A New FreeForm Shawl

I worked on some fun spinning this last week, including this Super Sparkly Soft and Silky lace weight. It's a blend of alpaca, merino, bfl and silk, plus generous quantities of sparkle. I'm working on a freeform shawl and I needed a light weight, glossy yarn that was delicate, but with a lot of personality so that it wouldn't get lost in all the texture of my art yarn.


I'm using it to embellish this fabric I knit with some of my handspun art yarn. It's hard to capture the pretty opalescence, but I think this little lace weight holds its own amongst all the curls, twirls and cocoons.

I hope you have had a wonderful week, I'm on my way to visit Andrea and check out all the happy creative people at WonderWhy's Fiber Arts Friday!

Blessings Friends!
Melissa

New Scumble Project

I've started a new scumble project, the (Mostly) Purple Scumbled Purse. I really planned on being done for this weeks Fiber Arts Friday post...well, I had good intentions and I really did make a lot of progress...soon, I hope! If you're not familiar with the term scumble, it's another name for/style of free form crochet/knitting. You create individual freeform pieces or scumbles, and then piece them together to create a fabric. This piece is all crocheted. My first introduction to freeform/scumbling was this gorgeous tea cozy created by Renate Kirkpatrick, it's one of the very first projects that I faved way back in 2008, when I first joined Ravelry. This lead me to other great freeformers like Prudence Mapstone , Jenny Dowde, Janice Rosema....and tons of other creative and inspiring fiber artists. (Hopefully all these links will be incentive to join Ravelry, if you haven't already!)


Other projects in the works this week, a Fairy Tail spin/swap. Super fun! I'm just ready to begin spinning, can't wait! The big reveal will have to wait until it's been mailed off to my swap partner, but maybe you have guesses as to which fairy tale I was randomly assigned?


I also knitted up another pair of sleeping cuffs, love the first pair, but wanted them longer. I did these in bulky weight and made a modification to the bind off cuff by knitting two together, then binding off. It created a nice cozy, slightly narrowed cuff that stays partially covering my hand unless I push it back. This is especially nice for sleeping, since the others tend to get pushed up when I'm sleeping.

That just a little recap of my fiber activities this week, I look forward to checking out all the marvelous creations over at Andria's Fiber Arts Friday blog hop!

Blessings Friends!
Melissa

A Gathering Of Magical (aka Sparkly) Pink Clouds

I was asked to spin a soft, fluffy, cloud like yarn from the PinkFog! Alpaca and Silk Spinning Clouds. I may have gone a bit over on the fluffy! I put the #2 pencil in for scale reference, as you can see even where the strand is small, it's mostly more than pencil thickness, and the bulk of the skein is, well, really bulky! It's a super bulky 1-3 wpi, but it's light as air and as soft as super soft alpaca and silk can be.


I hope I captured the cloud like effect of this yarn, it's hard to photograph clouds...camera shy, hahaha.


Do your hands get cold? Mine do, especially when I'm sleeping. I'll wake up and one hand will be absolutely freezing cold from being out from under the covers. So I knitted myself some cuffs, of course they had to have bobbles! They have been so nice, I like them much better than fingerless gloves, I can wear them around the house when I'm working and the fingerless part means I can push them up on my wrist and out of the way if I need to. I'm currently working on a second pair, I decided I wanted them a little longer so I can scoot them down over my fingers a bit more if I want and my wrists will still be covered.

But, the most exciting fibery thing this week is, that yesterday I got my copy of Lexi Boeger's new spinning book, Hand Spun, New Spins on Traditional Techniques. It's completely wonderful!!! I was so excited, I dropped everything and sat down and started reading it...then I remembered I was on my way out the door to run some errands! She puts together a great book! I've gone through it over and over. I do that when I'm excited about something, what I will eventually do is make myself slow down and really absorb all the information.(To accomplish this, I will have to try not to let the wonderful photographs distract me!) Not only are there spinning techniques and patterns, but there are also interviews with some of the many fiber gurus that inspire us. It's so cool to get a closer look at them and their creativity and the paths that lead them along their fiber filled adventure. Buy the book spinner friends, you will not be disappointed!

I hope you have a wonderful weekend,
Blessings Friends!
Melissa

Pink Fog!

I'm in a Pink Fog, it's a good fog though! I've dyed some of gorgeous alpaca in shades of soft pinks and orchid, then I tossed in some of my new custom blend of Angelina sparkles, FaeriePrincess and PixieDust, plus beautiful, glossy silk fiber and pale pink Pizzazz sparkle fiber. Ooo, it's good enough to dive in and go for a swim, I love it! All super soft fibers, these alpaca/silk spinning clouds dance really well together!


So well, that I had to drop everything and dance some up onto my bobbin! I played around with the single, making it fatter and thinner to see how it worked up. I even did some core spinning, I like it every-which-way, it's pink, soft and sparkly, what's not to love!

I was super busy with fiber activities this week, but I'm too tired and lazy to post any more pictures! haha! I hope you had a wonderful and creative week!

Blessings Friends!
Melissa