Get Your Mini on at COLORBOMB!

Another !exclamatory! post! !!filled!! with exclamations!!!!!! I'm excited because I had fun dyeing this week, and I've finally added new yarn crack to my Etsy shop!



Introducing Family Jewels Fingering Minis and Family Jewels Fingering Minis Family Pak from COLORBOMB Creations!

Hot out of the dyepots (ok, they're cooled down now, but you know what I mean), my new Mini Skeins are PERFECT for all kinds of projects that require a bit o' this color and a bit o' that color. Think hexi-crack, blankiemania, mochi-garumi, colorwork...



Individual colorways available currently are: 'Creamlicklesicle' (orange peel), 'Krazy for Kornflower' (azure blue), 'Turqonton' (turquoise), 'Powder Puff' (soft pink), 'Lime Lolly' (acid green), and 'Lemony Fresh' (bright yellow) - with more to come soon.

Each mini-skein is 10grams (.35oz) and 32meters (35 yards) of professionally hand-dyed 100% superwash Merino wool sock yarn in slightly-variegated/semi-solid colorways on a 2-ply base yarn with a medium, evenly-distributed twist that yields a plump and soft yarn with loads of 'sproing'.

Buy just the individual colors you like OR go for the gusto! and get a Family Pak with one of each, packaged together at a discount, as the 'Candy, Little Girl?' color combo.

You're probably asking yourself: "Where, where can I get me some of these beauties?!?" Glad you asked! Get on over to www.colorbombcreations.etsy.com and slurp yours up before they're all gone!

Lace Me Up!

New, NEW, All New!

How about something NEW from COLORBOMB? I know you'll want some! I've taken the first baby step into the field of hand-dyeing millspun yarns, and my first offering is LACE ME UP!, a 2-ply superfine merino lace weight yarn. I've put it up in 3.5 ounce (100 gram) skeins that top out at over 1000 yards (914 meters) of next-to-skin soft yumminess. (In the Ravelry database here.) The first colorway I created I call 'Unsubtle', for obvious reasons:

Hot, isn't it? All the skeins in the first small batch are already spoken for - sorry! - but this IS a repeatable colorway, so let me know if it is something you're interested in and I can create a custom Etsy listingfor you anytime. Look for more colorways coming soon.

Wanna keep up with the latest from COLORBOMB Creations? If you're a member of Ravelry (and really, who isn't these days?), pop in to COLORBOMBers, the group for all things CBC, where COLOR CAN'T HURT YOU!

BSG Kodak Moments

Following up with my previous post with contributions from the papparazzi!

Unfortunately, my camera battery crapped out after I took only a few photos at Pie & Beer, but happily Don Butler, one of my campmates that traveled up from Humboldt with our regular local crew, was kind enough to fill in for me & share his pics. A big shout out to Don & to his wife Edie for bringing him!

I put together a photo collage of some of the best of them for you. If you click on the hyperlinks in the caption, it will take you to the photo page for each one on Flickr.




COLORBOMB 2nd Annual Pie & Beer at Black Sheep Gathering - June 24, 2011

1. Woolywoman at the wheel, 2. Velma & Dawn, 3. Mmmmm, PIE!, 4. Draft, girl, draft!,
5. Spinners Circle, 6. Pocket Wheel closeup, 7. Tailgating at Pie & Beer, 8. Another group shot,
9. Goatboy's new turkish spindles, 10. Conviviality reigns, 11. Our Mascot,
12. Dawn, Edie, & Windy, 13. Support spindle spinning
Created with fd's Flickr Toys

Lots of spinning, lots of visiting, lots of PIE! I think there were at least 35 people there this year, & we had so much pie that I was able to contribute a few left over to the Saturday night potluck. And a big thanks to John & Carla for bringing the c-can of homemade root beer!

It wasn't all wheel spinning, either: I saw drop spindles, support spindles, & even a needle felter! Mostly it was visiting with new & old friends though, & I just wish I could have sat in on ALL the conversations!

