Holiday Handknits

The Holidays were good for the Dreams in Fiber Household.  We managed to avoid much of the illness that is currently going around right now (fingers are double crossed that we continue to do so), we spent time with family, we had a brief trip to Chicago to see family, and we hung out together.

Here are some pictures of what was made for the Holidays this year - in no particular order.

I got my weave on this past year and made a handful of scarves. Little miss received the pink one :)

 

 

This one went to Little man.

 

 

He also received a new pair of mittens. This is the Sea Serpent Colorway from my Fantastical Creatures Part 2 Series.

 

 

Little man got to pick out sock yarn for a new pair of socks and he chose my Mexican Red Knee Colorway from the Tarantula Series.

 

 

My hubby's Cousin E received this woven scarf.

 

 

She also received a new pair of mittens.

 

 

This woven scarf hasn't actually been gifted yet but I am pretty sure the recipient doesn't check the blog...

 

 

I showed this cowl earlier (I think), but this was gifted to the Principal at our school. It was made from alpaca in her favorite color :)

 

 

This scarf was also made earlier last year and went to my SIL K.

 

 

This next project was not made by me (well, I did a row here and there...) but I wanted to make sure to show it - this is a scarf that little man made for little miss. We went to the store and he picked out the yarn especially for her and got to use US 15 needles which he was pretty pumped about!

 

 

Didn't he do a great job?

 

The Korknisse went to a teacher at school. I whipped together a matching tree and will definitely be making more of these - a korknisse forest! Can't you just imagine it?????

 

 

Not shown are the scrubbies. I made something like 26 of them for people this year and didn't manage to take a picture of them. Oh well. I love these scrubbies though.  Seriously, it's the only scrubbie I make anymore because they're perfect - it's a pattern from a friend of mine. Go make some! I'll be making a few for myself so maybe I'll get a picture taken then ;)

And this is Wilfred.  Wilfred will get his own post :) 

As per my usual I did not get everything made that I wanted to.  Plus, I still have a few things to make yet....  I don't know what it is about the Holidays - I start out by trying to keep it nice and simple and then the Holiday Mania hits and I just want to make everything for everyone and then I'm vexed because I didn't get everything finished (or even started in some instances).  I guess it gives me a place to start for the next round of Holidays!

Bumbling - the Fiber Portion

There has been a flurry of activity lately in the Dreams in Fiber world which is fantastic because I have been in a bit of a dye-slump lately; I didn't have any big inspirations as to what I wanted to dye, I had nothing on the calendar Club-wise at all for 2014, and I had nothing lined up for the remainder of the year aside from the upcoming series.  I was struggling, constantly trying to come up with an idea or two and nothing seemed to feel right/speak to me.  It had become un-fun and that is a big no-no for me.  So I took a break, tried to quit thinking about it, and sure enough, it became fun again - inspiration had struck!

Tarantulas.

I know I know, enough with the spiders already, right?  No!  I have been trying to convince people how cool tarantulas are and how beautiful they are and it hit me, why not create colorways inspired by some of the more than 900 different species of tarantulas?  During these past few weeks, I have spent time dyeing up prototypes for one of my new colorway lines and have officially launched the Tarantulas are Beautiful Campaign on Ravelry!  Don't worry, there will be no spider pictures here, just the colorways.  As it happens, I am still not overly fond of spiders in general, but I have become something of a tarantula advocate and that happened when I began to learn more about them.  Instead of making it a club, any of these colorways are available for custom order, on yarn, on fiber, and some of them will be dyed in a self-striping skein as well.  I couldn't resist dyeing up big hairy tarantula braids ;)  These are the prototypes, (sorry for the sloppy skeins), and I will have a tarantula update on Etsy late September featuring yarn and fiber.  For any curious parties, you can click on the links to view photos of each species.

Chilean Rose Hair (Grammostola rosea)

Rio Grande Gold (Aphonopelma moderatum)

Indian Ornamental (Poecilotheria regalis)

Cobalt Blue (Haplopelma lividum)

Greenbottle Blue (Chromatopelma cyaneopubescens)

Mexican Red Knee (Brachypelma smithi)

Antilles Pinktoe (Avicularia versicolor)

Ecuadorian Purple (Avicularia purpurea)

On my Ravelry thread, I have listed various facts about each featured species as well as a list of random facts I've learned about tarantulas in the hopes that it will enable others to be a little less afraid of them :)

Things sort of began to snowball from there.  I have been in contact with people that put together the annual Sticks and Strings event and I will be vending, once again, during the first part of 2014 so I will be busy dyeing for that this upcoming Autumn.  

At this point, I was still Club-less in 2014 but then inspiration struck again :D  During this Autumn, I will also be busy dyeing up skeins for my upcoming Clubs - yes, Clubs, plural.  I am still ironing out the finer details, but come January, I will be shipping out the first two skeins of my Fantastical Creatures Club - Part 1.  I have way too many fun creatures to create colorways from so I split it into two Clubs (and have enough for Parts 3 and 4 in 2015 if I wanted to).  Part 1 will last January-March, and will feature 6 different Fantasical Creatures (2 skeins/month) - in no particular order, there will be:  Kelpies, Griffin, Banshee, Hobgoblin, Leprechaun, Pixies.  The colorways will remain a surprise until they are released.  Fantastical Creatures Part 2 will run from August-October and will again, feature 6 different colorways.  This time, the Fantastical Creatures are, in no particular order,: Giant, Boggart, Will-o-Wisp, Nixies, Fire Salamander, Unicorn.

So what else have I been up to?  I have been knitting, weaving, and beading!  I managed to finish one of my plain Stockinette socks so I could free up my needles for the minions' back to school socks (which are on the needles now).  I don't remember when I started this sock, sometime back in Winter or Spring, I think.  

I'll get to the other sock sometime.  I also finished up the last of my Camelot patterns.  I will be shipping those skeins out early next week, but here are a few photos of one of the colorways.

I will not be making the mate to this sock - there is no way I will be able to make the match in a timely-enough fashion to match gauge so this will be paired with my single Huntsman sock from my Snow White 2013 Club - instant pair :D

While my Muse was on a roll, she gave me some inspiration for my annual handmade Holiday Ornaments this year!  More spiders - beaded though.  Most people think I'm insane, but there is an actual story about Christmas spiders and how pretty will these look with the lights hitting them?  I have made 7 so far and will make about 10 or so more before all is said and done.  Each one different than the others.  Here are a few.

Let's not forget the weaving!  I dyed up a skein of my Sarah Jane Smith colorway from the Inspired by Dr. Who series on Silken Sock and wove a scarf out of it.  I used a 12 dent read and had 74 warp ends.  

I took that scarf and the other one I wove using Fresh From the Cauldron's MCN Worsted in the Brown-Eyed-Girl Colorway to Living History Farms yesterday with the hubby and minions for a photoshoot.  Yesterday was the Grain Harvest Day at LHF so both minions were excited to go and see what the activities were.

Here are a few other pictures from our outing.

I have another scarf on the loom, socks on the needles, a handful of WiP's that I still need to finish, spiders to create, and dyeing to do.  Housework?  School shopping?  Cooking?  Yard work?  Bills?  Who needs to do any of that???  o.O  Looks like I will be busy!