Coral Moment

Today I am thinking of the tactile qualities of memory. The color of the sky the day I graduated from college; now four years past, but the memory still as hot and blue as the day it happened. Sitting on the fire escape at the school last summer, when the rain rolled in and my ballgown laid in a heavy pile of silk and pins on my work table. The feeling when a customer says that dress looks nice on you, and I think of Sufjan Stevens crying on stage while singing about his mother.

I've been having trouble writing about much of anything for the past few weeks. Secret projects and private matters both have been taking up my time and energy lately, and although they're not all that mysterious, they're still not mine to write about. So instead, I've been grasping for things that are real - wool, cloth, soap and water - and feeling alternately perplexed and joyful at the state of things.

And lately, this skein of yarn is one of the wooly things that's been sitting on my table and asking to become something. My friend Michael is quite a gifted spinner, and a few weeks after I admired this beautiful coral wool/silk on his wheel, he brought it to the shop and asked if I'd like to have it. (Would I??) Yesterday afternoon, I was taking photos of it in the dining room and realized how perfectly it matched my outfit - and after a rough day, that was a really nice little moment.

Hope you have an equally nice moment today. Happy Friday, friends.
<3
Cory

WIP: The Saddest Cowl on Earth

 

Yesterday was my birthday - a quiet one this year - and in celebration, I grabbed a couple of skeins of Spincycle BFL Worsted from my stash, in the colorway The Saddest Place on Earth, to make a simple cowl. I'm doing a larger version of the Sonmi Cowl, which I finished right before starting on the show and never did a finished object post about - silly me! I'm enjoying the gorgeous shift of colors and subtle thick-and-thin quality of the yarn paired with the simplicity of stockinette with just a dash of garter stitch. This yarn is so, so lovely and it's exactly what I needed on a dreary spring day like today.

In other news, I'm currently working away on my ball gown presentation, which sadly I can't share with you until after it's finished; I'm also realizing how run down I am from dealing with health problems. As a result, the blog will be quieter for a bit while I finish the presentation and replenish my reserves.

I'll probably still be posting sporadically - I can't stay away, especially when yarn is involved! - but otherwise, I'll see you on the other side. <3

Yarn Love: Wedding Handspun

Warning: Wedding talk ahoy! If weddings aren't your jam, feel free to stop here!

Having just received our gorgeous wedding photos - which I'll do a post about soon - I was inspired to write a little bit about this handspun I received as a gift from our friend Jennifer, who also made the handspun ring pillow.  It's a 2-ply, 50/50 merino/tencel laceweight in the most beautiful coral color, which also matched one of the colors in my dress and my bridal party's dresses and ties.  I see handspun laceweight so rarely, much less handspun laceweight made especially for me by a friend to celebrate a special occasion, so this is a very special gift!

It hasn't decided yet what it wants to be, but I know it will become an heirloom of some sort - a shawl or scarf, most likely.  Evelyn Clark patterns seem particularly suited to showing off unique yarns, so I might look through her library.  I've actually been thinking of knitting another Swallowtail Shawl out of this - here's my others, Swallowtail 1 & Swallowtail 2, which I loved knitting and wear often - so that pattern is a strong contender.

Whatever it becomes, it will always remind me of Jennifer, the time we spent with friends the week before I graduated from Oberlin, and the wedding.  A lot of great memories and love wrapped up in one very pretty skein of yarn.

Thank you, Jennifer!

WIP: Sonmi

 

Yesterday I was feeling unwell and rather antsy, so I cast on for something new - a mini-scarf/buttoned cowl.  And re-cast on.  And re-cast on again, until it was exactly the way I wanted it.  And then this morning, I finished off with some garter stitch and played with a crocheted edging until it was exactly the way I wanted it.  I used every single possible inch of a 100 yard skein of Yarnarchy handspun in the Cherry Blossoms colorway, bought at the last Seattle Urban Craft Uprising.  In the last year or so, I've started to get really obsessed with handspun, so it's nice to have it actually get knit up from my stash!

