I’m Knitting As Fast As I Can

Let’s begin with the last day.

On the last afternoon of the fiber festival, Margene, Teresa, Carole, and I took a dyeing class. The premise was to produce roving which, when spun up and then knit, results in two identical socks.

We wet two pieces of roving and set them out on a piece of plastic wrap, parallel to each other.

It was quite windy that afternoon and we had a difficult time keeping the plastic wrap from sticking to itself. Margene got frustrated and let loose a string of expletives, shocking the class (and herself) with her potty mouth:

After applying the dye, you wrap up the roving in the plastic wrap and steam it.

Here’s what mine looked like after steaming:

Then you remove the plastic wrap and set it out to dry:

The roving should be fun to spin up (yellow? what yellow?). However, I’m a dedicated pre-drafter so I might tear mine into strips and not worry so much about making 100% identical socks.

And where was Kim through all this?

I tell ya, that grrl.

I’m feeling a bit under the weather today but I wanted to respond to everyone who asked about the short rows I added by my Sitcom Chic.

Let me start by saying, this is not my original idea. It came, of course, from the master herself–Elizabeth Zimmermann.

One of the things I dislike about cardigans knit in one piece, either top-down or bottom-up, is that the front of the sweater always seems to hang slightly lower than the back. I don’t know if this is a result of the lack of “real” shoulder shaping on these types of sweaters or some other phenomenon. But I know that I don’t like the way it looks.

Enter Ms. Zimmermann to save the day.

In Knitting Around (a book that should be in every knitter’s library), she explains how to work short rows across the back of the sweater to keep the back from riding up. Basically, you knit to within 3-4 stitches of the side marker; wrap & turn; purl back to within 3-4 stitches of the other side marker; wrap & turn; and then just continue knitting around, picking up the wraps as you come to them. This adds a couple of extra rows to the back of the sweater and solves the problem of the front hanging lower.

EZ suggests repeating a total of 2-3 times, with a few inches between the repeats. For my Sitcom Chic, I worked the short rows 2 times, with only about an inch between the repeats. I worked the first short row about an inch after I finished the ribbing.

Now I’m off to take a little nap and try and shake this yucky cold/flu/allergy thing. But I do have a teaser photo for you:

I spun up this single-ply yarn a little more than 2 weeks ago and just finished knitting up the project for which it was destined. Now what could that project be???

Inspired by the scorching, 100 degree temperatures and humidity hovering around 15%, I decided to add a little heat to my spinning. After listening to Margene extol the virtues of wet finishing handspun, I pulled out a few of my earliest hanks to see if wet finishing would improve them.

Most of my early attempts at handspinning on the wheel were disappointing. My weakness was in the plying, not the spinning. In my defense, I later discovered there was a very rough, jagged spot on the inside of the orifice of my Schacht. So, the singles were getting caught on the sharp metal edge when I plied, resulting in an uneven take-up and less-than-smooth finished yarn. Although it took several emails back and forth, the customer service person at Schacht was able to diagnose the problem long-distance and I sent the flyer back to Schacht to have them grind the inside of the orifice. It was returned to me less than 2 weeks later and the problem was solved.

But, I still have several hanks of handspun that were plied before the orifice was repaired. These were the prime candidates for wet finishing.

Basically, I tied the hanks up in several places with cotton yarn, filled a basin with extremely hot soapy water, and plunged the hank into the water. Then I roughed the hank up a bit by agitating it slightly. I drained the basin and rinsed the hank in very cold water. Then I repeated.

I’m sold.

Here are some before and after photos.

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Before (a 4-ply, cabled yarn):

After:

Let’s be realistic–wet finishing won’t turn uber-crappy handspun into fantastic handspun, but the yarn is definitely softer and the wonky spots are evened out a bit.

I came a little close to felting one hank a bit too much so it’s definitely possible to end up with a huge, felted clump of yarn. I assume a hairy, easily felted fiber like mohair would not be a good candidate for this finishing technique for that reason. Or maybe not. Anyone tried that?