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.
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.
First 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.
Bottom of the board with indents for nail heads and all
The 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.
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!
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.
I haven’t been spinning since my fat singles adventure, but this week I thought I’d get out two braids of Rambouillet that I bought summer 2011 from CJ Delights.
I’m hoping they will take up less space as yarn, although braids are actually quite dense, but I also decided to use them for practising consistensy, so I’m just spinning and spinning from one end to the other, planning to make a chain-ply. I’ve got 3 batches of Targhee from Spunky Eclectic that are destined for the same fate.
Normally I’ve been able to put 100 g on my small bobbins, as you can see I’ve started to pack it down one end, but then I realised I had nearly 60 g of fiber left and gave up, started a new bobbin with the rest. I hope this means my yarn is getting fluffier = more yardage, but I’m not really organized enough to have kept solid records of everything I make.
And then today I read Woolwinding’s review of “The Spinner’s book of Yarn Designs” and was tempted to buy that and use my assorted fibers for something fun – but there’s time. Another time. (although the page says they only have 6 left, and not, as they usually add “…but more on the way”. ACK – what if they get sold out. Sigh. You have no idea what my Amazon wish list looks like. I need some cash. Wanna buy yarn?
Lageroprydning
Spinder Rambouillet denne uge, som jeg købte for et par år siden. Sådan et par fletninger er egentlig ret kompakte, men jeg håber alligevel at jeg kan frigøre mere lagerplads ved at lave fiber om til garn. Så jeg bruger de her købte, færdigfarvede fibre til at øve mig i ensartet spinding.
Jeg var lidt overrasket over, at spolen var så fuld kun halvvejs gennem den første fletning, normalt har jeg let kunnet have 100 g på, men her er altså kun godt 60g, så jeg valgte at starte en ny frem for at kæmpe med at få det til at være der. Jeg kunne sikkert godt, men jeg har jo rigeligt med spoler.
Det er dejlig blød og bamset fiber, men det er jo også en art merino. Minder måske egentlig lidt mere om Polwarth? Det er længe siden jeg har spundet Polwarth.
Originally this post was drafted to show and talk about “designing” yarn. (see how I had to put that into quotation marks, so as not to come off too presumptuous 😉 ) And then as usual I got sidetracked from the yarn ideas I had so they still live in my head.
The first yarn that I “designed” shortly after I started spinning, 4 shades of merino blended on my homemade hackle
The funyarns are figments of my imagination, not so much planned for or even suitable for knitting, but spun just because. Because the colour concept appealed to me, to resemble something I’d seen (such as the half done rowan tree yarn), or just to experiment. I won’t call them art yarns, because I’m just not that good. It’s not that I don’t enjoy spinning yarn for a purpose, but it’s a different joy. Funyarns are really more like painting.
So anyway, I’ve spun almost a pound of wool in the last couple of days for absolutely no purpose at all, it’s colourful and random, so I thought I’d kick off this category now and keep adding once in a while.
It started out with a challenge on Ravelry, theme “Safari” (which incidentally was my own suggestion). I had a couple of batts that I bought a long time ago before I knew the difference between a real woolen prep and “just” combed top blended on a drumcarder, still running perpendicular. One is not better than the other, just different spinning, different purpose. I thought one set of batts looked quite like a piece of rainforest, so off I went spinning a fat single.
I have all sorts of things going through my head while I see the fiber run by my hands, goes something like this: “I wonder if I should have included some pink tufts for orchids in a jungle, no, all that yellow is enough. So would this resemble the amazonas rainforest or this turquoise, where do they have those mineral lakes in old sinkholes, Indonesia? Hmmmm, this is turning out a bit muddy and earthy, a bit Mexican inspired colouring with the strong greens and yellows? Do they have jungles too? I should make some South American themed colourways. And Chinese inspired drawings (oh, don’t be silly, not in this lifetime. I thought you wanted to be the new Otto Frello?). And definitely look up something on Celtic symbols as well as old Scandinavian. And do a palette of the garment colours used in various times in Europe for some project. But something oriental would be cool too.” Yes, that IS pretty much what the inside of my head looks like more often than not.
