Witching hour - what to make from Art Yarn

A good friend of ours has knit an incredibly gorgeous witches' hat from different kinds of art yarn:


The yarn she used was partly spun by myself (the red/black/white one and the olive-green parts intermingled with the rest of green yarn) and partly by Teetante from Authentic Fiction.
She has spun the yarn with all the lovely felted flowers in it.
I think we've all done a wonderful job ;-)



The pattern our friend used can be viewed here, but it is in German and I think our friend said she altered it a bit.

We really love to see what people make from our yarn. So if you have purchased any Weird&Twisted yarns and like to show us and the rest of the world what you have made from them, please feel free to contact us and send us some pictures! We'd really be delighted! If you don't want the world to see them, but don't mind us taking a peek, we'd of course be happy, too! :-)

D-A-Y-S unpacked

I couldn't stand to wait any longer. Last night at about ten past one, I had to see what was in that parcel. Here you go:




















































I am very happy and I absolutely adore this yarn! Maybe I will take the advice of my dear swap partner and spin the fibre she's also sent me into a suitable yarn and knit those two up in stripes. I suppose a scarf would be great - and would also go very well with the black clothes I usually wear :-)

Thank you again so much, Chra!

Finally!

All right - now I've just received a parcel. I am not completely sure it's the one I have been waiting for, but since I don't expect anything else, it should be.
I am so glad!
I am not allowed to unpack before tomorrow, though. I will keep you posted ;-)

Art Yarn Swap - still waiting

As posted a very long time ago, there is an art yarn swap we are participating in. Last sunday was supposed to be the thrilling day of unpacking, but we had to postpone that until the coming sunday. I am very excited - but I still haven't got a parcel. I am getting quite nervous now, I hope I will get it in time. And I am really curious about the yarn!

Looooot!

Arr! Loot!

Last weekend, I was in Innsbruck in Austria to accompany my hasband on a business trip. I had some spare time, and I found out that there are quite a lot of interesting shops in Innsbruck!

I bough all these beautiful things in about 30 minutes - every time I fell out of one shop, I saw the next one. Weird... But well, I won't complain! :D

I love the fabrics on the left: The first one will be used for a mermaid-themed yarn, the second one probably for something mythological. The third one, the green one with the golden stripes, is bound to become a 1001-nights-embellishment. And the two fabrics in the background, the golden and silver ones... Well, I already spun one yarn with the silver fabric - you'll see! ;-)

Then I found those beautiful sequin bands. I love especially the darker blue one. It's rather mat, but the color is awesome! I can't wait to spin it into one of the next projects!

And then, of course, there are the two ribbons in the background, the sage green one and the red one. I don't know what I'll to with them, either, but I had to buy them! The green one is beautifully ruffled and will sure look gorgeous spun into a yarn!

Oh, and on the left you can see a starry garland that will show up in some Christmas yarns.

Meet the Supercoils!

Aw, I wanted to do these for a long, long time. And they turned out so beautiful! Gosh, I love supercoil yarns! And finally! I spun some of these beauties.

Somehow my first attempts failed terribly. I still don't know what I did wrong - perhaps there was not enough tension on the single or the plying thread had just too much grip, I really can't remember, but I DU remember that I ended up entirely entangled and close to tears.

I think the yarns I finally managed to spin really make up for the trouble! ;)

How I long for a Drum Carder!

Oh... A Drum Carder would absolutely be the most adorable present this Christmas. And I bet Weird feels just the same. I just can't stop drooling over those fantastic fiber creations on etsy and I wish I could card them more professionally myself!

I mean... See for yourself!


Butterflygirldesigns makes these wonderful, dark, glimmering batts. She's really good in blending contrasting colors and creating outstanding color combinations, and she seems to use many wonderful types of fiber!

Those batts radiate in vibrant colors and look awesomely soft. Ah... I really don't know if I could spin them up, I mean: They look already so fantastic!

I think I'd just hug them and pet them a bit...


TerraBellaSpun has carded this beauties.

I really like the colors of these batts, they're all warm and gentle. The fibers look soft and my fingers itch if I think of spinning these batts! I already can feel the softness of the caramel fibers...

And the best is: There's much glittering stuff in these batts already! That's great, because I love glittering stuff. :-)

I guess I'd have my problems spinning these wonderful batts, too, as I reckon I'd drool all over them if I could lay my fingers on them. ;-)


And then, of course, there's Loop. I don't know what I can say about those fascinating batts. You can see for yourself how gorgeous they are! Those shimmering colors, the softness of the fibers!

