Advent Calendar 2024 Day 22 - Mrs Claus

I have seen a few variations of a "Mrs Claus" character over the years and she is usually portrayed as being dressed very similar to her husband "Santa Claus".  My favourite one is from Santa Claus The Movie and she is played by Judy Cornwell and John Huddleston played Santa and Dudley Moore played Patch, the elf.  All the information can be found in the first photo and if you click on the photo you can zoom in if you need to.

I guess this pattern could feature on her costume if she is wearing something knitted or maybe an apron with stitching on.

I have undone the tightly wrapped little bundles and made them into braids to take any pressures off the fibres and also so that I can see the colours properly and feel the texture too.  This one is really soft and smooth and is so lovely.  I definitely want some more of this one.

Advent Calendar 2024 Day 19 - Little Troll Prince

I have to admit that, although I was still attending school and was already an aunty at that age too, I have never heard of The Little Troll Prince nor have I ever seen the film that was released in 1987.  I have Googled it and none of the images look familiar to me in any way but I do see how the colours in the fibre match his clothes.  All the information can be found in the first photo and if you click on the photo you can zoom in if you need to.

I can see how they have tried to match this design to the story of the trolls but in all honesty these are Gnomes, not Trolls, and are different in looks to trolls.  I like this sweet, cute design.

I have undone the tightly wrapped little bundles and made them into braids to take any pressures off the fibres and also so that I can see the colours properly and feel the texture too.  I don't know what to do with this one.  Do I blend it with something like white or other neutral?  I don't think I want more of this one.  I will have to do some serious thinking about this one and maybe see what options are.

Advent Calendar 2024 Day 17 - Cheeses for Meeces

Today we are back to "A Christmas Carol" but this time it is The Muppets version.  I've watched it a couple of times but this version really is my husbands favourite and he knows it like the back of his hand.  All the information can be found in the first photo and if you click on the photo you can zoom in if you need to.

Today's packet design seems to once again have no connection to the character or story or even the fibre but I do like it.

I have undone the tightly wrapped little bundles and made them into braids to take any pressures off the fibres and also so that I can see the colours properly and feel the texture too.  This one is absolutely gorgeous. Its really soft and silky.  I may just have to order more of this one.

Advent Calendar 2024 Day 10 - Kevin!

Todays' fibre is based on a film, or series of films, that I have never watched all the way through.  I have seen clips but it's not a film that I would sit down and watch all of the way through.  I am vaguely familiar with his jumper though, in as much as I know that it was red.  All the information can be found in the first photo and if you click on the photo you can zoom in if you need to.

The design on this packet seems to me to be just a kind of general seasonal design and nothing specifically linked to the film, unless I am wrong, as I said I haven't watched it all the way through.

I have undone the tightly wrapped little bundles and made them into braids to take any pressures off the fibres and also so that I can see the colours properly and feel the texture too.  My first thought with this one is to pair it with one of the fibres from the 2021 Advent Calendar which is 100% Shetland and is called Cherry.  I like this one but at the same time it is my preference for it to be a lightened in colour and pairing it with the Shetland Cherry would also make that fibre more interesting too.

Advent Calendar 2024 Day 9 - Knecht Ruprecht

I have never heard of this character and the spelling is a little bit confusing to me, I kept reading it as Rupert, but it isn't helped by the fact that the main heading in the booklet has a spelling mistake in the fact that there is a K before the last letter of the first word when it should be a H. All other instances of the word are spelt correctly, as far as I can tell.  All the information can be found in the first photo and if you click on the photo you can zoom in if you need to.  

I wonder if the design on this packet is meant to represent the children in the tradition.

I have undone the tightly wrapped little bundles and made them into braids to take any pressures off the fibres and also so that I can see the colours properly and feel the texture too.  It's nice and soft quite smooth so I have no idea what I will pair this with right now but I do notice that this is the fourth fibre on the bounce that has been quite dull and in the grey/browns kind of range.  I do hope we have a nice colourful one soon.

Spinning some BFL/Mulberry Silk in green-blue

I bought this yarn in April 2020, so about 4 and a half years ago-ish and at a time when I was looking around for alternative fibre suppliers.  It is from an independent spinning fibre retailer who buys in undyed fibre and dyes it themselves and then sells it.  There are a lot of small businesses that do this and whilst they can be pretty they are also quite limited in terms of fibre content as they wouldn't contain any sparkle element or they wouldn't be a solid shade with different colours of texture etc and sometimes the dyer accidentally felts the fibre a little, which is easily done and I've done it a few times myself over the years.  Thankfully that is not the case in this instance, it's so soft.  The original fibre is from John Arbon Textiles.