For more photos of this year's gathering, check out my 2nd Annual Pie & Beer at BSG set on Flickr. Be sure to tag yourself if I didn't identify you, & feel free to leave a note for Don - I'll be passing on comments to him & thanking him for generously sharing his photos.

See you there next year!!!

Tags: Black Sheep Gathering, COLORBOMB, party

Hot AND Lucky

Do you remember this fiber? My hand-dyed bamboo in 'Hottie'? Yep, it was waaay too Velma to sell, so this one went into my stash. Bamboo Pigtails porn!

3.9 ounces of citrusy-TANGY-goodness in tangerine, clementine, ruby grapefruit, and lemon. OMG, I swoon!

I spun it up -- it was easy-peasy! -- into this Singleton singles that ranged from cobweb to a heavy fingering weight, for a total of 290 yards, ~20WPI.

See? I TOLD you it was gorgeous!

My original plan was to write a lace shawl pattern for it. You know, the hat trick: dyed, spun, designed, & knit by ME (I guess that's more than 3; what do you call that? A hat-and-scarf trick?)

But as it turns out, it's a wee bit arrogant to think that, having NEVER knit lace before, and NEVER made a shawl before, that I could just whip out a lace shawl pattern. Not to worry, though, I found the best pattern!

Bonne Chance, by Mercedes Tarasovich-Clark of Kitchen Sink Dyeworks and Pie Bird Design, is almost exactly the look I had in my head when I was planning my own design. Knit from 1 stitch that gradually gets wider & wider (so I could just knit 'til I ran out of yarn), open & lacy, with diagonal ribs - just the ticket!

Look how nicely it shows off the sheen of my fiber! And drapey! Did I mention how drapey it is? Just divine.

I can't stop showing you closeups of the texture, I love it so much!

Despite the fact that bamboo has no "memory" to speak of, I decided to block it lightly, if nothing else so that I could compare how Bea's blocking wires performed in comparison with my yarn-stretching method from my blocking tutorial. Thanks for the loan, Bea, they worked great! SO much faster than running yarn along the perimeter, & easier to get a straight line. Totally worth the investment; it's on my list.

Ta-da! I knew you were waiting to see the real deal. Knit in just under 3 weeks (VERY fast for me) on US8 needles, I did a couple of mods to the pattern: I knit only 3 rows of garter at the end, rather than 4 (I was running out of yarn), & I did a K2, YO, knit to last 2 sts, YO, K2 pattern on those rows; oh, and I used Jenny's Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-off because I was worried about it being too narrow - LOL! Definitely NOT too narrow; it measures 56" wide and 34" deep. It's in my Rav projects here.

Plenty big, and so wide that I don't absolutely need a shawl pin because I can tie the ends together in front, it is so light I hardly notice it's there! I think I need to bust out my little black dress and my push-up bra and have Cole take me to The Pearl for cocktails.

Or I can just rock the babuschka look. ;)

Tags: handspun, knitting, bamboo

A SAL, a KAL, & a Cowl

Three-fer! Ever wanted to feel like an Elizabethan queen (or king)? Then boy, do I have a pattern for you: the Court Jester Cowl! My friend Tracy Hudson, aka Himalaya, knit up a kickin' cowl, & when she posted it in the Novelty & Art Yarn Spinners group on Ravelry, my cohorts and I jumped on it. You're lookin' at me in mine - Buffoon in my projects - there in the photo-op at Black Sheep Gathering.

Soon as I saw Tracy in hers, I PMed her & demanded that she write up the pattern. Turns out, I wasn't the only one pestering her to do so. Studioloo Cindy also inquired, albeit more gently than I, about a pattern. Tracy was gracious enough to accommodate us, and it bloomed into a 3-way spin-along/knit-along in the N&AYS, COLORBOMBers, & Insubordiknit groups on Ravelry.

