Blue batts and a 'denim' yarn

One of the best things about our blogworld is the mutual inspiration - how one idea leads to another, like in a relay ...

My dear blog friend Elizabeth/Landanna is working on a big jeans project, where she is unseaming piles of worn jeans and then handsewing them together for new shapes with a bright red thread. This combination of faded blue shades and the red stitches is really awesome, and I just adore the fresh and beautiful look of it.

Having had these pictures in mind, I've been pondering over how to integrate these colours in a project of my own.

And a few days ago I found what I've been searching for - the 'Shizuku' scarf pattern by Angela Tong (free Ravelry download). Shizuku means drops of water, I've learned, and so I think these shades of blue will be a perfect match.

(I admit I'm not really the only one loving this pattern - if you go visit Lavendelblau or MelinoLiesl f.e., you will see other beautiful versions of it.)



To create the feeling of worn jeans, I carded the different blues I had stashed - a little green and white too - together with some red sheep locks I've dyed myself.

I carded the wool quite roughly and only once, then spun the batts into an irregular and a bit bumpy worsted yarn. I decided to ply with a ball of the new Noro Sekku (yes, also stashed!), a very thin cotton/wool/nylon/silk blend, which emphazises the casual denim look quite well, I think.

(German summary: Seit einiger Zeit folge ich meiner Freundin Elizabeth's Jeansprojekt und überlege, wie ich die schöne Kombination ihrer blauen Jeanstöne mit leuchtendem Rot auf ein Strickprojekt übertragen kann. Das nette 'Shizuku'-Muster von Angela Tong gab mir dann den Anstoß zum Kardieren, Spinnen und Stricken ...)

Knitting sea waves .../Wellenstricken!

No, no, I haven't been lazy though I'm still enjoying my holidays!

I've been carding and spinning and knitting my blue water into a sea wave pattern, altering between knitting and spinning and spinning and knitting ...

and just for some change, treating myself to a couple of matching stitch counters after taking a dive into my magic stash!



...knitting ...



... carding ...



...spinning ...



... knitting!



And well - it wouldn't be me, if not - a couple of other projects as well ... But that's another story!

(German summary: Nein, ich liege nicht faul herum, trotz Urlaub - ich kardiere, spinne, stricke meine 'Wasserfasern' zu einem blaugrünen Meer ...!)

Spinning blue water .../Wasserspinnen!

Sorry for being absent for so long now - I'm fine, just enjoying my holidays ... Today I started carding and spinning 'water': blue and greenish silk and wool fibers, which remind me of the sea ...

I'm mixing my own self-dyed silk/wool fibers with those I bought from 'Dornröschen' - you can read about these fibers in my earlier posting here and have a look here - spinning a thin, quite even thread for a 2-ply, which I will probably knit with that 'feather&fan' pattern to make a gorgeous water-coloured sweater ...

(Ich spinne gerade so etwas wie 'Wasser': Blau- und Grüntöne von Seiden- und Wollfasern, handgefärbt von mir und von 'Dornröschen' ... luftig, seidig, erinnert mich ans Meer!

Blending camel and bamboo ...

Did I tell you I ordered and received a drum carder - it's a Louet Junior - recently?



Hand carders are fine for carding and blending small amounts of fiber, but I've realized you really need a drum carder when working with a bit more of material.

Although wool is still my favourite fiber, I wanted to try out other ones as well - especially as wool is quite "hot" working with in the heat of the summer days ...

Today I blended camel with bamboo, which is a great soft and lightweight combination of the matt and short-stapled camel and the shiny, long-stapled bamboo fibers, easy to spin in all thicknesses.



As I've spun my yarn quite thin at a higher ratio, it is rather energized - and so I guess I will make a 2-ply out of the single - or maybe ply it with an old, slightly golden thread I found in a thrift store ... we'll see.

(German summary: Ich habe mir endlich eine Trommelkarde gekauft - und bin gerade dabei, eine Mischung aus Kamel- und Bambusfasern zu verspinnen. Die Kombination dieser einmal kurz-, einmal langfaserigen Materialen ist sehr angenehm zu verspinnen und auch optisch recht gelungen.)

A Spinning and Carding Session!

This is the harvest of my spinning and carding session with Sara!

As Sara had brought her huge drum carder with her, I used the opportunity to card a whole stash of blue-green batts for a new project: I'd like to spin enough yarn in this colour range for a pullover, looking like nature itself ...

First, I had only planned to use different shades of blue and green wool - but Sara encouraged me to use tiny little bits of bright red inbetween, and also some yellow spots on the turquoise segments to make the basic colours come out even clearer and brighter. Inspired by this, I decided to use some brownish and purple wool inbetween as well - "to add further interest", as Sara would say.

Anyway, we had a great time this extended weekend - covering my living room/kitchen with two spinning wheels, two laptops, the drum carder, a weaving loom and loads of wool, yarn, books and other supplies; working, eating, laughing, drinking, talking 'til the early mornings ...

It really is a very special gift to get to know someone with whom you can share so much of your thoughts and ideas, making plans for future projects, inspiring eachother ... I'm so grateful for that.

Oh, what a Joy!

Friday evening I finally got my spinning wheel, an Ashford Joy which I had found on Ebay. One of the reasons I chose this one is because it only weighs 5 kg (11 lb) and comes with an integrated handle and a sturdy carry bag.



On Sunday it was so warm and sunny that I could even spin a little in the garden ...

And I've practised a lot this week-end. First, the wheel just "ran off" on me, and it was quite tricky to co-ordinate hands and feet and wool and keeping the wheel from switching into the wrong direction and undoing the twist again ...

Finally, I managed to create something looking almost like a yarn and of course I was eager to try out a lot of ideas, even if my skills are not yet that high ... But I did notice some improvements even in these two days (or nights, rather ...)!

In anticipation of the wheel I had spun some more on my drop spindle as well:

And I've also finished the scarf I made out of my first drop spindle yarn - I decided to make a tube scarf out of it and added a crocheted border, a feather edge braid, for the finish.



This weekend, a dear friend brought me a book which I've been aching for so long: it's the textile dictionary by Hohenadel/Relton - really highly recommendable for all of us searching for those textile expressions in English when translating from German ... (and all I had to do to receive it was to feed the cats of my friend now and then!)



Does anyone of you maybe have a niddy-noddy you don't need in exchange for some yarn ...?