Ah... It's just too much for me. And that's the problem: I can't decide! They are all so delicious! I don't know if I'm able of purchasing just a single one of those fantastic batts and neglect the others! My self-discipline is rather low, especially concerning yarn stuff, and so I end up with purchasing none at all.

The solution is: Someone has to buy me a drum carder, so I can at least start my feeble attempts in carding batts.

Hello, Mr. Claus? Anyone there? ;-)

You're lucky!

"Sticheleien", the craft fair we went to, is over!

It was an experience, for sure! We met loads of nice people there, but I guess our tasty Art Yarns are at the moment just a tiny bit too freaky for good ol' Germany. ;)

Take the yarn above, for example! I love it, I really do! I spun it some weeks ago and put lots of handfelted zombie heads into it, along with cool linen and sparkling Angelina fiber. Well, many people looked at it and said some approving things - but it's still here with me!

Well, the better for you, as we'll put all our great handspun Art Yarns into our shop the next weeks. :)

Off to the Craft Fair!

It's time! Finally! Well, you don't know yet... Because we didn't tell you - until now! This weekend we'll be showing our Art Yarns at a market called Sticheleien in Michelstadt in the Odenwald in Germany. The past weeks we've been spinning like hell - that's the reason we didn't write about it here. We were way too busy!

Well, now both Weird and me have more than 30 (THIRTY, right! Each of us! Oh yeah!) new Art Yarns in stock, just longing to be sold on the market in Michelstadt. And just in case we don't sell each and every yarn there, you can look forward to literally TONS of new, exclusive yarns on etsy! ;-)

Art Yarn Challenge

There's an art yarn challenge on TreasureAyland which sounds... well, challenging :-D I'd like to give the Hanging Gardens of Babylon a try, so hopefully, there will be something new to look at in the near future.

In Love with Texture

Recently, I started experimenting with texture once again. I just love creating different effects in one yarn; it looks so much more interesting with some coils and some corespun parts than it does just as a plain single :-) I can't help doing more and more right now *g*

WOW

A little while ago, Twisted and I ordered new business cards. Until now, we have always printed them ourselves, but at some point we decided it was time for "real" business cards. Well, they arrived today and it was quite a large package - a thousand cards, and they look great :-) Like our previous cards, but on better paper and we don't have to cut them ourselves, anymore. Hurray! :-)

7% off!

