Tour de Fleece

Everyone in Europe has been under the spell of European football and on top of that the Tour de France has started as well.
As most of you know are there a lot of Tour de Fleece groups on Ravelry to participate with.
We have a Tour de Fleece of our own on Facebook.

What is that? Tour de Fleece?
It is an event that is all about spinning.
Every group has is own goal so to speak and in our group everything is very relaxed.
You do what you can and everyone can have a goal of there own which everyone can subscribe in a document.

I have 200 grams BFL (70)/Silk (30) mix to spin in a green color range from Willow Fair Wool.
130 grams of rainbow tops from Susses Spindehjørne, which I already have span but not sure how to ply it.
Suggestions more then welcome.
I have two bobbins of a Mediterranean 56's English tops (swapped it with a friend) which I want to ply with a blend of my own.
I am note sure though if that is what I really want, because the blend is kind of a dark blueish and I am afraid that it will take the colors down instead of complementing them.
So we will see how it goes about that.
And then I have two 50 grams tops lying.
One very pink and one lilac blend. Merino/Silk and I am going to experiment with that one.

I bought a DVD from Spinning Daily from Jacey Boggs and what to try something from that video. 

And I am sure that I will have some more projects. 

Ohh, already comes one to mind. I got a request of dyeing wool and spin it for someone so I think I am going to add that to the list.

And I have spun 100 grams Merino/silk blend for a customer. 

So it is all about spinning the coming month and I did the green skein on my electric Babe and that was not easy and a lot of noise. I am kind of more friends with it know then ever before but I must say that I love my Ashford Joy more!!

       

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Dyeing

Yesterday I started dyeing 100 gram of 19 micron Merino with silk and is now hanging to dry.

I dyed them with Jeaba cold water dye and it is amazingly easy and fun to do. 

A couple of weeks ago I made the solutions and I had a request of spinning and dyeing 100 grams and yesterday was the perfect day for it. 

On Saturday Tour the Fleece is beginning and I have a lot to spin so I can fill my days easily.

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What to do?

It has been a wonderful Easter and I was home alone with my eldest daughter and I should just count the buttonholes I knitted on my Tant Kofta's Kofta when I discovered a mistake and I cannot live with mistakes.

Second Easter day I had a wonderful knitting meeting at Ateljé Norrgården/Ostbiten and decided to take out just the stripe were the mistake was but that was more complicated then I thought (it took the whole afternoon and a part of the evening) so I ripped out the whole cardigan and have now began again from the beginning. I lot of people were chocked by me doing it but I would not been satisfied if I left it that way. 

So today I have begun again.

My daughter and I went to the yarn store today and bought some yarn for her shrug for her ball dress.

This is the one I am going to knit.

I am not knitting it with the recommended mohair yarn but with Drops Lace (alpaca with silk) and it is very nice to knit in and I have to say fairly easy knitting and not a job to be done in front of the TV.

My third project to start up is to spin 100 grams of black angora for Rebecka who won a lottery at the online knittingcafé.
So I have a busy week ahead of me and I have ordered a mini washer to wash my wool in. They are expected to have them in at the end of April and was kind of a bummer because my husband is in the Netherlands and it would be perfect for him to pick it up. Unfortunately not meant to be!

Bye for now!

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More project finished today

I have been busy today.
First I finished my bag and I finished my amugurumi dragon.

Isn´t he the cutest?
He will be soon on his way to The Netherlands.

I had to make some samples as well from the Merino/silk bland from Ashford and today I did the Pomegranite and the Mulberry and turned out pretty nice. I spun 15 gram of each and twined it Andean style.

Mulberry

Pomegranite

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My first blog

Last weekend has been great !!
I was invited bij Dineke van "de spinners" from Holland to help her to give courses at the Siv (Stickfest i Väst) on an island which is called Grötö in Sweden.
It has been a marvelous weekend!!!

A week before I found out that it was on an island and had to take two ferries to get there.

I can say that it was a small adventure!

First of all there are now cars allowed on the island so we had to park our car at a parkingplace nearby the ferry and get our stuff (and Dineke had a lot of stuff) on the pier and later on on the ferry.

This is the ferry to Grötö

Mostly Dineke´s stuff and a little bit of Marianne and me

Luckely there where a couple of women who helped us carrying everything on the boat.

We got a little extra because the ferry had to go to another island first before he would take us to Grötö.

The weather was excellent as well as the accomodation.

An electric car was waiting for us to get all our stuff to the Västerhav.
 We had to walk the small road to Västerhav.

The key to our small cottage was arrange very quickly and we made ourselfs at home and went to the mainhouse for a lunch.

And during the afternoon a lot of knitters came to the island.

I think we were with about 100 people.

Everywhere you looked people were knitting. It was very cosy.

The food was by the way excellent.

We listened to a speaker and then it was time to have diner and after diner it was time to set up the workshop and Dineke´s shop.

Marianne´s silk scarfs and handspun embroidery yarn 3-ply

A part of Dineke´s shop

Dineke´s shop

We turned in late and tired after all the impressions.

The next day was an early morning because the lessons started at 09.00 am.

Lena on the electric spinningwheel from Ashford

Mia making a beautifull thread with silk on the workshop

Dineke and Marianne had 1 workshop in the morning and 1 in the afternoon and I took care of the shop which was very nice.
On Saturday the workshops were all about spinning silk.

It was amazing how everybody picked it upp so quick.
On Saturday evening their was a knitting contest and Marianne and I participated.
Their were a lot of nice prices to win and everybody went home with something.

Marianne at participating in the knitting contest

Elin and me casting on as preparation on the contest

We made a lot of new friends and we had a marvelous evening with a lot of laughter!

Sundaymorning Dineke and I gave spinning and twining lessons and that was also a succes.

A lot of people went away with a lot of inspiration.

And we went home with a lot of inspiration as well.

Today is a day to reflect and sitting out the cold I got.

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