A Tale of Four Swatches

A Tale of Four Swatches

Happy FriYAY from a MUCH cooler, LESS humid Pittsburgh! The AC is off and the windows are open!!

Cranky Pants level has been dramatically reduced.

AND!!!

Dark Sky™ is forecasting temps in the 70’s next week, with overnight lows in the mid 50’s – low 60’s!!!! Funny how a little change in your surroundings can have such a huge impact on your emotional well-being (and FriYAY does not hurt either)!

That brings me to the Fiber portion of the post (if you are not a spinner, please feel free to skip ahead to the Friday Links below):

Last week’s yarn has become this week’s swatches, with some very interesting results! I knit up four swatches – two 2-ply swatches, and two single lace swatches. All yarns were washed in hot water with a little Soak Wash and laid flat to dry – they did not hang. The single yarns were fulled slightly by agitating them lightly in the hot water and plunging them into cold water. I repeated this process twice.

First up, the yarn spun and plied on my Matchless (details are here if you are interested):

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The first swatch with the finished plied yarn, the yarn bloomed some, but not so dramatically that it changed the weight of the yarn. The finished yarn is 27 WPI and 5.5 TPI. This swatch came in with a gauge of 8 stitches per inch and 11 rows per inch.

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The single yarn bloomed dramatically and ended up between 18-20 WPI and 1.25 TPI. It created a stiffer swatch, but it blocked out beautifully. Because I fulled the yarn, it has fairly good strength, however, it is still a fragile yarn. I do not think this yarn would wear well, but it does make a lovely open lace swatch.

Next, the spindle spun and plied yarns:

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The first swatch with the finished plied yarn, the yarn bloomed a bit, but this yarn was less consistent than the yarn spun on my matchless. The range of TPI went from 23 to 14, however, the TPI was consistent at 5. I knit both swatches on the same size needle (US4), and this swatch got 7.5 stitches per inch and 10 rows per inch. However, I like the fabric that I got with the Matchless spun and plied swatch much better. It is much more even and uniform.

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The second lace swatch with the finished single yarn is my favorite! The finished yarn has a little more twist (2 TPI) and it is consistent at 20 WPI throughout the skein. It created the most lovely, airy fabric! This fabric has beautiful drape, and it allowed for some aggressive blocking! While this yarn would not be perfect for a hard wearing garment, it would make a lovely shawl.

Now for those fabulous Friday Links:

That’s all I have this week, have an amazing FriYAY and an even better weekend! I will see you back here on Monday!

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Sock Spinning

Sock Spinning

I learned quite a bit during the 20+ days of Tour de Fleece – and one of the things I really honed in on was how to produce a 3-ply fingering weight sock yarn.

Actual fingering weight – not heavy fingering weight. But, fingering weight that will knit to gauge on a 1.5mm needle!

So, I had this Perendale from Sheepspot hanging around. Only one bump, so I divided the fiber in half and split each half into 3 sections – one for each ply. I almost have ½ of it spun up – so it is going fairly quickly. I am not spinning more than an hour or so in the evenings.

 

My goal with spin a more “striped” sock yarn – keeping the colorways intact and hopefully very little barber pole effect. I am not sure how much yardage I will get – I might have to figure out toe up socks!

I am also cruising along on Tales from the Isle of Purbeck. I am into the third chart and should be done with this very soon.

Friday Links:

(FYI: there are only 77 days until Rhinebeck, sweater weather is coming…)

Now for a bit of political bragging…feel free to skip if you are so inclined. However, no matter your political leanings, the fact that we have a woman nominated for the highest office in the land is something that we should all be proud of. Bravo America!!

That is all I have for this week – have a fantastic weekend!

A High Fiber Diet

A High Fiber Diet

I am in the home stretch of TdF2016 and I have had a fantastic time. The spinning has been varied and educational. While I have not spun that many yards (3570 yds to date, i.e. 2.02 miles) I have spun a variety of yarns. From worsted to woolen, including about 2100 yards of fingering weigh sock yarn!

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I am finishing up a nice lofty Coopworth currently, which will be done sometime tomorrow. I have decided that this will complete my tour and I will move back to my regularly scheduled knitting, which I have been largely ignoring over the past couple of weeks!

I need to get myself back on track for my Summer Knit Along because we are about to enter the home stretch for that as well!

