Irish Fair is upon us (much sooner than I expected. I thought I had another week!).

there are sheep herding demos, Aran sweaters galore, and I believe the Weavers Guild has a few people to demo spinning (and knitting?). not to mention the food, music, dancing, sports (rugby & hurling demos), and the vendors (I’ll be searching out the one with the sweets. why does Irish/English chocolate taste better than American? and why don’t we have Yorkies?)

I will be performing Saturday with the group Knocknagow. The rest of the weekend I’ll be soaking up the craic (Gaelic for good times, fun, something like that) and dancing in the ceili tent methinks.

I feel like a bit of an idiot. for 10 months, I’ve been wondering where my Denise set could have gotten packed. the last project I used it for was the Felted Clogs back in October. We moved in November. A few months later, I thought (again) that I might want to sell them and get the Knit Picks Harmony set. Was all ready to post a ‘for sale’ post when I realized I had no clue where they were. I had no problems finding the extra cords, but the set … *poof* gone. nowhere to be found. as I was packing up in May for my move, still no sign of them.

so today I’m trying to gather up some much neglected WIPs to work on during the Olympics - yes, I’ll be participating in the WIP Wrestling event for the Ravelympics, just to see how much I can get done. don’t worry, I’m still delusional with hopes of finishing 15 14 projects, or, at the very least, making a good dent in those projects. (there’s a variety of finishing needed - some just need ends woven in and seaming, others aren’t very far along).

open the knitting machine box to find the yarn needed to fringe the Harry Potter scarf (you may notice that that was also worked on at the end of October), and right on top of the yarn… the Denise needles.

now, to find the rest of it so I can sell it… probably after the Olympics WIP Fest, since one size is in a project.

see:

I think it’s merino. and some misc brown wool. squished into nylons (as suggested here). I’m waiting for it to dry, and it’s for a swap and supposed to be a surprise, so that’s the preview for you.
(I’m not sure how true to color that is. it was pretty juicy when I rolled it up in the saran wrap pre-steaming. we’ll see how much the colors bled.)

I had a bit of dye-stuff leftover, so I pulled out the Louet Fingering-weight I bought last year at WI Sheep & Wool and ended up with this:

and flipped:

the one on the left was reskeined, the one on the right was twisted up as-dyed. I need to work on the color transitions, I think. (I also don’t think the reskeined one had nearly as much white spots.)

details for the curious:
Cushings dyes in Bright Purple, Peacock, and Rose
used Citric Acid crystals instead of vinegar.
added Synthrapol to the soak water.
used syringes to apply the dye. much fun.
steamed on the stove top for about 20 minutes each. let the roving cool overnight (and all day while at work)

DSCF6378, originally uploaded by criosa.

The second half of the Duo.

I started this Sunday during spinning at The Fiber Studio and finished it up tonight.

While I’m not usually a red/pink fan, I absolutely love how this spun up.

apparently a month and a half of not spinning means lots of spinning on my first day back at it.

behold:

Part 1 of the Dyeing Duos is complete

My first attempt at Navajo plying. the singles was spun back in March. It’s Brown Sheep Mill Ends Wool/Mohair that I picked up at Detta’s

and I’m about half-way through the Shawl.