Wool For Brains

The Thirteenth Floor rip I have a list of things that must be done this week and “visit blog” is not one of them. I have “cancel papers” and “buy sundress” but most of the list starts “sow…” followed by the name of a herb or vegetable. I am popping in to exhibit knitting on the strict understanding that I’m not really here because I’m so Very Busy trying to remove things off the list faster than I write them on at the bottom.

Top of the knitting that I’m not showing you because I’m not here is yet another BSJ. This is the last one I promise, it’s just that I came across this ball of stripey yarn and another co-ordinating ball that was begging to find its way out of the bag of leftovers and as I hadn’t actually put the pattern away I was vulnerable. This time I will put the pattern away as soon as I cast off so that I don’t accidentally start another.

This would appear to be the start of a sock. I’m not sure how that happened as I am off sock knitting for the summer but it certainly does look like a sock to me. This might have a patterned cuff or it might continue in two colours to the toe, I have a vague idea of what I want it to look like but I’m quite happy to knit along and let it sort itself out. Progress is very slow because I’m not actually knitting at the moment, “knit” is not on my list at all. As an aside, there’s more to these arty shots than there seems to be. I may try again with an attempt at composition and focus because I certainly missed both with this photo.

The pile of alpaca fibre is no more, it’s now a pile of single and some plied yarn. The plan (because unlike the sock I do have a plan for this) is to make it into a three ply, wash it in an attempt to make it clean, dry it and then ply it again. I think I stand more chance of getting the dirt out before it’s made into the final cabled yarn. It would have been a good idea to have got all the dirt out of the fibre at the start rather than getting it half clean but there was such a lot of it and washing is boring. I wanted to get on with it and the result is that I get another stage of washing now. I’m sure there is a lesson in there trying desperately to get out but I’m not listening lalalala.

There will be no blog next week, it’s half term and we are heading for the sun. The temperatures are forecast to be between 82-88 F so although I’m taking the sock I can’t see that it’s going to grow much while I’m away. I bet the weeds do though.

Just at the moment I don’t have all my mind on wool. As usual I can be seen wandering about with the teapot in my hand ignoring the world around me while I concentrate on planning things but at the moment my thoughts don’t have anything at all to do with fibre. My thinking time has been spent on deciding the priority order for jobs at the allotment and a big chunk of my day has been spent carrying out the plan. I’m not caught up yet but I can see that I will be soon. I gave myself the day off yesterday after I’d dug out the compost heap and then couldn’t raise my arms above my head. I nipped out of bed one night earlier in the week to go to the bathroom only to find that “nip” was not an available option and that a more realistic choice would have been “hobble” or “fall down”. My day time knitting time is spent fighting weeds and at night I’m too tired to think about anything other than vegging in front of the tv. It’s now Thursday and I haven’t touched a knitting needle since the weekend.

I’ve also demonstrated that this won’t spin itself. This is the very last of the shabby white alpaca, the pile that was in the bedroom was joined by another four bags before it started getting smaller. I’m not making much progress (see “exhaustion” and “lack of time” above) but like the weed bashing, the end is in sight. I get two batts on a bobbin so there’s all of three bobbins left now which is two day’s spinning if I actually sit and spin.

I did get to sit yesterday and sew up a couple of seams, a sign that this had been the day off from digging. I’d originally planned to finish these with an icord edging like on the last one that I made but I started and ripped that on both jackets. The darker pink Opal was slightly thinner than the lighter Auracania Ranco and although it didn’t matter too much in the body of the jacket it pulled horribly at the edging. It was the same story with the blue, I’d found a solid purple for the edging, the colour was perfect but it was slightly lighter in weight and the icord was just wrong. I don’t have buttons for these and it will be weeks until I have the time and energy to get some so I’m calling them done.

The weather forecast was originally for rain today, then it was rain on Friday and now it’s no rain in the next five days. There goes my idea for another day off tomorrow.

It’s that time of year when usually I lay off knitting socks. It’s warm, I’m wearing sandals and so I don’t need to address the sad state of my sock drawer until October because I shan’t be wearing many socks until then. With impeccable timing I’ve just finished two pairs that will sit unworn until the weather turns cold (which with the Great British Summer will probably be June sometime).

These are Firebirds, the first sock of the Tsock Flock Club. They were great fun, I learned that I love plaited basket weave stitch in small amounts, I found that Russian loop stitch has a name (I am struggling to remember where I’ve used this before, it was a long time ago in a sweater far, far away) and I made my first sock with a picot edge. The second was very much easier than the first because I didn’t have to try it on every three rows to check that it fitted. I followed the pattern except for the heel, I moved it by three rows, worked it over a different number of stitches and worked it down to fewer unwrapped stitches in the centre. They fit nicely and they were worth the effort. I’m still unsure about the embroidery on the birdie’s tail. One sock has an odd feather embroidered here and there and the other has none at all. Knowing me I’ll probably spend the next four years deciding which I like the best by which time I’ll have lost the embroidery thread anyway.