Designed to show off art yarn ("art for your neck" as Tracy dubbed it), it's a corrugated rib cowl with two contrasting art yarns, knit in the round. I had this skein of thick-and-thin COLORBOMB Singular TnT handspun in my stash, spun last year, & decided it would be a nice backdrop for some supercoils. I dug out some acid green Romney roving my friend Janet gave me & set to spinning up some LoopyDoopy Minis for the project.

This would have been a REALLY fast knit-up if I hadn't had to stop repeatedly to spin more supercoils. In fact, I ran out of the acid green fiber and had to spin the yellow Romney, and eventually spun up some chartreuse Romney. But they look great together, & unless I mention it they're just a "design element". ;)

I did a few pattern mods on mine: cast on fewer stitches to make it tighter in the neck like a turtleneck, added extra ribs, did my ribs as purls to pop the texture to the front, substituted seed stitch for stockinette at the hem, & made mine longer. Mine didn't ruffle around the bottom edge like the pattern because of the extra increases & length. I called mine 'Buffoon' because, according to Wikipedia, it "is a term for someone who provides amusement through inappropriate appearance and/or behavior.” Me to a T!

I was planning to line it with fabric (the Romney in the supercoils makes it a little scratchy), but I realized that would make it difficult to maintain the stretchiness, which it needs to be nice & snug around the neck. Besides, when it is cold enough to wear this TOASTY garment, I'll probably have a turtleneck on underneath it to keep it off my neck anyway.

Received the very BEST comment on it from Jim/Fosterson: "It's like a Gallifreyian High Council Collar on acid!" Gotta love a man that makes Dr. Who references!

Speaking of Jim, check out his version of the cowl. One of my COLORBOMB customers, apuffyj, made one using a skein of my Enwraptured handspun yarn - beautiful in blue! And the incomparable Miki/Knitzphat made a gorgeous chocolate brown/green version.

So, the pertinents: I used ~75 yards of a bulky singles for the main color, 'Psych', and ~40 yards of 'Acidic' supercoils for the contrast color. Knit on US13 needles. SUPER easy-peasy pattern, too. If you've been looking for a simple but effective way to show your handspun art yarn (or someone else's) off to best effect, this is a great lil' project.

Tags: knitting, art yarn, COLORBOMB Creations, handspun, cowl

Gettin' My Silky On

Feeling silk-tastic! My bamboo handspun shawl has put me in the mood for some lustrous, drapey fiber action, & the hand-dyed Mulberry silk sliver I dyed last week is just the ticket! I put 5 colorways of my handpainted Pigtails™ into the COLORBOMB Creations Etsy shop for your spinning pleasure. Pictured above is the pinkiest-pink colorway 'Speak Softly', and the Etsy listing can be found HERE.

COLORBOMB Pigtails™ (Rav link) are daisy-chain braids of roving (carded) or top (combed), hand-dyed using professional acid or fiber reactive dyes in fun color combos & semi-solids. These particular silk braids are 100% Bombyx (aka Mulberry) silk combed sliver/top, and the colorway above, inspired by Monet's painting of the same name, is called 'Bridge at Giverny' and can be found in the shop HERE.

Mulberry silk fiber is the highest quality available, made by Bombyx mori silkworms. The luminosity is stunning in this fiber, and when spun it creates a shine that is unparalleled. It is also the strongest natural fiber available, making your spun yarn extremely durable. Mulberry silk is hypoallergenic and odorless, unlike it's wild counterpart, and will not felt. Get some in the colorway above, 'Punch Drunk' which is full of tangerine, lemon, and strawberry citrus colors & is for sale HERE.

Each of these braids is 2 ounces of silky goodness, with a staple length of approximately 3 inches. My colorways are OOAK & non-repeatable - be sure to grab yours while you can! Above is my 'Wind in the Willows' colorway, created by using the grassy-est, most arboreal greens I could create. It's available HERE.

For 'Banana Seuss' I paired a lemony, banana yellow with spots of magenta pink to create a shimmery, playful palette. Get yours here!

I've got several more pounds of this scrumptious fiber to dye up, so get your color requests in soon if you are looking for something specific. I'm happy to work with your color cravings!

