Spinning | All knittings great and small

A weekend in the country

Posted on June 20, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

It’s summer here in Canada. Time to start heading to the cottage on the weekends and summer vacations and time for a little guide on fibre fun you can bring along.

General thoughts
Keep your projects small and light. Bring several! Have things you can do while traveling and ones for when you are at your destination. Variety is good! Pack things in sealable containers or ziplock bags to keep them from the elements, especially if you are camping.

Knitting
Small and simple knitting projects are great to bring along, like socks, hats, scarves and mittens. Travel time is a great time to work on your projects.

Spinning
Spindles are great for traveling with. Supported spindles, like a Russian spindle (or here) or a Takhli, can be used in the car during traveling.

If you are staying at a cottage or someplace indoors then a folding spinning wheel is also an option. Most should fit in the trunk or back seat.

Fibre prep is something you can also do. Hand cards and a dog brush are pretty portable. You can go through a bunch of fleece in no time on a relaxing evening.

Dyeing
Dyeing can be a fun activity for the whole family. Before going you can do research with the kids to find out what plants are available where you are going and figure out which ones you want to try. Once there you can get them to help gather and prepare the materials and help out with the dyeing.

My partner and I sometimes do natural dyeing when we are up at the cottage. We bring the dyepots, mordant, stir sticks and fibre/yarn with us. I would suggest using only Alum and cream of tarter, as these have the least impact on the environment. Also, make sure to only use as much mordant as needed for the amount of fibre you are working with. This will reduce the amount of left over mordant that will be disposed of.
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We use either lake water or spring water from up the road. We use the propane stove in the kitchen, but you could also use a campfire to do the dyeing. You have to watch closely with a campfire to make sure the dyepot doesn’t boil.

We usually collect our dye materials from the area. A good rule of thumb is to never collect more than 10% of a plant in any given area. For example, if using leaves, only take leaves from 1 or 2 branches of a tree and spread out your collection over a large area.

Used plant material can be used for compost or spread out in the bush to decompose. Left over mordant baths can be disposed of onto sandy areas, like a dirt road away from the house and septic system. Do not pour it down the drain into the septic system! Left over dyebath can usually be disposed of this way as well. Make sure to dilute both baths with a lot of water before getting rid of them.

Weaving
There are several very portable options for weaving and traveling

Weavettes and small weaving frames
These are very portable hand help frames. The small ones are great for working on while traveling! You can whip off a square in 15 – 30 minutes.

Backstrap looms and ground looms
These can be setup before you leave and used once you get to your destination.

Weighted warp loom
This is a very simple version of a weighted warp loom. All the material can be kept in a medium sized container.

Some of my favourite fibres

Posted on June 18, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

I’ve spun quite a lot of different fibres over the last ten years. I haven’t met one that I absolutely hate. There are many, like man made fibres, that I’m not fond of, and others, like angora, dog and cat, that I’m allergic to in varying degrees. I’ll spin them – I just don’t find it enjoyable.

Angora is one I wish I wasn’t allergic to. I react to it fairly quickly. Being around a bunny for 15 minutes will get me quite stuffed up. Working with the fibre may take less time then that. If I know I’m going to be spinning with Angora I’ll take an antihistamine a few hours before starting to spin.

This is a small list of my top fibres to spin with.

Wool
Polwarth is a wonderful wool to work with. It is bred from Merino and Lincoln sheep. It is almost as soft as Merino, with extra length in the fibres coming from the Lincoln heritage. I find it a bit easier to spin then Merino because of the length. It gives a soft, springy, cushy yarn. Most of the sheep are white, but it does come in other grey and black shades.

It blends nicely with other fine fibres. I especially love polwarth and silk blends.

This is my second year project for my spinning certificate program. It is the Pretty Thing Cowl by The Yarn Harlot. It is made from light and medium grey Polwarth. This started as raw fibre, was washed, flicked open and combed to give a light top. It was then spun worsted on my Lendrum wheel to make a 2 ply lace-weight yarn.

These are a couple examples of spindle spun projects I have made with Polwarth and silk blends. The scarf is a 2-ply worsted weight yarn. The hat is a 3-ply worsted weight yarn.

