Shreds

I managed to shred one of my handknit hemp dish cloths, scrubbing lime scale off a stock pot.  The dish cloths are good at scrubbing but poor at wiping counters, having little absorbency.

I managed to properly calculate the number of rows and put them into the revised felted cloche-style hat so that it had the desired final dimensions after two trips through the washing machine.  The hat is in the mail.  The only photo I took shows the hat modelled by a friend, who didn't sign up to have her face on my blog, so you will have to go without photographic evidence.  I didn't show it off at a guild meeting either.  I was impatient to get the hat in the mail and to the intended recipient to find out if it fits.  Fit is important as I plan to make another for her and garment dye it.  I saved the reject hats to chop up and test dye on.

Some of my friends tell me they like making new things all the time with plenty of variety.  I like production work.  Making the same thing again, or with a small variation.

The språng loom, alas, remains bare.  And the wool room messy.

And I may be about to cast on another Norwegian Sweet baby cap, just because I like production work, I have extra sock yarn, and I want something to do before and after supper in an unfamiliar restaurant with a group of strangers.  The one wrinkle is, it has been so long, I have forgotten all the modifications I used.

Losing My Amateur Status

I like to write and I like to make up jokes and clever sayings to make people smile.  Recently I have had a lot of fun writing witty sayings about fibre arts and putting them on pin-back buttons.  I am very fortunate that a friend lent me her button maker.

Here are some examples.  "Give fleece a chance" is not original.  

buttons for knitters

Looking forward to festivals and SIPs

My thoughts are turning to Spring wool festivals and spin in public days.

A farmers' market expressed interest in having members of our guild come out and demonstrate handspinning but we don't have a volunteer coordinator to take it on.  It's a good location: I can think of two guild members who found the guild because we were at that market doing a demo.

This month at another location, the guild is doing a demonstration, fiber prep through weaving, and I am participating.  I am trying to decide what wool to spin.  The yarn I make at a demo comes out irregular with thicker spots, so the yarn has to be destined for a suitable project.  There is a wool festival coming up where I'd like to display some yarn that looks like a beginner did it, and I was thinking some indigo blue would be eye-catching.  There's all that BFL I dyed with natural dyes in the fall.  Some of it is indigo.  I must quit being such a miser and use it.

As for current projects, the sweater is on hold, I haven't started the språng pullover yet, and I am knitting another hat to felt.  In other words, I'm doing the easy stuff.

Fulling Woes

I knitted a hat and ran it through the washing machine a couple of times to full it.  I think the shape is too short in the crown and too flared in the brim for a cloche shape.  My head is too large to fit women's hats so I need someone to try it on and tell me.

When you full knitted fabric, you can't undo and redo your work.  But the resulting fabric looks terrific.  Also, the knitting is very easy.  It is done with large needles in the round with knit stitches only, no purling, and the shape is simple.

You Made That?

There you are, photographic proof that I have finished the watch cap with Fibonacci stripes.  I would like to rip out the crown and make the hat shorter so the brim doesn't need to be turned up, but it stands as it is right now.  I have other things to make.

It has been six years since I learned to knit and spin yarn.  I showed this cap to someone, an ordinary guy.  He said, "You made that?" and I remembered what it was like to lack the skills to select yarn and turn it into something wearable, to live where a handmade hat is remarkable.  I mostly discuss knitting with knitters, and forget how impressive a finished object can be.

Fibonacci Stripes on a Hat Brim

I'm knitting a watch cap with Fibonacci stripes on the brim.  I'm using up some leftover yarn to do it, plus I bought a ball of grey.  Not crazy about the synthetic dye but am living with it.

Felted Bowl

Took some leftover Paton's Classic wool yarn, knitted it, and fulled it to make a bowl.

For my upcoming språng project, I bought some gorgeous Border Leicester yarn from Solitude Wool dyed with real indigo.  I wetted the skeins and hung them to dry with weight on them so that when I warp the loom the yarn won't give much and the tension will be consistent.

Waiting and Planning

If all goes well, this spring I should be at a public event where I could show people examples of språng.  It follows that I have to make the språng examples, språng being a rare sort of textile.  So I am in the planning stage and hope to get to the creating stage soon.

The first question is what yarn to use.

I don't have enough time to spin the yarn, except for språng patterns where a little yarn goes a long way, such as all-over holes.  The Wensleydale roving I have might be good there.

I want to spend a sensible amount of money on the yarn so I have to balance practicality with my desire for quality and the attributes I like (local or domestic, cruelty-free, undyed or naturally dyed, lustrous).

