Happy holidays!

My shop is now closed for the next couple of weeks as I am off to Switzerland for our family holiday. :)


Thank you all for making 2010 such a great year and I hope I can offer some great new products in 2011 - so many ideas, so little time!!

A stunning creation in Tussah silk

This was a very special yarn, consisting of mainly naturally golden Tussah silk blended with some soy silk to add even more of a golden sheen. It was then spun up with lots of beads to look extra glamourous. The yarn was bought, but sent on to another knitter, Cricket's creations to create the fabulous scarf you can see below.

Creations from my yarns!

I've been meaning to show off a few of the gorgeous creations some of my very creative customers have made from my yarns for some time now, so here it goes.... :D


A fellow UK Etsy seller, Sarah from SLC SLC has created several scarves using my yarns and they have since been visiting craft fairs with her, where she also sells really gorgeous hand printed and sewn clothing designs.

If you feel so inclined, you can even purchase this scarf, made from my banana fiesta yarn here. The main ingredient is organic falkland wool.












The second scarf has been knitted from one of my yarns naturally dyed with redwood. The scarf has a lovely texture and a sweet little flounce. :)
It is available for purchase here. Btw, the hand printed scarf next to it is also one of Sarah's creations. :)

Star decrease hat knitting pattern

Here is another pattern, just a simple hat with a nice looking decrease. :)

Ravelry link or you can download now

I've used it on a few hats, especially some of my handspun ones and it's always turned out nice and cuddly. :D

Venturing into knitting patterns

It has finally happened! I have been meaning to write and upload a few of my own knitting patterns for a while now and today I have finally taken the first step by uploading my very classic cabled wrist warmer pattern to Ravelry.
They are called 'Single cable wrist warmers', yeah, I'm original, haha. (Ravelry link)


...and it's all rather exciting! I've got a few more lined up, including freebies. :D

Most of them will be wrist warmers, with some other accessories thrown in - I'll have to take this slowly, lol.

Look what the postman brought!

My life is complete! I've now officially got it all. ;)

My order from world of wool arrived today and I couldn't be happier... this crazy excitement might make a little more sense if you knew that I haven't ordered ANY fibre since I moved back to the UK (Which is just over a year ago) - cynics might say it's strange that I didn't have to, because I had a nice little stash, but nevermind that! Either way, in this cute box is everything from milk protein to Cashmere/silk and I will start spinning up some Baby camel/silk right away. :D

New fingering weight hand dyed yarns

I am introducing a brand new yarn base, consisting of 100% superwash Merino wool.
This lime green yarn is the very first one to be listed, but more will follow shortly. :)

It is basically either a sock yarn alternative, for those who prefer the pure Merino yarns or a very nice option for slightly more substantial lace patterns.

For example, I have seen some beautiful examples of the Annis shawl knit out of fingering weight yarn - I might have to try it myself soon!

Who will be my 500th customer?

To be honest, I thought I had more time! But that is a good, no, a great problem to have! 500 Sales in my Etsy shop will be a very major milestone for me and I will of course add some serious freebies to that order...

I've been pretty busy with getting the shop back in shape and adding lots of yarns which have been ready for a while as well as some brand new, freshly spun ones.

To get into the swing of autumn, I have added some gorgeous pumpkin related yarns, 2 of which are still available here and here.

Remember the Tour de Fleece?

I know it's been quite a while, but this morning I got a nice reminder in the form of a price I won during it. :) The lovely Sara from Lush Mommy sent me an absolutely stunning piece of fluffyness in form of a beautiful batt - can't wait to spin it up!

TDF the very last days!

We're done, we're done!

It was fun while it lasted, but wow it causes pressure, lol. To be honest I was only really active in one group, my lovely LaiGrai girls. :)

Day 21 (23rd of July):
I carded up some pinks and spun them into singles.


Day 22 (24th of July):
Spun up some more singles in a mix of blues.



















Day 23 (25th of July), LAST DAY:
I finally finished this yarn on my hand spindle, lots of hand washed beautiful Shetland wool, hand dyed Merino/silk, silk noil and some Angelina, plus of course those blobs I crocheted a while back.

TDF Day 20

I missed a few days of the TDF, as I spent a long weekend in Edinburgh, which was very nice. :)
Yesterday, day 20 (22nd of July) I worked on an art yarn made from a handcarded batt with lots of handprocessed Shetland wool (from Wonderwool earlier this year) and as inclusions lots of little crocheted balls:

All on my trusted Turkish spindle of course (handy to take along to my knitting group).

TDF Days 11-13

This first picture shows what I have been spinning for the TDF so far. Today's yarn is the one just above the purple invasion, a simple yarn spun from naturally dyed wool (using Redwood).

But let's go back a step...

Day 10 is a resting day, so that is exactly what I did....

