Madrona 3

Hello,

The tulips and daffodils are getting taller.

The gospel in mass today was the one where Jesus is out in the desert for 40 days (precursor to Lent) and the devil tempts him.  I bring this up because I am continuing my coverage of the Market at the Madrona Fiber Arts Winter Retreat, and well, temptation temptation temptation.  Luckily, I did not give up yarn for my Lenten Sacrifice.

Angora Valley Fibers and Fly Designs shared a booth.  They are out of Tenino, WA, and specialize in both hand dyed yarns, and New Zealand naturals.  Their yarns were very vibrant.

In addition to the beautiful wool blends, they had some beautiful "other" fibers, including Tencel.

But, I thought their wool blends were the best.  Just look at the colors in this rack of fingering weight yarn by Fly Designs:

Great Yarns, from Everett, WA had a booth.  While I was checking out the lys booths, I wasn't really looking to buy.  Not because I don't love what they have, but, well, I can easily drive up and DO plan on stopping by during the North Puget Sound LYS Tour this Spring.  They did have more of their Pure Elegance yarn which is 100% mink.  And they swore to me that no mink are harmed in the making of the yarn.  The yarn is from COMBED mink, so you can knit a mink stole, completely guilt free. 

Island Fibers, from Lopez Island, WA offered both local yarns and fibers.

Another local fiber booth was Rainbow Farms Pygora.

I remember from the Whidbey Island Fiber Festival, that Pygora are pygmy angora goats.  This booth had raw fiber, beautiful bats, and yarn for sale.

They were sharing a booth with Spindle Wood Co. 

They had some of the most beautiful spindles I have ever seen.

It was fun to see the beautiful spindles with the local fibers.

On to my knitting.

Right now, I am working semi-monogamously on socks.  Semi because I am working on two pairs:  The Improvised Crossings, which are my "bring places" project, since I have the fun chart memorized,

and the Smaug Socks which have a complicated pattern, and can only be knit on at home.

I have finished the heels and am 2-more-rows-to-go on the gussets.  I was finding the gusset instructions very complicated.  They are written for one sock at a time on 4 double pointed needles.  I am knitting 2 at a time on Magic Loop.  I had a stitch marker in the middle of the backs so I could think needle one (back, left side of marker), needle two (front), and needle three (back right side of marker).  But, it was very confusing jumping from right sock to left sock and up and down from directions to charts.  I had to simplify it for myself.  So I put 18 plain stitches on the "back" or "sole" needle for each sock, then all of the other stitches in front, and rewrote the pattern so I could read it this way.  MUCH faster knitting for me.  I am finally beginning to make sense of how it all works.

I have about 10 more days to finish these 2 pairs to be able to submit them to SolidSocks and Sock Knitters Anonymous (SKA).  Well Smaug will go to both, and Improvised Crossings just to SKA.  That is about 1 inch per day on Smaug, and 1/2 inch per day on Improvised Crossings.  I can do it.

Peace.
f1bercat
shaping the planet with gussets.

Knitters and Spinners at Madrona 2013