Spinning and knitting hand-dyed silk and wool/Handgefärbte Seide und Wolle spinnen und stricken

I have a new passion.
I've put all other projects aside for spinning the hand-dyed silk & wool rovings from Dornröschen.



I found the link to Christine/Dornröschen and her hand-dyed rovings and yarns on Jana's wonderful blog - 'Anaj's kreatives Tagebuch'. Jana is a most talented master spinner, dyer and felter, and her beautiful artyarns seduced me to trying out this hand-dyed silk wool as well.

Feeling the soft silk running through my fingers while spinning, plying and knitting makes me happy. The colours come out so rich in the spun yarn, shining warm and precious when hit by the light.

I've started knitting two shoulder shawls, one in green and purple, which remind me of crocus, lilacs, hyacinths, asparagus, bulbs and sprouts ...



... the other one in oriental reds, resembling herbs and spices in an exotic bazaar - or maybe the red, ripe fruits and berries in the midst of the summer heat:



The classic feather & fan pattern which I've used looks intricate but is yet quite simple, one row changing between 6 times k2tog and 6 yok1, one row knitted, one row purled inbetween. You can find the complete pattern in "Beautiful Knits" by Alison Dupernex, which holds several easy patterns.



Though this yarn was a new purchase - which I just couldn't resist - I've promised myself not to start another project without incorporating recycling or stash material. Even for this 'precious' silk I was glad to use the - almost antique! - rayon silk thread bobbins for plying, which I found in my mother's cellar about a year ago.

And I'm sure my stash will provide some beads and maybe some of that Indian recycled Sari silk for the finishing as well ...

Speaking about other projects - look what I received from Elizabeth at Landanna last week: driftwood!



This lucky girl lives on an island in Denmark with the beach nearby, thus being able to collect wonderful driftwood on her daily walk ... At the moment, she is taking us on a virtual walk with her in her blog.

And this is what Carolyn is doing with her beach finds - so beautiful! - another lucky girl, living close to the sea ...

Quite busy spinning, crocheting, embroidering .../Textiles Allerlei

I've been carding some bamboo, fine wool and silk fibers together for a very soft and delicate yarn. As I didn't find any bamboo fibers in green, I decided to dye some and mingle them with the white roving - funny, but in my opinion it looks more 'bambooish' that way.

Slower treadling, just to the point of holding the fibers together, made this yarn as soft and delicate as I wanted it to be - then plied with a very thin cotton thread.

I still have some problems with the new slide yarn guides, though - they just don't seem to stay where I want them, but keep sliding towards the bobbin ... Anyone else who's got the same problem, or am I doing something wrong?



I've been playing around, doing some necklaces too - using cotton yarn and glass, bone and wooden beads from my stash. Thought it could be a nice thing to wear now to the summer clothing.



This is how the embroideries proceed for 'My Neighbour's Garden':



and for 'The Vineyards':



Sara is coming on Saturday - maybe we'll do some acid dyeing this time ... :-) By the way, if you want to read about really archaic natural dying, go visit Manya Maratous' wonderful Greek 'Mythcolour'-blog!

(German summary: Bambus-, Woll- und Seidenfasern - und laaangsames Treten - machen diese Wolle sehr weich und geschmeidig. Allerdings wollen die neuen gleitenden Fadenhalterungen immer wieder von selber Richtung Spule gleiten - ärgerlich. Mache ich etwas falsch oder hat noch jemand die gleichen Probleme damit?

Und dann gibt's noch ein paar Bilder von Halskettenspielereien mit buntem Baumwollgarn und verschiedenen Perlen, für's Sommergewand - und davon, wie die beiden gestickten und gepunchten Bilder voranschreiten - fleißig diesmal, gell?)

Fibre sisters fabric brooch/Die Stoffschwesternbrosche

Yesterday I finished the small fabric brooch which I began to stitch at Sara's just before returning home.

It shows us two fibre sisters - and makes me smile and remember this nice week we spent together!



I found a piece of white cloth with one of Sara's b/w pencil drawings in her waste fabric scrap basket, showing two caterpillars, and I asked her if I could use it.

Eager to try out the handdyed threads, I started stitching and embellishing on it - and voilá! The fibre sisters turned up!

Proudly wearing my new brooch, I'm now working on two other fabric recycling and punching projects, of course including a lot of free embroidery, so I can use the threads :-)!



(German summary: Ich habe die Stoffbrosche fertiggemacht, die ich bei Sara begonnen habe: Grundlage war eine s/w Federzeichung von ihr, mit zwei Raupen, die ich aus der Schnipselbox gefischt habe - jetzt ist sie mit Stickereien recht verändert, und zeigt stattdessen passenderweise zwei Stoffschwestern! Und zuletzt noch eine kleine Vorschau auf das, was ich jetzt gerade mache ... auch Stoffrecyclingprojekte!)

A basket full of inspiration/Einen Korb voller Inspiration

So I'm back from my trip to Sara, filled to the brim with fresh inspiration and some new yarns and threads in my basket.

Due to the Icelandic ash clouds and the shut-down of the airport in Stockholm, Sara's Swedish guests had their flight cancelled; thus the two of us had lots of spare time to talk and exchange ideas, to work in the studio, visit the local pub and to do some shopping (at yarn shops and a textile thrift store ;-)).



