Sonia Makes Things

I’ve been stress knitting. The yarn I made for Tour de Fleece is so lovely to work with. I love the gradient.

Help has arrived, and my panic is subsiding. So, I unpacked my spinning stuff and started on my Tour de Fleece spin. I’m using a Finnish distaff called a rukinlapa. The seller didn’t know how to use it either but I seem to have figured it out on the first try. The ancestors were with me this day.

I have to drop out of Tour de Fleece this year. Life came at me very quickly. I’m facing an eviction. Everything else is on hold until I can sort things out with the landlord. Ideally, I would have a support worker or cleaners to help me with my daily needs, but that doesn’t seem to be an option.

I have a portfolio now. It’s a little rough, but I like the direction it’s going. Let me know what you think: https://soniasulaiman.com/illustration-portfolio-2/

Now that something is happening publishing wise, it’s time for me to work on my illustration portfolio. It’s so hard!

A small thing that might change how I spin yarn, especially for Tour de Fleece. I figured out that I could cross lace the flier on my spinning wheel. The hooks are on different faces so I thought it wouldn’t work, but happily it did. It slows the intake of yarn onto the bobbin giving me more time to add twist which is necessary for thinner yarn. It also helps with consistency.

I have some wool for Tour de Fleece!

I regret choosing the long version of the Sophie Hood to cast on but it’s working up nicely so far. I even made some three ply red wool yarn from the merino sample my dog chomped into chunks.

I changed my mind, and swapped the hood pattern. There were a few reasons behind the change. Using this hand spun yarn makes a dense fabric and, looking at the projects where folks used thick yarn, I didn’t really like the effect. I don’t think it would be nice to wear… but, also, the cast on was really annoying. I didn’t want to hate the project right out of the gate.

This morning I knit my first actual gauge swatch from my hand spun yarn. I used 7 mm needles, and it hasn’t been blocked because I’m not loving the way the fabric feels. I’ll have to try going up a needle size.

I’ve decided on a pattern for knitting up the hand spun yarn I made with the indigo Corriedale wool. Behold, the Hoodola by Laura Nelkin:

Letting the singles rest over night made for some really smooth plying (also, knowing how to ply helps!)

Before I forget, fabric samples I ordered last month finally arrived! The idea was to get some greens in textiles that would be suitable for each season, and all natural fibres.

I watched some tutorials on plying, realized I was doing literally everything wrong! lol it’s all good. I have useable yarn! I made this up this morning to sample the spin.

Cleaning while disabled is not a good time. I’ve been at this since Monday. It’s a very low energy kind of day but I only have four days left to finish this deep clean.

Yup, I am pretty sure that the Corriedale wool I’ve been using to learn spinning all this time is, in fact, compacted if not felted. This explains why I can’t manage to draft easily no matter what I do.