I will do well to go against my natural orientation to monochromatic yarn suitable for textiles with interesting structures, and instead consider yarn with colour and språng with colourwork because the majority of fibre artists respond to colourwork more than structure.

The second question is what sort of items will I make and with what patterns and dimensions.  I would like a number of things that look good hung on coat hangers.  Artwear, if you will.  I'll have to work this out myself, as I don't know of any suitable patterns.  Even if I just get one piece done, I will be pleased.

It's a puzzle to figure out and hopefully execute reasonably well.  I like planning, and I like doing språng.  I expect I will like the products very much, as språng is so pretty.  This is good, as the products could wind up being part of my wardrobe.

I've been in the planning stage for this project for a few weeks now.  Just in the last few days, I've become more optimistic about the whole thing's chance of success.  There are other things I need to make this spring for the same event and I just recently found a better method to get them done, which means I can be more productive and have more time to give to språng.

Språng Waistcoat in Skrydstrup Pattern

språng waistcoat

I finished my språng pullover.  You can see it is more of a waistcoat than a sweater.  It is in the Skrydstrup pattern from Collingwood's The Techniques of Sprang, so four rows of S twist alternate with four rows of Z twist.  The pattern of twists cause the fabric to curl a little but not distort to one side the way all Z twist would.  The curl is visible in the edges of the armholes.  

I am more pleased with it off the loom than I was when it was on the loom.  

The drape of it makes the armholes look curved but they were done straight.  

The construction is a lot like what we used to wear in kindergarten to keep our clothes clean while fingerpainting, a plastic garbage bag with holes cut for the neck and arms.  Except you don't cut språng just anywhere.  I didn't cut this piece at all.  

The hole for the neck is a slit formed by treating the threads on either side as a separate section.  You work to the middle of the row, move the threads as if you'd come to the end of the row, move the next threads as if you were starting a row, and go from there.  I picked the easiest row in the pattern to start this on, row 7.

The armholes are formed by seaming the sides partway.  They look rather deep but they are correct because when you put on the vest, the fabric stretches horizontally and shrinks vertically.

Eight Feet to Propinquity

I steeled my heart to take the incomplete, lackluster språng pullover off the loom to discard it, and then I couldn't do it.  I like things to be useful and this project still has something to give.

So I ignored the loom as it sat out of the way next to the window of the wool room.

The last few inches of warp are the most difficult to complete, not mentally but physically, as there is little room to maneuver and interlink the threads.  This is why so many traditional objects in språng are not worked right up to the middle.

However, it turned out that it wasn't the interlinking that was holding me up, but the position of the loom in the room.  Once I moved the loom eight feet over to my desk within reach, I felt a lot more like finishing the project.

Of course, feeling like doing something is not actually doing something.  You'll know I've finished the project when you see one or two new språng how-to YouTube videos from me featuring a white pullover vest in the Skrydstrup pattern.

Speaking of making things convenient, stuck to the top of my loom is the pattern copied from Collingwood and on it a bobby pin marks the row where I left off last time.  I don't have to figure it out from the strands' positions in the last row.  Learned this from my weaving lessons.

I'm trying to think of a språng pattern where I would have a hard time figuring out where I left off, and can't.  Not even the Coptic turban pattern, you just have to count how many holes down from the apex of the diamond.  I have some trouble following that pattern.  It's easier now that I've improved the chart I made.

The next large piece in språng I make, I'd like it to be in the Coptic turban pattern.  I'd like to make a more polished piece than I've done so far, an eye-catching stole that would get people interested in doing språng.  Unless, that is, the next large piece I do is for my dad on the loom he made for a permanent installation piece.  Coptic turban would have too smooth a texture and too understated a look.  That loom needs something with texture, like Gothic arches.

Now, I have no use for a stole myself, so it would not in the least fulfill my goal of handspun wearables for me in natural colours.  You can tell I still lean toward making things that allow me and others to learn about techniques and tools.  I expect this to continue.

Started Knitting a Sleeve

By Christmas Eve, I had knitted the body of the Cullercoats sweater and started knitting a sleeve.  It's progress.

I don't know if I have firm fibre arts resolutions for 2015.

Assuming Cullercoats is not an absolute horror to finish, I'd like to knit another sweater, this time in plain stockinette.  Maybe a pullover in commercial linen yarn.  Or one in wool.

I need to wash the Gotland fleece.

We'll see how the rest of it goes.

Rose Bead Stitch Markers

Here's another look at the rose bead stitch markers I have made.

Funny things, beads made of rose petals.  They're rather nice.

