What I made, by Sharon

  On Friday night we hosted my parents for Shabbat dinner, and I finally remembered to get a photo! And here's my mother, with sitting on her lap. Saturday was gloriously quiet. We slept in and lay around reading and then cleaned the house. I went to practice time at Pole and then the supermarket. It really was a blissfully quiet day! I did finish plying my latest spinning project. It's Australian Polworth and I got 800 metres from 200 grams, so it's a light fingering. It puffed up a lot on finishing, and I am so looking forward to knitting with it. I'm going to make The Beeswax Shawl  for the Richmond Knitters Bendigo knit-a-long. I'm obsessed with how pretty it is, and don't even want to put it away, I just want to leave it on the coffee table and admire it. Sunday was another gloriously slow start. I did start my next spinning project, sampling some long draw. More on that when i work out what I am doing! d then we went down the road to see Lulu. I'd call...

I finished spinning some yarn in February  and I got it on the needles within to months! I think the only thing more delightful than  spinning a project and knitting it up right away might be doing that, and having it come out this well: I love this yarn and I love the resulting shawl. I'm also quite surprised I got a shawl this big out of about 370 meters of yarn. Please also note the personalised Richmond Knitters t-shirt, courtesy of Sonia's artwork and StickerMule 's deal on t-shirts. I'm not sure I should have been let loose on that website. Stay tuned for more spinning, knitting and personalised things ordered from the internet! 

I know many regular spinners who would not think that a finished skein of yarn is worthy of a post of its own, but for  me this is so rare I think it deserves a celebration. I think I started spinning this in June 2022. It's from Ixchel , a lovely blend of silk and bunny and merino. Then my shoulder started to hurt when I was spinning. I found out why, and how to easily prevent it, but life got busy, I did a bunch of  crocheting and spent my home down-time on polymer clay creations. When I was inspired to sit down and spin last week it only took me a weekend to finish the second braid and ply it. I do love long draw. It makes for such a relaxing spin, and beautiful airy yarn. It's 377 metres for 160 grams of fibre, probably about an 8 ply. I'm planning on spinning up some darker fibre  I have in stash and making a Hitch on the Move ... probably in about 2026!

I got pinged as a possible COVID contact again yesterday. That's twice in 10 days, for those following along at home. I had not brought my work lap-top home last night and I feel really tired. So, we went and got tested this morning and then I went to a work meeting, with no camera and no mic, and then called in sick for the rest of the day. I expect I'm tired because I didn't sleep well last night and living through a pandemic is exhausting. I was meant to be going to my parents with the rest of the family to celebrate Chanukah, but I don't think we'll have our test results by then. I'd bought everyone presents and everything. Fingers crossed that my text come though soon, since it's the Richmond Knitters Christmas Dinner tomorrow night, and I would really like to go. Until  my text message comes all I can do is lie on the couch and read, and keep preparing this endless, endless fleece. 

I'm at a weird stage with my knitting. I've knit most of what I want / need. I'm enjoying some charity knitting, but I'm finding my craft energy is going into new things, things I'm not so familiar with. Tis weekend I've been processing the small amount of fleece I bought and washed last month .  I pulled out my drum carder, which I bought in 2011  and which I've barely used. It was living in my parents storage loft. I'd forgotten how much work it is to prepare fleece for spinning. It's not the drum carding that takes the time, it's the flicking and lock preparation. It is worth the effort to do it properly though. But it does make beautiful lofty batts, that will be  a pleasure to spin, once I get it all processed.  This weekend I also assembled the Dropcloth Samplers Christmas ornaments I've been embroidering. They have been a real pleasure to work on, and I felt very creative, choosing colours and stitches. Well, i feel clever now. There ...

Last Saturday I started a spinning project to soothe me through the current lockdown. On Sunday the wheel was feeling and sounding really clunky and not quite right. I loosed and tightened everything you can loosen and tighten on the wheel and it didn't really help. I emailed Majacraft in New Zealand, and we worked out that the crankshaft had worn out.  I needed to order a new one, but most of the sellers in Australia order then in... from New Zealand, which, given the current postal situation would take weeks. Majacraft put me in touch with Virginia Farm Woolworks in Sydney, who were very helpful and got the part in the mail last Tuesday. Meanwhile I could still spin, even with the issues. I spun the first bobbin I was working on and decided that I want to pair it with some black yarn for Waiting for Rain - yes I know I just bought yarn for this shawl, but I'm going to spin for it instead. Although I have tried that before , so who knows when / whether ...

