Spinning Guild Gathering

Jenny and I drove to Connecticut yesterday because the Nutmeg Spinning Guild was having a speaker - Abby Franquemont who is the guru of all things fibery and spinnery, most particularly spindle-y. It was a 2-hour drive each way (less because I drive fast) so we had great visit time in travel, and enjoyed our time there.

The first thing that hit me was how diverse a culture can be when it has an interest in common.

There was a woman who reminded me of Annie Oakley, dressed in this amazing outfit that from the top down, was a well-worn suede prospector's hat, leather vest, blousson sleeves and braids. Another was in full burka (there were two men in the room, I think husbands, though one was working a spindle). Some of us look like yuppies, stressing the "young" part, and others of us are clearly grandma age. NOTHING separates women who have interests in common, particularly something like spinning.

I can't count the number of wheels people brought to take advantage of quiet listening time, or spindles. Lots of projects underway in that room, all the while listening to Abby chatting about the fiber-industry small village in Peru where she grew up as well as some fascinating history of the fiber arts, and even the somewhat sad note that fiber arts are disappearing.

Abby said one thing that really stuck in the minds of both Jenny and me. It applies to way more than spinning. It was along the lines, "Don't scoff at the proverbial hand knit dish cloth. Things like that can seem so unimportant and trite that no one records it. Some day there might be no one who can bring it forward because no one bothered to write it down."





One wheel was really worth photo time. I'm finding that I am a total tradition-bound wheel afficionada. I know there are others out there, but for me, Kromski, Kromski, Kromski! The turned legs, posts, the styling. And my favorite style overall (which I just got informed Kromski makes) is the Fairy Tale design. I just can't get behind anything made of plywood or plastic, no matter how efficiently it spins.

But there was one exception. A woman who was sitting right next to me had the most amazing wheel. I wish I could remember the name of the woman who made these... my neighbor said she's in her 70s, and has had health issues so apparently is not making wheels anymore, but she made them herself and then decorated them with pressed flowers.

Here is one of her wheels.



Here it is showing the pressed flowers, in close-up.



Okay, so when we walked through the door, I was still filling out my name tag when Jenny had already landed upon a vendor (Painted Sheep) who was set up just down the row. She had amaaazing roving for sale. Having sworn that I was done, done, done with fiber purchases for a while, I bought three tops. I mean, who could resist THESE!



Jenny had showed me the red/brown top and the more blueish of the two multi's that follow which she had already discovered and was buying, but seeing a slahering mom who's gravitated increasingly beyond 2-toned roving, she had no objection to my getting the same red and one of the multi's below. As for the red/brown, duplicates like that are just fine because we can both spin the same fiber and, as it goes, two spinners, two treatments... they won't look the same. As for the blueish toned top, while she will head in one direction with hers, I'm headed elsewhere. I saw a close neighbor colorway and my own interest was in combining them. If fibers are the same as two others I bought last week, I might combine the red/brown with those as well.

Two different colorways, but do these just belong together, or what!


There was one spindle vendor there who had an assortment of fascinating spindles, including some of Tabachek's Russians, complete with spinning bowls. I'm not good enough for those yet, but some day might branch off. Meanwhile, though I'm holding out for a Bosworth for a lighter weight spindle (to be hand choosen at the NH Fiber Festival in May), what I have been flirting with is the idea of getting a plying spindle. These are bigger and heavier, with a LONG shaft because plied yarns eat up shaft space fast. She didn't have any on display, and said any spindle "can" be used for plying (obviously)... but then she remembered, she actually did have one. In her bag. Not on display.

I'm fussy, I always want choices. But I really liked her plying spindle! It's huge. So it's slow. But it's beautiful, and not at all what I would normally be attracted to. I don't particularly like light woods, and I gravitate toward very traditional wood grain patterns. Nothing flashy. Well, this is flashy. It's Curled Maple, which I've never heard of.

But it speaks for itself.





The shaft is Curled Maple also.



It dwarfs my Kundert, and a Kundert is not a small spindle (2.5" whorl, 8+" shaft). This has a 3" whorl and a 9.5" shaft. It is not all turned together, shaft and whorl (my strong preference) but I just liked it.



