FF: Buckland

Ironman just took the girls off to the playground, so I have a few minutes to blog before I run down and meet them. Enough time hopefully to show you December's spinning FO:

Fiber: Finn wool top from Hello Yarn, November 2008 Fiber Club offering, colorway "Buckland", 8 oz
Spun/plied: 10:1 on ST Lendrum
Yardage: 3 ply - 236 yds, 2 ply - 50 yds
WPI: 3 ply - 12 wpi before washing, 11 after washing. 2 ply - 14 wpi before washing, 12 wpi after washing (pictures are pre-washing).

I wanted to do a true 3 ply this time, so I split the fiber into thirds by weight. One third I spun straight from the full width of top, one third I split into thirds before spinning, and the last third I split into approximately thumb thick strips before spinning. All fiber was spun from the fold, supported/assisted long draw.

I let the singles sit on the bobbins for a few days before I plied. The two ply skein was the left over from the two bobbins that had the most singles on them. After I finished the last of the plying, the yarn sat on the bobbins for about 3 weeks while vacation got in the way. Soaked in warm water with a bit of Eucalan and hung out to dry next to the plumbago bush, which was a mistake because I spent a while picking plumbago seed heads out of the yarn before I wound it up.

This was the first time I've spun any real amount of Finn and I found it a bit tricky. Maybe I wasn't in the mood to be particularly attentive, but I had trouble getting the right amount of twist in the singles. I tended towards undertwisting (!) which is never a problem I've had before, and makes me think that it may be time to jump up to the higher ratios - my hands seem to be getting ahead of my feet a bit.

Per usual, Adrian's colors are drop-dead gorgeous. The finished yarn is soft and squishy, and would be perfect for some scarves or hats. I was thinking about making something for the kids, but I'm afraid I might have to keep it for myself. The colors are just too pretty. Maybe they can have the 50 yds of 2 ply for something.

Next week I hope to have my Ply by Night project finished: a bit of Sunshine for some grey winter days!

The Christmas presents

Here they are, in all their glory. Some of these have been blogged previously, but in the interests of not having a pages-long post, I've included more notes on the Flickr pages for those of you who are interested.

Ironman's socks

Crofter's Cowl #1

Brambler for Nana

Socks originally meant for Ironman, but reallocated to my lovely brother-in-law, who had no problems with the color

Diamond Waffle socks for my brother

Red Velvet handspun for my SIL

Another Crofter's Cowl for Koala

Sunflower hat for Mermaid

Not pictured are the Jacques Cousteau hat I made for my Dad (maybe someone will email me a picture perhaps?), and the super-secret project for Aquaphilic that will be going in the mail tomorrow. Just in time for her birthday. And no, it's not yarn this year.

Here's the last Christmas present, and it's not one that I made. This is one that my mother made for Ironman and me, to go with the beautiful cherry bed he made about four years ago.

This is the Mariner's Compass quilt* that she's been working on for the last while. It is absolutely gorgeous. She wanted to make us a quilt, and asked for colors. I said "blues and purples", and this is what she came back with. It is truly stunning, and I can't wait for it to arrive and get put on the bed (even if the edges aren't yet done).

So that's it for the Christmas knitting. Up next will be some thoughts about projects for 2009. 

* Many of the pictures in this post were taken with my Christmas present. Hooray for Ironman!

FO: Ironman's Christmas socks

Pattern: Spiraling Coriolis by Cat Bordhi
Yarn: Trekking XXL colorway #76, 1 skein
Needles: US 1/2.25 Harmony double points
Gauge: 9 sts/12 row per inch
Comments: I did the same pattern that I did for my July SAM socks, but widened the spiraling band to include a cable. I worked the cable over 7 stitches (p1, k2, p1, k2, p1), crossing every 8 rows. I crossed the cables towards the top of the sock, so they go in opposite directions on the two socks.

Again, lovely colors from the folks at Zitron. They looked a lot redder in the skein then in the finished socks, but the striping is pretty subtle (always a good thing with items for Himself).

I always get a smaller gauge with Trekking XXL then with other sock yarns - it's definitely on the thinner side - but it makes a nice fabric that wears well. I made a pair of entrelac socks for Ironman out of the same yarn a couple of years ago that are going strong (must write up that pattern sometime).

So this concludes this year's Sock a Month extravaganza. I think I only missed one month, and one month was a total cheater. I'm hoping to keep up the streak in 2009, but may have to resort to either knitting socks just for myself or for people with smallish feet - there's been a lot of very small stitches this year!

FO: Rose Garden Mitts

So named because the colors of the yarn could have been inspired by nothing else.

Pattern: Mahayana Flying gloves
Yarn: Artyarns Supermerino, 104 yds/50 g - I used maybe a skein and a half
Needles: US 6/4.0 mm
Start/finish: 12/19-12/23 (I didn't quite finish these in the allotted 24 hr time frame (shock and horror, I know), but they were done very quickly. The second mitt took about 3 hrs start to finish)
Comments/modifications: These were a lovely quick pattern, and the gorgeous yarn made it all the better. The stitch pattern (which looks waaaay more complicated then it actually is) breaks up variegated yarns amazingly well (as evidenced by these examples) and it was great fun to see how the colors would stack up. I knit the pattern pretty much as given, although I had to increase the number of stitches - I used 37 stitches for the repeat instead of 31. To compensate for the larger size, I also worked the palm stockinette section over 15 stitches instead of 12, which necessitated starting in the middle of the stitch repeat after the palm. It wasn't too complicated once I got going.

I also worked 4 rows on the thumb and then 5 rows of ribbing - it comes up basically to the base of my thumbnail.

So, in summary: gorgeous yarn + great quick pattern = toasty warm hands. And these worked up so quickly that I suspect I will be knitting more of them for last minute presents. Not that I would ever have any reason to need a last minute present mind you.

Fiber Friday: The first Porpoise-dyed from Yarn School

It is still Friday, right? I'm really falling behind here - this yarn has been spun up and done for almost two months, but I'm only getting around to blogging about it now. Pathetic!

Superwash merino, handdyed by yours truly, with Jacquard acid dyes in black, brown, brilliant blue and pumpkin orange I believe.
Spun/plied at 10:1 on ST Lendrum
Stats: ~185 yds, 14 wpi, 4 oz. This is some seriously dense yarn. I was planning on giving this to someone for a Christmas present, but I'm not sure how big her feet are - this is not going to be enough for a pair of socks. Sigh. Which means the other 4 oz I was going to save for myself will have to be spun up for her as well. Too bad...I guess I can always dye more.

I was really surprised by how this yarn turned out. Given the large white stretches in the top, I was expecting it to be a lot lighter.

It's a lot more uniform in color then I thought it would be. The 2-ply barberpole, in this instance, had similar enough tonal values that the whole skein ended up somewhere in the middle of the range instead of going from one extreme to the other.

This is only the second superwash fiber I've worked with - the first was superwash Corriedale, and I'm a lot happier with this one. I think I overspun the singles for the Corrie - the finished yarn felt somewhat wirey - but this merino basically spun itself. Literally. I sat in front of the wheel and just let the fiber run out into the single with hardly any effort. The 4 oz took two nights to spin (+/- 3 hrs), which is fast for me. Plying was another evening. So if I have to give up the other four ounces, at least I know it won't take forever to get through*!

* As soon as my new tension knob arrives - there was a small Lendrum-child collision this morning apparently (I think I was in the shower) that did not end up well for the Lendrum. Very sad, but given the amount of Christmas knitting left to be done, probably just as well.