Violent Spinach

A while ago, I sold my very first hand spun yarns, two of which went to the lovely Lottie. She has very kindly sent pictures through of what she has created with the yarns and has allowed me to show everyone what TomatoTea hand spun looks like when knit up. Its a silly thing to say, but i felt so proud when she showed me!

Lottie bought Violent Violet and made a cabled panel for a blanket project.

At the time, she was slightly disappointed that someone had beaten her to Super Spinach, another hand spun skein she was interested in.

Ironically, the other buyer was her good friend Frantasm who had actually bought the yarn for Lottie as a late birthday gift!

Lottie has knit the yarn in a lovely simple garter stitch square, which i think really shows off Super Spinach quite nicely.

Lottie has been brilliant and I hope to provide her with more hand spun in the future! Please check out Lotties Coriandr Shop for awesome recycled, knitted and woven goodness.

Can't Find The Yarn? Dye Your Own!

Or more correctly, if you can't find the right yarn in your stash, dye some of your stock instead.

Recently inspired by Monty Knits who reminded me of the awesomeness of Double Knitting, I wanted to attempt to make my own scarf design and I wanted some grey or cream yarn and some blue, plus they needed to be long enough to make a scarf. However most of my stash consists of one ball of this and one ball of that or a packet of that colour but not of another... etc.

Anyway, in the end I remembered I stocked up on some undyed Blue Faced Leicester which fit the bill with one colour and so I dyed another ball in the blue I was after.... I may start doing this more often. Its definitely cheaper and this BFL feels really lovely too. So look out for future photos of that project!

In spinning news, Three more skeins up for grabs in the shape of two full skeins and one sampler, spun up from the dyed fibre I posted a few days ago. Still working through that stash!

"Garden Zest" - English 56's Wool


"Peaches and Cream" - British Massam Wool


"Peaches and Cream Sampler" - British Massam Wool

These will be up on Coriandr in the next few days!

A Tale of Andean Plying...

It sounds really sad, but i have only just got over this:

This is some plying that went horribly, horribly wrong about 2 weeks ago. I've tried this technique of Andean plying before and although it was a little tricky, I did manage with tangles and things and made Violent Violet. I tried to be clever and made a makeshift Andean plying tool similar to this by using a book and a lolly stick. It's fine when its on the book, all tensioned nicely but when you slip it onto your wrist, all that tension disappears and so tangles and snarls appear.
Lesson learnt. Don't do it. Its more hassle than spinning two singles. And, the worst part of it is I hand carded all of the fibre. Merino, Soya bean and Angelina. And wasted it. Not only that, it seriously killed my crafting mojo for a few weeks. I was afraid of bodging something up again.

However there is a small happy ending to this story.

I did manage to ply 25 meters of it. Its available in my shop as a sampler.

I also bit the bullet and got back into spinning a couple of days ago.

I'm so glad I did. This has to be the BEST yarn I have spun yet. It is super squooshy and soft and pretty damn even too. 133 meters of worsted yumminess. Its up for grabs in my shop along with a 13m sampler.

Sold

Not only have I just sold my first hand spun but my second and third too! *Michael McIntrye style "Woo Hoooooo!"* Please excuse my boasting :(

I honestly never thought this day would come. I really hope the recipients like their yarn and I hope that they will share what they create so I can show you guys too!

A round up of the last week...

Its been a rather hectic week.

The biggest event was leaving the Boscombe Underground. I'd always been indecisive about the whole thing. Yes, it was exciting and great to have a share in the stall and an opportunity to sell my own bits, but it didn't really work out on a few levels. It was a fantastic experience though, would have been perfect if it was just a weekend thing.

Anyway, there's Winchester next week. Now that certainly has crept up fast. I'm not sure if i'm looking forward to it or if i'm apprehensive. I definitely do not feel ready but at least i'll be going with my buddy, Nicole of Hearts and Skulls. Do go over to her blog and say 'Hi' btw! She's new on the blog scene but has been crafting for many years.

So. What have I been up to?


Bargain Hunting! Inspired by Bex, Nicole and I went to a Car Boot last weekend and I snapped up 2 lots of buttons. All these for £3. JOY!


Dyeing! I think this will be my last batch of 'colour experiments' for a while. The past experiments were a bit nuts, but the yarns turned out better than i expected!


Spinning! After a too long a hiatus I spun Shepards Delight, which will be up on Coriandr some time next week. Also, if its still with me it'll be on show, with the rest of my yarns, at Winchester :D


Also spun up some more natural BFL tops. Thick and thin art style.

Next week will involve gearing up for Winchester and waiting on some packages in the post. Oh, and quite possibly melting as we're heading for temperatures of 30˚C in the shade. Joy...