Taking Off!

Yep, I did it. I swatched for Boo, Too last night, and I drank a matching beer while doing so.

To answer Bezzie's terribly, terribly rude question about my balls, they're big. (Well, of course they are!) This swatch is for the corrugated slipstitch pattern that Jillian so cleverly used to take advantage of yarn with long color repeats; thus, you see the two-stitch-wide columns of different yarns in my swatch (please say you can see the different yarns!). The lighter color is the thick-and-thin singles Araucania Magallenes color #312, of which I have a total of 726 yards, more than enough for one of the two main colors in this jacket. The garter stitch rows at the beginning of the swatch are all this yarn.

The other yarn, the darker one, is my handspun - well, half of it is my handspun, anyway. This is roving (I didn't note the breed, if I ever knew) from Susan's Fiber Shop, bought at Rhinebeck in 2006. In February of 2007, I spun it up and plied it with several different solid colors of Patons Kroy sock yarn (85% wool, 15% nylon) that were lying around my stash. I have a total of 882 yards of this yarn, more than enough for the other main color. I doubt that these two yarns together are enough for the entire jacket, but we'll see - I can always use something else for the ruffled edges.

Also, it is obvious to me that swatching Boo, Too was all that was needed to:

• Break the heat wave.
• Bring on the new Knitty.
• Get me into SOAR!

I'm going to SOAR, I'm going to SOAR, I'm going to SOAR! I'm taking Abby Franquemont's workshop! Geez, I think I'm more excited about this than when I got accepted into grad school, either time. Ohboyohboyohboyoh.... Uh, oh.

WARNING: Puritan content ahead.

This means I have to shape up. This means I really have to learn how to spin, before I take this class on Spinning for a Purpose. This means I need a list. A list of all the practice spinning I should do in the next 4 months before SOAR. Therefore, I give you The List:

1. Spin about 150 yards of a bulky singles yarn and knit myself a hat.
2. Try spinning a two-ply from the same fiber several different ways - looser singles, tighter singles, then looser plying, tighter plying - to understand how to judge what works best.
3. Spin two different colors of a three-ply yarn (I've never spun a three-ply) and knit myself a Fair Isle hat.
4. Spin enough 2-ply laceweight - say, 400-500 yards - and knit a scarf or small shawl from it.
5. Produce at least 300 yards of a decent 2-ply on a spindle (I have several beautiful spindles, and I've never used one of them).
6. Spin the fiber of five different breeds of sheep.
7. Spin five different non-sheep fibers.
8. Hand-dye three colors of roving successfully and spin them up.
9. Take one batch of multi-colored fiber and spin it three different ways, in terms of displaying the colors in the finished yarn.
10. Use hand cards to prepare one of the Shetland lamb fleeces I got from my friend Isabel, spin up the rolags, and knit something.

That oughta keep me out of trouble this summer. Luckily, some of these items overlap (dye the roving for spinning the laceweight, for example) and I think I'll count anything I've spun in the last month or so (like that Shetland roving a week ago). I probably have every single thing - fiber, spindles, dyes, hand cards - to do all of this in my stash already, so maybe I should resolve to use just what's in the house for this learning game. And I really should get around to subscribing to Spin-Off.

Now, don't you all look at me like that. I know you think I'm crazy. I know you think I'll never do all this (and you're probably right). I know, I know. Just for that, I'm not going to give you my list of what sweaters, scarves, socks (yes, socks), etc., I want to finish in time to wear them to SOAR and/or Rhinebeck. Not today, anyway.

Just remember, you only have four months till Rhinebeck - what are YOU going to wear?

(and I'm definitely not telling you about my co-worker, who told me today she already has two Christmas presents knitted up. Some people are really sick, unlike me.)