Last Friday, I spent several hours spinning the Cormo while at a demo. I started a new bobbin at the beginning of the event. Here’s how it looked at the end of the event:
Heart Illusion Dishcloths
I’ve knit four more dishcloths this week.
Raindrops on Roses Shawl
I joined the Testing Pool group on Ravelry and signed up to do two test knits. This is one of them. It’s a top down shawl, stockinette with a lace border. I’ve finished perhaps 1/4 of the stockinette section.
Sand Tracks Scarf
This is the second test knit. It is a cabled scarf on a seed stitch background. I’ve finished the garter stitch border and the first pattern repeat. I think I’m really going to love this project.
I didn’t write a post about finishing this scarf, though it’s appeared in several WIP Wednesday posts (January 22, February 4, March 25). I had to finish it so that I could weave the Dr. Who scarf on my rigid heddle loom! Since this is the fourth Houndstooth Scarf I finished (see the posts on Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, and Ravenclaw Houndstooth scarves), I felt like I didn’t necessarily learn anything new on this project. I did apply the lessons learned on the prior Houndstooth scarves, so the Slytherin is the most consistent of the four.
This is another project that I’ve been working on for a while and which has appeared in a couple of WIP Wednesday posts (February 4, February 18). As of February 18, I’d finished plying and had wound most of the yarn onto a niddy noddy. It then sat around, still on the niddy noddy, awaiting washing.
I whipped out a new cat bed to line the bookshelf where Pepper likes to sleep. Although she wasn’t very co-operative re: posing for the picture, she loves the bed. It’s now her favorite sleeping spot.
Semi-finished Projects
These projects are “semi-finished” because I’m making multiple dishcloths from the same patterns, as part of my ongoing Dishcloth Advent Calendar (details in my 2015 Plans post) project. I’ve finished at least one individual item, but am still working on making more. I need to make 18 dishcloths in each pattern, and will write blog posts with all the project details when I finish all 18.
Heart Illusion Dishcloths
I finished 9 of these in May.
Bias Knit, Crochet Cotton Dishcloth
I only finished one of these. Even with two strands held together, it took about 3 hours to knit one of these, and I didn’t even make it as big as the pattern suggests. It’ll take me a while to make all 18 of these, but I do like them.
Activities
I participated in three demos with the Weavers of Orlando. I’ve written blog posts about two of those: St. Johns River Festival of the Arts and Arts at Audubon Elementary. The third demo was just this past Friday, and I’m working on writing a post about it!
I also traveled to New England to attend my cousin’s college graduation. While there, I visited 12 yarn shops, including WEBS! I bought yarn in all the shops, and will be writing multiple blog posts about the experience. I needed to take pix of all the new stash for the posts and to update my Rav stash. I’ve been working on it and I’m just about finished. I will be posting about these shops throughout the month of June; I plan to get all the posts up no later than June 25 since several of the shops I visited are part of the 2015 I-91 Shop Hop which starts that day.
I’m working on three big yardage projects right now, and it feels like I’m making progress on all of them. I love that feeling!
Super Secret Shawl
I’ve finished a total of 9 or 10 repeats of the pattern.
Clapotis
I wanted to finish this project before I went to India, but I ran out of yarn. After I got back from India, I ripped back all the way through my last straight section and put the project back onto the needles. This week I started knitting the decrease section again.
Cat Bed
Pepper spends her nights in my office, to keep her away from the other cats. She’s fragile, they are bigger than her, and I’m afraid they might accidentally hurt her. Her arthritis is bad enough that I don’t think she can get down the steps into the garage to get to the litter box. I’ve left one bottom shelf of my bookcase empty because she likes to sleep in there. I decided to make a felted sleeping pad for that space, to make it a more enticing sleeping spot. I cast on about twice the width of the space and will knit about twice the length. Since it’s just garter stitch, it is going fast. I just cast on last Saturday night and I expect to be done knitting through 500 yards of yarn by tomorrow!
Last night, Audubon Park Elementary held their annual Arts at Audubon open house. The Weavers of Orlando have participated in this event for many years; it was my first time. Local artisans have tables scattered throughout the school. Kids and parents walk through to see demos and do make and takes. The Weavers of Orlando set up the school library. We had a floor loom, a table loom, two spinners (including me), and Kumihimo disks for a make and take. We were inundated for the two hours of the event; we brought 200 Kumihimo disks and ran out 1/2 hour before the end of the event! Usually, I try to share pictures from these events, but I don’t have any from this one. We were so busy talking to kids and parents that I didn’t have time to take pictures. Instead, I thought I’d share some of the things kids and parents said at the event!
