sweetgeorgia

Life before drum carder.

But lest you think it was just the shoes that pushed me over the edge and got me drum carder crazy, here’s what really made me crazy:

I blended some hand dyed Merino with plain white French Angora and a bit of hand dyed Angelina (might be Blue Moon Spinnery?) by hand using some coarse Ashford hand cards. It really wasn’t much fun — do I have too much merino? too much angora? Is it even? This would be so much easier with a drum carder?

The Angora guard hairs really pop out and give it a spiky look. I don’t mind — I think it looks kind of interesting, but it may not be so interesting if you want to knit it and wear it around your sensitive neck.

The skein was washed, whacked (for some fulling) and all chopped up into 5-yard samples. And the samples, well, they are travelling the world now in the KR Handspun Yarn Swap.

Thursday, whatever.

I’m feeling a little scattered (scatter-brained) right now, finding it difficult to concentrate on one thing at a time. I mean a little knitting, a little spinning, a little dyeing. Tonight, we’re planning on going out to a movie so I’ll be able to get my sock finished — knitting plain stockinette in the round, in the dark, is the best. And I am but inches away from finishing the sleeve cap of the Manly Sweater, so hopefully that sweater will be blocked, seamed and done by the end of this weekend.

But anyway, while my mind is racing between current projects and future fall projects, here’s the sock yarn I dyed a few days ago:

Over the past few weeks since the trip to Salt Spring Island, I spun up a bit of angora fibre that I bought there. I found this fibre kind of “high-maintenance” — I mean the staple length is really quite short and the fibre itself is slippery, so I found that it would break often or I would lose my spinning… But here it is, plied and skeined.

It’s not yet finished — I’m planning on felting it a little as I’ve heard is good with angora. You alternate between washing the skein in hot water and ice cold water to shock it and then whap it against the table to agitate the fibres. All this helps the little slippery fibres hold together better. I guess it is all worth it though, this yarn is so soft!

And finally, I’ve gotten to the end of the first ball of KSH on Birch. It’s nearly six repeats. Notice the new needles? They are blue! (And the 5mm ones come in lovely lavendar!) They are Boye circulars — less than half the cost of Addi’s. I bought these on Wendy’s recommendation and they are actually quite nice for KSH. The tips are pointier, the painted aluminum finish is not as slippery, and the join is sufficiently smooth. I like. The only thing I don’t like is the cord — it’s stiffer and has a mind of it’s own.