The only fibre-related present I got this birthday is a Bosworth Moosie, but I’m not complaining as if I’m going to get only one, a Moosie is a good choice!

Mine is 28g (1 oz) and has a Cochin rosewood shaft. It isn’t easy to get pictures that show the markings well. Click on the side views for larger pictures.

Most of my other presents were paperback novels, plus one DVD set, but Rys also gave me this beautiful little fossil, only 1.2″ across:

Lastly, I have a better picture of the mini-socks, which shows the colours better. I’m still trying to decide whether to make them into earrings or just add cords to make them into ornaments.

Our national Association of Guilds of W, S & D has asked for submissions for a Wall of Socks for some upcoming exhibitions, so I thought I would play around with some quick ideas. I spun this laceweight skein:

as a sample for yarn to knit the Multicolored Sockies from Socks, Socks, Socks, but the colour repeat was far too long, so I decided to use it for mini-socks instead. Here is the first one:

The colours are more accurate in the skein picture, but the green is bluer than it looks in either of them. I had to scan the sock instead of photographing it, as the camera is playing up.

I was thinking of making them into earrings, but they may be a little too big … they are 2.5″ from the tip of the toe to the furthest point of the cuff. I have enough left to knit the second one, so I’m going to do that anyway, then decide.

First, here’s a look at the silk scarf (or belt or hairband or however the recipient wants to use it) which I entered in the Berkshire Guild Challenge. The theme this year was “Nature’s Colour Palette”. We got the results at today’s meeting. Mine didn’t get a prize, but that’s fine by me as there were 15 entries, all of them very good, and I loved the prizewinners.

Technical details: warp – 16/2 silk dyed with acid dyes, weft – Gutermann’s sewing silk, plain weave. It was sett to make it very drapey, but I think it may have ended up too sleazy and unstable. The judge didn’t say that, though, so perhaps it isn’t too bad after all.

After the meeting, we took a friend home. While we were there we got some photos of the blue tit nestlings being raised in an old cylinder vacuum cleaner ouside her house. It seems that the hole where the hose went is just the right size for the adult tits.

She keeps silkworms, and we had a look at her current ‘crop’. She doesn’t have any live moths at the moment, but she has some beautiful dead ones for display at demonstrations. She does have a lot of larvae at the moment, though. Moth-phobics are advised not to read on. :-)
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I finally finished my exchange shawl, and it is on its way to the swap hostess. I used Heartstrings’ Pendants Faroese pattern and 4-ply merino lambswool. That “4-ply” is the UK yarn weight description, equivalent to thin sportsweight, but the yarn is actually 2-ply. It is as soft as you would expect, and very nice to use, and being coned, there are no joins.

The distinctive feature of Faroese shawls, of course, is the shoulder shaping which gives a good fit and lessens the problem of the shawl slipping off all the time. This pattern uses the lace design itself to give the necessary increases.

That shaping would cause problems if blocking the shawl laid out flat, so it needs to be blocked while folded. Jackie says it doesn’t need pinning or wires, but I found that helped.

With that out of the way, I’ve been working on my other shawl, for me this time, and I am ready to cast it off. Two shawls finished in the same week – definitely a record for me! I probably won’t block that one until my Zonta wires arrive. 

I also finished a woven silk scarf for my guild’s annual Challenge, but I forgot to take pictures before I handed it over. I’ll get it back the weekend after next, so I’ll take pictures then.

I plan to get back to the Sanquhar gloves and another shawl (laceweight this time) and the socks I started for myself before Christmas, I think. I have a couple of ideas for the loom too, but more on those later.

We received our takadai back in January, but we set it up in a room we don’t usually heat so it has been too cold to work in there till recently. We have finally finished our first braid. Most of it is my work, but Rys used up the end of the warp.

The edges are wavy and my beat was not as consistent as I’d like, but I’m happy with it as a first attempt. We have our first lesson in June, so I hope I will do better after that. Meanwhile, I will have fun muddling along on my own, working from books.

I’m still working at them, between knitting shawls. I have one glove past the end of the thumb gusset. Please excuse the bad picture, but you can see a larger version if you click on this one:

Although I am enjoying knitting these gloves and I do like the way the pattern is developing, I really, really want to knit one of the more famous grid-based Sanquhar patterns like Duke. I couldn’t make them for myself because I’d have had to mess around with the pattern too much to make it fit my narrrow hand, or aim for a gauge of 15 or more sts/in. Fortunately, Rys has volunteered to let me knit him a pair, which with his big hands will only be about 11 sts/in, and he has even promised to wear them if I get the fit right.