Happy shopping and Happy spinning!

Tags: COLORBOMB Creations, colorbomb, silk, handspinning, fiber, Etsy

Wanna See Where My Babies Live?

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

Only 12 more states, & COLORBOMB yarns & fibers will live in every state in the Union! Come on, Alaska, Alabama, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Mississippi, North Dakota, Nebraska, Rhode Island, South Dakota, West Virginia, & Wyoming - what's up?? Make the COLORBOMBers map complete! Everybody else is representin'!

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

Internationally, there's Australia, Canada, France, Greece, Japan, Qatar, Sweden, UK, US - spreading like a rash!

Are YOU on the map??? See the full COLORBOMB Lives In... Map - it shows each city that has 'adopted' one of my yarns or fibers!

Tags: COLORBOMB, maps, yarn

Monday

A gift of spring, from me to you - I'm guessing this might be particularly welcome if you reside in a still-icy clime (I'm talking to you, Sharkbite Su!). This tulip is a volunteer, or, maybe planted by gnomes in the night? (More likely I planted it & forgot, lol). Whatev, Cole & I were tickled when it popped its sunny head up last month. Me likee tulips!

In knitting news, I'm getting close to finishing Color is a Lifestyle¹ sock #2, BUT... Yep, I made a boo-boo! I decided to add 4 extra stitches at the ankle, just after the heel gusset, but I didn't think through just how to do that, & all of them ended up on the same side - doh! Weirdly, it doesn't seem to affect the fit of the sock, so I decided to call it a wabi sabi socky design element instead of an error to avoid frogging back 3.5 inches or so. Why not, it's my friggin' sock! I started the calf increases last night, so am hoping to finish them before the end of the month rolls around on Wednesday.

This photo is proof that I'm continuing in my newly-renewed spinning jag. I can't even remember when the last time I listed a skein of LoopyDoopy™ yarn (my line of supercoils), but I put one in the shop today! Want to see more pictures? I know you do!

1. COLORBOMB 'Flashback to 1974' handspun art yarn, 2. COLORBOMB 'Flashback to 1974' handspun art yarn, 3. COLORBOMB 'Flashback to 1974' handspun art yarn, 4. COLORBOMB 'Flashback to 1974' handspun art yarn

Want it in YOUR stash? It's yours if you go here & lay down the cash! Better act fast, this one is likely to go quick. ;)

Before I go, I wanted to share this closeup of the fabric I bought on Etsy: stoner deer! It's part of Jay McCarroll's Woodland Series, & Saremy of Chicken Boots is going to make me a knitting needle case with it! And with that, I guess that's it. For today. Happy Monday!

¹Check it out! This link is my first test of the new Ravelry pony feature that allows non-Ravelry members to view Ravelry project pages that allow public viewing/sharing. So although I can't imagine there's a yarn-obsessed person out there who isn't a member of Ravelry yet, there might just be a VWorld reader who isn't & who wants to see my projects. From now on, all my Ravelry project links should be viewable by all! So, go forth & heart my projects at will, Ravelers & non-Ravelers alike! /shameless self-promotion

Tags: yarn, supercoils, COLORBOMB

Craft or Bust Week 12

Today finds us at the close of the 3rd month of Craft or Bust. Can you believe it? That's a whole quarter of crafting, with absolutely zero busting!

This week was almost exclusively about spinning yarn, in terms of crafty pursuits. Lots & lots o' art yarn!!

In the shop:

April Showers Bring May Flowers

Denim Shmenim

Melon Baller

Buttered Popcorn

Green Man

Oh, and Neon Filoffee, that last one, which is a TwoFer, it's bound for France, for a swap with another art yarn spinner. She says she loves it - score!

Don't you just love all that texture? We've got bobbles, we've got wrapping, we've got flowers, we've got supercoils. Enough texture to git 'er done, I'd say.