After buying it, I spun a length of fiber they gave me, specifically to ply it then and there. Best I can describe, without knowing how other plying spindles act... it's slower. (Chug, chug, chug.) That may or may not be a good thing to the extent it is. I have a feeling it might be a VERY good thing from one standpoint. Its speed suggested that it might be an advantage for control. I tend to ply tightly. This might open up a whole new challenge for me -- more even plying, and slower gear to get it.

What actually came to my mind right off? I told Jenny that this is like driving a 1950 Chevy. Compared to a 2000's Honda. Again, for a plying spindle, particularly since I do tend to ply pretty tightly, that might be a good thing.

Okay, too many days like this I can't afford. $40 in fiber (THAT is a good deal), $42 for spindle (not sure about that if it's not one turned piece, but jury's out on how I interact with it), $20 attendance fee... plus a tank of gas. Yeah, too many of these days I can't afford. But all bets are off with the NH Sheep & Wool Festival coming up in May! On Mother's Day no less. I can't think of a better Mother's Day than going to a big fiber festival with my daughter. It just doesn't get better than that.

The Dragon Has Arrived.

It did NOT come Saturday. I waited until I knew Saturday's mail had been distributed into the boxes, and I called them. This is a small town post office. I know everybody there. Glen answered, who never gets upset when I ask him to check my box as long as I only do it when something really serious is on the way. He said no yellow "get-something-from-the-front-desk" notices were in there. I told him maybe someone forgot to put one in my box. Could he check the shelves? He said he knew what was in the selves. Nothing for me. And yes, he anticipated, all the mail and packages had been distributed. It just wasn't there. Accept it.

So Monday, there was the yellow card. Two of them. One from the seller of this top, and another from the seller of the other four. It was raining. I got it all out to my car, and right there in the parking lot, I opened "the" box. I was prepared for a big disappointment. I mean, my monitor is pretty right on. So much so that it's probably 7 years old and one of those huge, heavy (21") Hitachi types before thin monitors were even thought of yet. And I won't replace it. It's that good. But cameras are involved, photo lighting is involved. It might not be anything near what I saw on the shop's listing.

Oh...Migod. It was EVERYTHING I saw. And more! It was The Dragon! I could photo it all day long, inside, outside, in the sun, under my best indoor lighting, and I would not get a better shot than the seller's two, in my previous post.

The shine is serious. But it's not gaudy. This fiber needs to be spun... like gold. Looking at it, I really hate words like "savor" and "morsel" but I seriously considered bypassing Dunkin Donuts for iced coffee, and even the market for needed things... so I could get it back home to my spindle. But I needed the iced coffee and the stuff at the store. At least part of the list, so I settled for that. I got two extra plastic bags because I didn't want any rain getting on this fiber.

After staring at it some more, only now under the light I'm used to, I pulled off about 4 inches of the wine end, just seeing how it separates. I snagged it on my spindle, and spun a few twists with my fingers which is how I start off. Now I'm thinking of how ancient grooms must have felt when lifting their newly bought brides' veils. "You are MINE!" Mwaaaaaaaaa-hahahaaaa! I parked and drafted. No way I'm going to not savor the first of how it drafts. I had to know everything I could about how this fiber releases, with full attention on that. Then how it twists as I spin it. I did about two yards, then set it down so I could just think about it some.

Okay, thought process... as much as I want to start on this, as I've been writing this post so far, I'm deciding I'm going to spin the 4th top my last post also shows, first. The beautiful teal merino-tencel blend that sent me searching for other same-blend listings to get more info on the blend and any spinning notes in the first place, whereupon I discovered this roving. Yup.

Yup, yup, yup. Any ancient groom who wanted a wife who wouldn't start scowling at him right quick would have known what he was about before doing much more than lifting a veil. Okay, the pressure's off. I'm gonna spin that seriously pretty green fiber first and see what its same-blend secrets are. Tencel is totally different.

So maybe I'll rent a safety deposit box for The Dragon while I'm doing that?

Fiber Buying MANIA!!!

Well, first I bought THREE freaking tops. Just liked all three. They're all merino or BFL and I like spinning both of those.

