WaveFunction Design

Wool Fest 2011

admin — Wed, 18 May 2011 18:29:15 +0000

Here are some photos from the Wool Fest 2011. Along with other members of the Greater Los Angeles Spinners Guild, (GLASG), I went one to one with the sheep! Wrangling sheep is not as easy as it sounds. Due to rain the day before, the ground was a bit slick. So my first few tries to wrangle ended up looking more like sheep skiing. On my third attempt, I managed to settle the Dorset ewe down and walk her over to be sheered by a pro. Then a skirting, and bagging. Last is a close up showing the amazing crimp.

Fleece Haul

admin — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:23:29 +0000

Airing out the fleece that isn’t very good for spinning but will be great for felting.

Project Updates

admin — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 23:14:54 +0000

I know I haven’t been updating that often, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy. Here is a list of all the projects I’m either working on or have finished and need posts written up:

The Thater Dress is finished and have lots of great photos to post for it.

Building two more yarn blockers. One is for a knitter extraordinaire, Tina Marin. The other I’ll be putting up for sale on my etsy page.

The vintage Cartercraft floor loom is nearly assembled. I think it’s from the 30′s and haven’t found any pictures of it on google, so I’m guessing where all the parts go.

Knitting a “bat shawl” for a client.

A lady wants me to spin her angora’s fur into yarn for her. It’s a sweet sweet fluffy bun.

Knitting a bunch of stripy scarves for sale at an undisclosed boutique.

There’s a drop spindle class in the works at the Little Knittery.

Not to mention, there are several projects I’m working on for my art practice.

spinning wisdom

admin — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 06:33:53 +0000

“In vulnerable types, knitting a lot can lead directly to spinning. Almost all of these poor souls believe (somehow) that taking up spinning – a process that creates yarn- will mean that they buy less yarn.

This. Is. Not. True.

(This is your only warning.)”

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee The Yarn Harlot

Ravelry Updates

admin — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 22:01:48 +0000

Two updates made on Ravelry. Finished Strippy Scarf for Mallisa with new photos and put up pics for Thater Dress.

- Posted from my iPhone

Knitting Wisdom

admin — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 20:00:41 +0000

“I have come to believe that swatches are not actually small samples of knitting that you use to measure gauge. (If they were, they would be way better at it, wouldn’t they?) I think they are actually small yarn sacrifices that we offer to the knitting fates as a plea for safe passage.”

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee The Yarn Harlot

Wind Knitting Factory

admin — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 19:47:05 +0000

From artist Merel Karhof

“With the power of the wind, a knitting machine knits from the outside towards the inside of a building. The knitted material is harvested from time to time and rounded-off in individually packaged scarves. Each scarf has its own label which tells you in how much time it has been knitted and on which date.”

wind knitting factory

Dyefest 2010

admin — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 00:32:43 +0000

Here is the results from the Greater Los Angeles Spinners Guild annual dyefest. I didn’t have everything so planed out other than wanting to make some primary colors for blending on the drum carder.

I don’t think I realized how much raw fiber I actually had. I didn’t even take any of the four or five washed whole fleeces I have. I ended up taking about 16oz of white Coridale, a small bag of angora, A silk brick, 16oz of bombax nori silk noils, a silk cap, two pounds of mohair roving, two pounds of mohair locks, and last but not least, 16oz of bamboo/merino.

Now on to the colors! This was the first time I used Aljo dyes. You never know how much pigment is in a given dye so this was a bit of a craps shoot. Boy did it pay off! I wanted to do a red pot and a yellow pot with time left over for a third. I consulted twitter as to the third color and purple was decided on.

The Scarlet Pot

A bunch of stuff soaking in vinegar

The Purple Pot

Overdying some of the reds in the yellow pot

Coridale soaking up the last of the scarlet

Ready for rinsing

Everything Drying

Close-up of the yarn on the blocker

Yarn on the blocker

All in all, it went swimmingly well. My favorite result is from the bamboo/merino roving dyed in purple. Since I was using acid dyes, I knew it wasn’t going to have much effect, if at all, on the bamboo. In fact, the bamboo didn’t take at all. So you can see these really pretty silvery streaks throughout the now purple merino roving. I can’t wait to spin that roving up!!

Latest Fiber Acquisitions

admin — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 21:20:02 +0000

Here’s the latest fiber acquisitions:

Two whole Dorset fleeces
one pound mohair ready for dying and blending
undyed pencil roving
one pound mill end roving in black tones
one pound washed longwool locks in dark tones
4oz mystery roving!

New Spindles

admin — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 05:36:28 +0000

The Spindles

Here are the latest spindles to come off the lathe. I used some nicely figured maple I came across. The one at left is 24grams. The whorl has a diameter of 3 1/2″ and the spindle is 9″ long at 1/4″. The two on the right are 23grams and the whorls are tad under 3 1/2″ clocking in at 8″ from top to bottom.

I sold one already on my etsy store and well, she says it a lot better than I can:

“So….I’ve been spinning on the spindle nearly everyday. It has a very nice fast spin, but what I like the most is how LONG it spins. That and the large size of the whorl allow me to not only spin for a long time before it stops spinning, but also lets me really load the spindle up before I have to wind off. It’s not my most decorative spindle by far, (and I have a lot of them) but I’m finding myself choosing it before all of my others. It’s light enough to take anywhere has spun both a fingering and heavy weight yarn. I’ve dropped it several times, trying to push it just a little longer before I wind on, and it’s held up really well, even on concrete.”

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