Drying

So how did it go?

I have started knitting my green and black Dreambird shawl. Knitting with
a hand-spun single thread yarn is very different to a commercially spun yarn.
It changes in thickness and the colour variations are much more random
and interesting.

The feeling of the shawl is also very different, it's much more airy and light.
The yarn doesn't fill as much as the merino/silk in my blue Dreambird so
the feathers come out thinner.

See how amazing the feathers look! No, they are not feathers, they are leaves.
I'm going to re-name this shawl 'Dream forest'!

You can see the variation of the yarn in these close-ups.

I'm so naughty...

When I decided to knit a Dreambird shawl I asked my sister MiA if she could dye and spin some green/blue yarn for me. She happily said yes! MiA spins some amazingly beautiful yarn. But for those of you who don't know, MiA lives in Sweden and dyeing, drying, spinning, skeining, shipping, well it just took so long and I could....not....wait...

That's why I dyed some of my base and started the blue Dreambird and – yay – it's coming out so beautifully!

And then THE YARN arrived! And it's just divine! It's a mix of 50% BFL wool, 25% baby alpaca and 25% Tussah silk. Say no more... It's soft and squishy and just stunning.



And now I can...not...wait...
I'm so naughty but I have to start...

I will combine it with a black alpaca from Kaipara farm outside Auckland. Now that the green yarn is wound into a ball, you can see that there will be interesting things happening to the feathers!



But I'm not giving up the blue Dreambird – oh no! I have knitted 10 feathers now and I love the way they shade. I'm just going to – you know – knit both at the same time!

 

Progress

My Dreambird shawl is growing and I'm very pleased with the shading of the feathers!

I can recommend this pattern, the shawl is so much fun to knit! I just wish there were more hours in a day...