Other animal fibres
Alpaca
There are two main types of Alpaca: Huacaya, which have a fine, dense, somewhat crimpy lock, and Suri, which have a long, dreadlock like locks.

Both of these come in a variety of natural shade, with multiple shades and spotting possible. Huacaya are the most common in North America, with a few breeders raising Suris.

The fibre can range from very fine micron counts to fairly course. Fibre fineness is usually fairly consistent on an animal.

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Alpaca and silk is one of my favourite blends. Suri alpaca and silk can make very luxurious lace yarns.

This is a shawl I made from a blend of 67% grey Huacaya alpaca top and 33% bombyx silk top. It is a 2-ply yarn. The silk I used was a handpainted top in two colourways. One was a mixture of blue tones, the other of red tones. I carded the alpaca and silk on handcards to make rolags to spin from. The blends with the blue silk mix I re-arranged to make a colour progression of grey, denin blue and purple. I left the rolags from the red mix in the order they were carded, so there is more of a mix of shades for those rolags. I spun up the blue mix as one ply and the red mix as the other, then plied them together. The result was kind of a watercolour affect.

Mohair
Mohair from Angora Goats is another fibre I like working with. I don’t often spin 100% mohair, but use it in blends with other fibres. It adds strength, warmth and lustre to blends.

Kid mohair is usually the finest fibre. It is from the first and sometimes second shearing of the goat. After that it usually is considered adult mohair. The fibre generally gets courser as the animal ages.

I fell in love with Mohair when I started using yarns and fibres from Wellington Fibres. They have several very yummy blends, including alpaca/wool/mohair and mohair/wool/silk blends. The silk blends are pretty neat. The silk is added in as a streak of fibre, rather then being fully blended in. It gives a nice highlight when spun up.

This is not my own handspun, but it is something I plan on spinning one day. The red sock on the very right is made from Wellington Fibres fine 3-ply sock yarn. It is a 60% mohair, 40% wool blend, about 380 yards per 113g / 4oz skein. It was made on 2mm / US 0 needles at 10 sts / inch. The pattern is Nancy Bush‘s Gentleman’s Fancy Sock from her book Knitting Vintage Socks.

Silks
There are several silks available to spinners today, but Tussah and Muga are my favourites. Their fibres has a bit more of a tooth on them than Bombyx silk and they are easier to spin because of that. The fibre also tends to be a little shorter – between 4 and 5 inches long, then bombyx, which is usually 6 to 9 inches long.

Both fibres are naturally coloured. Tussah is a nice honey colour and Muga is a rich golden colour. Tussah also comes in a bleached version, which usually isn’t as soft as non-bleached. Tussah dyes up wonderfully with both natural and chemical dyes. Muga can also be dyed, but it requires a little more work as the surface doesn’t allow dyes to penetrate as well as Tussah.

This shawl is spindle spun Tussah silk that was handpainted by Nancy Finn of Chasing Rainbows Dyeworks. The singles were spun on a spindle and wound onto a spinning wheel bobbin when the spindle became to full. Additional full spindles worth were attached after that. The singles where then chain plyed from the bobbin onto a plying drop spindle to give a final 3-ply yarn that included long colour sections.

Video blog day – Welcome to the Display Room!

Posted on June 17, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

Today I’m taking you through a tour of the Display Room from the Ontario Handspinning Seminar 2013 that happened June 14 – 16, 2013.

You can continue the tour by going to the following videos:
Baggie Challenge table
Skeins for next year
Special Projects Competition
Skeins Competition pt.1
Skeins Competition pt.2
Just for Fun! tables
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I worked on the display committee this year with one other woman. There is minimal work over the months before the seminar. Most of the work is done at the seminar.

Before the seminar we take care of finding judges for the competitions and planning the layout of the display room. We make sure all the materials needed for displays were passed along to us, gather additional display materials as needed and print updated signs for the current years displays. We also update various forms for the competitions, judges, Just for Fun and Fashion Show items.

