Tag: colourways

Sample spinning

PiaPÃ¥ dansk

Remember the fiber I bought at the sheep market? I’ve been wondering how I wanted to spin the variegated top on the right, so I decided to get all scientific about it and at least try out all the usual varieties (knowing full well that perhaps in the end I’d have 50g of samples….)

merino

So a split lenghtwise 2-ply, a chainply, a fatter single and a 2×2 cable for starters. As well as knitted swatches!! Then afterwards, depending on the results, I might look into new to me spinning methods…

Well, I got as far a 2×2 cable, real thin, as I thought it might emulate a thicker, longer yarn using the whole top. And realized that all the plying would just make me an orange yarn. (of course I could try 3×3 chain ply, but no, not this time)

flat cable

Then I thought I was real clever, and brave too, deciding to waste all my yarn on something really different (to me). Never mind all that sampling!

I split it in half, then one half split into a thick rope and a thin. The idea was to try and match the lenghts/colours when plying the two. Well, it works in theory. Except I haven’t spun for ages and I’m prone to underspinning – even when I think I’ve added extra twist. The fiber is superwash. Can you see where this is going? Yes, everything pretty much drifted apart when I tried to ply. Some bits are looking really good, but it’s definitely not the same type of yarn at both ends! I will however try this again some other time as I think it could be a really cool feature in a woven item of some sort.

The other half I spun fairly thin, and then I wanted to make a coiled yarn. Well, duh. After 20 cm or so plying, I learned that to make coils, your single should probably be somewhat thicker than your core unless you want serious corkscrews as well! I think I’ve got a pretty good handle on how to make the coils though, I just have to figure out what to do with a thin, variegated, orange single now….

superwash merino

Testspinding

Jeg har gået længe og funderet på, hvad jeg skulle spinde af mit orange fiber fra fåredagen. Spekulerede i mange nye eksperimenter som jeg ikke har prøvet før, lavede en lillebitte test med kabeltvinding, som bare gjorde det hele ensfarvet orange og kedeligt.

SÃ¥ jeg endte med at finde pÃ¥ noget for mig rigtig vildt og uvant. Og selvfølgelig mislykkes med begge dele, men til gengæld har jeg lært lidt af hvert. Det er lidt ærgerligt, at jeg ikke fik noget direkte brugbart ud af de fine fibre, men sÃ¥dan er der sÃ¥ meget….

Den ene halvdel splittede jeg op på langs i en tyk og en tynd tot, som jeg så forsøgte at spinde lige lange, så det, når det var tvundet, ville være en tyk og en tynd som fulgte samme farveforløb.

Det virkede også rimeligt i teorien, bortset fra jeg ikke har spundet meget længe og har en tendens til at underspinde. Fibrene er desuden superwash og meget glatte og kan ikke filtes hvis det kniber med sammenholdet! Og ja, det hele skred jo fra hinanden gang på gang da jeg begyndte at sno det den anden vej, ikke?

Godt sÃ¥, næste lektion bestod i at lave “coils”, kan vi kalde det fjedergarn pÃ¥ dansk? Jeg spandt en tynd single, for sÃ¥ tænkte jeg at det færdige garn ikke blev sÃ¥ massivt. Efter 20 cm tvinding fandt jeg sÃ¥ ud af, at det ikke er en smart ide at kernen er samme tykkelse som garnet, men skal være meget tyndere, ellers kommer der sÃ¥ meget sno pÃ¥ at det ikke bare ligner en fjeder pÃ¥ den ene led, men at selve garnet ogsÃ¥ er en grisehale. SÃ¥ nu har jeg en lang tynd single i orange nuancer jeg skal have fundet pÃ¥ et eller andet sjovt til!