The weather all week ('til today) was sheer awesomeness, so I spent a good part of it doing my spinning outside in the backyard. There's not much nicer on a Saturday afternoon than sitting at the wheel amongst the daisies, letting wool pass between your fingers & listening to the chickadees in the Hawthorne tree. Look, I'll show you!

Tags: yarn, handspun, art yarn, COLORBOMB Creations

The Handspun Love Continues

Yes! MORE art yarn! I'm finally spinning again. I listed two, count 'em, two skeins in my Etsy shop today. This one here is called 'Melon Baller', 'cuz that makes me giggle uncontrollably. Tee hee! It is one of my Enwraptured™-style yarns, wreathed in myriad threads &, in this case, the secret ingredient: banana silk!

The closeup gives a good view of all the goodies packed into this singles, super-bulky yarn: locks of the Cotswold, BFL, Wensleydale, & Leicester variety; more wool, including Romney, Rambouillet, & Corriedale; cotton quilting fabric scraps; upcycled threads; and the aforementioned banana fiber. That last is a form of rayon, & adds the soft & silky look & feel that you KNOW you love! This is one texture-y good yarn! And it's listed HERE.

I also listed a new skein of 'Denim Shmenim', the blue shade of my Shaganator™ yarn like 'In the Buff' and 'Green Man' you saw the other day. It's jeans-inspired color palette would coordinate with anything, just like your favorite pair of dungarees! And this baby is jammed with more upcycled yarn scraps than you can shake a spindle at. The whole shebang is plied with a single strand of navy wool yarn to sturdy-ify the skein. Fun! Wanna see a closeup? I know you do!

Ain't it grand? Yeppers, & it can be yours if you go HERE. Hope to keep this spinning spree going, but I need your help - buy some yarn, mama needs to pay the RENT!

Tags: yarn, art yarn, handspun, COLORBOMB Creations

Handspun SQUEE!

Yep, I'm spinning again folks. We got us an art yarn bulletin! That there is 'Green Man', one of the colorways of Scraptastic™ yarn I make. Scraptastic™ is one of my Greenish™ yarn lines, made of upcycled materials. In this case, a metric TON of yarn scraps! I have myriad sources for collecting scraps, & I need to send a shout-out to one of 'em: thanks to all my local knit homies for saving your yarnie bits for me!

I also did a skein in off-white, which I call 'In the Buff'. Although both of these two skeins have already sold, I can generally gather enough materials to make a skein of Scraptastic™ in whatever color you want; just drop me a line!

These two skeins are paired, a TwoFer™. One each of Tufty™ (top) and LoopyDoopy Extreme™ (bottom). These skeins now live in France, with a handspun swapee! Super fun to make, can't wait to see what she does with them.

Last but not least is 'April Showers Bring May Flowers', the BOMBastic™ skein I spun today! Take some BFL wool roving, spin it thick-and-thin into a singles, then ply it into beehives, coils, turkish knots, & turbans with cotton, then add a few fabric flowers: voila! This one is headed into my Etsy shop as soon as it dries - it could be YOURS!

Tags: COLORBOMB Creations, art yarn, handspun

New Shit in the Shop

I am the worst yarnie in the world when it comes to doing shop updates! Between procrastinating, & having a bajillion other things to talk about, & not wanting to overwhelm you, dear reader, with sales crap, I just don't do it as often as I should. But, I'm doing it today.

Green BOMBits are in the shop! Last minute St. Paddy's Day crafting to do? This is the ticket! Want to spin your OWN art yarn? Don't have the time or inclination to put together the ingredients? Try a BOMBits™ Art Yarn Ingredient Kit - this one has: Cotswold locks plus 3 different coordinating millspun yarns, & an assortment of RIBBONS, FABRICS, SEQUINS, BUTTONS, BEADS, FAUX FLOWERS, FEATHERS, LACE, SPARKLE, VINTAGE TRIM, & OTHER EMBELLISHMENTS. Enough goodies to fill a repurposed & recyclable tennis ball tube!

