My Tour de Fleece Wrap-Up.

Yes, I know the tour doesn't end until tomorrow, but I'm out of fiber!

Specs:
Brand: Two if by Hand ("Whisper" colorway)
Fiber: 100% Polwarth
Yardage/Weight: 308 yards, 4 oz
Thickness: Approx. sport weight
Plies: 2

Tour de Fleece Fail and Giveaway Winner.

 My only goal for the Tour de Fleece this year was to spin for at least 30 minutes every day of the tour. I was doing really well, sometimes even going over my 30 minute goal by almost another half hour. Life got a bit hectic though, and I got a bit scatterbrained. I completely forgot to spin on Saturday. Even though the goal was to spin every day and that's failed, I've tried to make up for it a bit by spinning for an hour yesterday and spinning today, which is supposed to be a rest day.

Here's the stats I haven't posted yet through today:

Day 14: 39 min
Day 15: 0 min
Day 16: 38 min
Day 17: 60 min
Day 18: 38 min

In other news, my giveaway ended today, and I have to say, I was blown away by the response I got from it. I expected that maybe 20-25 people would enter, and when I locked the thread today, I had 92 entries! I'd really like to thank everyone who entered for taking the time to look at my shop and tell me their favorite colorways. It was a lot of fun reading them all!

That said, the winner on Ravelry is Psychogirl! She's already been in contact and picked out her skein of yarn, which I'll have in the mail for her soon.

 In other other news, I signed up for a Stephen West (of westknits fame) workshop this morning! He's teaching a class on shawls in September at MadTosh, and I knew I had to be there. In fact, I was at the MadTosh store as soon as they opened this morning to sign up, because I knew spots would go quickly. I'm already looking forward to it!

WIPs: July 12, 2012

It's been a little bit since I've shown what I'm working on, so I got out my camera and took some pictures.

This is my Aristida Shawl. I'm through the set-up chart and halfway through the second repeat of the body chart (the body chart is knit 4 times).

 This is Jose's sweater. I don't know how, but it seemed stuck at about 4 - 6 inches for weeks and weeks, and suddenly I'm only 3 inches away from the armholes. I might actually get this done before the end of the year.

I've barely gotten started on my Lowry Pullover. I've just started the cable section, and I can tell that this sweater is going to take me a long time.

As if I don't have enough going on, I cast on the Spectra pattern that I was talking about in a previous post. Look at that, I have 3 wedges done! Only... 82 more to go! So far I'm loving it though.

Tomorrow I'm going to one of my local yarn shops with my mom to pick out yarn for a sweater she wants me to knit her. Yep, that'll be another sweater on the needles. I need a small project to work on.

Tour de Fleece:
Day 12 (July 11): 44 min spinning
Day 13 (July 12): 34 min spinning 

Gynx Yarns Giveaway and an Ice Cream Social Recap.

First thing's first, Gynx Yarns is having a giveaway! I'm giving away one skein of Gynx Aran in the colorway of the winner's choice (out of currently available aran yarns) over in my Ravelry group. You must be a member of the group to be eligible, and then you can enter in this thread: Link. All you have to do is tell me your favorite Gynx Yarns colorway and you're entered! The giveaway will close next Tuesday (July 17) at noon CST, and the winner will be decided by a random number generator.

This past Saturday, the MadTosh store hosted an ice cream social. I could only stay for the first half, but I had so much fun! There were tons of people there, a lot of which I knew. I didn't eat any of the ice cream, but I had a lot of fun shopping around, chatting, and enabling people to buy things. I came home with two skeins of Noro Taiyo sock yarn.

This blue/purple skein is one I actually have a plan for. It, along with a skein of madelinetosh's Tosh Merino Light, will become a Spectra by Stephen West.

This one has no plans, but it had to come home to live in the stash for a bit. Hey, I had a Groupon and had to spend $30, so I had to get something else! This was the skein I originally picked up for the Spectra, until I found a skein similar to my Tosh Merino Light at home and realized it didn't go well together.

Tour de Fleece (goal is 30 min of spinning daily):

Day 8 (July 7): 32 minutes

Day 9 (July 8): 44 minutes

Day 10 (July 9): 30 minutes

Today is a rest day for the tour, so I will not be spinning. Honestly, I'm glad,because I was getting tired of spinning. That's probably why I rarely spin regularly. I'd bet if I had a wheel and could blow through 4 oz. in a day like a lot of people have been doing this tour, I wouldn't get bored of it.

Gynx Yarns Picks: Aristida Shawl

I mentioned a few weeks ago when I reviewed the Knitscene Accessories 2012 magazine that the whole reason I bought it was for the Aristida Shawl by Alexandra Beck.

I have since cast this on with some recycled yarn that I dyed an emerald green, but there were some Gynx Yarns colorways that I really wanted to use for this.

The yarn I really wanted to use was Natsu, which is a really nice, very subtly-variegated deep red colorway. The original in the magazine is in a semi-solid, so the slight variations in this yarn would be absolutely gorgeous.

One of my newest colorways, Gunmetal Gray, is the closest to the original color, and the pattern looks amazing in that medium gray.

Random cuteness:

In one of the Ravelry groups I'm in (My Knitting Has Cat Hair in It), someone posted this link to a live feed of seven baby kittens. The past few days I've had it open in one of my tabs on my computer, and I check up on them from time to time. They are so adorable, although I do feel bad for the momma cat when she's ambushed for feeding times.