I wanted to try and keep the variation of colours in the finished yarn as much as possible but I also didn't want it to form splodges of colour so I split it down the length, one for each ply, and spun it over the fold.

For the second single I started spinning from the other end, again over the fold, and this way when I plied the two singles together there was less chance of the same colours coming together all the way through the yarn.  Of course the colours probably do come together at times but hopefully, for the most part, it has barber-pole the colours.

This measures up to 16wpi - Light Fingering Weight and there is 110g/478m.  The fibre content is 80% Bluefaced Leicester, 20% Mulberry Silk

Advent Calendar 2023 Day 22

The Tradition

Day 22 is called Dia De Las Velitas and the tradition comes from Colombia and means "The Day of the Little Candles" and it is celebrated on 7th December, which is the eve of  the Immaculate Conception.  On this night small candles and paper lanterns are lit and placed outside both a home and in public places, anywhere they can be seen in honour of the Virgin Mary and her Immaculate Conception.  It is not mandatory to work the next day, on 8th December and it is customary to hoist a white flag with an image of the Virgin Mary for the entire day on houses.  

The Fibre

The actual fibre content is 50% Shetland (Corn & Cinnamon), 30% Bluefaced Leicester (Lightning), 20% Sari Silk (Honeycomb & Goldrush).  We have blended together Shetland, Sari Silk and BFL.  The Shetland and BFL are very British fibres and this is a very bright blend, much like all the light given off by all those candles.  There's a lot of texture in here.  The Sari Silk brings streaks of golden yellow, there's some paler yellows, little pops of red in there as well and you can see a pale yellow from the Shetland and then a pale creamy white from the BFL.  Because these are British breeds, they're not as soft as Merino but do not let that put you off, they are absolutely lovely.  They have bulk and a good smoothness and they're not going to run away with you when you spin.  When you're spinning it you will find that the Sari Silk clumps a little bit but that's absolutely fine because it will give you texture, lumps and just make a really interesting yarn so that whatever you make from it afterwards will have just a little bit more character than it would otherwise.

My Thoughts

I really like this one and I think this could work with Day 19, Volcancitos as the colours are closer in those two than they are with Day 14, Misa de Gallo (Festival of the Rooster). The Sari Silk in this will make an interestingly textured yarn and I find Sari Silk easier to spin than Silk nepps, which I have been adding to a lot of my own blends lately.  This one is so different to how the camera on my phone captured the colours, that first photo looks so washed out and pale but thankfully all the colours show up in the photos taken with my Canon camera.

The information that has been printed on the bags is not always correct and there are no fibre content percentages, these have been provided on the chat boards.  The percentages that they gave on the chat boards seem to be correct, although the name of the day seems to read as Vetitas instead of Velitas, that cross on the second t certainly crosses through what should be an l.

What I have done with my bags is to write the actual fibre content on the bag using a gold gel pen in the gap immediately below the printed details, pretty much the only thing that will show up on black are the metallic gel pens.  This is why I have not taken "new" photos of the bags.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2023 Day 10 - Rest

The Cycling: Today is a rest day.  There is no cycling today.

The Daily Challenge: Use today to catch up, get ahead or just chill.

Suggested Fibre: No recommendation

What I did

Because I have looked ahead at the upcoming challenges I have been able to plan my spinning from day 1.  I haven't always managed to finish on time to be able to do the next days challenge but I have done a lot of the challenges so far.  I know what tomorrows challenge is so today I will be starting on the National Trust braid that I wanted to spin a couple of days ago. It is one of the monthly subscription fibres that I used to have.  It is 50% Merino, 37.5% Bluefaced Leicester and 12.5% Swaledale.  I will be doing another Fibonacci spin, although the colours are more blended in this braid than the first time I tried this style of spinning.

Because of the Swaledale element, there is quite a lot of kemp fibres in this and I've been picking it out as much as possible when preparing this for spinning.  My lengths for this one is 21cm, 42cm, 63cm, 105cm and 168cm.

Top: the lengths of fibre as per Fibonacci sequence
Bottom: one of the lengths split into 3 colour bundles ready for spinning

So, because of how blended this fibre braid is compared to the first one that I did a Fibonacci Spin with, I was only to separate out 3 distinct colours but I'm still happy with that.

