WIP Wednesday, and opinions needed :)

Is it really Wednesday already? I feel like this week just started!

I had a really hard time deciding what to talk about for today's WIP Wednesday without making it sound like the same old projects again. Yes, I'm still working on the shawl (ready to start lightest stripe), and the top (hasn't gone anywhere since my last post). Today though, I am going to talk about my headbands.

For those of you who did not see my Etsy link on the right, or even if you did, I am knitting black headbands with colorful borders and flowers to sell. They seem to be very popular around the winter time, so why not take the break time I have at work and get a head start on my inventory?

I finally bought a foam head!

I am hoping to have at least 1 a week made so that by the end of the summer I can finish them up and sell them.

In progress, this is 2 hours (four 30 min breaks at work) worth of work, will be done by tomorrow!

Here's where you all come in. I have been knitting them with black wool yarn (Paton's -- a Random Act of Kindness from a fellow Ravelor -- to be exact) and am debating whether to keep doing so or not. Would people be O.K. with acrylic? If I choose acrylic, does it have to be 'luxury' acrylic, or can I get away with something like Simply Soft?  Will it lesson the value of the product?  My thing is that for those allergic to wool, this is a nice option. Plus it's cheaper to buy for me to knit with, and also most of my customer base may not really know the difference anyways. What would you do?

And then there's the borders, made with hand dyed and spun superwash wool/nylon blend yarn. If I did acrylic, for those allergic, would this small amount of wool still irritate the wearer?

I pretty much run out of previously spun and dyed yarn, except for these 2, which I am thinking I will over dye soon. The pink because I already did one band in it. The red/yellow because I think that a different color may sell better. I am thinking of overlaying both with blue, to make the pink a purple color and then the other a purple/green variety? What do you all think?

Obviously, I cannot make up my mind on much of anything. I was debating this all day at work (all 8 hours, really!) and finally decided to ask all of you. I value your opinions so much because you are all such creative knitters and spinners!

One final thought. I don't usually reply to comments on here because I am unsure if you guys read them. If I know you read or look for replies, I will start doing so. What do you all think?

I hope the week is serving you all well! I finally got more stuff moved to my new place. It's starting to look less like an empty room and more like an empty room with boxes!

Don't forget to check out Tami's Amis for more WIP Wednesdays!

~Lisa

Sasha being awesome! Courtesy a photo message from my little sister!

Scotland Revisited

No, I am not going back to Scotland. I sure wish though. However, I did spend much of my Christmas vacation working with yarns I got while I was there this summer. Maybe I just don't buy enough wool, but all the wool I bought while I was there is somewhat scratchy, scratchier than normal but sure does seem to work well at doing it's purpose: keeping me warm.

While staying in Edinburgh, I went by a cute little knitting 'boutique' - K1 Knitting - and managed to find a couple different "Spun/dyed in Scotland yarns". While I was hoping to find more handspun type yarns what I did find was still not the norm for here in the United Stated. I managed to walk away that day with 2 balls of dk weight wool and 2 balls of a wool/angora blend.

The wool/angora blend was all set to become a cats paw scarf, a pattern I also bought at this shop, because I needed something to work on while I was over there. I didn't much done on it, mostly because I lost a needle on my plane trip back and now I am not liking the pattern. See for yourself. Should I frog it? Or keep going?? My issue is that it's really wide, and scarves get very boring for me after awhile, especially when they are the wider ones.

With the wool I purchased, I decided to try my first attempt at fingerless gloves. You probably saw these in a former blog post. I playfully call them my "Ness X Gloves" because the color of the yarn was titled "Ness" appropriately. The entire glove is an improvisation of about 4 different patterns.

After finishing them, I realized that they weren't fully ideal for the long walks to class carrying art supplies, but loved how warm my wrists were (thank you 100% wool!) so decided to use the extra to knit flaps onto them and make them convertible. And thus my new set of convertible mittens came about last week. I personally love these and am considering publishing the pattern. Any thoughts?

While visiting the Isle of Skye and the Highlands we saw many, many, many sheep and it made me want wool! There were a few shops here and there advertising home spun yarns, but we couldn't stop anywhere and it made me sad. You can imagine how estatic I was when we went into the gift shop at one of the castles and I found a whole rack of hand spun Skye wool! I quickly grabbed up the most natural yet pretty yarns I could find.

Upon winding and working with these yarns, I have established that the spinner probably did not treat her wool before/after spinning it, as it is sticky and still has some bits of hay here and there. It's also very scratchy and uneven. But I love it none the same. Having come from another country and being hand spun makes it really special to me.

