I did it!

Yes!  I finished more than half of the knitting part of my self-imposed 2014 Winter Olympic Challenge!  I earned a Silver medal!  Ask me if I am proud!  I am...because I didn't give up and I learned a new technique and, all in all, I had fun doing it.  Now I am ready to settle down and sort out my tax stuff and get that done!

By the way, I think the "Silver Medal"  will be a huge York's Peppermint Patty!  What do you think?!

I like it!  It is wrapped in silver, it is cool and refreshing like a beautiful winter day....and it's chocolate.  It's PERFECT!  It will definitely make me feel like a winner when I bite into it.  Getting it to hang on a ribbon around my neck will be hard ....may have to skip that part....

So I suppose you want to see what I created with my challenge.  Are you ready for the unveiling?!  Here it is, and I must tell you that a week ago I didn't think this would be such a success!  I really didn't!  Sometimes we surprise ourselves....

My first entrelac knitting

I learned (and re-learned) some things with this challenge, I am proud to say.  I have listed 10 of them below:

     1,   That you can change your plans in midstream if necessary.

     2.   That you can over-think things a bit too much. (I have been told that numerous times!)

     3.   It is fun and rewarding to knit something out of your own hand spun yarns.

     4.   It is best not to take shortcuts if you really want something to work out/end up a certain way.

     5.   Just because something looks difficult doesn't necessarily mean it is.

     6.  I can learn something new easily even at my ripe old age.

     7.  Sometimes what you think you want is not what you end up wanting.

     8.  Colors are not only birthed in the spinning and plying, but in the knitting, too!

     9.   When making a finished project with yarns it is important to go beyond colors in your choice. 

    10.  Entrelac is truly magical!  I want to do more!

I have struggled many times with #9 above, and that is probably one of the reasons I spin skeins of yarn that I just prefer to look at and not actually use to make something.  I tend to lean towards "color making" in my yarns, and not the texture or draping quality or diameter in them.  In this challenge I think, and hope, I have finally learned that color is not the most important aspect of knitting with yarns, hand spun or otherwise; the physical aspects of the yarn is just as important when designing to knit with your yarn. (I am thinking that it is less important and more flexible for weft yarns in weaving, and I did know it was  very important for the warp yarns on the loom.)

How this project brought this home to me is that even though the brown alpaca roving was lovely and the perfect shade of brown, when plied with the merino top it made a yarn that, although beautiful color wise, was of a completely different feel from the other....thin and delicate... almost too delicate, in fact, when knitted on the same size needles.  And even more, when plied with itself, the alpaca, which is much softer to the touch than the merino (which is a pretty soft and fine fiber for wool), tended to be way too delicate to be paired in a finished article of knitting with the merino/merino of the same number of wraps per inch.  And, wool has elasticity...alpaca does not.  Take my word for it if you are not a knitter or fiber person.

And so as I knitted along with my newly acquired knowledge of the mysteries of entrelac this past week, I learned and I realized and I was happy with it all, and I decided that I could not/would not pair the brown alpaca/alpaca yarn I had spun with this project.  I would save it for something delicate, like lace, and its lovely shade would be used to enhance the colors of a more appropriate collection of my hand spun fibers.  I had changed my mind in midstream!  And I survived!

I also decided this week that what this entrelac learning project begs to be is.... a purse!  I adore the colors as they grew on my needles, rich and jewel tone, that remind me of my beloved Texas Renaissance Festival! They make my heart sing!  I love the look and the texture of what I have knitted so far, and I will finish up with these yarns, and then look through my stash to find an appropriate textured as well as colored hand spun yarn...I think that one of my batches of Welsh Black Mountain wool will be just right for what I intend.  

To be continued.....

Time to work on taxes at HeartSong Farm...ugh!