I still have the following items that I need to complete:

  • 2 Jen Lucas Mystery Shawls
  • Triticum
  • Nahant
  • Pincha
  • Tales from the Isle of Purbeck
  • Puskinia sock mates for 2 bachelorette socks.

As you can see, there is quite a bit of knitting left to do! Panic might be setting in, but apparently I am easily distracted. I saw this stunning beauty and all I wanted to do was to drop everything and cast on. FYI, I have looked at yarn and I am strongly considering ordering something. I keep telling myself this will be the perfect prize knitting to start when I have completed the above list…

Friday Links:

That’s it, Gentle Reader, another week in the books – have a fantastic weekend and see you back here on Monday!

Spinning and Listening

Spinning and Listening

It’s Wednesday and that means it is Ginny’s Yarn Along today!

I am completely immersed in Tour de Fleece this year and enjoying it far more than I have in previous years. This year I am not keyed into logging miles of frenzied spinning, rather I am more focused on fiber and creating a yarn to highlight that. I finished spinning up the vintage batts from Deep, Deep Stash. My goal was a lofty, tweedy yarn and I think I achieved that! There is some sheen from the silk in the batts and the bits of silk noil have created the loveliest tweedy effect. The yarn is as squishy as the batts were and I wish you could feel it!

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I have started in on the Montadale, which I am spinning for socks, so this will become a 3-ply fingering weight yarn. Slow going, but enjoyable none the less!

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I am looking ahead to determine what to spin to finish the tour out – I will have this done this week and I only have the Coopworth remaining from my original selections.

I have 2 gradient bumps from Amy at Spunky Eclectic that I think I will finish out with. I am not sure I will get them both finished, but I will certainly try. My goal will be to spin this in a lace weight 2-ply.

I am almost finished listening to The Summer Before the War, which I am enjoying tremendously! Once I am done with this, I have Doc queued up, thanks Carole for that suggestion. I finished reading A Man Called Ove. What can I say about this book, if you have not read it – do so right now! Ove wormed his way into my heart and by the end of the book, I found myself longing to live next door to him. I did not want the book to end, despite the tears that would not stop through the last chapters. Fantastic writing! The reading this summer has been absolutely spectacular. I am still working through Big Magic, though it is losing that rosy glow it had when I started. It will be some work to finish it, but I will try. I should get a good bit of reading done again this week as Steve will be away for work from Thursday through Sunday.

I am knitting a row or two at night on the Mystery Shawl. I am almost done with the set up rows for the final clue – so the end is in sight! My goal remains, finish this by month end!

I would especially like to thank Kate Larson for the shout out today on the Spinning Daily Blog. It is truly an honor and deeply appreciated!

How is your summer reading and knitting (or crafting) going?

Weekend Meditations

Weekend Meditations

It was a rather somber weekend here in light of the news of the past week – it seemed a bit wrong to be overly excited about a weekend when you take into consideration the families whose lives were forever altered last week.

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But, there were meals shared and we caught up on The Great British Baking Show, which is perhaps the best cooking competition show ever.

There was spinning, which was most meditative.

There was a minute amount of knitting (3 rows on the last clue for the Mystery Shawl)

I crossed an item off my summer bucket list – I treated myself to a pedicure on Sunday and my feet are so happy about it!

I “taught” (Thanks YouTube!) myself some rudimentary crochet skills this weekend so I can make a little something for a certain someone who is turning ONE this month. To all those people who say it is much faster than knitting – these 2 squares took me hours to make. So, crochet for me is so not faster than knitting, so this is not likely to be completed before the big day. Also, instructions that have multiple country abbreviations are likely to cause problems. I have simplified the pattern (by printing out the US only instructions, omitting the UK instructions which are not the same but, really – why aren’t crochet terms universal?) Anyways, I think I am on track now, and I have started another block and it is full steam ahead!

Book Bingo Card

I also read and read and read! Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda. What amazing dialog, what fantastic photos! What incredible history! And, I am using it for a square on my Book Bingo – Nonfiction in a graphic novel format. Last week Carole helped me out with a suggestion for ‘A literary magazine or journal.’ I read the latest issue of The New Yorker as well this weekend. I am now sufficiently immersed in all things political (I hope you can read the sarcasm here as apparently, politics has become life as we know it!) I am also almost done with A Man Called Ove – I should have it finished tonight at the very latest. This has me excited, because I have some very good things in my Kindle queue!

Here is hoping that this week will be much kinder and gentler everywhere.

How was your weekend? Care to share?

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