Flame- finished at last!

Flame- the spinning process, originally uploaded by Bright Side.

My mammoth spindle spinning project is finally finished! This mosaic shows the spinning process from new spindle and fibre through singles and plying to completed yarn. I ended up with 160g and 442m, at about 12 or 13 WPI. I couldn't believe the yardage, I was aiming for about 180m but getting over double that is incredible. No wonder it only just fitted onto my plying spindle! I used a lovely butterflygirldesigns 31g/1.1oz jade spindle for the singles, and a 58g/2oz Sublime Spindles bottom whorl for the plying. The fibre is 99% superwash merino/1% angelina, also from butterflygirldesigns.

Nesting Scarf

Nesting, originally uploaded by Bright Side.

I've finally taken some decent photos of my scarf, knitted with my own handspun from FeltStudioUK batts and with a pewter button from Purlescence. It's one of the favourite things that I've knit so far with my handspun, I'm so pleased with it.

I'm still waiting for my Flame spindlespun handspun to dry so that I can take some photos of it. With any luck it'll be ready tomorrow.

Bootees for Sophia

Bootees for Sophia, originally uploaded by Bright Side.

I made another pair of Saartje's bootees recently, this time as an extra to go with the BSJ for Sophia. Unofrtunately I didn't have enough buttons to match but I did find these small wooden ones which were nice too. Hopefully I made them large enough that they should fit Sophia at about the same time as she grows into the BSJ.

We're back from Cornwall now and we had a wonderful, if slghtly soggy time. I finished plying the singles of my Spindlers quarterly challenge yarn- now to measure it and see if I made enough! I'm also about a third of the way through my Ravelympics Cowl jump event. The Posh Yarn is knitting up beautifully, it's so soft. Other than that, I have also started my next spindle project, which is the All Spun Up spin-a-long fibre. I've decided to use my Golding to get a very fine single and then I'm going to navajo ply it. I've only done a tiny bit so far but I'm pleased with how it's going.

In other spinning news, I've got two swaps coming up that I'm busy preparing for. I've just bought loads of fibre and bits and pieces from etsy for both of my swap partners. I'm really excited about the fibre that I've bought for them to spin with, it's from one of my very favourite vendors. I've also bought some fantastic fibre from another one of my favourite sellers to spin for them. It's really nice to ferret around on the internet and find out what your partner likes, before putting their package together. I've always been really lucky as my swap partners so far have all been lovely and it's been a real pleasure to go shopping for them :)

Meeow

Hand felted cat, originally uploaded by Bright Side.

I made this little felted cat for my sister. He's hand wet felted merino around a wire and pipe cleaner frame, in orange with brown and rust stripes. His eyes are lovely green buttons and he also has a little felt collar with a yellow button bell. He has his own fish toy too!

I based him on the cat from Sue Pearl's felt animals book. The instructions were really clear and easy to follow. He was great fun to make, although I did wonder at one point if he was ever going to felt- perseverance is obviously the key there.

Flame

Flame, originally uploaded by Bright Side.

I've finally completed my first full spindle of Flame, which will be entry to the Ravelry Spindlers first quarterly challenge. If I ever get it finished, that is. I reckon I have at least another 3 or 4 spindles worth of fibre left to go. I'm determined to finish this by the end of the month though to get it in by the deadline. I'm really enjoying this new spindle, although I am slightly regretting not deciding to go for a notch. The thread was really starting to slip once the cop got heavy, but luckily the top of the shaft is carved and I can use that to help hold everything in place. With this go I won't try and squeeze quite so much fibre on there!