During the weekend we are responsible for taking in items for display and competition, setting up the room and displays, helping the competition judges, watching over the displays during public times, helping during the fashion show, getting the items back to the owners and clearing up the display area. Thankfully we have great volunteers helping the two of us with all of this!

We were also responsible for creating the awards certificates, gathering up all the prizes, taking pictures of the winning items, updating the slide presentation for the awards ceremony and handing out the certificates and prizes at the ceremony.

I had an awesome time being on this committee! You do work long hours at the seminar, but it’s so worth it to be able to see all the amazing work that comes it. Plus we are the lucky ones who get to handle all the items and get a good look at them.

Ontario Handspinning Seminar – live and kicking!

Posted on June 15, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

By the time you read this we’ll all be busy and having a lot of fun!

I’m at the Ontario Handspinning Seminar this weekend. I’m working on the display and judging committee, so I get to help setup all the fantastic items people bring in to display. There is always truly stunning works to see.

This years theme is Spinning Tales. We are using stories as inspiration for the classes and events happening this weekend.

For example

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, ALANNA WILCOX
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When spinners select a handpainted roving to spin sometimes it can be a mystery if the yarn will come out as beautiful as the roving or look beastly with colors that clash. In this workshop students will explore 12+ different ways of spinning a handpainted roving to get color combinations that are visually pleasing for their desired end use. Students are expected to be comfortable spinning a continuous yarn at their wheel, know how to ply yarns, and card wool using hand carders.

Alanna Wilcox is an art teacher by day and a fibre artist by night. She has always loved the fibre arts and got into spinning 8 years ago and has been hooked ever since. In her spare time she makes and sells her handcarded batts on Etsy as ‘Spinnybuns’. She is also currently enrolled in the OHS Spinning Certificate Program.

On Monday I will have some pictures and (hopefully!) a little video from the weekend.

Till then have a great weekend! I know I will!

Spinning certificate program

Posted on June 13, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

My final projects from years one through five

I’m heading into the sixth and final year of my spinning certificate program. You can see an outline of the years here.

It’s been a pretty amazing journey.

My class started when I was 40. At the time I figured I could do the program then, rather than waiting till I was 46 or 52 to do it. It was also the right time as I wanted to take my spinning more seriously and I thought this program would give me a structured way of learning all this stuff, rather then me trying to find classes all over the place to learn things.

The teachers for our classes are amazing people. Their knowledge and generosity are humbling. And lets face it – the thought of having to grade homework for 25 to 40 students is pretty intimidating, yet they do that, year after year.

Some highlights for me:
All of the dyeing classes. We’ve done both acid dyeing and natural dyeing. These have been a lot of fun and I’ve learned a lot in them.

Spinning woolen. This was probably the hardest challenge for me when we started. I’d mostly spun worsted or semi worsted. Learning to spin light and lofty was challenging. I still don’t spin enough of this and have to retry it each year otherwise I forget how to do it.

Bast fibres. Flax, hemp and cotton. I had tried these before, but it was pretty dismal. Last years class finally made things click and I was able to spin them. I think these fibres have moved up from the “Ugh! Argh!” list to “Ok, that’s not so bad”. I think with more practice I could actually spin enough cotton for a decent sized project – like a shirt or light sweater.

Silk has become one of my top five favourite fibres to spin. The diversity of silks that we have available to spin now is pretty amazing. I also love dyeing silk.

The other other students in the class. We have a very diverse group filled with really amazing people. For the first three years there were a lot of us in the college cabins, which bonded us all to each other. It’s great being able to share with these people, and to know there is a group out there that supports you through getting the home work done and supporting you in your life. I’ve met good friends through this class.

==================

I thought I would finish off by showing you what part of an assignment from class looks like.

This is from my year five final project. The criteria we had was to make a project using a bast fibre, with at least 150 meters of yarn. After that the choices were up to the student.

I chose to make a crocheted bath scrubby out of hemp. After doing sampling I found that I liked a 3-ply yarn that was the size of #10 crochet cotton. The gold coloured hemp was fairly easy to spin – it was a well prepared fibre. The purple was not a nice experience. There were sections with very short cotton like fibres, and other sections where the fibre may not have been retted very well and were clumped together and hard to draft. The final purple yarn was thicker than I was aiming for, but it worked out fine in the final product. I pretty proud of the final product, thought it certainly isn’t economical. The final project took a total of 71 hours. That includes all the sampling, spinning and making the final project, and doing the documentation and mounting.

