I've fallen in love with the Caora sweater and would love to make one with my own hand-spun yarn. The gorgeous chunky garter stitch calls for a bulky weight (7 wpi) yarn. So a few weeks back, I spent the morning sampling as I was curious to see just how thick I could go.
In no time at all, I had spun up some fat singles and was fairly satisfied with the results. It was a real joy to try spinning a thicker yarn, even if they were a little more lumpy bumpy than I've been producing recently, but apparently it's very normal to find it harder to produce regular thicker yarns than thin. Then came plying the singles together, which was a whole different matter!
Within minutes I was having trouble drawing the plied yarn onto the bobbin, which no matter of fiddling with the tension seemed to solve. I ended up having to ply in fits and starts, pretty much hand winding the entire length of the plied yarn onto the bobbin! It felt as if I had regressed back to being a complete novice spinner...although unlike my first attempts, this yarn is not over-plied thank goodness!
Although I've ended up with a slightly slubby (uneven) yarn, weighing somewhere between Bulky and Aran (7-8 wpi), the finished yarn is really gorgeous - beautifully balanced and very soft to the touch. I can just imagine how wonderful it would be to wrap myself up in the Caora sweater on poorly days. I'd love to spin enough to cast on, but I think I've sadly discovered the limits of my 19th century spinning wheel - it just is not happy producing chunky yarn.
Looks like I might have to start saving up for a more modern wheel, with a bigger orifice and jumbo flyer....
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"néou aran"
Ingredients: 70g of washed and carded wool. The fibre used was white Berichon du Cher from Gèdre.
Spinning: Two singles spun from rolags in the Z direction, using the woollen technique.
Plying: two singles plied in the S direction until balanced.
Finishing: Wound off into a skein, washed and dried weighted to set the ply.
Quantity: 67g giving 40m of finished yarn
WPI: 7-8
Yarn Weight: Bulky/Aran
Oh, that Caora sweater looks beautiful. It really would work perfectly with hand spun!
ReplyDeleteI have to say I don't know much about spinning wheels but I have started to do a little research and I'm hoping to learn more and more. Seeing your spinning wheel in photos I'm very impressed that you use such an old one. I would love to get an antique/old fashioned wheel but I'm worried that it would have limitations in the long run.
I do hope you get the tools you need to make the yarn you want! :)