U.K. Travel Knitting and LYS Shopping!

As a knitter, you can't go on a trip without bringing knitting AND visiting any local yarn stores in the area.

For knitting, I kept it very simple and brought one small project and one large-ish project. The smallish project was the self-striping Potter-themed that I picked up at Stitches West 2016. If I was going to the UK, I was going to bring something UK themed, and what better thing than a colorway containing all of the Hogwarts house colors?!

The largish project was my Viajante (traveler) shawl. My hope was that I would get a lot of knitting done on the plane and (hopefully) finish it while in the U.K, which didn't quite happen. The shawl grew quite a bit in size and I worked on while having large swaths of time, such as on the plane or on the train or hanging out with my friends. It was much too cumbersome to carry around with me.

Consequently, I worked on the socks quite a bit, while riding on the Tube (their subway system) or at various restaurants and cafes while travelling around London.

So, I've named my project Hogwarts TUBE Socks.... ;-)

 

Okay, I thought it was funny......

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LYS Shopping

As the Viking and I were going to the U.K, I did some research on a few local yarn stores that were in reasonable distance that were open while we were there. We were on foot about 90% of the time (except when traveling by train), so accessible was key.

Unfortunately, I only managed to visit one LYS in Scotland, Ginger Twist Studios, because it was the only one that was open and within reasonable walking distance.

However, she had yarn made out of strictly English wool, such as Jacob and Blue Faced Leicester! So, of course, I had to buy a few skeins, as well as some of her specific colorways. :-)

And the owner, Jess, was a very nice & pleasant person. I highly recommend visiting the shop if you're ever in Edinburgh!

Jess, the owner, told me that there had been the Edinburgh Yarn Festival the week prior, which we had just missed! I made a mental note to visit Scotland whenever this festival happens next.

Stitches West 2017

Once again, Stitches West happened in the Santa Clara Convention Center in California. Unfortunately, due to some timing of some archery tournaments and other things, I was only able to attend one single day!!

Since the LYS I frequented the most closed last year, I had been a very good knitter and had been knitting (mostly) from my Stash, except for some sock yarn purchases when I was running low. And, for this Stitches, I intended on stocking up!

I was even very good and went through my Ravelry queue and made a list of all the projects I wanted to do and what yarn/yardage I needed.....

....except that I left it at home and had to go by memory!! I only missed one or two things, but I managed to get everything else.Yay for carrying the Intranet in my pocket!

There were a lot of sweater quantities that I needed, in addition to more sock yarn. 

And as a special bonus, there were some especially Geeky themes this year! A lot of the vendors, such as Fresh from the Cauldron, really stepped it up with some of their colorways from Marvel, DC, Supernatural, etc.

She had some amazing Geeky colorways:

Wonder Woman	Deadpool

She also had a couple of amazing ones for Black Widow, Iron Man, Batman, etc. But, I had to actually choose a couple instead of buying ALL THE YARN!

White Birch Fibers had this colorway for Harry Potter fans, called "Resisting Voldemort".

Dizzy Blonde Studios had some great Doctor Who themed ones.

Copyright. Dizzy Blonde Studios

For fun, I stopped and got a Mystery Bag at the Buffalo Wool Company. The cost was about $20.00

I came away with a luscious 50-50 blend of Bison and silk, in MY COLORS. The skein is worth more than the $20.00 that I paid for it, so I was extremely happy.

Of course, while I was there, I was duly inspired to increase my Ravelry queue by quite a bit, including Martina Behm's Viajantes, for which I might have purchased the yarn.  It wasn't all about the yarn. I did pick up a few amazing buttons and I might have splurged on a Romi Hill shawl pin.

There were just so many talented knitters and artisans there that it was quite inspirational. Overall, it was a good Stitches. I got to hang out with some friends, spend a bit of $$, and came home with more than enough to continue knitting for quite some time.

Increasing the Self-Striping Sock Yarn Stash

Whenever I order small stuff online, I have it delivered to work because it's easier for me to retrieve said items than having them sit on my doorstep at home. Plus, it's like Christmas whenever I get a package at work. Last Friday, I got two separate packages full of sock yarn to replenish my lack of sock yarn stash.

Webs (yarn.com) was closing out their supply of Stilleto yarn from Plymouth, so I bought a few skeins. Each skein lets me knit a pair of socks AND they were about $7.50 a skein.

Colorway (not in order): Winterthru, Dillon, Villandry, Eden, Birmingham  

I had previously knitted two other colorways of this yarn, and while I wasn't happy with some "splotching" of some of the color, the socks have worn like IRON. Consequently, I have really fallen for this sock base. I hope these new colorways don't have the same color issues.

Yes, I have a "thing" for self-striping yarns as of late. I love how the stripes knit up. In fact, I've finished a whole bunch of socks that I haven't posted about yet.

(Yes, I have a lot of work meetings)

The second package was from Simply Socks Yarn Company and picked up some fairly cool self-striping yarn from a new-to-me company.

Vespers 75% Merino + 25% Nylon

Colorways: Hay Ride & Callistos

I really can't wait to start knitting them....as soon as I finish my current pair of socks....

Kroy Pattons Yarn. Toothy, but holds up like iron.
Great as boot socks as it's slightly thicker than sock weight but not as heavy as sport.

