Woobu Scarf: Take Two

For the second iteration of the leftover Woobu scarves, I decided to revisit a fancy-looking twill design that I used for my very first ever weaving project. The Handweaver's Pattern Directory tells me that it's a variation on M & W threading. Me, I just did what it said to do, and hoped for the best.

If you compare this scarf to the original, you will see the similarities, as well as some differences. The original was done in a super-drapey bamboo yarn, which was quite fine. This yarn is of course a much fluffier wool and bamboo blend. After blocking, it does have a surprising amount of drape for a wooly scarf.


Unfortunately my indoor photo shoot washed out the colours a bit, due to the sheen of the yarn - the design does actually stand out quite a bit better than it appears to, in these photos.

Having finished that one, I am in a bit of a scarf-frenzy right now. More to show off, tomorrow!

Woobu Scarf: Take One

Although my yarn stash isn't yet taking over my home, it is slowly growing excessive. As most knitters do, I periodically pledge to make some projects from yarn out of my stash, rather than buying more yarn. Sometimes that's easier to do than others. In this case, it was an inspiration to dig out some gorgeous Woobu that I had left over from two projects (oops, that reminds me of two more Finished Objects I haven't yet blogged...) Once I dug it out of my closet, I realized that I have just tons of it. I decided to make two (maybe even three) woven scarves with it.


The Jengu yarn is the whiter one - I used that for the warp of the scarf, in a point threading. Then I wove a 2/2 reversing twill to match, using the Irish Girlie Green. The colours in the green look pretty fantastic, not least of which is because of the sheen of the bamboo in the yarn.


It was a challenge for me to weave this loose enough - after having woven so many towels out of cotton/linen, I am used to beating the weft yarn pretty firmly. Even while trying to be gentle, I still started this out with far too many picks per inch, and had to unweave a bit and try again. It was a very quiet and gentle project, and I enjoyed the beautiful colours for every bit of it. In fact, while I was weaving this scarf, I kept thinking that it must be the prettiest thing I've ever made. After weaving, I twisted some fringe for the ends, and then gave it a bath in some Soak and laid it out to dry.


Once again, the whole scarf took only two days (which ultimately means I finished two whole scarves, start to finish, in four days!) It seemed to take a bit longer to dry than the alpaca, and resulted in a firmer fabric than the previous scarf did. That might be due to the much springier nature of this yarn in comparison to the relative lack of stretch in the alpaca. I am planning a second scarf with the same warp & weft combo, but in a different twill design, and right now I'm considering whether I might want to make that one a bit looser, at maybe 10 ends per inch, rather than 12. The jury is still out on that.

End results: a pretty scarf, a smaller stash, another project out of my head and into my hands. Big win.

On the Needles

I noticed that I've been getting lazy about showing things that I'm working on. A few of them are big projects, and I always try to wait for them to be photogenic before I post something. Sometimes they aren't really photogenic until they are finished, though. Here are a few candid photos of what I have on the needles, right now.


The latest shawl in progress, the Bridgewater shawl by Jared Flood. It has a garter stitch square for a center (very meditative and enjoyable) that is knit diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner, with increases and decreases along the sides to shape the square. Then you pick up a border around the edges of the square, and knit a lace border. I'm at that part of the pattern, which is why it looks like an amoeba. I admit I haven't been working on it much, of late. There are a couple of other things that are taking up my attention.


One of those is a plain stockingette cardigan in black and boysenberry stripes. I had some black worsted wool in my stash, but only half what I needed to make myself a sweater. Of course I immediately thought of using it with another colour, doing a nice wide stripe on a basic cardigan, and got some yarn in this beautiful boysenberry colour to cast on. I'm using EZ's percentage system from Knitting Workshop, and making a steek up the front to cut apart into a cardigan after knitting the body. I am also going to use her formula for circular set-in sleeves to see how that works. And I'm "complicating matters" with a v-neck, as she puts it. "The techniques are simple, but would gum up directions for your first circular set-in sleeve to an intolerable degree." I do love complicating matters.


The other large project I'm working on is another cardigan, the Traveling Sweater that all the Blue Moonies are in love with. This one is a more interesting construction: short row wedges that form a circle of ribbing, with sleeves and upper-back knit separately and attached. I am just past one-fourth of the circular ribbing. It's simple enough, and the yarn is soft and lovely wool/bamboo. I'm still enjoying it, but I might be cursing 2x2 ribbing in another week or three.

Well, those are the big projects. I will show you the smaller ones, too, one day soon. Maybe even a finished one. Well, I can dream, anyway.

Hat With Braids

I decided to grow my hair long again. It's a cycle I go through every few years: get bored with it being short, grow it out, get bored with it being long, cut it short. Well, right now I'm in that awkward phase that makes it really hard for you to remember that you want it long, since you want so badly to get it cut so it doesn't look like a disaster all the time. The only thing to do is try not to think about it, and make yourself a cute Norwegian hat with braids, that will remind you how awesome it is to have long hair.


I've been craving one of these hats for months, since I first saw it on the Drops site. The other day I was searching for something in one of my storage boxes when I found some Woobu left over from my Jengu Woobu Aran. I immediately thought of how great it would be for this hat.

Turns out that the hat called for a heavier weight of yarn, so I held it double for the pattern, and ended up using a different gauge, which meant I had to recalculate all the numbers, and I didn't make it quite as long... but really, it's still essentially that hat. (Plus I used a lot more yarn than the pattern suggests, to make the braids, so they would be as thick as they are in the photo -- and as thick as they will be when I have finally grown my hair long.)

Don't you love it?

