The grass is growing

Well, actually it's Mystic Meadows which is growing. It's going pretty well and I'm really enjoying the knitting so far. The only other knitting I've been doing this week is a plain stocking stitch sock, I needed a 'no concentration needed' project as well.

More alpaca to spin

Why do I do it? Not content with having nearly enough mid brown alpaca spun up to knit a sweater or jacket, I've gone and bought 500g each of two other colours of alpaca fibre to contrast with it. So now I have some dark brown and some white as well. I've made a start on the dark brown, the picture is 50g of singles. In addition I spun some more of the dark chestnut fleece I bought last year.

This is over 120g and 222m of roughly aran weight. Once I get the other two colours done, I'll have to get designing. I'm going to have to find some willpower from somewhere, because I also want to dye and spin some BFL for socks.


The Charade variation socks are finished. They fit fine and I'm happy with them. I'm still not too fond of short row heels, but at least I know I can do them if I want. These were knitted on a 2.5mm circular needle with 72 stitches.

Lace knitting has had a little break since I finished Secret of the stole ii about a week ago. It isn't blocked yet, so no picture. The weather is so damp and dull, it would take forever to dry. Still, the chart for Mystic Meadows was released today, and I cast on. It looks promising so far, but there isn't much to see yet.

Having dithered about Jewel, I finally opted to rip back far enough to change it to a smaller size. It seems that a couple of inches of positive ease was too much, so now I'm aiming for no ease at all. This seems to actually fit quite nicely and with just a few more rounds on the body to do, I'll soon be on the sleeves.

The colour of meadows

As part of the preparations for taking part in the Mystic Meadows KAL, I've been preparing some yarn. I wanted to use a non-solid colour of fingering yarn and decided that I would try to dye my own. Three skeins needed to be dyed at the same time, so first I had to get a suitable dyeing vessel. Previously, I've only dyed 100g at a time in the microwave, but this needed to be a bigger dyelot. Luckily, M&S are currently offering 7 litre stock pots at a good price, (stainless steel with a glass lid) which proved to be ideal. The idea was to create a range of greens to reflect my idea of meadowland, but the first attempt was a bit off colourwise. Very yellow-green. I had prepared three different greens, then dipped opposite ends of the skeins in each of the first two, followed by total immersion in the third. Something wasn't quite right obviously.


Realizing that this wasn't quite what I wanted, I overdyed the whole lot with blue, and finished up with multishaded greens, maybe a bit darker than I had planned, but still pleasing.


The swatch for the KAL was released today, so I'm all ready now.


The Tidal Wave socks are finished, I really enjoyed working with this yarn (merino/tencel) and the socks feel so soft on my feet. It's almost a shame it's nearly sandal weather.

Sometimes, life gets in the way of knitting

Having realised that I haven't written anything here for over a week and a half, I thought I'd better try. Blogging about not very much seems a bit pointless really, but this is supposed to be my fibre related journal, so I'm going to do it. It's hard to isolate the reason, but there are no FOs, nothing started, and only a bit of progress on Secret of the Stole ii. I'm halfway through the penultimate clue, and I'm finding it hard to keep enthusiastic about it. I'm past the heel turn and gusset decreases on the second Tidal Wave sock and on to the plain stockinette of the foot.

I've spun up a little of my mid brown alpaca, and spent some time this morning carding some more.

We're having a warm spell of weather at the moment, and I think Mollie has the right idea.

Done and blocked

Mystic Light is done. It's been a really nice knitalong, and the design is lovely. It used a bit less than 200g of yarn, and it stretched out to about 34" deep and 68" across. I'm glad I learned to cable without a cable needle which is easier than I thought it would be.


Progress on anything else has been slow, but I have made a start on the second Tidal Wave sock. I couldn't resist reversing the pattern to make a mirror image of the first one. This merino/tencel yarn is so soft, it's very nice to knit.

A lesson learned (again)

You would think that a fundamental like swatching using the exact same needles or hook that you intend to use for the item itself would be obvious. I know this, so why I didn't do it I don't know.

I bought this book by Doris Chan having seen rave reviews on a couple of blogs. The garments are worked top down with raglan shaping which is nice for trying on as you go. Anyhow, the swatch you can see was worked with my grotty old plastic 6mm hook and I got exact gauge for Jewel. Jubilant, I started out using my 6mm Clover soft touch hook which I really like. The rest is predictable really. Of course my gauge was off with this hook, instead of 3" for 2 pattern repeats, I was getting 2.75". No problem, I'd just do extra rows and increases. I finished the yoke and laid it flat to measure, when I noticed that the raglan increases weren't laying flat, there was a bulge in the same place on each one. I'd followed the pattern for my size, but it seemed as if there was one increase round too many early in the yoke.

So, I ripped nearly all of it out and continued with the old plastic hook. I omitted the offending row, and currently I'm nearly to the armpit on this version with the raglans laying flat so far. This picture shows progress before this evenings crochet frenzy.

My Mystic Light shawl is approaching completion, almost half way through the final clue. I'm going to be sad when this one is done, I've really enjoyed knitting it. Looking on the bright side though, I'll be able to wear it.

Lots of Alpaca

I thought I'd never see the day, but this batch of Alpaca is spun, plied and washed. There is 910m weighing 492g. Not quite enough for a sweater, so I will have to spin up some of the darker brown to get the yardage. Then I'll have to get ingenious with designing something which works with the yarn I have.

I started a sock using 64sts on a 2.75mm needle with the merino/tencel yarn, colourway Devilishly Red which came from this seller on eBay. It feels so soft, and I'm really enjoying working with it. The pattern is Tidal Wave socks which is a simple pattern with a lot of effect for a little work. I'm just past the heel turn at the moment. It'll be interesting to see what happens to the patterning at the instep, but I like it so far.