The first project is a vest. The yarn was spun from 8 oz of coopworth purchased at MDS&W in 2009. It was my first ever big skein of handspun yarn. I spun about 410 yards.
Then, I had the inspiration to make a striped vest by combining my uneven handspun with rustic noro kureyon yarn.
I looked at few vest patterns, both free and for purchase. There were universal things I did not appreciate: vests should not have any sleeves. When there's no shaping to the armhole, you end up with a funky triangle thing resting on your front shoulder like
this and
this. It's personal taste, but I find it sort of getting in the way. Also, without shoulder shaping, the vest will fit sort of awkwardly because a person's shoulder is not a straight line. There is curvature on the top of the back. There is a gentle slope from the neck to the arm. All that had to be incorporated.
I had this all worked out: the shaping, the math, everything. I'll do a provisional cast on, so if I do run out of yarn, I'll just do an extra-long ribbing at the bottom. I made 180 sts, and knitted in the round. After few hours of knitting, I tried it on. It could fit another me. Waaay too big. So measured how long I knitted and weighed how much yarn I had used. The calculation came out that I should have enough for the whole length of the vest.
I recast on 160 sts and instead of stockinette st, I worked in k3p1 rib using #5 needles.
That's looking better.
I did not want to interrupt the gradual color change of noro yarn, so I decided to add 5-stitch steeks for the front, back, and the armholes. Basically, you pretend like the 5 stitches aren't there, and work the decreases just like you would for a vest shaping. When I got to shoulder shaping, I used short rows so I would be able to use a 3-needle bindoff. That is way stronger, neater, and easier than seaming.
With the steeks worked in, the vest looks like a cone: Here it is from the front
and back.
Here you can see the steek stitches--it's the five stockinette stitches in the middle. I saved one stitch from the body designated as the center stitch for the rib edging.
I chose to use the crochet steek technique, described in great detail by Eunny Jang
here. The grey yarn is the crochet chain I made. I'll be cutting between the two crochet chains.
...and..cut! Now it looks like a vest!
Whilst knitting the body of the vest, I was pondering about the rib edging. I knew I wanted a k1p1 rib, but nothing else. Should I use some commercial yarn? I didn't think I would have enough coopworth for the entire edging. I wanted something darker.
I searched through my fiber collection, and found just enough of the border leicester fleece in dark chocolate. Perfect!
I flick carded all the dark chocolate fiber, and spun it up in sport/dk weight yarn. In the previous photo there were 56g of fiber, but after flick carding and spinning and plying, I only had about 46g. It must have been dusty!
Here is the photo of the yarn spun-up. It was late and dark when I finished, so the colors came out all weird.
Anyway, I spun about 80 yards, and picked up the stitches for edging. For some reason I was listening to the BBC documentary on history of Scotland, so seeing this makes me want to talk in my best Scottish accent.
For the edging, using #4 needles, I picked up 4 stitches every 6 rows. I then worked 6 rows of k1p1 rib. on the 7th row I decreased by 10% , then used the
tubular cast off technique to retain elasticity of the ribbing.
And here it is! Take a look:
I'm so happy with this! It fits perfectly, and it's super duper warm. I mean, it's warmer than normal knitting. I'm cold natured, but this vest kept me piping hot with just a tshirt underneath.
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The next one up is this handspun: Merino/silk blend and Corriedale plied together. The fiber was from Eatonton when I borrowed the spinnning wheel. I managed to spin the merino silk using the wheel:
...but only could spin corriedale using my home-made spindle.
Anyway, I plied it up in October 2009, and it sat waiting for its turn. Plied, it was about 300 yards and 2oz.
I wanted to knit the
Annis Shawl from knitty.com for a while, but wasn't sure if I wanted to use my wollmeise yarn or not. I looked at the yardage again, and thought maybe this yarn was the better option.
So I casted on using the knitted cast on with size10 needles and worked one row of knit to make a sturdy edge:
Then worked the rest using size 7 needles. See the brachial plexus illustration on the book? I've been illustrating that for few months now. When not illustrating, I worked on the shawl monogamously. Few days later, I had this:
I had about 2 feet of yarn leftover. Asher keeps making fun of me for worrying that I will run out of yarn, but I can't seem to get rid of that fear. Maybe it's a phobia...like subyardagephobia or something. :)
I love the result! Lovely color, and wonderful drape. It can only get better with blocking!
Again, this shawl is super duper warm. When I had the shawl resting on my lap, I could feel the warmth oozing out from the fabric. I can't wait to knit some socks with handspun yarn. Hopefully they will finally keep my feet warm!
That's looking better.
and back.
Here you can see the steek stitches--it's the five stockinette stitches in the middle. I saved one stitch from the body designated as the center stitch for the rib edging.
I chose to use the crochet steek technique, described in great detail by Eunny Jang here. The grey yarn is the crochet chain I made. I'll be cutting between the two crochet chains.
...and..cut! Now it looks like a vest!
Whilst knitting the body of the vest, I was pondering about the rib edging. I knew I wanted a k1p1 rib, but nothing else. Should I use some commercial yarn? I didn't think I would have enough coopworth for the entire edging. I wanted something darker. 
I flick carded all the dark chocolate fiber, and spun it up in sport/dk weight yarn. In the previous photo there were 56g of fiber, but after flick carding and spinning and plying, I only had about 46g. It must have been dusty! 
Anyway, I spun about 80 yards, and picked up the stitches for edging. For some reason I was listening to the BBC documentary on history of Scotland, so seeing this makes me want to talk in my best Scottish accent. 
I'm so happy with this! It fits perfectly, and it's super duper warm. I mean, it's warmer than normal knitting. I'm cold natured, but this vest kept me piping hot with just a tshirt underneath.
...but only could spin corriedale using my home-made spindle. 
Anyway, I plied it up in October 2009, and it sat waiting for its turn. Plied, it was about 300 yards and 2oz.
Then worked the rest using size 7 needles. See the brachial plexus illustration on the book? I've been illustrating that for few months now. When not illustrating, I worked on the shawl monogamously. Few days later, I had this:
I had about 2 feet of yarn leftover. Asher keeps making fun of me for worrying that I will run out of yarn, but I can't seem to get rid of that fear. Maybe it's a phobia...like subyardagephobia or something. :) 
It was a beautiful day, so naturally parking was tricky. We did succeed and walked through the woods to get to the beach.
The exposed cliff you see is from middle Myocene period, which is about 22 to 8 million years old. That boggles one's mind. 
We got to swim too! The ocean floor was bit silt like and felt like clay, but it was all right. I promptly found a crabby friend. 
Blue crab female. I love the scientific name, Callinectes sapidus, which translates to "Beautiful swimmer who is tasty". mmm.
Fun day! Then we went into a restaurant in Bowie and had a pound of shrimp. mmm. shrimp. 
And tonight I picked up my right sock and started working on the third repeat of the leg. 
I'm pretty excited about how plying covers up some irregularities of the yarn you spin. The irregularities further disappear once you wash/set the yarn then knit it. 
I did the Wraps Per Inch thing. It's about 12 WPI, which puts the yarn in worsted weight category. It's a bit thick, but I think it will be all right. 
And here is the swatch...I screwed up the knit column before the purl recess. I need to tug more yarn to make it even. Again, the irregularities have been nicely hidden for the most part in the knit fabric. This is knit in US2 needles (2.75mm)
Last batch of fleece is soaking in the sun. aaaah...