Meanwhile, there was a 4th I was VERY intrigued with, but that one was 50/50 Merino/Tencel blend. I saw a lot of glimmer to the roving, which made me think slippery. I contacted the seller, and she loves to spin that blend, but she uses a wheel. Drop spindles can be quite different.

Here's that top, I just loved this colorway.



So I went on a search on Etsy, hoping to find other sellers with the same blend, one of whom might say how it is to spin on a drop spindle. That's all I was after, honest.

Whereupon I ran across this amaaaaaaaazing roving. I clicked on it, and said, "SHEEEEUT! What the hell IS that! I just stared at it. I truly didn't know what to make of this colorway. It is so totally off the charts in terms of anything I've bought so far. I stared at it some more. At one point, I thought, "This is a love/hate thing." But I just kept looking at it.

Time out! Years ago, when Jenny was just a little thing (2nd grade or less) we had bought a Nintendo. We got Super Mario Bros. with it. Well, I played that with Jenny, and we could get to the 4th part of the first level maaaaybe. But that was it. So this is a thing that kind of grows on you. Well, one day I came home from tennis and thought I'd have a little rest before showering and getting out of my tennis duds. So I grabbed a cup of coffee and put on Super Mario Bros. Well, I really got on a roll with this thing. I mean, I kept dodging the bullets, the bangs, the zaps. I was so ridiculously into it by this point (I mean wired from all that fast reacting, like... sitting at the edge of my chair with this maniacal gleam in my eyes, lips peeled tight in anticipation of yet another thing to come bouncing across the screen to get me). And I got through levels we hadn't even SEEN yet! Suddenly, I heard that suspense music that happens when you're going to another level. But now there was something a little more shrill about it. That meant only one thing. I was headed somewhere BIG!
Whereupon, I got plunked down into this Living Hell Place. I was just absorbing that when, all of a sudden, this HUGE FREAKING TERRIFYING DRAGON popped out of nowhere and started coming at me. FAST! With everything it had! I couldn't help it. I screamed! I mean, in real life, sitting in the family room, I totally screamed. LOUD!!! Freaking loud!! Somewhere in the back recesses of my mind it registered that if the neighors were home they'd come running out of their house, calling hysterically over the fence, maybe even jumping it, because that was no normal scream. But meanwhile this dragon was wasting no time. Fire shooting out of its mouth, with this loud, terrifying "Whooooooosh" sound you NEVER want to hear anywhere near you. And its eyes were gleaming. RED! I could see right away that I'd obviously have to jump over this recessed pit, and it led God Knew Where and my timing would have to be perfect. I mean, now the veins were popping out in my temples, my heart was racing and my hand was clapped over my mouth in horror, but there was no time for that, all sorts of crap was being hurled at me. But I just had to see more of that dragon.

Well, I just freaked. I put the whole program on Pause, because I had to think this over. I went into the bathroom, not to pee. But to stare at myself in the mirror, and I said, "OH MY GAWD! WHAT the FUCK do I do with THAAAAT!!!! Out loud. And no neighbors were pounding on the door.

Okay, now that did NOT happen when I saw this fiber. Trust me. I'm a totally sane person. Pfffffft. But for some reason this fiber made me think about that day.

Here it is.
Is this amazing or whaaaaaaaaaaaat!



And another view.



I mean, fiber doesn't get dyed like this. Look at the deep teal, and deep wine. The other odd colors in there. The gold. I didn't know what to make of it. I had to buy it. Even if that fiber had been so expensive that it meant living on lentils (with no bacon) for a year, I had to buy it.

So now I'm resisting setting up camp in front of the door of the post office until Sat. morning like Snoopy's little friend sits in front of the dryer waiting for his bankie. I've sure looked at a lot of fiber, I mean for hours. Nothing like this exists. I'm either going to love it. Or hate it. Just like with that dragon.

Comparisons between 1st and 3rd batch, HAH!

Okay, still working on the Verdant colorway. As my ability to draft Jenny's technique (pretty much a standard technique you see in experienced youtube videos) gets better, my yarn gets thinner.

I wanted to check this as I went, so even though I'm no where near through that 4 oz. of roving, I've done it in three batches.

