It all started with my seeing this yarn from Folktale on Etsy; I instantly fell in love with the "scrappy" nature of the skein and the "pops" of color. Color, if you're in a cold climate like here in MN, is hard to come by during the dark winter months and I simply crave it on a truly physical level. Thus, I thought I'd try my hand at spinning some of my own scrappy yarn with lots of colors to fed my need. Friends in Fiber's shop carries Ashland Bay merino wool in a plethora of colors, which are also pretty inexpensive, but the quantities were much too big if I wanted to purchase all the colors I desired. So, I inquired if they would sell me just 1/2 ounces of each of the 28 colors I wanted and they happily agreed much to my satisfaction. Really they are lovely ladies and I have been so happy with all of my purchases from them, they have unparallelled customer service skills. You should give their shop a try.
Well, the fun began when all the colors arrived in the mail and I began sorting them out and matching them up. In my first attempts I tried for a random look, but I wasn't really liking how my colors got muddied and diminished in brightness. Which brought me to the colorway you see above that has more of a gradient/rainbow effect (Me liking rainbows - shocking I know.) The colors stayed bright and flowed nicely into one another just as I wanted. I used 16 colors total per pair of mitts and with 14 ounces of wool I got almost 7 fingerless mitts (I'm missing just 2 colors for the last pair.) They are all listed here in my shop for you to peruse.
I focused mainly on the colors I like blues, greens, yellows, oranges and browns, but if they sell well I'm going to try my hand at mixing in some reds, pinks, purples and greys. You would think it would get boring to make the same mitts over and over again, but the color changes really make it so fun for me and the surprise of how it all turns out upon completion is wonderful.
Joining in with Linda for Creative Friday and Andrea for Fibre Arts Friday.
WOW! I love the yarn! I'm working on my very first attempt at mixing colours so I'm starting off slow with a pink/white/brown/grey mix. Yours is truly inspiring! thank you for sharing it.
ReplyDeleteThanks Natalie! I popped over to your blog and etsy shop and I love the buttons you make - so sweet. Good luck with your yarn!
Delete28 colors! It's like the biggest rainbow ever!
ReplyDeleteThe mittens look great. So bright and cheerful.
Hope you're staying warm these days!
Thanks, I was really pleased with them and now just want to make more, more, more!
Deletewow, how pretty! And the mittens are a perfect pair too, that's just showing off lol
ReplyDeleteI cheated just a bit by cutting some yarn out and felting the ends together to keep the colors even. That and I did choose the best matching pair to show in this post ;)
DeleteWhat a fabulous project from start to finish! I love how it turned out.
ReplyDeleteThanks! Yes, it was a blast! I might be making more soon...
DeleteReally pretty Ann! You are so prolific with both spinning and knitting. You amaze me.
ReplyDeleteThanks Halle! That's nice to hear as I usually feel like I get hardly anything done, but maybe that's just in relation to my grand plans.
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