Seratia and Monty spun!!

Even before I learned to spin I had the idea to spin some yarn from the fur of my daughters two dogs Seratia and Montana. I tried llama, loved it, alpaca loved it, dog fur, not so much.

It's not the spinning part that I minded nor the actual knitting of the yarn into mittens for Michelle, it was the fur that kept getting all over my clothes, the chair, the floor, my nose, everywhere that I didn't like. It's everywhere I turn, dog fur.

The yarn is very soft with a halo and the pattern for the mitts is out of the September, 2010 issue of Creative Knitting magazine called Cable and Rib Set.

After a visit to the farm of Silent Valley Alpacas in Ompah, Ontario, I purchased some raw alpaca fibre the exact color of the dogs and the owner gave me some great advice on spinning and carding it dirty, when sheep are spun dirty it's called spinning in the grease, I don't know what it's called when you spin alpaca and dog fur dirty because they don't have lanolin as the sheep do, maybe spinning in the dirt, maybe not!! But the advice was good advice and it worked. I washed the yarn in hot soapy water when I set the twist. It felted a bit because I had to pull the yarn apart slightly after it was dried. When I carded the alpaca and dog fur together the colors blended together and I got a golden beige yarn, the picture is pretty close to actual color.

I'm almost finished knitting the mittens just one more thumb left, but now (again) the test, will these be worn or will they sit in the closet??

Cardi for Chloe? Nope! Cable Duffle Coat for Alexis!

A couple years ago my daughter Michelle and her Aunt paid a visit to our local yarn store! I think knitting fever hit Michelle because she had purchased enough yarn to make herself a scarf and a pattern for me to make her daughters a cardigan -Coat by Sirdar. Woo Hoo! I was thrilled!

But I never got around to making the sweaters, until now.

Michelle had given up on the sweaters or forgot about them and bought Chloe a natural coloured sweater for christmas. So I couldn't make her another natural colored one.

I started out using some homespun yarn that I had hand dyed myself (green) Not exactly a little girls color and of course Michelle didn't like it. So that was frogged!!

Then I began spinning some natural coloured Canadian Arcott for a Cable Duffle coat for Alexis instead. This is the process.

I spun up about 1400 yards, washed and set the twist and began knitting and knitting and knitting. Decided to knit a size 5-6 hoping that the info from Ravely was correct that the sizes were big and they were correct, I would guess the size is about an 8-10.

I got the back done and left the stitches active so that I could neatly join the shoulder seems by using a three needle bind off. Then I knit the left and right fronts. When it came time to join the shoulder seems I had knit the back about three or four rows too long to make a cable join so had to unwravel it a bit. That wasn't too hard. Then I knit one sleeve, then the front borders, then the hood, then the hood border and finally the second sleeve. I joined the coat with a mattress stitch. Michelle wanted a certain brown button for this coat so I went to my local button store aka fabricland and found the exact button she had suggested. Sewed them on and voila!!! a new Cable Duffle coat for Alexis. Now the test , will Michelle like (wear) the coat on Alexis or will it just sit in the closet ready for Good Will next year. We will see.

This is the way we wash our....

Llama fibre, wash our llama fibre, wash our llama fibre.

Rick, myself and Logan (grandson) enjoyed a very nice Saturday morning a couple of weeks ago at Sunlark Llamas in Harrowsmith. At first Logan was frightened of the strange looking llamas, but very quickly he felt at ease with the friendly animals and was soon mimicking the llama hum.

There where brown fibre, I mean llamas, white ones some almost black and beige and Susan had bags and bags and bags of their fleece just for the picking. As grandpa and Logan paid the rest of the farm a visit I got to pick out some SOOOFT fibre. I bought an almost black fleece and a dark brown and am hoping to get back and pick out a couple more, maybe a white and maybe a beige and maybe a .....

I left the farm excited but also a little nervous because I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me, how to wash this beautiful llama fibre without felting it and how to card and spin it without loosing the softness and could I even spin it!!

After a trip to my local hardware store to buy some Animal Wash(which is supposed to be used to wash and prepare animals for show making them shinny, and recommended by an master spinner/weaver) I headed home to see if I had just made a big mistake or if I was headed into a whole new world of gorgeous fibre for spinning.

After a quick search on the internet I found a video on washing alpaca, I followed the ladys instructions precisely, because it worked so well I thought I would post it here .

I spent five hours Sunday afternoon soaking, rinsing and rinsing and rinsing llama fibre.

Monday was a beautiful, sunny day so I set the fibre outside to dry in the sunshine and by that afternoon I was carding, dry unfelted fibre. I decided because I was new to spinning and hadn't spun anything except sheep fleece that I would card a mix of white/koolade dyed Canadian Arcott fleece with the llama fibre. Logan, Alexis and I had dyed up some blue fleece the night before to make some leg warmers for Alexis sister and I broke into some of it to add to the brown llama fibre.

The carding seemed endless because I flick carded ALL the fibre before putting it thru the Patrick Green carder, because I could only work on it afternoons, it took all week but wow was it worth the trouble. I decided to try carding one batt of just llama alone and was greatly surprised at how soft it turned out (I can see endless scarf knitting for my whole family out of this stuff) I ended up with eight 50 gram batts of llama fibre ready to spin into this BarHarborHoodie by Amanda Scheuzger for Logan. I found it in the September issue of Creative Knitting.