First batch and the Third batch, side by side.



Here's just the third.

A Thinner Spinner - Verdant Merino

Well, Jenny's drafting technique has gotten some practice, and it does make you tend to spin finer, which I'm just wanting to do with this spin anyway. I'm learning the yarn plumps up when it's off the spindle, plus plying it seems to make it do that more because, as Jenny said, plying takes some of the spin out.

I wasn't too sure about this colorway once I got into it, it seemed all I was spinning was dark blue. I wasn't sure, either, about spinning quite as fine a thickness as this was turning out to be, so stopped at just under an ounce, plied the yarn (amazed... 90 yards of singles, 45 yards of plied obviously, but all that out of less than an ounce?)

This time I used the expected penny reference. This yarn looks a lot like the Printemps EXCEPT it's a whole lot darker and more intense hues, through and through. It does not feel like I'm duplicating, at all. I'm really liking it!

The thinnest (plied) seems to be 14wpi. A super thick stretch comes out to 8wpi. I'm likely to average it out for purposes of patterns, etc. at 10-12. Or, as a lot of spinners seem to say, "Somewhere between DK and Worsted Weight."

I STILL don't have consistent thickness, but waaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAY more so in this spin than before. At least that's how it looks to me when I go through the 22 strands I have on the niddy noddy in various places in the skein.

So that's progress!!

Ta Daaaa.... My First Cowl

This is my first try at a simple pattern modification. I loved the stitching in the cowl designed by NovaMade, but she has the neck for a bulkier cowl (plus finer yarn) so I tried my hand at some changes...

1. Less bulk under my chin, so closer fitting there;
2. Yet a little spread out as it went down toward my chest so it would lie flat;
3. I wanted the scallops that her pattern creates to be at the top edge; and
4. Since I would be knitting this on bigger needles with fatter yarn, I didn't want the larger size holes from using a Yarn-Over.

At first I was clueless where I'd plug in increases as the cowl progressed, but my gut said to leave the straight stitching alone and put the increases in the diagonal ribby-sort of stitching, so I put them in the center of that, switching WHICH center-ish stitch each time. As for the holes, I tried what I THOUGHT was a M1 instead of the YO on a swatch, and got a nice smaller hole. Well, it turned out I made a mistake in "M1" but that mistake is actually a real stitch, called an "Eyelet." So that worked out.

As for the RATE of increase to get the right spreading out over shoulders, measuring my body's rate of increase there with a tape measure was next to impossible, so I just winged it. I'm going to try it like this a couple of wearings, and if I decide it "must" lie flat, it'll be a little frogging time, that's all.

So here it is on the table...



And here it is on me with nostrils cropped out because this was definitely an up-the-nose shot (easy to get when you're photo-ing yourself).



Now looking like an "angry Arab" from self-shooting (hence concentrating), these photos were as good as I could get under the circumstances.



And a sorta side view. I discovered two things here -- if you stand in front of a mirror and point the LCD screen at the mirror, duh, you can see what's in the LCD screen; and (2) is it reeeeeally necessary to concentrate on the LCD screen to THAT degree?



Okay now HERE is the original idea of what I was aiming for. (I had to hold it stretched because since I started the increases so late, it won't lay this way naturally.



As for the stitch pattern itself? I really love it! Here are some shots of its construction that show off NovaMade's design. And, of course, that neat bind-off that Jenny showed me.



Here's a shot of the increases I added. As mentioned, I picked the slanted part rather than the straight stitching part of the pattern. I have a feeling that turned out to have been the right choice.



And here's what it looks like overall when it's first being started. I'm only including this WIP photo because it just looks like it could spark the imagination of more experienced knitters... for something. The main imagination it sparks for me is back in grammar school we starched things with a strong sugar-water solution. Since this looks like a Queen's Crown AND all that sugar would surely attract bees, it made me think if you were to make a crown and starch it that way, you'd have to name it the Queen Bee crown.



So hopefully it'll lie right under jackets as is, in which case I'll give up the original plan to have it spread out because that many increases would once again be total guesswork.

Now back to that hat shown below, and trying to make it look less like a fancy toilet paper roll cover.