You have to document your thought process on the project – what you wanted to make, why you chose which fibres, fibre prep and spinning techniques you did, what worked, what didn’t, and your comments on it. You are also to show and document any sampling you did to get to the final yarn you used.

Part of the final project is to show a mounted skein of the final yarn, plus the final object.

For the mounted skeins, you need the following:

fibre samples (raw, washed and processed if you do all that work)
a 10 yard sample skein, tied in four places with white cotton
a 1 inch card of wrapped singles
a 1 inch card of wrapped plyed yarn (if final yarn is plyed)
finished samples / articles
documentation on the yarn, stating it’s purpose, describing the fibre and how you processed and spun it, your finishing techniques, description of sampling or finished item, and final comments / observations on your yarn, spinning, sampling and anything else you may have learned or want to change.
for the documentation you need to keep track of how much fibre was used, how much waste was generated, the wraps per inch (WPI) of the singles and plyed yarn, the twist angle (TA), twists per inch (TPI) and yards per pound (YPP) of the plyed yarn.

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A short yarn about my spinning

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

Spinning is something that I’ve taken to fairly recently – only ten years ago.

It was Ted Myatt, again, who convinced me to try it. He tried for a couple years but I resisted. I should have known better. In 2003 he taught me how to spin on a drop spindle. After a few attempts something clicked in my hands and it just made sense. He started me with wool fibre which was fairly easy to draft and spin. Early success encouraged me to continue and I haven’t stopped since.

In a lot of ways spinning works better by not over thinking it. Your hands have to do a lot of repetitive motions, and until they understand them it will feel awkward. Practice will make things easier, and there will come a time when things will just click.

I’ve mostly made smaller projects with my handspun – hats, scarves and a few shawls. I have plans to make a large shawl one day – 2000 yards or more. I also plan to make a sweater for myself. These will be quite an adventure.

I now spin on both drop spindles and a spinning wheel. For some spinning I still find the drop spindle easier to work with. I tend to use them to small projects and for finer spinning.

These are some highlights of my spinning over the years.

2003
Ted finally got me interested in spinning. He taught me how to use a drop spindle and I made a few small skeins on it. And the new fibre addiction began!

2004
Attended my first Ontario Handspinning Seminar in Guelph with Ted.

I learned that spinners are a much calmer bunch than knitters.

I had been going to the Downtown Knit Collective’s Knitters Frolic for a few years. Knitter’s seem to have a feeding frenzy when they go to large sales events. They rush about and grab everything!

Spinners a much more laid back. They wander around, fondle the fibre and yarn more, take their time, talk to the vendors and catch up with each other. It really was a much more pleasant experience then the frolic.

Spun my first lace project on a drop spindle.

2005
I was finally able to get the hang of spinning on a spinning wheel. My spinning guild was doing a demonstration at Allen Gardens in Toronto and they had an Ashford Traditional there. I got a little practice on it and was finally able to keep spinning for over half an hour! I was in heaven!
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In November I ordered my Lendrum spinning wheel from Romni Wools in Toronto. This was the wheel that a lot of friends and people in my guild had and I really liked the modern look and the fact it had two treadles on it.

2006
In February my spinning wheel arrived!

Attended Handweavers Guild of America’s Convergence in Grand Rapids, Michigan. That is an amazing event to attend. It is HUGE! They had between 2000-3000 people go through over the course of the week. I took a 3 day workshop on everything about silk with Robin Russo. The rest of the time were half day lectures and small workshops. I got to meet Kathryn Alexander and Gord Lendrum at the Lendrum booth. Kathryn was demoing spinning cotton on the Lendrums very fast flyer. She made it look so easy! I got to try out spinning on it with wool. Good lord that thing spins fast!

2008
Started the Ontario Handweavers and Spinners Spinning Certificate Program. This is a six year program. I’m going into my sixth year this summer and will be graduating at a ceremony in 2014 or 2015.