Turned out much more blended than I wanted, I liked the batts better than the yarn, but such is the way of those things. In any case I decided to spin ALL the batts to practise getting that thickness. Whoosh! All gone, one empty box. And the red and purple with gold thread took me on a trip to India, so around the world in a few hours isn’t half bad, is it? I must be getting better at it too, since each yarn ended up shorter than the previous colour. I don’t normally thwack my yarns, because I don’t want the halo, but these got a severe beating because I wanted them to felt a bit and bloom as much as possible.
Bollywood collection 😉
Which leads me to my second mission: fiber stash bashing. When I first started out I bought all sorts of random stuff to try out, then I had a bad spell and didn’t spin for something like 8 months and now I just want something completely different. I still love to OGLE all the pretties that are offered for sale on Etsy, but I do love to make my projects from scratch, i.e. dyeing my own fiber. I also need more space for my paint supplies now, so I’m going to try to spin all that random fiber and in the future keep just a stock of undyed fiber in a few varieties that I like.
This was originally named Sea & Sand when I dyed it – but it actually could go in the savanna category all spun up, yeah? Smallest braid spun this week also.
In an ideal world and a bigger house I’d have all the yarns and all the fibers (and all the paints, inks, papers, cameras, horses, greenhouses and…). But then I do like my sleep, so I think the current plan is probably the wisest. 😀 .
Spindehalløj
Jeg kunne godt tænke mig at tømme lidt ud i mit fiberlager, så jeg kun har ufarvede fibre i mine yndlingssorter liggende. Dels mangler jeg plads til andre hobbyting, dels fordi mit fokus har ændret sig lidt siden jeg begyndte at spinde.
Og da jeg har rigeligt med strikkeprojekter pÃ¥ venteliste, vil jeg bruge den næste tid pÃ¥ at spinde garn som ikke har noget formÃ¥l, men bare er skægt, har en flot farve eller fordi jeg har en tosset “design”ide.
SÃ¥ jeg startede med en fletning jeg selv havde farvet, i superwash BFL. Bagefter kom turen til Ravelrygruppens februarudfordring “Safari”, og da jeg var godt i gang med at øve tyk single tog jeg lige de resterende batts i den kasse fra samme leverandør, købt den gang jeg ikke kendte forskel pÃ¥ rigtigt karteflor og kæmmede fibre kørt en gang pÃ¥ kartemaskine for at blande farverne let. Det gik let og gesvindt, og hvert garn blev lidt kortere end det forrige, sÃ¥ lidt bedre til at spinde tykt blev jeg da, selvom det ikke er super-bulky.
Normalt tæver jeg ikke mit garn, for jeg kan bedst lide det glat, men singlerne her har fået rigtig mange bank, så de kunne filte lidt og puffe så meget op som muligt.
Finally got the last of the Dorsets coloured up with madder and weld. Some of the chunks had previously been dyed with other plants, but I wanted to see what happened if they had another dip – without any kind of plan or registration of which is what. Some dyed at 50 C, then a new batch in the same bath at 80 C for both plants.
Now to flick and then wait until I can card it. There’s a total of 1400 g so it’s going to take a while, since I also have that Suffolk fleece from the same source. I know I should practice using my handcarders, but argh!
And that’ll be all for a while, off to work on other stuff.
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Færdig
Endelig har jeg fået plantefarvet al min Dorset uld, så skal det bare renses for planterester og kartes en gang. Der er i alt 1400 g, så det kommer til at tage tid. Jeg har også en Suffolk ham som jeg har pletfarvet med syrefarver, den skal have samme behandling før jeg kan spinde.
