Hello!

Ysolda

I have just been chatting to Ysolda, some of you know that we are working on a joint project and I've been designing a few colours for her.
 
We thought you might like to see a photo. There will be more on her blog later I think.

I asked her for snippets of inspiration and she sent me half a dozen cotton reels which was perfect. These are two of the colourways derived from them.

  

I can't tell you what she's designing though, you'll just need to be patient!

This is Clan, the new base for the Yarn Club. 

October is such an in-between month, too soon to be excited about Christmas or Thanksgiving and we all feel a bit down because it's darker in the evenings and we feel cheated out of our daylight somehow. 

So, why not brighten up your October by joining the Yarn or Fibre Club (or both)?

Sign-ups end today at midnight UK time. Yarn will be sent at the end of next week, and fibre at the end of the following week.

The subscription page is here, and remember you can cancel at any time so it's possible to try it for just a month, or just to give yourself a little October-boost. 

  

n 

 

Mothers' Ruin

So is it green, or is it blue? Well, technically it's both, as you'll see if you pop a skein into your shopping cart on Thursday. It's a green with blue overtones and the occasional flash of silver, a bit like a Juniper bush. There have been several suggestions about a name - including Mothers' Ruin!

Other colours coming up on Thursday include these.

  

n

 

VT

 

As you may have noticed, I am a bit of a sucker for greens and golds. My hands seems to instinctively reach for those dyes when I am doodling.


     

Like this one.

Almost a solid, but not quite.


   

I do like a nice round ball of yarn. Click for bigness to see the myriad of greens.

Wound in layers but not in a criss cross fashion. Instead this is done in a spiral building up in a clockwise fashion, but with a couple of fingers betwixt ball and winding on each new layer so it doesn't get stretched.

A bit like a gob-stopper, I suppose.


   

If at first you don't succeed then try again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

At the seventh attempt...


   

I won!!!

Let's just hope pride doesn't come before a frogging.


   

This is Yarnissima Very Terhi, knitted in Clan, which is finer than the yarn specified and knitted on 3mm needles (vintage Aero, I think) which are fatter than the yarn would suggest is required, but they are the only ones I have in a circular which are pointy enough to cope with the no-cable-needle travelling stitches so they will have to do.

I'm going to weigh the ball as I go along. The pattern calls for 2 x 50g balls of sportweight/5 ply. I am wondering whether, if I make them one pattern repeat shorter, I can get two mitts from one skein of Clan. 

What do you think, can it be done?
 

n

Out of focus

 
It's been a colourful weekend. 

And although the phone-photos aren't all in focus, I'm not sure that matters.


   

A good friend got married.


   

And the Annual Gathering of the Scottish Guilds of Spinners, Weavers and Dyers took place at Battleby, the HQ of Scottish Natural Heritage. 

The first speaker was Ruth Lee, author of Contemporary Knitting.


    

You can see some of the bracelets on the second row of her online gallery. She described her methods for knitting with wire and talked about the history of the Yorkshire Dales knitting sheaths which were often engraved/carved with personal messages which may have been from the maker (probably a husband) to the knitter (his wife).


   

She brought felted scarves, wire knitting, and best of all, her sketchbooks. 

Who could fail to be inspired?

n

The shop is closed.

It's offline until Monday because I'm taking it out and about tomorrow.

Busy dyeing though, and there are some scrummy new Clan colours are ready for Thursday - unless they all go tomorrow, of course!

n

FIMAPOABD

So far this yarn has reminded people of

Popcorn, both buttered and toffee.

Icecream of all flavours, caramel, toffee, butterscotch and vanilla with any of the appropriate sauces.

Roast potatoes or tatties as we call them here. Ditto roast parsnips.

Crisps.

Marmite on toast.

Crusty bread, everything from brioche to cinnamon buns.

Cinder toffee/puff candy.

Crumpets.

The common denominator? 

They are all things which, as the Government, the Dieticians, the TV experts, and your Best Friend - if he/she was being scrupulously honest and not sharing the crisps/bread/icecream with you at the time - would tell you are Fine In Moderation As Part Of A Balanced Diet.

Not a very snappy name for a yarn though, is it?