Attended my first SOAR (Spin-Off Autumn Retreat) in Pocono Manor, Pennsylvania

SOAR is an absolutely amazing time. There are about 200-300 participants over the course of a week. You start off with a 3-day intensive workshop that is one one topic, then you have a down day, then 3 days where you can take four additional half day retreat sessions. The shopping is always phenomenal. But it’s the people that really make the event. You learn as much hanging around in the lounge in the evenings with other people as you do during the day. Sometimes you just don’t want to go to sleep in case you miss something!

2009
Taught a workshop on knitting gloves from the finger tips down using handspun yarn at the Ontario Handspinning Seminar in Kingston, Ontario.

2010
Attended my second SOAR at Lake Lawn Resort in Delavan, Wisconsin. My 3-day workshop was on colour blending using a hackle taught by Deb Menz. I took a lace spinning retreat session with Margaret Stove and another one on dyeing with cochineal.

2012
Taught two workshops on spinning silk on a drop spindle. One was at the Men’s Spring Knitting Retreat, the other was at the Ontario Handspinning Seminar.

2013
Gave a lecture to the KW Knitter’s Guild on using handspun yarn in knitting. Members of the Guelph Handweavers and Spinners guild supplied me with yarn and finished items to enhance the presentation.

Working on the committee for the Ontario Handspinning Seminar for 2013, being held in Burlington, Ontario.

A little lacey something

Posted on June 9, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

After years of crocheting a lot of doilies and lace things in my teens and early twenties I figured I never wanted to do anything lace related again.

WRONG! I guess it must be in my blood. My grandmother on my mothers side was a great crocheted lace maker. I figure the need to make lace comes from her.

I can thank Ted Myatt again for getting me interested in knitting lace. He makes phenomenal pieces on seemingly impossible sized needles. You can see a few of his piece here towards the bottom of the page.

I can also thank Joan Kass and Dorothy Seimens and several other women in Toronto’s Downtown Knit Collective for lots of inspiration and guidance. Joan is an amazing knitter and Dorothy writes some pretty amazing lace patterns.

A man knitting lace is one of those funny contradictions in the knitting world. Big burly guy, tiny needles and light as air fabric. It just shouldn’t be, but it is.

There’s is such a fascination in making something that can be so complex and so fragile looking. The yarn can be quite delicate, but once the piece is made it can usually stand up to a lot of stress when blocking it out.

Lace really needs the final blocking. Until then it just looks like a mass of spaghetti, but once blocked is blossoms into something amazing.

Here are a few of the lace items that I have made over the years.

This is a small triangular scarf. The pattern is the triangular scarf from Two Lace Scarves by Dorothy Seimens.

The yarn is some of my first handspun lace yarn made on a drop spindle. The fibre is a 70% merino and either 30% alpaca or mohair blend. I left off the tassels from the pattern as I didn’t have enough yarn to make those.

These are pics of one of the Lotus Blossom Shawls I made for a couple friends. The pattern was originally made for a yarn that was slightly heavier then dk weight. That original yarn was discontinued years ago and Dorothy updated the pattern to use a dk or light fingering weight yarns.

This is the Faroese Flower Shawl by Lucy Neatby. I purchased this as a kit and made this shawl for my sister. One of the nice aspects of a Faroese style shawl is that there is extra shaping at the shoulder area of the shawl and they stay on the shoulder better then just a straight shawl.

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This is my Diamonds and Roses Shawl pattern. I had a lot of advice from Dorothy Seimens on creating the charts for this shawl. I still like making it! I plan to make it from handspun yarn one day – naturally dyed with either madder or cochineal.

This is a simple triangular shawl I have designed. The yarn is spindle-spun chain plyed (3-ply) Tussah silk, dyed by Chasing Rainbows Dyeworks. I kept the pattern simple to highlight the colour changes of the yarn. I had tried other lace patterns, but the patterning was lost in the colours.

Some lace designers that you should know:
Margaret Stove
One of the true lace goddesses. She has spun and knit many fine creations. She has also published several books on spinning merino and lace knitting.

