oceanos

When I was at Loopy Ewe, I was really drawn to this yarn. It’s Malabrigo Worsted weight yarn in the colorway Oceanos.

Like with the other yarn, I only bought 2 skeins, but when I got home, I decided I needed to order another skein to use it for the pattern I had in mind for it.

It’s so squishy & purty. :D

sunshine and rainbows

This summer, I went to St. Louis. I made a side trip to Loopy Ewe. During my time there, I decided to go on a ‘rainbow hunt’ and I found this fingering weight yarn by Studio June Yarn in ‘Sunshine and Rainbows’ colorway.

At the time, I bought two skeins.

A couple of weeks ago, I ordered a third. Whatever I make with this yarn, I want to make sure I have enough. And yes… I have a plan. ;)

One can never have too many rainbows.

fiber friday: cherished stash

Do you have cherished stash? Stash that’s been waiting oh-so-patiently for that …*ahem* perfect *cough* pattern? I have a much of that here at Saffron Knits.

I’ve been wanting to use this particular yarn for this pattern for a while. So this year, at some point (how’s that for vague ;-) ), I’m going to use this cherished yarn to hopefully make an equally cherished shawl.

The yarn:

It is Cabin Cove Mercantile Merino-Nylon fingering weight yarn.

Colorway: Midnight Sky

Colorway: Sunrise

The pattern:

Daybreak by Stephen West

What I love about the idea of using this yarn for this pattern is that each was created by very talented men and the name/colorway of the yarn and pattern compliment each other so well.

I think going from Midnight Sky to Sunrise will make a very lovely Daybreak. :)

fiber friday: so cute

ok, so it’s fiber friday on Saturday. :)

I got my Moose Toes Sock Kit from Cabin Cove Mercantile. It’s so cute! Seven 50-yard mini-skeins and one black skein of 200 yards. Just enough to have some major fun with color.

I wanted to cast on right away, but my yarn store didn’t have the needles I like so they ordered them for me. Don’t you just hate having to wait to cast on??? It’ll be worth it, I’m sure. :)

Not telling you what I’m gonna make, tho. (It’s pointless ’cause I keep changing my mind)… but when I do, you’ll be the first to know! :)

Have a rainbow day! :)

rainbows anonymous

Hi. My name is Saffron and I’m addicted to Rainbows. I mean, seriously. I’ve loved rainbows since I was in high school but it’s now a big part of my love of fiber and color. Every Indie dyer has such a unique eye for rainbows, it’s become so much fun buying trying them.

Cabin Cove Mercantile has recently offered some wonderfully colorful kits.

First came the Original Compass Collection.

It has 21 individually hand dyed 50-yard skeins. That’s over 1,000 yards of fingering weight yarn!!

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I have some ideas of what I’m going to make with it… but the most prominent idea… this idea would require me to buy at least one more kit so it warrants more thought.

Dave’s most recent kit is the Moose Toe’s Rainbow Sock Kit. Yes I bought one and I know exactly what I want to make. Given the snow storm making it’s way across the country, I doubt that it’s shipped yet. But that’s ok. The anticipation is fun!

Rainbows in winter. Gotta love it! :)

playing with depth of field … and yarn

A while ago I bought a Chevron Mitten Kit from Knitterly Things, but I never really took good photos of the yarn.

I’ve been thinkings of knitting this pattern recently so I pulled the yarn out to get some shots and ended up having a little fun with depth of field and having different areas in focus. (If you wanna ignore all the camera talk and go right to the pictures, I understand. It makes my head hurt sometimes. :roll: )

(According to Wikipedia, depth of field of an image is “the portion of a scene that appears acceptably sharp in the image”. So basically, the smaller the f/ number, the smaller the area in focus.)

I shot these at ISO 400 with my 50mm lens, but because my camera doesn’t have a full sensor, it represents as 80mm.

