I knit a fair bit these days. Not all the time, and I’m certainly not a fast knitter, but I do do a fair amount of knitting.

One issue that keeps coming up is the fact that I never seem to have the right yarn for the right project. There’s always some issue, the wool is too thin, not the right fibre type, or there’s just not enough of it. Often, too, if I do have a large amount of yarn, it’s not the nicest yarn, so it limits what one can make from it.

For example, right now I have five balls of Cleckheaton’s Snowflake in green, which I’m going to make into the Venta Neckwarmer, but even there, I’m not really a fan of the snowflake yarn, but it was given to me for free, and I can’t afford to buy yarn at the moment, so there it is.

I’m also making the DeVine neckwarmer, but the yarn I’ve got to work with is the Berroco Ultra Alpaca Light in Pea Soup Mix, but you’ll notice that the yarn is much too thin for this project, so I’ve gone down a needle size to 4.5mm – my only set of Lantern Moons, I alter a lot of patterns to knit them on these! – and it’s going to be a much closer fitting neckwarmer, sitting snug against the neck, and I might not have enough of the yarn, too, so I’m not sure at this stage whether it will actually work.

So… yeah, it’s just really frustrating to never quite be able to knit what I want the way I want it, but I know one day it won’t be an issue when I’m wealthy enough to afford all the yarn I want!

Now for a knitting pattern. How about the absurdly simple, yet pretty, Fig Big Cowl!

When I first started spinning up the Dorset wool, I was really fighting it too much. You’ve got to take a much gentler approach than I had realised. I sort of got this with the silk, but it’s making so much more sense with the roving I’m working with now. This bundle is one of the two I actually ordered! 3.1oz, or 87.88grams made up of the following beautiful fibres! Hand dyed mulberry silk brick, baby llama, corriedale, single colour sari silk fibres, and angelina. That last one is a synthetic fibre that’s basically sparkly stuff. There’s a very thin thread of it here and there in the roving, so it’s almost entirely natural!

It’s so smooth to draft, it just gently wafts apart and it’s going along so nicely! I’m hoping very, very hard to have enough to get a shawl out of, and I’m spinning it really finely! I was trying for light fingering weight, 3ply, but it might just be a lace weight, or 2ply, not sure how it will be. I tend to knit tightly, so if it is a lace weight, it will still work for light fingering weighted projects!

When I finally skeined up the silk sample, I realised there was a lot more thick and thin that I had previously thought. Part of that was out of sheer laziness I think, and part was due to lack of experience. I think if I had thought that this was ‘the good stuff’ and not a free sample, I would have gone back and pulled those slubs out to make a more even yarn. It kind of ranges between Aran weight and lace weight, so yeah, there’s some huge variation there, but not with this new roving!

It’s called Woodland Wonder, by the way, and is mostly brown with the silk being in green and the angelina as I said is all shiny and sort of translucent. I would love to get enough out of it to make something really special, perhaps a Haruni shawl? I like the idea of there being leaves in this, but I’m really not sure how many meters I’m going to get in the end. Well, we’ll wait and see!

Today my fiancé said that he’d like a new book. So we found one he wanted to read, book one in the Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson in this case, called The Final Empire, and I called round and found it in a local book store. So off I trundled on the bus to get it for him, and couldn’t help taking a peek in an Opp Shop whilst I was on my way to the book store, and happened to spot a little bag with a single skein of green mohair yarn. I then happened to notice a bigger bag, stuffed full of nine 50g skeins of black mohair yarn, and I could get both for just £3! I couldn’t let that slip by, so I grabbed both and then headed over to the book store to get my fiancé the book he wanted.

I know I don’t really need the yarn, but I really can’t pass up cheap yarn in natural fibres. If nothing else, I know mohair felts very well, and I’ve been wanting to make up some cat beds, so it could turn into that. Or, alternatively, it could turn into that damn circular shrug I’ve been meaning to make since forever. Of course, the issue I had when making that one was that the mohair was causing my asthma to play up, and if I find that here, well then this yarn will be amongst my trade-able stock, and I can always trade it with someone for something I want. Either way, I’m happy with having it.

So now for a knitting pattern. As the weather warms up, knitting always feels a little odd. I mean, why knit when the days are lovely and you’re rarely chilly? And yet, I don’t stop knitting in Spring and Summer, I just choose my projects wisely! Small projects, like these OTK Japanese-esqe Leg Warmers. Small enough that you’re not sitting with a huge pile of knitting in your lap, but also useful for those in-between seasons.

I’ve only been diagnosed asthmatic for about three years now, so I don’t always realise when I’m having an attack. My attacks are pretty mild most of the time, though when I was first diagnosed it was due to such serious bouts of coughing that I couldn’t breath for stretches, and would have tears rolling down my face. Understandably this freaked my fiancé out, he hated seeing me in such pain and distress. He told me we were going to the doctor so off we went.

I had had a cold or the flu about six times in a row, at this point. I’d had blood tests done to see why I kept getting sick, and my immune system seemed okay. When we told the doctor what had been going on, she asked a few questions, and then stated that I had asthma. It was a shock. I’d never thought that it was anything so ongoing as that, but it made sense. My mother has asthma and had smoked in the house around me for my entire childhood.

Asthma is really annoying for me, and I’m glad that it’s just annoying and not more serious. Of course I say that whilst coughing away in spite of taking my Ventolin and having cough mixture for the cold I’ve caught. Next stop is a bowl of boiling water with mint in it, but of course the Summer heat has killed my mint plant… This blogger here about sums it up with what she says. I’m not going to repeat it but yeah, I feel the same way.

