Look for the Silver Lining

It's sweltering though, so maybe not all the time...

What? What do you mean it might not be the best idea to wear a 100% wool dress with half sleeves in the dead humid heat of summer? But I just finished this lovely thing!

So I finally finished the silver linings dress!! Remember how I started here and promptly ran into problems here? I absolutely LOVE this dress! I know I say that about most of the stuff I knit, but this dress is really one of those things I can see myself wearing all the time. (Maybe switching between this and the frost flowers dress, actually. They both occupy a large share of my heart.) And it's not even just because I made it and I have some sort of attachment to it as its creator. Nor is it because I ran into so many troubles and had to rip out so many times that I feel like the end product has to justify all that work (... maybe a little. But only the tiniest bit.). Enough of that. I'll just enumerate its qualities:

• A-line dress with body-hugging bodice. Hits a couple inches above the knee, and should actually just hit above the knee after blocking.
• Set-in sleeves that actually fit just right! Look at those pictures - no bagginess! And you'll just have to take my word for it that they aren't tight. (I actually had to reknit it because the armscye was too small the first time around.)
• The button placket at the back! Adorable!
• Those tucks! They aren't loud or obnoxious at all. They could definitely try to speak up a little more, but that's just because the yarn is a bit more outspoken than them.
• No restrictions at all with that skirt (see picture below).
• Did I mention it has POCKETS?

More pictures on ravelry.

Take that, summer heat!

The Rose

 

More pictures on ravelry.

I actually finished this a while back, but only got around to taking pictures of it yesterday. It's ridiculously soft and a lovely shade of pink (I did not alternate skeins at all, but they're all more or less the same; I think one skein was a little darker overall than the other ones, but it wasn't too noticeable, as you can - or can't, rather - see), and I can't wait for fall and winter to come rolling on back so I can wear it! I am a little concerned about pilling, or at least lots of fuzz developing with more wear... but we'll see. I definitely want to work with this yarn again, but it's a little pricey, so I don't think I will purchase any more of it unless there's a huge sale or something.

In the end, I ran out of the pink (I used every last yard of it, save for the gauge swatch) and had to cut into a skein of Mostaza for the side pockets. You can't see them here, but if you go to the ravelry page, there are a few more pictures, with pockets and everything. The pockets looked like strawberries while I was knitting it up and there weren't that many rounds of green-yellow yet - so adorable!

Knitting in continental was a lot easier to adjust to than I thought it would be, which was a nice surprise. I still can't claim any amount of confidence in my purling and casting off, but I think I've got the knitting down pat.

Small Shetland Sample

Handmade wpi measure & 3g of handspun Shetland, n-plied

I spun up a handful of the Shetland just to try it out, then n-plied it, since it was so little. I really like the look and feel of it! Although I might have spun too little to knit a big enough swatch, so I'm going to have to keep spinning. I got 21 wpi after I plied it together, and it's looking nice on 2.5mm needles. I might even be able to go up one size to 3mm. So I'll go with what I'm doing now and maybe a shawl might come of it, if I have enough!

The only qualm I have with it is that when I was spinning and knitting it up - any time I touched the fiber for a length of time, really - some of the dye came off! So my fingertips would be a little brown/greener than before I started spinning. I guess the little wash I put it through for setting the twist wasn't enough to remove all the excess dye.

Name Change

I have changed my blog name from fuutwo to lukknits in order to try to synch up my social media handles (someone has already taken fuutwo on another platform). I don't intend on changing my ravelry though. That might reflect in the shop name once I open it up.

Fiber Fibre

Singles unite!

I started to experience some mild discomfort during my knitting, probably because of the weight of the mecha sweater and the fact that I'm just learning continental, so I decided to turn my attention back to spinning to let my arms rest a bit. (As though I actually need more motivation to spin more other than the fact that the sweetgeorgia fiber from last summer has still not been finished yet. I'm done spinning all the singles that I think I'll need of the "summer skin" (above) now, though, and I'm about 40g into one braid. Just need to ply them and set the twist before starting up those gloves for my friend!)

Malabrigo Nube in "Aguas"

Malabrigo Nube in "Persia"

So with this (re)new(ed) attention on spinning, I went out to further motivate myself to spin more! (The clear rationalization of my actions is only mildly disturbing.) The original plan was actually to go and see whether I could find a supported spindle - more specifically a Russian spindle, since those have really caught my eye - to try out, since I've only ever tried a top-whorl drop spindle, as well as maybe some cotton fiber to take full advantage of the supported spindle exerting zero weight on the fiber. I poked around at Romni's, where I knew they stocked African bead spindles, and purchased one along with another Ashford drop spindle (same as the one I already own) and some Malabrigo Nube.

Northbound Knitting Grey Shetland in "Heatwave" + Spindles

Then I made my merry way to Lettuce Knit, where I was sorely tempted to try out the silk hankies, but I settled on the Grey Shetland above. (I was also very attracted to one of the lace yarns, I forget the brand, but it's a superwash merino singles, and it comes in the most gorgeous vibrant colours; I wanted to take home a couple of grey skeins and a couple of the cyan blue to make a sweater; I resisted.) It's very different from the Corriedale and Merino I've been spinning (no duh) so I decided to have a go at more wool before moving on to plant fibers.
My goal is to spin at least 8oz of stashed fiber by the end of this summer (let's be generous and give me until school starts), whether it's just singles, or plied and set. I'm counting the sweetgeorgia already spun up. I think I'll need it.

Tricksy Knitter Knitting Needle Gauge

Guess what came in the mail today? The Tricksy Knitter Knitting Gauge from Miso Crafty Knits! Thanks again, Melissa! Although I've already cast on 4 large projects, I'm already looking forward to swatching for the next one just so I can use this!

What's in a name?

Enough for me to make a reference to it, clearly.

So it happens that apparently, 3 full-sized projects (2 old sweaters that really should be finished up this year and my silver linings dress, which in comparison should actually take a lot more time to knit up and should therefore be much more behind progress-wise than those aforementioned sweaters - this is one of those times reality does not match with theory) is not enough for me to keep my mind from wandering. And with the arrival of those Knit Picks Options interchangeables in the size I needed to start working with my lovely Malabrigo Mecha, what else was I to do? Cast on, of course!

I only have 5 skeins of English Rose (though I do also have 5 skeins of Mostaza, an equally gorgeous colourway), so I decided to make a bare bones sweater: plain raglan sweater in stockinette stitch with ribbed collar and hems, worked top-down seamlessly (no need to use up more yarn seaming where unnecessary when I'm not sure I even have enough to complete the sweater without that extra concern), no shaping. Possibly with pockets. We'll see when we get to that stage and by that point I should be able to gauge how much more yarn I'll need to finish it all off. Or maybe I'll use some Mostaza to make the pockets. That's an idea.