2nd Hat, 3rd Spin (Will partially frog, but learning!)

Hats go fast once you know what you're doing. (I say that on blind faith because I don't yet.) The way the swatch from this spin knitted up though, I figured I'd get this same distinct striping on the hat, but that was a different part of the spin, it's less distinct on the hat.

First, here's the swatch, it's a BIG swatch, knitted on 10.5, 11 and 13 needles, a couple inches each. So is this kickass yarn or what!! The fiber I spun it from is Printemps colorway, hand-dyed by Erica (Squoosh is her store name on Etsy). LOVE that colorway!!



Okay, as for the hat. Bear in mind that I'm not going off a pattern with my hats, but from a general design-your-own guide that touts it's for "knitting any hat, any yarn, any size needles." Since this guide prescribes knitting from the top down, you really can design and size it as you go. That really appealed to me.

It would help to know what I'm doing, but I don't have the experience for that yet, so I've become very much at peace with serious swatch knitting AND with frogging.

Anyway, the general instructions say that for a pullover Beanie, stop the increases that happen in the top circle at about 5-10% less than your head size. For a Pillbox design, make the circle the same size as your head measurement. And for a Tam a/k/a Beret, make your top circle 2-4 inches bigger.

Beyond that, you're on your own. I'd ORIGINALLY planned on a beret for this spin because that would show off the yarn variations best. However, after 40 Ravelry pattern search pages of "beret," only one looked like I'd like it, and there was no pattern. The rest all hugged around people's foreheads with no hair able to be showing (NOT a look I can wear!) I got the feeling that all berets are going to do that though, so figured, "Pfffffft. Abandon the whole beret idea."

So not knowing which of the other two I'd want to make, I tried to straddle the middle of the two remaining suggested circumferences (beanie calling for 20" and the pillbox calling for 22"). I settled at 21" in hopes of ending up with a "convertible" hat that I could wear as a beanie OR as a pillbox.

First, here's the hat modeled on a 21" tube-shaped bowl. It's to show the 3 rows of garter stitching I threw in after I stopped the increase circle. (This was meant to be a design element if worn as a beanie AND to enhance the pillbox effect if worn as a pillbox hat).

But Voila! I now know how to make a toilet paper roll cover!!


Okay, so here it is as a pillbox hat, with a cuff.



Another Pillbox shot...



And if it gets pulled a LITTLE downward more, it would be a semi-pillbox.


Now for what it would look like with that garter stitch "design element" left in if pulled down more and worn as a beanie...


Another shot...



And a shot that shows the 3 rows of garter stitch (which I'm not yet sure about at all)...



So if I keep this design, I'm going to frog UP TO the decrease row and remove half the decreases because the hat's just a TAD snugger than I like.

I'm also considering two other changes. One is ADDING a single row of garter between the 2" of stockinette and where the ribbing starts. (This "design your own" idea is both a good and a bad thing. Good once you know what you're doing, but frog-prone if you don't. Like me.) The other possibility is to frog all the way up to the 3 rows and just remove them.

I'm waiting for Jenny to get back from their kickass sounding vacation in California to give me her opinion on several questionable elements, which opinions are almost always right. Meanwhile, though, any modifications whatsoever will get parked until I spin the rest of this fiber and make sure I have enough yarn for a cowl because I'm thinking the cowl Peggy found takes priority. If it needs enough yarn so all I can get for a hat is the barest minimum beanie with no cuff, then I'm willing. I want the cowl.

Peggy is a fierce researcher, and she went on a hunt for cowls, I think just because we were emailing about them and they seem like a super neat thing, except so many of them look like the neck pieces of moon walking astronauts! She landed on a blog where not only did she find some neat cowls, but the one that really caught my eye was this woman's own design, and she was nice enough to post her pattern! The one Peggy favors is much more plain, but it very well might be the best one for this yarn, because anything that'll show off its natural variations... that's ideal.
___________

I'm now test-knitting the cowl I liked with a skein of cheapo Walmart acrylic. (Very harsh color changes but at least it shows the general idea.) I'm hoping that the softer color changes in my spin will look better in this design, but it sure is smacking of a pattern that lends itself to a solid color yarn (sob, sob, sob).