We have now sold 71 yarns, some of which we really had a hard time parting with ;-) We decided to do a little promotion concerning item number 77:

~~~whoever buys our 77th yarn will get 7% off the whole order~~~

Be quick ;-)

Can't get enough!

I never thought I'd fall for something like polymer clay, since I normally prefer glass, wood, gem stones and the like - but I just can't stop myself making more beads ;-) It's amazing to be able to make just the stuff I need for a project, and especially for Halloween, I don't care if they are made from plastics (or whatever exactly), they are far too gorgeous :-D So there will be some new yarns soon, I suppose. I might keep some for the crafts fair in October, but some of them will make it into our Etsy shop. The first batch of ghosts has already been spun in and the yarn is drying, setting the twist. Now I'll need some good weather to take good or maybe at least acceptable photos, but it's been raining quite a lot for the last few days and there was not enough light for good pictures...

Spooked

We have been contagioned - by the common Helloween Fever ;-)
Twisted has already spun -and sold- some Helloween yarns I and have been working on a few now, as well. There's a Banshee coming up, as well as Hel, the germanic goddess of the underworld, which is also quite adequate, I think :-)
I also wanted to do a ghost yarn, and since I didn't have any ghost charms or beads at hand, I decided to try making some from polymer clay. Here they are - soon to be in a wonderful yarn.

Art Yarn Swap

We are participating in an art yarn swap and since all the other participants are German, my blog entries concerning the swap will mostly be in German, as well. I could translate, of course, and maybe I will do so at some point, but sometimes that might result in very long entries, as it would with this first posting.
If you are really interested, just tell me and I will try to translate, anyway :-)

Twisted will post her entries concerning the swap in her private blog, TrashQueen's Vault.

*****

D-A-Y-S Fragebogen

Welches ist Dein liebstes Kinderbuch?

Gleich zu Anfang so eine schwierige Entscheidung... Ich mag viele Bücher von Astrid Lindgren und Michael Ende, aber wenn ich mich entscheiden müsste *grüüüübel*
Ronja Räubertochter.
Es sollte übrigens mehr (Kinder-) Bücher über starke Mädchen/Frauen geben.

Wie zieht Hechtsuppe?

Vermutlich so wie offene Fenster und Türen zusammen. Das war zumindest immer die einzige Situation, in der ich mit der berüchtigten Hechtsuppe konfrontiert war – und auch da zum Glück nur verbal, ich stelle mir das Zeug eher scheußlich vor ;-)

Mein Beruf hat zu tun mit...

…Dreck.
…Papier.
…Müll (so um die 5000 Jahre alt – mal mehr, mal weniger :-D).
…Erde.
…Nachdenken.
…Recherchieren.
…Scherben.
…Projizierten Klischees, gegen die ich ankämpfe.
…Schaufeln.
…Spaten.
…Schubkarren.
…der oft vertretenen Äußerung, Frauen seien eine Randgruppe – auch etwas, gegen das ich mich vehement wehre, logisch.

In welchen Situationen wendest Du Trick 17 an?

In allen möglichen und unmöglichen… Wie sich’s für Trick 17 eben gehört ;-)

Welche Tugend glaubst Du zu besitzen?

Mut. Manchmal wird er allerdings zu Übermut.

An welchen Swaps hast Du teilgenommen?

bisher gar nicht – wenn man von Forenwichteleien absieht, die nicht so richtig dazugehören.

Welche (DAYS-relevanten) Allergien hast Du?

Keine, die mir bekannt wären.

Welche Deiner Grillen pflegst Du?

Die Frage finde ich unfair – was der einen einer anderen Grille, ist schließlich der anderen ihre Libelle. Oder so ähnlich :-D
Und wenn ich Außenstehenden sage, ich spinne, halten die das sicher für eine Grille – während alle, die am DAYS teilnehmen, da nur stirnrunzelnd die Schultern zucken können.

Was geht (DAYS-relevant) bei ArtYarn garnicht?

Pink und rosa in allen Schattierungen. Pastell.
Versteht mich nicht falsch, das kann auch für meine Augen manchmal hübsch sein – aber nur von weitem und nicht für mich selbst.

Was geht sehr wohl (hier gehören Lieblingsfarben & -materialien hin!)?

Grüüüün. Ich liebe Grün. Grün macht mich glücklich. Allerdings stehen mir keine hellen bzw. gelbstichigen Grüntöne.
Petrol. Sieht toll aus zu meinen roten Haaren.
Schwarz. Passt zu allem und zu meinem äußeren Halbgrufti-Dasein. Na gut, das ist übertrieben, aber ich hab mehr schwarze Klamotten als alles andere.
Rot. Passt auch toll zu schwarz :-D
Alpaka, Merino, Seide, Leinen, Lamm… Ach, eigentlich mag ich alles.
Glitzerkram – aber nur in Maßen.
Glasperlen.
Metallzeug – ob nun Schraubenmuttern, kleine Anhänger oder Perlen, finde ich alles toll.

Gib bitte drei Websiten an, die Dich gewöhnlich lächeln lassen...

http://www.metro.co.uk/nemi/ (Gute-Laune-Lächeln)
http://cornwallcam.co.uk/ (seeliges Lächeln)
http://www.emma.de/ (grimmiges, manchmal triumphierendes Lächeln. Manchmal leider auch kein Lächeln.)

Und zähle hier zehn Dinge/Situationen auf, die Du magst

Kaffee – zuhause mit meinem Liebsten oder im Café mit FreundInnen. Oder zuhause mit FreundInnen. Oder im Park. Moment, zählt das noch als eins? Wie auch immer; Kaffee des Kaffees wegen und natürlich als Event.

Rumhängen. Mit Liebstem, mit FreundInnen, mit Katzen.

Richtig gute Serien, wie Heroes und Battlestar Galactica. Ich spreche natürlich nicht von dem alten Schrott ;-)

Wald- und Wiesenspaziergänge, inklusive Kräutersammeln. Und Pilzesammeln, wenn TrashQueen dabei ist (ohne sie trau ich mich nicht)

