AFHandcrafts at the Handmade Mafia

Always exciting in Edmonton are the constant farmer’s, artisans, pop-up and handmade markets throughout the city.  I feel very fortunate to be able to take part in these events to be able to showcase my handmade products to locals.  I have had much more luck selling items in person than online with Etsy.com

I love that at markets customers can come up and feel my yarns, rovings, batts, scarves and bags.  When I have stuff for sale, I know that touching an item is a big part of wanting to purchase it.

Needless to say I’m in full gear for the upcoming Handmade Mafia Market on June 2, 2012.  As always, I will have varied selection of hand spun yarns, uniquely dyed roving, crazy blended batts, squiggly scarves and a wonderful project bag.

Here are two Shetland rovings dyed with the season in mind. Bright green spring and late, lovely fall.

Newest from my studio are beautiful blended batts.  Ranging from 40g to 75g in weight, these batts contain wool, silk, firestar, locks and sari silk.

Crafter in the Mountains

Spring has finally arrived in chilly Alberta, and with spring comes camping!  Last year, my Hubby and I were very fortunate to find our very own travel trailer.  A 1973 Holdaire, around 18′ long with a bed, a bathroom, a small kitchen and 2 rolling wheels!  Needless to say that we’re excited to get going!

We’ve decided to head out to the Mountains for the May Long Weekend.  This time, however, we’ll be on a fully paved highway in a well-established campground/resort.  Learning from experience, camping off of logging roads is best done is dry season.

Hopefully this camping trip will be a little more mellow and a lot less snowy.  So far the weather reports are hopeful, mild weather and a little rain!

Now the debate starts, what do I bring to craft over a 4-day weekend?

Re-Skeining, FTW!

I love dyeing yarn!  Whether is my own spun yarn, or commerically spun, I will dye it all!

This is Lion Brand Fisherman’s Wool dyed with Dharma Acid Dyes. I love the colours, but hate the fact that it’s a little blotchy.  But, after a re-skein and looking over the terrible little knot, I could not be happier with the result.

Now I have two wonderful skeins of 100% wool, bright green with orange splashes.  My favourite dyed yarn to date is my own handspun, Blue Faced Leicester spun into a thin 2-ply yarn.

I dyed the skein with Dharma’s Navy & Peacock blues, hoping for a cobalt-like colour.  I think I succeeded in making yarn that I don’t want to part with!

I think that this yarn would make a beautiful shawl, like the Boneyard (free Ravelry pattern), or perhaps a beret! But, if you’re a weaver, I know it would look wonderful as the Woven Gossamer Wings Butterfly shawl by Noreen Crone-Findlay!

Knitting hiatus!

Is has become very apparent to me that too much of a good thing can be painful…  Which is sad because I love crafting.  But crafting too much and too long has forced me to slow down and enjoy the skeins, so to speak.

In the last month I have given myself a painful case of tendinitis…  This has come to severely interfere in my knitting, spinning and overall craftiness.  My Physiotherapist has told me I should stop knitting, spinning or doing anything involving my wrist & thumb.

As of this post, I have not knit in over 60 hours.  I have no knitting or spindles in my purse, backpack, car as to avoid the temptation to pick up a UFO or to start a new project.

On the other hand, I have been able to organise my hand-dyed and hand-spun yarns for sale over the next couple of weeks.  That is something that I have put off to complete time-sensitive projects.  It feels very good to re-skein, label and track all my yarns, rovings and spindles.

Although….

Next weekend, I will likely turn sharply from my Physio’s advice as I will be joining a group of fibre freaks in the Mountains for a bi-annual crafting get-away.  I plan on bringing a large amount of spinning to work on, and to show off Walter, my handsome, German spinning wheel.

Organising my sale yarns has become my evening activity that brings me inner peace. I have been able to measure, weigh and label all of my completely skeins, a chore unto itself.

Thankfully, my Hubby and I are setting up my AFHandcrafts website where I planning on blogging, updating local events and selling my fun handspun yarn.  I also plan on making tutorial videos as my skill level allows, I’ve very excited to be able to show people how I dye my yarns & fibres.

Hooray for technology!

AFHandcrafts Sale!

I love spinning, I spend much of my time at behind my Walter Kircher spinnrad (spinning wheel) working on different styles of yarn from laceweight, to bulky and even art yarns!  Right now, I’ve started gathering quite the variety of yarns and I need to clear out my AFHandcrafts etsy shop to make room for the new stuff!  If you go to my shop, use the code spring10time to get 10% off your purchase!  The sale will be on until April 30th, 2012 or until the items are gone!

'Green Grass' corriedale handspun

Red corriedale handspun

Orange merino handspun

Happy crafting!

Dyeing commences!

This spring I have decided to build my skills by learning how to take wonderful rovings, locks, fleeces and dyeing them with wonderful Dharma Acid dyes.  This past week, with wonderful weather, I was able to set up a preliminary dyeing station on the deck to try my first roving with the new dyes.  I am very, very happy with the results:

Aurora, Merino/Silk roving dyed with Dark Navy, Peacock Blue, Teddy Bear Brown and Brilliant Orange.

Aurora Braid, Merino/Silk

 

Once the dye was used up, I put in some BFL roving and tried something a little different, Brilliant Yellow, Fire Engine Red and after a few minutes, a touch of True Black.

Zombie, BFL roving

 

Because not all of the blue had full exhausted and because I did not change the colour, the Brilliant Yellow became lime green.  I can’t help but to think of all the fun zombie movies I love to watch with my husband.

These are currently for sale on my Facebook Page, seach: AFHandcrafts, or in my Ravelry stash page, search: nomadalli.

Happy crafting!

AFHandcrafts Etsy Store

At long last and with great pride, I can announce that my Etsy store, AFHandcrafts is now open!

I have a small collection of knit and crochet items! This is a uni-sex felted toque made from Corriedale handspun yarn, it is super-warm and very large.

Felted Handspun wool toque

I also have my hand-dyed, handspun yarns, perfect for knitting, crochet or weaving.  I am very happy to have my yarns used by the wonderfully talented Noreen Crone-Findlay, most recently in her Woven Mermaid!

Merino Handspun yarn

Finally, I am very happy to share my newest passion. Creating combed top for spinning and felting.  Below is wonderfully soft top made from Corriedale roving, Mulberry silk roving and shiny, shiny Firestar!

Hand combed top - Grey

I will be adding more items as I make them, and as always, custom orders are welcome.  Please come by and see what I have in stock!