SparkleShan

This is a funny question to me. I have so many hobbies its hard to pick just one. It's always weird to be when people don't have any hobbies. Most of my hobbies can fall under the arts and crafts category. Here's a list of my hobbies that I currently work on: 1. Knitting 2. Sewing 3. Smash booking /journaling 4. Yoga Some of my past hobbies that I still like to do but am not currently working on: 1. Spinning Yarn 2. Making jewelry / hair accessories 3. Dance 4. ice skating

I really wanted to go to Rhinebeck today and had planned on going until I got a flat tire on the way to work Friday morning and had to buy a new tire :( I have never been to a fiber festival before. I guess I'll have to wait another year. So I decided that Emma and I would spend the weekend crafting and making new items that will go in my Etsy shop in a few weeks. Here's a sneak peek. I also did some spindle spinning and spun my first yarn on my wheel Since July!

So a little while along, I got a new design for my Etsy Shop and renamed it to from 'Princess Emma's' to 'SparkleShan Handspun Yarns & More' to better reflect my store. Here is a banner preview of the new shop design. I am still offering my hand spun yarn, knitting project bags and other knitting notions. I have also added hand spun & knitting project bag club listings. I am also slowly adding my original hand knit items & accessories. The majority of my hand knit items are knit with hand spun yarn by me or my wonderful spinning friends. I also have a new twitter account mainly based around my Etsy Shop and crafting adventures. I'll also tweet about other random life events once in a while as well. Tweet I also have a page on facebook for my Etsy Shop. I list coupon codes, shop update announcements & pictures here. So check my page out out facebook and like it please!!

I am trying to get back in the swing of things to contribute to Phatfiber sample boxes on a regular basis. I was able to get 59 Samples of stitch markers, hand spun yarn and my first hand pulled roving fiber in to the May box. I am not sure if I will have time to contribute to the June box or not, but there are special ideas in the works for the July Box! Here are the samples of fiber that I sent in for May. They can also now be purchased in my Etsy Shop, Princess Emma's . I blended different fibers including: merino, mulberry silk, bamboo, angora, mohair, mohair locks, angora mohair locks and firestar on my homemade fiber hackled. I then Pulled the fiber into mini roving buns using a diz to get this super luxe, chunky, funky fibers. I am really please how they turned out and I hope people enjoy them! I just need to find the time to make more now!

I am participating in a Valentine Swap over in one of my groups on Ravelry. I am not a big fan of Valentine's Day mushy stuff but I love those girls so I wanted to spoil someone. When I got home from work today I had a box waiting for me and I wasn't even expecting it already! What a nice surprise. I got a totally awesome package from SweetPeaFibers (Felicity). She even sent me some of her awesome batts that she carded! I can't wait to spin them up!

I finally got some spinning done with weekend. It was a month and a half since the last time I spun anything. I didn't have time between the holidays and moving. First I spun this 2 ply of Camel down and Mulberry silk. Then I spun two holiday inspired batts that I got from Bohoknitterchic . This came out to about 100 years, I love the colors.

Because of packing, moving and the holidays. It had been about a month and a half since I spun any yarn. So today I decided to break out some yummy holiday inspired batts that I ordered from my friend Brittany's Etsy Shop , back in the beginning of December. Here is the lovely fiber I received from her. Emma loved the batts to, so she decided to use them as a pillow. I spun the batt on the right in to the below yarn. I got about 100 yards. I also spun this two ply yarn out of kettle dyed baby camel down and mulberry silk roving.

So since I am not good at keeping on a my blogs as I go along. I am about to post a few yearns that I have spun over the past few months. Hopefully once I move and get all settled in I can start posting more regularly!

Now that I have a wheel, I have started spinning up my Fiber Stash. I spun up super soft pink and black Merino that my friend Melissa sent me. She is so great she sent me a package of fiber that was waiting for me at home when I got back from deployment. I love the wheel. Here are all the yarns that I spun up this month. And some more Fiber I ordered from Uniquely Yours , Bohoknitterchic and Jazzturtle . I was lucky enough to snag a June Fluff Phat Fiber Box too! I also got to met a wonderful friend that I meet on the Bad Knit Girl Group on Ravlery. Karen (angrypoddle)also lives in Connecticut, so we met up in West Hartford for lunch and desert. I also got to meet her wonderful like boy Liam. He loved Emma and she was sweet trying to help feed him.