Getting it right

PiaAcid Dyeing

I mentioned in a previous post, that some of my dye samples for hexiflats turned out muddled and blended compared to what I had in mind. Especially these two:

wrong

So although I like them the way they are, I had another go, nuking the green for a minute in the microwave, THEN adding the “flowers”. You see, what I had in mind was 1. a lawn of dandelions and 2. rosehip bushes in bloom*. The dandelions are still not very obvious, but the other skein showed more promise. Little dots for flowers.

hex06

Voila! All knit up. Sorry about the cat hairs, our stupid barn cat managed to sleep on them even though I’d propped up the blocking mat vertically on top of 2 knitting baskets. She’ll try to lie on anything I’ve touched, even a hand sized notebook. Seriously disturbed creature. 😉

hex05

I also wanted to show the knitted skeins I made to test out the “cloud colourway”.

microskein02

hex07

I really like the first one, with a bit of effort you can actually see a blue sky with clouds?

hex08

And lastly, a picture of the other crazy hexagons I’ve been making lately, so different from when I started out making mini-skeins. I’m not sure I’ll be using all of these, but it’s a long way to 300 pieces, so things can change. I seem to like the yarn better than the fabric for some reason.

hex09

* I humbly apologize for the use of the words flower, bloom, dandelion and rose although I promised yesterday I would not.

My next knitting project is a hopefully quick summer sweater, completely see-through just to cover my goosebumps when the evening wind gets a bit nippy. I’ve had the yarn lying around for years, there’s really just enough for a t-shirt on normal size needles, but I hope for sleeves. As usual I’m making it up as I go along, I have no idea how the yarn will behave, so the “quick” could end up as frogging x 20.

isager1

Sekskanterdanish

Jeg eksperimenterer videre med mine microgarnnøgler til det magiske sekskanttæppe. 😉

Der var et par bundter sidst, som ikke helt blev som jeg planlagde, farverne rendte sammen og blev lidt mudrede inden de nÃ¥ede at fiksere. SÃ¥ jeg prøvede igen, malede grønt pÃ¥ først, en tur i mikroovnen, male “blomsterpletter” og sÃ¥ en tur i varmen igen. Det ene nøgle blev ok, det andet blev ca. ligesom det foregÃ¥ende.

Jeg fik også strikket mine sky-bundter, jeg synes det første blev ret godt!?

Jeg kan af en eller anden grund bedre lide garnet end det strikkede stof, så jeg ved ikke helt om alle stumperne bliver brugt i tæppet. På den anden side er der jo lang vej til 300, så meget kan ændre sig. Jeg forsøger at huske på at det er processen, at slappe af og lege og ikke planlægge eller designe noget.

Der er kattehÃ¥r pÃ¥ mine billeder – vores tÃ¥belige gamle staldkat lykkedes med at sove pÃ¥ sekskanterne, selvom jeg havde stablet udspændingsmÃ¥tten lodret pÃ¥ toppen af en bunke strikkekurve. Hun har en sær trang til at ligge pÃ¥ alt jeg har rørt ved, om det sÃ¥ er en A6 huskeblok.

Mit næste projekt skulle gerne være en meget hurtig sommertrøje pÃ¥ store pinde. Garnet har jeg haft liggende i 3 Ã¥r, der er egentlig kun nok til en t-shirt, men nu ser jeg om ikke den kan blive langærmet. Den bliver gennemsigtig, men den skal kun lige danne lidt barriere nÃ¥r vinden bliver en smule køligere en sommeraften, jeg sidder let og fÃ¥r gÃ¥sehud selvom temperaturen egentlig er ok. Det er frit fra leveren som sædvanlig, sÃ¥ det med “hurtig” kan nemt ende med 20 omstrikninger….. Isager bomuld/hør, og jeg aner ikke hvordan det opfører sig før og efter vask og i brug osv.

No tour

PiaAcid Dyeing

I’m not doing Tour de Fleece, in fact I haven’t been spinning at all lately. I do have a few yarny things going on though. Working on little things, a bit at a time, since my good days are still spent in the garden mostly, and then I have days where I can barely keep my eyes open. Hexagons are excellent projects for such days, takes no time to knit up 3 g/ 7 m of yarn, but you still feel like you’ve made something.

hex04
The Sunday batch

Dyed a few more micro skeins for the hexiflats and knit up the ones I showed on Sunday. Some of the solids I didn’t like because I used too much dye, so I’ll reknit combining them with other colours and scraps. Even if it’s a random, messy blanket I do want to like each piece that I put into it! I’ve figured that for starters I’ll need something like 250, but then I’ve only done the sum in my head and I really suck at that. It’s going to be roundish/hexagonish in shape or something along those lines.

