Etsy Treasury

How fun! My Grey Gotland handspun yarn was just included in an Etsy treasury. http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=105938

First batch of spinning from the new roving

If you recall, the other day I got a shipment in the mail of mill end roving from the Sheep Shed Studio. This is lovely, high quality wool from the Brown Sheep company, that they couldn't use for some reason. I broke into the cream and brown roving, and quickly discovered why this particular batch wasn't up to being able to be used in the mill.


The roving was full of slubs of fibers, that weren't incorporated into the rest of the roving. If you tried to spin them, the yarn ended up lumpy bumpy, with weak spots. However, the slubs were really easy to strip out by hand, leaving me with quite a bit of usable spinning fiber. I'm sure it was not time and cost effective to do this in a factory setting, but a hand spinner had the advantage here.I'm also left with a bag full of slubs, which I'm planning on using in felting. They're just about the right size for the juggling balls and camera cases I make.


Once the slubs were stripped out, the fiber spun up beautifully!







After filling the bobbins with singles, I plied them together into a two ply knitting yarn. Then I reeled it off onto my weasel (antique clock reel) to measure how much yarn I ended up with. Each time around the arms of the weasel is 2 1/2 yards. I spun three skeins of yarn, for a total of 215 yards.



Look how straight the skein of yarn is hanging! That means I got the plies balanced perfectly in the finished yarn. This should knit up nicely with no biasing.










A before and after shot. The finished yarn almost always looks darker than the roving.









To wet finish my yarn, I let it soak in hot water for a little while. This allows the fibers to move into their finished position. Then I gently squeezed out the yarn...and smacked each skein a couple of times on the floor. This helps the fibers lock together and bloom.



My high tech drying station. The skeins had better stop dripping water before I need to take a shower tonight!

Once the yarn is dry, I'll take pictures of the finished product. The yarn is soft to the touch, and would make a lovely warm winter scarf. Or, with that cream heathered base, I bet it would dye up beautifully. Hmmm... Well, I'll pop it into the Etsy shop until I decide what to do with it.

Time to Spin!!

The mail man just dropped off a package for me, and I couldn't wait to rip into it. Like a kid at Christmas time! I knew from the 'Sheep Shed Studio' return address that it was going to be good.

What was in it, you ask?



Roving! Pounds and pounds of Brown Sheep mill end wool, all set to be fed into my spinning wheel. Check it out here: http://www.thesheepshedstudio.com/Roving.html .
They usually just have the brown/black/cream tones, but every once in awhile they get some colored roving in as well. If you catch them at just the right time, you can grab some of it.

So, I got 5 pounds of blue, 5 pounds of red, and a pound each of some of the brown tones. They threw in several ounces of teal/blue/purple dyed superwash as an added thank you bonus. Take a look!






























Now mind you, I'm not sure where I'm going to store it all. It certainly isn't going to fit back into the box it came in. I'm not quite sure how they got it all in there in the first place! What I am going to do though is drag out my Kromski Sonata spinning wheel, with my handy dandy Woolee Winder attachment, and go to town with production spinning. Look for some large batches of knitting yarn to show up in the Etsy shop before too long!

Ok, I'm going to go play Fiber Breathing Dragon now, and sort through my treasure trove. Picture me doing the happy fiber artist wiggle dance just about now...

Christmas is done!

There! Finally done. It only took me to a couple of weeks past Christmas to finish up all the presents this year, so I guess I'm not doing too bad.



The kids had both been in and out of my studio in the weeks before Christmas, looking over my hand-dyed sock yarn and Strongly Hinting as to which color scheme they would like. So for Christmas morning, they each got to unwrap one skein of yarn, with an IOU attached. Yesterday and today, I finally cleared my schedule enough that I had time to crank up the socks on my Creelman Brothers sock knitting machine.

Kevin's socks are the green ones. They were knit on the 72 slot cylinder, as follows: 20 rows, then hang the hem. 30 rows, then turn the heel. 70 rows, then make the toe. (I'm not using the ribber at all on these yet.) This made up into a nice size 12 mens sock.

Michelle's socks are the orange ones. She likes her fire colors! This pair was knit on the 54 slot cylinder, as follows: 20 rows, then hang the hem. 35 rows, then turn the heel. 60 rows, then make the toe. She wears a size 10 womens shoe, and as you can see the socks fit very nicely.

The yarn I'm working with is a little thick for my machine, so I probably won't order any more of it. I had the tension down at the half-way mark to make these work without my machine dropping stitches all over the place.

