Jumping in May 27, 2010

What's that? I can't hear you at the bottom of this rabbit hole!

Today I embarked on a little experiment in fiber preparation.  Now that I didn’t feel like I was going to spontaneously combust upon moving (98* was the high Wednesday…oi), it was time to play with some alpaca.  You saw the suri alpaca I bought a post or two ago.  Since there was only 6.5 ounces, I decided to blend it with some mocha merino from the stash.   Being scientifically inclined, I decided to do a simple comparison experiment: blending the two fibers by combing  first, then by carding and finally spinning each preparation into a two-ply yarn, from which a swatch will be knit.  I am curious to see how much difference there will be in the end product.

To begin, I took my bag of alpaca and began separating it into individual locks….like so:

Next step:  blend!  I wasn’t very scientific on the merino-to-alpaca ratio, but it probably worked out in the end to an 80-20 merino-alpaca blend.  My DIY combs worked pretty well.  I only scraped my fingers one time so I’m counting it a success.

Combed fiber

Carded fiber

I started spinning with the combed fiber first.  So soft!  So fluffy! And its the same color as Elisabeth’s hair.

Elisabeths hair!

The blending of the lighter alpaca with the darker merino ended up with a beautiful brown shade with blonde “highlights”.

Single on the spindle (combed)

Using the handy ply technique from Knitty, I created a two-ply yarn.  Final stats on the yarn: 0.2 ounces of 2 ply 16 wpi ~ 20 yards.  (**The picture below in no way does justice to the yarn…)

Finished combed yarn

Tomorrow, I’ll spin up the carded preparation and see how it differs (if I can tell anyway!).

I finally did finish my Spunky Eclectic Shetland in the club colorway, Selfish.

2-ply fractal spun; ~3.1 ounces, 280 yards

My camera will be back from China on Saturday (along with Rich….woohoo!)  so I will get some better (read: less blurry/grainy) pictures next week.

It’s kool man May 24, 2010

When I first started knitting, I said that I would not ever get into spinning.  When I started spinning, I said I’d never want to work with fiber that needed preparations, and I certainly wouldn’t ever dye fiber or yarn of any kind.  My fall down the rabbit hole is continuing at a rapid pace.  Last year one of my lovely friends gave me a bag o’ fiber (of unknown origin…at least to me).

Mystery Fiber

.

The colors were a little bright and a little strange but I figured, fiber was fiber and I would be able to practice with it.  I tried.  I failed.  It wouldn’t draft at all; I even borrowed some hand cards to make little rolags.  No dice.   Part of the problem was likely my being a relatively new spinner; frustrated, I put the fiber away and forgot about it.

While perusing Ravelry one day, I happened upon a post where someone was selling some suri alpaca.  Not prepped, just washed.  I have been following the fiber journey of my friend Pat and the two fleeces she was working with.  Despite my disastrous attempts with the hand cards, I decided maybe combing would be a good thing to try, and so I bought the alpaca.

Pretty....alpaca....

Combs are expensive.  Like…really expensive.  I started looking around to see if there were any substitutes or DIY combs out there.  On Ravelry, someone mentioned using paint brush combs (used for cleaning paint brush bristles).  So off to Home Depot (or La Casa de Pot as it’s known at my house) I went; $20 later I had 4 combs which I decided to try gluing together (another suggestion on Rav) to make a 2 pitch comb.

Macgyvered combs

I also wanted to try hand carding again.  PetSmart came through with inexpensive dog slicker brushes.  Yes, they are small, but they were also cheeeeep.  More on how I feel about their smallness in a minute.

Cute and pink

While waiting for my alpaca to arrive, I suddenly remembered that bag o’ fiber that had been sitting in my basement.  To Rich’s bemusement, I scurried down and came back with two handfuls of the fiber.  My plan?  Wash it (it felt greasy) and then comb or card it into something I could spin.  If that worked, there was another step….involving me falling further down the rabbit hole.  Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures of working with the fiber, but I was able by first combing, then carding get it  into a little bundle of fluff rolag-ness.  The small size of the dog slicker brushes turned out to be beneficial; I have small hands and I was able to control them a bit better than the larger (real) handcards I used earlier.  Using my Bosworth Midi, I spun what I had carded and made up some samples, one singles and 3 2-ply.  The color was well…not quite anything I would wear.

That’s where I started drinking the kool-aid.  Well…figuratively.  There are tons of tutorials out there so I’m not going to detail exactly what I did but here are some pictures of the process.

Upper row: color before (was really more orangey); the kool aid. Bottom row: after microwaving; the wee skeinlets of dyed yarn.

I really liked the way the red color turned out.  So the plan now is to get the fiber prepped (it’s currently drying in preparation for carding/combing after a tubby).  Then I’ll spin it up and overdye with a red color.   Maybe enough for an Ishbel?  Stay tuned!

**My camera is traveling to China right now…so all I have is my iPhone camera.  I can hardly take pics with a good camera so I apologize for the bluriness!”**