Friday 22 June 2012

Oh Bother

Due to my Landlord not maintaining the property terribly well water got into my ADSL line and I lost Internet connection for a week or so.

This gave me plenty of time to get acquainted with the spinning wheel I borrowed from Vivian.

I discovered that while the bobbins for my wheel (Which needs a part made for it so it will work!) fit on Vivian's, they're a shade too small and make an absolutely appalling noise that drive the cat from the house and darn near drove me up the wall!

 It takes a surprisingly short time to fill a bobbin when you're watching Pirate movies! A good swordfight always gets the blood - and your foot - pumping.

In order to get more than a total of one single made, I was forced to stop every time the bobbin was full and wind the single off into a centre-pull ball before I could continue. Centre-pull balls are a great way to store your singles if you intent to ply them at a later date. Just make sure you keep tabs on where the end in the middle went, I didn't and made a right mess of it before giving up and using the one from the outside.

Yay, knots.

Not.

Note that it is probably wise to shut the cat out of the room where you're spinning if you think there is even the slightest chance you'll be chasing balls of yarn across the floor.

Cats+Yarn=Tangles. Lots and lots of tangles.

Happy spinning!

~Topaz

Thursday 7 June 2012

Such a Winter's Day!

Brrr, the cold has set in with a vengeance!

I'm freezing my fingers and toes off, and recent snow falls actually settled on the Peninsula.



Sounds like the perfect time to learn lacework, right?

(Hey, I never claimed to be logical!)

The wonderful Vivian at Knitting Squad taught a mini-workshop on Wednesday where we made little lacy Christmas angels, to teach the basics of knitted lacework to those who wanted to learn.

Ta-dah!


Recognise the yarn? XD I'm so ridiculously proud of this little pink-punk angel, Dralion loves her too. Or maybe it's the bell she's holding? With cats it's anybody's guess!

Next week we will be doing the bigger pattern, and I can't wait. I want to be able to follow a lace chart on my own so I can turn this wonderful yarn I found in Oamaru into a lovely lacy wrap for going to my partner's formal-type functions. (He seems to have a lot of things like that)

This is the yarn, a laceweight Kid Mohair&Merino made by Touch Yarns:


It looks and feels AMAZING! I'm so incredibly excited about this project that the provisional cast-on it requires (a technique which intimidates the stuffing out of me) seems like nothing more than a speed-bump.

Also: The skein was approximately 900m and I wound it by hand instead of resorting to my ball-winder. I definitely appreciate those time-saving gizmos a lot more now!

Happy crafting!

~Topaz