Wairarapa Wool Weekend all shiny and bright

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The first Wairarapa Wool Weekend is done and dusted to a brilliant shine! I had a thoroughly enjoyable time trading, demonstrating natural dye techniques and generally chatting, meeting people, plus a little shopping myself. Thanks go to James from Joy of Yarn in Greytown for conceiving of the idea and making it happen at the Cobblestones Museum in Greytown.

James successfully lured Gudrun Johnston, The Shetland Trader, all the way from the USA to be the guest tutor. As well as Gudrun’s inspiring classes there was a tempting range of workshops, classes and talks from our talented NZ craftspeople. Attendees I spoke to were full of praise and enthusiasm for the various workshops/classes they had done.

My contribution was to deliver a close-up demonstration of eco-bundle dyeing for a lovely group of people. Time flew by and we managed to produce three very pretty variegated skeins of different colours using readily available local plant materials.

Walnut husk background colour

I’ve said before, and again….. I am so grateful for the purchases of Kindly Dyer yarns and the feedback and conversations about yarn, dyeing and making in general. These chats spark ideas and make a real difference to how I feel about continuing my dye practice learning and creating colours with new ideas in mind.

It’s interesting too to see what catches the eye of customers.

This time it was the little daisy mittens I’ve been addicted to making. The pink sample pair made with Kindly Dyer “Flora” 4-ply merino and a strand of variegated 2-ply mohair-silk sparked a lot of conversations, ideas for future colourways and the possibility of kits. I’ll explore the idea of kits a bit more and see if I can make this happen in time for Capital Fibre Fest and Woolfest in May. Gee whizz, that’s setting myself an out-loud goal.

There was plenty of variety on offer in the traders hall with selections of both sought after international brands and specialty NZ yarns. The camaraderie amongst traders made the weekend a treat to be part of.

Rewarewa station yarn cakes
Ceramic vase by Sarah Drake
Spincycle and Garthenor

I was delighted to come across a few things that piqued my own creative interest which meant I came home with some local yarn spun at Patrizia Vieno’s micro-spinnery on her farm, Rewarewa Station, at Tinui. Also, some Spincycle multicoloured skeins from Happy-Go-Knitty, a skein of organic Garthenor Shetland Wool from Newtown House and a beautiful little ceramic vase made by Sarah Drake that I just imagined holding little stems of dried flowers from my garden. The surface pattern is the imprint of a fragment of lace fabric. Possibly unusual for me but I already know what I’m going to create with these yarns. One project I’m thinking of will use a Kindly Dyer yarn that I need to dye specially and another needs some embroidery skill development. We’ll see how all that works out in a future post. Watch this space.

All in all, in my opinion, it was a very successful event with a great local vibe and I’ll be keen for the second muster of Wairarapa Wool Weekend in 2027. Meanwhile let’s look forward to May for Capital Fibre Festival and Woolfest. Now it’s time for some knitting.

Welcome to 2025

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Kia ora, How are you all? I hope that you have enjoyed the Christmas break, especially the love and company of your special people. Thank you for following along here and encouraging me in what I do. I hope to make it worth your while in 2025 with more posts and enjoyable reading. I often think of things I want to talk about but drift off task and, well …….the focus dissipates. I actually enjoy writing so I should make it happen!

So, what’s news ……

Despite the damp and dreary end to 2024 I finished the year on a high note getting my outstanding knitting projects finished and gifted. In particular my Lana Vest is a gift to me!

I bought the Pakihi yarn for this project in February 2023 when we were on a campervan holiday in Golden Bay. I was on a mission to acquire some very special yarn from Ruataniwha Dye Studio – a blend of Polwarth and Arapawa sheep wools from her family farm. It is a natural grey, maybe grey-brown, colour which I overdyed with a natural dye blended brew of coreopsis flowers plus Saxon Blue (indigo extract) to achieve a marine blue-green colour.

I had imagined this sea-turquoise colour right from the outset as a memento of the beautiful Golden Bay seascape we enjoyed on our holiday. Each day as the tide came in and out we saw sea and sky colours ebb and flow. With the sun shining the blue-greens were brilliant emerald while in the fading evening light as the sea crept in the blue-green was just a wash of colour over the taupe grey of the sand. I kept that picture in my mind’s eye when I made the dye blend. I waited until I felt sure and confident I had the colour blend spot on and the vibe of the day felt right. (The vibe is an important ingredient for me ….lol).

As for the knitting, this project was always a pleasure. Knit top down in pieces and joined below the v-neck and armholes it progressed quickly. I found the pattern with cables and texture easy to remember through each repeat. I did pause for a while as the near-finished garment was too big to take as travelling knitting, and then I picked up the momentum again as my end of year holy grail goal. I’m really glad I did as the cold weather meant I’ve even worn it a few times already – I consider that a bonus. Now I have a precious new handknit that works as well in my wardrobe as I hoped and every time I wear it I am transported back to Golden Bay where I sat and soaked up all the colour inspiration.