Good-bye, Hampshire Wool

I gave away the Hampshire wool.  I'd washed some, combed some, dyed some, and spun a little but I never made any more progress than that.  I feel good about this move.

I also owned up to how much I dislike the yarn in my current språng project compared to the handspun in a couple of early språng pieces I did.  I could complete the project, show it off, and then shelve the finished object.  Or I could undo the piece and reuse the yarn.  Or I could skip any further effort entirely and scrap the project.  Decisions.

Let's say skip.  I have other projects to work on, and the piece did teach me some things so it wasn't a total waste.

A Brush with Cotton Towels

The other day instead of my handwoven linen Ms and Os bath towel, I had to use a cotton bath towel.  What a dismal experience.  I never want to go back to using a cotton towel.

The linen one was well worth the work and money.

This is one of the reasons to appreciate fibre arts, because the end product can be superior to mass produced common things in materials, structure, fit, or colour.

Now, to produce more fibre arts items and get more value.

Store-bought Hemp Yarn

I got some hemp knitting yarn from Hemp Traders delivered and straight away I wound a ball and knitted the start of a dish cloth.

I like knitting that particular dish cloth pattern because it's easy.  There's very little casting on and a lot of knitting with the occasional yarn over, or decreases after the halfway mark.  I can even knit it while watching subtitled videos.  The only thing I dislike about handknit dish cloths is the cotton yarn, so much so that I give all of mine away and never keep any.  This hemp yarn is a great improvement in my mind.  It has a crisp feel and a sheen, even in bumpy garter stitch.  I keep looking at it and feeling the cloth.  The yarn is skinny: I am using size 2 needles.

I'm glad I took a chance and ordered the yarn sight unseen.  I can knit dish cloths mindlessly and I can replace my ratty woven cotton ones.  I suppose it's the chatelaine in me, fussing about the state of the linen cupboard.  I've been putting off replacing the sad things because I didn't know where to get my usual brand, my old source failed me.  Now I can have hemp cloths and lots of them.  They should perform well, hemp is durable and doesn't moulder when damp.

I ordered a large quantity of white Romney roving from Qualicum Bay Fibre Works, wool that will be picked up and stored for me by a kindly family member until my next visit.  I have masses of unspun wool already.  This purchase is less about need that it is about my desire to support a mill that deals in local fibre on Vancouver Island.  I think it's important that an area keep the means of production.  The mill needs more sales to stay in business.

I have asked the mill to put my name in the queue for their spinning services.  At the proper time the roving will go back and be spun into yarn much like the stuff I'm knitting my Cullercoats sweater out of.  Ideally I would spin the wool myself but again, I have lots of other roving to keep my spindles busy.  Moreover, yarn from this mill gives a lot of what I look for in fibre.  It's not like buying mass-produced yarn from a craft store or yarn shop.  It's traceable to a region, undyed, and breed-specific, and it supports local producers and processors.

The hemp yarn is mass-produced and imported.  I am okay with that because it is good quality and I doubt it's possible to get anything comparable that's small batch and traceable.  The laws on cultivation in North America are restrictive.  I don't know about machinery to process and spin hemp, whether there are small-scale setups that bridge the gap between hand-processing and a factory line.

The Cullercoats sweater is coming along.  After getting stalled for a while near the top of the back, this past week I cast on the left front and knitted quite a lot of it.  Good thing I've made progress or I'd feel guilty about starting the hemp dish cloth.

I have a språng project on the loom that's about two or three hours from completion.  I hope I gauged the width correctly.  It's hard to tell.

Weld Dye and Over Dyeing

I went to a natural dye day and got to dip some wool in the weld pot.  We dipped yarn and wool into large pots heated over a fire.  I discovered that I really like the colour weld dye gives, a clear lemon yellow.  I plan to use it again sometime.

Besides weld, I dyed with indigo, woad which I like better than indigo, walnuts mordanted with iron for black-brown, madder overdyed with indigo for purple, weld overdyed with woad for green, and brazil wood.  The base wool was Blue Face Leicester, a pound divided into two ounce portions.

I would have liked to have dyed the Romney wool I brought back from Vancouver Island a while ago instead of the imported BFL but I didn't get the Romney ready in time.  I pulled it out and washed it all but a considerable amount of grease remained in the locks, and the grease would have resisted the dye.  I need to pick and tease the wool thoroughly to loosen the locks so the hot water and detergent will penetrate when I wash it again.