For some reason, from the moment I cast on, I was thinking of Sonmi 451 from Cloud Atlas - I saw the movie a few weeks ago, and am currently reading the book.  At first, I couldn't figure out why I would associate such a soft color and texture with a character who lives in glossy, dystopian view of the future.  Then I remembered this.

Which got me thinking about the film again, and how they used Sonmi's clothes as a way to subtly echo the shifts in her character.  At the beginning, she works as a waitress in a cafe in Neo Seoul, where the uniforms are tight, shiny, and regulated by the corporation that runs the cafe.  When she is freed, her clothes become more fluid and soft, and although they are provided to her by the man who helped her escape, they communicate her character's introspection, curiosity, and kindness much more accurately than her uniform ever could.

And when I think of it that way, this association makes much more sense.

The mini-scarf/cowl is currently blocking in my yarn room - now I just need some extremely excellent buttons to go along with it!

Handspun Love

 

Dang.  Lately, I've been on a real handspun bender!  These are all handspun that I've gotten this year - the first two I just bought at Urban Craft Uprising in Seattle this last weekend.  I went with a new friend and a few of her friends, and we had a great time!  As usual, I am powerless to the handspun - I bought the first from Spincycle Yarns - 120 yards of BFL goodness in the colorway Wall Flower - and the second from another local spinner called Yarnarchy.  It doesn't have a tag, but the vendor said that it's 100 yards, the colorway was inspired by cherry blossoms, and I think it's either a BFL or some other specialty wool.

I don't know what is about handspun that I love so much - if it's the slightly rustic thick-and-thin quality, or the interesting fiber content, or the lovely colorways that occur when spinners use handpainted batts and/or play with the colors when they ply.  I also love getting handspun at events or while traveling, because it's so often unique to the particular area that you get it.  Someday, I figure I will get into spinning, but for now I'm content to support local spinners!

I'm pretty happy that I've been actually using my handspun stash, but right now I haven't figured out good patterns for these ones.  They're all so special that I want to find the right things to make with them!

Stash Addition: Puyallup Handspun

So last week, I was merrily working on Lumberjack's red scarf when I realized as I was knitting that my third skein of handspun was a little skinnier than the other two.  I did a few more rows, and it sunk in that the yarn was just a little too small to match the rest of the scarf.  I got worried, because the shop that carried the yarn is no longer in business, but a quick google search found the spinner's Etsy shop.  I messaged her, found out she did have an extra skein of the right color with a heavier weight and that she would be a vendor at the Puyallup Spring Fair - about a forty minute drive from where I live.

So Friday I made the drive down to Puyallup, expecting to walk in, pick up my skein from what I was sure would be the one booth of yarn in the whole fair, and walk out... and found a whole barn of roving, sheep, handspun, and spinners.  An hour later, the sun bright in my face and dizzy with yarn fumes, I left the barn with a bag full of a bag handspun.  I swear, stash bandits came in and forced me to pick up the yak/merino blend and hand over my credit card!  Really!

In all reality, I had several lovely conversations with the vendors, fondled a lot of really beautiful yarn, and snapped up a few extremely cheap and extremely gorgeous skeins of handspun.  The skein I actually went to the fair for ended up being just right, so I'm hoping to finish that project soon.

From left, there's Crown Mountain Farms Aris merino/nylon in the colorway Free Bird (hand-dyed but not handspun), Sunset Fibers handspun DK-weight blue-faced leicester in an unnamed dusty rose colorway, Sunset Fibers handspun fingering-weight merino in colorway Cowgirl, and Crown Mountain Farms handspun fingering-weight undyed merino/yak blend.

Sigh.  I love yarn, and I really love yarn people.  Who else would compliment your handbag and try to figure out the stitch pattern in your sweater in the same breath?