So I frogged all the mohair, and have been swatching for gauge for my circular shrug. I think if the pattern turns out nice, I’ll give the shrug to the lady who gave me the yarn as a gift, as I probably shouldn’t be wearing it, and buy yarn for my own one in a fibre that isn’t trying to kill me. I don’t want to do that, you see, but I’m thinking that’s the smartest thing to do. Of course, maybe I shouldn’t be knitting with it at all… perhaps I’ll see about a yarn swap with someone… *ponders* At this point I kind of just want it away from me, because I’m sick of coughing.

Anyway, today’s pattern is asthma related… it’s an inhaler sock! Now, I don’t like knitting socks, never tried and never will… I’ve just never seen the point in knitted socks! Anyway, this is a little cozy for your inhaler, which could easily be attached to a keyring or what not, which is a good thing for those of us who don’t keep track of them. I had four inhalers spread strategically around my home, but now I’m down to two. One on my desk, one on my bedside table, which works for me, as the one on the desk goes into my pocket or backpack when I go anywhere.

There are a few tools one needs to spin their own yarn, and in today’s post I am going to list a few options. It seems that the most common, and easiest from what I’ve heard, way to learn to spin yarn is with a drop spindle. These can be found all over the net or at your local craft store, but I like the handmade ones found on Etsy. This one here is one I have my eye on, and may purchase, because this idea is now firmly close to my heart as the next means of crafting I’d like to learn. You can take classes to learn with a drop spindle, or you can use instructional DVDs or even YouTube! The other tool you can use to spin yarn is of course, a spinning wheel, but this is much more complicated and not best for beginners but experienced spindle spinners. They are beautiful pieces of machinery, though, I have to admit.

Next you are going to need materials to spin, called ‘roving’. Roving is long bundles of fibres that have been created by carding the fleece, silk, or whatever fibre you’re working with. That basically means brushing it with two big brushes, one on either side, so you are pulling the fibres into rough alignment. Then end result looks something like this for fleecy fibres, and something like this for smoother fibres.

Now, if I were to spin up my own yarn, I would want a project that would showcase the yarn I had used. For instance, I really like this circular shrug at the moment, and there is enough space, and a basic enough pattern, that you could appreciate the yarn used. So here is a link to the Ravelry page where the pattern can be accessed, and hopefully I’ve inspired you out there to start to spin!

I also realised that the needles suggested when working with this yarn were 3.5mm and the pattern I was working with called for 5mm, so I had to look for a new yarn that would work. Now, the yarn I got is actually supposedly a 4ply Fingering weight yarn, but the recommended needle size is 5mm to 5.5mm… I’m not sure if it’s going to work out right for the pattern, but if it doesn’t I can always do something else with it. I have a heck of a lot of it, now. 5 balls with 550meters per ball! Now that’s exciting!

So this is the yarn I have, and it is in the same colourway as the ball on the right in the top picture. I was drawn to the colours straight away, I think green is such a lovely colour, and works well with white as a colourway. I’m not usually into mohair, but this is a tighter woven yarn that my other mohair. Not hugely fuzzy, like with the other stuff.

I have been keeping my eye out for another pattern, just in case the one I want to knit up is a no-go. However, after looking over other creations with this yarn, I think it is going to be really lovely. A Spring, Autumn wear, hopefully, with a singlet underneath. I think this is just such a lovely yarn, and I can’t wait to get started! My fiancé is reading me The Hobbit because I’ve never read it, so I will have much knitting time!

One of the ‘just in case’ patterns is the one I will link to for this post’s pattern… Serrano from Knitty, it is a nice pattern, but I am not 100% on it because I don’t think the slight fuzziness of my yarn would work well with this lace pattern.

I bought myself five 100g skiens of a dusty rose pink (though I’m considering going back and swapping this for a set of white that was there) merino wool. The yardage works out to about 1250meters, so enough to make a not overly complex jumper, or a vest of any sort, or maybe a cardigan. But now I don’t know what I want to make, and it is really annoying.

There are a few patterns that are standing out, and I think the pattern should be something with some detail, cables or the like, because the yarn is all the same colour so it would show up well. I don’t know about an entire jumper, because the yarn feels like it might be scratchy, so maybe a vest so it goes over another top? I don’t know! Gah! So frustrating!

The patterns that I have been considering are as follows, a jumper by the name of Terra, a cardigan by the name of Faery Ring, but I would have to buy more yarn for that one, a jumper by the name of Kelper, and a vest by the name of GreenDay…

What I love about the Terra pattern is that it is very pretty and flattering, and I love the hood. I love Faery Ring for so many reasons, the Celtic cables, the hood, and the name! I think the Kelper pattern has a lovely Celtic cable on it, and I like the simplicity of the garment, and it is also flattering, and the GreenDay vest is also very pretty, but not sure if it is as flattering.

I’m going to ask my fiancé and see which he likes better, and I think I will go swap the yarn for the nice white stuff. I just think I will end up wearing it more often if it is in white. Drum roll please… he likes… the Terra pattern the most! Woot! And he thinks trading the pink yarn for white is the way to go, too. Okay, now I’m set!

Today’s knitting pattern has to be something completely different, so how about absurdly cute? Sounds good? Yeah, this is just that, how gorgeous is that top photo of a baby in the the Brown Bear Baby Beanie?