Knitting on Impulse

October Leaves

2009-11-06T15:38:12-08:00

I definitely don't need a weather report to identify the freezing level these days:

It's a couple degrees above zero and raining hard down here in the valley, which means it is impossible to dress the kids appropriately. Snow gear comes home soaked to the skin, whereas the combo of thick woolly sweater and raingear isn't quite warm enough. Any day now, it will be properly, magnificently winter.

October's leaves all blew off this week, but the colourway keeps a bit of the fire alive:

In Summit Sock:

Blissful Sock:

and Mere Sock:

Stay warm!

Work in Progress

2009-11-04T15:53:15-08:00

This is what happens when you spill your guts (no traumatic allusions, I just thought it looked cool):

And this is what happens when someone's big sister gets gloves:

Except, instead of mindless stockinette, he wanted the motif to be "just like my sweater" (yes, the Little Knight pattern I've been promising for over a year and am working on a little bit every day.) Which meant I had to use my brain and doodle up a chart. I think I can improve it a bit on the other hand - I'm thinking of these as swatches with fingers.

Knitting On Through... Stuff

2009-11-02T19:16:12-08:00

Thanks to the 2010 Olympics, and beyond that, the now-local world of sliding sports, it looks like I'll be pretty much on my own with the business/household/parenting thing for large chunks of the foreseeable future. Rob does have the odd hour off here and there (oh, how I wish he were being paid for this) and I am proud to report that packages have been streaming out the door Right On Time. Today, however, he reported that the brakes on the car are now minimally functional (and I know it makes me a bad bad wife to say this out loud, but I noticed they were a little mushy three days ago, and it was All In My Head until today when he was driving down the very steep hill from the bobsled track and found the whole stopping thing to be rather fraught. Sigh. Even the most enlightened male....) So there will maybe be a day's delay while we impose on a friend to drive down the highway to the nearest gas station for brake fluid. (I know. A smart, modern woman would have known how to Take Charge and check that herself.) I might just walk to the post office tomorrow, but it will depend on whether the packages will fit in my backpack and how hard it's raining if they won't. It's not quite 500 miles, but the warm, fuzzy thought is there....

It'll be a good opportunity to see if puppykins can behave herself in the post office line-up. She could use a little novelty and it's pretty quiet early in the morning.

How about a wee sneak peek for the week?

Coneflower Gloves

2009-11-01T17:43:09-08:00

Knit to my daughter's exacting specifications and pronounced (by her) to be "way better than I ever imagined," these are basic knit-to-fit stockinette gloves garnished with a smidge of inexpert embroidery and two all-important pom poms.

"Knit-to-fit" in this case, incurred a certain degree of whinging about the four zillion fittings required to get the fingers of the first glove exactly right.

I don't think I'll win any prizes for embroidery, but you can make out a general petal-ish impression, right?

Not entirely unlike a Coneflower?

The recipient is thrilled, which in the end, is what really matters.

The yarn was a tragically knot-containing skein of Blissful Sock in Echinacea. (There were actually two more, each with a single knot, that I kept back - I suppose if anyone is so inclined, I could knock off a buck or so for the knot and let them go....) I have to say, I really loved working with this sock yarn - the superwash treatment has done nothing at all to diminish the sheen and wooly softness characteristic of BFL. Sheer pleasure to knit up.

Sampler Follow-up

2009-10-29T21:21:05-07:00

Thanks so much for all the feedback on the sampler idea! What I'm hearing here (and on the Rav group) is that:

Lots of people like the idea - both for the project and for the opportunity to try different yarns before committing.
Some folk don't need it and are perfectly happy to buy without feeling up the yarn first - and thank goodness, or an online yarn business would not be possible!
There is interest in more colour choice - it would certainly be possible to do say... warm colours, cool colours, neutrals, as well as a mix like the prototype. I would list each pack with a photo of the actual mini-skeins, so you'd know exactly what you were getting.
There also seems to be significant interest in sample packs of different colours of the same yarn, chosen for their compatibility in a project - also an idea I had toyed with, and totally do-able.
Feasibility? Admittedly, my creative ambitions have soared past the bounds of reality at times, so the caveat will be that the packs go up as they go up. No reservations or self-imposed deadlines (because those things are a direct signal to the Universe for somebody to break something, or fall ill, or schedule a surprise committment. Seriously - it's downright spooky.) I am learning (at times painfully) that a simple, linear system of "dye it, upload it, put it in the mail when it sells" is the way to go.