How about some Loosey Goosey™ loose fibers in 'Salmon Salad'? Loose 100% Coopworth wool from a coated sheep named 'Jacob', who lives on a rescue ranch in Wisconsin. Hand-dyed by me using professional acid dyes in the colorway SALMON SALAD! A mix of pinks & oranges with a bit of green for contrast. Coopworth characteristics are similar to Lincoln, but this is the softest I've run across, & the staple length is giant: 9 inches! Possesses a silky, spiral-type crimp, this wool should be an easy spin for beginners. Would also be great to felt with or use in other crafty projects. Get 'em here.

More LooseyGoosey! 'Billy Connelly', named after the blue comedian who sometimes wears a purple beard, is loose 100% Cotswold wool from a sheep named 'Amelia'. She also lives on a rescue ranch in Wisconsin, I dyed her wool a mix of azure blue & royal purple. If you haven't tried it, Cotswold characteristics are similar to Mohair, a long and lustrous fiber with a long, curly lock. Very strong!

Last of the loose fibers, but certainly not least, is Baby Doll Southdown LooseyGoosey wool, my 'Punch & Judy' colorway, from Trevor, another rescue sheep. Squoooooshy fiber in mostly pinks and oranges, with a bit of purple & lime green thrown in for good measure. Not familiar with the Babydoll breed? It is a fine wool breed & a miniature sheep as well. Characteristics include a springy, undefined short-staple (approx. 1.5-2.5 inches) with lots of crimp. Exceptional for spinning, producing a 'bouncy' yarn. Also excellent to felt with or use in other crafty projects.

Finally, I realized I never blogged about 'Hickory Horned Devils' Pigtails™ - in the shop long enough to sell some, but not all of these delectable braids of Rambouillet-Merino-Targhee blend combed wool top. This is one of THE most soft, squooshy, simply DECADENT fiber blends I've run across! All 3 of the wools that comprise this blend are next-to-skin soft, super-fine & crimpy. Rambouillet adds long-staple characteristics while Targhee provides the 'spring' that makes this fiber perfect for a lofty, airy yarn. A great choice for a thick-and-thin yarn! I dyed it in turquoise, gray, & orange, the colorway was inspired by this caterpillar of the same name: http://www.flickr.com/photos/8984641@N03/3932892882/

Happy Shopping!

Tags: COLORBOMB, fiber, Etsy

Poppin' FRESH!

I am feeling SO cute in this self-portrait, evidence of how pleased with myself I am with finally knocking off another UFO, with how much I love this hat, and with the fact that the rain stopped! What more could you want out of a Friday anyway?

Once upon a time, this hat was called 'Wrong Number', after the Scraptastic handspun of the same name on the top of the hat (above left). But after spinning up yarn to complete it, a Singleton style in what I called 'Retina Burn' (above right), and subsequently finishing it last night, I realized that it reminds me of the hat worn by the Poppin' Fresh Pillsbury Doughboy & it needed a re-name: Poppin' Fresh was born!

This hat got started waaay back in May 2008, as a top-down beanie, but it got set aside (read: abandoned), and despite my best Ravelympics 2008 intentions, sat until I went to SOAR in October 2009. There I trotted it out and realized that I not only didn't have near enough yarn to finish it, but that it was pretty FUBAR: too many stitches formed a ruffle, & I don't know if you've noticed, but my head doesn't have a ruffle. But my friend Jimbobspins was there when I was thinking of frogging & stopped me with a design idea: what IF I did some rapid decreasing, & left the ruffle in as a design element? Intriguing.

So that's what I did! I spun up that 2nd yarn, left it unset and unbalanced so the stitches would bias for additional textural interest - 'cuz really, all that scrappy goodness on the top wasn't enough! This last photo shows the top to good effect.

So, in the waning days of Ravelympics 2010 I have earned another WIPs Dancing medal. Now I'm working on my square for the Handmade Memories charity blanket to benefit Haiti. Just me, some Cascade 220 leftovers, and Barbara Walker's Charted Knitting Designs. Happy Friday night, crafters!

Tags: knitting, handspun, ravelympics