On day 11 I spun a corespun Mohair locks yarn:
The second yarn is the Twister yarn I mentioned a few days ago, that was great fun to spin. :)

The third picture shows the yarns I was spinning on for the last few days, all in the interest of destashing! They are pure purple wool with cotton nepps, which is supposed to be tweedy. I do actually quite like it now it's spun up, nice and chunky for sure!

TDF Day 8 and 9

Right, today I spun one of my blue batts into a single and plied it with sparkly thread, including glass beads, gems and freshwater pearls on the way.

Next up I carded some more batts, including this Alpaca and wool based one, which I then spun up into a simple single yarn:

TDF Days 4-7

Ah yes, taking pictures always takes a bit more determination than one might think...

I have been spinning every day though, including 2 days on a new Twister type yarn.

Yesterday (Day 6), I spun up one of the blue batts into a single yarn to ply with some beads, but I haven't finished that yarn yet.

Today however I carded up another two beautifully summery batts with a mix of soft hand dyed wools and lime green hand dyed Merino/silk - plus Angelina. Those two batts produced a luscious thick and thin yarn.

TDF Day 3

I gotta say, you are such nice blog readers! Having disappeared for 2 months I was just over the moon to get some lovely comments on my previous post. :)

Anyway, before I get all sappy, here is my progress!
The white yarn is called Vanilla delight and is the yarn I spun yesterday, this time skeined but pre-washing.

Next up we have a corespun yarn spun from the batt I carded yesterday. The pictures don't really do it justice, it looks so fluffy and gorgeous close up!

....and theeeeennn, I carded up a really summery, tropical trio, with lots of Angelina and Mohair curls added to the mix. Don't they just look yummy? Can't wait to spin them!

TDF Day 2

Hi there! Well, today I used some previously carded batts, mainly containing wool, silk and soy silk to spin a simple textured single yarn, very 'Vanilla'. :)

Browsing some yarns on Ravelry got me really motivated to use my drum carder again, so I used a collection of aqua tones and some yellow/lime green mohair curls for this batt. Tomorrow I will hopefully be able to finish spinning the yarn out of it!

Tour de Fleece 2010 begins!

Can it be, can it really be? Have I not written anything in exactly 2 months? Well, it is a little scary, but I suppose I did have many other things going on and in a way it was nice to concentrate on non-yarny things for a few weeks. You'll hopefully be pleased to know that I am back with fresh motivation and inspiration - just in time for the yearly Tour de Fleece!

For those of you who are new to the concept, it's basically spinning during the Tour de France (which I don't even watch) and all of it documented on Ravelry...

Unfortunately I was at work for most of this beautiful Saturday, so by the time I actually had some yarn to photograph it was already quite dark.
It's very much a scrap yarn made from some random fibres I carded together a while ago. The purple yarn is a commercial mohair boucle yarn.

Freeform CAL

I don't know what made me do it, but I am tempted to blame Gypsy Dancer for it. :P She showed off a freeform crochet piece at one of our recent local knitting meet-ups - it looked convincingly great!

Aaaanyway, some will know that I don't really crochet. Don't get me wrong, I think it's very handy and love doing little shell borders, but when it comes to picking patterns I just feel more comfortable in knitting. Doesn't help that I only vaguely know German crochet lingo, let alone British or American. Well, nevermind, I always wanted to do some freeform crochet and I am joining in this lovely freeform crochet-along on Ravelry to have some fun and perhaps pick up some new skills. The end result will be some kind of knitting bag, I think. To make it more my own I am trying to use mainly (if not only) my own handspun bits and leftovers.

Do join in if you like, I bet it will be fun!

Handspun button sweater WIP

After being so busy preparing for my recent craft fair, I have really been enjoying the calm last few days. I even finally started knitting a cardigan from my handspun Merino/silk singles (The type often appearing in my shop as well). The pattern I am basing it on is the button sweater by 'Oh my stars', a design I have been meaning to try out for ages. It is a top down raglan with a wide button band. The colours on this picture seem a bit washed out as you can mainly just see the shinyness of the silk... I will get some better pictures after more progress. As I am making it up as I go, there are already a few things I would do differently to improve fit, but I kept going as I plan on knitting another raglan in this style eventually anyway...

By coincidence (ok, not really, I just buy a lot of handmade buttons) I already have some lovely ceramic buttons that would go brilliantly with this sweater! http://www.etsy.com/view_transaction.php?transaction_id=9226423

Pictures of Wonderwool

This is a picture of our stall at Wonderwool Wales. My friend Sally had her rugs up on the walls and her handspun yarns (using local wool and only natural dyes) mainly on the left part. My hand dyed sock yarns were in the far left corner and my handspun yarns on the right table. My little handwritten sign hadn't gone up yet as I took the picture, but I am planning on sewing a nice big one for next time, using lots of pattern and colour. :)
The two colourful rugs on the floor were also hand dyed and woven by Sally, aren't they gorgeous? We had a fun but tiring time and really enoyed meeting all these knitters, spinners and fibre lovers. It was especially great for me to put faces to a few names I knew from the online world.