No, they aren't quite self-striping yarn, but it's almost self-striping, and when you're desperate to knit, you do what you can.

Giving away Yarn for Good.

Several weeks ago, I took the parts of my Stash(TM) that I was no longer going to use (left over acrylic/wool blends -- used to make amigurumi toys for kids-- boucle, ribbon yarn, and other big-box-store yarns) and handed it to my friend who works as a nurse as a childrens' home.

She had told me that one of the 'houses' has group of kids that have craft night where all of the kids (boys and girls) knit and craft. I thought, what better way to use all this yarn? I'm not going to be using them any time soon and the kids could use them.

Over Thanksgiving, she told me how much the kids went WILD over the yarn. I had a multitude of colors (blues, greens, reds, purples, variegated, etc). Apparently, the kids normally get stuck with "old lady colors" that the volunteers find at various thrift stores or that get donated. They didn't know that yarn came in so many different colors. (Apparently a lot of the boys just end up knitting pink yarn.)

I think I will ask my friends for their non-used yarns that they might want to donate to give to these kids. It makes me feel good to know that a small thing on my part has had a big impact. It's nice to hear that it made people smile.

Handpun vs. Commercial Yarn

I was looking at my Ravelry Stash page.

Out of 66 Stashed Yarns, 28 are handspun.
Now, granted, that I haven't listed some of my Stash yet (both handspun & commercial) AND I haven't quite spun all of my fiber (that is listed), but I like the direction in which my Stash is moving.

Now, I just have to start knitting THROUGH my Stash. LOL

Recycling a Sweater

Several months ago, I purchased a man's XXL sweater from a local thrift shop that I intended to unravel and recycle the yarn into a new project. Little did I realize how much work goes into unravelling a man's XXL sweater. There's definitely more than enough to knit myself a sweater and then some.

After taking apart the knit seams, I managed to unravel the front panel of the sweater and to get it wound up into a cake. I started unravelling one of the sleeves, but, did I mention the amount of work to unravel a sweater?

It's not that unravelling a sweater is difficult, although sometimes finding the beginning in order to unravel is frustrating, but unravelling just takes so much time! Plus, this sweater was knitted double-straned using a sport/DK weight yarn. So, I have to make sure that I unravel it evenly. Unravelling & winding onto a niddy noddy at the same time to help get rid of those kinks is TIME CONSUMING!

Here's the yarn on the niddy-noddy double-stranded

So, I put the the unfinished bits aside. However, it was taking up room, and I really wanted to try making myself a top-down raglan sweater, but I didn't want to buy some really nice yarn just to flub it horribly. So, I started knitting using the recyled yarn I had already wound up.

Wow, this yarn is just absolutely lovely to work with. It's a soft wool/mohair/nylon blend. It's a dark chocolate tweedy/heathery brown. I've almost worked my way through the first cake. Now I'm working to unravel the other unfinished bits so that I can continue knitting.

On Saving Money.

With the economy the way it is, I'm trying very hard to stay within the confines of my Stash -- both Fabric & Fiber -- in order to save $$$.

Staying within the Fabric Stash is easy, because I have an entire garage wall full of fabric with which to play, garnered by years of hoarding and purchasing (although in fairness half of the fabric belongs to DH).

Staying within my Fiber Stash is a bit more difficult, because I've tried to contain the yarn to one 32-gallon Rubbermaid bin, and the unspun fiber to a bin half that size. Plus I've only been actively knitting & spinning for less than a year. So I haven't had much of a chance to increase the Fiber Stash as much as the Fabric Stashes. But my LYS is such a place of temptations, plus everyone seems to be having really good sales on fiber/yarn.

And I think, "Wow, that's a good price!"

But even with a good price, you're still spending money ($$$) no matter "how" much you save from the full retail price. And spending money means you're not actually saving any money at all.

I've mentioned my Backlog of Fiber before, which should keep me busy for at least several months without needing to buy additions to the Stash, so says the Logical & Practical part of me. But, that doesn't stop my inner ferret from looking at all the pretty pretty yarn/fiber and squeaking, "PRETTY SHINY!"

A Backlog of Fiber

I have a backlog of fiber that I need to spin. I had bought a bunch of different 2oz samplers from Spunk Eclectic some time ago, and I've managed to get through only have of the different wool types I purchased!

I'm currently working on each one diligently (on the drop spindle) and taking notes on each one. I also bought a Phat Fiber Box sampler one month, as it was all *non* sheep wool fibers, and discovered that I don't actually like spinning pure silk, pure bamboo, seasilk, mulberry, or any of the "slick" fibers. (At least not yet).

AND, there's the spindle and fiber club from Butterfly Girl Designs, and I just got this lovely blend of fiber & spindle for the November club.



AND I just recently acquired 8 oz (1/2 lb) of dark Blue Faced Leiscter, which is just so YUMMY which is getting spun on the Kiwi. I'd *like* to be able to have enough yarn to make a sweater, but in reality, I probably wont...but I'm hoping.

This doesn't count the Japanese Maple I'm still spinning on my Butterfly Girl resin spindle, OR the Shetland roving on my Kundert.

Have I mentioned that I knit too? and have several projects on the needles? OOF!