Shutter speed: 1/20 sec
Aperture: f/4.5

Shutter speed: 1/200 sec
Aperture: f/1.8

Shutter speed: 1/10 sec
Aperture: f/8

Shutter speed: 1/8 sec
Aperture: f/8

Shutter speed: 1/60 sec
Aperture: f/2.8

This one is just for fun. :)

it’s all about shawls, y’all

I’ve been fighting it. Casting on for more shawls, I mean. It’s not that I’ve been taken over by all the wonderful shawl patterns that have been published recently, it’s that my yarn is being noisy again. It all seems to want to be shawls. I generally try not to cast on TOO many things, but now I think it’s beyond my control.

I have at least four shawls that I want to knit next – all from my stash. So … if I listen to my noisy stash and cast on for these shawls, I will have a total of about six shawls on the needles. I think juggling that many projects would make my head explode. … but all the potential projects that I want to knit are already driving me crazy(er) …

Ok … let’s see…

  1. Simple Yet Effective Shawl – on the needles – stalled again because I need the spin more yarn for it. It’s still not big enough.
  2. Ulmus – on the needles – almost to the lace edge
  3. Show Your Colors Shawl – in that pink Blue Sky Alpacas Skinny Dyed Cotton. ‘Tis a gift, just took a while to settle on a pattern.
  4. Attabi Wrap – Some handspun yarn I just bought cried out to be part of this shawl. I will have to buy some yarn to be a contrasting color.
  5. Daybreak – Use the ‘Doesn’t Want To Be Socks‘ Handspun and maybe the purpley ‘Yummy‘ yarn I have.
  6. Impatience – A beautiful pattern, perfect for the Dream In Color ‘Starry’ I just bought. … What? It was Romeo Blue. I couldn’t resist.

*looks at list* Omigosh!

Do you see my dilemma? *thinks for a moment* Maybe I will cast on for the ‘Show Your Colors Shawl’ and that will drown out the noise from the other three. But alas, I know that in the end, Resistance Is Futile.

And finally… you didn’t think I’d mention stash in the list above without showing it to you, did ya?

‘Spectrum’ – spun by DebbieB. I’ve admired her spinning for awhile and I finally had to buy a skein.

Dream in Color ‘Starry’ in the colorway ‘Romeo Blue’. Oooo… Sparkles!

Ta ta for now!

t.g.i.f.

I am so glad that it is Friday. It’s been a rough week.

Since my handspun shawl is kinda stalled until I can spin more fiber :( , I pull out the Ulmus and started working on it. I try to have about three projects on the needles for this very reason. The Ulmus still an enjoyable knit even though I haven’t worked on it for a while. My favorite part is the color sections, seeing where the colors will land.

I will say that my stash has been calling to me again. I never realized how noisy fiber can be. Which fiber to be exact, you ask? (I know you didn’t ask, but humor me, please. ;) )

Alpaca with a Twist’s Big Baby – two skeins of luscious alpaca yarn – bulky. It’s telling me that it wants to be a scarf. A Christmas present scarf. But… that would be silly, right? Starting a scarf, destined to be a present, one month before Christmas…

…wouldn’t it?

knitting everyday

Do you knit everyday? I do. It’s very rare that I’ve missed a day since the beginning of the year. I never expected a ‘hobby’ to become so much more than that – Therapy – Solace – just something to do while waiting in line for 30 minutes a the bureau of motor vehicles or to quiet the mind when there’s just too much goin’ on in there. Therefore, it’s been kinda scary the last couple of days when I was almost too tired to knit. … I said ‘almost’. ;-) Even if I only have time to knit a couple of stitches, I make sure to make time for my knitting. It’s that important.

I shall end this post with pictures the two small skeins of sock yarn I got at the yarn store yesterday to expand the color palette of this years ornaments.
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I love this one – It’s ShibuiKnits Sock in the colorway, Peony.

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and I wanted a purple so I got this – Plymouth Yarn Happy Feet in a pretty periwinkle.

