Keeping Busy!

February has been a very busy month! Lots of classes including Beginning Knitting and Fair Isle Knitting.










Soon Arachne Yarns and More will be hosting its first Knit Along! It is aimed at beginning knitters who are able to knit and purl but want to move on from pot holders and scarves! We will be making a sleeveless vest using the stockinette and garter stitches.

The pattern calls for making the fronts and back separately so we will learn some construction. Also, increasing, decreasing and gauge will be discussed. I found the pattern on Ravelry.com. It was published by Patons. The name of the pattern is "Button Front Crew Neck Vest". I think it will make a great first project for my knitters. It is a nice looking vest that can be made in several sizes. The stitches are basic and there are several new skill to be learned.





Also in March, we will be hosting a class on needle felting bunnies just in time for Easter!

Last week at my weekly knitting group I brought supplies and we all needle felted eggs. Everyone took their eggs home and decorated them. We brought them back this week to compare. It is amazing how many different kinds of decorating was done. Several people embroidered their eggs. Some incorporated beds and other goodies. One was done with more fleeting and had felted flowers on it. It was a little diversion from our knitting. Everyone seemed to have fun.

I have also been busy making hats to send all over the country with all the cold weather! Now, my friends will have warm ears! Other projects include blending some wool and spinning some fun yarns and weaving a bit.

On Weaving...

Well, I am off on another excellent adventure! This time I am weaving. I have been struggling with the idea of warping my floor loom, an 8 harness affair. It is going to take a lot of time and a lot of space in my living room. But I have really had a hankering to weave. I have a lot of small amounts of yarn left over from spinning skeins for sale. I thought weaving would be a great way to clean off the spinning bobbins and use up some yarn pieces either too small to sell or not suitable for knitting.


This weaving is done on a 12 dent reed. I am using a wool warp yarn that I purchased. The weft is made up of a lot of bobbin ends. For the part visible in the photo below I took all my bobbins with small amounts of singles and plied it with a natural white wool. I really like how it is turning out.

Other sections of the weaving are done with a solid mottled green, and different shades of natural Alpaca and wool in Browns and greys.

The loom I am using is a Schacht Flip Loom. It is a great loom. This particular one has a twenty inch weaving width. I figured anything larger I can do on the floor loom. This loom is set up for a second reed, giving it a lot of versatility. Another feature I really like is that it can be 'flipped' or folded with the warp and or weaving on it for easy storage or travel. There is also a floor stand available and a travel bag!

While I have been weaving on this project I have been busy designing future project with yarn I have in my stash. I also have reorganized my wool room in my head and redone my yarn storage to,better accommodate planning weaving projects. Now, if only I could figure out how to accomplish those things while weaving this...