Contest: Colorway of the Month

 I am hosting a colorway of the month contest over in my Ravelry group. See rules and enter here for your chance to win a skein of yarn or bump of fiber!

http://www.ravelry.com/discuss/all-for-love-of-yarn/2669765/1-25

This image is my inspiration for the August colorway:

Grand Opening 20% Off!

I wanted to add a coupon code for you and just figured it out, I didn't want to bother my designer again...she said it was pretty easy, so I gave it a try. I don't want to screw up the website with my ignorance! I'm learning every day and it will be fun I think :)

Coupon Code: **grand opening** will get you 20% off your entire purchase!

www.allforloveofyarn.com

Today through Monday!
Enjoy,
Angela

New Website!

We are very excited to announce the launch of our new website!
We have a few new yarns and fibers, too.

Brilliance Lace

Vivacity Lace and DK

Variegated BFL/Silk

Superwash Merino/Merino/Silk

Our new website can be found here:
https://www.allforloveofyarn.com

We hope you enjoy it!
Angela

Blinded by...

...Science is the PhatFiber theme for March. Here is what I submitted for my samples to the box. Thank you all for your contributions via my Ravelry Group contest! It would not have been so easy without your help, I'm not much of a science fan. Although I was inspired pretty easily by the eye images. As a former Surgical Technologist I was drawn to the eyes! Fascinating don’t you think? I primarily worked in Neuro Surgery, but occasionally got to work in the eye rooms as well and I enjoyed it.

I hope you enjoy the fibers that were inspired by all of these fantastic images! Some are one of kind, get them while they are available here at AFLoY Shop!

Cyber Monday...

...sale. Ends at Monday at midnight! In case you didn't get in on Black Friday's sale this is for you! You'll get 25% off the entire shop with coupon code THANKS12. Enter the code at checkout for an automatic discount, no need for PayPal refunds.

Cannot be used with on the 4 month Tea & Yarn Club, it's already marked down $25.00.

I'm sorry for not posting much lately; my camera was stolen and it has not been replaced. It's a long ordeal! I have projects that I want to share with you and totes full of new yarn and fiber for the shop! Updating the shop is the first thing I'll be doing when I get a new one, promise!

I hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving! We did spending time at my parents home with Mom and Dad and 4 of my 5 brothers and sisters.

Angela

Just wanted to share...

...this! "Chinese Take Out"

Happy New Year...

...to you! I'm stuck home with the kids while my husband is working tonight, but it's okay with me. The kids took a long nap and I was able to play with the drum carder, I'm still borrowing my friends, until I save up enough to get one of my own. Here is what I made...

They are 50% BFL, 25% Tussah Silk, and 25% Mohair. Soft and dreamy and of course they are available in the shop, two 4 ounce listings.

Slowly...

...but surely I'll get these socks done. I couldn't wait to get these started knowing I had a ton a yarn to dye for the upcoming fiber show, knitting a sweater for David, and too many other things to list here! I really love how the yarn is knitting up. I'm so glad I kept a skein for myself! I have the toe done, plus a few more rows and I'm sure my friend doing the green socks is almost done with the first sock by now! She's awesome and very speedy! Thank you Judi!

Oh, oh, I didn't mention that this is my October Phat Fiber contribution. I'm doing yarn and fiber this month, as well as last month.

Steampunk is the theme and I did this colorway on yarn first with some left over dyes and I loved it so much and it fit right in with steampunk, so I did it again on another yarn base and this fiber, all turned out fabulous. I'm so pleased with it.
One more photo, David's sweater, I saw this book when I was pregnant with him and said, I'm going to make that for a son someday, I just loved the pattern and still do. Fair Isle is, well,  let's just say tangley!  I'm not sure that is even a word, spell check doesn't have it...

 

Almost every afternoon when David is napping, I stop everything I am doing and sit down on the couch, (knitting in hand) with Katya. It's our time together, just her and I, because before David was born that's what we had all the time and she loves it, we read books; I read to her or she likes to "read" to me. Sometimes we'll watch a movie, Cinderella being her most favorite. Sometimes if I'm lucky Katya will fall asleep, too! It's getting rare that they take naps at the same time anymore, since Katya doesn't nap much anymore anyway. It is a very refreshing time and keeps me going for the rest of the day, I have come to really enjoy it and look forward to it, despite all the things that need to get done. They can wait and are not going anywhere, unfortunately!

A few side notes of the day:

David is now almost 17 months old and he can get the child safety locks open, you know the one's that are suppose to keep the kids out of the bathroom cupboard doors and drawers? Yes, he sticks his little finger in there and pushed down just right and is so pleased with himself, I can't help but smile. I can't get the darn things open most of the time! 

