European vacation, Part 3--In which I buy yarn and acquire fiber!!!

Thursday, May 5–We drove to Hauwert to see Annie and Jan. Annie was sure I’d get lost as it’s difficult to remember exactly which left turn to make after passing “Whoville” (a housing development that looks exactly like something Dr. Suess would think up. Where WERE the architects brains that day?). We were only 2 minutes late! Annie treated us to fresh coffee and cake, a walk through Medemblijk with a stop for lunch (brie on crusty bread, sparkling iced tea). When I mentioned that I couldn’t find stroopwafels in the supermarket where we used to shop in 2007, they stopped at the local Deen supermarket where I cleaned out the shelves. I am the Stroopwafel Blackmarket Maven! Then we drove over to Hoorn to see our friend Wilbert who owns Shouten Handwerken–you’ll have to check Annie’s blog for pix. Somehow, 2 skeins of sock yarn jumped into my hands and went home with me? The purple/pink Trekking Handart sock was started in Belgium--I looove it.

Friday, May 6–While we were getting ready to leave Akersloot, the front desk called to say my friend was waiting out front for me. She had about 3 kilo of Belgian flax for me stuffed in her bicycle saddlebags! Since it's considered an agricultural product, we could not take it in our suitcase (and it's just too much to fit in there without leaving clothes behind). On Monday morning, we stopped at the Belgian post office and mailed the flax home after much hand-waving and sad attempts at saying "Customs declaration" with a French accent. It cost 25 Euro (about $36) to mail home and it arrived quickly, although the side of the box was completely destroyed by US Customs and then taped back up with 2 (ONLY TWO!) strips of tape.

flax fibers against a black Prismatic pencil to show fine-ness

We hopped in the car about 9:30am and drove south through the Netherlands, heading for Belgium via Maastricht. Arriving around 4 at the Hostellerie du Cerf, we unpacked, washed up and had a lovely gourmet dinner accompanied by a local white wine. This dinner was just the beginning of a week of yummy delights cooked up by our host/chef.

The garden, 'our' chairs

The back of the establishment

Next: piles of rocks, we are adopted by dogs

Our Idaho adventure and Posy Toes spinning

We returned home last weekend and had a ton of stuff waiting for us--unpacking, washing laundry, mowing the overgrown lawn, making more arrangements for FIL to move in, etc, etc. I took a good number of photos for artistic inspiration and hope to have a new line of fiber batts based on the hot springs, geyser pools, and lichens that abound in Idaho. For a relatively dry state, I'm amazed at the amount of color that nature manages to squeeze out of the environment. Here's a teaser:



Work progresses on the Posy Toes Caladium batts. I've got almost a full bobbin.



I usually spin half the fiber on one bobbin, half on another bobbin, and ply them against themselves. I'm still trying to decide if I want a 2-ply like the others or if I want to Navaho-ply these to preserve the color gradations because I like them so much. Making a 3-ply would mean changing the sock knitting pattern as the yarn will be considerably thicker. We'll see.......

How to Spin My Posy Toes Batts--Sweet Peas

I apologize for being a few days late with the blog post. I ate some eggplant on Monday that didn't agree with me and have been sick for several days. It was not wasted time, as I started work on a Christmas present--can't say who or what because they will read my blog and spoil the surprise. At any rate.....

For the second technique and pair of socks, I chose the Sweet Peas colorway because....well, I just wanted purple and deep pink socks! And I know that the worsted technique described on my handout as 'stripping the batt lengthwise' will yield long repeats of color. I usually spin up 1-1/2 batts onto a bobbin and then ply it on itself from a center-pull ball, then repeat for the second 1-1/2 batts. This mixes the colors in a way that I enjoy. I started by unrolling the batt on my dining room table.



Then I split the batt down the middle, leaving about 1-2" still joined.