My handspun shawl is still growing. I still love knitting it. I got a longer needle and it make knitting much each easier w/out my knitting being so scrunched up.

One more thing – go visit The Kniterella View – She has instructions to make a yarn ball wreath. Who needs the Starbucks version when you can make and customize your own! (And if you Google ‘starbucks wreath’, you see other people who have made one as well.)

ta ta for now!

my yarn stash is calling

Oh My Goodness! Just like I couldn’t stay away from my spinning wheel this summer, now it’s the knitting. Yarn I didn’t know what to do with is now screaming at me, telling me what it wants to be. I’m not complaining, mind you, because I know what it’s like to have a creative block, but it’s frustrating that I can’t start every project idea that seems to come to me almost every day.

The most recent one is a possible blanket. Remember that 100% organic cotton yarn I bought back in April?

sprout

My original idea did not work and I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out what to make with it.

Recently, I remembered some yarn I bought at a fiber fest this past Spring.

sunset

sunset

It’s ‘Island Cotton’ in the colorway ‘Sunset’ from The Weaver’s Loft. (yeah, I know…again with the rainbow… ;) )

Both yarns are very similar in texture and weight. I thought maybe if I knit squares and have a mostly natural colored blanket with a few splashes of color, it would be pretty. On US size 10 needles, that would knit up pretty quickly, I’d think. I’ve been wanting to make something for an aunt who is allergic to wool. This might fit the bill. (Even if a blanket doesn’t work out, I think the two yarns would work well together.)

If push comes to shove, I could use the other skein I got from The Weaver’s Loft in a similar fashion and make something for me. (It’s also Island Cotton and the colorway is ‘Twilight’)

twilight

twilight

Free Smiley Courtesy of www.millan.net So much knitting, so little time. BUT… it gives me something to work toward, right? :)

all you need is yarn

I forgot to show you the yarns I have in my stash to make the log cabin blanket. Some are leftover from projects and others are full skeins that I never ended up using. It annoys me to have all this yarn sitting around so I happy to have a project to put it all (or most of it) to good use.

I couldn’t have planned this project better. Blue, purple & red are my favorite colors! :)

cotton pickin’ yarn

I recently bought some yarn that can’t seem decide what it wants to be. It from Classic Elite Yarn’s Verde collection… called “Sprout” – Bulky organic cotton.

When I was a beginning knitter, I used to get nervous about knitting cotton because I kept hearing that it wasn’t as forgiving as wool as far having memory and such so I was slow to start using it and slow to come to appreciate it. I still don’t use it a lot, but I’m learning to enjoy working with it.

Case in point: This is some very lovely yarn, has lots of texture and character and I like how it knits up. Nonetheless… I’ve had to rip out twice. First it wanted to be washclothS … then placemats … who knows what’ll be next. :roll: Sounds like me trying to decide on a major in college. ;)

I hope it gets over it’s identity crisis soon.

Hello, again … Hello!

There has been knitting goin’ on around here and it’s time for me to catch you up. First up: Finished Objects (yes… that means more than one! :D )

Finished Objects

BBE Socks

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Yarn: Apple Laine Apple Pie
Colorway: Royal Blue
Needles: US size 3
Pattern: Basket Weave (6-stitch) from More Sensational Knitted Socks
Notes:I didn’t finish these in time to give them to the intended recipient…which I why I still have them. But I like them. The yarn is really soft.

Odessa

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Needles: US size 4 & 6
Yarn: Rowan RYC Cashsoft DK (1 ball)
Pattern: Odessa by Grumperina
Notes: It only took me a week and a half to knit this. But it is too small. But that’s ok ’cause it’s basically my swatch. The gauge was given in pattern and I figured, if I’m gonna knit 4 inches in pattern, I may as well knit the hat. (I bought two balls of this yarn just for something like this.) But I really liked this pattern. Very easy to follow and a quick knit. Now I need to buy size 5 & 7 needles so I can make this hat in the correct size.

Next up: Works in progress… stay tuned! :)