Fiber Arts Friday ~ Where did all this yarn come from?

I've been doing some organizing this week and was shocked at how much yarn I had stashed around the house.  A little bag here....a bag there......the next thing I knew there was enough to fill a large tote.  Shocking!!!  So I decided I'd better get my you know what in gear and get to knitting.

I don't know what designer you might turn to but for me it's Stephen West.  Out came my patterns and books and after a couple hours choosing colors from "the stash" my knitting began.

I decided to start with Spectra

and just a day later.....

the pattern is so simple....just short rows and an incredible easy pattern repeat.  Somehow watching those little wedges appear just seems to take the boredom out of knitting this scarf.

I started Drawbridge Wednesday night at Your Local Yarn Shop knit night.  Super, super simple pattern....I'm hoping to get this done by tonight.  When I bought Westknit Book 2 my plan was to use my handspun for the patterns but since I found all that yarn......hmmmmmm you know how that goes.

On the spinning front......I had a line up of bobbins from the last couple of weekends that needed to be plied.

At the bottom of this pic is the yarn I spun at the MIAF alpaca show, the middle is the last bobbin of  coil yarn I started at Ann Arbor Fiber Expo and the top is what I'm spinning for my Stripe Your Fancy shawl.

All in all a very productive week....now I need to get ready for a special day at YLYS for the "Opening day of Yarn Hunting Season".   Yep....yarn hunting season.  Since it's 11/11/11....everything is 11% off....buy 10 items and receive an 11th item free.....spend $111.00 and receive $11.00 in "Yarn Bucks" for future purchases....."hunt" for special featured yarns that will be hidden through out the store and last but not least.......you can have your picture taken with your "big catch" of the day. 

Sounds like the perfect way to spend the day......oh, no worries, I'll just keep up my montra........use up my stash, use up my stash....

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!!

Fiber Arts Friday ~ Ta Da

I did it.....I did it....my first coil yarn!  I must admit it seems I got a little carried away on spinning my singles.  By the time I used up my batt and most of Wonder Whys batt, I had 2 1/2 bobbins filled.  So I plied......and plied.......and plied.... hoping to get it all on my jumbo bobbin.  Wrong!!!... I still have 1 full bobbin left.

The nice thing about having spun that much singles.....it helped me get a good rhythm going for making the coils.  The down side.....it took me 2 1/2 hours to do the plying.

 6.7 oz and 160 yds 

In these close up pics, you can see I have various sizes of coils.  Not actually the look I was wanting but now I have a better understanding of how I should spin my thick and thin singles.  Some were to small and some to large but I love how the two separate colored batts helped give extra pops of color to the finished yarn.

                           mostly my batt                                                                                Andrea's batt

I don't have the last bobbin plied yet because my husband volunteered our services for the MIAF Alpaca show last weekend held at the Delta Plex in Walker.   We worked in the South West Michigan Alpaca Association booth with Tim and Jane Talbot/Grand Alpaca Company talking about alpacas, our organization and spinning. 

Nope, this is not a pic of Tim and Jane.....it's my husband, Jim and Jane taken by Tim. Tim seems to be one of those behind the scenes people.  We didn't get 1 picture of him the entire weekend.

It was amazing how many people I spoke with about spinning over these two days.  You can see my coil spun yarn peeking out next to the pumpkin.  It turned out to be a favorite with the ladies....I could have sold it 20 times over before the weekend was out.  Just goes to show I might be headed in the right direction with the art yarn.

Since art yarn spinning takes my full concentration, I decided I'd better take something mindless so I could spin and talk at the same time.  I took a blend of Suri, Silk and Merino which I spun thin so I can have a fingering yarn when it's plied. I started with 3.5 oz and got it all spun but haven't decided if I'm going to ply it back on itself or with something else. I'll have to wait for inspiration to strike.

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Beautiful Suri's from Wind Walker Ranch in Middleville

It seems I've been a little spinning crazy the last two weeks.  This last pic is of the new "kids" on the farm.......

Jim traded an alpaca fiber boy for these two pygora boys.  Oh boy, oh boy...... new fiber to learn about!

 Happy Fiber Arts Friday!!