Summer's Ending

This past Sunday, I took a trip up to the Sabbathday Lake Shaker Village and its surrounding antique stores as a fieldtrip for my upcoming 27th birthday (Tuesday!).  The Shaker village is simultaneously the most peaceful and most energizing place I've ever been, and I wanted to visit to recharge and celebrate the last little bit of summer.

This trip was exactly what I needed, and a wonderful start to my birthday week.  I wanted to extend some of this celebration to you, so from tonight until Monday, September 3rd, all the patterns I have available on Ravelry are on sale! Just use the code "27for27" at checkout for 27% off, and thanks for helping me celebrate!

The Power of Twitter, and a Pair of Mitts

So a couple months ago, this happened on Twitter (that's Amy and me).



Then this happened.



And then all of this happened.



So it seemed kind of surreal a couple weekends ago when I trooped up the stairs at a local pub and met up with some of the coolest designers in the knitting world today.  Once I got over the fact that I'd been admiring these people's careers since I'd started getting into the online knitting world, it was such an amazing experience to swap ideas, listen to different perspectives on publishing and the industry, and just realize that these were awesome people that were way too much fun and perfect for having a beer with.  (And would you believe it, I didn't take any pictures?)

So the week after that amazing event happened, I had another wonderful moment--a pattern of mine came out as part of the Woolen Rabbit's yarn club!



The club's theme this year was the Roaring '20s, an era that I love.  One of my favorite parts of that decade are the films that came out then.  My family are HUGE into old movies, and I spent more than a few afternoons as a teenager in the arthouse movie theatre in town, watching the classics come to life.  One of my hands-down favorites is Fritz Lang's Metropolis, a masterpiece of a dystopian future society and Art Deco scenery.  It was not a hard choice for me to use this movie as an inspiration for the club!



The Metropolis Mitts are currently available exclusively to the Woolen Rabbit club members, but will be opened up to the general public in February 2013.  If you're interested in being notified when they are generally available, please let me know! I'm so pleased with how they came out; special thanks again to my girl Casey, who modeled them and was totally up for wandering around the State Theatre building here in Portland, looking for the perfect Art Deco accents.  We were both standing on rickety chairs in an old elevator vestibule at one point, which is sadly typical for a photoshoot with me.  All in all, though, it was such a pleasure to work with Kim at the Woolen Rabbit; I've been a huge fan of her work for a very long time, and I may have done a little fangirl squeal when she said I could design for the club.   Thanks, Kim!

So what's next for me? Well, I'll be wearing a certain birthday crown in a couple days, and I'm thinking it might be time for a present for you, too!

Medomak and the New England Fiber Arts Retreat

I got back from teaching at the New England Fiber Arts Retreat on Saturday afternoon, and I'm pretty sure I left most of my heart up there.  Here's a view of the week in pictures:

 

the view of the walk up to the cabin I shared with three of my best friends

 

the four--count 'em, four--Stephen West Mystery shawls in progress at camp

 

working on the community weaving project

 

a panel from Dana's rigid heddle-woven blanket

 

another kind of spinning--we met lots of rather amazing spiders this week

 

visiting Cloud Hollow alpaca farm

 

Rachel's natural dyeing class--indigo as it begins to oxidize

 

midway through . . .

 

fully oxidized!

 

a visit to Katharine Cobey's studio

 

a view from the loft.  I never wanted to leave.

 see why?

 

fogged-in cove, gorgeous studio, knitting goddess, standard poodles--yeah, I'm happy

 

Rachel's yarn for the week, both handspun and naturally dyed

 

the varied and wonderful results of the needle felted sheep class

 

some of the amazing felted bowls we made on the last day

 

 

 

These felted bowls, one of the best classes I've ever taught, summed up the week for me.   We all had the same materials and the same time, but the finished pieces were all wildly different, and all absolutely gorgeous.  Everyone's experience at camp was completely different, but I'm pretty sure that none of us would trade it for anything.  Next year we'll be meeting up from July 28th to August 3rd.  There is nothing that will stop me from being there, and I'm already counting the days.  Hope to see you there!

