Hand-dyed cashmere, even

Also, red is my FAVORITE color.

The second review in my cashmere series is a real treat... Sumptuosity Lace by All For Love of Yarn.  Oh.  My.  Goodness.  It is 70% baby alpaca, 20% silk, and 10% cashmere, and hoo nelly, do I love this yarn.  It is a very fine lace weight - there are 1300 yards in 3 oz - and so you need to be careful not to work it at too loose a gauge.  That being said, most lace patterns it's not overwhelmingly important exactly how big the finished object is, so that's easy to work around.  It is a two ply, but I haven't been having issues with splittiness like I do with a lot of two ply lace.

As for texture... I cannot stop patting this yarn.  It is beautifully soft and smooth.  It is also, however, extremely slippery.  One of my attempted swatches, I did on nickle plated needles (it was the only US4 I had!), and let me just say that it was a good thing the kids were already in bed.  My husband now jokes that I only swear when I'm in labor, and when I'm knitting lace.  It behaved itself quite well on my Harmony wood needles, however, so it's just an issue of the right needle for the right yarn.  On the note of swatches, this yarn really doesn't like to be frogged.  That fine baby alpaca halo just grabs.  That's a good thing tho if you happen to drop a stitch - if you catch it right away, it doesn't seem to run too far, which makes for much easier fixes.

Angela's yarns all have fabulous color.  The high silk content of this yarn in particular means it just DRINKS dye... the color is rich and saturated and glossy.  The kettle dye is very subtle, just enough to add some depth to the color, without distracting from the pretty stitch work at all.  It does have some halo to it, but not much.  A suggestion of a halo, perhaps.  In short?  I very much recommend this yarn.  It's absolutely delightful.

Do you have something you want me to review? Needles? Yarn? Notions? Drop me a line! marusempai at gmail dot com Put "Maru reviews" in the subject line.