The socks were made with one ball of Opal ZwergerGarn 4ply (462 yards is a lot of sock!)  I did a 3-1 rib all the way up the leg, adding 4 stitches of increase every 1-2 inches.  There was still yarn left when I got most of the way to my knee, but by then I was so tired of the sock, I just quit!

I made a prayer shawl for my mother after she was hospitalized.  Now I have orders for 2 more for her favorite nurses aides that have been really kind to her, and will be making shawlettes for 2 more of them.  Those are the kind of knitting I can do on the 12 hour drive from Cheyenne to Lake of the Ozarks, which John and I have made 4 times since April 15.  More knitting!

Coriander hat

My friend Gerry (gerryart.blogspot.com -- look her up, you'll get inspired!) sported me to the pattern for a knitalong, the Coriander Hat.  The design is by Carol Feller (littlefellers on Ravelry) and it was a ton of fun.  I knit it in alpaca because I love how alpaca feels.  The stitch definition might not be what it could be in a less fuzzy fiber, but it is so soft and warm, I couldn't resist.  The design was really intuitive once I plodded along deliberately through the first set of patterns after the setup.  By the time I got done, it was pretty natural and knitted up fast.  It only took me 2 or 3 evenings between my other hats, my thrummed slippers, and my Wedding Shawl lace project.

Introducing : The Coriander Hat    Thanks Gerry !!!!

It's not knitting, but it certainly is beautiful ....

The sunrise view from the deck of our new condo at the Lake of the Ozarks.  We bought it to have a place in Missouri when we're ready to retire, so that we can be closer to parents, sibling and kids.  I'm also pleased that we will have a place close enough to Jeff City that I can drive up for Knit Nite!  I spent the weekend sitting inside the patio door, spinning and knitting and looking out over the bluffs.

SuperBowl shopping trip

Went clearance shopping at my LYS.   She has a clearance sale on Super Bowl Sunday afternoon.  I picked up a bag of 13 balls of Wool of the Andes worsted weight in various colors for $10, a Lantern Moon knitting bag for $12.50, a few stitching projects, and the book Power Cables.  I also threw a beanbag at a TossAcross board to see what % discount for regular prices items.  I was a weenie, I only hit 10%, so I bought another set of Addi Turbo circs in size 8.  My philosophy of life is: You can never be too skinny, have too many silk blouses, or too many sets of size 8 circs!

Maybe I'll use these to do dishes .... naaah!

I made several new knitting friends on my field trip, and one of them had a really great dishcloth pattern on Ravelry under her handle, shyannlindy.  I did a couple, and then, being me, had to mess with it to see how the formula works out for smaller cloths.  It worked so well that I am likely to try it out with more stitches and make a table-topper for my round dining table.

The larger cloths are made with the original pattern of 20 cast-on stitches, the smaller pink is with 17 cast-ons and 7 wedges instead of 6, and the peach and mint with 14 cast-on stitches.  These are such mindless knitting that they have become addictive, and I'm having to physically restrain myself from grabbing cotton yarn while I watch TV!  But I have to, because I have so much beautiful roving to spin up and so much yarn stashed to do other fun and interesting projects, and I can't stop on these.  But they would be nice hostess gifts to knit up while you sit and visit with friends.

Tomorrow is Super Bowl Sunday, and one of my LYS proprietors opens and runs special sales.  It is the only Sunday all year that she opens, and she has a football for you to throw at a target to see what percentage off you get on your purchase.  I'm a terrible thrower, so I'll have to post later about how that came out!

Field trip !!!!!!!

Yesterday was a great day for a field trip.  It was sunny and pleasant weather for the 90 minute drive from Cheyenne to Mitchell, Nebraska (outside Scottsbluff.)  When you're in Scottsbluff, you're close to the Oregon Trail, Chimney Rock, and Brown Sheep Company yarn factory.  Brown Sheep is the only mass-produced yarn made 100% domestically.  Fallout from the 2012 Summer Olympics has turned into a business boon for them:  After the hubbub about USA Olympic team uniforms being made in China, Ralph Lauren (who has the contract for USA Olympics) contacted them for wool for the 2014 Winter Olympic uniforms.