Jeg har brugt kraprod og hjemmedyrket vau, første bad ved 50 grader, blandet bejset og ikke, derefter mere blandet og før-farvet uld i samme bad og op på 80 grader
Ikke mere plantefarvning i denne omgang, nu er der fokus på andre projekter.
My experiments with Hollyhock flowers continue. This time a “solar” dye technique, using variations of indoor temperatures to mimick summer.
Rainwater, vinegar, pH 4. 35 g yarn, 10 g dry flowers. Left on top of fireplace 2 days. I shook it up once in a while when taking photos of the progress. Shelf temp. 60-65 C when fired up, 40-45 C on the top of stove (where I let it remain), 15 C in the morning.
30 minutes – 3 hours – 24 hours
2 dayscompared to first batch which have faded a bit while in the cupboard…
Same procedure, pH 6-7 (my strips are not super accurate) yielded pretty much the same shade, so I took the remains of the dyebath, put in ammonia until it was way up (11+, it takes only drops….), then dunked it for a minute. Thought I might as well compare it to the “boiled green”. There are some strands that had not as much dip as the rest, they turned blue. I left them as such, for science. 😉
Next, both exhausts mixed and upped to pH 8, 2 days on stove. As you change the pH the dyebath pretty much changes to the colour you’ll get on the yarn, how’s that for an indicator? I had fun adding ammonia to get green, then vinegar water to make it rosy again with the last bit of dyebath before I poured it out.
This skein is incredibly hard to photograph to the exact shade – as close as I got today in the snow.flash photo – always a bit brighter that life…
As you can see however, once I took it out I didn’t quite get the steel blue (left jar below) or the baby blue of the strands on the previous skein, may have left it in there too long and it got too alkaline. A safer bet if you want sky blue may be to do a neutral 6-7 pH lavender then a dip in pH 8. Maybe it takes even less to turn it.
I think I’m going to have to try and get some dark red flowers and see if they give a more rosy warm shade. I thought the acid one would be, given the heather rosy tint I got on the first project with a vinegar afterdip – maybe afterdips are different, maybe if was the temperature? As you can see the dyebath starts out very pink, then to turn purple over time. Could be a completely cold dye procedure would be different yet again. Or maybe I need to push the acid lower than 4 if we have green on the opposite end, then blue, purple in the middle and ?
Join us next week in the quest for pink, 2 more jars in this series still cooking… I’m thinking that perhaps the lavender skein was closer to neutral pH, since it was identical to the neutral one, so I’ll have to conduct another test with the exhaust from the red jar below. Meaning, I need to mordant more yarn to get reliable comparisons, meaning y’all need to wait for a bit.
In the meantime, I’ve also mordanted the rest of my Dorset fleeces in tin/alum/CoT, about 650 g. So look out for “Hollyhock 3”. Or possibly 4.
Nye eksperimenter, denne gang farvet ved stuetemperatur, dvs. jeg forsøgte at kopiere solfarvning ved at stille glassene pÃ¥ brændeovnen, det giver 40-45 grader om dagen og ca. 15 om natten. 2 døgn hver ved pH 3, 6 og 8. Den mellemste lignede grangiveligt den første, sÃ¥ den fik et meget basisk dyp til sidst og blev en flot grøn. SpørgsmÃ¥let er, om jeg har fejlmÃ¥lt pH værdien pÃ¥ det første fed, og det mÃ¥ske var nærmere neutral, dette er jeg i gang med at teste….
Jeg har brugt regnvand, men nu hvor vi har fået frost er jeg nok nødt til at bruge vandhanen, selvom det evt. godt kan give et mere gråligt resultat at dømme fra første test.
Næste test er dels tinbejset, dels helt “koldt” bad uden ovn og, nÃ¥r jeg fÃ¥r dyrket nogen, mørkerøde blomster i stedet for sort-violette. Noget tyder dog pÃ¥ at det er pH værdien som er afgørende, sÃ¥ jeg er i gang med næste test i ren eddike.
First 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.
The 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.
