A wee bit of fiber to tide you over til the Tour...

So I'm full in to the rush of knitting six different versions of Annis by July 7th, but really the deadline is July 3rd, because that's when the Tour de Fleece/Tour de France starts. My goal for the TdF is to spin up at least three of the seven lbs of Hello Yarn Fiber Club I have sitting around. Here's the status of the pile as of March:

Since then, there has been two further shipments (one more pound) added. So Something Must Be Done.

But, as I said, there's some scarf knitting to be done in the meantime. So here's the last spinny bit for a while: Dev's Mermaid Yarn, spun from top that she dyed herself, destined for some sort of top-down yoke sweatery thing.

Spun/plied at 12:1, short forward draw, about 300 yds from 8 oz. That's some dense yarn! But there's a lovely pink bit showing up there - I'll have to figure out how to get it front and center on the sweater.

I split the top in half lengthwise and spun two bobbins starting from opposite ends - as you can see, one end was a lot darker then the other, and I wanted to try and minimize the dark-to-light variation. It was a fairly easy spin - a bit of felting/sticking in spots, but I predrafted a bit to loosen up the fibers and it went smoothly. I plied pretty tightly in order to get some good bounce in the finished yarn and then soaked in warm water. In fact, I put the yarn in warm water and forgot about it until the next morning, so it got a really good soaking...

So that's it on the spinning until the prologue. I'm thinking about going in chronological order, starting with Mollusc Wensleydale (August 2007!).

I even have a plan for this fiber: laceweight singles to make an Anne Hanson shawl. Either the Honeybee Stole, which I already have the pattern for, or one of the Raven ones she's done. After I finish that, I've got 8 oz of Insect Wings(somehow I don't have a photo of this fiber, so I'm pointing you towards the HYFC pool) to do up. Not sure what form that will take though - anyone have any suggestions? After Insect Wings is some more Norway, and then Five Plum Pie. And then Sour Fig. If I can get through those, I'll be a happy camper! And there will be space in the bin for April, May and June's installments (1.5 more pounds - ulp!).

Bonus!

An unexpected upside to living in the UK: when Interweave sends out a sneaky email about the Hurt Book sale at 11:20 am my time, all my knitterly competitors in the States are likely still asleep. My bank account is now somewhat lighter, and my mother is going to have to deal with a large, heavy box of stitch dictionaries (I got almost every Harmony guide available, even the crochet one!) and some of Franklin's cartoons. I think I'll need a extra bag for our trip this summer to haul all this loot back. Plus some cashola for the heavy bag charge...

There is knitting being done: I have decided on Annis as the teacher present for this year, partly because I think it's lovely, but mostly because I did one and it took me four days. That would have been three days if I hadn't mucked up the stockinette section (only I would do this...). So Numero Dos is on the needles in this, with some modifications for slightly short yardage. First one was 340 yds, and I've only got 305 yds of the handspun, but I think it will be ok. Expect an Annis Rainbow post sometime around the end of the term.

FF: Six. Freakin'. Months.

Well, that was fun.

Started with 2 lbs of fiber.
Spun the singles at 7.5:1, semi-longdraw from the fold.
Stage 1 Plying, at 12:1
Stage 2 Plying, also at 12:1.
Final numbers: 8 big skeins and one mini-skein of 4-ply cabled yarn. Total yardage: 1745 yds/1.83 lbs (29.3 oz) of finished yarn. Holy shit, that's almost four miles of singles. Dooooooode!

I cannot believe how long this took to do. Granted, I had a few other big projects in there (the Knitting Olympics springs to mind), and I got so sick of those singles that it was hard to keep making progress on them. But I wanted to get all the singles spun up at once, so I could then ply the first bobbin with the last, the second with the second-to-last, and so on. In hopes of evening out any, ehem, alterations in the spinning.