We happened to be in John Lewis yesterday. Our friend Diana, who works in their yarn department, had told us about a yarn that might be suitable for his gloves, Rowan’s 4-ply Yorkshire Tweed. I think she is right, as it is not machine washable so although it is not as ‘clingy’ as the Shetland I’m using for mine, I think the floats will bed down nicely once it is washed. Rys chose the combination of Oceanic and Dessicated. ["dessicated"? what kind of name is that for a yarn colour?!?!]

While we were in John Lewis, two little fellows followed us home:

… and talking of being followed home by sheepies, my friend Jan, who was also my first formal spinning tutor, picked up some interesting fleeces while at the 6th World Congress on Coloured Sheep in New Zealand last November. I bought 500g of moorit Polwarth from her:

The speaker at the meeting was Annabelle Spencer of the Falkland Islands Agency in Wells. She brought along a good selection of pure Merino fleece from the Falklands, and I couldn’t resist getting a pound of this superfine ‘silver’ which, as you can see, is actually more brownish than the description would suggest.

… that we go to a Wingham Wools sampling day. Well, that is our excuse for buying so much in one day. Wingham bring a vanload of fibres of oh-so-many types, some yarn and equipment and various other stuff, enough to fill a hall, and then a horde of avid spinners descend on them and strip the place almost bare.

We bought a lot of natural silk tops to dye, replenishing the stock I’ve gradually used up over the past year, and some silk filament for experimentation. Most of the other fibre I bought was as presents for friends. I got some merino/silk top (back and centre) and space-dyed silk top (front and right):

and merino top and pencil roving:

and Rys bought some merino pencil roving for himself:

That brightly coloured tangle of merino top is for teaching at demonstrations. It is easier to get kids (and many adults) to have a try if we have nice bright roving for them to use, so we rummaged among the balls ot top and pulled off arm-lengths of the brightest ones. It was fun!!!

I’m making progress on the gloves. I’m knitting them in parallel to avoid any risk of ‘second glove’ syndrome. I’ve reached the start of the thumb gusset on both, so it seemed a good time to take pictures and give a progress report. It’s getting dark so I had to use fill-in flash, and by the time I realised the “5″ is obscured by the needle it was too late to take more.

Yes, I am using unmatched sets of needles. The pink ones are #00s from the Susan Bates sock set (very nice needles) and they are a tad larger than the others, which are 1.75 mm Inox. That doesn’t worry me as I discovered when I measured my hands that my right hand is slightly larger than my left, so if that glove does work up a little looser, that will be a good thing.

That discovery started me wondering whether there is any connection between my right hand being dominant and the size difference. It isn’t like having better developed arm muscles on the dominant side due to more exercise, as my hands are very thin and the knuckles (where I measured) are really just skin and bone.

A few friends were chatting about swifts on AIM last night, and I mentioned my charity shop find, a folding mini-swift called the Aero Wool Winder. In the hope that some blog-readers might be interested, Rys helped me take some pictures of it today. Judging by the picture in the leaflet, I’d say it was made in the 1940s, or perhaps early 1950s:

It fits into a box 10″ x 2.7″ x 1.3″ (25.4 x 7 x 3.3 cm):

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The postman and my friends have been really good to me over the past few days. I have been sent fine lace knitting needles (US #00) by Sharon, and beaded stitch markers from Tricia, who makes lovely markers and also row counter bracelets:

The blue ones were a gift, and fit sock needles and fine lace needles. I was so impressed I bought the red ones (with that lovely bonus one) to use with thicker needles.

Then yesterday, the postie brought a package of hand-reeled silk from Michael (a.k.a. Oaken King) You can read more about the different types he sent.

If you are at all interested in silk fibre or silk moths, you must explore Michael’s web site.

As for what I’ve been doing since my last entry, I finished the corrugated ribbing on the first Sanquhar glove, but it is on hold while I try to come up with a chart I like for the initials block. I realised that when I put my ALF aside weeks ago, I was actually within 20 rows of finishing it. I’ve decided it makes sense to finish it before getting back to the shawl I started more recently. ALF was intended for me, but it will also serve as a fall-back for hte scarf exchange if I can’t finish the other shawl by the deadline.

Now I have to eat some Haagen-Daz Chocolate Midnight Cookies ice cream, so I will get back to blogging another time …