I couldn’t find my dye notes, so I just played around (again), aiming for a summer flowers vs. beach ball look. Ok, I made that up after I saw the skeins… I also did a few “ok, if 4 sections look like this on a 1 meter skein when knit up, what do 4 sections on a half meter skein look like knit up?” Perhaps I’ll even document the result for later use. Some of them were supposed to be more defined, but the colours bled and blended. Oh well…

microskein01

And then I had leftover blue, so I thought I’d start a sky/cloud series for later use in various combinations. All sorts of possible scenarios there, morning skies, winter skyes, rainy skies, storm, sunset…

microskein02
There’s cobalt, ultramarine and teal in this collection, but microcamera can’t see the difference.

I also restarted knitting the lace scarf for my mum – and since I need the leftover yarn for something else I really should get it done, so I know HOW much I’ll have left. I cast on in December, then husband had vacation and could not stop talking while I was counting and I simply didn’t get back to it…. I don’t really wear this type of thing myself, but she’s much more ladylike.

lacescarf

I’ve been dyeing cotton yarn and worked a bit with madder – more about that in a later post.

maddertowel

I also do have some spinning planned, but some blending needs to be done first. This is an old project, and I know I need to make certain yarns together, I just don’t know what they’re for.

red indigo silk2 silk1 blue purple

I just borrowed Spin Art by Jacey Boggs, lovely book, pretty photos and very simple, clear instructions for making the basic art yarn techniques, in fact you feel like you’re quite able just reading it! So inspired by that as well as the Spinner’s Book of Yarn Designs by Sarah Anderson which I received some time ago, that may well be my next project once I get this one done. I’d love to make some projects with really textured yarn blended in I think.

And last but not least, I’m making a couple of tapestry looms a bit larger than the small sample frame I did. I seem to be coming up with too many ideas that contain blue and I don’t HAVE any blue yarn just now, not plant dyed, nor commercial (Which is odd since I love blue. And green. And, well, all the others of course). It’s a good thing tapestries take something like forever to make, because I can’t afford yarn to make that many! I keep falling in love with different colour combos and getting ideas for using them. Yes, I should paint more, much faster. Water colour sketches would be great, but that means I’ll have to buy watercolours!!! LOL It just never ends, does it.

loomsupplies

More snow dyeing

PiaAcid Dyeing

I promised I’d do one more skein, so here goes:

Look, it’s all tied up! Cotton, so no, I hope it won’t bleed. It’s what I had. Because I was too impatient to go searching. And remember, I was supposed to be doing something else, something USEFUL, like?

snowdye6

Didn’t I mention using less powder? A light sprinkle? Well, don’t apply it outside on a windy day, then. Also don’t think you can remember which cup is which when you’ve mixed 2 different shades that look exactly the same in the powder.

snowdye7

But hey, I kept off the greens, pink and yellow. Some progress at least.

snowdye8

snowdye9

The previous two skeins, all untangled and rewound. The first one I’m ok with, the second not so much.

snowdye10

snowdye11

So I dunked it in a ½% solution of blue, and now I’m happy. Also in the nick of time with this experiment it seems, no more snow!

snowdye12

Fiber Friday next week will be spinning – I hope.

danish

Snefarvning 2

Mit sidste snefarvningseksperiment gik også lidt i vasken, jeg huskede at binde feddet men lagde ikke mærke til at det blæste = ikke særlig smart når man skal strø pulver. Så der blev brugt rigeligt.

Af de to første fed var jeg ikke så glad for det ene, så det fik en tur i en blå gryde og det var meget bedre.

Jeg har besluttet at det nemmeste er at dampe garnet, så ikke farverne render sammen, jeg har ved andre lejligheder kunnet fiksere farven lynhurtigt ved at nedsænke i meget varmt vand, men det virkede ikke rigtig her.

My inner hippie

PiaAcid Dyeing

Snow dyeing is a bit like tie-dyeing, only more unpredictable. But groovy. And in this case, very loud. At least to begin with! I hadn’t planned the colours before I got started, which tends to result in too many of them.

