Shinyyy

My new spinning wheel

Although spinning with my LouÃ«t wheel was a vast improvement compared with spindle spinning, I wasn’t entirely happy with the fineness of the singles I could spin with it. I’ve been thinking of buying a more sophisticated spinning wheel for a while now, and when my parents were in the states for a month, I though this would be the perfect opportunity to order one and have them bring it back with them, thus cutting on the shipping costs.I was debating between Schacht Matchless and Majacraft Rose, though my internal debate was very quickly resolved when I found out that Rose has to be ordered 3 months ahead, while I found a Matchless in stock at Webs.

They returned a few days ago, and today they brought me the spinning wheel all the way to Jerusalem. I have already mounted it, but haven’t spun with it yet, though it does feel oh-so-smooth. I can’t wait to actually spin with it, I’m so excited!

Yarn bombing in Jerusalem

It might be that we lack appropriate sculptures, or that our public areas aren’t particularly inviting, but whatever the reason may be, yarn bombings are not common in Israel. Therefore, when one does find an area subjected to yarn bombing, it’s all the more exciting, especially if said yarn bombing is in an unexpected place, like the big market in Jerusalem, Machne Yehuda. You can imagine my surprise when I walked into this small sitting area and found that it was decorated with yarn, mainly crocheted. I liked it so much that I lingered there for a while, resting a little bit on one of the benches, with a tiny kitten as my company.

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Cherry madness, again

Just like last year, we have had a good cherry harvest at the Kibbutz, but this time we were better prepared for the challenge, and we got the fruit a bit earlier so it was easier to preserve, with less fruit discarded because it was rotten or infested with worms.

This year we made some beautifully coloured yellow cherry and apricot jam, and some liqueur, as last year’s vintage was so good, though this year we’re using a different variety of black cherry, to see which produces the best liqueur.Besides these two we’re also preserving some of the fruit by light cooking followed by freezing, which ensures us we could make some cherry muffins all year around.

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Paisley skirt

Now that I have a proper “studio” room, I decided to do a little bit more of sewing. I found this lovely Paisley rayon fabric, which has as part of the design a very nicely patterned border, and thought it would make a very nice summer skirt.

I drafted an 8-piece skirt, as wide as I could make it with the fabric I had, and meticulously cut and joined the parts so the border band would match on all 8 pieces. I left out some of the blue, unpatterned border fabric for the belt, over which I added some top-stitching in white for contrast, after consulting with my sewing twitter friends.

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I’m really happy with this skirt, and can’t wait to wear it. It would look so elegant with a blue or creamish white shirt, wouldn’t it?

Trying out my LouÃ«t spinning wheel

It didn’t take long to start spinning on my new-old LouÃ«t spinning wheel, just a few touch-ups and, of course, getting some spinning fibre that I wouldn’t mind practising with.

I got some merino combed top at the annual Ravelry meeting, and started spinning. I am still waiting for my bobbins to arrive from Holland, and till then spin using the original bobbins, which are quite big and have a low ratio, which means treadling faster or spinning fatter singles.

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I’m quite happy with the yarn I got (more info on its ravelry page) and think I’ll start spinning from my stash already.

Posted in Spinning | Tagged fibre, LouÃ«t, merino, spinning, spinning wheel | Comments Off

My new-old spinning wheel

My mother is the best, and not just because she’s my mother – she has the best eye for findings such as this one. She was walking in a town not far from home and just saw this old LouÃ«t spinning wheel standing in the window of a second hand shop, and decided that I have to come and check it and maybe buy it.

It was a matter of great urgency, of course, so the following day she took me there and we checked it out. The wheel itself, an old S51 single treadle wheel, was in good condition, considering that it wasn’t used for so long. It will require some work and ordering some spare parts, mainly bobbins, but it seems it would work just fine.

So how about the newest addition to my studio?

Dicromatic February sweater

All our friends seem to procreate recently; a couple of friends who lives in my man’s Kibbutz, are expecting a baby girl, which was an occasion for me to take out all the unleashed passion for knitting tiny lace adorned baby stuff, and I took the occasion with both hands and decided it would be a perfect opportunity to knit Elizabeth Zimmerman’s baby sweater on two needles, an all time classic.

I chose two different colours, red for the body and grey for the hems and button band, and I think the combination is very elegant together:

Project is Raveled here.

Baby gift set

My cousin’s best friend is about to have her first baby girl, and my cousin asked me to knit her a gift set, for which she would buy the yarn. We went together to a yarn shop in Haifa and she chose a cute orange and light blue variegated yarn, from which I made a matching set of a baby surprise jacket…

a Norwegian baby cap, modified to garter stitch so it would match the cardigan…

and matching booties to which I invented a pattern because I didn’t find one to my liking:

Shinyyy

My new spinning wheel

Yarn bombing in Jerusalem

Cherry madness, again

Paisley skirt

Trying out my LouÃ«t spinning wheel

My new-old spinning wheel

Dicromatic February sweater

Baby gift set

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