At the moment I’m keeping the dyepots and skein winder busy as I’m preparing for this year’s yarn festivals. Here’s a quick run down, I’ve also put all the dates and information here.

First up Martinborough Fair (Saturday1st Feb and Sat1st March) I’ll be helping out on the Palliser Ridge stand located on Kansas Street this year, and will have naturally dyed yarn there.

Next up is the Wairarapa Wool Weekend 20th – 23rd March 2025. This is a new event and promises to be a wonderful weekend. I’ll be trading and also giving a botanical dye-bundle demonstration. Do check out the details on the event website here.

May is Capital Fibre Festival at Whirinaki Whare Taonga Upper Hutt on Saturday 10 May, and Woolfest Auckland Saturday May 24th at Kumeu Showgrounds, Kumeu (Auckland).

I’ll write again soon, meanwhile go well, enjoy getting outside in nature and happy crafting.

Keiry

Knitting favourites for Palliser DK yarn

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Last Saturday I spent the day with the Palliser Ridge team on their stand at the Martinborough Fair. It’s always super to talk with people who come along to see the wooly goodies. I’ve learned from past markets that there’s always going to be conversations about ideas for what to knit with the Palliser Ridge wool so I now have a selection of my favourite things to show. Last weekend reminded me that I need to share some pics along with links for where to find the patterns and to stop procrastinating with listing Palliser DK yarn cakes in my on-line shop. Thank you to the people who asked about buying my yarns on-line – it was the prompt I needed and it’s finally done. Hurrah!

So, here’s a few of my favourite things to make with Palliser DK…. the hats and mittens are perfect for summer knitting – they’re small, quick and easy and if you’re a pressure knitter they can even be knit for Christmas gifts! Best of all these hats and mitts are great free patterns from the lovely Tin Can Knits design duo. The patterns are written for different yarn weights. and multiple sizes; children to adults.

World’s Simplest Mittens – I made a child size sample, one pair used a total of 38grams of Palliser DK. So, if you have a few cakes you can make a few pairs in multi colours, or make a pair in a single colour with one cake. Here’s a link to the pattern on the TinCanKnits site, or here on Ravelry

Hats – I’ve used TinCanKnits’ Anthology hat pattern as a basic recipe and made my own randomly striped versions with bits and bobs of yarn leftovers and dye pot experiments. You can get a hat for an adult out of one 50g cake, or mix it up with a few colours. Again, this is a free pattern. Here’s a link to the pattern on the TinCanKnits site, and here on Ravelry.

Bounce Blanket – now this is one of my MOST favourite knits, probably because the stroller blankets I made were for very special little ones. This is another design from TinCanKnits – here’s a link to the pattern on their website, and here on Ravelry. Please be aware that you will need to purchase the pattern separately, I do not have rights to sell it .

There are many ways to organise the stripes, I’ve made mine with 4 colours striped in repeat sequence with natural white (undyed) ripples in between. I’ve put together some yarn sets in 4 different colour combinations and listed these on my on-line shop. You are welcome to ask about other combinations – I’m happy to send photos of different options.

Bounce blanket

MKAL 2022 – fear or FOMO?

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Anyone else thinking about joining Westknits MKAL Twists and Turns this year?

I confess, I’ve never participated in any Westknits MKAL, or anybody’s MKAL for that matter. I’ve always succumbed to the “Eeeek – what if I don’t like it when it’s finished” worry that bounced around in my mind. But during the last few MKALS watching from the sidelines, the FOMO builds as knitting friends post pictures of their gorgeous MKAL WIPs. So, this year I’m in!

The timing is right, there’s no other pressing projects, Westknits MKAL 2022 will be on my needles in just a few weeks. My rational brain has reminded me that even when I know what the design is, sometimes I don’t like the finished project, and that’s OK. I’ve either given the thing away to someone who does love it or re-wound the wool and made something else. No worries.

After faffing about with skeins and colours for days I’m leaning towards the trio of my Kindly Dyer yarn (photo on left) but wondering if I should have just a touch more colour with the coral as the accent (photo on right).

I’ve got time to percolate on the options and maybe even swatch a little. It does feel a bit exciting to be venturing into this project using my own natural-dyed yarn.

Now, if anyone out there is still thinking about joining in and fancies going the natural dye way there are some lovely colour combinations possible with the Kindly Dyer yarns. I’ve put a few skeins up in my online FELT shop here.

Stephen @Westknits advises the requirements are 2x 100g skeins each of Main Colour and Contrast Colour plus 1x 100g skein of Accent colour. Ideally that will allow contrast to show up well.

Here’s some ideas……………if you’d like to see other combinations or have questions please message me.  I am happy to take and send you photos.