Too Many Wheels.

That's it. I now officially have Too Many Wheels. Also, I want to buy a set of wool combs and they're far too expensive for my current equipment budget so I've decided to sell a couple of wheels to raise the money for combs.

First wheel up for sale is my Frank Herring Saxony wheel. Complete wih six bobbins, original orifice hook, on-board Lazy Kate and instructions for both use and assembly. Can be used wit either Scotch Tension or double drive.



And the completely refurbished Ashford Mk1 Traveller that I spoke about recently. (This is the "before" picture, I hasten to add. It's a lot cleaner now.) Three bobbins and an on-board Lazy Kate. Scotch Tension.



I'm currently in the process of taking pictures and writing up a description of each before I put them on Ebay next week. Might put them on Ravelry too. I just wanted to give you, my faithful readers, the chance to express any interest in either wheel first.

Natural Gas Commercial

Shamelessly swiped from glittyknittykitty's blog...





I want that shower.

Scrap Swap.

I took part in a fun little swap over on the UK Spinners Forum on Ravelry.

Basically 20 or so of us sent in 100g or 200g of painted wool tops to a central coordinator, she stripped them down into 10g or so sections and then you were sent the same weight of fibre back of mixed short sections.

There were some fantastic colour combinations in the scraps.



Half the fun of this sort of swap is to see what other people do with their scraps. Some folk have opted to separate out colour families or divide the scraps into cool and hot colours, then spin the resultant piles. Some folk have drum carded their scraps into amazing multicoloured batts. And the spinning techniques have varied too. Singles, thick or thin or both, two ply, three ply, Navaho, coiled yarns...endless combinations.

I opted to spin what someone else called a "pudding yarn". I tore the scraps down even further into finger length sections, drafted them out a bit then spun them in a totally random sequence.




This was spun on my old Louet S10. Every time I get out my Old Man Louet I think that if I was made to have only one wheel he would be it. First wheel and still favourite, lol.

When plied this should end up about aran weight so I was thinking of making another Liesl with it to wear to spinning demos. But of course there's only a couple of hundred grams here and I'll need 700 yards or so, or 400g+ of fibre. So, yup. I'll have to do the next Scrap Swap (or two) as well.

Fun to spin. I'm not going to Navaho ply it though. I'll spin a second bobbin with the scraps from the next swap and ply the two bobbins together into one crazed barber pole yarn of many colours.

Madonna of the Yarnwinder.

I was sort of half listening to the news on the radio today when the phrase "Madonna of the Yarn Winder" caught my ear. Eh? So I went and Googled for it and found it's a painting. Really!




The news article, btw, was about the prosecution of the gang that had stolen the above from Drumlanrig Castle a few years ago. Story here, for anyone interested.

But. Really. I knew there was a Knitting Madonna..



(Detail from 'Visit of the Angel', from the right wing of the Buxtehude Altar. 1400 - 1410. Meister Bertram von Minden (1340 - 1414))


.. fact there's more than one..




(The Holy Family ca. 1345 Ambrogio Lorenzetti of Sienna (1290 - 1348))

...but this was the first I'd heard of a possibly spinning Madonna. Because, bah to the "yarnwinder" bit, that's a niddy-noddy the Baby Jesus has in his little mitts.

So I went looking..




(Madonna with the Child 1570s. Oil on wood, 72 x 52 cm The Hermitage, St. Petersburg)

I don't know why I find the thought of a spinning Madonna faintly amusing, but I do. The expressions on the first and last Madonnas' faces are priceless, actually. As are their hands, poised for a fast removal of spinning equipment from possibly sticky hands and drool, lol.

Olympic Liesl #2.

Liesl. Finished and blocking. Used almost exactly seven balls of Noro Kureyon 157 for a size 46". Yarn obtained from the York p/hop Yarn Swap.



Modifications.....left out purl ridges in main body and sleeves, added four rows of reverse stocking stitch to neckline, used a purl cast off at sleeves and lower body to give a rolled edge finish. No buttons. I'll never wear it buttoned up so I'm not going to rush off to look for buttons. If some come along one day, that's fine.

I enjoyed knitting this. I've never knitted an entire adult sized garment in two weeks before and I've always struggled a bit with lacy stitch pattens. This was such a nicely written pattern though that I got past my mental block about actually having to count while knitting. I'm very happy with it.

Olympic Liesl.

I only have a few rows to go on the second sleeve, plus sewing in the ends, so I'm pretty confident about finishing my Olympic Liesl in time.