I want to dye with woad over weld again sometime for Lincoln green since I didn't get that consistent or strong a result.  It looks like mottled lemon and lime.  Someone else got a beautiful clear green.  I think she got such excellent results because she dipped earlier when the dyes were stronger, more concentrated and also because she dyed skeins.  My wool was scrunched up in a cotton bag and the woad did not contact all of the fibre.

Not only did I go to a natural dye day, I went to a synthetic dye day before that.  I got a good result by filling up two cups of dye with the same colour tinged with a little black, then dividing a cup into two cups and topping them off with different colours, then using the resulting three related colours to paint a skein.

You may remember that I am off synthetic dye.  I had not intended to dye anything but rather knit more of my sweater, but a friend persuaded me to dye a spare cotton skein she had.  It went home with her.

I was asked recently why I avoid synthetic dye in my fibre arts.  I explained how I was influenced by the Fibershed project.  Later while I was at home finding links to the founder Rebecca Burgess' interviews to pass along, I watched one of the videos on YouTube about the 150 mile wardrobe.  It was a good refresher.  I still find the clothing and the philosophy meaningful and inspirational.

More Acquisition

Another week, another fibre festival.  I bought a fleece.  This is unusual for me.  I have limits and my rule is to buy wool that is at least washed if not processed.  Not to mention I've run out of places to stow fibre in the wool room.  However, the colour and texture was so very much my taste that I found myself standing in front of the fleece warding off other shoppers with my presence as I made up my mind.  The fact that it is a local product is a bonus.

Gotland fleece

I know that once it is spun into yarn, it will lose the contrast of silver against grey and thereby lose its beauty.  I know that I should have been satisfied with a photograph and left the fleece where it was.  But right now I don't care.  It is mine and my wool room is graced by it.

I helped people learn to use a spindle to spin yarn, and sent four people home with drop spindles and wool.  A couple of them, I let them struggle for a while.  They were trying to draft fibre after they'd allowed the twist to run up into the wool and lock everything up.  I was sitting beside them, spinning a little yarn or knotting handspun bracelets for kids, available but not intruding.  Finally I said, may I, and reestablished them at the place where the fibre drafted freely, winding the felted stuff onto the shaft out of the way.

I liked the setup of the demo area this year.  I was seated on my own between a table and a tent pole, with one empty chair beside me.  It was like a little nook.

Acquisitions

I haven't done much this past week, fibre-wise, except buy things.

Had the unexpected opportunity to buy the språng loom I borrowed before, so I took it.  May not be my taste in looks but it works and I don't have to take my chances trying to get a woodworker to understand what I want.  Plus I can fit it in the car and carry it with one hand, it was a good price, and språng looms are rare on the ground.

I got in the mail the most expensive textile I've ever bought, vintage Japanese hemp cloth dyed with indigo.  It cost about as much as a pair of pants, and is not large enough for making anything.  It is just for keeping and admiring.  The feel of it is crisp and intriguing.

Today there's a good prospect I'll be on the spot to help people try drop spindles.  I'm looking forward to it.

Foreign Parcel

I bought a copy of Fenny Nijman's Egyptisch Vlechten from the Netherlands.  It's a bit of a splurge, buying a book in Dutch, which I can't read, but it has pictures of finished objects and historical pieces in språng.

I tried making a pullover in språng.  The finished chest size came out at 76 inches unexpectedly, nothing like the small gauge swatch I made because it's harder to beat down a row on a wide warp and the rows are looser.  The piece looks better thrown across the back of a chair than it does on me.  At least I tried out false circular warp.

I made some stitch markers using fragrant beads I made from rose petals.  Here they are on my sweater.

rose petal beads

"Finish Him!"

My sweater is still very much an unfinished object and all urgency has gone from that project now that there is no deadline for it.  I have just done the armhole decreases on the back and that's all I have.

I am still using a kanban board to track the flow of work on my projects.  Each task is written on a card which I move left to right from the "ready column" to "in progress" to "done" by turns.  I'll get annoyed when a card is stationary too long, and do something about it.  The saying in kanban is, stop starting, start finishing.

I finished more Norwegian Sweet baby caps.  I assembled drop spindles that I painted with woad.  I posted YouTube videos that show someone processing dogbane and kudzu fibre, and someone spinning dogbane into yarn.  I pinned pictures of språng.  I dyed commercial yarn with tumeric and walnut.

Am glad I went to the kudzu fiber workshop.  Am probably cured of wanting to use kudzu.  Wasn't the smell of the composted vines, it was how little fibre came out of all that material.

I had another whack at the Tegle stocking språng pattern and still could not suss out the last few rows of the pattern repeat.  Oh, it's pretty though.