These are the first pair from my ministripe dyeing experiment and although they are so very much simpler than the Firebirds I like these too. These were the round and round tv knitting pair and they practically knitted themselves. Yet again I’ve gone for a heel flap and gusset rather than a no gusset short row heel and I still can’t work out why I’ve gone back to this heel when I prefer the other for my socks.

I do have more than the odd ball of sock yarn hanging about but I don’t have the urge for socks just now so the sensible thing to do would be to knit something from sock yarn that is not socks. This is the start of a baby surprise jacket in a three ply superwash merino. I did spin it to be sock yarn but it is so soft that I can’t see that it would wear all that well. My thinking was soft+superwash=baby item and as it stripes I thought it would make a pretty BSJ. I was a couple of inches into it when I had a lightbulb moment, one of those where you wonder how you can be so slow on the uptake to have never have thought of it before. I have a pile of sock yarn leftovers that I’m always looking to use up – why have I never thought of knitting some of them into a surprise jacket? When I’ve finished this one I’ll be starting another from the scrap bag.

This is also sock yarn, the same yarn as went into the mini stripe sock. There’s 900g here and this will be a sweater for me (not the adult surprise although I do have the pattern) once I’ve decided what colours I might like it. This might take me some time because I’m changing my mind on a daily basis. It’s now Thursday and so far this week I’ve settled on grey with plum and gold highlights, hunter green with navy and gold accents, plum with gold and navy accents and brown with green and gold. I’m now thinking that dark green and navy would be good with just a little gold and plum. There is a downside to dyeing and that is having too much choice.

Arabian Adventure full

I did finish up with a cake that looked enough like a narrow boat to pass muster but it wasn’t as good as I’d planned. This was in part because there wasn’t enough of the black ready to roll icing to cover the bottom of the boat but mainly because I hadn’t enough experience with icing to make it do what I wanted. I didn’t think I was asking for much as all I wanted was for it to cover the cake but it was something of a learning experience. It was a simple enough idea, cut up two Madeira cakes and cover them with icing. The problem was that the icing stuck to the rolling pin and the work surface but not to the cake, even though I had painted the cake with sticky shredless marmalade as instructed. In my mind it would have looked fantastic but in real life not so. The good thing is that no-one else could see what I had planned and didn’t know by just how much the reality had fallen short.

The bag is another case where the reality didn’t match up with my idea. I swapped the handle to a braided one that I’d seen on Ravelry but mine needs something to tie it together as it doesn’t stay braided. This is of my own doing, I was running out of the fibre and the last bit, the bit that went into the handle, had more silk than the rest. This means that it’s not felted to the same extent as the rest of the bag. This is partly a good thing as the handle was a bit on the short side anyway (due to the running out of fibre thing) and it’s ended up about the right length. I think the fix is to add some leaves around the lip of the bag and an icord vine running through the handle to give it a bit more bulk and lash it together. This is a sometime later thing, at some point the right leaf and the right yarn will present itself and I’ll finish it up. I would certainly knit this again, I particularly like the shaping on the bag that makes the top smaller than the base. That should avoid the embarrassment of setting it down and having the contents tip out through a suddenly gaping opening.

To make a nice line up of three dodgy things, here is some yarn that certainly didn’t meet my expectations. I bought it from the sale bin of a well known indie dyer and I’d assumed that it was cheap because of the unintentional white patches on the skein. I thought I was getting 200g of unattractive cashmere/silk sock yarn that I could fling dye on and transform. Well it was no duckling. The clue was when I picked it up and a cloud of dust came out. I soaked it and the water was cloudy, dyed it and the water was cloudy, put it through the washer and there were clods of loose fibre in the drum. “Shedding” does not begin to cover what this yarn is still doing, the clouds of fibre in the photo are from the yarn that’s been soaked, dyed and washed. If anyone can think of something that it’s good for they can have it, my own belief is that it is fit only for the dustbin.

On the positive side, the three day weekend turned out much better than planned. This was no doubt helped by the fact that we hadn’t planned to do anything at all but ended up going to Twycross Zoo on Saturday and Hardwick Hall and Stainsby watermill on Sunday (go and see Mr WFB’s blog for more photos). We had two brilliant days out, helped by it being a dry and sunny bank holiday weekend. We had three and a half hours at the zoo and still didn’t get as far as the parrots which is a pity as they are usually a good inspiration for sock yarn. In the absence of parrots I fancy trying to dye a flamingo. I know that Opal did a flamingo yarn (I knitted those socks) but having seen the real thing I’m not convinced that the colours were right.

It’s now weed-growing season and my allotment needs me. If I’m not here as much then that’s where I am, pulling up weeds, pushing in seeds or counting asparagus spears (I have two so far but it’s early yet). Do not send out a search party unless they come armed with hoes and forks in which case they would be very welcome.