Lazy Summer Days

 By lazy summer days I mean the weather. It is hot, humid and everything seems to crawl along. However life is still very busy and does not look to be slowing down anytime soon. Coming up is caring for my Grandmother, House sitting, Fiber dyeing, Fiber festivals....
This morning I did some fiber dyeing for a custom order that came in yesterday. Since I had all of the equipment out I decided to do a little extra. I ended up dyeing a total of 2.25 pounds. I'm looking forward to the fiber drying so I can put up some new listings on my shop.

 The lovely flower shots above were taken yesterday at my Aunt's home. It isn't quite as dry there as it is at our place, so there are still some flowers blooming and the garden actually looks quite nice. The Hollyhocks are almost done for the summer, but I did get a nice photo of the last one or two. The lilies above are doing amazing! Such a bright pink and flourishing nicely.

 Well my project is coming along nicely! I have been at my Grandma's three different times this week as she heals from ankle surgery. We've had the Olympics on and I have had quite a bit of time to knit. I was hoping to enter it in the Ravellenic Games 2012 but I started it a week before the Olympics opening ceremony so it doesn't qualify for any of the categories. They do have a WIP category but it has to be untouched since May 15, 2012. So I am just knitting away and enjoying myself. I can set my own goals without being apart of the Ravellenic Team, though it would have been fun. 
I do want to make another Seaweed Stole but I need the needles that I am currently using on the above knitting. Good incentive to finish, eh?

Speaking of the Olympics I decided to set aside my other spinning project and work on some red, white & blue roving in honor of Team USA! The 2012 London games have been marvelous so far, I am glad I have been able to see some of the events this time around!
Since I just started this spinning yesterday, I can enter my yarn in the Ravellenics spinning category. If I get  in done in time, that is! I'll keep you posted.


Alright, we'll see you later! The track events are on and I am going to take a break from the shop and pull out the above spinning and make some progress!

An Announcement & A GIVEAWAY!!!

I am thrilled to finally be able to announce the opening of my Etsy shop, Turquoise Owl Fibers! After four years of dreaming, praying and preparing, I opened my online shop June 26, 2012. This has been a dream come true for me and I am so very excited. Finding my way around Etsy has been an adventure and quite the learning curve. I still have much to learn, but I don't feel quite as lost now as when I first got on Etsy. 

Here is a link to send you straight to my shop if you want to take a look at it: http://www.etsy.com/shop/TurquoiseOwlFibers?ref=si_shop

In celebration of my shop opening I am having a giveaway that will run the whole month of August.

 So what are we giving away? Well, first I have a skein of my handspun Merino in a lovely variegated blue color. The exact yardage escapes me right now, but it is close to 200yards. I'll look it up and let you know, when I find where I jotted it down! 
I am also including 2 ounces of Merino roving in this giveaway. This is the same fiber that I spun the yarn out of, just dyed in a different colorway. 

Here is another look at the yarn. I spun it as a single on my top whorl drop spindle, then plied it from a center pull ball. It is a 2-ply yarn, spun worsted.

The roving is a small, specially dyed lot. I am sure I will be dyeing more up in larger batches. I really like the way the colors came out and I wouldn't mind spinning some myself.

It is dyed in oranges, red, and pink, with splashes of white. If I am going to dye this up in bigger amounts it will need a name. So I thought I would get some help from all of you. 

To enter the giveaway please leave a comment on THIS post telling me what you would name this roving. The winner will be drawn at random and will NOT be based on your suggestions, BUT I will be looking at all the names you suggest and I will have a special surprise for the person whose suggestion I like best! 

****If suggesting names isn't your cup of tea, just visit my shop and let me know in your comment which colorway you like best :) ****

Giveaway will end on August 31, 2012 and the winner will be drawn shortly thereafter.

Put your thinking caps on and lets get creative. Please keep suggestions clean and above board. 

Have fun!

****This giveaway is now closed. Thank you for entering!****

Of Coffee, Rain, & Spinning.

Having a snack while I blog. Coffee and cookies. Or biscuits, as they are referred to in the UK (and probably other places as well). 

 It is raining here. Hard. A good steady, pouring sort of rain. It is beating down on the metal roof and creating quite a cozy sound and feel in the house. We are having a bit of thunder and lightening as well. I do so love a good thunderstorm! We have needed rain desperately. I am not home this week, but thankfully it is raining at home as well. I was so glad to hear that. It will be interesting to see if anything looks different when I get back. When I left everything was parched dry, and brown as can be. Even the trees looked dry and thirsty.