I then split each of those halves in half again in the same direction, leaving a join at the ends. With this batt, I split the batt so each color would have just a bit of the next color included. Once I have 4 sections split, I start from the other end and split those 4 in the opposite direction, leaving a join at each of those ends. When finished, you should have 8 sections of the batt pulled apart lengthwise like a series of Z's. When I was a kid we used to cut a piece of paper in this fashion and open it up to make a long 'rope' of paper (we were easily amused kids).



The next step is to attenuate these Z's into a useable 'top' and rolling it into a ball. Starting at one end, with your hands about 5" apart, gently start to seperate the fiber as though you're drafting to spin. Actually, you ARE predrafting the fiber. Doing this makes spinning a fine yarn much easier as most of the work is done for you before you sit down at the wheel.



This is the yarn I've spun up on the first bobbin. This bobbin has been plied and the sock begun, but we'll talk about that next week.



I'd like to end with a little philosophy I learned in the last few months. As you've heard me mention ad nauseum, we've moved into the family home which my oldest brother occupied for many years. He managed to alienate himself from just about everyone and almost lost his life because of it. He had a 45-year long argument with the next-door neighbor who wanted him to cut down the walnut trees, and they haven't been on speaking terms for 20 years. It was this neighbor who called the EMS when the wife noticed that my brother had not been out of the house for 3 days, and she thereby saved his life. Tonight I delivered homemade soup and muffins to them because she's had a hip replacement and can't be on her feet long enough to cook (no, her husband can't cook--he can't even boil water!). And WE haven't cut down the walnut trees either, although we did have them trimmed thoroughly, and they've stopped asking us to cut them down. It was so simple to have a conversation about pruning the branches that hung over their yard and solve the problem instead of the name-calling and silence that had ensued for 45 years on BOTH sides of the fence. Life is too short to hold grudges and hate people (unless they're dangerous). Most problems are solvable with good communication; silence is the weapon of the truly stupid, and it NEVER works the way they think it will.

Off my soapbox and on to the knitting.....

Temporary hiatus

I haven't posted for 12 days, shame on me you say? But, but, but.....I have a good reason! We've stepped into high gear on finishing the 18-month-long renovation and getting ready for the upcoming household move, and I can't seem to keep a straight thought in my head any more. Had to send the hubster out to threaten the carpenter today because I was busy chasing down the last 2 cans of matching paint for our interior trim--company changed their line of paint when I wasn't looking, humph! I certainly shouldn't be at a spinning wheel trying to make fine evenly spun sock yarn if I can rarely drive one block without thinking of 3 things I forgot to do and almost driving into oncoming traffic!

So.....posts on spinning sock yarn will be sparse or nonexistent for a bit. I'm cleaning, painting and packing boxes. But I'm definitely thinking about how to spin the next batts. I just can't manage it right now. Will hopefully post pix of packing/moving soon!

How to Spin My Posy Toes Sock Batts AND Hiking Pix!

The Snake Plant yarn is finished.

It was spun on the 16:1 whorl of my Bosworth Journey Wheel, as will all the sock yarns in this series. I like to put a lot of twist in my sock yarn and then ply it tightly so it wears longer.

The sock has been started, and I can see the subtle variation between the forest green and the teal colors. The tan seems to be mixing in well--I wanted it to appear serendipitously in the sock. Hopefully I'll have the time this coming week to start spinning the Sweet Peas colorway.


On another subject altogether.....
We went out early this morning to a local park, Raccoon Creek State Park. The Audubon Trail is at it's peak at the end of April and I LOVE wildflowers!










Trout Lily and May Apples

About 9:30 we heard honking and saw a pair of Canada geese calling for their buddies to join them. After a bit they flew off and circled the area a couple of times before heading out to their destination.










"Hey Mable, it's time to leave!" and a Trillium

By 10:30am I was getting pretty sweaty walking around in the valley, but it was so worth it. sigh....If only I had the time and enough colored wool to interpret all these flowers in sock batts.














