Fiber Musings

Random thoughts of a fiber enthusiast - mostly fiber related, sometimes coherent

Category: FO Page 24 of 48

Yarn

By

On 20 Jun, 2009

In FO, Spin

April ClubLest you think I’ve completely gone over to the dark side. There has been activities other than weaving around here.

Tactile Fiber Arts April Club

Fiber: 50/50 Angora/Merino
Weight: 2 oz
Singles: 60-68 wpi
2-Ply: 36 wpi, pre-fulled; 28 wpi, fulled
Yardage: 438 yards, pre-fulled; 426 yards, fulled.

Singles spun on Reeves Frame Wheel. Plied on Schacht Matchless.

I firmly plied this yarn so that the bunny fur will stay put instead of shedding on my clothes, once knitted.  Then I fulled it by shocking the yarn in alternate hot/cold soapy baths, and generally bashed the yarn around with a water bottle in the hot soapy bath. After pressing out the water in a towel, I thwacked it several times while rotating the skein to ensure that the entire skein has received “the treatment.”

“Thwacking.” Someone asked what this is in one of the Ravelry discussion groups.  You take the wet skein on one hand and swing it from the back of your head against a sharp edge (the edge of a table or your kitchen counter).  This does a couple of things.

  1. It loosens up any felting of strands that you may have done in the hot/cold, bashing around process.
  2. It fluffs up the short fibers and helps it bloom.  The yarn now has a lovely halo, which it didn’t have when it first came off of the spinning wheel.
  3. It helps even out your twist by shifting it a bit.

Faroese Styled Shawl

By

On 27 May, 2009

In FO, Knit

faroese-shawl

Specs:

  • My own design: from the neck down; finished off with 3 st i-cord bound off/edging all the way around
  • Yarn: Noro Silk Garden Sock, 1+ skein each of White/Natural (S269, Lot A) and Reds (S84, Lot A)
  • Needles: 3.00 mm
  • Back Length: 15″

I had originally aimed for about 20″ depth, but I was so darned bored with this, that I opted to keep it short.  And it works.  At the arms, the shawl ends right at my elbows, which is perfect for wearing around the house — nothing to drag into whatever I’m working on.

Lessons learned?  My design was based on measurements right at the neck.  Instead, I should have allowed for the fact that shawls, like sweaters, generally sit about an inch or two (or three) off of the back of the neck.  So, the shoulder shaping is too far back, which compounded the problem of minor slippage.

In addition, I should have stopped the shoulder shaping about 1-2″ shorter.  As it is now, I have a bit of a David Byrne thing going on.

All in all, I’m happy with the results for a first attempt at a faroese shawl. I definitely would do this again. I don’t think it would have been quite so onerous if I didn’t have to drag 2 balls of yarn around all the time. As it was, I had limited mobility with this project.

Spring Cleaning

By

On 23 May, 2009

In FO, Knit

I know. This weekend actually marks the beginning of summer here in the United States, but the summer equinox isn’t for another month, so I’m still good.

I’ve been thinking a lot about projects that have been languishing in various knitting bags around the house, and it’s time to make some hard decisions about these projects. What caused me to stop working on them? Are they worth reviving? If so, what do I need to do to get them going again?

Project #1: Unspun Silk Scarf

unspun-silk-1I actually don’t have a picture of the state of the project before I picked it up. This is a picture of it after I started working on it this week.

Last spring, I had an urge to play with unspun silk hankies, so I dug up a package of Chasing Rainbows hankies in Peacock colorway. I chose a simple 5×5 rib for a quick scarf. I casted on 40 stitches and worked about 4″, then stopped. I don’t know why I stopped. (Maybe I needed a manicure?) In any case, I stuck the whole thing back in a bag with the silk hankies and forgot about it.

This past week, I had an idea for working with unspun silk again.  (Hmm. There seems to be a theme here.  Looking back, it’s always spring when I want to play with unspun silk.  There was at least one other instance of this to support the theory. If it’s May, it must be time to play with silk hankies.) Anyway, back to today. I pulled out a bag of silk hankies and found the knitting with it.

unspun-silk-scarfA few hours of knitting over the course of 3 days, and it is finished. I don’t know if I intended one of those long and skinny scarves, but I chose to finish it off quickly by making a slotted scarf instead. Many, many inches shorter this way!

The finished scarf weighs less than half an ounce, between 10-15 grams. (I really need to get a better scale!) So, one package of hankies (Chasing Rainbows put up is 1 ounce) is more than enough for a scarf.

Knitting notes:

  • 40 stitches in 5×5 rib with 2.25 mm needles
  • at approx. 24″, knit 20 sts, attach new strand and knit the next 20 sts
  • continue working 2 sides separately for 2″
  • join the 2 sides again to close the slot
  • continue knitting as a single piece for another 4-5″
  • cast off

unspun-silk-2I like the sewn bind off, but it’s a bit difficult to work the sewn bind off with unspun. I worked around this by compressing the unspun a bit by rubbing the unspun between my palms, as if I was washing my hands. Do this all along the length of the unspun.

It’s not spinning because the twist goes every which way. But because the silk is so sticky, it stays compressed.  Now, the silk strand is ready to be used for the sewn bind off. The rest is history.

On to the next project!

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