I also used my vintage suitcase and antique wooden spools for the first time and am really delighted with the look achieved. Of course there are always improvements to be made, but I get better with every fair I do. :P

Right now I am delighted to be able to say that I am finally truly updating my etsy shop again and have already added lots of new sock yarns! Just before Wonderwool I dyed up a storm and am so pleased to be able to finally show the outcome. Taking my yarns 'out there' forced me to weigh and label a lot of my recent work, which makes my life now a lot easier, haha.

Aaaanyway, this is no time to rest, I am back at my spinning wheel already!

Wonderwool Wales is coming!

Wow, time has flown. I'm telling you, absolutely flown! Suddenly I find myself just one night away from my first ever UK craft fair, and it is a big one at that!

Well, if by any chance you find yourself in the heart of Wales this weekend, do make sure to drop by this amazing Fibre Festival! http://www.wonderwoolwales.co.uk/
Ok, I haven't been before, but I have heard and I assume that it is amazing.... ;)

There are so many things to be done yet and soooo little time. I did get lots of sock yarns dyed up though and am going through labelling loads of exciting handspun yarns, including many never seen before art yarns! I will be at stall F8, which I will be sharing with my spinning friend Sally, who is also a brilliant printmaker and weaver.

Please, wish me luck - I could use some. :D
Veronika

Vagabond

A vagabond travels and has no set home. For some reason I also connect the word vagabond with beautiful bohemian clothes, all shades of browns and for the girls some splashes of subtle colour. All in all this is a concept I very much love to work with and this simple yarn fit the draft really well. It is pure wool in moss green and rusty red, leading to this rich brown only through carding.
I have listed this yarn in my etsy shop, hoping it will find a kind home.
Slowly but surely I am getting back into the swing of spinning and creating, but there are still many projects I would like to finish first. A triangular lace shawl I started knitting in September is coming closer to completion every day and I am working my way through a neverending 'to spin' project list. Today I brought out most of my bead collection to put together a few exciting mixes for future art yarn projects. Next I want to card up a storm, it being my day off and all.... I just need to move my laptop first and stop looking at gorgeous handmade jewellery... :D

Fight the WIPs!

How many different projects do knitters and crafters always have going on at the same time? I am definitely no exception and I am currently vowing to fight the WIPs (works in progress).
First of all, I don't just knit and spin (although that would certainly already take up enough of my spare time!), but I also dabble in various sewing projects. I keep seeing (and buying) beautiful fabrics, but somehow I never get around to finish anything. Somehow I ended up with a huge stash of fabrics and have now decided that I should really start working through them instead of buying more all the time. One of my purchases last year was an autumnal jelly roll from uberstitch on etsy. On the left you can see how that is coming along now, I finally made a big dent into the progress of this simple quilt!

My current knitting project are my latvian mittens and I have almost finished the first one! Ravelry Ravelry link.

And then, let's not forget my sweet little striped cardigan, the eternal WIP. Ravelry link.

Well, either way, I am trying really hard not to get side tracked in this endeavor and hopefully it will result in a few new pieces of clothing and a bit less in my stash dresser. :P

Latvian mittens

What happened? Well, quite a bit, actually.
For a start there was my birthday on the 2.2., in February I had a range of guests over for various reasons, I also finally wound my 700g of latvian wool into balls by hand instead of getting a yarn winder, started knitting an adorable pair of mittens from the book latvian mittens, which is simply amazing. It features such a variety of charts and instructions that you are bound to mix and match your favourite mitten pattern. In other news, I rediscovered my sewing machine once again and am sewing my way towards a full-sized quilt in autumnal colours (I know, wrong season, but by the time I am done it might well be autumn in 5 years time....). The fabric is from a jelly roll I bought on etsy a good while ago. :P

Spinning.... yeah, sometimes... not as much as usual though.

New sock yarns are in!

Here are two of my latest sock yarns from my recent dyeing day, 'Fairytale' and 'Storm warning'. More are being added every day. :)

Carding and dyeing

After my move to the UK my lovely boyfriend got me a drum carder and I have been carding ever since... Mixing all kinds of different colours, textures and fibres is just such instant gratification.
On the left is a simple batt carded from hand dyed Merino wool and Mulberry silk.

Today has also been a big dyeing day - with lots of new sock yarns soon ready to be listed! I'll add some pictures soon, but it is looking pretty good, considering that I haven't done any dyeing in many months.... :D

Grapefruits and limes....

...back in the swing of things and happily listing more items in my little shop!
My latest yarn is called 'grapefruits and limes' with more of lilley's beautiful beads.