The Knitting Pirate

The “Starry Night” yarn is plied, but not yet washed (and I’ve no picture yet, either). Of course one bobbin ran out sooner than the other; I looked up a tutorial on Andean plying and gave it a try. What a neat trick that is! I ended up with 138 yards of worsted-to-bulkyish weight yarn from four ounces of fiber, and nothing left over! As soon as I’d skeined the yarn, I ran to show Pirate-Husband. “Look,” I laughed, “I’ve spun Chanukah yarn!” Blue and blue, bits of white and yellow and silver sparkle, it really does remind me quite a bit of Chanukah. Pirate-Husband agreed and asked me if this was going to be the first yarn listed in the Etsy shop.

I keep saying I want to sell handspun yarns, but now that it’s come down to it, I find that I’m a little more hesitant than I’d planned to be. I get attached to the yarns I spin! And will people really want to buy them? Can I spin enough yarn well and fast enough to stock an Etsy shop? Will spinning start to feel like a chore instead of a favored hobby?

I thought about all of those things last night as I cast on for the second of the handspun socks. I made it through the toe increases before I went to bed, and now it’s boring ol’ stockinette from here to the heel. This is going to accompany me on the airplane tomorrow; stockinette in the round is perfect airport and airplane knitting.

So I got started on spinning the “Starry Night” roving, and I’m really not sure what I think of it yet. It’s very soft, and doesn’t draft the way I’m used to with combed top, and I’m getting fuzzles and bits of glitz all over my clothing. I thought I’d aim for a heavy fingering to DK weight yarn, but the fiber might not really want to do that. It might want to be a lower-twist, thicker yarn in the end.

This might end up being the first yarn to be listed in my Etsy shop. It’s pretty, but I’m not in love with it. Of course, I might completely change my mind a few ounces in the future. One never knows! If I do want to sell handspun, I’m going to have to spin with production in mind, rather than “what can I knit with this?” It’s just a matter of changing my mindset.

Apologies for the posting delay. Life became very busy, very suddenly, and left me very little time to knit and spin. I had a short deadline on a graphic design project that I hadn’t expected to be doing, and then spent last weekend at my parents’ for Rosh Hashanah (no knitting). But now I am back with a firm determination to catch up in my fibery pursuits!

Because it’s really unlikely that the second half of the merino-silk blend is so much more well-behaved than the first, I’m going to guess that I went up a level in Spinning Skill between bobbins. I fought with the first half; the second half seems to draft more easily, has fewer nepps and sticky bits, and is generally spinning up much more smoothly. The finished yarn should be interesting, with a very slight thick and thin texture to it. I am considering making a pair of gloves, armwarmers or mittens from it. It probably won’t be smooth enough for socks, but I can’t totally rule that out.

I think I want to spin something lively, next. Perhaps the Finn/Mohair batts that I carded should make a floofy textured yarn. There’s eight ounces of the stuff (probably more like 6.5 after discarding all the short bits and dirt) and I’m thinking that a light worsted weight would be perfect to show off the character of the fiber. I have a bunch of batts which were sorted out by color and progress from this pinky-orange through to the greens. Perhaps I will tear each of them in half and spin a two-ply where the colors will mostly match up. Except for one failed attempt at the alpaca batts, I haven’t spun from batts before. I’ve certainly never spun anything so textured. It will be a fun challenge!

Yesterday I told a non-fibery friend that my eventual goal is to sell handspun yarns on Etsy. I think I’m almost good enough to get started with that; now my problem might be that I get so attached to the yarn I spin, I don’t want to let it go! Maybe I should start spinning in colors I don’t like, in yarn sizes that I won’t use? Ahh, a sunny yellow three-ply worsted weight would be easy to put up in the shop.

This designing stuff is harder than it appears! I sketched out what I’d like to knit, and then realized how much of it I don’t know how to do. The thing I want to make has raglan-ish sleeves, but because it’s a baby outfit, it also has some extra buttons around the neckline to make it easier to get on and off – and I’d like to put them at an angle to match the sleeve seam, rather than across the top of the shoulder. I’m not quite sure how to make the legs, either. Seamless would be nice, too.

I looked up some patterns on Ravelry and found one that had the sort of neckline I am thinking of. It’s in a book that my library system has, so I put it on reserve. Hopefully that will help me get some idea of how this thing goes together! Fortunately, I have at least a year to come up with something. Baby clothes are so adorable; I’m glad that there will be another little one to knit for! Maybe I will crank out a bunch of small sweaters… but probably not.

Someone suggested to me that I could sell my ‘practice knittings’ to make a little extra money, much like a pen-and-paper artist might sell sketches. I am running out of ways to say that I don’t have any ‘practice knitting’ and that my hourly rate would be prohibitively high or I’d be cheating myself. Selling PDF versions of patterns seems like a much better idea; I only have to do the work once, and Ravelry has a nifty way of handling sales. That, and handspun – I think I could speed up my spinning to the point where I could get a reasonable rate for it on Etsy.

