Advent Calendar 2024 Day 15 - Wenceslas

I only know of Good King Wenceslas from the song and I had no idea he was such a young man nor that he died at such a young age. We've had a fibre based on Good King Wenceslas before, back in 2022, but I presume that was based on his clothing as the colours are so rich whilst this one is based on the forest in which he walks with colours to represent the logs, the trees and the snow.  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 does feature some kind of plant with berries on, which might or might not be found in a forest location, and also the night sky. Its pretty.

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 very soft and I need to carefully consider what I might pair this with.

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 Pink and Munstead Wood

As soon as last months club fibre landed in my porch I knew exactly what to do with it.  Spin it and combine it with Decembers Pink to tone down that bright pink.

I spun them both separately from the end, worsted style, and then plied them together to make two large skeins of barber-poled yarn and, because there was a small amount of Pink left over, I made a small skein of that plied back on itself.

Munstead Wood is 62.5% Merino, 25% Linen, 12.5% Bamboo and Pink is 75% Merino Wool, 25% Peduncle Silk.  I've worked out the final percentages of the main two skeins, which are a little less than a straight 50/50 calculation due to the amount of Pink that wasn't used in the main two skeins but its approximately 68.25% Merino, 13.5% Linen, 11.5% Peduncle Silk, 6.75% Bamboo.

All of it is spun sport weight with the two main skeins being 95g/332m and 85g/280 and then the small skein of pink is 75% Merino, 25% Peduncle Silk and weighs 15g/51m.

December's Fibre is here - Pink

It has arrived a few days after the letter.  My worst nightmare has arrived this morning.  Thank you Mr Postman, not!

It is definitely very pink and very, very soft but it is extremely pink, I don't see this as an accent shade of pink.  The natural grey of the Peduncle Silk definitely softens the vulgarity of the pink a little though.  75% Merino, 25% Peduncle Silk.

So, Peduncle Silk, what is that?  Well it comes from the tropical Tasar Caterpillar in India and when it spins a cocoon the first thing it makes is a kind of stem, which is called a Peduncle, and the cocoon hangs from that.  It has a shorter staple and greater bulk than many other types of silk and is a gorgeous natural grey-brown colour.

I don't like this one, its just the colour of it but then I have to knit and spin for my customers who do like pink so I will probably get around to this one at some point and if I really, really can't face it I could always over-dye it with blue to get something in the purple range.