Sunday 24 June 2012

A Cardigan is born and celebrated.


Last March, Grace came into my life. She is an Ashford Traditional Spinning Wheel and I ADORE her. Thoughts of replacing her make me feel like a traitor. She has soothed me through many a bad day and has my family telling me to 'go and spin' when they see me getting stressed.


I had a few spinning lessons in April 2011 and spun a few plaits of tops and then Tour de Fleece was imminent so I decided to participate. My goal was to spin to knit myself a cardigan. I had been spinning on a wheel for 3 months so I did not have 'expectations' but decided to simply enjoy the process.

I ordered 1.1kg of light grey corriedale from Handspinner and the amount of tops that arrived scared me. This photo was of the the last little bit, as I had separated the rest into 50g bags.


I read Judith Mckenzie Mccuin's Intentional Spinner and set about spinning to sample. I made a 2ply, a 3ply and cable sample and knitted them up.



2 ply and knitted sample



 3ply and knitted sample



Cable yarn, 2 2plied strands plied together and knitted sample which I found defined the stitches beautifully but was hard to the touch so I settled on a 3ply yarn and set about to spin it. 


Tour de Fleece Day 1


TDF Day 6


TDF Day 10


By day 16 I had to ply yarn as I did not have enough bobbins left.


On the 23rd day I had spun and plied all the yarn.


All washed and skeined and ready to knit - Alas, no pattern. I trawled Ravelry for months to no avail and set it aside for other knitting adventures.

Then in December Chonnie Chang Chinchio's book Textured Stitches arrived on my doorstep and I fell deeply in love with Professoressa. I cast it on immediately.




When I completed it, I was pleased and it fitted my ample curves deliciously. It is a joy to wear.



I wore it to one of our guild meetings, Janet, one of the lovely guild members complimented me and suggested I submit it for the National Exhibition of the Association of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers. I was quite taken back as this was not anything that I would have considered doing. I prepared it and submitted it.

I heard last week it has been accepted for the exhibition. I am both honoured and delighted. I shall be going to visit it during the exhibition and I shall take photographs of the exhibits to share with you if it is allowed.

12 comments:

  1. Lovely to read the whole story, and I can confirm that this is a beautiful cardigan and deserves to be displayed and admired at the exhibition ... I shall look out for it myself.

    Beautiful x

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    1. Thanks, Dawn. I am still coveting your hand dyed top....

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  2. How exciting for you and it's such an inspiration for me to make sure I spin more often. Gorgeous!

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  3. Thanks, Tina. I am madly considering goals for the TDF this year.....

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  4. How utterly beautiful!! From the yarn to the knitting, it is just perfect.

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  5. Thanks Karin. It was a delight to make. I enjoyed the process so much that I am repeating it!

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  6. I gazed at your cardigan at the exhibition for ages, it is beautiful!

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    1. Thank you for the big smile you brought to me:)

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  7. Thank you for sharing this project - I feel intimidated by the thought of spinning enough for a garment, but you show that it is within reach of many of us, and with such stunning results!

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    1. Tina, I felt very intimidated at the start too so understand your feelings. However I was having so much fun after I actually started that it all seemed to fly past. It was well worth the effort and time.

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  8. Beautiful spinning and knitting! Congratulations!

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