Stripes

I thought I’d give you a peek into the process of choosing the colors for this month’s Tiger Club.  Sometimes I already have something in mind, but for this month I looked around for inspiration.  Always a good thing to look at are the Pantone color forecasts.  I like several of the palettes I found, and they may become future Clubs or regular colorways.  This one caught my eye for this month:

I knew I wanted to do something 3 color because of the SAL/KAL I want to do (more on that soon), so I narrowed this palette down to Navy Blue, Grey, and Gold.  I then put those into an image search.  Here’s one favorite from that:

And another…..socks!!

But then I saw the picture of the Blue Angels, and knew I had the perfect color set and inspiration. I love watching the group fly, and have a soft spot for the Navy, as my dad served with them.

Our fiber is Polwarth, and I chose a simple three color band pattern. This is so we can spin it fractal for our SAL/KAL.

For the yarn, I have a brand new yarn. It is 100% Merino, and three plies. It is a tad thicker than the Tiger Twist (which it will replace), so I have dubbed it Tiger Sport. It comes in at 330 yards per 4 ounces, but this really will be plenty for a pair of socks. To gild the lily, I’ve dyed the yarn in a new technique which will be debuting in the shop soon. Long repeating stripes, each area in a fun semi-solid, and slim bands of darker colors.

I hope you enjoy this month’s Tiger Club.  If you aren’t in, pop over to the shop, there are a few openings for September Club.  You have until the 15th to sign up.

For June, I originally went looking for pictures of English cottage gardens…..you know, the lovely jumble of blooms against tan or grey of the building.  It turned out that the pictures were too jumbled….and too similar to a few colors I’ve already done for you this year.  And then I stumbled across pictures of things in English Gardens, and fell in love with this:

What machinery did this thing come from? It is fun to speculate. And what a colorful place to toil with the turquoise and red paint. I pulled these colors, and the greys and browns of the wood to bring you ‘Weathered Cog’ for June’s Tiger Club.

The yarn is Safari, 75% Corriedale Wool and 25% Nylon….this was a bit of a sly nod from me, as this wool is sometimes called Colonial. Anyway, it’s a smooth 3 ply, and makes lovely sturdy socks. I dyed the skeins in a double repeat that should stack and swirl as you knit socks with it….sort of vertical or diagonal stripes.

The fiber which started this whole saga is English Shetland. Why the distinction? Well, generally Shetland is considered to be from the actual Shetland Islands, but naturally the sheep can live elsewhere. These happen to be from England, and are on pasture, which produces a slightly finer wool than what you may remember from the Moorit Shetland we had last year (Spiced Chai). The sheep on the islands don’t have grass, instead eating heather and seaweed.

I was really pleased with this month, it is a nice combination of colors, and lends itself to a wide range of projects.

Club is closed for July, but spots will open up August 1 if you are interested in joining.

I’ve been on a big gradient kick lately, so I went looking for sunset pictures for our May Fiber and Sock Yarn Club.  This one won:

So I did quite a bit of sampling and came up with gradient of gold to mauve to greyed purple to blue purple to deep purple.  (Yes, 5 different colors.  Simple is not in my schema, apparently.)

The yarn this month is Bengal Twist, a tightly twisted BFL sock yarn that takes color beautifully, and is a nice thin weight that is also suitable for shawls.  (Which is what mine plans to be, join us on Ravelry for discussion.)

The fiber this month is a beautiful blend of BFL wool and Tussah Silk.  It makes the fiber just glow.  Due to the silk content, shipments were 3 or 6 oz.  I really love this stuff, so look forward to new gradients on it in the shop in the future.

I’m looking ahead to June and a new twist on a fiber that was new last year.   New this month, I will be posting any extra fibers at the bottom of the Club page.   Also, a heads up….Tiger Club is going to close for the month of July, due to some travels we have planned I need to dye July’s club in June before we go.  So if you have been on the fence, get in before June 15 to enjoy the summer Tiger Club installments!