It took me so long to sort this one out that I ran out of time for today to be able to finish spinning the single in readiness for the chain ply (navajo ply) tomorrow.

Advent Calendar 2022 Day 21

OMG it's another fawn coloured soft fluffy fibre and it's called Winter Knitter.  The fibre content is 50% Bluefaced Leicester, 25% Alpaca and 25% Muga Silk (geographically linked to Assam in India and previously reserved purely for use by Royalty).

After Christmas, in the New Year, WoW made additional 100g braids of fibre of all of the Advent Calendar Fibres available to purchase to those who had purchased the Advent Calendar.  There were limited stocks of each one available, it was on a first-come-first served basis and there was a short time frame of priority before the remaining stock was made available to general purchase.  This was one of 7 fibres that I bought an extra 100g of.

Advent Calendar Day 6

Packet 6 of the Advent Calendar contains a fibre put together exclusively for the Advent Calendar, oooh its exciting.  It's 50% Bluefaced Leicester, 25% Cashmere and 25% Peduncle Silk.  Today's saying is "we wish you a Merry Christmas".  This one scares me a little, its so soft and fine.

Spinning up Emerald City

My next fibre to spin up is from May of 2019 called "Emerald City".  I'm working through them in order so as to catch up and spin the oldest fibre first as it does tend to clump together a bit and get harder to spin the longer it is sat there doing nothing.

I wasn't sure about this one when it arrived and now that I have spun it I know that when I knit it up it will need to be worked with something else, a lighter colour, to break it up as I think making a shawl out of this on its own would be very dark and unappealing.  I spun this one up to Fingering weight and I got 368m from it.  The fibre content is 50% Merino, 25% BFL, 12.5% Mulberry Silk, 12.5% Bamboo Rayon.

Spinning up Gold

I'm getting on spinning my way through some of the mass of spinning fibre that I have building up around me.  This time I have chosen one from last year, the February 2019 monthly fibre called "Gold".  I really like this one as its pretty much a single colour, with varying shades, and sparkle.  I do like a bit of sparkle as it adds interest and makes for pretty lace shawls.

There's not a lot to say about how this spun up really as I didn't encounter any problems with it so I'll just get on and show it off.  I spun it to fingering weight and I got 364m out of it.  To re-cap the fibre content from the linked post about the fibre it is 58.% Merino, 25% BFL, 12.5% Mulberry Silk, 4% Stellina.

Spinning up the Texture Sparkle blend

Last year I bought some spinning fibre using money/vouchers that I had for my birthday.  I've just spun up one braid from that purchase.  It was a bit of a challenge for me as it is so textured, lots of bumps of sari silk, and I am a little OCD with wanting to create a nice smooth even yarn but I am trying to get out of my comfort zone from time to time and push my own boundaries of creativity a bit.

Its 28% Manx Loaghtan, 28% BFL, 28% Sari Silk, 10% Merino, 6% Stellina.  I've spun it at sport weight and I have 246m of lovely squishy to play with.  Its not super super soft but it is really nice.

January's Fibre is here - National Trust

A few days ago I received the emailed letter giving details about this months club fibre and today it has arrived.

Its not something that I would pick up if I were at a fibre festival, I wouldn't be attracted to it, but it is nice and is very close in colours to the paint that was her inspiration.

The fibre content is 50% Merino Wool, 37.5% Bluefaced Leicester Wool, 12.5% Swaledale Wool, so a pure wool blend of 3 different breeds of sheep.

I've bought a Clun Forest Mule Fleece

I couldn't resist.  I saw the photos of this fleece and the high praise of fellow spinners for this ladies fleece and I thought, yeah, why not?  Its beautiful and weighed 2.2kg and I got straight on to cleaning it the day after it arrived.  Very clean fleece in terms of no vegetable matter or other rubbish, no dust, no dirt, no soil or sand fell out as I pulled it apart and I've never had that happen, I am usually sweeping up little mounds of soil and fine sandy grit type of material when I pull a fleece apart but not with this one.  Its got good crimp and so some locks needed a bit of extra cleaning on the tips but overall most of it is decent length staple and reasonably soft.

A Clun Forest Mule is basically a cross breed produced from a Clun Forest and Bluefaced Leicester mating.  I have never spun Clun Forest before and the Bluefaced Leicester I have only ever spun as part of a blend or another Mule Fleece, way back in 2013.

