tiny happy

I hope October is going well for you and you're feeling the spring sunshine on your face (at least, if you live in the Southern Hemisphere!) 

I feel as though I've been preoccupied by two things, lately: work and wool! Work is self-explanatory, but on the wool side of things… I went to the annual sale/open day of local yarn factory Woolyarns just outside of Wellington last week. They have in the past produced wool carpets and other products, along with a range of different yarns, including Zealana yarns, which are some of my favourite because they blend possum fur with merino and other fibres. 

Anyway, the sale was quite amazing and there were cones and cones of natural wool for sale, as well as some blends. I bought a few cones that I'm planning to share with friends and family. Also for sale were lengths of machine knitted possum-blend yarn, made up in a fine moss stitch. The pieces had been cut apart with scissors but I managed to find a beautiful big piece in grey that only needed finishing along one edge. I did that and now i have a lovely soft, warm shawl from fine grey merino/possum blend yarn. It has a dusky-pink ribbed border on each edge. 

I had thought about hand-knitting something like this, so I'm very glad I never embarked on that particular project! With the rustic marled yarn I bought, I plan to knit sturdy slippers using this pattern (Tom and Arlo need new slippers for around the house and before we know it, it will be autumn.)

The hank of cream yarn you can see in the picture above is very rustic and I'd like to try some natural dyeing with it over the summer. I recently bought a punch needle (more on that in my next post!) and I think it would be fun to prepare my own yarn colours for this craft. My dream project for the pale grey/mauve yarn is this cardigan pattern in Laine magazine by Libby Jonson (Truly Myrtle).

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The Wool Lover is a new NZ online journal devoted to all things woollen. It has some lovely articles – I recommend it!

Also in the photos above, you can see some floral embroidery I worked on this week (clusters of daisies on oatmeal linen) and some beautiful real flowers I encountered today. Now that it's lighter and warm in the mornings, I'm trying to get up an hour earlier to walk up the hill before sitting down all day to work. Some days I'm more motivated to get up than others, and once walking I do tend to stop and look at plants on my way, but it is a lovely way to start the day.

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