Category: Spinning

Carding not weaving

PiaPÃ¥ dansk

suffolk18

Been so busy picking, carding and spinning the first of three fleeces I was given last year, that I haven’t had time to paint the tapestry sketches that are floating around in my head (they just keep marching in), nor weave the small samplers for learning the process.

I’m finally done, although only with the dyed part. Still 900 g of white (from the one fleece) to deal with…. I must say, the spinning goes super fast from rolags, but picking out plant bits and hand carding was murder. Only 550 g of yarn to show for a whole month’s work, and there’s in total 2500 g left of those fleeces to process. In the meantime, I’m not doing any fun spinning, hardly any knitting, no weaving, no painting… in other words

NOT WORTH IT.

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Now I’ve been there, done it and not even a t-shirt to prove it. Yes, buying a collection of many colours of yarns to weave with (gotta have a proper palette) requires a budget, but really, in hours each of my skeins here are worth a fortune compared. If I compare a paid job for the same number of hours I could have gotten several looms as well as a ton of yarn. If I did of course I wouldn’t have the time or energy to play with my hobbies, which is why I opted for free fleece in the first place. I still have an ambition to spin yarn for tapestry, BUT I’m also working on simplifying and destressing my daily life and this is not how you do it.

Using the plant dyed yarns however are an entirely different matter, at the moment the colour schemes I seem to come up with for designs are not very consistent with this intention, but I can work with that. If nothing else, my not plant-yellowish sketches can become paintings I suppose! So, carding is put on the back burner and more instantly gratifying projects are back in business. (and OMG is carding also boring!)

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Kartehelvede

Så er månedens udfordring erklæret slut, jeg fik ikke spundet de hvide totter som håbet, kun de farvede. Og det er HELT ok.

Ideen gik ud på at endelig få onduleret den ene af de gratishamme jeg fik sidste år og gik og sjatfarvede hele sommeren. Spindingen tager ingen tid overhovedet, men pille, pille, pille små stumper strå ud og derefter karte, gab!

Og hvad har jeg efter en hel mÃ¥ned uden anden (sjovere) spinding, uden læsning, maling osv? Blot 550 g garn. Omregner jeg det til et almindeligt job, kunne jeg have købt det pÃ¥ blot et par timer… Det er vist ikke sÃ¥dan man afstresser og simplificerer sit liv, men nu er det da gjort og jeg er tilfreds med at have ordnet dette delmÃ¥l. Resten fÃ¥r pænt lov at ligge til en kedelig vinterdag hvor der ikke skal luges, sÃ¥s spinat, fotograferes forÃ¥rsskov (nÃ¥nej, mit kamera er jo ved at opgive ævred), males skabeloner til at væve efter sÃ¥, ideerne vælter ind og hober sig op mens jeg karter og karter! Der var vist ogsÃ¥ lige noget sommerstrik der skulle være færdigt.

Goldilocks

PiaAcid Dyeing

I’m working away carding and spinning the fleece I dyed in honey jars last summer, making good progress I think. For most of the yarns I’ve taken several similar chunks and blended to get even more depth in the finished yarn, but this one intrigues me so much I want to leave it alone even if it’s just a small amount.

I have no idea how I got this colour, it’s made with the “pour several leftovers into the same jar” method. I just hope I like it as yarn as well!

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And then there’s a batch that looks almost like a fox pelt, which I also rather like after it’s been fluffed:

foxy

Targhee

PiaPÃ¥ dansk

For the monthly challenge of the Danish spinners on Ravelry, I’ve chosen a braid from Spunky Eclectic named “Nova Scotia”. The theme is “North”. I’ve chosen to spin it as a single, not because I’m in a hurry, but because I’ve already tried spinning bits of it as chain-ply and 2-ply, so I wanted to get a feel for the yarn this way, as well as the colour distribution. I had a feeling it would seem “cleaner”, and, well, I just wanted to.

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It’s a very soft fiber and very easy to spin. It ended up rather thinner than I had planned, simply because I wasn’t paying attention, but too thick to chain ply because I had a feeling it would bloom when I washed it, and I didn’t want a bulky yarn either.