The Jengu Woobu Aran

Finished on Friday morning before work, but I didn't really get to rock it out until today. I am so so happy with how it turned out -- soft and snug and cabley.

As I've mentioned before, I made many modifications to the pattern, since the yarn I used was a smaller gauge (sport vs. aran) and the size I made was bigger than the pattern included. I widened the berry stitch section in the center by a couple of berries, to keep the overall stitch-pattern proportions right, then added a few stitches to either side of the front and back, to make the whole sweater a bit wider. I did waist decreases, bust increases, and short rows to lengthen the back ribbing. I lowered the front neckline by an inch or so (thank goodness.) I made the sleeves about an inch shorter than the pattern would have them. For the diamond cable on the sides, I stopped the diamond and made it into a zig zag after the beginning of the armhole decreases. (The pattern didn't say to do this, but the original pattern photo in Vogue Knitting has them this way, and I liked how it looked.)

I think that's about all the modifications I made...

The Woobu yarn itself is great -- soft and full. I wouldn't call it a sport weight, though, more of a DK to light worsted. I almost got gauge with it, actually, which saved me a lot of grief, math-wise. And knitting with it was so nice. I would totally knit with this yarn again, for more soft cozy sweaters. Only time will tell how it wears.

Overall, a very satisfying project, from beginning to end. Thanks for the sweater design, Michael Kors!

So Close

I headed out of town for a couple of days of R&R at my folks' place. There was much relaxation, jigsaw puzzles, knitting. Not to mention a hot tub. Pretty heavenly, really.


I finished the sleeves for the Jengu Woobu Aran, while I was there. I did both at once, and they were quick -- they took a handful of hours, from start to finish. When I got home, I blocked the back and sleeves of the sweater on the floor, and when my HLM saw them, he thought the sleeves looked like I had knitted a pair of panties. Warm wooly aran panties. Hmmm something to think about...

I would love to keep chatting, but I have a sweater to put together. Stay tuned!

This Week Chez Crafty

Well I had my last weaving class on Monday night, and none too soon, since my favourite Local Boy Turned Screen Star**, Nathan Fillion, has a new tv series starting next Monday. Yay! I am super-excited about it, and hope it catches enough interest in the fickle public eye that it will last a while.

Meantime, I don't have much to show off, just more of the same -- I have finished and blocked the front of the Jengu Woobu Aran (photo included for proof)
and made a lot of progress on the back. Another week or so and I should have this one ready to wear.

In related news, we had our first meeting of the Post-Apocalyptic-Readiness Knitting Guild at the pub on Sunday night: there was food, beer, knitting, conversation and hilarity, and a few knitterly mistakes. Much fun was had, and it seems like it will be a regular thing. I think it is in my best interest to bring simpler projects in the future, though -- the aran designs might be a bit much for a brain saturated with Guinness.

**Lest we forget the other precious Local Boys, like Callum (did I ever casually mention how he popped by my work one day?) or Bruce.

A Weaver is Born

So I spent an hour or so making a twisted fringe on my woven scarf, and then I wet-finished it (which is basically the same as blocking in knitting, but by a different name.) Now it is dry and lovely. As with knitting, the finishing makes all the difference. When it first comes off the loom, it is quite stiff from being made under so much tension. After it is soaked thoroughly, the fibers can all move around a bit and get comfortable with their neighbours. Now that it's dried, it is very soft and has a lot more movement. (Hard to explain, but if you felt it before and after, you'd know what I mean.) As I suspected, the camera doesn't really pick up the iridescent quality of the fabric. If you see it in person, it's quite something. (Click the photo for a ridiculously big image, where you can make out the pattern more clearly.)

Secondly, here is a little progress shot of my Jengu Woobu Aran.
I have just bound off a few stitches for the front neckline. A few more inches and it will be done and I can start the back. It's been a bit of a challenge to keep three different stitch patterns (which all have repeats of different lengths) straight, as well as adjusting the shaping of the thing to fit me. Hopefully it all pays off in the end.

A New Hope

My yarn parcel from Blue Moon Fiber Arts finally arrived. It contained (among other things that we'll talk about another time) three big beautiful skeins of their Woobu yarn (a wool & bamboo blend) in the colour Jengu, which is one of their Spirit colours, thusly named because it is a sort of 'barely there' colour, just a pale pale tint. The idea came upon me a while back to use one of these colours to make an aran sweater, one that is almost but not quite the traditional natural colour of sheep's wool.


I wanted to make the chic little aran sweater (ravelry) designed by Michael Kors for Vogue Knitting Holiday '05 (yes I am four years behind in my knitting queue... what's your point?) I made a handful of generously sized swatches (very out of character for me, I know) because the gauge of my chosen yarn is different than the recommended, and because the size I'm making is one not included in the pattern. After a needle change and an extensive knitting/measuring of the various stitch patterns, I finally cast on for the front, yesterday morning.

I had to make charts for the three stitch patterns, since there are only written directions in VK. My chart cheat sheet is only in the photo so you can see how the yarn is just baaaarely blue. It is slightly variegated, but I'm not sure if it's apparent in the picture or if I'm just imagining it because I know it's there. The yarn itself is soft and sproingy. Enough bamboo to make it shine and give it some weight, but still a lovely soft and elastic wool. And the skeins are huge. I couldn't even use my ball winder, since they are so big. I wound one whole skein by hand the day they arrived, and was shocked at the size of the ball. Don't believe me? Here is a photo of it beside a well-known landmark, to give you some idea of the size:

Huge.

I have dubbed the sweater the Jengu Woobu Aran, which I think is great mostly because it sounds like something George Lucas would come up with. (I may be a geek, but at least I'm consistent.)