Today we were at the park and I always bring a snack a long, but leave it in the car or bike trailer and we go and get it after we've played a while. So, we went to the car, got the snack and Katya is running back to the picnic table waiting for us slow pokes, David and I. On the way back, I told David: "We have to go and sit by Katya so we can have our snack". He stopped, and carefully sat himself down right in the middle of the blacktop parking lot and wouldn't move! He wanted his snack! He was sitting after all, this is a house rule, we sit at the table or on the kitchen floor to eat, not running around the house. He's learning fast, too fast sometimes!  

Look what I got...

...in the mail today! Fun mail lately. I'm going to make a RoseRed hat for myself with this one! It is from Corgi Hill Farm on Etsy. It is 75 Merino Wool and 25 Silk with Firestar for Sparkle. It is one of the softest merino batts I've ever felt, granted I've not touched that many in my short days of spinning, but a few. I can't wait to get this on my spindle! It might be a little while, I'm working on David's sweater, not much progress yet, just got the dark brown in the mail yesterday. And my brown socks, the toe is almost done on one sock. Slow progress. I need to dye more yarn, the fiber festival is coming up too fast! Oh, I got something else at her shop, but I can't show it yet, because it's a gift for someone, she's mostly likely going to read this, but it will just keep her guessing! It is just as gorgeous, pictures later!  (HeHe-HaHa Tawtaw!)

AnnaMarie also sent me these little samples, the left one is silk and the right is superwash merino and cashmere, way so soft!! What a sweetheart she is!

~ Angela

I can spin, I can spin....

...I can spin! I love it and I was warned that I would and be addicted! She was right, my dear friend who poked and prodded me all winter long finally got me to do it! I told her I had something to look forward to when I was old. She sat me down and I hated it, as she called it, I freaked out every time I sat down at the wheel. She lent me her wheel to practice on, I'd go to her house a few times and it just wasn't my thing I thought. She then lent me her hand spindle, it was okay, a little better than the spinning wheel, my kids couldn't get at it as easily and I just didn't have the patience for all that coordination I had to keep up.  The fiber I used was correidale, great for beginners, but it was brown and boring and just not very exciting, and it didn't get me to want to come back again and again. I would spin once in a while and I was slowly learning, but still not making any yarn. Until one day in May when my PhatFiber box came in the mail (it was my very first box- I contributed yarn for the May box) and I was in heaven! There was so much pretty and beautiful fiber; how could I not want to spin this gorgeous stuff! I immediately got my spindle and ripped off the boring brown stuff, you couldn't really call it yarn yet. I threw it in the garbage -- I wasn't going back to that after I saw before me a box full of yummy fiber. That should get a person intrigued and it did!
Needless to say, I spun...

I couldn't believe I was spinning this! It was easy - I was making yarn, and I spun some more...

This pink batt was so gorgeous and so fun to spin! Ya, the day before I would have never said spinning was fun! I spun some more...

 

Now, this stuff was the greatest to spin so far, it was like butter to draft. I was slowly realizing that these big balls of fluff were so much easier to spin than roving! I spun some more and plied my first small skein...

I later learned that these balls of fluff were called batts, not really balls at all, and that drafting them was easy as pie I was definitely hooked! I called my friend and told her she got me finally and I was loving it!
I ordered me up a batt from BohoKnitterChicSpins and couldn't wait for it to get here.

Meanwhile I tried spinning some merino roving that I dyed to sell, it was awful! I went straight away to YouTube to see what I could do to help myself out. I learned a ton, but still didn't like roving much, especially merino. It's not so good for beginners they say. Here's mine:

I waited and waited for my batt to come, in the meantime I learned how to prepare it on YouTube. It was a joy to spin and I got better and better the more I did.

This green yarn, (it's so nice to be able to call it yarn now!) reminds me of John Deer; I think I'm going to make a hat out of it for my son and he will fit right in with Boompa (that's what my kids call Grandpa) out at their house. I learned that alpaca was an easy fiber to spin so I spun this up and I'm making a scarf out of it, it's a 2 ply alpaca and silk. A very lovely fiber combination to spin!

I get to spin every so, not as much as I'd like, but that's okay. We've been playing outside instead! I did order a lighter weight spindle and I'm able to spin a much finer weight yarn which was exciting! I'm using toilet rolls for bobbins and then to ply on, the hand spindle takes more time than a wheel, so I'll need to fill a bunch more of these before I can actually do anything with it, but I'm having fun!

Here is what I'm working on now:

I am absolutely loving to spin and I'm so glad my friend was so persistent, she said, you love to knit and dye yarn, why wouldn't you love to spin! She also said, learn now and when your older and have more time you'll already know how to do it, it's always easier to learn when you're young. I'm glad I stuck with it; it's relaxing and very enjoyable. I'll stick to my hand spindle for now, a spinning wheel can wait until I'm old! 

So, as you can see here, my fiber stash is growing ever so slowly, but growing all the same thanks to Phat Fiber! If only I had more time to spin!

Fiber...

...dyeing is so much fun and rewarding...I'm imagining it all spun up!