And after all that sampling I did, my grist was all over the place. Here's the list:

Skein 1: 970 ypp
Skein 2: 984 ypp
SKein 3: 955 ypp
Skein 4: 875 ypp
Skein 5: 982 ypp
Skein 6: 1001 ypp
Skein 7: 842 ypp ***The Winner!***
Skein 8: 911 ypp
Mini-skein 9: 1984 ypp

The goal, as you probably don't recall, was 840 ypp. I'm not sure why it didn't come out closer, but maybe I didn't finish (full) the final yarns enough to get them to plump up? I may try pulling out the skeins that are pretty close (1-5 and 8, about 1200 yds) and try a swatch with those to see how it looks. The other alternatives are 1) running things back through the wheel to add more plying twist and finishing again or 2) just trying to full those lighter skeins a bit more and see if they plump up.

In any event, I am breathing a huge sigh of relief and accomplishment. Sheeit, that was a lot of purple fiber. Worst case scenario: I knit the sweater, it comes out too small, and I give it to my Mom, who has made appreciative noises over both the fiber and the pattern.

A deadline

It's that time of year when crafty spinning/knitting mothers the world over start to think about presents for their children's teachers. Actually, most have probably already taken care of this issue - it's just us procrastinating ones that are suddenly realizing that time is running out.

So my kids have 6 teachers between them - Devil has a main teacher (Mrs. A), a teaching assistant (Miss. B) and a reading teacher (Miss. M). Boo has two main teachers (Miss A and Miss B)(hunh...conservation of initals?) and then Miss I, who she spends the afternoons with and who also sometimes babysits for us. I'm looking for quick knits that won't bore me silly but that I can finish in the next 3.5 weeks. Add to this the fact that Mrs. A is preggers with her first wee one, so I need to do a baby present too.

Baby first: I considered a number of different sweater options before I realized that 1) I don't know what type of sprog she's popping out, and 2) I don't know what kind of colors she likes. So I'm taking the easy road out - it's Dragon time. I got some cotton/acrylic blend at the store yesterday and cast on last night.

My row gauge is seriously off, so I'm having to just figure out how many inches are needed between drecitons and work that number of rows. It took me all of "New Moon" to get this far three times. Good thing it's a horrible movie and I didn't really want to pay any attention.

So...for the teachers. I'm thinking Branching Out or something similar, particularly with some handspun. One of Boo's teachers actual knits, so I'm thinking she'd appreciate some handspun in her gift. I'm also drawn to Annis, from the new Knitty, which I might cast on in this, and see whom it seems to suit best. But I think the girls and I might be having a big dye party this week end to get some appropriate yarn for these babies.

So...the last day of school is July 7. That gives me just under four weeks. Ready, set, go!

Drummossie

So a few years ago, I knit a pair of entrelac socks. This pair, in fact, in some hideous Trekking XXL colorway that included black, grey, chartreuse, yellow and kelly green. They were something else - fun to knit, definitely challenging, but they ended up too small for me. Entrelac definitely does not have the side-to-side stretch of stockinette, so I gave them to my Mom. But I wanted to knit a pair that would fit me, and I wanted socks with entrelac on the top and stockinette on the sole.

After a bit of mucking around, I came up with these.

They ended up being for Himself - Trekking XXL for the entrelac, and a bit of Knit Picks Essential to finish off the heels and soles. I wrote the pattern up and submitted it to Knitty, but it didn't fit for them. Then last summer, I saw a call for sock designs for Sock Madness IV (which I've mentioned a bit before), and sent in the pattern for these. They liked it, and yesterday it was released as the final round pattern for this year's Madness.

The construction is either ingenious or diabolical, depending on your mood. You start with the toe, and then put half the stitches on a holder. The other half are worked as a flat entrelac panel for instep up to the ankle. Then you provisionally cast on the rest of the stitches for the leg, and knit entrelac in the round up to the cuff. The heel flap and sole are worked down from the provisional cast on, and are attached to the instep flap at either side.

So far there are six or seven pairs underway, including the four finalists. It's been a bit over 24 hours, and I'm thinking someone is going to be finished pretty darn soon. Which is amazing, since entrelac is not exactly a fast way to knit anything.

If you're on Ravelry and want to watch the contest wind down, the group board is here. I will be releasing the pattern in three sizes in the near future, so keep an eye out for it here and on Rav.