Wonderwool haul

I thoroughly enjoyed this years Wonderwool, could have been the wonderful weather (until the very end when it poured), the even more wonderful company or just to have a massive selection of yarns and other bits and bobs to choose from.

Introducing Monsieur Mouse

First things first my 'Learn to love short row shaping' class which started (when I booked anyway) as an 'Introduction to short row knitting.'  Either way it was fun, turns out I'm an average speed knitter I just needed more time to read the instructions correctly and I think I knit in a weird way; it would be lovely to have a beginners knitting class around these parts so I had some instruction rather than what I find on YouTube.  I learned how to wrap a stitch for invisible increasing, so no holes in the knitting and no lumpty bumpty bits.  

You can see where I have twisted the stitch

Turns out when I slip stitches I twist them, I don't know how but I do, so my finished creation didn't turn out as should (smooth no lumpty bumpties) and we didn't have enough time to finish them so later that night over a glass of wine I finished my mouse...henceforth known as Monsieur Mouse 'cause he looks French to me.

My friend Sarah kindly gave me a easy peasy (so she says) fingerless mitts pattern which is knit in the round (eek) and on Aran weight yarn so I had to buy some Aran weight yarn, I bought Laal Bear either called Thirft or Devon I can't tell from the label.  It feels gorgeous and will be nice as mitts.  I even managed to turn the skein into a ball with very little hassle this time, thank you Youtube!

I went a bit crazy with the old Super Chunky, but I do lovely super fast super chunky knits, purchasing Rico Design Creative Twist Super Chunky and Sesia Echos both in light grey colours.  I should talk about that.  As I have tried to purchase yarn in colours which remind me of a place I have visited (e.g. Bath I bought blue  for the spa and yellow for the buildings, New York orange as it was near Thanksgiving) I thought this years Wonderwool I should get the colours from the wedding (4 more sleeps by the way) pink and grey. I also bought Aragon Yarns Classic Romney which is an Aran/Chunky weight yarn (depending how its knit) in a lovely pink colour.

Zoom in to see the silver sparkle...gorgeous!

Saving the last for best though I think my absolute favourite purchase (aside from Love Patisseries' epic Lemon Tarts) has to be Silver Sparkle D K from Bluefaced.com or here as when I last checked the website was down.

So all round a good haul with more to add to the to do list...
1.  Learn how to slip stitches without twisting
2.  Learn to knit in the round and make those fingerless mitts
3.  Find out the weight of previous years purchases...this will involved a trip to the wool shop, ho hum
4.  Learn how to do thumbs before Sarah :)

Its WonderWool 2013

Thinking back I wish I had kept my blogs over the years rather than doing massive culls as I can still remember my first ever visit to the first ever Wonderwool.  In fact I may even still have yarn from then as being quite inexperienced I bought random things and either have no idea the gauge or what to do with them.

It is where I first learnt I had to turn a skein into a ball...

With varying degrees of success...

This year I have signed up for a course on short row knitting so that I can add to my knitting techniques.  I quite enjoyed making Sackboy a few years ago and do have in my head to make Amigurumi and other small toys so I thought this would be a good class to sign up for - also it had a cute picture of a knitted mouse on the signup page.

Sackboy...just chilling

So this year I'm looking forward to seeing my wonderful friends from all over Wales, eating my own weight in Lemon Tarts from La Patisserie, trying a scotch egg and hunting down any chunky yarn.  My friend and I might even try going along to the Ravelry Flock later in the evening.

I shall endeavour to take as many photographs as I can...and not delete this blog!

The best bit, shopping!

I am still working my way through the Craftsy course, "Know Your Wool" and I found the talk about different breeds and how they produce different yarns interesting but now we get to the good bit, shopping for yarns!  

As the course is delivered from North America I thought all the online stores would be from the US or Canada but the very first shop demonstrated was from the UK.  Blacker Yarns has been added to my favourites list as you can also search by sheep breed - Welsh Black anyone?

Also demonstrated, which are useful to me in the UK, was Etsy (do a search for yarn, wool etc) and also eBay.  Again try and keep the searches specific, especially if you know the breed you want. 

Although shopping online for specialist yarns can be fun there is nothing like giving a ball of wool the squidge test so I think I would save my pennies for the annual Wonderwool Festival held in mid Wales in April each year but if you can't make it to a wool festival I can see this being a great idea.