2016 Yarn & Fiber Colors – Weeks 12 – 19

Aloha! Happy Spring to you all!

These past few months flew by so quickly and I am excited for the Spring/Summer seasons. I am still dyeing wool for SPIN THIS BOX and did a couple months for SPINNING BOX.

Here are some of the colorways from each of these boxes.

SPIN THIS BOX

April box

May box

SPINNING BOX

April box – theme: English Garden. This collage was inspired by photos I took at the Huntington Library and Gardens in San Marino, California and the Wellington Botanic Gardens in Wellington, New Zealand.

May box – theme: Birds of Paradise. This colorway is WAIMEA ROOSTER, inspired by a rooster that I photographed at Waimea Falls Park on Oahu, Hawaii. I later learned this rooster is named ‘Willy’ and is a long-time resident of the park!

As some of you may be aware, the KnitPicks Community website has been closed down. The members have migrated to our own Ravelry group called “The Frog Prince and his Knitting Community Orphans” and is dedicated to Susan the Blue Lake Knitter, who we lost a few years ago.  Feel free to join us on Ravelry!

We completed a Spin-A-Long last month and they were kind enough to ask me to dye up custom colorways in our group’s colors for the next SAL, which will coincide with Tour de Fleece. Here are the colorways I will be dyeing this month:

Most recently I’ve been working on more sock patterns while keeping up with some dye colorways for the shoppe. Let’s talk about some sock projects . . .

DIAMONDS AND PEARLS Socks feature a diamond pattern created with bobbles (pearls) and a diamond pattern on the foot/back.  This pattern is in honor of the musical legend, Prince, and was knitted with KnitPicks Stroll Tonal in Blue Violet and Stroll Duchess Heather. I hope The Purple One would approve 🙂  Pattern is in progress.

LOVE IS LOVE Socks was completed this past month as well, and was knitted using KnitPicks Felici Rainbow (discontinued) and Stroll Firecracker Heather. Pattern is in progress.

I love animated movies and these socks were inspired by a Disney classic from the 1990s. I loved how the the main character in ALADDIN was called a “diamond in the rough” and turned out to be a true hero in the end. DIAMONDS IN THE ROUGH Socks is an homage not just to this animated hero, but to the hidden gems in all of us. Pattern is available on KnitPicks.com

Onto the colors! This first new colorway is inspired by one of my artist friends, Sue Blanchard. I just fell in love with this image last year and knew I had to re-create I PROMISE TO BE GOOD in yarn and wool.

PICCOLO is another art piece from Sue that I thought was pretty fabulous. Here is my re-creation in yarn and wool.

Sue’s amazing artwork can be found at:

soobeeart.etsy.com & soobee.com

Facebook: Soobee Illustration & Instagram: soobee362

The next new colorway was inspired by an image that fiber friend, Faith, sent me. This is SUMMIT LAKE in her home state of Indiana.

I also dyed up some pima cotton in fingering weight yarn:

Having decided to go back to some of my Hawaiian/Tropical themes, I dyed up 2 oldie-but-goodies, with a few more on the way. This first one is COCONUT LIME (Put the lime in the coconut and drank it all up . . . )

and POI, which is a Hawaiian side dish made from the Taro plant which gives it the purple color. Now, if you’ve ever been to a Hawaiian luau they would have most likely had a small bowl of Poi for you to try and the consistency is usually paste-like, though for most people, it is an acquired taste.

Onto some weaving projects! This first scarf was created for a friend’s mother who is once again fighting cancer. We hear she is doing OK and really loved the scarf.

I did finish one more weaving project which I’m very happy about. This scarf is made from Merino wool that I dyed, spun then wove using plain weave and Brooks Bouquet techniques.

I’m currently working on a table runner on my 32″ rigid heddle loom, and I’m excited for my 10″ Ashford SampleIt loom to arrive today! This smaller one will be easier to port around 🙂

Lastly, I have been spinning more and here are some of my finished skeins from this year.

A = SW Targhee/Nylon from the December 2016 SPIN THIS BOX

B = Mixed BFL in my KEEGAN colorway

C = Corriedale Cross in blues/greens

D = Mixed BFL in my MOODY RAINBOW colorway from the March 2016 SPIN THIS BOX

E = Merino/Black Tencel in my WAIMEA ROOSTER colorway from the May 2016 SPINNING BOX

The following skeins were all spun from the January 2016 SPIN THIS BOX

F = This skein was spun from fun Merino/Firestar/Bamboo rolags from Tiffany King of The Wooly Witch

G = This wonderful 50/50 Merino/Silk wool was dyed by Joe Cole of What The Flock Hand Dyed Yarns

H = Nicholette Reynolds of Spun Sugar Yarns dyed this fabulous Merino wool

I (middle) = LaDonna April of Fistful of Fiber dyed the beautiful Merino/Bamboo/Nylon wool for this skein

J (two skeins) = These two art skeins were spun from vibrant Mystery wool and Bluefaced Leicester locks from Jeri Powtak of Jeri Lynn’s Farm

K = This lovely Rambouillet was dyed by Cherish Stevens of Dandelions & Daisies

SPIN THIS BOX is curated by Anna Barnett of Fiber Felt n More

Here are the individual images so you can see what the original wool looked like.

Lastly, I’ve been wishing for an electric spinner and my wonderful hubby was kind enough to give me one as an early birthday gift! Here is my Hansen Mini Spinner in Wenge wood.

I can’t wait to do more spinning and weaving and dyeing and knitting! 🙂

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