Frisian Frillies

After all that spinning, I decided to get on with some other crafting this week. The first thing I did, was get a project done: Expectation , a design by Dutch Knitting Design. I used that funky yarn I bought at Balloo, and although you can't see the shimmery thread running through the yarn, it really shows up when you wear it. Shows you again that a picture cannot capture all of reality... The shape is amazing. It wraps all the way around, and especially as this is a shawl for Mermaid, it can even be worn in a way where you tie it around the waist. This shows you how large it is for me.Quite small, but a nice shoulderette for those chilly nights or visits to a church during the Summer holidays. I am notorious for always wearing shoulderless tops and to not offend people, I will gladly wear this type of bling. It was nice to knit with something so colourful after spinning the natural fibers, and it inspired me and Mermaid to other things... After this shawl was done, we ra...

The Tour de Fleece is behind us, and even though I am taking a small break from spinning, I couldn'n not ply this yarn up... It was just shouting out at me. So here's the French sheep, n-ply, around 230-ish meters in sock-yarn thickness. I love the way that the variegated colours all blend together when you ply it. It ended up as a nice mixed up brown, with silky white and burnt omber highlights and nearly black lowlights. Now the hunt is on for a nice pattern for this lovely soft yarn... Wood, merino, soy silk, diamond bamboo, 100 grams, De Spinners And being a true perfectionist, just buying a new box for my spinnings wasn't enough, I had to properly label them as well... There's still plenty of room in the box for more! Not tonight though, I'm knitting...

WE DID IT!!! Cadel Evans won the Tour de France, and I won my own Tour de Fleece! 23 days of spinning (with 2 days off...) resulting in 1476 grams of spun yarn and lots of material to knit sweaters, scarves, socks, hats etc. with. I had a blast! I am so going to miss my Maillot Orange team on Ravelry... hope we'll keep in touch on the regular spinning forum! I met loads of new friends and found out I actually quite like spinning. A lot. Yesterday was quite a marathon session for me, and while the cyclists were already on their fifth bottle of champagne, I was still spinning away at my wood/merino/soy silk/diamond bamboo mix. 100 grams is a lot if you want to spin it lace weight. I will n-ply this and turn it and the other love mixes I got into mittens or a chique scarf for the winter... I hope I'll keep up the spinning, but maybe not every day... And even though it's very tempting to start plying that last bobbin, and start on something new, I'm taking today off.

The last 'real' day of the Tour de Fleece competition, and I was following the time trials with one eye, while keeping another on the drum carder... In the end I carded nearly 200 grams of pink/purple fleece, turning it into a great little stash of batts for spinning later. The bag I got when I bought my Namaste Zuma bag comes in very handy to store these soft fluffy bits of goodness. Later at night, I attempted some lace weight spinning with the wood/merino/soy silk/black diamond bamboo roving, failing miserably as I was laughing so loud while watching Kick Ass . Really, big LOL. It is definitely a 16 movie though... However funny and comicky it is, the kids won't be watching it. Too much gore... I will try and give the lace weight another go later today. First it's clean-up time... There's nowhere to go in this weather, so we'll just give the house a spruse up before sitting down in front of another cool movie with the kids...

I can see the finish line... Last night, the second half of the French sheep was spun up. It went so quickly, unbelievable! So while we were switching from the news (Oslo/Norway, speechless...) to Holland's Got Talent (also speechless, but in a different way) and back, I also turned it into a 2-ply soft, bulky yarn. I didn't get round to carding, that's on the program for today. Today is also decision day, what will I spin? I have three natural-looking blends which are ready to go, or I can get the drum carder in full swing and card enough colourful roving to get me through the evening. Or, I can get a start on the funky yarn I bought at the Weversmarkt... Dilemma's... Coffee first, I think...

We're nearly in Paris... The cyclists are crossing the Alps and I almost went to bits today... Well, as a figure of speech, that is! It was such a busy day: first getting the kids to school for their last day before the Summer Holidays, baking pancakes, dropping them off at school, getting our own lunch ready, then back to school for the class performances... But I never got to that last one. Work put a bit of a spanner in the wheels, in the form of a software glitch, which meant I spent 2 hours cleaning a document up that I had to hand in that afternoon. So no performances for me, but luckily hubby was able to go and take some pictures. While the kids celebrated their first free afternoon, I got on with the rest of the translation jobs in my queue, some cleaning, some cooking, lots of laundry etcetera... to finally sit down to some relaxing and spinning around Question Time... I first n-plied the yarn I spun yesterday, and then got to work on the French (yes, French, not Fresh.....

Shock Horror! There was NO spinning yesterday! But I have a good excuse, because it was Challenge Day. While the Tour de France cyclists were facing their biggest challenge, we were 'challenged' to face ours. And mine was quite simple: go to the Weversmarkt and resist all the goodies on offer there. Well, I failed . Big time. I came home with a drum carder*, which I had bought online from another Raveler, Nelleke . She had taken the carder with her from Tiel to Hoorn on the train, left it with my friend Marieke who had a stand there yesterday, and we picked it up and brought it home to Leeuwarden. I did manage to succeed waiting until the kids had gone up to bed to take the big, dangerous, spikey contraption out of the bag and attach it to the table. And then the fun started. With all the fluff I had bought, I created a nice colourful batt, and then I got to work on the raw sheep I have lying about. SUCCESS! People, I have seen the light! No more rough sheep for me! See ho...