Hand dyed, Hand spun, and Hand knitted by Me.

Around January, Rebekah and I had a impromptu craft supply swap. She had admired a red blanket that I knit for Melody a while ago, so without her knowing, I sent her the rest of the yarn so she could knit her own. A few weeks later, I was surprised with a box full of goodies: Japanese felting books, felting needles, a bag full of colorful roving for felting, undyed Shetland Combed Top, and part of an embroidery kit.

She originally was going to use the undyed Shetland wool as the stuffing inside felted animals. With 4 oz of undyed fiber on my hands, my mind turned to spinning. So, one night, I pulled out the dye pot and kettle dyed the Shetland Combed Top. It was my first time dying roving and it went well. My fear was that the roving would fall apart as soon as it hit the water, but I was gentle and none of that happened.It dried by the next day, so I practiced braiding it into those pretty braids that you see when you buy roving/combed top.The spinning was a two part process. I had begun spinning half of it and then forgot about it for many months. I finally decided to finish it when I cleaned up my room and unearthed the spinning wheel. This was the thinnest yarn I have spun so far. It's a 2 ply, 395 yards of fingering weight (19 wpi). I was thrilled with how the yarn came out.I knew that I wanted to gift this yarn to a knitting friend of mine, but I thought that knitting her something with it would be even better. Ishbel by Ysolda Teague was a fun and fast knit. It's my first lace shawl project and it couldn't have been easier. I never had a problem with the stitch count like a lot of people on Ravelry. I made sure to keep my markers on the center stitch, which required moving it every so often but I think that helped.I made the Large Stockinette and Small Lace. I really wanted to show off the hand spun and felt that a larger stockinette would show more of the colors.Towards the end of the lace charts, I thought I would run out of yarn and would have to cut out part of the charts. Emily, from my knitting group, suggested I put in a life line just in case. With the life line in place, I was able to knit on with confidence and didn't care if I ran out of yarn because I could always rip back to the life line. Well, it was my lucky charm, because I finished it with plenty of yarn to spare. 395 was more than enough for a Large Stockinette, Small Lace Ishbel.I am going to give this to my friend for her birthday next year. It's at the end of February, so I am really proud of myself for being really ahead of schedule.

Pattern: Ishbel by Ysolda Teague
Yarn: Hand dyed, Hand spun Shetland Wool by me. 395 yards of 2 ply fingering weight. (I had leftover yarn.)
Needles: US 6/ 4 mm
Size: Large Stockinette, Small Lace. 55 inches across, 20 inches from the top to the bottom point.