Sharon Miller of Heirloom Knitting
Amazing Shetland Lace patterns.

Dorothy Siemens of Fiddlesticks Knitting
A Toronto designer that I’ve known since she first started creating patterns for sale. Beautiful designs, clear instructions and large easy to read charts are the hallmarks of her designs.

Katherine Matthews of Apparknitchick and Ravelry
A local Guelph designer. Ted Myatt introduced us. She has many fun designs.

Anne Hanson of Knitspot.com
Many wonderful designs for lace and other garments.

Birgit Freyer of Knitting Delight and Die WollLust in German.
Many amazing designs.

Judy Marples of Purl Bumps
Many lace scarves and other patterns.

Welcome to the fibre floor!

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

Having a dedicated space for fibre work is an amazing luxury. Van and I really lucked out when we found this place to rent.

The top floor is an open area with a LOT of natural light. There is a skylight on the south side, a large window on the west and north sides, and a smaller window in an alcove on the north.

We have had a few craft parties and meetings up here. It can hold 10 people quite nicely.

So onto the tour! Most pictures are taken from the top of the stairs, except for the closeups. I should warn you. Pretty much all the boxes and bins you see are mine. Van only has a teeny amount of stash compared to me!

This is on the left at the top the stairs. The little alcove at the far left is Van’s drawing nook and holds the sewing machine. It also contains the boxes I store my OHS Spinning Certificate Program binders / work in for first 5 years of the program.

You can also see my rocking chair. Sitting in this and plying yarn is really peaceful.

Half of the big bins here are holding fibre. One has yarn and the rest hold my photography stuff and papers.

You can just see the other window alcove at the far right top of the picture.

The bookshelf at the top right holds all our fibre books, patterns and magazines.

The credenza and the bins and boxes next to it are most of Van’s stash.

At the back is a bunk bed that has a fold out futton on the bottom. Right now the top is home to the yarn that I have cataloqued. The bottom is holding fibre that I’m finding containers for.

In the front center you can see my Lendrum double treadle wheel. I’m currently spinning some BFL / Silk that is dreamy.

Lots of good stuff. There is Van’s Lendrum right at the front. The craft table gets used for a lot of things. We have two swifts and ball winders. The second one is not being used and is on the white credenza you can see at the back left.

The brown boxes just under the skylight are my Wellington Fibres collection. Many wonderful mohair blends with wool, alpaca and silk!

These containers are a mix of fibre, yarn and completed projects.

This is mostly Van’s corner of the room. He has his spinning wheel and floor loom setup here. He also has a small rolling bin with some stash in it. Not pictured is a lovely set of cotton cones for a colour gamp.

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This is my blending hackle. A wonderful tool for blending fibres to get funky rovings to spin.

Van’s created rovings for his Peacock Shawlette on this hackle.

These are some of Van’s spinning yarns.

A lot of these are from Habu Textiles.

These are some of my drop spindles. I have a few more stored inside the white credenza that this is sitting on.

Also in the credenza are my hand combs. They are made by Alvin Ramer. The first set are Dutch combs, the second are the Super Mini combs. Both these and the hackle above are made in Cherry wood.

This is my 15″ Leclerc Dorothy Table loom.

I don’t use it as much as I would like to. I’m hoping to get a bit more time on it this summer.

Just to the side of the loom are two rolling drawers. They hold my excess needles, some yarn and magazines.

Next to the loom you can see a white drawstring bag and a Tupperware container. The bag holds my current sock project and the container is my usual traveling sock kit. It contains 40″ circular needles in 2, 2.25, 2.5, 2.75 and 3mm, a couple sets of dpns and some other things for making socks. It also has copies of a couple sock recipes I use for my basic plain socks.

One last look at the yarn stash on top of the bunk bed. Lots of interesting stuff up here and actually not as much sock yarn as I was thinking I had! But there is still more to cataloque, so we’ll see what else turns up!

Some things that are not shown here are the dyeing equipment and a few fleeces which are kept in the basement.

Thanks for coming along for the tour! I hope it was fun and you saw something interesting.