Spinnen. Die Tätigkeit, nicht die Viecher. Die mag ich eher nicht, aber ich krieg wenigstens keinen Schreikrampf und deswegen bin ich fürs Retten und Rausbringen zuständig.

Hörbücher – vorzugsweise Harry Potter auf Englisch, gelesen von Jim Dale (auch wenn ich sonst eigentlich britisches Englisch bevorzuge)

Fantasyrollenspiele. Auch wenn mich ungefähr die Hälfte der Rollenspielenden vermutlich naserümpfend beäugt: ich liebe DSA.

Feminismus.

Freiheit.

Computerspielen mit meinem Liebsten.

Rauchst Du so unerbittlich viel, dass man es bei DAYS beachten müsste?

Neeee.

Hast Du so eine starke Rauchallergie, dass man es bei DAYS beachten müsste?

Ja!

Hast Du eine Ahnung, was man mit Artyarn anstellen kann?

Aber sicher! Stricken und Weben hab ich schon ausprobiert, Häkeln hab ich gesehen.
Neckcuffs, Mützen, Schals und Stulpen sind die Dinge, die ich stricken kann und auch schon aus Art Yarn gemacht habe. Ein Beutel ist in Arbeit.

What do I do with my Art Yarn!?

Yeah - a good question, isn't it? Jinx asked in her (german) podcast what we do with our Art Yarns. Do we just hoard them in dark places, take them out on some holidays to admire them but never do anything with them? Do we just sell our Art Yarns and don't work with them ourselves?

I can tell you, the last answer would be my answer of choice. I'm a lousy knitter and a poor crocheter, I can't read any pattern and have problems with knitting terms in general. But then there are these yarns we spin. Some are so soft to the touch I can't believe it and end up stroking the yarn for minutes (no joke). And some have such a unique look and I put so much effort in spinning just this special yarn I can't part with it.

And so, sometimes I can't help it and I have to try to do something with those yarns. So I'll show you what I, a poor knitter and lousy croecheter, did with my handspun yarns, and perhaps there's some inspiration for you. :)

This is the very first Art Yarn I ever spun. I wanted to try all techniques in one single yarn, so this Art Yarn is full of stuff and looks a little bit "stuffed".
I crocheted this thin scarf from one big skein. The drop stitch look comes from my super creative pattern which I invented: Every now and then I made a whole row with gigantic loops, contrasted by normally crocheted rows. There's nothing more to it, and because I'm such a poor crocheter I don't know if there's a term for this technique or if this can called a technique at all - but well, it did what I wanted it to do: It shows the yarn very nicely.
The look of both yarn and scarf is quite unique, and even though the yarn is that stuffed and full of clutter, I very much like this scarf and wear it often in winter. :)

This is a hat I did for myself. I have always wanted a totally unique hat, one that no one else has, but the patterns and yarns my granny used (and still uses, I guess) for knitting hats just didn't seem right.
So there was this really scrappy yarn, spun from lots of bordeaux red merino wool and bits of woolen left-overs in green, lilac and white. It looked really boring as a skein. But I knew that there was something to this skein... And as I had just raised my confidence in crocheting as I had completed this strange faux drop-stitch scarf, I thought: "I can do that!" and just started off.
It was a piece of cake. The yarn was very easy to work with, quite plain with some thicker parts, and as I wanted the colored pieces to stick out a bit, I varied the stitch from time to time.
I was done in about an hour - the yarn had been about 6-9 WPI or so. And I have to say: I love the hat! It's a completely unique piece of work, it's individual and a bit nerdy, but it's not the classical handspun eye-catcher, nor does it look as if it's a knitted (or crocheted) remainder from the stone ages.
Sadly I can't wear both scarf and hat, the colors don't match...

This is a neck warmer I knit. Yeah, I do indeed knit from time to time, even though I'm a veeeeery slow (and painful... sigh) knitter. I had to knit something from this yarn: It's Happy Alpaca, Yummy Lime, and I really had to try this super soft yarn! I love the colors, they're are so fresh and light! And so I knit this mini-shawl - again without a pattern (because, as I already said: I can't read patterns other than those written in plain words). I don't know how much yarn I used exactly, but it's not very much. This piece of work really taught me that crocheting just eats up your yarn, while if you knit you can easily get twice as far with the same amount of yarn! It must be about 20-30 g or even less, really not more! This mini-shawl made a great gift. :)

And here is another drop stitch scarf. And this time, it's a real one, a knitted one!
The yarn I used was quite similar to my White as Snow, Red as Blood and Black as Ebony yarn. It's of such a soft wool/silk-blend, it doesn't scratch in the slightest!
Again, as I knitted, I became aware of how much less yarn is used up by knitting than by crocheting. From one big fat skein of about 130 g I knitted not one, but two drop stitch scarves, one to keep for myself and one for my mum's birthday.
I really think drop stitch patterns show the structure of Art Yarns very well. And the best thing: Very few yarn is used in a drop stitch pattern and you knit very fast. Being a slow knitter, it took me two evenings for one scarf, but I guess if you're a bit more advanced than I am (which is quite likely!!), you can complete a thin scarf in just one evening!