First we had planned to do some dyeing, but as Sara went through her stash of already dyed threads and the weather was too windy and chilly for our purpose, she generously told me to pick a big bunch of her threads and forget about dyeing this time -
I'm overwhelmed with my treasure!



Anyway, the dyeing project is just postponed, not cancelled!

We also played around with a pincushion project, using a waste Chinese garlic basket which we stuffed with some weights, foam, wool and then embellished and embroidered.

While Sara was working on her wall hanging, I used the time for sewing two organizer rolls for my crochet hooks and knitting equipment, using fabric scraps and some of those beautiful threads:



Returning home, I find the summer to have arrived here in the South - my house and my garden are calling out loud for being attented to and there is such a lot of work to do - still my head is filled with colours and yarn and threads ...



(German summary: Da Sara's Workshop auch der Aschenwolke zum Opfer fiel, hatten wir unverhofft Zeit für andere Projekte - sie arbeitete an ihrem neuen Stück weiter, ich habe mir u.a. zwei Stoffrollen für meine Strick- und Häkelnadeln genäht, je ein Nadelkissen haben wir gemeinsam ausprobiert. Neue Wolle habe ich auch im Gepäck mit nach Hause, einen Korb voll mit wunderschönen, handgefärbten Stickgarne, die mir Sara geschenkt hat - und jede Menge neue Ideen und Inspirationen!)

Almost to good to be true!/Fast zu gut, um wahr zu sein!

A couple of days ago, I was surfing the net for this and that - and suddenly I read that Ashford, the producer of my "Joy" spinning wheel, had come up with a "Freedom Flyer" - a new flyer for artyarns, provided with a 25 mm/1" orifice hook and slide yarn guides ...



... and large bobbins (left - the 'old' one to the right, as comparison) ...



Maybe you remember my earlier posting about making a DIY solution for bypassing the former small orifice? I have been using it since, but of course I was eager to get that professional gear now!

Anyway, I ordered the new equipment online the same night, and this afternoon the parcel arrived! So now I'm looking forward to quite some new spinning sensations :-)! Maybe someday I'll be able to spin such wonderful yarns as Jana does ... This is really a site to find inspiration!

On Sunday I'm leaving for a trip to Sara - I'll be gone for a week this time, as Sara has asked me to assist as a translator for a group of Swedish ladies attending an embellishing workshop at her place.

I must admit I do feel tempted to take my fancy equipped spinning wheel with me - but I guess there won't be that much time for spinning this time ...!

(German summary: Als ich vor ein paar Tagen im Netz herumgesurft bin, habe ich erfahren, daß es jetzt einen neuen Krebs für das Joy-Spinnrad gibt, mit dem man auch Effektgarne spinnen kann, dazu noch wesentlich größere Spulen. Das neue Einzugsloch - eigentlich ist es ein offener Haken - beträgt 25 mm, statt bisher 10 mm. Heute kam die Zusatzausrüstung mit der Post!

Viel ausprobieren kann ich es im Moment noch nicht, da ich nächste Woche bei Sara bin - aber bald! Bis dahin ;-), schaut Euch die dollen handgesponnenen Garne von Jana an - die sind wirklich wunderschön!)

Three knitted shawls with crocheted endings/Gestrickte Schals

I'm done!

Actually I finished my country lace shawl just before leaving for Sweden, but I didn't have time to post about it then. It's just as cosy and warm and 'wrappy' (with a tiny smell of sheep - I love that :-)) as I wanted it to be - but in the end, I didn't do that fancy border à la Nicky Epstein, which I originally had planned to do.

I decided that this rustic shawl would look better with a simple crochet ending instead, the only decorations are those curled tails which I've come to like a lot ...



I used my Sweden holiday for knitting a bit too, this is a 'false' moebius which I did out of one of the Schoppel lace balls (yes, same curly tails there too!) - it's knitted in simple garter stitches, starting with three stitches in one corner, knitting kind of quarters in a row -but the yarn itself is so beautifully rainbow coloured, that I wanted the knitting technique to stand back for the yarn:



And this is another one in garter stitch, the yarn being a red Swedish traditional one-ply wool which I bought on site - I'm considering doing some mouches in different red yarns on it - and finally a new design (my own) on a crocheted flower necklace:



(German summary: Drei sehr einfache Dreieckschals mit gehäkelten Umrandungen - ich wollte, daß die dollen Wollsorten hier die erste Geige spielen dürfen! Und noch eine Häkelkette ...!)

Happy Easter!/Frohe Ostern!/Glad påsk!

So this is the Moebius-scarf I told you about in my last posting - I just managed to get it ready in time for our Easter holiday trip to Sweden!

And I've also managed to get the Kauni lace shawl for my mother ready - here it is, all in earthy colours:



Much of the credit must be given to these wonderful yarns, which I found lately: the four bright coloured ones to the left and in the middle are Schoppel yarns ('Zauberball'), then you see a Japanese 'Noro' and to the right a Danish 'Kauni' wool. They are not so easy to find at the normal yarn shops, but there are of course several online-sellers.

They are all mostly or entirely wool and are wonderful to knit with!



I wish you all a very nice and happy Easter, with lots of eggs (and wool :-))!

(German version: So, jetzt habe ich meine Osterschals fertig - mit diesen dollen Knäueln aus Deutschland, Dänemark und Japan - und wünsche Euch allen ein schönes und frohes Osterfest - mit vielen Eiern und auch recht viel Wolle :-))