The second girl in the room, just moments into the event: “I’ve come to this for 5 years, and weaving is my favorite.”
“Will you make me a snow hat?”
Girl: “What can you make with the yarn?”
Me: “Anything you want!”
Girl: “Shoes?”
Me: “Well, you can make slippers and those are kind of shoes.”
Girl: “Can you make me some?
Mother: “Do you get the wool from a lamb or a sheep?”
Me (confused): “Well, a lamb is a baby sheep. I don’t know how old they are when they are sheared the first time.”
Mother: “A lamb is a baby sheep? Shows how much I know!”
Girl: “Where do we get the jellyfish?” (referring to the Kumihimo disks)
Father: “Do you have a cotton gin? Or know anyone who does?”
This turned into an interesting conversation. He’s been growing cotton in his yard — the native cotton that grows into a tall bush. He has bags of cotton, but no gin to clean it. He’s looked online, the only gins he can find are huge commercial versions, and he doesn’t have time to build his own. Then he offered me cotton seeds!
I always ask if people want to touch the roving, then the spun yarn so they can compare the two. I’m still spinning the Cormo, which is super soft. One girl, probably a kindergartener, just couldn’t stop touching the roving. She bent down and buried both her hands in the bag of roving on the floor. “It’s so soft!” she said, again and again. Yes, yes it is.
A common question: “How does it work?”
My standard spiel, regardless of age: “Every time I press down on a pedal, the big wheel goes around one time. The big wheel is connected to this smaller wheel by this band. Every time the big wheel goes around once, the small wheel goes around 8 times. The small wheel makes all the rest of this (as I generally wave at the bobbin and flyer) go around, including the fiber. This puts twist in the fiber and it is the twist that makes the yarn hold together. So when I spin, two things are happening. With my hands I’m drawing out a little bit of fiber at a time, and this determines how thick the yarn will be. At the same time, my feet are moving, putting in the twist to hold the yarn together. The amount of twist is determined by how fast I move my feet in relationship to how fast I move my hands.”
I didn’t notice any eyes glazing over, and several of the kids asked questions after or during the spiel. The questions were logical extensions of the spiel, so it sounded like they understood.
Boy: “What happens if you move your feet really fast?”
And before I could answer, he says: “You’d have to move your hands really fast too, right?
I love it when someone gets it!
The most common question of all: “Can I try it?”
Me: “No. Not tonight.”
Child: “Why not?”
Me: “I’m not good enough at it myself to explain it!” or “It’s a little too chaotic in here!”
Both are true statements; if I’m going to keep doing demos, I’ve gotta get better at the teaching part!
I finished the Doctor Who Scarf while I was in Vermont last week, and presented it to my cousin as a graduation gift. He loved it! Here’s all the info about the scarf.
Official Stats
Draft: Plain Weave
Loom: 15″ Cricket Rigid Heddle Loom
Reed: 8
Warp Stats
Yarn: 369 yards llama yarn, gifted to me by Stacy, produced at a local-to-her farm
Loom waste: 42 yards
Total Warp Ends: 96
Ends Per Inch (EPI): 8
Warp Length: 16 feet (no, that’s not a typo!)
Weft Stats
Yarn:
52 yards Berroco Vintage, colorway 5180 (purple)
63 yards llama yarn (camel)
24 yards Peace Fleece worsted in Sheplova Mushroom (bronze)
36 yards Peace Fleece worsted in Khrushchev Corn (yellow)
70 yards Peace Fleece worsted in Sakhalin Salmon (rust)
69 yards Lion Brand Amazing in Olympia (gray)
44 yards Peace Fleece worsted in Shaba (?) (green)
Picks Per Inch (PPI): 7-8
Width in the Reed: 12″
Dimensions Before Finishing: 164″ x 11.5″ (not including fringe)
Finished Dimensions: 153″ x 10.5″ (not including fringe)
Made for: My cousin Cooper, as a college graduation present
My cousin loves Doctor Who (and many other things geeky), so I decided to make him a Doctor Who scarf as a graduation present. If you aren’t familiar with this particular bit of geekery, Doctor Who is a science fiction television show produced by the BBC. It’s been around since 1963, though it was off the air between 1989 and 2005 (If you’d like an overview of the show, check out the Wikipedia entry). The title character is a time traveling alien who regenerates rather than dying. So far, 13 different actors have portrayed the Doctor (I’m counting John Hurt as the War Doctor, for those of you yelling that it’s only 12).