So these are some of my knitted and crocheted objects. I think, the advice I can give you if you want to knit or crochet something from an Art Yarn is: Don't be intimidated by this yarn. Try something easy at first, just as I did, and choose perhaps a pattern (if you can read them ;) ) which shows the yarn off a bit, like a drop stitch pattern. And: If you don't have a larger amount of yarn, stick to knitting, as you'll get much farther than with crocheting. And: The more extravagant and stuffed with stuff the yarn is, the plainer the pattern - 'cause you won't see the beautiful pattern anyway if you use a highly complex Art Yarn. ;)

Weird posted some of her projects lately, perhaps she'll add her other projects, too. :)

Featured!

We're featured on Rayela's Fiber Focus - this is great, thank you again, Rayela!

It's amazing...

...how differently various fibres can smell and feel, especially when they are wet. I've just washed my latest 7 yarns and was once again amazed at how e.g. alpaca feels and smells in comparison with silk. Silk does smell a bit fishy and feels somewhat slimy or slippery, while alpaca smells... well, I can't even describe it; I just like it :-) Smells like warm animal - in a positive way.
I don't know if this is even interesting to anyone, but never mind ;-)

Oh - I finished my set of needles mentioned earlier, btw.

Punk goes Metal - once again

Some time ago, I spun (and sold) an art yarn in black and red with metal discs and screw nuts. Spinning it was fun and I also really liked it - so I did it again. This time, I didn't want to sell the yarn, but to knit a set of scarf and hat/beenie to sell.
I did the scarf in two days, but since I would have to craft a set of double pointed needles in order to knit the hat, I somehow got lost on the way ;-) I really don't like working with wood... But sometime soon I will proceed and make a hat as fabulous as the scarf is :-)
It will be quite hard for me to sell this beauty - but at least I know that I can always make more of this wonderful yarn and knit whatever I like.

Experimenting

Some time ago, Twisted experimented with carding fibres such as linen and cotton together with wool. I really liked her yarn and had to try myself. I used grey and rust red merino wool, cotton, linen, hemp and some coppery angelina (glittery stuff) and carded all these wonderful fibres together. I then spun them together with a copper thread, which was quite stiff and didn't work as well as I would have hoped. It twisted around the yarn, but occasionally made big loops which still stick out. I wanted to make something from it to see how the loops would do (I suspected they would just vanish in the finished object and that's what they did).

I have been wanting to experiment with weaving for almost two years and a few days ago I bought a book ("Weaving without a loom") and today was the day :-) I used the new yarn and started weaving on cardboard and I really like how it's turning out :-)

Done Digging

It's finally over - I'm done digging and hopefully I will be able to spin quite a lot in the near future :-) I've spun a few yarns over the last weeks and I really need to take photos. There will be time for that on sunday, so I can start listing them on etsy after that.
I'm really glad I won't have to get up at a quarter to six in the morning any more! But somehow it's also a little sad that it's over, especially since the others will carry on digging without me and I will miss some of them.

We're featured

Wow, that's awesome! We've been featured in Cricket Creations Handknit Scarves! It's a very special honour, as she knits the most beautiful scarves. That's the reason we included one of her gorgeous creations in a treasury we were able to grab a few days ago. :)

Dragon Art Yarn Series coming up

I am currently working on a new series which started with a Green Dragon Art Yarn. This started one day in my favourite café in Heidelberg where some friends and I were talking about yarns and someone came up with the dragon idea. I was into this immediately :-) So I bought some things, including red ricrac, and started my first dragon yarn. I liked it so much that I wanted to do some more. One of my friends (in the café) had mentioned the Hungarian Horntail (from the Harry Potter books) and I knew I wanted to make yarn inspired by the dragons from the Harry Potter World. I really like the books and I have already made some Harry Potter Art Yarns - Slytherin (sold), Skin of a Basilisk (one skein is still for sale) and Gryffindor (not finished yet) - and I wanted to do more, anyway. So I bought some more stuff *g*

I made the Hungarian Horntail yarn a few days ago, but sadly the coppery ricrac is very stiff and it was difficult to spin in - and I was afraid it would fall out at some point, so I couldn't really sell it. I decided to knit it up myself and sell the finished object with the ricrac secured properly.
This project is to be a drawstring purse. I started too big, so I'll probably have to spin some more yarn before the end, but I don't mind ;-)

I might decide to knit all of the dragon yarns instead of selling them as yarns, but either way there will be a new series in our shop soon :-)

So, what's up?