A hillside of Virginia Bluebells and Carpets of tiny white flowers










Virginia Bluebells and Wild Phlox

Spinning Sock Yarn--Twist and Ply

While 2-ply yarns is just fine for socks, you may want to consider 3-ply, Navaho ply (3-ply the easy way), or a cabled 4-ply yarn for you socks. 3- and 4-ply cabled yarns appear to make longer-wearing socks, but of course are thicker and can be more work to produce. You must decide for yourself what you want, but you should always ply sock yarn to make it stronger and even out the inevitable variations in thickness we find in handspun yarns.

You should also keep in mind that the amount of twist required in the singles yarn is affected by the amount of twist that will be subtracted when you ply. 2-ply yarn needs more twist, as the tight plying required for sock yarn will subtract twist from the singles; 3-ply requires less twist as there are three strands of singles being twisted in the opposite direction and thus less twist is subtracted from each individual singles. Cabled 4-ply is a yarn that takes some thought and experimentation to come out perfectly balanced—this is one that requires experimentation and note-taking, but is well worth the effort.

Some pros and cons of the different plying techniques:

2-ply
Advantages: Quickest path to finished sock yarn
Disadvantages: Can wear faster than other techniques

Navaho ply
Advantages: Great way to preserve the striping in variegated singles
Quickest way to get 3-ply yarn
Disadvantages: Little bumps can irritate sensitive feet
Requires finer singles and more yardage than a 2-ply of similar thickness

3-ply
Advantages: Avoids the little bumps of Navaho ply
Allows use of 3 different (in color/texture/content) singles if desired
Disadvantages: Requires 3 bobbins/cops of yarn, all approximately the same yardage

Cabled 4-ply
Advantages: The longest-wearing socks
Allows for many effects with any combination of singles being different in color/content/texture
Disadvantages: Takes the longest to spin a finished, with 3 steps involved (4 singles, then two 2-ply, then one 4-ply

Spinning yarn for socks 1--prepare your fiber

I've had several requests to write something on spinning sock yarn. This will be the first in a series of three lectures (ramblings?) about how I construct my sock yarn--YMMV.

Once you've chosen your fiber for socks (you can't go wrong with Posy Toes Sock Fiber), the key to spinning fine yarns like sock yarn is to use a thin fiber source. Meaning, if you're using top or roving (wool that comes in long ropes) it's best to split these lengthwise into strips about the size of your little finger or finer. I typically split top into 8 strips and roving into 4-6 strips. If you've got batts like my Posy Toes batts, you can make strips or roll them into really big rolags (see below for handling rolags).

Next, you'll need to pre-draft or attenuate the strips. Hold the end of a strip in two hands, making sure that your hands are further apart than the staple length of the fiber. In other words, if your individual wool fibers average 3" long, your hands should be 4" or more apart. Gently pull the strip in one direction so the fibers begin to slide past each other. You'll notice that the strip is slightly fluffier and less compressed--that's exactly what we want! Continue working your way from one end of the strip to the other. You can leave your attenuated strip in a heap on the floor and spin from that or, especially if you have feline pets, you can roll it in a ball and keep it in a basket or your lap while you spin.

If you're using rolags made from batts or from handcarding, simple take one between your hands and start stretching it out. Work from one end to the other, and if it's still not thin enough for your likeing work back to the other end. Carded batts take several passes until they're thin enough for sock yarn.

Once your fiber is prepared, there's nothing left to do but spin it up. More about deciding the yarn grist (thickness), twist and plying in future posts.......

It's Easter all over again

The new sock rovings are all dry and listed on my webpage. I had to keep one of the rainbow rovings for myself and started spinning it over the weekend. The first bobbin of Easter Eggs yarn is finished....ta da!

I seem to be suffering from mild pollen allergies this year. Not badly enough to dose myself with meds, but not satisfactorily clear-headed either. My car is covered in pollen every day, so it's little wonder that I'm muzzy all day. Spring is my favorite season, but my sympathies to all those who suffer seasonal allergies.

Off to the studio to get some work done.....