Each iteration of the Doctor has a different personality and costuming. The Fourth Doctor, portrayed by actor Tom Baker, wore a very long multi-colored scarf. According to legend, the scarf came about because a costume designer picked up some wool and handed it over to a knitter, asking her to knit a scarf. She used up all the wool she was given, creating a very long scarf. While this wasn’t the original intention of the costume designer, he liked it and the BBC went ahead with it. Over the various seasons that Tom Baker was on the show, different versions of the scarf were created, including a stunt scarf. Many people — including me — have knit replicas of that scarf, and there’s a website recounting the various iterations of the scarf and options for knitting it yourself.
I knit this scarf for my husband back in 2010. I’d rather poke my eyes out with my knitting needles than knit this much garter stitch again.
Since I didn’t want to knit that much garter stitch again, I decided to try weaving the scarf instead. I looked on Ravelry and found woven Dr. Who scarves by the following Ravelers: Jason, Serenova, Littleredmitten, jeen, jeen again, jeen a third time, jeen a fourth time to use up the leftovers from the first three, quiltnknitgirl, rosalynk, and MountainAsh. Only Jeen has detailed project information. Some of the others included the yarn and yardage used, but no detailed project notes. Therefore, I used the knitting patterns at Doctor Who Scarf and created a spreadsheet to figure out the weaving.
When making a Doctor Who scarf, you can decide to be true to the literal representation of the scarf, the spirit of the scarf, or both. A literal representation of the scarf means picking a season, getting yarn that is as close as possible to the colors used in the scarf in that season, and knitting stripes that are exactly the width of the ones on the scarf. The spirit of the scarf is going with what you have on hand and making something unexpected.
I knew I wasn’t going for a straight literal representation of the scarf because that would mean knitting it. I also wanted to use as much stash yarn as possible, rather than buying yarn. I tried to get as close as possible to the colors in the scarf as my stash would allow, but I wasn’t going to stress about minor color variations (I ended up buying purple yarn because I had nothing in my stash that was close, but everything else came from stash). On the other hand, I did want to pick a season and replicate the color order and stripe lengths of that season’s scarf. The Doctor Who Scarf website has a side-by-side comparison of the scarves for seasons 12 to 14, with the total length, stripe length, and total width of the scarf marked. I decided to go with a season 12 scarf because it is the longest of all of them.
Unlike knitting, weaving shrinks when taking off the loom and wet finished. In order to adjust for this, I added 20% to the length of each stripe, hoping that by doing so, I would get close to the correct stripe size after finishing. The scarf only shrunk by a total of 11″, which is about 7% of the pre-finishing length, so I probably could have added only 10% to the length when weaving. Unfortunately, I forgot to measure the length of stripes after finishing, so I don’t have the data to do an actual comparison. Since I used 3 different brands of yarn in the weft, I assume the different yarns shrank at different rates, but don’t know for sure.
This is the first project in which I did calculations to determine the yardage I needed for weft. I used a spreadsheet formula to add the length of all stripes of each color. I then multiplied that length by 88 (8 picks per inch * 11 inches wide in the finished scarf) and divided by 36 to get an estimated yardage for each color. This calculation was not particularly accurate.
Total Weft Length
Estimated Weft Yardage
Actual Weft Yardage
Purple
18.30
44.73
52
Camel
32.40
79.20
63
Bronze
19.20
46.93
23
Mustard
13.80
33.73
36
Rust
22.50
55.00
70
Grey
23.70
57.93
69
Greenish Brown
24.90
60.87
44
154.80
378.40
357
There’s a number of possible reasons my initial calculations were inaccurate. One is that I did not accurately measure the length of each color as I wove. Or perhaps I missed weaving a stripe in one color. I don’t think this is the case — I had a 4×6 card with a list of stripes and I crossed them off as I wove — but it’s possible.
I wasn’t always getting 8 picks per inch as I wove, partly due to tension challenges (more on that in a minute) and partly because of the different types of yarn. Since I used stash yarns, and some of the yarns were partial balls, I may not have had an accurate weight for the partial skeins before I started the project. I didn’t weigh each one; I relied on the weight listed in Ravelry, assuming that I had accurately listed information on my earlier projects.