Well, it's been quite quiet here for the last weeks. And I'm really sorry for that. Unfortunately it'll stay that way a bit longer: Weird is currently digging for some ancient artifacts (no, I'm not kidding, she does!), which seems to be quite exhausting. But well, she eventually got a light tan which suits her very well. I in contrast am still completely cream-faced, because I spend all my time studying for the big fat final examinations. I'm really, really, r-e-a-l-l-y-! looking forward to be done with them, to finally complete my degree! Even though I don't know what I'll be doing then, it can't be worst then studying all darn day!

But even though neither Weird nor me have too much free time, we're still spinning for stress relaxation. So check our shop if you're interested in what we spend our leisure time with! ;-)

What kind of invasion is THAT!?

:-)
That's the new yarn I'm about to spin, of course! Somewhere deep down in my fiber stash I found this hand dyed merino wool, all dyed in soft and chilly blues with a hint of green. I don't know any more what I wanted to do with it, so I thought I'd try something new. And bright and springy! I mixed it with soy silk in cream and the brightest orange merino wool you can imagine. It really rocks! :-D

And then it came to liiiiiiiive! ;-) I think this wooly things look like little fishes or mice or something. I'm sure the yarn will be great!

A Glimpse into the future ;-)

I finally got to start (and by now, finish) my long-planned project of the mythological object "Brisingamen", which is the necklace of the Goddess Freyja. The name might be translated to "flaming ornament", so I chose flaming colours for this project.
I wanted the art yarn to be sumptuous, so as to do justice to the object that inspired the project and to the Goddess who owns it, so I not only chose a lustrous wool/silk blend, but also real gemstones in different shapes: carnelian, citrine, moonstone, garnet and aventurine.


The fibres have been hand dyed by myself, using professional acid dyes.
The gemstones have been strung onto a very delicate golden lurex thread, which I took along all the way while spinning. It turned out I dyed enough fibres for quite a large skein, about twice as large as my skeins usually are. Since I now own a wonderful spinning wheel with huge bobbins, it all fit onto one - but I decided to sell this beauty in two seperate skeins, since it will be quite expensive due to all the luxurious materials and I want people to have the chance to buy a smaller part of it. However, I won't cut it in half until someone buys just one skein, so if someone buys the whole lot, it will be one unbroken, large skein.

I really love this yarn and it will be very
hard for me to part with it... But I guess I can't afford to keep everything I like ;-) Especially since I don't want to sell stuff I don't like myself; so after this beauty has been washed I will list it on Etsy.

Oh, my granny would be SO proud!

Yes, I bet she would, because she's a master knitter for sure and always wanted me to knit. And I hated it, I really did - I was so slow, and my knitting was uneven and clumsy.

I recently spun this gorgeous yarn, "Happy Alpaca, Yummy Lime", and it was such a pretty one, extremely soft and all, I had to convince myself to put it in our shop for sale. But I thought that I'm such a bad knitter, it would be a waste...
And what did I do? I spun another big fat skein of this gorgeous yarn for me to keep! :-D And I already started to knit it into a fluffy neck cuff!

Ah, granny would be so proud! Even though I'm processing very, very slowly and have my problems knitting...

Spinning on my Ashford Traditional

is pure joy! It's almost noiseless, it's so smooth and... Ah, I'm in love! :)

Here you can see me spinning the latest addition to the Weird&Twisted Shop, "Happy Alpaca, Yummy Lime". Snowberrylime was in Switzerland some weeks ago and brought some beautiful alpaca fleece. Yesterday I washed and cleaned it, and today I spun a bit of it with some green and yellow wool. The structure of the hand-washed fleece was so gorgeous I didn't want to ruin it by forcing it into a too even thread - so I tried some slubs. I think it looks really beautiful, and I loooove the soft touch!

You may ask: How did she take that photograph... she can't have a third hand, can she? Well, I could, I guess, but I don't. ;-) Even though I spent my last weekend playing the RPG "Call of Cthulhu", I'm not some creepy mythos creature with too many limbs! I just used the automatic release and seized the camera under my chin, that's the whole trick.
Not very comfortable, but I prefer that to being a mythos creature. ;-)

I love that wheel!

As Trashqueen has already noted, I positively begged her to sell me her Schippertje and she finally gave in and made me the happiest spinner on earth (at least I think so ;-)).
Today I spun my first yarns on that beautiful wheel, intending to fill our mythology collection. These two new yarns are called "Ljosalfar" and "Svartalfar" (Light-Elves and Black-/Dark-Elves), who are part of norse mythology. I especially like the Ljosalfar yarn and it is incredibly soft as well as beautiful :-)



I still have some other yarns I need to list in our shop, but my time is quite limited right now, owing to the fact that started working at an archaeological excavation last Wednesday. I have to work 8 hours a day, drive a little more than 2 hours (altogether) and it's really exhausting at the moment (but also fun!).
I took a picture of myself on Friday and I really don't look too happy - but that's not entirely true; I just need to get used to that much work ;-)
