I suppose that really I should be moving forward with projects, but I am doing much worse than that. Instead of simply not knitting things, I am also frogging things I have knit. Not just lack of progress, people, but moving in reverse. Behold:

Handmaiden Silk Rumple in Glacier (now discontinued) 100% silk

Isn’t it lovely? I don’t know if anyone remembers what it was? It was a bias shawl, or a poor facsimile thereof. Here it is:

Sad little bias shawl that is no more

I had knit it to wear to a wedding in May, and decided to experiment and make it a little more on the squarish side than long, rectangular side, thinking perhaps I could wear it a couple of different ways. And so I knit on, thinking “hmm, this might be a little short, but in blocking…” so you see how I continued to dilude myself that it just might work. It did just work, and I wore it to the event I hoped to… but I don’t love it. And the yarn is just too pretty (and has an amazing drape too) for it to be something I don’t love wearing. And so, now it has morphed back into a pretty yarncake, until I re-knit it in the proper way. As an aside, it was way easier than I thought to frog this yarn. I thought since it was a boucle I was asking for trouble, but since it’s silk it was pretty slippery and didn’t cause me much of a hassle at all. Whew.

I have been busy on the spinning front this week, working diligently on some of my club fibers. I started spinning the Spunky Club Aspen fiber and I love it! It is sooo shiny and is as soft as it looks:

Aspen Spunky Club September fiber, 2oz Merino/Tencel

I haven’t spun Merino/Tencel before, and it’s a little tricky at first but once I got the rhythm going it was easy peasy. Just treadling a lot slower than I normally do with straight up wool, and paying lots of attention while drafting. Usually I predraft my wool tops, it makes the spinning itself go a little faster and to be honest allows me to be a little less attentive at the wheel if I feel the need to just chill out and spin. Lazy much? I think so. With this fiber I just split it in two down the middle and started spinning. It’s so slippery it doesn’t need any help in getting started, in fact I have to pay close attention so that it doesn’t get away from me. Here’s the started bobbin:

Aspen spinning in progress – oooh, shiny!

It’s also the finest yarn I’ve ever spun on my wheel, it likes to be thin, thin, thin. I’m definitely going to do this one as a two ply. But the combination of the slow treadling and the skinny yarn means it’s taking a LOOONG time to spin up. So, because I also need instant gratification, I spent some time predrafting these beauties:

Lantern Festival ~ Corriedale wool, Hello Yarn July Fiber Club, 5oz

Celebration ~ Shetland wool, Spunky Eclectic July Fiber Club, 4oz

And then I spun them up. But right now they are having the twist set, so their finished pics will have to wait until next time. I did spin them both as singles (instant gratification, I said!). I’ve been on a real singles kick lately.

I’ve also picked up a new book, Clara Parkes’ The Knitter’s Book of Yarn. It’s fabulous! There is a lot of information in the book helpful in both spinning and in knitting. Background on types of fiber and yarn construction, and how different types of yarns are suited for different knitting projects based on how they are made and what they are made of, and how the properties of the yarns will impact your knitting. There are also many lovely projects, some of which are by Amy of Spunky Eclectic and Adrian of Hello Yarn… two of my favorite fiber artists. Anyway, I am enjoying the book and look forward to using it often.

I have all but abandoned the idea of Christmas knitting. It’s November 21st and since I haven’t yet started a thing, I think it’s pretty safe to say I’m not going to finish any either. On one hand, this bums me out, because I wanted to do up some knitterly gifts for some… but on the other hand I guess it will mean less stressing in the long run. I do have a couple of little things I am thinking of casting on just to see if I can make the deadline, but I also don’t want to feel badly if I don’t… which at this rate, is highly likely. What to do, what to do? If Baby O would just sleep through the night and I could get caught up on some rest, perhaps I’d be feeling slightly more ambitious. But, she’s bionic, and doesn’t nap throughout the day, which leaves me only about an hour in the evenings to do anything… and by then I’m too wiped. All I want for Christmas is a few good sleeps!