It drifted apart very easily with too little twist, so I went and gave it some more, then let it drip dry after hand-stretching the skein to see if that would get the kinks out. I never weight my yarn as I think it doesn’t give you a correct image of how the yarn is spun. I also very rarely beat it. So my yarns will have to be balanced straight out of the bath! As you can see the skein is balanced but the yarn is still a bit kinky. Will be interesting to see how it knits up, it feels soft and not curly at all. But I’m guessing this fiber looks best plied if you want “perfect” yarn.

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before wash

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Targhee is an American breed related to both Merino and longwools. It’s about 22-25 microns according to the Fleece & Fiber Sourcebook.

To make this fiber Friday a bit more interesting, here’s a shot of a pin cushion I’m making from woad dyed yarn.

pins01

danishDenne uge har jeg spundet Targhee, som er en fiber der kun kan købes i USA mig bekendt. Super blødt og nemt at spinde! Men falder ret nemt fra hinanden hvis ikke man giver det en ordentlig gang sno. Heldigvis gik de fleste af krøllerne af i vask, også uden at hænge vægt i feddet, hvilket jeg er meget modstander af. Det føles blødt og de resterende krøller er ikke hårde, garnet er ret elastisk. Hvis man vil have perfekt garn, er det nok en fiber der egner sig bedst til at blive tvundet, men det bliver interessant at se, hvordan det er at strikke med. Ingen planer lige nu.

Racen er amerikansk og jeg er kun stødt på fibrene derovre. Det er en krydsning mellem merino-typer og languldstyper som Corriedale og har arvet det bløde, elastiske fra Rambouillet og puffer op på tilsvarende måde. Jeg har endnu ikke prøvet at strikke med det.

Og så lige til sidst en nålepude jeg er ved at lave af vaid-farvet garn.

Fiber Friday Epiphany

PiaChit Chat

Only managed to spin half of the 2nd Rambouillet braid, I think (didn’t check) it matches the first in type pretty well although consistency went out the window along the way. I have another Ravelry challenge this month, so I better get the last half done. Or maybe I won’t actually (keep reading)! Fiber for the challenge is Targhee.

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As you know I’ve been thinking about how to simplify my hobby life without actually cutting some of them off completely. The other day (while hanging wet laundry of all things!) I also got to thinking about “The Purpose” vs. creativity, my knitting and all things yarny and if they fitted into all this in any way. Why I keep planning to plant dye now that I A. have learned how to do it and B. don’t really have an actual purpose/project for it. I’ve been feeling quite ambivalent about that.

And then it dawned on me, that I don’t really have to focus my yarn habits on knitting. At all. I’d already been contemplating not doing so many garments, but trying to work on smaller objects instead. I only knit sweaters when I learned, then I didn’t knit at all for about 20 years, so when I picked it up again, it was sweaters. And specifically, I like to design them myself, more fun that way than just producing a copy of somebody elses work. Then I learned how to spin, so the next logical step was: I won’t buy more yarn, I’ll spin and dye all that I knit with.

The thing is, I’m not terribly good at sweaters.

  1. I can think up cool stuff, but it’s no way as cool as what many, many other designers can think up. Ergo, I don’t see a “carreer” as a knitwear designer in my cards, really.
  2. I always get something about the fit not exactly right and completely pleasing. I know this can be learned, but is seems I’d have to work very hard and dedicated on it in that case. And it appears more logical to focus on the areas that you already seem to be at ease with than try to develop the ones where you struggle, right?
  3. I often take very, very long to finish sweaters, starting multiple and then leave them all with one sleeve missing. I get bored. It’s not the clickety part of knitting that fascinates me the most, in fact if I could just have the ideas and then get someone else to do the actual work, I’d be totally cool with that…. Or get a machine.
  4. There’s a limit to how many accessories and bags that I use (virtually none), and it’s a lot of effort for just potholders and washcloths. (admittedly, it would reduce both spinning and knitting time considerably if I only did it when I needed new potholders)

What I really want to do is design the yarn. Play with colours and textures in all sorts of ways. And the yarns I think up are just NOT suited for my wardrobe, no little inner gypsy waiting to come out, I really like it plain, classical and casual. And inconspicuous on the street. 😉 Crazy clothes on other people I dig, but it’s not me.

