New yarn, new colors

We recently received a new yarn from Classic Elite - this is Cricket, which is a 60% cotton, 40% linen blend DK weight yarn.  I think this will make some great spring & summer tops.  The pattern booklets for spring weren't available yet, so I can't show you the designs they've come out with just yet. 

 There were some new colors in Firefly as well - yummy jewel tones.  That red is HOT!  A friend of mine used to say that every woman should have a red sweater.  He may be right. 

 And a new lovely shade of Silky Alpaca Lace.  It's called Beach Glass, which seems appropriate for this dreamy muted shade of green.

Plying options

Saturday when Anita came in to teach the beginning spinning class, she tossed me a hank of heaven.  She brings in lots of examples of hand spun to show her students, and this was a new one.  She plied a strand of hand spun wool with a some Rowan Kidsilk Aura.  It was exquisite!  I wish my photos had feel-o-vision so you could touch this too.  She said it's VERY loosely plied - you're basically throwing the plies together onto the wheel. I seem to always forget about the possibility of plying your hand spun with a commercial yarn.

The brushed mohair of the Kidsilk Aura lends a bit of halo that gets tempered by the smooth ply.  I really liked it!

Thanks for sharing, Anita!

Finishing things

An eon ago, I started a quick little cowl out of Classic Elite's Fresco, using a pattern they sent in their e-newsletter.  I got pretty far along on it, and then for who-knows-what-reason, or no reason at all, it was set aside and languished.  I even had a hard time finding it when I decided to work on it again.  Entirely too many projects sitting around all over the place.  Do you ever have that problem? 

Well, I finally found it and sat down and finished it.  There were something like 3 rows left to do.  THREE ROWS.  This is ridiculous.  But there you have it.  I absolutely adore this yarn.  There's a smidge of angora (the bunny) in it that gives it just a little bit of halo and soft soft soft.  PERFECT for a cowl.  I'd love it as a pair of fingerless mitts too.  Oh, hey, a sweater would be terrific too.  Yum.  You can't go wrong with this yarn. 

Looking a little pale, is my styrofoam head.  But that's life in winter in Oregon. I could have made this longer, but I think I was afraid I'd put it down for another year.  I'll probably just wear it around my neck, instead of over my head - long hair does weird things with cowls (and hoodies). 

And for a closer-up (not close up, but closer):

Restoring Henry VIII Tapestries

A friend passed along a link to a story about restoring the original colors to tapestries that were made for King Henry VIII nearly 500 years ago.  Here is another site where you can see something of the size of this tapestry. It boggles my mind to think of the work that went into making these amazing tapestries, and to think of them lasting so long.  Do we make much these days that will last so long? 

In an interesting bit of synchronicity, I recently finished reading a book called The Children of Henry VIII by Alison Weir, and my friend didn't know that.  Funny how the world brings such things together.  Thanks Cheryl!

Woodworks?

What's in a name? 

Last week I happened to be outside getting something from my car in the side parking lot when I heard someone pull up in front and SCREECH to a halt.  I came back in and a nice couple were in looking around.  The gentleman had been driving, and saw our sign, but he thought it said "Woodland Woodworks", and was excited to think he'd found a place for folks who like to do wood working.  We had a laugh, and he admired the spinning wheels.  His wife happens to be a knitter though, so she didn't mind the stop in the least! 

Speaking of names, we've had several people read our new town as "Yarn hill" instead of YAMHILL.  It would be great if we were in Yarnhill!  Somebody even asked if we'd had the town's name changed just for us.  Hmmm, now there's a thought! 

Finished Chenille Scarves

I managed to get all 3 scarves woven, off the loom, fringes twisted, wet finished, dried, in the mail and TO the recipients in time!  Hurray!  I didn't even begin to make a dent in my stash of chenille (how I love this stuff), alas.  Or maybe that's okay, because really - what's WRONG with surrounding yourself with stuff you love?  I like just moving the cones around looking at different colors together and thinking of all the possibilities. 

Here is the greeney one that was but a blob of warp yarns in the last post. 

 I used the outside stripes color (a rather marled yarn) for the weft.  I thought I'd like the pale green for weft, but I didn't...  This one turned out the softest once it was finished - like butter!  (why do we say that?  I don't think I'd want to be wearing butter...  maybe soft like a kitten!  not so easy to wear either, but I'd rather pet a kitten than butter...).
  Next up was a scarf in red tones...  I used two shades of red wound at the same time for the red stripes.  The other stripes are another marled yarn that turned out to be quite green in the light of day.  In my basement when I was choosing it it looked like something else.  I don't know what, but not so ...  green!  Oh well, covered in red weft it's a whole lot less green.  I outlined each stripe with 1 strand of blue. 

 This scarf started out 11" wide in the reed, because I can't count.  Well, more that I wanted the red stripes to be 2" and the green 1", and I wanted 3 stripes of green, and to surround them with red makes for 11"...  Surprise! 

Now my upstairs loom is naked.  I have 2 looms in the basement that have been in a state of partial warp for waaaay too long.  I need to finish warping both of them and get them woven.  Resolution!  Weave off both these projects!!  One is a shadow weave chenille throw, and the other is 8/2 cotton for dish towels to try out 12 harness weaving....   I'm entirely too tempted to toss a mixed warp I measured and dyed a long time ago onto the upstairs loom...  it's a gradation of greens from light to dark, intended for a vest.  I'd love to wear it to Madrona.  But should it be light to dark across the width once, or narrower flows of color back & forth (light dark light or dark light dark or light dark light dark light.....  sigh)  Sometimes the decisions are paralyzing.  It's a good problem to have. 

We're going to Madrona!

We get to have a booth at Madrona in Tacoma this February!  I'm VERY excited about this show.  I attended a couple years ago as a participant & class-taker, but this year we get to have a booth.  More formally known as the Madrona Fiber Arts Winter Retreat, this is an amazing event with many of the top names in knitting, spinning & weaving.  Take a look at that class schedule - some of the classes are still available (many of them fill within nano-seconds of registration opening), and the wait list is actively maintained as well. 

Let us know if you want us to bring something specific (save shipping, we'll bring your order there!  and if you pay for it ahead of time, the Oregon tax rate applies (zero!)). 

Very very excited!  It's going to be a BLAST!   Will you be there?