Frisian Frillies

With the arrival of Spring (some time soon, I'm told) comes a lot of inspiration to make things. To finally turn all that homespun yarn into cushions, toys, shawls and other wearables. To finally turn all that fabric into coats, skirts and pants. And to finally turn that plot of land we call a back garden into a fruitful vegetable patch. But first, some stash enhancement... On the yarn front... 100 gram of roving turned into... 568 m of BLF and silk goodness (2-ply). Courtesy of the Dutch Wool Diva (January yarn club).    There's more yarn in the making... This one speaks for itself...  I started spinning it yesterday, quite thin, again, planning to turn it into a n-ply yarn. But I might change my mind and twine it with something twinkly. Who knows... Fabric-wise, I have been inundated with the stuff... Not only did I get meters of green/brown fabric which would be perfect for a tunic or long skirt, yesterday we also went to a 2nd-hand store where there wa...

Yesterday, we celebrated the 5th anniversary of our local Stitch 'n Bitch group. The preparations started a few months ago with an inventory of ideas, and the organizing committee got to work with all that input, planning the big surprise for all of us. We were first invited to knit, crochet or otherwise craft cool head gear. No party without hats! This is our Frisian geisha Marijke, who unfortunately did not win the prize for best head dress. That went to blogless Gretha with a beautiful summery hat with butterflies on it. I have no good pictures, hopefully I can put up a link to better ones soon! We started the party with some Prosecco, of course in suitable glasses... There were pictures to look at (and take home) of our yarnbombing event earlier this year... And then after depositing our swap yarn for later on that evening in the big box, and writing down our estimates for the 'Guess the weight' competition, we got stuck into the food. Café Wouters had put up a gre...

Yes, the final day of the Summer holiday has arrived! We've thoroughly enjoyed it this year, even though the weather was abysmal at times! We spent a week on the Dutch west coast in the forest, close to the beach (which we didn't see at all, due to a massive sand storm when we went, rain and low temperatures which meant we did mostly city-related day trips) and a week in the east of the country, on a great campsite which we are definitely going to again. I did some knitting, but I read a lot. I really missed doing that at home, so it was great to be able to just sit down, let the children run wild and just read... Read... The knitting isn't finished yet (socks, of course, the perfect bring-along for camping knitting), but I do have to show you some other stuff. During the holidays, I also did some sniffing on eBay, and because I am such a bad loser, I bid hard (not too hard, by the way...) and won two lots from Colourmart. The first one was three cones of DK 2/6 merino i...

With the start of the Tour de France, we also started the Tour de Fleece on Ravelry. A yearly spinning event, with the aim to spin as much as you can, spin new fibers or just spin a few meters every day, to end up with an empty stash ;) I started day 1 with my Wensleydale, turning this: into this... Around 120 grams, 240 meters, 13wpi. Sock yarn on the thick side. And a close-up: Today will be a quiet day: the balling up counted as my work for today. But you never know, maybe tonight I suddenly feel like spinning up part of a sheep...

As dear husband had a business appointment in Joure this morning, and I am his personal chauffeur, I was looking for a nice place to go in the meantime. And when you say Joure, you say Ajoure ! A lovely store filled to the brim with yarn! I had never been before, but had heard raving reviews from fellow knitters from the area. And it still managed to exceed my expectations! As I was on a 'budget' - with the Breidagen in a few weeks' time - I only got enough yarn for my new mittens and a skein of sock yarn. With the Cashmerino, I'll be knitting these lovelies ... And now I'm home I realize I should have probably bought a second ball of white. Ach well... I'll just start them and if I run out, I can get a ball at the Breidagen :D The Tausendschon is the same type of yarn I knit my Hat Heel socks with. I just loved that yarn, so I got a different colour combo to knit up some more lovely warm socks. Despite it nearly being Spring, it is still cold enough to need...

Today's Ray of Sunshine is my friend Jolanda , who Twittered yesterday that she was clearing up her stash and asked me if I was interested in some scraps for my sock yarn blanket. And of course I am. Little did I expect that she would hand me this. I was suitably flabbergasted, just about managed to get my hubby to make us a coffee and stammered a thankyou. What you see in the basket is four (FOUR) skeins of Ballee Mystery yarn, 50 grams of a mohair/acrylic mix, which I'm thinking of turning into a lovely tunic for Hannah (thinking of Lapwing from Little Knits, although Starling is also great, two totally different patterns which would both work with the yarn, but any ideas are greatly appreciated), two balls of red/pink sock yarn, a ball of colourful sock yarn and kitchen twiny-look sock yarn and then a smaller ball of lace yarn. And of course, I just had to wind up the Storm op Zolder sock biological sock yarn (with cotton and tencel) straight away, and start a Sokkenpad w...