I had a moment of weakness yesterday and bought three braids of fiber from someone who was destashing at super-reasonable prices. She will be mailing them out today. Maybe I will get them before Pennsic!

I picked up this half-ounce drop spindle in gaboon ebony and african rosewood from the Spanish Peacock on Saturday afternoon. On Sunday, I started spinning some laceweight from a sample of merino I’d gotten from Sheepish Creations, because I just had to try it out. On Monday, even though it wasn’t Tuesday, I spun some more with it. And now that it’s Spinning Tuesday, I’m debating whether to keep on with the drop spindle, or do some wheel-spinning today. I could also spin on the other spindle, which is half-full of some gray-green mystery fiber. Or I could take out the drum carder and work on processing some more of the alpaca fleece… technically that’s not exactly spinning, but it’s fiber prep *for* spinning, so I think it counts.

Laceweight takes a long time to spin. Longer than I’d thought. I’m not very fast at this, and I’m glad I decided to try the spindle with just a half-ounce of wool. I have no idea how much laceweight yarn I’ll get from this, but hopefully it will be enough to knit something small. Meanwhile, it’s really good practice at drafting finely. The fiber is dyed in a rainbowish progression. I split it in half down the middle, weighing to be sure I got it right. I’ll spin each half in the same direction, then ply them together. Hopefully the colors match up somewhere!

This year I want to try dyeing my own yarn and fiber. I would love to experiment with my own colors, and possibly even sell some of my work on Etsy. I’ve had the shop set up for a while, and it’s been empty since day one. Maybe if I get really good, I could sell some of my handspun yarn. I have some ideas for other things to sell, too. 2009 is looking to be a creative year!

Yesterday I gave car-knitting a shot on the way to and from work. I’ve never been able to read in the car without getting lightheaded and headachy. Once I was able to knit on a larger-gauge hat project in the passenger seat, but yesterday I had some trouble with the socks. Ah well. Maybe once I’m past the gusset and don’t have to look at it so much, it’ll be easier.

Inevitably I end up picking up one more stitch on the second side of the heel flap. I figure it’s no big deal; the last decrease round will only decrease on that one side. I wonder why it happens, though. I pick up stitches through every slipped heel flap stitch, and always there’s one extra. Maybe that’s a natural extension of knitting in the round, the second side has to be one row taller than the first.

While I really want to get this sock done (so I can start on the next one) I’ve also been wanting to spin lately. I spun up half the BFL roving that I bought at MD Sheep and Wool this year, and I should probably do the other half in a similar weight. …and then both skeins will go on the Etsy store, I think. That is my eventual goal – to spin sock yarn for myself, and other yarn to sell. I don’t expect to get rich, but if I can make the hobby pay for itself, that’ll be enough for me.

I went through all the new sock patterns I’ve queued up and assigned most of my sock yarns to the future projects. There are a few I left unassigned, so I can do whatever I like with them, muahaha! Okay, it’s the short-yardage multi-colored yarns that I love but have no plans for yet, other than being sure to weigh and split the skein before starting, and working toe-up.

Last night I finished the gusset decreases on the Garter Rib Sock. I took a gauge measurement and re-measured my foot, and I think it will fit okay. If it’s a little loose, well, then it’s just like all my other socks. Better a little loose than a lot tight! I will try to remember to get a picture of it this afternoon. The colors are really vibrant and I love the way they’re swirling around the leg of the sock. I wonder if they will swirl on the foot, or pool.

This week I got a skein of the new Noro Sock Yarn, in colorway 188 – greens and purples. Because green and purple have always been “my colors,” I’ve made a conscious effort to avoid buying too much green and purple yarn. This stuff was irresistable.

Next week I’m driving (again) with a friend up to Canada, and this time we’re going to actually stop at WEBS instead of just talking about it. I plan to buy the yarn to make Revolution from the Fall 2005 issue of Knitty. I’m thinking a warm brown for the body of the coat, and maybe a sage green for the accent color?

Tomorrow we’re closing on the house. While this project has severely impacted my knitting time, I’m so. freaking. excited. about this. In the fairly near future I will have much more time on my hands and much less spending money… but I’ve got a serious yarn stash that should keep me occupied for quite some time to come. I’m also going to buy some fiber with my birthday money, so I’ve kept up on scouting Etsy for beautiful roving. I have a mental image of myself, spinning by the fire, deer cavorting in the yard, a 50-mile view laid out to the east… it’s a nice daydream which will be a reality soon!

I just bought $60 of yarn in some absolutely gorgeous colors, justifying the purchase by telling myself that this yarn is for the projects that I’ll sell in the new Etsy shop, and I’m funding my habit here. If the pieces sell, I can use the proceeds to buy yarn for myself at the Sheep and Wool Festival, or at WEBS, or at the yarn stores I plan to visit in Ottawa in June.

This purchase pushes the basket to overflow level. I’m such an addict!

Though there’s nothing there yet, I set up an Etsy shop today. I have lots of ideas for things I would like to sell – all knitting-related, of course!