So I ran into this book at the library, and I know I’ve mentioned it previously as a frivolous idea of adding yet another activity. But now I’m thinking – I think in pictures, I want to paint, I’ve been taking photographs for decades – tapestries are really much closer related than clothes. It doesn’t look harder to learn than new knit and crochet stitches.

tapestry

The advantages are plenty:

  1. I can keep using the cheap yarn for plant dyeing instead of worrying about the cost of getting a good, soft type to work with that I can tolerate next to my skin.
  2. Amounts per colour also isn’t that much of an issue, nor with spinning. No need to chug through 800 g of brown Shetland fiber.
  3. I wouldn’t feel too guilty about having a large stash of different yarns just sitting there waiting for the right project, because weaving takes A LOT of yarn. Also removes the time pressure of having xx sweater amounts waiting. As long as I make sure I don’t feel obligated to weave a certain amount per month or year…
  4. A small tapestry loom for starters really is dead easy to construct, so no huge investments.
  5. Thinking in image creation only, I can hopefully arrange them as serial projects more often rather than parallel, better focus through singletasking. Get more done in fewer hours per day leaves more time and energy for chores, horses etc. and no scatterbrain.
  6. And if I do feel like knitting sweaters I can relax and do some of other people’s really cool designs that would make me feel better about wearing them and even pretend to be more fashion conscious. And even buy those yarns perhaps, at least in part.

Less stress on a lot of levels I think (hope). It feels good. Maybe the weaving turns into felting images instead, which removes the time it takes to spin…. It would make my hobbies more unified somehow, the fiber being just another painting medium. What do y’all think?

The effect won’t kick in immediately – I do want to finish my current knitting WIPs (6). But spinning will be different, my approach will be different and I won’t be actually getting ready to weave or even think about tapestry projects. Unless they happen on their own. It’s just there as an option for when I want to work with yarn, not paint or Photoshop.

Synchronicity of the day: 2 hours after I pressed Schedule on this post I see a news flash from World of Wool announcing a workshop with a tapestry weaver. I can’t go since it’s in the UK, but they usually write about felting….

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Rambouillet igen og en åbenbaring

Det lykkedes mig kun at få spundet halvdelen af ugens fletning, men jeg synes den matcher de foregående rimeligt i type og tykkelse som planlagt. Dvs. det tror jeg den gør, for jeg har faktisk ikke hevet dem frem og sammenlignet!

Og så har jeg ellers haft mit strikke- og fiberliv oppe til revision, for jeg har alt for mange aktiviteter jeg gerne vil, ikke når og så får dårlig samvittighed eller stress over. For ikke at snakke om de huslige ting, som jeg så ikke gider fordi jeg mangler energi. På den anden side synes jeg det er svært at vælge noget fra, når det nu interesserer mig! Jeg har ikke lyst til at gå rundt med skyklapper.

Jeg har også spekuleret over, hvorfor jeg bliver ved med at samle farveplanter, jeg har jo sådan set lært hvordan man plantefarver nu, men jeg har ikke nogen egentlige projekter planlagt med det.

Og nu har jeg så besluttet, at det er strikningen som kommer på vågeblus. Jeg havde allerede besluttet at jeg ville begynde at tænke i små strikkeprojekter fremfor trøjer, som er min standard, for det er det jeg bruger mest i den genre. Jeg er nemlig laaaang tid om at strikke en trøje, jeg begynder at kede mig halvvejs og finder på en ny osv.

Det er faktisk ikke selve strikningen der interesserer mig men det at finde pÃ¥. Jeg er bare ikke verdens bedste strikdesigner mÃ¥ jeg nok erkende, og ja, hvis man øver sig bliver man bedre, men nÃ¥r man nu vil 1000 ting er det mÃ¥ske mere logisk at satse pÃ¥ dem man har lettest ved, fremfor dem der skal knokles med og sÃ¥ alligevel kun bliver middelmÃ¥dige? Huer, sjaler, sokker og tilbehør er ikke rigtig noget jeg bruger…

Det jeg egentlig har mest lyst til er at bare designe garnet. Lege med farver og skøre ting som ikke kan bruges i min garderobe alligevel, jeg er mest til det enkle og neutrale på det område.

