Breaking a long silence

I am sorry I have been absent without leave for a while. We went on vacation to Australia and New Zealand over the Chinese New Year festival. Internet access was spotty so I couldn't post while I was traveling. Then, when I came back, life was so busy that I didn't even upload the photos till today. So now I can start to slowly blog about that trip as well as the previous one to Korea and Japan that I started and stopped.
Today's post is all about fiber. There is fiber in the holiday also but today's post is about my fibery activities.

While we were traveling, I knit this beauty up. It is a pattern called Bonsai and I both loved knitting it and love wearing it. I found the perfect beads in my stash. They have the colors of the yarn - which is my Fiber Optic Blackberry to Raspberry gradient. I wasn't able to use all the raspberry part as I needed to stop the repeats before I did the edging - so had to estimate how much I needed for that and the picot bind-off. In hindsight, I could have done one more repeat of the body pattern. Oh well. At least some of the raspberry is visible.
After I came back, I have been spinning. I had started a Briar Rose Cormo in reds on a spindle but it was going too slowly so I also started it on the Hansen. I finished spinning the second single on Friday.

I then plied it over the weekend. Since we are in an apartment and a cleaning lady comes twice a week, I am afraid to leave things lying around during the week. Plying is especially dangerous because there are two fine threads stretched out across part of a room. Therefore, there was a marathon plying session and I finished it on Sunday, or so I thought. After I was done with the first bobbin, I went to get the cops fhat I had spun on the spindle and.... what did I find?

More fluff! The Hansen was occupied with the second single going through the orifice and so I didn't feel like breaking that just to spin this bit. Out came the spindle. I did two cops and estimated how much bigger one had to be given what was on the bobbin. I was so close. I had a tiny bit of the second cop left and plied that on itself from the inside and the outside. I lost a bit to snarls as it was freshly spun but it was so tiny that it doesn't matter.
Here is the plying before that little bit went on. It has some lovely color changes. I am thinking of making Adrift with it. There is a lot of yardage. I don't know exactly how much yet as I haven't wound it off into a skein but that giant Hansen bobbin is full and it is a nice light fingering-laceweight. I am unfortunately still not consistent enough to get the same weight all the way across. One day....

I had started another shawl while traveling but it didn't speak to me. I have decided to frog it and I am going to start a shawl with these yarns from a kit. They are Strickwear Merging Colors yarns - 100% merino. I don't like the scarf pattern that came with the kit but I love the yarns and colors.

I want to make Echolaria, a cross between Laminaria and Echo Flowers. It is a large shawl which is why I chose it. There is 8 oz of laceweight in that photo and I want to use all of it. I haven't started yet. I have wound the first skein and will start this week.
That is all for now. I have new projects planned for the Hansen and the spindle, but nothing in the works yet.
Travel photos coming soon, I promise! You can see them on flickr if you can't wait. My name is the same as on Ravefry. I'd rather not post it here.
Thank you for your patience!

Posted with Blogsy