I didn't know the yardage of this yarn, so I didn't want to risk starting something and running out. So I settled on my standby headband. I chose a different pattern this time though: Serendipity Ear Band, and after much struggle with the crochet parts, managed to produce this:

It's scratchy yet warm, and very pretty and large. It looks pretty good on me and I have enough yarn I could probably make a second.

Overall, all my fiber finds in Scotland were successful and it makes me want to travel more just to check out the different local yarns. Anyone reading ever been anywhere outside of the USA and experienced some fun yarns? I would love to hear and learn all about international fibers.

~Lisa

A Warm Wool Winter

Winter vacation is always a great time for getting some serious knitting done, and this year was no exception. I still have a week left of break, and it will be spent finishing a painting, working at the pre-school and hopefully some more knitting time!

Winter vacation was barely winter this year. The weather has been in the 40's and 50's the whole time and we have only had one fluke snow storm here in Kansas. The combination of the warm weather and the excessive fiber art that was going on in my house leads me to call this a very Warm Wool Winter.

The first thing I decided to conquer with my newly found free time was this amazing pair of socks.

Knitted using magic loop, one at a time, and Zitron Trekking 6ply (one of my new favorite sock yarns, yet very hard to find). The pattern is Soft Waves from the book Toe-up Two at a Time Socks, which I used to teach my self the toe up technique, something I had never tried before. I think it was a complete success!

While I was knitting on the socks, I was also finishing up my purple wool that I started way back this summer. I managed to finish this by the end of week one, and got it plyed and set on Christmas Day.

As a knitter, I couldn't just let the yarn sit in a plastic bag in my drawer. So I decided that there was actually enough to make something with and found the perfect pattern: Diagonal ribbed cowl. Knit on size 8 fixed circs, I had this thing done in less than 3 days.

Finishing this led me to need a new project to work on and so I decided to spin up the amazing 100% alpaca roving I purchased back in October. It was so soft, but really hard to draft because of this. The end result is something I am really proud of and one of the better yarns I ever spun.

The original roving was black, tan and white striped, so I didn't want to lose that pretty design in the final product and therefor I didn't pull apart pieces the way I usually do, and in turn I didn't produce as much yarn. I did produce enough to finish a hat though! The had is very soft and I absolutely love it! It's a little big, which means I should have cast on a few less stitches, but when you have thick and thin yarn (like all my handspun tends to be) it's hard to figure out the gauge, let alone knit a gauge swatch. That's one of my goals, to one day be able to figure out the gauge and 'weight' of the yarn that I have spun.

In between the cowl and the hat I was able to work on my Effortless Cardigan and it is slowly coming together. It still has quite a bit to go though.

With one week left, I plan to work on my ever growing collection of Relay for Life Dishcloths; hopefully I'll get 2 or 3 more done, so I can have a decent amount to sell this spring at farmer's market.

I hope all my readers are enjoying any time off and are keeping to any New Years resolutions. Until next time,

~Lisa

Well, That's a First!

I like puns :)

In case you are wondering, this post is all about the "firsts" I am acheiving this month in the world of knitting and spinning.

First on the list is a project I am making with some wool I got at K1 knitting boutique in Edinburgh, Scotland. It's going to be a set of fingerless gloves. Why a first? Well 1, I've never made fingerless gloves, and 2, I am improvising the pattern. I am taking the construction from a basic gloves pattern, using the math of another fingerless pattern to know when to cut off the fingers, and creating my own cable design to go on the outside of the hand. The cable shown in that pattern is not the design I am creating, but it is the chart I am basically working from. When they're done they should have an X across the front of them.

Second on the list is my first handspun with my new spindle. I am not sure of the weight (The owner of Wicked Stitch didn't tell me...) but it's heavier, which means thicker plys. It's also being spun with my FIRST (Sensing a pattern here?) Wilton Food Dye dyed roving, and I really love how it turned out! It's various shades of blues, greens and yellow and it looks so pretty! And the thicker plys make it softer too.

And that leads us to the next first, my FIRST sweater! Ok, it's actually a cardigan, but what's the difference? I am using this very pretty shade of Berocco Vintage (My old standby for worsted socks) and so far it really is effortless, hense the name "Effortless Cardigan". I am only 6 rows in, and it seems like it may take awhile, but I am up for the challenge.

No I did not take this picture, it's a very nice picture taken by one of my test knitters for my first published (and for sale) pattern! I'm so excited about these because they are super basic and cheap and all proceeds go to Relay For Life. Here we go again with that, but I am really passionate about that cause.

The next 5-6 weeks are going to be torture. My teachers are pushing me so hard, and I'm grateful for it, but also burned out. I don't really feel like doing anything, but I have no choice. School should come first, but I'm having a hard time lately remembering that. Wish me luck as the next weeks speed by.

~Lisa