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Back to Hatting!

denisemor 2 June 17, 2018

The urge to swatch and play with colors has launched me back into hat mode-

And between SuperGeeen leftovers and newly tinctured Esther fleece, I’ve got lots of fun shades to play with!

Dug into the yarn stash a little bit for one currently on the needles-

I do love the rhythm of stranded colorwork and watching the pattern emerge .

Was also able to get a little spinning done this weekend, and washed up my Dottie fleece!

And I have to give a little shoutout to Reine de Violettes, who is putting on quite a show out in the garden.

So proud of that girl. I raised her from a cutting! 🙂

I probably should have started with the “best of”, but I had Felix seconds from the cleanup shearing a couple of weeks ago sitting around in the laundry room, so I thought I’d get them washed up. It’s really nice wool, there was lots of little veg and grit, weathered and felted tips, and scurf. Ugh.

So I had to pull out the combs. It was a little short for combing, but most of it lashed on ok. Lots of waste left over (maybe use that for stuffing something), but what I did get drawn off t he combs is pretty sweet

yay 🙂

And knitting-wise, I’ve retreated to my hat comfort zone

using some of the freshly dyed Esther wool from last week and leftover greens from the SuperGreen sweater.

there’s just something about that little circle motif that is very comforting to knit.

Tidying Up

denisemor 3 May 28, 2018

Finally got a hold of Frank and Felix today, and managed to get their haircuts finished up (Yay!)

Frank wasn’t thrilled to be the subject of my fussing, but was a good boy once I got the halter on him

Felix was another story. He resisted right to the end.
So no pictures on that one.
Man am I pooped.

But they both look fairly respectable now, so I’m calling it good.

In other wool news, I did a little bit of dyeing this weekend!

Trying out Abundant Earth Wool Tinctures

Each packet dyes 7 oz of wool

Since I was dyeing fleece rather than yarn, I decided to go with my big pot, just so that the fleece would be able to move freely in the bath (yes, that is Gus commandeering my chair 🙂 )

Here are the Blood Orange “teabags” dissolving in the pot

And the fleece fresh out of the bath

Fleece in the pot taking up Deep Water in batch #2.

The colors are fabulous. I had a little issue with the Deep Water breaking into bright blue and hunter green- and I’m not sure what I might have done to cause that. Perhaps I screwed up the addition of the citric acid. But once dried and carded together, it all came togehter nicely- here is a sample skein

May’s Splendor

denisemor 0 May 13, 2018

First rose in bloom, Therese Bugnet

Bearded Iris from a friend

Lilac scenting the whole yard

Deciduous azalea

Fig tree just starting to leaf out- with tiny figs already formed!

Another soft and squishy skein of Esther fingerling weight yarn

The grass is growing like crazy, and the sheep are hard at work munching it down. Just a couple of bales left in the woodshed- much to the chagrin of Boo Kitten, who is usually found lounging atop the stacked hay.

I can’t wait to have a shed full of sweet smelling bales again!