Last night, there was a whole chorus of frogs singing away, down by the river.  While it was exciting to hear our friends croaking away, I find this quite disorienting as it is still March…in the mountains.  We woke up to frost everywhere this morning, and at music lessons yesterday, there were piles of snow in patches across their yard.  And yet, the frogs are singing full gusto.

It makes sense, in a way, that I am posting a hat I knitted up, despite the warm days that have us peeling off woolen layers…strewn about our own yard that is sprouting up grass to feed our sheep.  However, once the sun sinks behind the mountain, we throw on our sweaters and vests and jackets before you can count to twenty ~ I know this because we’ve tried.  Without the sun shining down on us, it doesn’t take long to get chilled.

Good thing I finished this hat.  Rather, I re-finished it.  I knit myself a winter hat over a year ago and was happy to have a cozy head for our cold mountain winters.  However, I was dismayed to find it was more of a beanie than a good  warm hat and so it found a spot in the corner of our hat basket, gathering dust…though gratefully, no moths.  But it is such beautiful yarn that I finally sat down and unravelled the decreasing bits and re-knit the top.  I think it took me all of twenty minutes to finish it!

I knit the Butterfly Hat, a favourite pattern of mine, in the same Malabrigo Rios yarn to match the Honey Cowl from a few years ago.  The yarn is so decadently beautiful I feel a little spoiled wearing them.  These are definately not farm knits…and I hope to keep them far away from the barn, the mud, and the hay…oh, and the nimble mouths of goats.

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My spinning wheel is getting more attention lately…I’m trying to use up as much of the mountain of roving I’ve collected in the past few years.  Combined with my own sheep’s fleeces from last year, it is getting slightly out of hand over here.  A little fibre hording gone awry.  My mini flock of sheep are getting shorn tomorrow, so I’m thinking this can justify all the time spent with my wheel this week.

I figured out how to fractal spin and dyed up 4 ounces of Blue Faced Leicester roving to give it a try.  BFL is one of my favourite wools to spin as it is very very soft and springy…and a joy to spin.

Once dyed and dried, I split the roving in half.  One of the halves became four.  And then I spun it all to keep the dye sequence the same, hence creating the visual rhythm that creates the fractal effect.

The real magic comes with plying the two singles together and the colour combinations take effect.

Sunshine is trying to persuade me to keep this cheerful skein of squishy softness, but I’m leaning towards adding it to our shop…I think I’ll try and recreate another just for my girl so we can sell one and keep one.  Seems like a good compromise.

And soon, that mountain of wool is going to get bigger.  A whole lot bigger.

joining Ginny and friends for the weekly yarn along

ravelry notes for the butterfly hat are here and the dragonfly cowl here