I can just see it at Knit Night, you are happily bumbling along, chatting away when someone opposite notices that you are knitting with the most fabulous, soft, interesting looking yarn. They put down their knitting and lean over the homemade flapjack and the golden shortbread on the table to have a closer look, and they can't resist touching the fabric (this is sounding more and more like pr0n) before asking what it is.

"Fine In Moderation As Part Of A Balanced Diet", you reply. 

Here endeth the homemade flapjack and shortbread enjoyment.

So, I'm not going to call it FIMAPOABD, you'll be please to know.

I'm naming it Naughty But Nice.

Because it is.

n

On the other hand...

... the rest of the world thinks it looks like icecream. 

Honestly. Numbers are so much easier!

Honeycomb ice.

Cappuccino.

Cake.

Toffee Coffee.

HELP!

Garden Shed, Crusty Bread and a Bloke.

 First of all, thank you for all the orders and the emails about the new yarn. I am delighted that you love it as much as I do.

Several people have asked similar questions, so I'll put the answers here for you.

Are any of the colours going to be available again?

Yes.
 

Crusty Bread

Fresh from the oven.

I have tried calling this croissant, brioche, Challah, bloomer, cob and every possible bread-name you can think of but in the end this just looks like a delicious craftsman-baked loaf, so I'm leaving the selection of your personal favourite up to you.

  

Probably Jane

Of course!

  

Poetry

A blend of words which holds something different for each of us.  

  

Bramble

The juice gets everywhere!

  

Weekend

Throw off the work wardrobe and get out those soft, comfortable denims.

  

Escape

Beach huts. Deck chairs. Sandals. Sarongs. Sunshine.

  

Garden Shed

Timber faded by the sun, a mixture of homeliness, warmth and practicality.

  

Bloke

Understated, but with hidden depths. An everyday, ordinary guy who thinks he's nothing special, and who would be astonished (and probably embarrassed) if he knew all the nice things people say about him.
 

How will this work?

There will be more new colours, certainly semi solids and probably a smaller range of variegated yarns. Once the whole range is there, you just need to look in the shop and see if your heart's desire is available in the weekly update. They won't all be in stock all the time, but they will appear on a regular basis.

This means that if you see a project on ravelry in one of the permanent colours, you'll be able to get the same yarn - within the parameters of hand dyeing, not exact, but very close.  I'll set up a reference gallery on the blog when I get a minute.
 

Can I order undyed Clan?

Two people have asked for Nude Clan (the mind boggles) so I will make this available too. It will be washed and dried so that it's ready to use. 

A skein of Nude and some Bloke would make great Selbuvotter mitts I think. 

Hmmm. Nude Bloke. Hmmm.
 

Will there be larger quantities for sweaters etc?

In future I'm hoping to do one-off solids in batches of 10 or 20 at once, this will start happening in a week or two. Someone emailed me last night to ask for half a dozen for a fine-weight sweater and that's a really good idea, so If you are interested in garment-quantities of yarn this will make it possible to order enough to make something rather special. If you would like to order enough for a sweater in one of the permanent collection colours, please get in touch. I may not be able to do them right away, but I'm happy to discuss special orders where a colour match is important.

n

Almost there...

1225 - Last Month's Club yarn, just one skein of it in toddy.

1223 a variegated autumnal colourway in Clan.

I'm just starting the uploading, and hoping to have it all done by eight. Wish me luck.

n

Clan has arrived.

If you look in the sidebar to your left you'll see a new gallery for the update for this week.

(And if you are reading this on a feedburner or as an email, click here instead.)

These are all 65g skeins which give 210m of 100% superwash merino and a snuggly 8ply sockweight just a shade heavier than toddy, and is £6.99 per skein. You'll need two skeins for a pair of socks.

This is a skein of Clan, next to a skein of toddy, just to show the difference in size.

Some of the colours are going to be available on a regular basis, although I won't dye to order as I have done in the past, I'll just dye each week and there will be a certain number of skeins each time.

This is Probably Jane in the new yarn, along with the purple toned yarn some of you may have seen at iKnit in the form of a shawl knitted by my friend Judy.

In the centre here is a new colourway which needs a name. All suggestions happily received.

It's a warm toned underdyed base colour with conker and honeycomb dashes.

I'll be adding more yarns to the shop before the sale goes live on Wednesday. 

n