I thought I’d used very little powder, being careful to keep the areas separate, but as you can see throughout the process, it was more than ample. I’d love to try to mix the powders beforehand (for special colours) and apply them to the snow with a small sieve, just a light sprinkle to get spotted yarn. I haven’t got one however. I may try – something. Just one more skein, since the white fluff isn’t going to evaporate this month apparently.

snowdye1

snowdye2

snowdye3

snowdye4

snowdye5

So what happened here?

1 – I know this yarn needs to be tied, and Every. Single. Time I think – “nah, it’ll be ok.” I must love detangling. I do know why I don’t tie it – it’s because I hate it when my figure-8s are too tight, leaving little white bands on the yarn. But, really – learn to do your ties properly.

2 – So I also do know my colour wheel and which colours = mud. As long as you keep them separate, fine, and a teeny bit of blending just mutes them, also fine. What I did think but did not listen to, is “let the yarn drip dry before you attempt to set the dye“. It’s been soaked with melted snow, it’s overflowing. A bit of a squeeze isn’t enough. What happens when you lie it inna heap in the sink? The overflow blends. Guess then what. And yes, I do have a strainer. In fact I have 3. This also goes if you want to wrap your yarn in plastic and steam it. Let it drip dry first. OK? Preferably stretched out horisontally, like, leave it on the rack for instance?

3 – Bubbles and steam does not mean your water is near boiling, in fact it’s only about 65 C. Not enough to shock set your dye. = Muddy water. Flush and repeat. Get your bleedin’ thermometer out.

4 – Do this part of the process when you’re NOT supposed to be doing something else and so feeling guilty and in a bit of a hurry. Resist instant gratification. Surely it can’t be that hard.

I suggest you read some tutorials if you haven’t done this before. I never do until I’ve tried and screwed up at least once, usually twice or more. By which time I’ve usually got it figured out. I guess I have more fun that way, even though I get slightly odd results in the process.

And if you do like muted or mudcoloured yarn – do what I did, not what I said. 😉

danish

Hippie-farvning

Jeg skulle liiiige prøve noget snefarvning nu vi fik et ekstra hvidt drys, og ja, det er sjovt fordi det er ret uforudsigeligt. Især nÃ¥r man kvajer sig undervejs. 😉 Jeg har en tendens til at først læse manualer og tutorials nÃ¥r jeg har forsøgt mig mindst én gang, gerne flere. Og sÃ¥ har jeg som regel hittet ud af det undervejs. Det er Ã¥benbart sjovere end at fÃ¥ et perfekt resultat med det samme?

Opsummering af min engelske fristil ovenfor er:

1. Brug meget mindre farvepulver end du tror du skal. 2. Lad garnet dryptørre grundigt inden du smider det i en gryde kogende vand eller plastwrap til dampning, der er RIGTIG meget overskudsvæske i fra sneen, og den blander sig til brun, hvis man bare lægger garnet i en bunke i håndvasken. OGSÅ selvom man trykker noget af vandet ud. 3. Mål vandets temperatur inden du putter garnet i, det er ikke ved at koge når der er damp og bobler, det er kun ca. 65 grader og det trækker endnu mere brunt ud af garnet.

Det smarteste er naturligvis at vælge farver som ikke mudrer, det ved jeg udmærket godt hvordan, men nÃ¥r ikke jeg har lagt planer pÃ¥ forskud tænker jeg altid, at det gÃ¥r nok lige. Jeg binder heller ikke feddet op, selvom jeg ogsÃ¥ ved at dette garn har brug for det, fordi der stort set ingenting er til at holde pÃ¥ det fra fabrikantens side. Jeg ved bare at jeg bliver sur hvis jeg sÃ¥ binder for stramt og fÃ¥r hvide bÃ¥nd pÃ¥ garnet. Say no more…

TÃ¥lmodighed er en dyd jeg ikke har sÃ¥ meget af…. Nu kan jeg sÃ¥ bruge x antal timer pÃ¥ at vikle skidtet ud!