Wonderhaul, Wonderwool, Wales

It took a while but this is my haul from Wonderwool, Wales.

I have already started spinning the Ryeland fleece and the Camel/Silk.

Wonderful, Wonderwool, Wales

Coughs


(This post is not for the feint hearted. Nor should my husband read it, just in case he realises how much fibre my already considerable stash grew by this weekend.)

Those of you in the know will realise that this weekend was Wonderwool, one of the best excuses to visit Wales beside the scenery. I am going to try and document some of what I did and I am so sorry if I forget to mention you, I met and talked to so many people, spent 10 hours in the car and got high on fibre fumes. I was also ably supported by my gorgeous and lovely friend Puddytatpurr for the whole weekend. We were so easy to spot as we were the really noisy ones squealing, laughing, talking, touching, and it seems buying as much as we could.

Before I dive fully in, I have a huge thank you to give to Jeni for gifting me some gorgeous angora from her lovely bunny. I shall do a separate post on playing with Hartley but it was great to get a chance to meet in person.

I also need to thank the ever wonderful Lynda. She recently purchased a Tekoteko Wendy and we had some great chats as her's needed a bit of work. A couple of days ago she supplied me with a couple of small oak dowels, which I was really happy to receive and on Sunday we finally got to meet and she gave me:

I can see you are as excited as I am! those two shaped dowels are from the wonderful Mr Philip Poore, the original maker of my Wendy. She arranged for him to make and send me this pair of bobbin supports as mine were missing. Wendy and I are very happy with this brilliant gift. 

One of the most fun things was to have an opportunity to meet up and talk to the masses of people I have met, those I know through Ravelry/Twitter and new people because they are there. It would be impossible to mention everyone I spoke to and a huge list would just be boring so, just quickly just because there are photos - I met:

Longdrawjames, so helpful and fun and look at his Saturday haul!

The lovely Wyndwitch, happy as always with red, she left with a Knitters Loom - it could be messy.

Babylonglegs who I have wanted to meet forever. Her fibre was the second hand dyed fibre I ever spun. I still have it and love it and one day I'll knit with it. I think she was happy, that is her Cherry Matchless.

Jeni (with Babylonglegs and me). Jeni has been great and is so generous with her time.

Freyalyn - her knitting is as delightful as her fibre. She was probably bored of me by the end of the show as I kept popping in and saying 'hi'.

Guzzisue couldn't stop smiling - she had been covetting a Sonata and on the last day had one of her very own.

Julie, Ursula (The Laar Bear) and Puddytatpurr.

Ian, (at the back), Bellgrove and Puddytatpurr from the IST stand.

The lovely Puddytatpurr, ToadofToadHall, (so sorry, I didn't get a chance to talk to you so I don't know your name), Guzziesue, Brian and Picperfic at the end of day one.

And last but definately not least the wonderful Ambermoggie and Mr Mog!

I'll post about my haul tomorrow.

Folksy Friday

I am so happy! I was Tweeting as I do and I received notice that Craftyjemima had included my yarn in her Folksy review on her blog. My yarn!

Go!

Check it out!

Don't forget to stay and look at her blog. Nerys is very talented.

Thank you for making my Friday :)

New Yarn!

It is time for some shop news.

I have introduced a new core yarn: Cavern.
This is beautifully soft and it is hard to believe it is 75% superwash merino and 25% nylon. Giving an excellent 425m per 100g there is no fear of running out of yarn with just a toe to go. Cavern will replace my first yarn Merino/Nylon. All the stock I have of Merino Nylon is currently in my shop.

Cavern takes colour beautifully and I shall be loading the following in the shop:

A Spring Morning

Moody Sea

Dusk til Dawn

Mint Choc Chip

Powder

Pangea

I am so excited I am also a contributor to the wonderful Fibreholic's sample box scheme. If you are not aware of this Fibreholics issue boxes filled with samples from inde dyers and spinners and boxes are available for yarn or fibre. This month I submitted samples of A Spring Morning.

This seems to be an update for new yarn as I would also like to introduce you to Supershine, this yarn is soft and so very shiney with great drape. Wonderful for knitting shawls and garments where a fine stitch is needed. It will also make lovely, shimmery socks. The yarn contains 50% superwash merino and 50% tencel for the sheen and drape. There are 333m of this beautiful yarn to 100g. It is machine washable but, as with all my yarns I recommend hand washing to maintain colour.

Hail

I hope you enjoy my new yarns and colours as much as I have selecting and making them.

Shawls!

I have been working hard on my 10 shawls in 2010 challenge and completed two shawls in March (making a total of 4). Both the shawls also fit the large category. Don't worry I have bigger shawls planned.

So, without futher ado I would like to introduce to you Sock it to Eva. This shawl is a simple crochet pattern. When I say simple, I am sure it is when you are good a crochet but I had to frog and start this shawl 3 times. Guess I really shouldn't be a perfectionist. There are some errors towards the end but by that point I just did a quick fix and I'm not sure I could point them out even if I felt like it, which I don't so don't bother asking.

And a quick close up of the shawl:

To summarise the pattern is Eva's Shawl by Milobo, and I used two skeins of Noro Kureyon Sock Yarn, a total of 771yards. I only did the first row of the border as I preferred this.

The second shawl I finished was Pudding Swap.

The pattern is Multnomah by Kate Flagg and was made in my handspun from the Scrap Swap I took part in in February. The fibres, including mohair and gotland were spun in a pudding fashion giving me these lovely singles.

The shawl weighs 159.9g and took 502yards. I love knitting with my handspun.

And the Winner Is ....

The time has come to draw the winners in my shop opening give away. I have been blown away with the interest in and lovely comments about my products. I know you really just want me to get down to business and tell you who won so, without further ado.

So that I could draw the winners I made a list of entrants, dividing them between sock yarn and project bag. I then gave each entrant a unique number.  The first winner to be drawn was for the sock yarn so I hopped over to Random.Org, filled in the details and pressed Get Numbers.

And the winning number was 25, which was Deirdre and she requested Hail as her prize.

As you know, I am also giving away a project bag and again I used Random.Org.

The winning number was 10, which was BB Group and she requested Hippy Skulls as her prize.

Congraqtulations, please contact me to claim your prize :)

Once again, thank you all for taking part in my giveaway.

A Hint of Purple

Thank you all so much for your lovely comments, the giveaway is still running this week and there will be some new colours coming up. Here are some drying on the line.

Elle and I were discussing how much we like black and I just couldn't resist a blast of American Gothic, soft greys build up to dramatic charcoal.

The back skein shows how the yarn was dyed and the front shows the yarn re-skeined. Do you think I should show the yarns in my shop re-skeined, although I think they will be supplied 'unmixed' so to speak? I think the re-skein shows the yarn to best effect.

I also painted Rainbow. This is slightly different to the colourway Miss Elle so kindly knitted for me as I have changed both the dyes and amended the method slightly. However, I really love how the colours work and flow together just like a rainbow.

I also created a violet (top) and a purple (bottom) colourway. I should have photographed them this morning while there was plenty of light but I'll post pictures anyway.

I also dashed off my first solid colour, I've named it Lacey as it is great for really fancy patterns.

Lastly, I had some BFL roving in my stash and I really wanted to play with some greens. I am very happy with it and think I'll keep it all for myself as I love the richness of the greens and pinks.

I have also been knitting and working on my fourth shawl for the 10 shawls in 2010 challenge I am doing. The pattern is Multnomah (Rav link) and I am knitting my own handspun yarn.