Handspun

I've finally managed to give both my skeins of handspun a bath. These are the first two skeins I have spun on my beautiful new Little Gem. I'm very pleased with this one which is a merino/seacell blend. It feels nice and soft, may have a little bit too high twist.

This one, however, is a different story. It's superwash merino. I struggled plying it. I think I got too much twist in the singles and in plying. Plying it was difficult as the singles kept getting tangled up. I'm using my travel lazy kate which came with the wheel and I'm thinking I may find it easier if I get a tensioned lazy kate. I'd also like to have a go at spinning 3 ply but the travel lazy kate can only take 2 bobbins. I was going to knit socks with this but I'm not sure now. I've not counted wpi yet but I'm pretty sure it's fingering weight/4ply weight.

I'm not sure what to spin next. I've got several lots of fibre I'd like to break into. I thought about spinning some of hte Falkland I got last week. I've also got some camel and cashmere fibre and some gorgeous alpaca, and merino/silk. I've got plenty to choose from. Due to deadline knitting this week I don't think I'll have any time to spin and on Friday we go on holiday. I'm tempted to take the Little Gem to Spain with me. I jokingly suggested it when I first got it and Simon laughed, thinking I wasn't serious. I'm not sure he would laugh if he realised I was serious. I can just imagine sitting on the balcony on warm evenings spinning while watching the world go by. Actually, it's fairly quiet were the flat is so not much of a world ot watch but I like sitting on the balcony in the evenings or first thing in the mornings. Not sure I will be allowed to take the Little Gem on the plane so perhaps i'd better not risk it.

I've had a bit of a knitting disaster this weekend and I mean a real DISASTER. I'm working on a secret project which needs to be sent in before we go on holiday. I knitted the front and decided I wasn't happy with the shaping, the size or the tension. So I rejigged the pattern and started again with a size smaller needles. I knitted the front and the back. But I DID NOT unravel the wrong front - BIG MISTAKE. I guess you can guess what's coming next. On Friday when I was so tired after waking up at 3am I decided I'd better unravel the wrong front. I thought I checked properly which one I needed to unravel and got on with it. Then on Saturday I realised I'd unravelled the wrong piece..........

I panicked, screamed then decided perhaps i could just alter the wrong front to make it suitable and I started unravelling in the middle but decided the tension was too loose and the stitch count was all wrong. So this morning, at 4am, as I was awake at 3am again I started the front again. I've done the back and the sleeves and I'm at waist height on the front now. I'd like to finish it tomorrow but I don't think that'll happen. Realistically it'll be Wednesday evening before I finish it. Which means I can still get it sewn up and in the post on Wednesday. But I'd planned to finish it off today and do some other knitting this week. Oh well, not much I can do but to knit very, very fast. I wish it was an aran weight sweater on 5mm needles but it's DK on 3.75mm needles so it's a little more work.

Commissions have been flooding in over hte last week, 5 in total. Which means I'm going to have to take some on holiday with me. I'd planned to knit EZ's moebious vest and a sweater for Simon and some smaller projects. I'm still planning to start a sweater for Simon which I've told him probably won't be finished till Christmas time. But I'm not sure about the EZ moebious for me. I'm planning to knit it in Manos Silk Blend and I love that yarn so was really looking forward to it. But two of my new commissions are in Silk Blend and I'll take one away with me probably. So I'll still be doing some Silk Blend knitting.

More on holiday knitting tomorrow or propably Wednesday as I'm out most of the day tomorrow. Lace and sock club will go out some time this week, not sure which day though.