I started spinning some of it Thursday afternoon (I couldn't wait) and it is amazing to spin, glides thru my fingers like butter, (not exactly a spinning term) and I have one bobbin of singles spun. I've started the next single and have about 150 grams spun, So I can't tell if it is successful yet thaat will have to wait until I finish the second single and ply them together. Stay tuned until I get that done and ply the first skein and I will post some picks.

Yesterday I finished the first skein and have 228 yards of SOOOOFT llama/Canadian Arcott fibre. Again I couldn't wait to start knitting so this afternoon I started knitting Logans cardi. I've got 5 inches done and can't believe how soft, light, soft, amazing, soft this stuff is. I made a collage of the process.  And also a pic of the finished hoodie. 

Thanks for visiting!

A new umbrella swift?

When I began learning to spin a few months ago I very quickly acquired a new spinning wheel. A few ladies in my class where buying Lendrums and the opportunity came for me to purchase one. As I began piling up lots of unusable yarn the need came for a way to keep it neatly stored so I did a quick search on the internet for a niddy noddy. I found some plans online to make a homemade one and it worked quite well. As I attend fleece/sheep shows I see this type of PVC niddy noddy showing up. If you're interested you can find it here .
Next came the need for a carder. But wow they are expensive so I starting searching KIJIJI (craigs list) and wouldn't you know it I found a used one in a town close by so I quickly bought it. I even found a yarn winder at a yardsale for $.50, what a great find that was.

Now I need a yarn swift, the problem is I can't find one. My local yarn stores are selling them for $89.00 and I read on a blog recently that the stores are charging $5.00 per skein to ball them for customers and that's when you purchase the skeins from them. Too much!!

After searching ebay, KIJIJI, yardsales, LYS's and local fibre shows, I have decided to try making one myself (when I say myself I really mean my husband)
I found a couple of different plans on the internet and have made two material lists 1. made of wood 2. out of PVC pipe. Both authors say their cost us under $20.00.
So I'm off to the hardware store to see which one is the cheapest and which one I can find all the materials for. If your interested you can find them here: PVC wooden .
I'll try to take plenty of pictures of the process and post them here as well as the cost.

The wooden yarn swift was a success!! Super hoot!! The cost including tax was $11.27 way under the $20.00 and it is amazing. It took approximately 2 1/2 hours to build and maybe 20 minutes to find the material at my local hardware store. I like this one because it works great, can be taken apart for storage, you don't have to mortgage your home to buy and it doesn't require too much skill and just a few power tools, a chop saw and drill press. It sits on a table top , and needs no clamping because it has skid pads on the bottom to keep it from moving.

Here's a little video of the swift assembly

Just sittin'and knittin'...

and listening to my ipod. I had only a few hours today to do my favourite thing to do, sittin and knitting and listening to J.V Mcgee on my ipod. but I got quite a few lessons done . As for my knittin I managed to start Alexis' cardi this weekend. And when I measured the back of the sweater (Coat Sirdar #1733) I was surprised to see that it was about 5 inches. I'm knitting this one for Alexis because Michelle didn't like the color of the dyed by me one that I was knitting for Chloe. So I have frogged that one (I can use this wool for a cowl maybe??) and started on the natural color for Alexis. This is the color that Michelle had in mind when she bought me the pattern (oh about 2 years ago) and asked me to knit it for her daughters. Chloe and Alexis.
Managed to sneak in a bit of carding this weekend, better get at it because I'm running out of fleece for the above mentioned cardigan. Please don't ask me what type of fleece I have yet because frankly I just don't know.
I learned that if you don't want the nubbies in your yarn, card your fleece really slowly. Painfully slowly. Probably a more experienced spinner would know how to get them out when spinning but I have a goal in mind (make the yarn as fine as possible so that my sister will be able to use some of my handspun when she makes her doll clothes and sells them on ebay) don't think I'm quite at that point yet but I really am enjoying this journey of carding and dyeing and even using the yarn winder. I guess it's about the journey, making (many) mistakes and picking up the pieces aka using the (frogged) yarn for something else, right?
I've learned that dyeing the yarn can come at any stage, before you card the fleece, when the fleece is roving and even after the yarn is spun. You can nuke it in the microwave, (my favourite) or boil it ( I mean simmer) it on the stove in a big pot or bake it in the oven or even crock it in the crockpot. There are so many books at the library to help you along the way but my favourite way to learn has become youtube, you can find anything on there that you are interested in learning, everyone has an opinion or a great way to do it. But nuking it in the microwave seems to be the fastest most economical way for me, oh and I'm using wiltons icing dyes and koolade. but one thing that is nagging at me, I can't seem to make it colorfast yet. I've been searching all over the net for a way to keep the dye from fading. I knit Alexis a beautiful pair of gauntlets only to find one of them outside (Monty the retreiver loves to pick up something and take it with her on her bathroom run) the sun had faded the bright pink to a faded pink. I just took that mitten home with me with my tail between my legs. So the hunt is on to find a way to make the wool keep its color. Using salt and vinegar don't seem to be working and setting the dye just doesn't cut it either. Too bad I couldn't find out what the yarn companies do. But one good thing I don't think the natural yarn I am spinning now will fade.
I bought a yarn winder on ebay a while back and wouldn't you know it Rick found me one at a yard sale for $.50 that's fifty cents, they sell for $70 here in Canada plus tax. Now if he could just find me an umbrella yarn swift.

I've gone and done it....

I've started a BLOG!

Now what to write about in my blog. What comes to mind is of course my hobby spinning, dyeing and knitting fibre. Through this blog, you'll get a behind-the-scenes look at my life and fibre progress. A journal of my everyday life.