Next up: my family gave me two yummy snuggly skeins of sock yarn for Christmas, to make up for myself. And I have a cone of white wool, thinner than the stuff I've been using, that I want to experiment with. One of these times, I'm going to find the perfect sock yarn!

Tutorial: Fringe on the tri-loom

I was finishing up a tri-loom shawl today. It is done in Lion brand Homespun yarn, in soft creams and earth tones, and will be shipped off to Shane's Granny in the next day or so. By this point, adding fringe to the shawls is old hat to me, but as I was working it occurred to me that not so very long ago I had no idea on how to do this. This may be simple for most of you, but for those of you who like me had never added fringe to anything, here's a few pictures of how I did it:


First off, I figured out how long I wanted the fringe to be. I doubled that length and added a bit, because the yarn will be doubled over and knotted on the shawl. Then I found a book that was the right size and wound my yarn around the book. Then I cut the yarn. Much better than cutting and measuring each piece of fringe one at a time! I knotted the ends of this yarn, since it is prone to fraying if not controlled. Then I used a hair tie around the bundle of yarn, to keep it from tangling before I got to using it.



Once I had the yarn cut and tied, I grabbed a crochet hook that would fit between the pegs on my loom. I like nice full fringe, so I grabbed two strands of the cut yarn.






I doubled the yarn over the index finger on my non-dominant hand, lining up the cut ends together.











Now, I took the crochet hook and went between the pegs, up under the yarn and into the first little square formed by the weaving. I slid the loop of yarn on my finger over the crochet hook, and turned the hook downward so I could catch the loop in the next step. (I know it shows me doing this all one handed in the pictures, but I actually use two hands for this process, with the hook in my dominant hand. I had to hold the camera somehow though, and my toes just aren't that nimble.)




I pulled the loop through the opening and down.












Some people are good enough with the crochet hook to use it for this next step. I'm not. I store the hook in my spare hand while I reach through the loop with my dominant hand in order to grab the fringe.









Pull the fringe through the loop.













Pull down with one hand, and use the other to snug up the knot nice and tight, evening up the ends as you go.











I usually start at one corner of the shawl, and work my way down the loom to the bottom. I add extra fringe at the bottom, just to make sure it looks full enough. Then back up to the top of the other side, and the shawl is ready to bind off and take off the loom.




Doesn't this look all snuggly and soft? I love wrapping up in these shawls! The fringe really is the finishing touch, making it feel deliciously luxurious.



(This yarn is machine washable, but I find fringe tangles in the machine if you're not careful. To wash, I put it in the washing machine on the 'handwash' cycle, then lay the shawl out flat to dry. Haven't had a problem yet.)

Christmas on the Dobby loom

I think at this point it is safe to post pictures of this project, because all the recipients should have received their Christmas present by now. I hope!

Some time back, I got a new-to-me dobby loom. I decided I was going to start it up for Christmas this year, and each of my relatives on my side of the family was going to receive a matching hand-woven napkin in Christmas colors. I chose an extended point twill pattern out of the book "8,12...20" (p 64; Fig 134), and did my figuring. I ended up using red and green 8/2 unmercerized cotton set at 22 epi for the warp, and white 10/2 mercerized cotton for the weft.


It was a bit of a learning curve to get the dobby loom warped up. I am used to warping front to back with sticks to separate the warp. The dobby is set up with a raddle in back, and recommends warping extra tightly with paper to separate the warp layers. I eventually got it.




Here is a shot of the front of the loom, with the pattern started. I had to sample for a couple of inches, because when I made the pattern I had some floats that were too long. I also had the warp set too closely on the first try, and had to fiddle with that. I eventually got the pattern dialed in.





My loom wraps the finished fabric right around the front beam, which is new to me. I put about 11 yards of warp on the loom. After cutting off a batch because I had the set too close and had to re-sley, and accounting for loom waste and take up, I still had over 9 yards of finished fabric wound around the beam when I was done. I don't think I could fit much more without it interfering with the weaving process.






I had a hard time deciding which side of the finished fabric I liked more!








And here is the finished project: 15 Christmas napkins. Finished size after hemming was 17 1/2 inches square.



I've decided I really like the dobby. The weaving was simple, once I got it set up properly. Now, to figure out the next project...

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, folks! My wish for you: that the coming year is full of new techniques to learn, new gadgets to play with, and new materials to explore. 12 months from now, I hope you have had the time to start with untamed daydreams, have been able to find joy in the creative process, and have ended up with a thing of tangible beauty to hold in your hands.

And now, to sleep...