WnS Ep. 193: Shifty (FO) & Romney Spin (FO)
Dear Spinning Circle,
Live Stream: Saturday, April 3rd @ 8:30am PST
Direct YouTube link here.
Thank you for being here today, especially those who were able to make it to the Live Stream. I appreciate your time spent here in this place with me. You are most welcome. I hope you feel most welcome because you are welcome here.
Enjoy the show!
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There is a lot going on in our community! It’s a lot to cover and remind you of each week. Have a look here for more info!!
If you are curious about what happens in our community, please click the links below, reach out to me: rachel @ welfordpurls (dot) com, or reach out on Instagram/Ravelry/Slack (if you are a Patreon member, @welfordpurls_admin).
On & Off the Bobbins
Louet Romney in colourway Maize – Lendrum DT; 12:1; continuous backwards draw to mimic Plyology spin Hello Yarn Kent Romney 2-ply
Spunky Eclectic Gotland in “Thread Box” – Turkish spindle; 35gm; short forward with smoothing; low twist
On & Off the Needles
Finished Objects – Knitting
Shifty by Andrea Mowry
- slightly larger gauge on 3.5mm // US 4 needles; Westcoast Colour Falkland & Polwarth + Silk spins here, here & here
Hive Mind Mittens by Adrian Bizilia
- from Yarnitecture by Jillian Moreno
- Westcoast Wools BFL in reds, spun traditional 2-ply in Nov 2014
- Rankin Inlet Qiviut from Rebecca (@rebbiejaye), spun 50/50 with naturally coloured Merino, carded (content on this yarn coming later this month in How I Spin)
Community Participation
For April, share your favourite mitten pattern — share in the episode thread here or comment below here on YouTube!
Random number from Ravelry & YouTube chose Maria (@palmikkopuu) from Southern Finland! She says, We have had a very much snow this winter. Still some so we hope to go skiing today. Usually we have to stop in February. Last year we skiid only on our trip to notherern parts of Finland. The spring is now in the air and sun is warmer and days are longer. The birds sing with a new inspiration. Yesterday I saw two white swans on white snow. They looked awesome.
Breed & Colour Studies – Shetland
Jackie shares via Ravelry: Here is my first yarn in the study. I started with the white braid. I split the colors to keep them separate to make 2 ply mini skeins. I knit the Leftie shawl using a commercially spun Romney in white to highlight the handspun leaves. Here are the results of the second braid. I split it in half horizontally and then split in 2 lengthwise and 4. I knit up a hat to see the color progression.
Kaitlin (@MakeronaMission) shares via Ravelry: I’ve finished my second pair of yarns for the study and I’m so pumped about how it’s turning out! I was definitely dubious about the yellow/orange/blue combination on this brighter base. My original sample was especially garish, but I knew I wanted to push myself to make a barber poled yarn, so I stuck with it. It may not be my favorite yarn on its own, but paired with the rest of the set, it’s wonderful! I especially love the white skein, which is what I originally envisioned when I set out on this project. It was easier than expected to create the look I wanted, and I will definitely be making yarns like it again! I am working on spinning a consistent weight across all 6 of my yarns (2 to go!). It was easier to control my spinning on the moorit braids, since the fiber was rougher and a bit more sticky. The white turned out to be very smooth and wispy, which made it happy to draft but not so much easy to control. The finished texture is much softer than the moorit, which isn’t surprising since the starting fiber had fewer guard hairs and short cuts, as well as being softer to the touch. All 4 yarns together! So far, the darker colors still make my heart sing, while the brighter colors don’t inspire me as much. The idea of “swapping” a bit of two colorways as a way to tie them together for a project is really interesting to me. It’s a different take on combo spinning, in a way. I wonder how it would look with two dyed colorways, instead of one dyed and one natural? (Follow up post with more info about what she did here).
Alison (@abigbee) shares via Ravelry: I wanted to see the effects of the white undyed and moorit undyed base on each of the colored bases (white/moorit/oatmeal). I stripped the 2oz braids of each base into 4 1/2oz strips. The first 1/2 ounce strip from each base I plied into a 3ply DK yarn…I love how the color turned out! I then created 3 2 ply yarns using a 1/2oz strip of each base + a 1/2oz strip of the white undyed Shetland. The 2ply White on White base created a big color difference from the other 2ply yarns but the difference between the Colored Moorit base/white undyed Shetland and the Colored Oatmeal base/white undyed Shetland was very much more subtle! I think, to my eye at least, that the browns/reds/and possibly the blue/purples are slightly more vibrant in the moorit base (the middle yarn of the picture below) and the oatmeal base created a 2 ply yarn with more of a grayish cast! The difference is so subtle to me that I don’t know whether to continue to ply the 3 different bases with the moorit undyed Shetland that I have or just move on and create another 3ply yarn using all 3 colored bases together again…I will have to think on this I plan to create a 3 ply with the white and moorit undyed Shetland and make either a Shift Cowl or a Shiftalong Hat and mittens to match using all the yarns above.
