Socks, shells, spinning.

Well, a week has gone by and I have some more stuff to show you. First up is some pretty yarn that I should have showed you last week, but I selfishly kept it to myself.

I won this on Tiennie's blog, I wasn't trying to win - honest. But it turns out that I was the 5,000 commenter on her blog, can you believe that? 5,000 comments!? Then again, if you've seen her blog, you will probably easily understand, Tiennie takes amazing photos of her beautiful projects. I, for one, am happy to have found her.

I have a couple of FOs for you, I finally finished sock #2 from the beautiful single sock sent to me by Nova. I really loved knitting with the Shibui, and it's a really great color (Pagoda). I did have some pooling issues in the second sock, but the color differences are subtle enough not to bother me. Ravelry Details here.


The other FO is very important to show you. After I publicly shamed myself on my inability to actually finish Sheldon, and probably traumatized at least a few of you. The first thing I did was pick him up and finish him that night...

Here he is. Details here (ravelry)


And the spinning? Yes, I figured out the plying and am trying not to feel too stoopid about not changing the drive band - the one consolation is that my real issue was that the wheel had come loose from the back. After tightening the bolt at the back all was well. I couldn't get a great shot of the yarn for some reason, hopefully this will give you an idea.

An FO. And a call for spinning advice.

I finished hubby's henry while were were away, which makes it a 2007 FO - maybe. But then I didn't wash and block it (i.e. truly finish it) until we returned home, which would make it a 2008 FO, right? Oh well, either way, it's an FO and he loves it.

I managed to time the finishing perfectly for the warm spell we've had. It looks as though winter will recommence next week, so Mr B will get a chance to wear it without sweating bullets.


On the whole, the scarf is a winner for me, I love how it looks more woven than hand knit, and the fact that the recipient loves it is the most important factor - oh! and it's soooo soft. It was knit with ColourMart Cashmere 2/7NM DK weight, full details here (ravelry link). However, it wouldn't be fair of me if I didn't share the negatives. This scarf was NOT FUN to knit, in fact I do believe that it may have played a part in the disappearance of my knitting mojo.


It also doesn't have the finish I wanted. I tried the tubular bind-off, I must have done it too tight, because when I went to tug the scarf, the bind-off snapped in several places. I won't tell you how much fun it was to unravel that bind off and pick up the 450+ stitches again. There was no way I was going to risk trying it again, so I used EZ's sewn bind off. I think that the edge is so-so. Biggest disappointment for me is the ends, which are kind of... well, for want of a better word... frilly. Mr. B says it's fine, but I'm not the least bit pleased about them, and considering the special yarn and pattern, I guess I expected perfection, or something close. But no amount of tweaking, tugging, squishing or pulling during blocking could fix the 'frill'.


So, with the knitting mojo MIA, I decided to do a little more spinning. I finished 3 bobbins of some roving I bought at Rhinebeck from Little Barn. I couldn't wait to start plying, so I added the jumbo flyer and tried to get started, but this is where I need help from any fellow Lendrum owners, the wheel keeps jamming, I just can't spin it at all. I've tried all sorts of tensions but I just can't wrap my head around what I'm doing wrong. Could it be that I have to use the second belt provided? It seems to be the same diameter as the one already on there, but I could be wrong. Even if I had to change it, I can't quite figure it out, I'm supposed to take the wheel off? Or is there something else entirely different that I'm not doing? Any help/suggestions would be gratefully appreciated. It's figured out, thanks to some advice from Kristi and in the process of looking, I found that the wheel had come loose. So I changed the drive band and tightened the bolt, and have now finished plying my first 3-ply on the Lendrum :)


Since things have halted, I'm thinking that today might actually be the day I finally finish Sheldon, who has been in this sorry state of unfinished for a couple of months, poor thing.

Happy New Year

Austria is a stunning place - the views are magical. This is what I saw out of the bedroom window the morning after we arrived at my parents (it was pitch black when we arrived the night before).

There are actually too many stunning views than I could shake a stick at, even just the walk into town had views like this:


this:


and this:


you can go to my flickr set for more.

As for other things about the trip, the beer and food were plentiful. And over the holidays the neighbors bring home-made cookies and highly alcoholic orange punch.



I managed to bag myself the cutest slippers ever.


I gave gifts of socks to my parents and a hat to little brother (never got a picture of the hat, sadly).

Childs first Socks for Mum (Lazy ravelry link - sorry)


Dads Earl Grey Socks (another lazy ravelry link)


All were well appreciated.

I even made some mitten ornaments for the parents:


The trip was a lovely and relaxing one, we saw Salzburg and even got a half day in Munich. I had no idea how stressed I'd become before we went away, with work being full on, and all the sewing during my free moments. I'm still on wind down right now, it's great!

I did a bit of knitting while away as well, but that's for another post.