The tour was absolutely fascinating.  The Brown family, who started the company, still run it 50 or 60 years later, and plan to for another generation.  They have introduced some devices that save energy and water, and those have now been presented to the industry.  The whole production line was amazing.  Watching the machines draft the roving before it goes into the spinners was insane!

Keep an eye out for Brown Sheep boucle yarn, being introduced this year.  I got to handle a skein (but not knit with it, drat the luck!)  I really liked the feel of it.  I usually don't like knitting with boucles, because they are generally acrylics and get very "splitty."  Because this is wool, it holds to itself rather than splitting, which gives a lot more integrity to the finished product.  I think it is premiering in 24 or 26 colors soon.

And now to the best part of the day -- the factory store!  They have a store that sells mill ends and seconds for bargain prices.  So let's go shopping!

I got 8 skeins (2 pounds) of their machine-dyed worsted for $13/pound, in a scrumptious teal that is my favorite color.  Their hand-dyed yarns are $26 per pound.  So I got 4 skeins of Legacy Lace and 4 skeins of  superwash worsted for about $50. 

Then I hit the jackpot.  At the end of the tour, they have huge cartons of roving that didn't get used in wool runs. Think about the cartons that Baskin-Robbins uses in their coolers, then picture them standing chest-high and an arm's-stretch across.  Then imagine them heaped over with roving, and you have the sight my eyes feasted on.  Then think about $6.50/pound for the roving, and imagine me diving in with both arms!  Here's what I came away with, for about $25.

There is about 1.5 pounds of the teal, about 1.6 pounds of the heathered greys, about .6 pounds of the camel, and I just grabbed the other colors for fun!

At the end of my shopping spree, the total added up to just over $100.  (I personally think I exercised a great deal of restraint!)  So, the moral of the story is this:  For an interesting day and the pot of gold (or wool!) at the end of the tour, make a side-trip off of I-80 to Scottsbluff Nebraska, to Brown Sheep.

Too busy knitting to post about knitting!

The holidays have been a time of busy-ness coupled with hustle and bustle.  I decided at Thanksgiving that I was going to knit each of my girls and their guy something for Christmas, so I got busy.  Liz got a green Homespun yarn slouch hat and Josh an orange acrylic yarn hat (orange being the only color one should knit in for Josh!)  Courtney got a pair of socks in bamboo and elastic  (Knit One Purl Too yarn, I think) and Chris now has a watch cap in Red Heart Team Colors yarn blue/red, which are Ole Miss colors (his alma mater.)  Kyle now has a pair of mittens in acrylic yarn (Loops and Threads Charisma) that can wash easily if they get dirty while performing all those homeowner chores that he will have now that they bought a house, and Hilary has the fingerless mitts and hat set pictured below.  The pattern is called Architecture, so it was appropriate for her.  Thankfully, everyone seemed to like their presents, or they have good manners!  Courtney put on her socks immediately and wore them all evening and the next morning, and all the others immediately modeled their gifts.  The hat may not be right for Hilary, who doesn't really wear hats, but I think she liked the fingerless mitts.

And if all those items weren't enough to keep me busy knitting, my prayer shawl group agreed to do some knitting for the St. Joseph Childrens Home and the Boys and Girls Club of Cheyenne.  The Childrens Home needed about 30 older boys caps/hats, so I got into the stash of Red Heart that my mom gave me when she quit knitting, and produced about 15 hats in varying sizes and boy-friendly colors.  When our group's organizer contacted the Boys and Girls Club to see if they had a specific need, the director said, "Oh, it would be great if you could make hats for all our kids!" When asked how many that was, she said, "About 160"  I nearly choked when I heard that!  But now that the Childrens Home hats are done, I guess I'll get started on the B/G Club hats.  This will give me the chance to do some hat patterns that I've been looking at for a while, mostly earflap hats.  So if I don't appear here for a while, it just means that I'm snowed under (figuratively) in hats.  And I have resolved to knit something for myself in the New Year.  More on that later.