So I got to come back to the states a week earlier then the rest of the unit because I was in charge of making sure that all the mobilization Adminstrative part was all set and run smoothly (and trust me there was a lot to be done). We got 150 people through Fort Dix and demobilzation in 4 days when it normally take a week or more for less people then that. We arrived home on mother's day. What a great Mother's Day gift to see my little girl! It's good to be home but weird to. I'm used to having people around me ALL the time and now it's just me in the house. I have the next 3 months off to spend every day with Emma once school gets out and to do much knitting and spinning. I got a brand new spinning wheel that was waiting for me when I arrived that I need to learn how to use! I also had a lots of fiber that I ordered waiting for me. Prefect to practice on the new wheel with (like I don't have enough already). And the a wonderful friend from Ravelry Meliss...

I spun have finished spinning up the samples I received in my March Phat Fiber Box. First I spun a sample of 50% merino and 50% tencel From Spincerely Yours. I Navajo plied it on my drop spindle. For the rest of the samples I decided to spin them all together so I could get more length out of them and I thought all the different colors would look good together. This yarn contains samples from Giffordables, Whorling Tides, East Kentucky Fiber and Uniquely Yours Design.

I am so bad for not posting this earlier. But one of my fellow Raveler, Knit Girl and Spinner, Carrie a.k.a CraftyPuppyLover, started spinning yarns inspired by girls in the Knit Girl Group. She spun up a yarn for little old me, I feel so honored. I of course had to have the yarn, which she offered on her Etsy Shop . Here is her description of the Yarn: "Fourth in my new series of knit girl inspired yarns. What's a knit girl you ask? Well, hop on over to ravelry and you'll find out quickly, we're a bunch of hot, kick ass ladies with tattoos and serious knitting skills. We've got each other's back, always offer a shoulder to cry on, and aren't afraid to show off our tattoos. I figured it only appropriate that I would name hand spun yarn after these fine ladies ~ since the only thing more unique than hand spun yarn is a genuine knit girl. Sparkleshan is one fine lady, she's just starting to spin and her yarns look great. I knew this "red" white ...

I spun up another wonderful batt from Jenna at Uniquely Yours. This batt was called White wedding and contained BFL,Faux Cashmere, Firestar and Tulle. It also Came with some extra add ins of white pearls and sequins. SO this came out to be bit of an art yarn. It's super bulky, 31 yards and soo soft. Now I just have to find a project to knit with it! And here is just some simpled soy silk that I spun up. Its about 43 yards.

I was introduced to another wonderful Etsy Fiber artist by a fellow Ravelry. Here name is Jenna and she has a store on Etsy called Uniquely Yours Designs where she sells Fiber Batts, Hand dyed Roving and Hand spun yarn. I feel in love with her Batts, they have such wonderful colors and sparkle. I got 3 batts of fiber in the mail from her the other day and I spun up the first one a few nights ago. Here are the 3 Batts that I received from Jenna. Here is the orange batt (contains merino, Angelina and firestar) spun up. First I spun up the batt into a thick and thin single and then I plied it with peach crochet cotton and coils in the yarn throughout. It came out to 43 yards super bulky.

The Spindlers group on Ravelry has a spin along every month and every month they have a different theme. You then Post pictures of your finished skein in that months thread and a random winner is drawn each month. February was the first month I participated in the Spin A long and the theme was Mardi Gras. So I decided to spin up a Batt from Butterfly Girl Designs that was red and purple bamboo, black merino and firestar and Angelina. I thought it fit the theme pretty well. I called the finished skein 'Ruby Tuesday' The March theme was Romance and of course I immediately though of pinks. This is inspired by pink roses and is the first 3 ply yarn I have ever spun. I spun thin singles of Soy silk, super wash merino and merino & Angelina. Then I plied the three together and came out with this wonderfully girl yarn and I have to add that it is super soft! I just wish that I had more of the soy silk so that I could make more length!