Here's a picture of where I was last night...rubbish picture with colour photo shopped to death because it's just about impossible to get a straightforward picture of anything in the grey gloom that passes for daylight here at the moment.



I do like the way that the colour sequence looks very different between the yoke with purl rows, the body and the smaller circumference sleeves. It's not been at all difficult keeping the colour sequence running correctly btw. Kureyon is very easy to spit-splice and as long as you don't mind shuffling the order of the balls around a bit and starting in the middle of a ball occasionally it works out fine. Incidentally it does match up across the front...it's just that I didn't lap the fronts over very neatly for the photo.

Some thoughts on this cardigan. Firstly I don't like the neckline. I opted for the lower neckline and it's just too loose and gappy, plus the weight of the yarn is stretching it. I will finish it all up, including blocking and the buttons then have a think about tightening the neck up. This will probably involve a crochet hook, bah. Don't much like crochet.

Secondly, the sleeves are pretty snug. This is of course because the sleeve is designed to preserve the 12 stitch repeat of the feather and fan pattern and so the sleeve size is not necessarily proportional to the exact size of body you are knitting. But it's worth keeping in mind. I think going up a needle size might work here, or adding a few plain stitches under the arm. In my case the sleeve is on the edge of okay and I'm hoping blocking will give me an inch more.

Fun knit though. Easy, well written pattern, very economical on yarn, minimal finishing. I may make another if I can find something suitable in plain black aran yarn with a bit of drape.

One for the Wheel Geeks.

Okay, my beloved fellow wheel geeks, something interesting for you today.

Mystery wheel...






Is it a Haldane Orkney, like this one I had a couple of years ago?






Is it an Ashford Traveller? (First picture swiped from the web, second picture from the Guild wheel down in the utility room.)







I tell you, I looked and puzzled. Table of a Traveller, uprights of an Orkney, mother of all and maidens similar to an Orkney, flyer and bobbins clearly Ashford. But it all fitted together with good clearances. So what is it??? Hybrid, made from parts of two wheels? Something different altogether?


Well, after much hunting round the net it turns out to be a Mark 1 Ashford Traveller, made between 1977 and 1979. I did not even know there was such a thing. I thought the standard Traveller had been around in the same form forever. But no, right there on the truly impressive New Zealand Spinning Wheel Index there is a picture, about half way down the page.


Bingo....possibly the only picture of a Mk 1 out there on the web. Till today.


Thoughts though. I still think it looks part Haldane Orkney, especially the upright/MofA and especially one of the maiden adjustments. Lookie....

Haldane Orkney....



Mk 1 Ashford Traveller.



The top of the maiden turns and there is a screw adjustment system inside that tensions the drive band as it stretches with age. Utterly unlike the modern Ashford system of tilting the whole mother of all to tension the drive band.


So... when was the Orkney first produced? Around or after 1979-ish? Anyone know? And did Mr Haldane borrow a few design features from the Mk1, or was it the other way round? The Mk1 almost seems like a common parent, doesn't it? I wish Haldane hadn't gone all quiet about the history of their spinning wheels since they stopped making them.

I do like spinning wheels. All of them, though some I like better than others. I have preferences as to design, material, looks...I don't necessarily prefer old over new or any one material over another, but some spinning wheels just grab my interest and some are terribly ho-hum. I have to admit the two most common Ashfords, the Traditional and the Traveller, both leave me cold as to looks. I hate the flyer and mother of all position on both. Ugly. But they are both amazingly good wheels as to function, utterly reliable, easy to use, sturdy and have lots of accessories available. Good wheels and ones I recommend all the time. But I've never wanted one, oh no.

But a Mark 1 Traveller is a wee bit special. Different. And it hasn't got that offset mother of all either. I quite like this wheel. Also, I feel sad for it. It has a lot of rust, paint dribbled on it, it needs a good dust and oil and the footman connector is broken but you know what? I bodged up a footman connector last night, put some oil on the crucial points, put a string drive band on it and it spins like a dream. Judging by the dirt layers, the squeaks and the filthy, mouldering yarn I pulled off the bobbins no-one has spun on that wheel for the last twenty years or so but ...that wheel is a real old trouper, a class act. I tell you, it's possibly the only Ashford I've ever really wanted to own.

Got to give it back though. (It belongs to a friend who I'm trying to lure along to The Spinners.) Eventually. Once I've cleaned it up. And spun a bobbin or two on it. And taken it round to meet my other wheels. Might even take it to spinning group next week....