July Happenings

July got away from me this year.  What with the Tour de Fleece, a spate of housesitting, getting back into running, starting a fashion illustration class, finishing up a couple designs and having a few others published, a trip up the coast for a wine and yarn weekend, and, oh yes, normal, day to day life, I feel like July picked me up like a whirlwind and dropped me off at the cusp of August, breathless and a teeny bit dizzy.  So here's a quick rundown before August treats me the same way!

This year's TdF started with a bang and ended. . . kind of with a fizzle.  For the first time in five years, I was a DNF--there were too many other things going on and working spinning into my schedule was stressing me out.  And since this is supposed to be fun, I made the grown-up choice (note: not my normal mode; I am far more likely to stick to something if it kills me, just because I said I would) and let it go for this year.  Instead, I got some sleep, worked on some deadline knitting projects, and petted the yarn that I had spun.  In addition to the first week's spinning, I managed to ply the eight ounces of 1 ply BFL, 1 ply Falkland fingering/sport weight from Pine Star Studios:

I also got started on that yummy CVM/Romeldale fleece I got back from Morro Fleeceworks.  Here's how it's spinning up:

 

I have plans a-foot for a 3-ply Aran weight to make a cable-y shawl collar cardigan, should I ever get the rest of it spun!

During TdF, and just when I needed it most this past month, my friend Elise came through with the best proposal ever: a weekend in a cabin on the ocean, with spinning wheels, knitting, friends, and wine.  Elise runs Nerd Wars over on Ravelry, so she has about as much, if not more, on her plate as I do! Some of the CVM/Romeldale spinning happened then, but my weekend mostly looked like this (you'll have to imagine the glass of wine that was out of the frame):

 

It was such a great weekend--loads of fun, lots of new friends, and a chance to take a step back from the rest of the crazy.  When I came back, I was ready and raring to go, which is good, because I had two designs come out in the next two weeks!

The Kit Camisole came out with Quince & Co. first.  This was a big leap of faith for me--it was the first time I'd done a garment with this much positive ease to it, and I was nervous as to how it would come out or what the reception would be.  It's been so great seeing people's reactions to it!

 

Kit is worked in Quince's Sparrow, which, as we've discussed, is one of my favorite yarns.  :) It takes texture SO well, and was a delight to work with once again.  You can find the pattern on Ravelry here!

The second pattern that came out this month was the Tideline Cowl, which will be published as part of Cecily Glowik MacDonald's first self-published book, Landing: Winged Knits Vol. 1.  Cecily is possibly the sweetest, nicest, most hard-working person I know, and it was a complete honor to get to be part of this latest endeavor.  

 

(both pattern photos by Carrie Bostick Hoge; she's amazing!)

Tideline is knit in Quince & Co.'s Puffin, another one of my favorite yarns! I LOVE the stitch definition and texture in this; I had originally thought about knitting it in Finch, but fell in complete love with the idea of knitting it with a larger yarn for even more of a statement.  You can find this on Ravelry here, where you can pre-order the book both in e-book and hard copy, and quick! Cecily's doing a giveaway about the book on her blog here!

So now that July's almost under my belt, what will August bring? Only one of my favorite weeks of the year! I'm leaving tomorrow for a week up at Medomak and the New England Fiber Arts Retreat.  I'll be teaching classes on designing a top-down shawl, picots, pleats, and welts, and wet-felting a bowl or vase.  I will also be swimming every day, spending as many hours as I can on the porch, and hanging out with some of my best friends.  I.  Can't.  Wait. 

Tour de Fleece Week 1

So, I've got this relationship with the Tour de Fleece.  This is my sixth year playing along (that's crazypants right there), and it's probably one of my favorite times of year.  This year is no exception! Here's what I've been working on so far:

This is 8 oz of 2-ply sportweight, spun worsted.  1 ply is Sour Fig in Shetland by Hello Yarn, and the other is Rambutan in BFL by Into the Whirled.  I still need to check yardage, but I love this yarn unabashedly.

Also on the wheel was 4 oz each of BFL and Falkland from Pine Star Studios:

 

The fast and furious plying on these started last night, and I'll hopefully have it finished up today.  I should have probably around 800 yards, and I have no idea what I'm going to do with it.  But I'm excited to move on to the next project! 