SÃ¥ faldt jeg over en bog om billedvævning og tænkte, at mÃ¥ske jeg bare skulle satse pÃ¥ det istedet. SÃ¥ er mine hobbies mere ensartede, male, foto – det hele er bare billeder med forskellige medier. SÃ¥ fÃ¥r jeg samlet mit fokus en lille smule?

Jeg vil også kunne have en samling blandet garn i mindre mængder, behøver ikke bruge krudt på at spinde 800 g hver gang. Jeg behøver heller ikke købe dyrt, blødt strikkegarn til plantefarvningen, jeg kan bare blive ved med at lege og eksperimentere med det billige.

Det er ikke svært eller dyrt at bygge en lille væv selv til en start, og det ser ikke sværere ud at lære end nye strikketeknikker.

Hvis jeg så vil strikke, kan jeg slappe af og prøve nogen af de virkelig lækre designs som andre har udtænkt i stedet for at ville lave alting selv fra bunden. Men jeg har endelig erkendt, at det er garnet som sådan der tænder mig, mit hjerte er ikke rigtig i strikningen som process selvom jeg er glad for de færdige resultater.

Bare en ide – som jeg har tænkt mig at afprøve. MÃ¥ske fÃ¥r jeg ligefrem overskud til ridningen igen!?

A good day to ply!

PiaPÃ¥ dansk

It’s nasty out there I tell you, mean and nasty! Wind directly from Siberia – I didn’t even stop to take extra pix for you to describe the misery just right, here’s my oversize hamsters coming in for breakfast.

snow

I’m force feeding the woodstove as fast as I can and moved the wheel over to ply that braid I spun the other day. Plus some odd singles I had sitting around, purpose forgotten.

First I needed to make an extra lazy kate however, for my weaving bobbins converted for spinning, since their center diameter is too small for my regular kate. Good thing we have this gizmo, also used for making all the holes in my blending hackle.

boreFirst I thought it had frozen to death, but it sped up as I let it run a bit. Voila, one piece of wood and some nails, good enough to go. Yes, I’ll make a base for it, so I won’t have to clamp it to the table, but never mind that now. We also don’t need to mention that I’m officially too old to read a rusty drill in a dark garage without my glasses, so the holes are too big… I can find another piece of wood I’m sure. It still worked with wobbly nails and no clamps, at least for transferring the singles onto a proper bobbin on the wheel.

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Bottom of the board with indents for nail heads and all

kate2The one on the right was lovely as fiber and then I did a really poor job of spinning it. Don’t like it much as plied yarn either, but I guess sometimes that’s the way of it.

All done and washed. The Rambouillet is incredibly elastic and squishy, I don’t know if the former is a good thing in yarn, but I love the feel of stretching and bouncing it. I’ll spin the other braid in the same way.

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And well, it was also a good day to dye, as I had enough to try a bit of snow dyeing. More on that later!

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Guess who doesn’t care about the weather…

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Tvindevejr

Ja, jeg behøver jo ikke fortælle jer danskere hvordan vejret har været de sidste par dage, så jeg har bare tvangsfodret brændeovnen og ellers flyttet rokken tilpas tæt på, så jeg kunne få tvundet det jeg spandt forleden.

Jeg vidste jeg havde nogen 3 mm tykke søm, der lige passede i de små, billige spoler, men havde overvurderet min egen evne til at gætte diameteren på boret; så det blev lidt vakkelvorent, da jeg lige hurtigt ville lave en spoleholder. Men jeg fik da flyttet garnet over!

Singlen til højre er jeg meget skuffet over i forhold til fibrene, og jeg er ikke blevet gladere efter tvinding, men sådan kan det jo gå. Jeg kan vel bruge det til et eller andet en dag, måske bare bamsefyld.

Rambouillet garnet er helt utroligt elastisk, jeg ved egentlig ikke om det er en god ting, men jeg kan godt lide følelsen, så jeg regner med at spinde den anden fletning på samme måde.