I’ve finally taken the plunge and started my first sock using Dream in Color’s Classy in the ‘Some Summer Sky’ colourway. The yarn weight is a little more than required from the pattern so I consulted Ali and we decided that 48 stitches should do it in contrast to the recommended 60 (ok, ok, so initially we went with 52 but it was too loose so I had to rip back and reduce by 4). It seems to be going pretty well as you can see:

In other news, I’ve done my first ever blocking of a project. I scared myself something silly when it came out all loose and about 3 times the size it should have been. After some manic reshaping and pinning to a towel on the room of my floor, I decided to leave it over the weekend while I went up for the weekend to Wolverley where some friends of mine were gathering for a multiple-birthday gathering (one of the birthday people was Ali‘s husband, Nick, who was completely in the dark as it was to be a surprise for him. Boy, was he surprised ). I came back on Sunday and was relieved to find that the project was back to its original size. Now I just have to sew on the buttons before Friday and then it can be given to its intended recipient. Pictures will be forthcoming .

Tomorrow is the spinning workshop during my lunch hour at work. I’m really, really looking forward to it.

Last but not least, I have finally got around to washing and blocking my first ever FO. It’s my great aunt’s very belated birthday present – a k2p2 rib scarf using Sirdar’s snowlake yarn. I’m hoping to be able to post it off to her sometime this week (please excuse the brightly coloured beach towel – I grabbed the first big towel that came to hand when I went home for my brother’s birthday):

So, I’ve been practicing today with the roving from Emma’s Cotswold sheep today. This is what it looks like before I started playing with it. Pretty, no?

And here’s some on my spindle:

And to see how much progress I’ve made since yesterday, you only have to compare the uneven, middle spun yarn in the picture below to the yarn in the picture above. There’s a bit of improvement there, wouldn’t you say?

And finally, some unadulterated spindle adoration:

Well, my room’s now covered in bits of fibre after some late night spinning followed by sleep and then some early morning spinning. The good news is that I’ve got my head around preparing the fibre (splitting it and opening it up a bit so it doesn’t bunch so badly) and pulling it just enough so that it’s nice and thin but doesn’t break… well, most of the time, anyway.

Also, spinning is great for moments of insomnia – half an hour of

spin the spindle, pull the fibre, release, pull the fibre, release, pull the fibre, release, spin the spindle, pull the fibre, release, pull the fibre, release, wrap yarn around bottom of spindle, spin the spindle

etc. etc. is wonderfully relaxing and involves minimum brain power once you’re used to it .