The Trouble with Tassels
In the television show, the tassels are made from one strand of each of the seven colors in the scarf. When weaving, the fringe is usually the warp, and the warp for this project is only one color. I considered a number of options for finishing the scarf. I could:
Dye individual strands of fringe to match the stripes
Cut off the fringe, sew a hem, make tassels, and sew them to the edge of the scarf
Needlefelt 1″ or so on each end, rather than hemming, then sew the tassels to the needlefelted edge
Leave the warp as the fringe, leaning towards the spirit of the scarf not an accurate representation
I planned to sew a hem, but I ended up leaving the warp as fringe because I ran out of time — the scarf took nearly 15 hours to dry and by the time it was dry I had to pack it. I don’t think needlefelting would have worked on this project, because I don’t think the llama yarn I used for warp would felt. I tried wet-felting a join between two skeins and it didn’t work.
Warped Warp
As soon as I started tying on the warp, I knew that this warp was going to be problematic. This yarn was very stretchy. The long warp meant that the warp was sagging between the loom and the warping peg, resulting in different lengths for each strand of warp.
Then disaster struck — I had one more strand of yarn to bring through the heddle when the warping peg hopped onto the floor. My entire warp was on the floor, and the loop at the end was in disarray. Rather than rewarping the entire project, I gathered up the end, shook the warp to even it out as much as possible, then wound it onto the loom. I stopped regularly to yank the warp and shake out any tangles. When the warp was mostly wound on, I cut above the loop so that the warp would be even. Since I had to cut so much off to even up the end, my warp was a little too short for my planned project. I had to skip the last two stripes.
The llama yarn wasn’t the best warp. It was strong, but it was very stretchy and hairy. The stretchiness, combined with the long length of this warp, led to variations in tension as I wove. The hairiness of the warp meant that it shed as I moved the heddle back and forth, leaving debris all over my floor and table.
Learning Experiences
This was the first project I wove using a boat shuttle. I have the 9″ Mini Schacht Shuttle (The Woolery, affiliate link), which I received as a Christmas gift. I wanted that shuttle specifically for this project. Seven colors, and long stretches of a single color make it impossible to carry yarn up the selvedge. The price of the boat shuttle plus a couple dozen 4″ bobbins (The Woolery, affiliate link) is a bit more than buying extra stick shuttles, but the boat shuttle is more flexible.
It took me a little while to get used to the boat shuttle. I discovered that it worked better when the tension was higher. When the tension was too loose, the boat shuttle tended to slip between the warp strands and fall to the floor. I also learned that the boat shuttle worked better when I threw it right side up. The bobbin does not sit directly in the middle of the shuttle; it is a bit closer to the top than the bottom. If I put the shuttle through with the top side down, the wider parts of the bobbin tended to catch on the warp strands. The shuttle has “Schacht” printed on the side of it. It is right side up when that printing is right side up.
This is the first project I’ve done where I cut the yarn for color changes rather than carrying colors up the selvedge. Therefore, it is the first project where I had to manage ends. On other projects, I carried the ends along the bottom of the work. I started doing that with this project and ran into a problem. As I wound, the cloth beam caught the ends and pulled them vertically. If you look carefully at the purple stripe in the foreground of the picture on the deck, you can see some wonkiness to the selvedge. This is the result of the end getting caught in the cloth beam and pulling. After I figure out what was happening, I brought my ends to the top of the work and cut them short before winding them around the cloth beam.
This project was just about the maximum size the 15″ Cricket loom can handle. By the time I finished, the cloth beam was full. I might have been able to get one more turn of the cloth beam — just enough to finish those extra two stripes — but it would have been close. The yarns I used for this project were heavy worsted weight. Thinner yarns would make a thinner cloth, so theoretically the loom should be able to handle a longer warp if I used fingering- or lace-weight yarn.
Conclusion
Weaving a Doctor Who Scarf is a lot more fun than knitting one. I tied on the warp on Saturday and cut the finished project off the loom on Wednesday. The project took something like 16 hours of hands on time, including the extra time it took to fix the warp after the warping peg abandoned its duties. While I don’t want to knit a Doctor Who Scarf ever again, I wouldn’t hesitate to weave one!
Cooper opening the scarf while my mother (l) and cousin (Cooper’s sister) (r) watch.
