I made 2 pairs of socks – a pair for DH from some wool that knits up identical socks, provided you follow the instructions and first knit one sock and then the other. I get bored very quickly when I have to knit a 2nd sock, so I prefer to knit both socks at the same time. This resulted in me having to jimmy the yarn a bit to get the socks the same! The other pair was a free pattern I got on the net. The name is Gothix socks. It is a fun pattern to knit, using slip stitches. I was very disappointed in them at first as I did not like the heels – I prefer an after-thought heel – but the more I wash and wear them the better they get! Now I love them! [Edited – I knitted many other socks from my own hand-dyed sock blanks.]
I had bought a lovely book with home weaving ideas (Tom Knisely – Handwoven Table Linens). One of the patterns really tickled my fancy! It is called Quigley. I decided to make cushions with some leftover dyed wool that I had from another project and used natural as my contrast colour. My original plan was to have both sides made of woven fabric but the back side was just as beautiful as the front side, which resulted in me making 4 cushions instead! Bargain!! I finished them off by making the backs of the cushions from a piece of indigo-dyed fabric we had bought in China in 2017. They are so striking and look very nice on our bed.
I still had warp left on the loom so I wove with some hand-spun silk. It was very beautiful in the cream and silky colours, but after washing it the red in the silk bled into the cream wool. I over-dyed it in a pink wash and now it is a gorgeous piece of fabric – it will maybe end up as the fronts of a waistcoat – we’ll see!
I was still not finished with Quigley! I put another warp on the loom and wove a Dinner 4 Two with Caterpillar cotton from Ashford. The patterns were a bit elongated (the sett should have been wider which would have resulted in a wider runner or wasting warp yarns, neither of which was acceptable to me!). I am still quite happy with it!
I knitted a shrug of some hand-dyed, handspun kid silk, which is lovely to wear on the cool autumn evenings – just covering my shoulders and arms. I also finished knitting a sweater of hand-spun wools that I have made over time, both on my spinning wheel and with a spindle. The pattern was inspired by Biscotte Yarns Ray of Soleil sweater.
I follow Biscotte Yarns and Louise Roberts, and Louise invited test knitters to test-knit a shawl she had designed. I volunteered to be a test knitter. She was looking for a name for it, so I suggested Zigging the Zag. This is now the official name of the shawl – https://biscotteyarns.com/products/zigging-the-zag-free-shawl-pattern. I dyed sock wool and some kid silk to knit it with. It was finished by the deadline of 29th June when it went live on her website. It was a very looong knit, but fun to do.
It was sold in 2022 at an exhibition at Tina Skukan gallery.
The covering of one of the chairs in the weaving room was disintegrating, I decided it needed an overhaul. I took a piece of fabric I had woven and stapled it in place and finished it off nicely! It is a really smart bar stool now!
I did another test knit for Biscotte yarns – the Octopus shawl. It was a lovely knit and very soft and wearable! It was sold in 2021 at the Tina Skukan gallery exhibition. https://leslainesbiscotte.com/products/octopus-garden-patron-de-chale-gratuit
I took part in a free online weaving course – it was initially called a stash-busting course, but eventually it was renamed to Colour Courage. The aim of it was to show you how to confidently mix colours (and different yarn types). I had some chenille and other yarns that I wanted to use, and did so very succesfully. I put all the info into the calculator and colour chooser program and came up with a beautiful combination for the pattern/colour and yarn. The result was another Dinner 4 Two and 3 placemats.
During the lockdown I have become very active on Facebook again, but mainly for the weaving and spinning pages I am a member of. I joined 2 local (SA) weaving pages and have had a lot of inspiration and weaving projects from these groups. The first thing I wove was a cotton bag on my rigid heddle – a long time since I have woven on the RH – and an 8-shaft sampler on my loom (I have made 4 cotton towels from the first section). We also have Zoom meetings every 2 weeks on the groups and this has been very informative and instructive. I feel I have really learned a lot from these groups, as well as all the others I belong to. FB is often knocked as being frivolous and full of fake news, but if you channel your interests you can ignore all the bumf and actually grow yourself in your interests!
The challenge now with the 8-shaft sampler is to choose a pattern from the dozens that have been woven and weave a shawl. I think I have chosen my pattern but I am still working on the sampler…
