Shetland wool blog

I LOVE MY WARM BOOT SOCKS...... It's that time of year again, socks are coming out of the sock draw faster than i can knit them ! Can't complain, had a wonderful summer, my grand daughter Ruby is a joy & my sheep all had healthy happy lambs with beautiful fleece.....life is Good ! Back to the socks...I just love how Shetland wool socks are kind to your feet. The only drawback is they are not very durable unless they contain 25% Nylon. I can not bare the thought of adding this awful disgusting man made fibre to my yarns so i came up with the idea of adding kid mohair/silk yarn to the sock for durability. Kid mohair is tough. Its soft & tough. The silk too is very strong & adds some sheen & Luster to your knitting.              This past summer i introduced a new qiviut sock that contains kid mohair/silk & customers tell me they are very durable compared to qiviut alone so why not try the same with the Shetland wool socks. S...

Thank you for reading my blog.  I have to take a break from the blogs for a while due to my workload in the mill & Studio. I will return within a couple of months with more giveaway's. If you want to see what I'm upto, go join my Ravelry group. I update the Ravelry group regularly & hold giveaways there too. Here is a link to the Ravelry group page: www.ravelry.com/groups/cottage-craft-angora-mill Bye for now ♥

This month its about colour.....beautiful Burnt Orange mixed with some natural Shetland wool yarn for contrast. To enter you need to vote for your favourite colour combination from the two choices here; Shetland Halo yarn in Burnt Orange, with Burnt orange Angora/Qiviut yarn & Natural Moorit.  The second choice is this: Yarns as above with a contrast yarn of Natural Black Shetland wool. I opted for the Moorit combination to knit my cowl. The Angora/qiviut yarn & Shetland wool were dyed in the same pot, see the difference in shade how grey qiviut & Grey Angora rabbit fibre produce a much darker shade than the natural grey shetland wool ! To enlarge any picture to see detail click on it ! If you are allergic to Angora rabbit fibre then you better give this months giveaway a mis.  The Qiviut blend yarn is 50% Qiviut & 50% Angora rabbit.....makes wonderful soft knitwear with a distinctive halo, softer than Cashmere & warmer than Cashmere ...

The Two winners drawn at Random are:  Doville who loved the Grey smokering & Stephanie Berkman who loved the Fawn colour. congratualtions to you both & please contact me so i can get these beautiful smokerings mailed off to you ! cottageqiviut(at)outlookdotcom Next giveaway is yarn to knit a cowl with some special Angora/Qiviut blend yarn added to the mix !

                               Pure Shetland Wool Smokering ! Sorry for the delay announcing the yarn winner for the booties ( winner was Jennifer Thiele), been so busy & I'm finding it very difficult to keep up the blog entries due to my workload in the mill, the home & barns. Don't get a sit down till 8pm at night & by that time I'm pooped ! This month I have 2 of these up for grabs. The smokering is knit with worsted weight yarn, the one above is shown in Musket- I dont have any musket colour remaining but I do have Fawn, Black,  Light Grey & Shaela which are all equally lovely & soft.  All the knitting is done for you so you can gift it to a friend or keep it for yourself (I hope you will keep it for yourself )-though it will soon be Chrsitmas.... I started knitting these 2 years ago & they sell like hot cakes. The garment is long enough to cover you...

Winners from last months giveaway are: Jess & Margareter....I'm still waiting for you to contact me so i can mail you your yarns-cottagecraftangora(at)hotmail.com Its been a busy time here at the mill & the farm !  lots of knitting & yarn making going on. My new line of Retro sweaters are selling well & life is good....it's good to be busy & have every day FULL ! Worked out our breeding programme for the coming fall, selecting Rams to father next years lambs, splitting the ladies up into small breeding groups to be sure we get as many coloured lambs as possible. All my Ram lambs are sold & due to move out to their new homes next week. I will be sad to see them go after taking care of them since the day they were born ! Again this year I kept all my ewe lambs for future breeding. The Fall is almost upon us here. Each morning the house feels colder. YAY....its slipper time again ! I found a great pattern for knitted booties that I thoug...

Hat, Hats, Hats....of the Month The winner of the red shawl from July giveaway Name drawn was ''InJuneau'' With Autumn just around the corner I'm knitting lots of hats & building musk ox knitwear stock for my Christmas sales that are approaching so fast ! I have a new Website www.absoluteshetland.websiteanimal.com  for all my Shetland yarns & knitwear so please check that out soon ! While browsing around the web I found a wonderful Youtuber who has really great Tutorial video's for all her hat patterns & her patterns so far have worked Beautifully with my light Worsted weight Shetland yarns ! Her name is Pleasesant seas- (will add links at the end of this post) Her instructions are very clear & so easy to understand, a very talented lady ! Patterns are included as a knit-along to the vid & in text form when you click on her links. One of my favourites is this one: Hat of the month for July 2014/the Little mermaid-Arie...