My first handspun yarn

I finally started spinning my own yarn. I bought a spindling starter kit last September, but it was just lying - until about two weeks ago. Since I do not know anyone who is spindling and can show me, I am relying on youtube videos and a Craftsy class to learn how to do it.

The starter kit came with about 100 grams of top in a nice dark brown (the picture only shows a small portion of it). I fear I can't tell you what kind of wool it is - I just don't know!

Anyway, my plan was to try spinning two singles and then ply them together. So I spun up about half the material I had and ended up with this single:

The thickness of the yarn varied greatly, it was quite lumpy bumpy especially at the start, but my spinning got more even towards the end. So the next thing I did was spinning up the rest of the roving - and I loved the result! Of course it was not perfect - how could it be after just a couple of sittings - but the thickness of the yarn was way more consistent than on my first try. I was so excited that I even forgot to take a picture... Anyway, because of the huge difference in how my two singles looked I decided to chain ply them individually rather than make a 2-ply yarn out of those very different singles.

The first third or so of my first wonky single didn’t really ply very well, and the yarn even broke at one point - I guess it was the yarn I produced during my first sitting and I didn’t put enough twist into it. After that plying ran slightly smoother, and while the result looked quite bumpy as a whole, I did actually see some stretches of yarn that look really nice. 

Plying the second single was a much more pleasant experience than plying the first one, although the yarn still broke once near the end - at a point where I had obviously rushed a join after the yarn had broken during spinning (I was able to fix it, though). My second yarn came out a lot more even than the first one - there still are some slightly thinner or thicker stretches, but the differences are by far not as extreme as in the first one. Overall I have to say I am really pleased with the look of my second plied yarn.

Right, so how much yarn did I make? My first wonky skein weighs in at 43 grams (1.5 oz), and has about 18 meters (just under 20 yards). Most of it is bulky to super bulky. The second skein is 51 grams (1.8 oz) and about 43.5 m (46.5 yards) of worsted to aran weight yarn. Just for comparison, a picture of both skeins together:

I had so much fon making my first yarn(s) that I have already bought more wool to spin. Just trying to decide what my next yarn will be... Bluefaced Leicester, Icelandic Sheep or Coburg Fox Sheep?

FO: Knubbelinchen

A couple of weeks ago I came across this cute doll pattern (Knubbelchen)  and knew I had to make one for my little girl. This month the Beginner's KAL group on ravelry included it in their suggested patterns for the monthly KAL - the KAL theme being stash busting. So I had my excuse for casting on rightaway in spite of all the projects I've got going on anyway. I had lots of leftovers of brightly coloured cotton yarn and decided to go with those... it would be a very colourful doll. Also, I decided to knit the girly version with the skirt.

The pattern is very well written, and it's a quick and enjoyable knit. But by far the best thing about making this little doll was to see Helena's happy face when I gave it to her a couple of days ago. She had seen me working on it and got really excited when I told her that I was making it for her.

WIPs - Old and new...

Blackberry Mystery Shawl

I have so fallen behind on this mystery! The last clue (number 5) is out, and I just started clue 3... To my excuse, I have been focussing on swap projects lately (which have to stay secret a while longer). Anyway, I am greatly enjoying the shawl pattern, but it's something I can only work on when my little girl is asleep, so it will be a couple of weeks before this will be finished.

Oh, and this is what the pattern looked like after the second clue (only one section of the shawl shown):

I love how it's turning out so far


Sock Yarn Blanket

I made four more squares for the blanket so far - so I've got five in total now. Just after I had finished the last of these squares I noticed that I had forgotten to give them a slip stitch edging. Oh well, it will make picking up stitches for the second row of squares a bit fiddly, but other than that I should be fine. I'll try to remember the slipped stitches for my next couple of squares...

Shadowboxing Socks

Started another pair of socks. Joined one of this month's HiyaHiya sock KALs again. This is the easiest HiyaHiya pattern I've knit so far, and it doesn't have cables for a change. I love the simplicity of this pattern!

I am now in the middle of the foot - the picture shows the socks right after finishing the gusset shaping.

FOs: Two more bags!

I made bags again last week to get some more sewing practise - I especially wanted to practise using zippers again. Someone had recommended tutorials for a Pyramid Purse and a Box Bag to me a while back and I had wanted to try them ever since. Both tutorials were quite easy to follow, and the bags turned out really cute (even though my topstitching along the zipper of the box bag is a bit wonky).

I made the pyramid purse a little bigger than the tutorial version - I used a 15 cm zip - but it is still tiny. I think it will serve nicely as a small notions bags. The box bag is a nice size to hold a smaller project such as socks. More bags to follow shortly, I guess...

Pattern: Archaeopteryx Felted Messenger Bag

A couple of months ago I took part in an endangered & extinct species themed swap with the Geek & Nerd Swap group on ravelry. I couldn't get the idea of knitting a bag with an Archaeopteryx fossil on it out of my head... But for some reason, knitting patterns for Archaeopteryx bags seem to be hard to find (and for some reason my husband was surprised to find me surprised at that discovery...) - so I decided to come up with my own design.

I wanted a nice size messenger style bag, sturdy enough to hold a book or two, I had recently discovered the fun in knit-felting, and I figured the easiest way to get that fossil on the bag would be duplicate stitching it on. So with all those parameters decided, I started calculating stitch and row counts to get the size of bag I wanted, taking into account about 30% of shrinkage in the felting process, charted the fossil design, knit, knit, and knit again, seamed, duplicate stitched and tried to keep calm while the bag was felting in my washing machine. This is what I ended up with:

I couldn't have been happier with the result!

As I've mentioned, I made this for a swap, so I knew I wouldn't keep the bag - but I wanted to be able to make another one for myself one fine day (that hopefully comes soon), so I took lots of notes. Now, I finally decided to turn those notes into something like a pattern. It's available for free on ravelry: Archaeoptery Bag pattern.

FOs: New Oaklet Shawl and Blue Mystery Socks

New Oaklet Shawl

I finally blocked my shawl. I must say that blocking has transformed it from something that looked... yeah, nice... to an absolutely beautiful accessory.

It's grown into a good size shawl now- about 1,5 m from tip to tip - and the fabric turned out nicely drapey, just as I expected.

Here's a close-up of the lace pattern - it reminds me of tiny butterflies.

Blue Mystery Socks

I also finished my socks for the Solid Socks Mystery KAL. I love these socks - they are so pretty! The pattern runs through to the toes - I've never done that before. They are also a very nice fit. I'm looking forward to wearing them a lot.