First day of spring

Remember this lovely white yarn that I spun up myself on my wonderful Fricke spinning wheel (mine doesn't have that fancy nancy winder on it, but it works like a dream anyway!)? The yarn is from a Blue Faced Leicester sheep, and is not dyed - natural color. Very creamy, really quite lovely. I was very proud of this yarn, I must say.

I also had scraps of some wonderful fiber that came as a "starter" gift with my wheel (which, by the way, I purchased from Artclub at etsy!). I had some black as night Merino Wool and some teal green Alpaca - really wonderful fiber. Both very silky, both heaven in my hands. Not such great yarn, as I was still spinning MOSTLY thick and thin when I spun them, but still wonderful to touch and to look at. I wanted to make something from them.

Well, I found a hat pattern that looked pretty interesting - and it required FELTING, which I thought would be good for my first completely hand made project. That way the irregularities in the yarn might be hidden a little. I jumped right in.

Here is the finished hat before felting.

Detail of the Merino/Alpaca stripe

The crochet on the top of the hat.

The crochet on the sides/brim of the hat.

Once the hat was crocheted, I put it into a zip up lace bag and into the hot washing machine. I couldn't decide if this was a good idea or not - it really looked nice just as it was, although it was too big for my head. I put the hat through 1 1/2 washer cycles, and when I took it out it was Just Felted Enough. I sat it on a large glass jar overnight to shape and dry, and am pretty happy with the results of this first "completely by my hand" project.

Felted hat

And now the hat is finished.

And it is the first day of spring. :)