Saturday, June 7, 2008

Gotland Singles, and More Dying

I had some unexpected fiber time this afternoon, and the sun was shining. So, I finally got some photos of the gotland I have been spinning.



This wool is amazingly soft, and I love the fuzzy halo the singles have. I was a bit surprised that it actually seemed to fluff up as I plied it. I think it will end up being a rather plump fingering weight as a two ply. I will know tomorrow, when the yarn I plied and washed tonight is dry. Fingering weight is probably perfect for the shawl I have in mind. The very fine lace weight I made for my sister's shawl would be a bit too light for this one.

Yesterday I managed to catch my friend Kim off guard and convince her to go up to the Patternworks tent sale with me. Last year I got an amazing amount of wonderful yarns for very little money. It seemed to me that there was a much smaller selection this year. It also seemed that the markdowns were not as good as last year. They were great markdowns, but last year's sale was crazy.

The big deal I got this year was on 4 hanks of Fiesta yarns La Luz. This is a beautiful 100% silk yarn that I have always wanted to try, but have avoided because of the price-over $25 a hank. Well, I paid $4 a piece for it yesterday! The down side was that it was the brilliant colours that I loved about the yarn, and I really wasn't crazy about the 2 colours that were available. I did find a solution to that, though....


I bought 4 balls of "golden rod", a yellow-orange colour. Today I dipped them in a deep red dye, and allowed the dye to travel up the yarn, to get a fiery red to bright orange ombre. This is also drying now, and I will try to have pictures of the dry yarn tomorrow.

Last, but not least for today, I had mentioned in a recent post that I had been late sending out my bookmark exchange package, because at the last minute I had located some materials I had been hunting for. I promised to share the project after it had been received.

Terri, my exchange partner, collects wizards and dragons. I figured with the popularity of Harry Potter, and other youthful fantasy fiction these days a wizard fabric would be as easy to come by as water. Well, not at all. Dragon fabric wasn't readily available. I did finally have a wonderfully helpful sales rep at Keepsake Quilting locate 2 different dragon fabrics. I went in to see them, and finally, I had a collection appropriate needle case for Terri.


While there were no actual wizard fabrics, I did find a "Camelot" fabric with references to Merlin. You can actually see "Merlin's Maze" in the photo.

I was very pleased to be able to get this in Terri's package, and she seemed to really enjoy it.


So, tomorrow, plied Gotland, and Ombred silk!

5 comments:

Joansie said...

I love the Gotland..it's terrific.

I am so jealous that you got to go to Patterworks and Keepsake Quilting. I was just talking about Center Harbor today with friends.

Kaleidscope's sale this year was not as great either. What's up with all of that. Difficult to find great bargains...except you did manage to.

Have a great rest of the weekend!

Unraveling Sophia said...

I'm excited to see your dyed silk as I just used a skein of this same yarn in a new design - a red skein that I got at Webs. But I got the very same La Luz at the Patternworks sale last year and have been wondering for the past 12 months what I'll make with bright Goldenrod silk!

Anonymous said...

How wonderful to find a great deal. I love the idea on how you are dyeing it. Oh I bet Terri is very happy with that needle case. You are just awesome!!!

Hugs!!!

gerry said...

i still haven't knitted up what i bought at *last* year's tent sale- so i decided not to tempt myself with this one. Plus i'm saving up for our road trip to teh Peaches & Creme factory this August :)

LDSVenus said...

You too have been very busy, I feel so lazy now :P. Love the color on your dyed yarn and the gotland looks so yummy!! Gonna have to try spinning some of that. In a day or two I will post about some free roving I just accquired!!