Last Saturday's knitting, or Why I hate you, Baruffa

All that stuff I said I was going to do last Saturday? I did it. I spent virtually the whole day in my lair, dealing with yarn and knitted things. Here's what I have to show for it.

A finished (but undyed and unblocked) girl tank:

See what I mean about the color being dead? I bought some dark brown dye for it, but that will be for another weekend.

Some new yarn:

Gems merino fingering weight in crabapple. For some socks I'm dreaming up. This is the first time I have ever used Gems, of any weight, and I've been looking forward to it for some time. I really like the twist to it. The swatch came out quite nicely. I'm thinking I might need one more skein though, because the stitch pattern will probably eat up the yarn quickly.

And you might remember this from a few weeks ago - a skein of Baruffa Cashwool.

You may also notice that the ends are not intertwined. Nor are there any bits of yarn wrapped around the skein to make it easy to place on the swift. Maybe you can see where I'm going with this.

Several weeks ago, shortly after I bought it, I took the band off and attempted to wind it. I did the best I could to straighten the strands, but I got only a couple of hundred yards on the ball winder before it bound up completely.


Have a closer look.

Just f***ing lovely. I put it aside for a few weeks, but when the power went out for a few hours last Saturday, it seemed like as good a time as any to take a stab at it. I spent 3 hours sitting hunched over on the floor unweaving (I guess that's the best word for it) the yarn by hand with little cardboard bobbins. I have three little bobbins (and a really bad backache) to show for it and it's only about a third of the way done.

F***ing f***ers. If this is how they keep the yarn so affordable - by not putting any effort into making it usable - then I'm not buying it again.

I have more knitting progress to share, but it will have to wait for another night. For now, here are my little not-helpers, not helping.