Hopefully, I'll be able to take a better/happier one next week - maybe I should do it in the morning, not after tiring myself all day *g*

The big spinning wheel swap: Hello Ashford Traditional, good bye Nameless One

This is the... uh, let me count first... the... fifth spinning wheel in about three months. The fifth! And it arrived three days ago, looking just as grey, dusty and sad as on the picture on the left. Isn't this just a shame!? How can anyone treat a beautiful Ashford Traditional that way!?
Well, I did what I always do when a new spinning wheel arrives here: I went to the hardware store to buy me some new glaze, new sandpaper (240s, it's always the first to be used up) and a brass aglet.
And then I spent yesterday with restoring it. I cleaned, sandpapered, sandpapered again, painted, glazed... Man, that was a tough piece of work!

But it was worth it! Look how beautiful it turned out! And as the glaze dried quite fast, I was able to spin some yarn on my as good as new Ashford Traditional - and I completely fell in love with it.
Meanwhile Weird spun a bit on my huge dark Nameless One and was that overwhelmed that she almost begged me to buy it!

And how could I refuse that request?
:-)
So we both, Weird & Twisted (well, TrashQueen here, eh) have new spinning wheels! Yay!

The Pacific

Did I mention I did a bit of dyeing yesterday? I think I forgot to - well, here's the first result: The Pacific!

I have to get used to my new spinning wheel as I did the last bit of restoration today (one of the three bobbins had to be mended). I dyed with food coloring, an easy but permanent way of coloring animal fiber. For the batt I used here I used light grey extrasoft merino wool and colors in the shades of blue, magenta and green, wildly mixed together. It's a two-ply, quite unusual for me, but I thought the wavy structure would look nice with the colors.

Aurora Borelis

I loved the yarn I spun for pluckyfluff's beenie challenge. The dark wool, contrasted by light blue and light green mohair locks just rocked! And it still did as a beenie.
So I made this beautiful skein on my newly arrived spinning wheel - btw, I think I'll call it "the Nameless one", it doesn't "speak" to me, well... ;-). This yarn has a bit more color to it, just a touch of blue and green, and I think it'll look really gorgeous knit! I call it "Aurora Borealis", the "northern lights" because of the light green and blue mohair locks.

Soon in our shop! :-)

More yarns to come!

Finally! Yesterday, just after the first of my examinations, my new spinning wheel arrived! Well, I must say, it was not as beautiful and highly polished as it had seemed. So I went to the hardware store and bought some nice glaze, spent some hours with my wheel, some paint brushes and stuff in the bathroom (don't ask - it's the only room with direct sunlight in our flat!), et voilà!

Therefore I spent this morning spinning like mad. Truely mad. Finally I came to spin some neat yarns from my hand-dyed batts I dyed about a month ago. And I love 'em! They'll be in our shop soon. :-)

New things to come

I was quite busy during the last week - I spun five different yarns, dyed some wool/silk blend in two different colours and... I bought a second (huge!) dyeing pot today. I hope this will help me save some time ;-)

The new yarns will be added to our shop soon (depending on how good the pictures I've taken today are), one after the other, of course.

And now it's time to do something else, for a change. Like finishing the paper for university, which will take some time. I'd rather spin some more, though ;-)

Farewell, my Sleeping Beauty!

Ah, the third spinning wheel in a short time left me today. The third beautiful spinning wheel, and I loved all of them. But this time, parting was hardest. Although I know there'll arrive two new ones here in a short while, I have none left right now. The flat feels empty and a bit cold (so I'm sitting with my back against the heater).
I restored all three spinning wheels, as I bought them via ebay. I became so fond of all o them, scrubbing them, painting them, glazing them and finally spinning some nice yarn on them.

And I'd have kept the "Sleeping Beauty", if the orifice wasn't too small for my beads and pearls and stuff I like to spin into my art yarns. I gave her shelter for only one and a half months. Now I wish I had a bigger flat, more space so I could keep her...

I know, I'm whining. I should look forward to the new wheels, which will hopefully arrive soon. But right now, I can't.

Give me my spinning wheel!

Ah. It's been a week or so since I bought the "Schippertje" spinning wheel. I sent the money immediately, I was so happy and so keen to lay my hands on this beauty! But since that day, I didn't hear a word from the seller. No "Thank you, your spinning wheel has been sent", no "Thanks for the transaction", no "Hey, you forgot 8 Cent!". Just nothing.

Yes, I'm a bit impatient, it's only been a week and the wheel has to be shipped from the Netherlands, but I already spun my farewell-yarn on my old "Sleeping Beauty". And it's sold! Right, it's still here, but it would just feel strange so go back and spin again on it... I said good bye and it would feel strangely wrong.

And the worst of all: I don't want to spin on my drop spindle, either. So I just sit here, windows open, listening for the sound of a transporter to bring me my new spinning wheel.

Support Slytherin House!