 This week I finished spinning and plied both of these singles. Not together, they are separate skeins of yarn. 

 Here they are hanging to dry. A friend gave me some flip flops from Old Navy and I save the plastic piece that held them together. I thought it would work perfectly for drying yarn. And it did! Originally I set this yarn over the fence to dry. But the evening sun was low in the sky and soon moved, leaving the yarn in the shade. I ended up hanging the skeins from a branch in the mulberry tree. It worked like a dream. 

The completed yarn is a gorgeous 3-ply. I intend to keep this one for myself! It has such a nice feel to it. I love the way a three ply feels and knits up! I navajo plied my single to get this three ply yarn.

My lace design is coming along beautifully. It slowed a little since I have been gone this week. I am hoping to add an inch or two tonight when I am relaxing. It is such a fun pattern to work on, just enough lace to keep you occupied, but not such a complex pattern so that it makes your head hurt after staring at the chart for awhile. If my design progresses at all while I am here, I'll share another picture with you. For now, I shall close and go enjoy this lovely storm!

The Beginning

 Just popping in with a little bit of knitting today. This past week I started on a new lace design. Here is a sneak peak! It is just in the beginning stages, and there is still a long ways to go. But most all of the technical details are worked out, and now I just have to knit until it is almost done. I am still not sure about the ending rows but hopefully it will all go smoothly and I won't have to tear anything out!

I am using Malabrigo Merino Lace and it is simply scrumptious to work with! This is my first time working with the Malabrigo lace and I am loving the way it knits up; the softness, the beautiful shades of the kettle-dyeing. It is such a unique yarn. I will be sure to show you more pictures as this design progresses. It is a pattern I hope to put up for sale on Ravelry sometime yet this summer or autumn. It depends on how swiftly I knit it up.
That is all for now. Take care and have a blessed day!

Catching Up: Projects, Past and Present.

I don't think I ever shared photos of this shawl that I knit last year. This is the Lillia Hyrna Shawl from the Knitter's Book of Wool. Knit with my handspun Merino/Silk lace yarn. 
I spun a 978yd skein on my top whorl drop spindle and then set the completed skein aside for awhile until I decided what to make with it. My sister suggested this shawl, even though I had already made it. I had just enough yardage, and I absolutely LOVE it in the handspun yarn! It is so airy and delicate. 

Up close of the lace

A big thank you to my sister for taking these photos for me! We had a lovely photo shoot out in the woods.

Sund-dapples woods. 

High above, the hot summer sky.

Here are a few of my current in-progress and just finished spinning projects. 
I have been spinning up some samples of the merino roving that I dyed in May. I was planning on keeping most of it for my personal use, but now after some reflection I'll probably end up trying to sell it. That will be a first for me, I have always kept my handspun for my own use. It is such a luxury to knit with handspun!

I'm slowly working on spinning up my birthday fiber. It is a beautifully soft blend of Merino & Bamboo. I am spinning it super thin for a very fine lace-weight yarn. I am planning on making a shawl, though as of yet I have no idea what pattern I will use!

More merino roving being spun. 

What about you? What have you been working on this week, or this month? I would love to hear all about it! 


Have a blessed week, my friends! 

Of An Early Morning Walk

This summer I have been walking early every morning. It is nice to exercise early on in the day. With the extreme heat we have been having, the early morning hours are usually comfortable, if not nice and cool. I have enjoyed these morning walks. I go at a brisk pace, and if I have company we chat. One day after my walk was done and the dew was still heavy over everything, I took out my camera to snap some photos for the blog.

Chicory

The alpacas field, holes dug, poles buried, stakes pounded. Now it just needs the fencing and a gate. And rain, so the grass will grow.

Mulberry Tree. Due to lack of rain, and the birds eating constantly, we did not get a single berry for jam this year. I was disappointed, I enjoy making mulberry jam. Perhaps next year we'll have a bumper crop.

Grape Leaf

Queen Anne's Lace

Dew on the corn.

Catnip, just blooming.

My little flower patch from last year has produced some lovely perennials. I never got around to replanting it with annuals this year. The clay was just too hard to till and seed, by the time we had a good rain it was too late to plant anything. So far the perennials that have come up are Painted Daisies, Black-eyed Susan, Sunflower, Alysium, and a couple flowers that I do not recognize.

Lord willing I can plant some more Zinnias next year. Maybe more perennials as well. We'll see how much space I have to work with! :)

Next up: Catching up on projects!