Only 3 days after posting handspun project #1 for 2012, here I am with handspun project #2 for 2012.

Impressive, non? The pattern is Wurm but with fewer repeats of the main section. This was a design decision, as Hannah wouldn’t have liked such a floppy hat, and also a necessary modification as I wouldn’t have had enough yarn to knit all those purl ridges.

Of course I do not remember any details about this particular yarn. It’s probably either Spunky Eclectic or Hello Yarn but honestly, it escapes me. It is fairly bulky, though, and the colors are favorites of Hannah’s.

Speaking of Hannah, she’s having a wonderful week in Florida, wearing a bathing suit instead of a hat. She’s going to be staying a little longer than planned, too, since her flight home for Sunday was with Direct Air and they suddenly suspended all flights as of yesterday. Luckily I was able to book her on a somewhat reasonably priced flight home next Tuesday with JetBlue.

So now I’m out a couple hundred bucks and she gets 3 more days in Florida.

Hunh.

P.S. Please send positive vibes for a safe and uneventful trip home for her, would you? Thanks.

One of my knitting goals for 2012 is to actually knit with my handspun. To be more precise, I set a goal of knitting at least 3 projects with my handspun. Allow me to present handspun project #1 for this year:

Legwarmers for Hannah. Don’t ask me any details about this yarn because I don’t remember any. I can tell you that it’s a heavy worsted weight. And I can tell you exactly how I made these:

Cast on 44 stitches and knit in 2×2 rib for 2 inches
Switch to stockinette and continue until 4.5 inches total
Decrease 8 stitches evenly across for a total of 36 stitches
Knit until 16 inches total
Knit 5 rows of ribbing
Bind of in ribbing pattern

And that’s it.

I love the way they look peeking out of the top of Hannah’s boots. They are slouchy and colorful and will go with lots of things.

They were very fast to knit and that makes me quite happy. And they put a smile on my beautiful daughter’s face and that makes me happiest of all.

You may recall, from a post back in April, that I was working at spinning down my backlog of Hello Yarn Fiber Club installments. At the time I wrote that post I said I had 2 bags left to spin. I’m pleased to report that those last 2 bags are spun and done.

I have to say, I think spun and done may be my new favorite phrase.

Hooray! Spun and done. I’m just going to keep saying it.

The May 2010 fiber was 4 oz of BFL/tussah silk called Floating Down.  I left it as singles and have about 200 yards.

And the July 2010 fiber was 4 oz of Mixed BFL Wool Top called Troublemaker. I plyed it and got about 175 yards worsted weight.

As much as I loved this fiber club, I am so glad to be done with it. I just don’t spin often enough to have 4 oz of fiber arriving at my house on a monthly basis. And seriously, it’s not like I don’t have a whole lot of other fiber to spin anyway.

Maybe now I can actually get to that. Care to join me? The Tour de Fleece is right around the corner and I hope to have a fleece spun and done.

I told you I was going to keep saying it.

Like a lot of spinners, I tend to spend time at the wheel in fits and starts. I always get very inspired after SPA, though, and this year it seems like my inspiration has stuck around a bit.

By putting in time with the wheel consistently each week I am slowly but surely working my way through the backlog of Hello Yarn Fiber Club installments.

Some has been finished and plied and wound into skeins.

And some is waiting to be plied.

And some is being spun.

When the 4 oz I’m currently spinning is done I will only have two 4 oz bags left.

Then I’ll finally be able to spin all the other stuff I’ve been buying. This is quite a relief, because, as you can imagine . . .

It’s been piling up a bit.

Spinning is such a great hobby.

You spin and spin and get lovely singles.

You soak the singles and thrash them around and wind them into a skein.

You make yarn.

Then, of course, you want to spin more and you make more yarn and the yarn piles up because you have time to spin or you have time to knit but you don’t have time to do both.

It’s a conundrum, no?

If there’s one thing I can count on every year it’s that SPA will inspire me to spin. This year it inspired me to spin a lot. Not only did I spin for the 3 days of SPA but I continued to spin a bit every day after I got home. Yay me!

I calculated that while at SPA I spun 12 oz. I finished a 4 oz bag of Hello Yarn that I had started at home, I started and finished another 4 oz bag of Hello Yarn, I started and finished 4 oz of BFL/silk from Sereknity that I purchased at SPA, and I spun 2 oz out of 8 oz of Targhee that I bought from Spunky Eclectic while at SPA.

The remaining 8 oz of Targhee have been spun but not plied but everything else is plied, soaked, thwacked and skeined.

Hello Yarn Fiber Club Sept 09
Finn in the color Winter Storage
210 Yards

Hello Yarn Fiber Club Nov 09
Rambouillet in the color Pallid
264 yards

Sereknity BFL/Silk
225 yards

They are all in the worsted weight range.

And they are all labeled.

Be impressed.

As always, SPA was a wonderful experience. As always, I took very few photos.

There’s this one of Sharon with our wheels on Thursday when there was no one around.

And there’s this one of Sharon and Manise drinking tequila.

And there’s this one of Manise’s handspun.

That’s it.

I don’t have pictures of all the laughing and the talking and the joking. I don’t have pictures of the knitting and spinning and shopping. I don’t even have pictures of all the eating and drinking and hanging out.

What I do have, though, are the memories. And those are, no doubt, the best thing of all.

I did a lot of plying this weekend.

The end.

On Sunday I:

Baked chocolate chip cookies.

Spent some time spinning. The fiber is a Hello Yarn monthly installment,  it’s  a combo of merino, bamboo and nylon. I’m thinking socks.

Did some knitting. This is the project I started on Saturday and it’s a sweater for Dale. The pattern is the Spartan  Sweater from Interweave Knits, Fall 2006.

Made jambalaya. It was goooooood.

I also watched football (boo Pats), blocked the Stupidly Easy Triangular Shawl, and packed up a box full of love to send to Hannah.

It was a good day.

The Tour de Fleece started this week and I am in! My goal: spin up all these bags of Hello Yarn Fiber Club installments.

That’s a lot of 4 oz bags!

My first day of spinning was Sunday rather than Saturday but I’ve been going great guns ever since, managing to spin a bag a day, even on my working days.

Sunday/Day 1: “Thrive” Corriedale Wool Top Feb 09

Monday/Day 2: “Peat” Superwash Merino Wool Top March 09

Tuesday/Day 3: “Five Plum Pie” Hand-Dyed Falklands Wool Top May 09

Wednesday/Day 4: “Alpine” Romney Wool Top July ’09

Just keep spinning. Just keep spinning.

I feel like Dory in “Finding Nemo”.