Today I looked at the yarn. Then I put it back. We had a moment.

The end.

Dragon's hide yarn

Goodness gracious, there is no end in sight for this pound of roving.  I've got about half a bobbin to ply and another braid to spin, which should be close to done, but it feels like the more I spin the more there is to spin.  One day I will be able to post with a picture.

Fan-girl Squee!

Miss Violet of the Lime and Violet podcast has friended me on twitter. :]

A Victorious Return!

I returned from five days in Ashland, OR today and brought with me new water bottle, a couple rings and of course, some yarn. Really, I only got a single skein!

After wandering around the local textile-whores' paradise last Thursday I had an armful of all sorts of beautiful yarns, everything from merino and alpaca to linen and silk. Considering the damage it would do to my already slim pocketbook I begrudgingly tried to whittle down the stash to a skein or two. I was stuck and couldn't make up my mind when my Boy handed me yet another skein of something soft and beautiful. But this time I didn't just add it to the pile, I put all the rest back and bought my skein of beautiful Linares Sportweight Yarn (colorweigh 508).

The boy and I had been looking at patterns together and I had a sort of vision of what I want to make. I cast on too many stitches the first time becasue I hadn't found a pattern i liked yet and had to frog it all back but now I'm well on my way to knitting a light hat for cool summer and

autumn evenings in California. I'm done with the ribbing but now I need to go get myself stitchmarkers since the ones we bought in Oregon seem to have stayed With the Boy's knitting, not mine.

Of course the trip up was not made amazing by the yarn alone. Thursday night we went to see the Oregon Shakespeare Company's production of Macbeth. It was awesome!!! The seats were front row and it's by chance alone we didn't get spit on by the actors. Peter macon was an amazing Macbeth and his performance was just as good as his performance of Othello which we saw last year. I stand by my statement of the last several years: the 8 hour drive and $50 tickets (now you know why I was strappd for cash) is definitely worth it. Check out OSFAshland.org for more info on this season's shows. I highly suggest going.

And the sweater trudges on...

So my partner got me the amazing Knitting Lingerie Style book for Christmas along with the yarn to make one of the sweaters in it for Christmas.  I knit up the sweater to wear to a friend's birthday party in January, but when I tried it on, it was much too big, and I frogged it and cast on the next size down.  Finally, 7 months later, I have almost all of the pieces knit.  I have one more sleeve to finish and then I can sew it together!

Phase two!

Phase two, the spinning begins.  I sat down and got a 2 ply skein of light fingering weight yarn spun up today.   

 Here is the first bobbin of it spun before plying. 

We have a buttload more of roving to spin.  Freya dyed an entire pound. It is superwash though, so it is spinning up slightly differently. I am really enjoying it.  In addition to the pound of dragon that I am working on that is slowly taking over my life and room, I have a few updates on personal projects.  I went to Maker Faire about a month ago and bought a oz braid of roving that was solar dyed, a process that we are thinking of exploring here at Wildwoodyarn.  I didn't get around to getting Freya to take a picture of it before I spun it, since she is far better about pictures and the blogging, but here is it all spun up.  

  

I am not sure what I want to do with it yet.  I think I want to make something for my friend that took me to Maker Faire, but I'm not sure what.  However, it will have to take the back burner while I get our new color-ways spun up.

A new plan!

Ria and I have been schemeing. Since my spinning-wheel is still in repairs, my spinning is slooooow work. However, I love to dye stuff. On the other hand Ria feels her color sense isn't up to snuff (I think she's come up with some cool stuff but whatever) but she spinns like spider.

WITH OUR POWERS COMBINED... We're going to put out a new line of yarns. Dyed by me and spun by Ria. Inspired by my lover-boy's passion for dragons, I've given this line of yarns a theme! Our first colorway, "Dragon's hide" is a dark mottle of blood reds and midnight blues with greens and browns throughout. The roving is pictured at the right.

I am also going to be putting out a line of hand dyed sock yarns in a faerie theme in the near future. I'll be doing some research into faerie mythology before I get started on this project but I suspect it'll give me a wide range of themes to work with.

Now I've got a craft day to get back to! It's going to be a productive day with everyone here.