FO – Page 3 – Fiber Musings

Project Bags

On 9 Nov, 2015

When I was at Green Planet Yarn back in June, I came home with this cute little shopping bag.

They had a selection of fabrics and I picked the these cats because I was in the midst of Carla Sonheim‘s Cats! class. I used the shopping bag as my project bag. It really is a perfect size. It is just the rightÂ size for a small projectÂ and project notes without fear of everything tumbling out if you aren’t careful.

I took some measurements. I may have even bought some fabric. But then nothing.

I didn’t do anything with it for months.

Then this weekend happened. I started a new small portable knitting project but didn’t have an empty project bag handy. Instead of looking in the stash for empty project bags that I know I have around, I dug out some stashed fabric and got to work.

A few hours later, I had these 2 new project bags to play with. My new knitting project is already in the bicycle themed bag because I’m knitting a head/neck warmerÂ to wear for my bike commute.Â Now, I have 2 cat themed project bags. And yes, they both are already adorned with cat hair.

Why a couple of hours? This was the first time I made these and I was measuring and planning as I went. Next go around will definitely be faster (if I can find my notes or decipher them). I also made this batchÂ with French seams because I was too lazy to pull the overlock machine out but I also didn’t want raw edges. Besides, the overlock would seem counter intuitive since I was using myÂ old school Singer Featherweight. The Featherweight doesn’t do zigzag so I was stuck. But overlock would definitely have made this much faster.

Lastly, I used the sew the box corner technique (#3). It was a little finicky with the French seams and the small size. I think I would go with cut the corner method next time (#2 of the same link above).

General Notes:

2 – 14″ x 14″ squares : I cut them separately instead of in a single long vertical strip (14″ x 28″) because my fabric pattern had up/down direction. I could have cut a long horizontal strip (28″ x 14″) but that would require buying a full yard of fabric. If you are making them in bulk for gifts, that is definitely an option.
2 – 14″ x 2″ strips : If I were to do this again, I would cut 3″ strips. Press the 2 edges toward the center, then fold again. Press.
1″ fold over edge at the top of the bag (with additional 1/4″ fold under so there are no raw edges).

Oh, and part of the time was spent cleaning and troubleshootingÂ my Featherweight. When I pulled it out the other day to do a “quick” project, it was skipping stitches. I didn’t want to take the time to figure out what was wrong so I switched to my Bernina*. (The Needle was inserted incorrectly after I replaced it last time.)

* Does’t everyone have more than one sewing machine? I assume if you are here, you have more than oneÂ spinning wheel or loom (or more than one of both). Sewing machines are in the same category. So stop judging.

Tasty Morsels

By Ann

On 20 Oct, 2015

In FO, Spin

Every once in a while, you get a craving for a little something tasty. You don’t want that entire box of chocolates but you don’t have the will power to open the box and just take one. After all, once the box is open, who will notice just another one? Next thing you know, you didn’t stop until the entire box of chocolates is gone.

No, I don’t speak from personal experience. This is just what I’ve heard from others. Why do you ask?

Sometimes it’s like that with spinning as well. You just want a small little something to carry along with you. But spinning a 4-8 oz braid of fiber is anything but instant gratification.

Enter Greenwood Fiberworks‘ Pigtails — approximately half ounce (label says 0.4-0.6 oz) of wool, beautifully dyed.

Just enough to take to a meeting and spin and ply the entire amount on a single spindle.

I don’t think these are part of her regular stock. I picked these up at CNCH a few years ago. CNCH 2014, perhaps? She had a small rack of these tasty little morsels. It was just too tempting.

For the first one, I split it in half and spun each half separately. I wound them off onto individual weaving bobbins before winding them together onto a 3rd bobbin for plying. I think because of how fresh the singles were, I had a difficult time plying them from their own bobbins directly. Too many pigtails.

I think for the next one, I will spin it as a continuous strand and wind it into a center pull ball before plying. I will still split it in half, but reverse the direction on the second half so the colors will still mostly line up.

I pulled outÂ my Bosworth Mini for this little project. It’s strange. I’ve always remembered these as fast little spindles with long spin, but that wasn’t my experience this time around. Perhaps it’s because I’ve been mostly spinning silk on my Goldings. There is nothing like those little Goldings for speed!

Speaking of on the go spinning, I’ve upgraded my little quart sized zip lock bag to this pouch. It’s a plastic (no more spilled water, tea, wine!) expandable zippered pouch that I picked up at Daiso. I use a similar one to carry my travel watercolor kit.

Hippo Face

By Ann

On 7 Oct, 2015

In FO, Knit

This sweater was finished back in early July but sat around waiting for me to sew on the buttons. Yeah. It’s been that crazy around here.

I adapted the Little Hearts baby sweater with my own chart of little red hippo faces *. Why? This is for the baby of my teammate who named our work project RedHyppo (internal acryonym variant) so I thought it would be appropriate to have a red hippo theme baby item. (Partial red hippo is also in progress — still needs stuffing.)

Project finally “launched” last week, hence the frenzy of blog posts and FOs around here. But we are knee deep in the mop up so things here might slow again.

* Hippo face chart is available on my Ravelry project page for this sweater.

Random thoughts of a fiber enthusiast - mostly fiber related, sometimes coherent

Category: FO Page 3 of 48

Project Bags

Tasty Morsels

Hippo Face