One thing I forgot to mention in the whirlwind of last week (thank you all for your kind words, by the way!) is that I got two fleeces back in the mail from Morro Fleeceworks.  I had sent them off during The Great Beetle Scare, which helped me be realistic about the actual likelihood of me washing those fleeces in my closet.  So off they went, and two of them came back to me last Tuesday.  Want a peek?

This is a CVM/Romeldale lamb fleece I picked up at Rhinebeck in--wait for it--2008.  It was an absolutely stunning fleece and I wasn't doing it justice by keeping it in the closet.  I can't wait to give it a spin! What are you working on for TdF?

A Big Week

So this week, I had a pattern release on Monday with Quince & Co., two patterns with Brooklyn Tweed's Wool People 3 on Tuesday, and chopped my hair off on Wednesday.  It's been a busy week! Let's start at the beginning.

(All Gemma photos by Carrie Bostick Hoge!)

The Gemma Shawl was a project that I absolutely loved knitting.  It was my first time knitting with Finch, Quince's fingering weight, and I went into it knowing that it was one of the springiest yarns out there on the market.  I wanted to respect that and not force it to block into serious lace, so I decided to play with simple textural stitch patterns with a single lace detail along the edge.   I was absolutely thrilled and delighted to block this and find out that, in addition to some amazing spring, this yarn has incredible drape as well.  I love it! I'm in the middle of a new project using it, and I'm loving it even more.  Stay tuned for that in the next few months!

Gemma is knit differently than my typical top-down shawls; it starts with only a few stitches and increases slowly only on one side to create a sideways triangle.  I loved the subtle asymmetry that creates!

The shawl takes 5 skeins of Finch, and can be found here on Ravelry. 

So that was Day 1! Day 2 dawned bright and early with the release of Auden and Bayard.  Eagle-eyed readers might recognize Auden as the sweater starring in the knitting catastrophe of a few months ago.  There is really nothing more *awesome* (sarcasm) than having to email Jared Flood with "the cat destroyed my sweater", but he was really awesome about it and gave me a couple extra weeks.  I was really glad, because I actually had the chance to change a few things from the first version of the sweater that were bugging me! (For those interested, Jashu is just fine--he's currently talking to himself in the other room.  Silly cat.)

(All Wool People 3 photos by Jared Flood!)

Auden is knit from the bottom up in the round, and then split to work back and forth for the armhole.  The allover pattern utilizes a series of smaller and smaller cables to create a gentle, delicate fern.

Auden uses Brooklyn Tweed's fingering weight Loft yarn, which I can't say enough good things about.  It blocks so beautifully in lace, cables, stockinette--you name it.  And the colors? Love 'em.   You can find it on Ravelry here. 

The colors of Loft were what drew me to design Bayard.  I must have spent an hour in the yarn room when I first decided to swatch for it, ending up with about twenty different possible combinations! It was almost a relief when I was assigned a color combo--it would have been really hard for me to choose.

Bayard is knit from the ribbing up, and utilizes slip stitches to pull one side of the hat shorter than the rest.  That lets the hat slouch without adding too much bulk.  Bayard takes less than a skein of Loft in two colors, and it's on Ravelry here!

The sample was knit in Old World and Woodsmoke, but I wanted to show a few other color combos that I wanted to explore as well!

Top row, L to R: Tent and Artifact, Blanket Fort and Plume, Nest and Sweatshirt
Middle row, L to R: Tent and Foothills, Homemade Jam and Wool Socks, Long Johns and Pumpernickel
Bottom row, L to R: Hayloft and Meteorite, Sap and Birdbook, Woodsmoke and Barn Owl

So many to choose from--these didn't even make a dent!

So on top of those, yeah, I cut all my hair.  When I realized I'd be going into a hot and humid Maine summer with buttlength hair, I balked, and off it came.  And yes, it's still long--but it's short for me!

 

I have committed myself to being a curly girl again! We'll see how long that upkeep lasts.  (Yes, it's in a ponytail right now.)

So that was a pretty awesome week for me.  But it's not over.  Because you know what starts tomorrow?  Oh yeah.  Tour de Fleece.  It's on.