I continue to be mostly occupied by science, but I’ve been doing a bit of knitting in the evenings. I stopped in the park on my way home from lab this afternoon and shot these photos:
Adamas is growing. I’m starting to get bored with the pattern, so I’m thinking about shifting into a different stitch pattern at some point, but it is nice to be able to work without referring to a chart…so I might just keep going.
And I started a new project last night, with some Malabrigo I picked up from a swap table (okay, swap futon) last month:
I’ve been wanting to knit a cowl out of handspun, but I haven’t been able to settle on a pattern to use. This stuff, while very nice, is less precious (especially than the other-people’s-handspun I’ve been contemplating), and it’s growing into a Darkside Cowl. I’m hoping to be able to wear it at least a couple of times before spring.
I pulled out this cashmere/tussah again a couple of weeks ago. I’ve been half wondering why it ever got put away–it’s so deliciously soft. I don’t know what I’m going to do with half an ounce of yarn when I’m done, but it’s definitely been worth spinning anyway.
This stuff already has a plan. It’s Good Fortune, the January shipment of Enchanted Knoll Farm‘s Happy Hooves club. Lots of shades of green, plus lots of bits of sparkle…..I’m having lots of fun with it. Which is good, considering I’ve got six ounces and I’m spinning laceweight. Okay, the plan’s not highly detailed yet, because I’m waiting to see what yardage I get, but this is going to be a lace shawl.
(Where’s the handspun lace shawl I’ve been working on for months, you ask? The darker stripe is about twice as wide as the last time it showed up here…)
I don’t think Mel was particularly trying to stop me from spinning by sitting in my (Victoria-) spinning chair–he seems to be enjoying the softness of that CVM.
I haven’t been cooking much lately, but I’ve managed a bit of spinning and a bit of carding. (And I went to a Sixers game on Friday, which was fun and very much out of my usual range of activity. And great people-watching, especially the people walking down stairs on their hands and the people breakdancing outside the stadium and on the subway.)
Organic merino, part of the January Spunky Club fiber. I separated the purple end for use in sampling, so it won’t contaminate the perfectly nice greens. This is about 100 yards, from what is probably ~18g. (Might be a little more, but it’s definitely lighter than the orange batt shown below, and it’s still damp.)
This is a lot like the previous two pairs of blue batts, except it’s got grey bamboo mixed in–I got some sari silk from Paradise Fibers, and decided to add some bamboo to play with. It’s very soft and flyaway. I think this batt is 14g.
I was trying to card up all of the superwash merino I’d dyed for Sherie’s batts, but I could only manage one more batt before getting sick of blue. As an antidote to all those cool colors, I carded up some orange.
Okay, the orange was also an excuse to use the angora I bought at Rhinebeck…which I surrounded with a little of the natural brown BFL I’ve been using, plus some superwash merino I’d dyed for a different project and some white BFL I dyed orange and yellow, and a few pinches of icicle. I think I may try to open up the angora locks a little more before I use it again, but I’m thinking that clumps of angora are more like clumps of brown sugar than of baking soda. That is, they may be noticeable in the final product, but they’re not necessarily bad.
And now I’m out of tea again and about to fall over, so I declare it to be (past) bedtime.
an ent knits 