After the last Harry Potter book it is at least morally all right to do so, I guess ;-) I have to admit, I always liked the colours best, so it was only a matter of time until I had to spin a Slytherin Art Yarn. Soon on Etsy :-)

A Diva to come!

It's done! Finished! And it really took its time, but how could I have hoped for anything else with a true diva? :-)

This is for sure one of my favorites, and it'll be hard parting from it. The beautiful color combination - dark, as I like my yarn - and the roses, feathers and pearls... Ah, all my spinning obsessions in one big skein of yarn!
But after all, it'll be all right. As I'm no big knitter, I'm sure this diva will fill the house of someone else with grandeur!

Available in our shop soon!

WPI-Tool

I have wanted to make a WPI-tool for quite some time now. I really need to measure my yarns this way, so today I decided to get down to work.






I don't exactly like working with wood, but I managed to make a nice tool.






I've already tried it out with some yarn I spun a couple of days ago to sell on Etsy :-) (Coming soon!)

Look at this!

That's my newest acquisition, and I'm so happy about it! My fourth. Well. But I'll start at the beginning.

I bought three spinning wheels two months ago. Three, that's right. You may ask yourself: "Why does she buy herself three spinning wheels!? Is she crazy?" and that would be a good question. So I'll tell the whole story.
I bid on two auctions on ebay. I just did minimal biddings - and never thought I would get the spinning wheels. I had watched dozens of auctions on spinning wheels before, and all went to prices about 70 or more Euro. I bid only because my ebay-favorites were extremely crowded. And then I forgot about the auctions.
Shortly after that I found a classified ad. Spinning wheel, just 20 minutes from here, the lady didn't know if one could spin on it, but well, it was worth the try. And indeed, the wheel was beautiful, fully functional. So I bought it.
And then I won the two auctions.

In the meantime I resold two wheels to friends of mine who didn't have spinning wheels on their own. I guess they were quite happy about my offer, and frankly: I was happy I got rid of them. Our flat isn't that big, you know...

And I really love my remaining spinning wheel which I dubbed "Sleeping Beauty", it looks a bit romantic, but its orifice is too small. So I looked for a spinning wheel with a bigger orifice - and here it finally is!

Cherry Blossom

Spring is finally here and it's time for me to spin some adequate yarn.
I bought these fabric flowers weeks ago and never really felt like using them, but now's the time!
It takes quite some time to spin this yarn because the flowers don't move up the sewing thread of their own accord, I have to push them up (one by one) every other second - but I think the result will be worth it :-)

Soon to be put up for sale in our Etsy-Shop.

Dyeing to spin

I spent some messy hours in the kitchen yesterday and now I can't wait to spin my freshly dyed fibres! They're still drying, though...

I started dyeing my own fibres just a few weeks ago and I'm still trying to figure out how to get the colours I want. The red batch was supposed to be summer wine, but I think it's more like a bloody mary :-D The second one was to become a suffragette yarn, but somehow the violet didn't turn out how I'd have liked it to be and the colours got intermingled just a little too much. However, I like the results anyway, I just need to adjust the names ;-)

Knitting Needles

This is one of my two new pairs of knitting needles. I worked them a few days ago for a new project. New knitting needles cost a lot, spars are much cheaper. And it's fun to work needles out of them, to carve and sand them - the surface is now all soft and shiny!
I'm so happy about how they turned out! I just love them! The little red beads shine in the light and look like red currants on cheese cake!

There are more photos on flickr of this pair and the other one, which I adorned with dark brown wood beads.

Yay for stars!

TQs Super Magical Beenie

I did it. I sent my first entry to a spinning challenge! And I even got two votes so far, even though one of the votes was Weird's. ;-)

Pluckyfluff wanted the participants to spin a yarn that is either representative of oneself, consists of ones favorite materials, illustrates a theme that one identifies oneself with or all of this. The second part of the challenge was to crochet or knit a beenie in a size and style that suits one or says something about oneself.

I did so and it seems I was the first to finish the challenge: Mine is the first in the long line of nine entries. I don't think I'll win, all others spun so great freaky yarns! But I really love my hat. It indeed reflects a part of my personality. If you want to see more pictures, visit my flickr-site, there are quite a lot of the beenie and the yarn.

Welcome to our blog!

Hello world!

Weird&Twisted now have a shared weblog! From now on, you will find here some of our ideas, many of our inspirations, glimpses on our stack and loads of stuff about our art yarns. We will keep you posted on our latest yarns, show you our photos and tell you a bit more about the spinning process.

The idea is to let you take part in our creative process. You're invited to comment, to discuss and to criticize.

It's all about fibers, spinning, about kitting and crocheting - and about creativity. ;-)