It’s the middle of January already! I can’t believe it – where has the time gone?
Well a quick update is long over due. Needless to say we had a lovely time in Scotland over New Year. In fact here are a few pictures taken of the Isle of Arran on New Year’s Day near the plot. 
The first one is at sunrise as we were driving over from Tarbert and the second in the afternoon from the shore of Kilbrannan Sound 
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Stashing:
On the knitting front I made it to k1yarns in Glasgow which is a lovely shop and well worth the visit. The owner, Katherine had just been on page 3 no less of the Herald (a broadsheet newspaper in Scotland similar to the Guardian or Independent!) in an article on the “Stitch’n’Bitch” phenomena! While there I had to indulge in some stash enhancement!
The ribbon yarn is Collinette Tagliatelli in Lagoon (3 hanks) and a ball of Orkney Angora in a beautiful turquoise colour for a curly whirly scarf. I also bought my friends (the Turner Sisters) a ball each of the Angora so that we can all have a go at a scarf each (that is while they teach me to crochet!). All in all I was quite reserved because a) it was post Christmas and I don’t have that much to spend and b) DH was sitting in the truck outside the shop waiting so I had to be fast!
I also managed to buy some sale yarn on Friday at our local Hobbycraft; 250g of Rowanspun for £1.99 per hank rather than £3.99 – not bad 
. I’m thinking of a scarf or if I’ve got enough even a shawl which is on my list of things to knit in 2006!
On the Knitting Front:
On the needles I have (too many things to mention) the front of my Greek Jumper from Interweave Knits Fall Issue with the back complete. I’m hoping that it will stretch in blocking as the width is a bit on the small side (what knit a swatch – who me, oh no I like to dive straight in and regret it all later) 
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Also on the needles is a scarf using some loop mohair I bought last year at Stash in a colourway called “Bubble Gum” which is exactly the colour! The only problem is my cast on is too tight so I’m debating whether to frog it or not which would release my borrowed no. 15 needles to start knitting with my Tagliatelli? 
On the Wheel:
Apart from knitting I’ve been practicing spinning over the holidays as this coming weekend the Turner Sisters and myself are off to a Spinning Day with our teacher Averil to North Wales. It cost £19.50 for the day (10am – 3pm) where you can spin as much as you want of natural dyed fleece so we’ve all been trying to speed up a bit.
We also had another spinning and dying day a couple of weeks ago at the sister’s house this time where I went colour mad and dyed 150g of Merino and 150g of Falkland rovings to look like this: 
which when spun up look like this: 
I love the way the colours intensify when you spin them. Averil tried to teach me Navajo plying but I mad a bit of a mess of it so I’d rather practice with some scrap yarn rather then my dyed pieces.
I’ve also started to spin my Opalessence Angora from the Woolen Rabbit. Its like spinning with cotton wool – sooooo unbelievably soft! 
Averil thinks I should leave it as singles but I’m temped to ply it. Also don’t know what it’s destined for yet……….. too much wool and so little time!
New Yarn Resolutions:
Normally I don’t divulge any resolutions as they’re destined to be broken once spoken but here goes:
- to finish all of my 2005 projects before the middle of 2006 (I’m trying to be realistic here!), or at least frog what I’m not going to complete and use the yarn for something else!
- to knit a shawl
- to try some colour knitting – this may be a while coming as I’m not that temped at the moment.
- to finish my first pair of socks and knit another pair before the end of the year with the cashmere yarn in my stash from Hipknits
- to make a real dent in my stash!!!
- to knit something from my own handspun – this is long over due now and should really be at the top of my list!
- be more selfish………..when it comes to knitting of course. I think I knitted too many presents at Christmas so I feel I don’t have enough FOs for myself.
- keep my blog more up to date?
Right, I think that’s more than enough to be getting on with! Roll on Saturday and some serious spinning!!
: 100g of camel coloured Alpaca which will go well with the brown/ black Alpaca I got free with my wheel. 
A booklet by Helen Melvin who ran the workshop on natural dyeing and 100g each of logwood and rhubarb root. I've not tried natural dyeing before but I know its quite labour intensive as well as space intensive so I may have to wait until the better weather to try it out! Given all of the lovely stuff there I was quite restrained!!
Also, here are the samples (very small ones indeed) of my attempts at long draw with Shetland fleece - and yes these colours are from natural dyes (quite amazing). Apparently the green is from yellow over-dyed with indigo!