Previously on 'What I made by Sharon" I bought an u nknown amount of laceweight yarn on a cone from an op-shop. I plied it up on a weekend away. Now to continue the story:   When we got back I finished plying it, counted it and washed it. It comes to 2118 meters of heavy laceweight. more than enough to make a long version of the cardigan I want to make from it.  This picture does not truly capture the beautiful colour this yarn is, a delicate sea green. All in all this was a very satisfying experience, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it knits up.

I'm back! I have been knitting pretty much pain free all week, but I was scared to blog about it in case I jinxed it. I started gently, but, as the week has progressed I have ramped up to my usual level of knitting and am doing well. It's funny, (odd, not haha) how much I missed knitting last weekend when I didn't do it. It was harder for me not to knit that it was to quit smoking. When I stopped smoking, I went "okay, I've finished with this. I'm done" and walked away. I'm so not done with knitting. I have to knit ALL THE THINGS, and then I'll stop. I've been knitting Magrathea for Elise and I've had a remarkable amount of trouble with it. I don't think it's the pattern's fault, but some of it has just not made any sense to me. I've had to fudge the last bit of lace like crazy, because I just couldn't work out what the problem was. I just want this finished, it's kind of a reminder of the bad times of the l...

I have, as previously blogged, been busy spinning. I spun up the rest of the blue from last post. It's very nice, but I got 205 meters, rather than the required 400. I'll make mitts to match the hat, rather than the shawl. This has led to a great deal of thought about spinning, thickness, lightness and so on. And some attempts at maths, always a painful and unfortunate occurrence. My current project is the rest of the Merino / silk, for Leon's mitts for his winter set. I'm planning for 500 meters from 180 grams, at about a fingering weight. This should be enough for Leon's knit and a shawl for me. Hopefully. I'm sure its achievable, and if I can do that, I can make Ysolda's Cria jumper, from Little Red in the City from 500 grams of alpaca / silk I am going to card up. That's the other thing that has been taking up my time. Last Friday I got the vacuum cleaner out of the cupboard, to clean up all the bits of blue fibre all over the floor, an...

I didn't do a lot of spinning during the break, partly because I was working monomaniacally on Bitterroot, partly because I was having some issues with Rosie the Elephant. Near the beginning of the week, when the weather was warming up, she started to moan like a haunted house. This usually started about 20 minutes after I started spinning. I also noticed treadelling was harder than usual. I discovered that the metal parts at the back of the wheel were heating up. Add to this that the fibre I'm using is not well prepared and there was not much incentive to spin. A note on the fibre: It was dyed by the very talented Stranded in Oz and is two lots of her fibre club, a light blue merino and a dark blue alpaca and a whole lot of Angelina. It was carded by me and that's where the issues are coming from, the original fibre was wonderfully prepared. I had a really good look at the problem yesterday and identified where it was rubbing and have (pretty much) fixed ...

On Friday a box was delivered, from Majacraft. I was preparing dinner for seven and didn't have time to open it. On Saturday morning I put her together and her she is: Rosie the elephant wheel. She is beautiful and elegant, but hulking compared to Gemima my Little Gem. Pretty much as soon as I had her set up my brother and his family came around. To entertain Isabella my four year old niece I "taught" her to spin on the Little Gem. Considering how little she is I thought she did a good job of treadling. Carrie, her mother, has concerns about Isabella's physical co-ordination and told me that she would really like Isabella learn to knit and spin. I think Isabella is just a member of this family and being uncoordinated goes with our curly hair and brown eyes. Still I very much look forward to teaching her to knit and spin once she is a little bit older. As for Rosie, she is a joy to spin on. I'm spinning the second bobbin of lace weight, to ply with the first, whi...