So... the concept is a go... but since Rob does 99% of the skeining around here (he had to laugh at the comments that asked if *I* would find it too much work) and is at the sliding track 14 hours a day for the next couple of weeks, the first packs likely won't go up until after that. (On a related note, this week's update will be going up Friday instead of Thursday, which is almost over now, in any case.)

Sampler

2009-10-26T17:38:32-07:00

I've been tossing around variations of this idea for ages, but I got a sudden impulse to just work up a sample (so to speak) over the weekend. I thought it would be nice for customers to be able to play around with the different yarns I dye before committing to larger projects, but at the same time, I couldn't resist the possiblity of doing a little more with it.

Here we have 10 yards of each of my wools and wool blends (I left off the super-luxury silk yarns for the time being) - merino in lace, fingering, sport, worsted, and aran; BFL in fingering, sport, and worsted, the three sock yarns (merino, BFL, cashmere-merino), merino-silk, Merino Whisper, and Cruiser:

I think I'd probably do 15 yds of each for the actual sample pack - a little more manageable, and would work out to a little over 100 gms of yarn in total. Enough to swatch, fondle, play with, or.....

Make something.

What do you think? Is there interest in something like this? I think I'd price it around $25. I could do mini skeins or mini balls (all labelled of course), though I think the mini balls are actually easier to handle on the receiving end. Although the concept of a feather and fan cowl is hardly original, the stitch does a fabulous job of mixing up varying colours and gauges, and I could include a wee pattern for this cowl version. Comments and/or further ideas would be gratefully received!

Pumpkin Day

2009-10-25T20:42:50-07:00

Second only to Christmas in our house... Pumpkin Carving Day! The whole family gets in on the action:

Last, but not least - the outcome of a long exposure photo with candles lit, lights off, and a mildly freaked out greyhound leaping at the photographer's head for reassurance.

After Sunset

2009-10-24T13:30:47-07:00

After the sun falls behind the mountain, as the light fades away, but before the heavens are quite black enough to reveal the stars:

the dark expanse is rich and magical, retaining hints of brilliant blue of a sunny day gone by, the warm glow of completed sunset, the smokey purple mist that invariably haunts the slopes.

Still available in:

Merino Whisper:

Bluefaced Bliss (fingering):

and Merino-Silk:

Summit Sock, Mere Sock, Camel Silk, Pure Silk Lace, and Silky Cashmere Lace will be coming in next week's update.

Echinacea

2009-10-22T16:54:30-07:00

I did a very subtle semi-solid version of the coneflower last year, but deep down, I've been longing to do this - to celebrate the vibrant contrast of the candy pink petals and the flaming gold/orange/red/brown of the central cone. I think it's a perfect Samhain / Hallowe'en sort of colourway.

Mostly in socks, because it IS an awfully vibrant colourway....

Blissful Sock:

Mere Sock:

and Summit Sock:

Merino Whisper is a new yarn I've been playing with for a while - a lofty single ply merino that knits around Aran weight but has amazing yardage. It is deliciously soft and would be the perfect yarn for cowls, scarves, mittens, hats, etc. Despite the soft hand, it is amazingly pill resistant - I ripped and reknit the bulk of one test skein three or four times while coming up with a simple cowl design (I was feeling indecisive) and it looks none the worse for wear!

I did indeed do the sunset colourway, but I'll save that for another post so as not to overdo the images.

Teasers

2009-10-21T14:52:33-07:00

Ruth Stewart