Yarn: August 2006 Archives
Some days I just can't wait to come home and find out what might be waiting on the back porch. Today was one of those days. You see, a very kind blog reader, Gwen (sadly blogless) has shifted her focus from knitting to quilting. And in order to make way for more fabric stash (which I can completely understand, since my mother's passion for fiber tends more towards fabric than yarn) she decided that she wanted to send some of her yarn stash out into the world to see what it might become. It turns out that I am very fortunate, because Gwen, who has read my blog for a while, thought some of her lovely stash would find its future with me.
I love surprises, and while I knew the box was coming, I had no idea what might be inside. After getting all my stuff inside the house, I grabbed the box and my scissors and took it all up to my favorite place to be in the early evening: my upstairs balcony. I love the light and the breeze and the odd view I have of the Sears Tower. I spend most evenings out there when the weather is tolerable. And tonight I had a mystery box to explore.
After opening the box, I got bathed in more color and texture. I just had to spread it out so that I could take it all in and do some serious yarn petting. I've seen Malabrigo before, but I'd never picked it up and realized how soft it was. And here were two skeins in a beautiful blue/green colorway. Ditto for the beautiful rich purple Karabella Aurora 8. With 4 balls, I can imagine a lovely special occasion scarf (I've read that Aurora 8, while lovely, does what most merino does, and pills a bit when it gets used a lot). And then there's the sage colored Classic Elite Premier and Attitude -- pima cotton and tencel and pima cotton and silk blends, respectively. Both are soft buttery yarns that remind me that I don't usually give cotton blends enough of a chance when I knit.
On the flashier side (in the center of the picture) are 3 skeins of one of my all time favorite yarns, Lorna's Laces Lion and Lamb. The colorway, Watercolor, is suble shades of some of my favorite colors and just calls out to be in a special project. And it's hard to miss the Colinette Prism in "Jamboree". I'd love to try spinning a yarn like that myself -- if ever I could convince my fingers to make a bigger diameter, fluffier single.
Just too much good stuff to list!
Lately, I've been feeling kind of uninspired about knitting, but this bountiful box of color has really got my brain whirring away... What could be the best use of 10 skeins of beautiful chocolate brown Jo Sharp wool? Is it cool enough to start on a pair of socks for myself in Mountain Colors Bearfoot? Is the pima/tencel blend a good substitute for the pima cotton yarn called for in Annie Modesitt's crochet cardigan pattern from the last Interweave Crochet? I just want to bury myself in my fiber room and start thinking about all the possibilities.
Thank you so much, Gwen. I am still overwhelmed in the best possible way by this treasure chest from your stash. I promise to give your yarn a very good home. Every time I knit with it, I will remember your generosity and that there is so much good energy and so many good people in the fiber/fabric/crafting community. And someday, I will brighten someone else's doorstep with a special gift in your honor.
Edited 8/19/2006 -- I'm turning off the comments for this post because it seems like the spammers have found something to love about it. Must be that spammers like gift yarn as well!
Right now its really hot here in Chicago. It was 100 degrees when I was out running some errands around lunch time and it only dropped to about 97 degrees at around 8 pm. According to my constantly updating weather ticker (courtesy of my Google desktop) it's cooler in Houston, Texas right now. And we even had a brief power outage this afternoon -- probably because of all the air conditioner use on the grid right now. And when you go out, you don't see many people. That's a strange and eerie thing in a big urban environment. But clearly people would rather be indoors with whatever climate conrol they have access to. Yeah, baby, it's warm outside.
Which is a very long lead in to me telling you I haven't been knitting much. I have been knitting some. I'm about 50 rows further along on Dad's vest. Only another 36 to go before the armhole shaping. No photos, because I don't suspect that it would look significantly different than the last picture. I've also turned the heel and finished the gusset for my second Broadripple sock. Second dark blue sock partway done? Boring picture, I decided.
So you get sock yarn and some more spinning commentary instead. The STR is the real yarn that will flesh out that pattern idea I gave you a glimpse of a short time back. Because the pattern and my idea have some "directionality" and because the directionality does change the interpretation I'm considering doing this pattern in both a top down and toe up version.
The Crown Mountain Farms Sock Hop yarn, colorway "Say a Little Prayer" came to me as a result of a marvelously lucky break. When I got to the website after the new yarn was announced, I got there late (I hate it when a business meeting gets in the way of yarn purchasing, but sometimes there's no help for it) and the shopping system would only let me put one skein in my cart. So I just left a little note that I really did want two skeins and I'd be happy to wait until there was more available (if you go to Teyan's blog you'll see that she invited people to pre-order/place a custom order if they were willing to wait a few months, which I was, since I have plently of sock yarn to keep me busy). Apparently I lucked out, because when I placed my order, there were actually two skeins of Say a Little Prayer left in stock and they winged their way to my door step on Saturday (I have to make a side comment here to say that Teyani and her husband must have some special connection to the post office, because the yarn shipped on Thursday and I had it on Saturday. From Washington. And it's come equally fast when I ordered the Corriedale pencil roving and the Sloopy superwash merino).
I've been asked in a couple of comments how my hand spun Sloopy sock yarn (made with the same startin fiber that Sock Hop is made from) compares to the Sock Hop yarn. Since I didn't have any yarn to compare it to at the time, I really couldn't tell you. Now I can provide a side-to-side comparison.
This picture makes me think of orange and lime sherbert....one of those things I used to love as a kid, when I judged the quality of a frozen confection by the brightness of the dyes used to color it.
Overall, the yarns are very similar. They are both very soft but still relatively tightly spun and plied. My yarn, however, is a bit thicker in diameter than the Sock Hop. Both yarns have the delightful variability that tell you that it was someone's hands and not a machine, that brought this yarn to life. Makes you realize that sometimes perfection does not have to mean complete uniformity.