The Clun Forest sheep is a conservation breed, there aren't great numbers of these around.  According to my fleece bible, that I go to for good information about a breed, the fleece is uniform quality all over, which I can say is true, there were no obvious rough bits.  This fibre can take quite a lot of wear, its quite hardy in that respect and it has plenty of loft and bounce so will be good for things like everyday shawls, mittens, hats, jumpers.  It takes dye really well.

The Bluefaced Leiceter sheep is part of the English Longwool breeds of sheep that produces a fine, silky, lustrous long fibre.  Not usually scratchy but is durable enough to withstand a lot of wear and takes dyes really well.  This is one of the hand spinners favourite breeds as it is so versatile.

So, combine the traits of those two sheep breeds together and we have something that could be pretty wonderful.  This came from Dunja Roberts of All In A Spin, who is based in Cwmdu, Crickhowell, Wales, which according to Google Maps, is pretty much in the middle of nowhere.

The photo on the right shows it rolled out but not opened out, it was certainly long.

Before and after washing.  Although it was a "clean" fleece, it was still dirty in terms of colouration.  Its washed up beautifully.

May's Fibre is here - Emerald City

I've only just received last month's fibre and this month's is here.  I'm not sure about this one, wasn't entirely sure from the description in the letter and now I'm really not sure.  Will have to see how it spins up, they often look completely different when they're spun up.  Nice and soft though but that will because its 50% Merino, 25% BFL, 12.5% Mulberry Silk, 12.5% Bamboo.

The Blue Llanwenog

Last year I bought a Llanwenog sheep fleece, split it into four amounts, left one undyed and then dyed the other 3 amounts in 3 different colours.  This is the blue part of the fleece that started out at 400g and now that it's been combed I only have 153g left due to some of it felting, and an amount of coarse fibres which I have removed.  That is a lot to lose, more than 50% but I am fussy and would rather not spin rubbish and waste my time spinning rubbish.

It is pretty as it is but I wanted to make it something special and to add things to it that would help to soften it a little.

I went and raided and supplies cupboard and came out with all these that work well with the turquoise blue Llanwenog and they come from various supplies I've brought over the last few months, mostly small amounts with one or two larger amounts thrown in.

I split everything in two and blended each half on my blending hackle to get this fabulously interesting fibre ready to spin.

I'm really happy how this has turned out, very interesting.  I have two skeins of double knit weight yarn, 99g/284m and 96g/262m and the fibre content is about 65% Llanwenog Wool, 12% Merino Wool, 10% Tussah Silks, 4.5% Sari Silk, 3% Bluefaced Leicester Wool, 2% Alpaca, 1.5% Shetland Wool, 1% Linen (Flax), 1% Sea Cell.

Bluefaced Leicester - Design A2

I've decided to use up some of my widow skeins on some more A2 Designs.  This one is 100% Bluefaced Leicester aran weight yarn from West Yorkshire Spinners and was spun at their Yorkshire Mill.  Its really lovely and soft.

I just kept knitting until I ran out of yarn.

It was a fair few months before I got around to photographing it.

I've bought more spinning fibre

What am I like, I've only gone and bought more spinning fibre to go with the vast amount I already have.  To be fair I've had gift vouchers for my favourite fibre seller and money for my birthday so I went and ordered some lovely stuff that she's just put in the shop.

The first braid is this 50% Romney Wool, 25% Silk, 25% Linen.  The description is that it gives and unusual texture but beautiful stitch definition. Romney is a long stapled British wool of 28-29  microns and by blending it with silk it softens the blend and increases shine and it can worn around the neck.  I love the colour, a pale blue-green colour.

The second braid is this 28% BFL, 28% Manx Loaghtan, 28% Sari Silk, 10% Merino, 6% Stellina.  The description is that this is a gorgeous fluffy textured blend that is not super soft but will have lovely bounce form the Manx Loaghtan, and ancient breed from the Isle of Man with a micron count of 29-31 with fantastic crimp. This won't spin smoothly so embrace the joy of sari silk and add some bling.  I was totally attracted to it by the colour, sparkle and texture.

February's Fibre is here - Gold

I've been anticipating this one ever since I got the letter come through which said it is very much similar to Illuminated Manuscript.  Really beautiful, sparkly and soft.  Its 58.5% Merino, 25% BFL, 12.5% Mulberry Silk, 4% Stellina. I do love a little bit of sparkle.