Handspun Sweater Makers
Tracey (@Trace44) shares via Ravelry: Finally decided to use up some of my “precious” handspun, you know those skeins that look just so pretty and need just the “right” project, and just for the “right” recipient? Of course I had to hold a strand of mohair with the handspun #teammohair lol Well the time came ….my grandson, another on the way, and my friends children. Worthy recipients and mothers! Patterns are Flax for the brown and green sweaters and Making Tracks for the pink one.
Claudia(@clotricots) shares via Ravelry: You all make me want to spin enough for a sweater. This is my first sweater using some handspun (only the contrast color). I’m not at the stage where i feel like i can spin for a full one yet but i’ll get there!
Natural Shades Along
Sarah (@TheRedStarfish242) shares via Ravelry: I’ve been prepping and spinning a Shetland x Finn fleece. I’m planning to 3-ply for a sweater. Spun longdraw on my CPW.
Marce (@heybrownberry) shares via Slack: My playtime with Manx Loaghtan really took a good turn last night. I sat down to read the new PLY magazine, which is about double-coated fleeces. In the first full article I read, there was a line that completely changed my whole path for prepping this bundle of locs! It suggested that for locs that include wool and hair, it may help to roll the fiber off of hand carders perpendicularly (from the short edge of the carder) instead of parallel (from the long edge). I tried it and it made for such a much smoother drafting experience on the spindle!! I’ve been playing with this fleece a bunch in the last few days, and things are starting to “click” a bit.
Luxury Fibres Along
Barbl (@bbtoo) shares via Ravelry: I already finished spinning and swatching my cashmere sample. I purchased the fiber along with other luxury fibers from martinasloveforwool.de in germany, I really liked to spin it at a ration of 20:1, longdraw, from the cloud, 2ply. The fibers were very fine (14-18 mic.). I actually prefer durable yarns, but I really like the softness and delicacy of the cashmere yarn. As I wanted to knit something usable with it, I combined it with my sample of sari-silk and knit a little brioche shawl. Although the silk (9g = 84m) is half as thick as the cashmere (20g = 80m), I feel that both yarns come out beautifully in the shawl. Researching on the internet about cashmere fiber I learned, that there are different qualities depending on where the fibers come from. The main producers of cashmere fibers are China and Mongolia. Chinese fibers are softer but shorter than Mongolian. As cashmere goats can cause invironmental damage there are governmental projects in Mongolia to prevent that and produce organic certified fibers.
Laura (@soapturtle) shares via Slack: Since luxury study is moving into qiviut, I’m going to share my qiviut story so you can laugh at me.My husband, while born in Wisconsin (Go Pack!) moved to Alaska when he was 3 and grew up there. My MIL dabbles in crafting. My knit/crochet led to her picking it up again. I got my wheel for xmas 2006, and she found out about my spinning and mentioned qiviut. I had no idea what it was but she said (direct quote!) “I’ve always wanted to knit some qiviut before I die.” Now, I don’t know about you, but when your future MIL says something like this, and qiviut yarn isn’t really a readily available thing anywhere at the time, but if you call around you can maybe get some fiber…. you’re going to try to make that happen. So on my husbands recommendation, I called University of Alaska Fairbanks Large Animal Research Station because the Oomingmak site didn’t have anything available, and “LARS has them, give them a call” because they were the only other source you could buy from at the time or something. I ordered 2 ozs of cleaned fiber, and I think it cost around 80 dollars or so. Needless to say, I was not ready to spin this. It was way beyond my skill level and the expense of the fiber scared me. I just knew I was going to ruin it. I didn’t spin it up until Oct 2014. I didn’t enjoy the spin because I hate short forward, and I chain plied it because it was so very thin, and I wanted my MIL to be able to knit with it comfortably. I give you 2oz/175 yds of heavy lace/ light fingering qiviut. I hated it so much that this is the only photo I have of it. My MIL said she made an infinity scarf out of it that she wears around the campfire at night (full time RV lifestyle retirement).
Elizabeth shares via Slack: Finished with the sampler box! I spun the silks short backward draw and the silk-cashmere from the fold.I am really happy with these. I learned a lot. The difference in each of the silk is so interesting. Both in the spinning process and in the feel of the finished yarn. I spun the bombyx first and found it really challenging. But I wonder if I were to spin more of it now, after spinning the other silks, would I find it much easier? The eri silk might be my favorite.This has really inspired me to branch out. My local yarn store has some silks and silk blends. I picked up a cotton/silk blend and silk hankies to try out.
Handspun Knitting
Sarah shares via Slack: I had some bulky weight Southdown in my stash that I dyed, spun and chain plied some time last year. I fancied a quick project so I improvised these rather mismatched mitts with it.
Thank you so much for joining me today!
Until then, Happy Spinning!