These are a few of my favourite things

Posted on June 5, 2013 by Danny Ouellette

Today is the Blogathon’s first theme day. The theme was your five favourite apps that help you with your productivity.

This is geared more towards the writers taking part in the blogathon, so I’m going to list five (or more!) things that I love that make my fibre work easier.

1 – Interchangeable knitting needle sets

These are a great tool to have around. Depending on the material of the needle these can be fairly inexpensive. There are many companies that now offer these kits.

Some pros: Compact systems, usually with a storage unit to keep things neatly together. Easy to add additional items to the kits. Some brands offer different materials for needles (plastic, metal, wood). Others offer different styles of tips (blunter or sharper). There are several sizes of cords so you can easily choose the length of your circular needle.

Some cons: The joins between the needles and the cords can sometimes snag yarns. Most kits only go down to 3.5mm (US Size 4). Smaller needle sizes still have to be purchased as normal circular needles. The smallest connecting cords usually give you a 60cm (24 inch) circular needle.

2 – Digital scales

I like to have a couple of these on hand – a larger kitchen scale that measures in grams and a smaller one that can measure down to 0.1 grams.

The larger one is great for measuring out large quantities of fibre or yarn. The smaller scale is perfect for measuring out chemicals for dyeing or for small batches of fibre when I’m blending with hand cards.

3 – Mini shears or small sharp toenail scissors

These are very handy for trimming yarns from finished pieces. I find the shears easier to use then scissors – they don’t put as much strain on my hands. They also are usually a bit sharper, so cutting is easier. I often use the shears if I have to cut fibres when I’m blending shorter fibres together.

4 – Hand spindles

I learned to spin using handspindles and I still often go to them for projects and just when I want to relax. Their biggest advantage is their portability. It’s very easy to slip them into a case and pull them out while on the go. It’s amazing how much yarn you can make when you add up all those 5 minute spins over the week. A few people I know use cardboard tubes, like whiskey bottle tubes, for transportation. Put in fibre, add spindle and away you go!

A selection from my spindle collection

Bill is an amazing photographer. His studio is in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

His main photography site is on Photoshelter, and you can also find him on Flickr.

Front row – left to right; 1 and 3 – Edward Tabachek Deluxe and Mini High-whorl spindles; 2 – Spindlewood Company Square Whorl Mini spindle; 4 – Golding Fiber Tools Pinwheel Rinspindle.
Back row: Tracy Eichem spindles, Production spindles in Star Light and Ultra Light weights.

5 – Storage bins

I need a lot of storage bins on hand to keep all my knitting and spinning stash in. I like to use clear shoebox sized bins for my yarns and larger Rubbermaid like bins to hold fibre and fleeces. Having the clear bins allow me to see the yarns, making it easy to see what colours I have on hand.

Yarn in shoebox sized storage units

There are 44 boxes of yarn in this picture. I probably have another 10 or so left to cataloque before adding them to this pile. Each box is numbered, so I can look up a yarn I want to use in the cataloque and easily find the box.

6 – HanDbase database software for catalogueing

I’m in the process of catalogueing all my craft related items – yarn, fibre, needles, books and other fibre equipment.

I found a great simple database program called HanDbase to help me with this. There is a community of users that provide database layouts free of charge. I used a few of these as the starting point for my catalogue, modified them and created a couple new ones. The other great thing about it is you can get a copy for you smart phone, so I can have a copy on me when I’m out and can check if I already have things before buying more!

My goal is to cataloque everything by the end of the summer. I’m probably about a third done now. It will get faster once I get to the fibre, as there are fewer items in a box to deal with!

7 – Charting software

Making charts for patterns is usually a designers biggest nightmare.

For years I’ve used Excel to make my charts. I would then have to give that to the person doing my pattern layout and they would have to recreate that in their software. Big pain you know where.

I’m currently checking out a couple charting packages to see what they can do. One big benefit is that they normally can export files that the layout person can use directly.

I haven’t found The One package yet. They all have their quirks. Some do more than others, but I haven’t been able to do everything I could in excel yet in one package. I’ll keep trying and may just have to find a way to do certain things when it gets to the layout tool.

Packages I’ve tried and like so far:

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