Tour de Fleece (Goal: spin at least 30 minutes a day):

Day 7 (July 6): 36 minutes

Tour de Fleece: Day 6

The goal I set for myself this year's Tour de Fleece was to spin at least 30 minutes a day. I didn't update the blog yesterday, so here's my stats for the past two days:

Day 5 (July 4): 38 minutes
Day 6 (July 5): 49 minutes

I took this photo yesterday. I've since spun a bit more, and I'm getting close to being done with the first half.

How are your Tour de Fleece goals going?

FO: Companion Socks.

I finished my Companion Socks yesterday! My left hand started hurting on Sunday, but I was already halfway through the toe of the second sock, so I ignored my hand to finish knitting it yesterday morning. I'm resting my hand today so that hopefully I can get back to knitting tomorrow or Thursday.

I am so in love with these socks! The pattern is very basic, but breaks up the variegated yarn a bit more than a plain stockinette sock would. The yarn is absolutely perfect. I don't know how Sarah of Another Crafty Girl does it, but her colorways are addicting to me.

Specs
Pattern: Hermoine's Everyday Socks by Erica Lueder (free Ravelry download)
Yarn: Another Crafty Girl Strong Sock in "Companion Cube"
Needles: US 1
Ravelry Project Page: Link

Tour de Fleece Progress:

Day 4 (July 3):  58 minutes (so far)

FO: Tempest Cardigan.

Relief is the only thing that can describe how I felt when this cardigan was finally finished. I started this back on March 12, and it really should not have taken me this long (I finished it this past Friday). You might remember my first big set-back that took away my mojo for this project. The original pattern is striped, but I had this yarn on hand, so I had to do some math to keep up with where I was in the pattern. Errors on the back resulted in me knitting double the length before the waist shaping that I needed to, which I didn't realize until I had almost finished the back.

It sat for a while in punishment, but I managed to power through the back and right front panel of the cardigan. Then, as I was shaping the waist of the left front panel, I realized I had too few stitches on the needle. I discovered it was because I cast on 4 fewer stitches than I needed at the beginning, which meant I had to start the left front completely over.

I knew I was going to be cutting it close with how much yarn I had to finish this project, so I decided to seam up the back and two fronts and knit the button band and hem before doing the sleeves. I followed the directions exactly for the button band, and once I cast it off, I was horrified to find that the band was way too tight and caused the front to be pulled and bunched very unattractively. I still don't know what I did wrong, but after trying a few things to fix it, I ended up taking it out and picking up significantly more stitches for the band.

The one good thing that came of this project was that I learned how to convert a sleeve knit flat and bottom-up to a sleeve knit in the round and top-down. Like I said, I was concerned about having enough yarn, and I wanted to (1) not worry about having enough yarn to seem the pieces together and (2) be able to knit the sleeves down until I ran out of yarn. I ended up being able to knit them the length they were designed to be, but at least it was less seaming for me!

The odds were in my favor at this point, where all that was left was the buttons. I will normally avoid patterns with buttons. I don't like picking out buttons or sewing buttons, but for whatever reason I still knit this pattern. I figured I'd have to go buy some, but I decided to check to see if by some chance I had 11 identical buttons that would work. My entire collection of buttons was given to me by my mom, so I don't have the best idea of what is in there. I opened one box, and right on top were these blue-green plain buttons that looked to be about the right size. Sadly, there were nine on the card. I set them aside, and opened another box. Right on top, was a card with eight of the exact same buttons. It was fate. I should have bought a lottery ticket that day.

Specs:
Pattern: Tempest by Weaverknits
Yarn: Araucania Ranco Multy, color #330 (2 skeins)
Needles: Sizes 6 & 3 US
Ravelry Project Page: Link
Mods: No stripes, more stitches in button band, garter stitch hem, sleeves knit top-down in the round.

Tour de Fleece (Goal: 30 minutes spinning per day)
Day 2: 33 minutes (Sunday)
Day 3: 47 minutes (Today)

Go!

Yesterday was the first day of the Tour de Fleece. As I said in my last post, I'd like to finish my braid of fiber by the end, but my ultimate goal is to spin at least half an hour a day.

Day 1: 32 minutes

And boy, was it hard. Othello was in a strange mood yesterday, and wouldn't leave my spinning alone. He was either on the floor batting at the drop spindle rather forcefully, or sitting in my lap trying to block my hands from doing anything.

 In other news...

Gynx Yarns is having a Pink Sale for the duration of July (while supplies last)!  It's rare that Gynx Yarns has a sale, so be sure to check it out. There's no need for a coupon code; prices already reflect discount. Click the picture below or this link to see the yarns that are a part of the sale!

Ready... Set...

Tomorrow is the start of the Tour de France, which means it's also the start of the Tour de Fleece! I didn't participate last year, so this will be my first year spinning along.

  As usual, I couldn't do a photoshoot without a cat trying to be in every picture.

I only have a drop spindle, so I only have one braid of fiber I'm going to be working on. I've never really regularly spun, so I'm not sure if a 4 oz. braid is too easy or ambitious. My only real goal for the Tour is to spin 30 minutes a day.

I picked out this braid of Polwarth from Two if by Hand at this year's DFW Fiber Fest for my mom to get me for my birthday. The colorway is called "Whisper," and is a lovely, subtle blue-gray colorway.

I already prepped it a bit by splitting it in half, as I think I'll be doing a 2-ply for this one. Check back tomorrow to see my start of the Tour!