The October Fiber Baristas shipment. This one comes DT Craft & Design from the UK! She sent it along with some candies and a recipe for Rhubarb crumble.

The color is inspired by rhubarb and the included recipe. It’s “Crumble Rumble,” a mix of reds, purples and dark pinks.

It’s amazing how inspiring this poisonous little plant can be! Look at the sampling of pix from Flickr. Many are inspired by its color, taste and texture. The leaves contain oxalates and are poisonous, the stalks not so much. Other plants that we eat that contain varying amounts of oxalates in their leaves are spinach, peas and potatoes.

But it continues to inspire dyers, and apparently me too. Here is Fiesta Boomerang in Rhubarb from my stash.

And Numma Numma ToastyBoo.



And that third one from the left is Rhubarber in Wollmeise.


I find rhubarb inspiring for it means spring and warmth and green growth. And for the next 6 months we will have none of that! Are you inspired by rhubarb?

Yesterday, I took advantage of the nice fall day to take some stash pictures. This skein is from Hazel Knits October Sock Club (I know, another sock club!) and the colorway is “Cascade Canopy.” It’s so pretty. The green just glows.

Here is the other skein. This color is “Path To The Peaks.” The wind blew that bottom leaf right on top of the yarn just as I snapped, I thought it was perfect.

I quickly had an audience!

No one was sure what I was doing, or more importantly, if it involved food.

Everyone had to take a look.

Even Murphy, and he’s an old pro.

Yarn Pirate Feb Club shipment “I want candy”

I think I have joined a total of 3 sock clubs this year: Socks That Rock of course (been a member since the beginning), made it into the Loopy Ewe Club which starts this spring, and the Yarn Pirate sock club.

What’s different from the Pirate club is we get yarn – and lots of great accessories like pink circs. But no pattern. The rest is up to us. There is a Yarn Pirate group on Ravelry that makes it all very interesting. We can share what we make with the yarn every month.

Spiral Eyelet

My first take with this yarn was the Spiral Eyelet sock. On size 2.75 at 48-ish stitches, the striping is wide. I really liked the stripes, the eyelets not so much. I wanted a pattern to smear the stripes, mix it up a little. I wanted to do something new to me.

Swirl Socks

So I tinked and started over. And started over. And over. Ended up with a toe up at 60 stitches on 2.25 needles. Stripes are still there, but the change in gauge has certainly affected them. I wish I had those wide stripes back, but frankly they would not fit an adult foot at the gauge I had before.

The pattern is Swirl Socks with a little bit of Wendy’s generic toe up thrown in.

Noro Socks

Another recent knit includes the new Noro sock yarn done in a basic cuff down sock at 56st with a short row heel. I am just at the heel on the second sock. I have adjusted the yarn so both socks are the same, and it looks like I will have a lot left over. So a tip for you – on size 2.25 I think it is – you can go more than 6″ on the top of the sock and have more yarn. I would bet you could do 8″, more if you did not care about matching.

Stella’s Hat

I kinneared myself while driving to catch my new hat in action. It’s Stella’s Hat in malabrigo. Quick knit! I did it while watching the Grammy’s!

Nutkin

January Pirate Booty Club shipment: Kalamata. It looks variegated but is a striped yarn with 4 colors. I thought this yarn would look good as Nutkin. Nutkin reminds me of Monkey, do you think so? I think it is important to keep track of your YO when doing this sock: I have seen some pix where the holes are very noticable and I don’t think that fits the pattern well. One thing I am sure of: I am terrible at picot CO and often the cuffs are too small and tight when I am done. This is the case with this sock too, and I have lost interest. I am sure I will pick it up once more when I finish a couple other socks on the needles. This is also done with a short row heel. I am on a short row kick lately. Word to the wise: wrap your stitches or face holes in the heel. This process is clearly explained in Wendy’s Generic toe up and applies no matter what direction you knit your sock, imo.

The April Sock kit arrived. It is a toe-up pattern. I haven’t even started the last pattern. Oops. The yarn is nice. It’s different than anything in my stash and anything I have knit with before. The pattern, although written for 2 circs, can be easily adjusted to DPNs and is actually a pattern that I have been wanting to try for some time.