The Unique Sheep Retreat - 2016

Even though The Unique Sheep Retreat was back in April, I hadn't gotten around to showing off what I dyed at the retreat due to the crazy work schedule I've been dealing with.  Above is the set of yarn that I dyed.  The base is Wild Thing, a worsted weight silk/merino blend.  I have a theory about dyeing gradiance sets and am trying to be scientific in my experiments.  We'll see how it looks when I knit it up.  I still haven't decided on a pattern.

I also dyed three more silk shawls.  I dye three so I can take them to the Bead & Button show and give away two of them to my sister and Carol, her business partner, who we all consider a sister.  Between the 2015 retreat and the 2016 retreat I had picked up a book on Shiburi dyeing, so I had a technique in mind before I got there.  I brought along a dowel to wrap my shawls around after I folded them.

It is actually three dowels that I rubber-banded together, which ended up giving me some fun options for applying dye.  Before the next retreat, though, I'm going to cut the dowels into three sections, to make it easier to soak and dye the shawls after I wrap them.

The first shawl I pleated length-wise, ironing between each pleat.  That took a long time to do, and I realized I wouldn't have enough time to do that with the other two shawls.

The second and third shawls I folded in half length-wise and ironed, and kept folding them in half and ironing until they were as skinny as the first shawl.  The second shawl ended up going home with my sister Virginia.

The third shawl ended up getting some dye from the first two and went home with Carol.

All three shawls were twisted as I wound them around the three dowels.  So what was the fun dyeing option the three dowels gave me?  Pouring dye down the inside of the wrapped shawl where the dowels came together.

MagicWaves Triangle - Three Skeins and Four Repeats of Chart 2 Done

I powered through the third skein and most of the fourth repeat last night, stopping two rows shy, which I finished up this morning.  Getting a good picture of the colors in this shawl is quite a challenge.  This morning I took my mats out on to the deck to take advantage of the natural light out there.  Here is a close up of the tip.

The greens are really starting to dominate at this point.

I switched to the fourth skein on row 17 of the fourth repeat of chart 2, and the repeat took 33.5 g.
As a recap, here is the yarn usage so far:

Chart 1:  4.9 g
Chart 2, repeat 1:  11.7 g
Chart 2, repeat 2:  18.8 g
Chart 2, repeat 3:  26.8 g
Chart 2, repeat 4:  33.5 g

Based upon my yarn usage, I should run out during the sixth repeat of chart 2.

Pattern:  MagicWaves Triangle by Kieran Foley & Nim Teasdale
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Snow Glint
Needles:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

MagicWaves Triangle - Two Skeins and Three Repeats of Chart 2 Done

When my brain has been awake enough I've also been working on my MagicWaves Triangle Shawl.  I used up the second skein this morning and joined the third skein.  I was looking back at my other blog posts on this project and realized I hadn't posted a picture of the yarn set, so here it is.  The order of the skeins goes from left to right, so I am just getting into the greens.  The colorway is Snow Glint and the base is Luxe, one of my favorites.

The skein weights are:
Skein 1 - 28.6 g
Skein 2 - 28.2 g
Skein 3 - 27.6 g
Skein 4 - 27.5 g
Skein 5 - 28.4 g
Skein 6 - 28.6 g

And so far my yarn usage is:
Chart 1:  4.9 g
Chart 2, repeat 1:  11.7 g
Chart 2, repeat 2:  18.8 g
Chart 2, repeat 3:  26.8 g

As you can see from the top picture, this is a really fine example of a gradiance set because the skeins blend beautifully from one to the next.  By contrast, a gradient set is one in which you're working with a family of colors, but each skein is a single color.

Pattern:  MagicWaves Triangle by Kieran Foley & Nim Teasdale
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Snow Glint
Needles:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Gazania Zebra - Cast On

I started this project last weekend because I needed a mindless project to work on while we watched the movie "The Adjustment Bureau", which actually required me to pay attention to what was going on.  Unfortunately it was Father's Day, so we were interrupted by phone calls from Bruce's offspring.  The up side of that was it gave me time to go wind all of the skeins for the project so I could weigh them and get a sense of how long I could make my snake, I mean central panel.

You have to admit, though, it really does look like a snake.  In fact it bears a pretty striking resemblance to a Coral Snake, as you can see from the photo below.

As a reminder, here is a picture of the yarn pack that I am working with.

My yarn weights are:
Gazania Skein - 57.8 g
Blue Skein - 48.9 g
Red Skein - 46.4 g
Orange Skein - 49.1 g
Yellow Skein - 50.2 g

For comparison, the yarn weights of my Charivari Zebra were:
Charivari skein - 52.4 g
Black skein - 48.9 g
Dark Gray Skein - 48.9 g
Light Gray Skein - 48.1 g
White Skein - 46.8 g

For the Charivari Zebra I used up all of my Charivari skein, which made the central panel longer than the pattern called for.  I did this knowing that I might run short on some of the other colors, but wasn't worried and new I could just adjust the number of garter stitch rows, which I did on the Black skein and the white skein.  Given the weight difference between the Charivari skein and the Gazania skein I don't think I can safely use up all of my Gazania skein, so I will use up about 52 grams.  I'm thinking that any leftover yarn that I have I will divide evenly in half, join the ends and just work additional garter stitch rows on both edges, reversing the order of the colors and ending with the Gazania.  I know that I won't have any of the Blue or Red skeins left, based upon my experience with the Charivari Zebra.

