Project Inspired Spinning

Many times I find a really cool art batt, fancy hand-dyed braids, or batt in a braid — the colors or the texture attract me and I have to have it. What will I do with the finished spun yarn? Who knows! Many spinners ply their art just for the pure pleasure of it. There is always a place for indulgence spinning — it’s like eating comfort food, it just makes you feel good.

Periodically I spin for a particular project, something I want to weave or knit. How does one go about spinning yarn for knitting a sweater or a jacket? Several years ago, I wanted to make each of my sons a Tomten Jacket. I was inspired by some of the changes mentioned in a blog by Jared Flood. This was going to be a special project, and I wanted to add my own personal twist to it — spin the yarn myself!
There were a few considerations I needed to address first:

• I spin VERY thin, the older I get the more like frog hair my spinning gets; funny, because years ago I wanted to make a sweater from Spin Off, which called for a thinner spun yarn, and I just couldn’t make it fine enough! For the Tomten Jackets, I decided to concentrate on spinning a thicker singles and do a 2 ply. I had PLENTY of roving, so if my yarn was still too thin, I could double the yarn.
• Consistency is important. I concentrated on keeping my singles as consistent as possible. It is also important to WATCH the plying process — you don’t just want the singles to lay next to each other — they should be chasing each other around a pole!
• When using Handspun, I like to find the right needle first. The knit structure was garter stitch, and I wanted it to be just tight enough to hold its own over time. I knit gauge swatches with several needle sizes until I found one that worked.
• Once I had all my materials together, I really studied Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Tomten Jacket pattern from 2 of her books. My gauge did not match hers exactly, BUT this is a modular pattern, so making changes was effortless.

Here are some views of the Tomten Jackets.

Below are some of the details that I published in my project section of Ravelry. Zimmerman has you cast on 112 stitches, I was going to need a few more, but everything is divisible by 4 and 8, which is what you need.

1. CO 136 Stitches
2. Knit for 14” — around 50 ridges. (remember garter stitch grows, so you don’t need to make the thing over long) — you can work a few short rows on the BACK section to prevent ride up.
3. Divide into 5 sections, Section 1 has 17 st and is one of the fronts, Section 2 has 34 st and is the ‘deep’ armhole (leave these stitches on holder until you are ready to do the arms) Section 3 has 34 stitches and is the back, section 4 has 34 stitches and is the other armhole, section 5 has 17 stitches and is the other front.
4. Knit Sections 1,3,5 until they are the desired length to the neck, Zimmerman recommends that you knit twice as many ridges as you have stitches on sections 1 & 5 — this actually worked out quite nicely. I knit the back section up first, and then knit the two front sections to the same length .

My Schematic for the body of the tomten jacket.

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What is next on the Docket?

Have you SEEN Knits about Winter by Emily Fodon? I want to made EVERY project in this book!

Barn and Soiree

​Several of the sweaters (Barn, Soiree) use DK weight — you can also use a Fingering weight with a strand of Mohair Lace. For me, Spinning DK means that I have to use a spin gauge. I looked up DK and went for 12 wpi – 2 ply. In retrospect, I should have CALCULATED the yards per pound of Emily’s DK, and spun it at 14 wpi. DUH, Slaps forehead. I now have almost enough of a middle-of-the-road DK — around 980 ypp to knit a sweater. Emily’s DK for Barn and for the DK version of Soiree is 1178 ypp — I’m off by about 15%. What to do?

Sierra’s “what to do” List

• Do a gauge swatch. If I have to go down by more than 2 needle sizes, it will be TOO compressed. All the sweaters have LOTS of positive ease, so I don’t want too much yarn in the sweater, or it will be HEAVY.
• If the swatch works out — then good — I’ll get started with Soiree. This sweater is smaller than Barn, so it’s a good first project.
• If the swatch does not work out, then I’ll make a swatch that gives me the weight of fabric that I need. Then I’ll measure it and compare it to the sweater’s schematic. I had planned on making a size 3, but my swatch may indicate that I could just follow the directions and make one of the smaller sweater sizes, like the size 1 or the size 2.
• If all else fails, I will knit the sweater in commercial yarn, to get a feel for what it should look like as a finished project, and to be familiar with the pattern. Then I’ll change the pattern, and knit a second sweater in my handspun.

The moral of the story is: there is no reason to give up just because you don’t get an exact match. There is always a work-around. Knitting with handspun is a magical, mystical process — it is WORTH the effort to make it work. I wasn’t even trying for a particular weight with the Tomten jackets. I just let the fiber dictate the thickness of the yarn, and made adjustments, like using 2 strands of yarn. Eleven years and a few repairs later, Nick’s Tomten jacket is still one of his favorite garments, AND it has kept it’s shape! SEE MAGIC! His dogs, Bear and Kaya, love it too.