Pattern:  Traveling Zebra by Louise Robert
Yarn:  Bis-sock by Biscotte & Cie
Needle:  US 2.5 (3 mm) & US 4 (3.5 mm)

MagicWaves Triangle - One Skein Done

I switched to the second skein on row 17 of the second repeat of chart 2.  I have now finished the second repeat, but didn't take a picture of it.  I haven't worked on this project since the retreat in April and it has taken me a little bit to get back into the swing of the pattern.  It isn't hard, but does require you to pay attention because the repeat section shifts around.  The second repeat of chart 2 used 18.8 grams, as opposed to 11.7 grams for the first repeat.  I am curious to see how the yarn usage increases with repeat.  I may have to plot it when I'm done.

Pattern:  MagicWaves Triangle by Kieran Foley & Nim Teasdale
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Snow Glint
Needles:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Deep Blue - Finished!

I finished this up on Sunday, with only about 10 grams of yarn left over.  It came out a good deal larger than I expected - eight feet long.  I did not block aggressively, just laid it out on the blocking mats and smoothed things into place.  I didn't even pin anything.  I left the bottom edge scalloped.

Even the ends look like waves.  I've uploaded my picture to The Loopy Ewe web site.

I went back to working on my MagicWaves Triangle shawl, and also cast on my other Traveling Zebra set, so I would have some mindless knitting.  I have also set up the Percy Shawl pattern in knitCompanion, and received my yarn, so I'm all ready to cast on.  And there is another Biscotte KAL starting up - a fun sock pattern called Scamper, and I certainly have plenty of Biscotte sock yarn, so I had to sign up for that plus I got a discount on the pattern.  And Sivia Harding just announced another KAL - the Peacock Shawl KAL.  I couldn't resist the yarn, my kit is ordered and I've bought the pattern.  I will confess that two other of her patterns slipped into my basket before I managed to check out.


Pattern:  Siren Song by Louise Zass-Bangham
Yarn:  JulieSpins MCN 430 in Fathom
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Charivari Zebra - Done!

I finished this up this past week, while I was home with a nasty summer cold and needed something mindless to work on.  My shawl is longer than the pattern called for because I used up all of the self-striping yarn.  This resulted in me running a little short of the black yarn and the white yarn.  To account for that I simply adjusted the number of rows of garter stitch.  I also ended up binding off with leftover gray yarn, although I didn't have enough to do the entire bind off in the gray, and on one edge (the bottom edge in this picture) I bound off on a wrong side row.  I also wet blocked it, which relaxed the ruffles somewhat.  I'm happy with the result, and I used up every bit of yarn.

Pattern:  Traveling Zebra by Louise Robert
Yarn:  Bis-sock by Biscotte & Cie
Needle:  US 2.5 (3 mm) & US 4 (3.5 mm)

Deep Blue - Past the Half-way Mark

I took Deep Blue and Charivari Zebra with me to Bead & Button, but mostly worked on Deep Blue.  I received a lot of compliments on it as I worked on it in the booth (the show was pretty slow, unfortunately).  I did have to rip back twice because I messed up even this simple lace pattern.  It happens to us all.  Fortunately this is very well-behaved yarn, so I was able to just pull the needles and rip back to one row shy of the mistake and then pull that last row out one stitch at a time while picking up the stitches with the needle.  Yesterday morning I ordered yarn for my second Camp Loopy project.  This one needs to be something that has been in my queue for over a year.  I picked the third item in my queue - a triangular lace shawl called Percy, but I think I will add another triangle (turning it into a 3/4 square shawl) and beads.  It has been in my queue since 2011.

Pattern:  Siren Song by Louise Zass-Bangham
Yarn:  JulieSpins MCN 430 in Fathom
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Deep Blue - Cast On

I skipped Camp Loopy the last two years, but decided to join this year.  This year there is a a pirate theme.  For the first project I am in the Lace Lagoon with Siren Song by Louise Zass-Bangham.  I picked a yarn I have not used before - JulieSpins MCN 430 in Fathom.  The cast on was 362 stitches and utilized the crochet cast on, which I'm not sure if I've ever done before, but I like it.  If you use waste yarn it can be a provisional cast on and is easier than making the crochet chain and then picking up stitches in the bumps.  If you crochet the chain around the knitting needle the bumps end up as stitches on the needle.  If you're not using it as a provisional cast on, you place the loop that is on your crochet hook on the needle as the last stitch.  I'm guessing that if you want to use it as a provisional cast on you would just secure that loop, maybe with a locking stitch marker, and then unravel from there later.  I'll have to try it sometime.

Pattern:  Siren Song by Louise Zass-Bangham
Yarn:  JulieSpins MCN 430 in Fathom
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Charivari Zebra - Halfway through side 2

I haven't done too much knitting this week because I've been working some long days to get things done prior to going on my annual trip to Milwaukee for the Bead & Button Show.  As in 10 hour days, and even an 11 and 1/2 hour day.  But before the long days I did manage to get through 2 of the stripes on the second side and start the third.  I'll take this project along with me as it is easy to pick up and put down.

Pattern:  Traveling Zebra by Louise Robert
Yarn:  Bis-sock by Biscotte & Cie
Needle:  US 2.5 (3 mm) & US 4 (3.5 mm)