The One About Inori

We’ve been really really busy lately and look like headless chickens running around. My house is in a TOTAL MESS and it’s been affecting my mood.

No.. it’s not that I got lazy with housework. I’ll explain it in the next post, I promise.

I’ve been frantically working on spinning this yarn for the past few weeks and it’s finally all done!

This single (unplied) yarn weighs 190gm and I have not measured the yardage yet. It’s somewhere between a lace and fingering weight (2ply to 4ply).

It’s made up of 70% West Australian Merino wool (about 22microns) and 30% Mulberry silk.

Let me show you how it all started:

This is fleece bought from a sheep farm in Yallingup. We took a trip down quite some time back and I bought this fleece. It was sheared from a single sheep. Kinda looks like the red plastic bag is vomiting the fleece out doesn’t it?

Sheep fleece is VERY grimy and dirty. It has natural oils (lanolin) and veggie matter (VM) and faeces (shit) stuck to it. Not at all like those cartoons where you see white fluffy poofy cutie sheep happily bounding around.

The white bits you see are the undercoat. The top is usually dirty brown and black.

I pulled out the longer parts (I believe they are called ‘staples’, please correct me if I’m wrong) and lined them up facing in one direction. I threw most of the shorter fleece away.
This is actually my second time washing fleece and I didn’t do this step for the first time. It was a disaster.

Then when I collected 200g of staples, I lined them up in 2 rows per laundry bag. I have 2 laundry bags here with all the fleece facing in the same direction.

I poured warm water and wool scour detergent into a tub and submerged the fleece into it. Used my hands to press the fleece down.

Look at how dirty it is!

I think it took 5 soaks before it was clean. I would recommend using HOT water instead of just warm as not all the lanolin came out, even with special wool scour detergents!

When I scoured for the first time, I didn’t have the wool scour detergent so I used Morning Fresh (dish washing liquid) with SUPER hot water and that came out lanolin free!

Anyway, this is how it looked like when it was clean and dry:

It looks matted but you can still pull out the staples like so;

I then dyed the fleece in 2 colours – purple and pink.

Sorry for the horrible photo – my kitchen is usually dark.

Then I carded the fleece.

Carding is a process where you make all the fibre face the same direction by using a drum carder. Drum carders are very expensive BUT can last you a lifetime if you take good care of it! It’s just like a spinning wheel I guess. My spinning wheel is the same age as I am and still working fine!

See the white bits on the carder? That’s the Mulberry silk. No, I didn’t grow my own silkworms. Not now, at least. I bought the Mulberry silk from EGMTK. (Mandie has excellent customer service and very fast shipping!!)

Blending two kinds of fibre together on the drum carder is called…………. taadaaaa! “Blending”. Kinda no-brainer ain’t it?

What you pull off your drum carder is called a ‘batt’.

I rolled them into this shape to save space but they should look rectangular after you pull it off the carder. Now I mentioned this is my second time doing this. The first time, I didn’t pull out staples from the raw fleece before washing it and therefore I had short fleece as well as slightly matted ones go through the carder. I got tons of nepps from that!

The next photo is of the batt from my first try:

See the parts circled? Those are nepps. I know they may seem harmless but when there are a gazillion of them, it makes the yarn spun from it VERY rough and ugly. That was the saddest part for me as I had spent so much time with my first try at washing and carding fleece. That’s why I did better this time!

So when the batts were ready, I spun the yarn!

And the end result:

This is going to be knitted up into a very special gift for someone. Someone who, obviously, likes pinks and purples.   But then again, MOST people I know love pink and purple…. I end up dyeing or knitting with a lot of purples and pinks!!!!!! Which isn’t so bad because if it were blue, I’d be tempted to keep it for myself… Hehehehe.

I hope to update again soon because I already have the pictures ready for the next post.

I still have more than half a bag of raw fleece left! These sheep have so much wool. Lol.

Sorry to be so late – the entries close in a day’s time! >.< Sorwie.. have been caught up with A LOT of stuff which I will blog about later.

But DO pop over to Melanie’s blog – Kimono Reincarnate – for her fabulous back-on-eBay-back-on-Etsy-joining-BrisStyle-Blogtobergest Giveaway!

When I was designing Mossy, I had to rip it back a number of times as I couldn’t get the calculations to work. It was after some time that I realised I had written “8 x 8 = 48″ on the top of the paper. Therefore, it didn’t take me very far.

Then, this Monday in Maths class, the teacher wrote y = x² on the board (we were doing calculus, finding derivatives) and he went around the class asking whats ‘y’ when x is 3 (9), what’s ‘y’ when x is 4, (16)…. and I immediately thought to myself… oh gosh… please don’t ask me!!!!!

ARGH, I was the 8th student and I panicked and replied……………….

……………………….

……………………….

………………………

………………………..

………………………..

56!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*head desk head desk head desk*

I’m no good with 7 and 8 times table. I only memorised up to 6 when I was a kid and got lazy with 7 and 8. 9 can be calculated by using your fingers.

I’ll teach you…

Hold up 10 fingers, palm facing away from you.

With 1 x 9, just put down your left pinky. You have 9 fingers left ‘standing’. So the answer is 9.

With 2 x 9, put down your left ring finger (it will be the only finger that’s down, your pinky will be back up). You will have 1 finger on the left of the ring finger and 8 fingers on the right of it. So the answer is 18.

With 3 x 9, put down your left middle finger and you will have 2 fingers to the left of it and 7 to the right of it. Answer 27.
Carry on in this fashion…. 7 x 9, put down your right pointer, you get 6 to the right of your right pointer and 3 to the left of it… answer 63….

So yes… I don’t know 7 x 7, 7 x 8, 8 x 8 by heart. Ok? Sometimes 7 x 6 is also a problem for me.

Sigh.

I wonder if I can get into med school? My classmates were probably laughing in their hearts then. *Hangs head down in shame*.

Not from me this time.

But, what better to use this oportunity to win two skeins of Malabrigo yarn of your choice in time to make Mossy!

Just use the links below to head on over to my friend, Salihan’s blog for the giveaway.
Yarn is sponsored by my little yarn store,

We stock Malabrigo yarn and (hopefully) our hand dyed sock yarns will be back soon!

Check out Salihan’s cute new Strawberry pattern and softies too!

I can barely contain my excitement as I type this entry. It’s 1.35am now and I’ve just finished writing, proof-reading and publishing my 1st sweater pattern for kids!

MOSSY!

This baby sweater is knitted in one piece from neck down. No seams!

Sunshine has a small little toy that she named ‘Mossy’. It’s actually Gonzo the Great but because he looks so much like a mosquito, she’s been calling him Mossy from day 1.

Mossy has been her favourite toy for a while now and since I’ve always loved the texture and look of the British moss stitch, I decided to design a sweater that uses this stitch, just so I can name it after Sunshine’s favourite toy.

I made a mistake while knitting the ’1st draft’. I used a variegated yarn despite knowing that the moss st will not show up well in variegation.

But, I’ve had these skeins of Malabrigo Merino Worsted in the Oceanos colourway marinating in my stash for a long long time and I’ve been dying to use it!

Oceanos is my favourite Malabrigo colourway (no prizes for guessing why) and I tell you, knitting with this buttery soft yarn and watching my favourite colour change from one shade to another……. woohoo! It’s like knitting on high! (I wanted to say ‘knitting org–m’ but I won’t, on the risk of sounding dorky and rude).

Anyhooo… I made the pattern in 3 sizes. 3 months, 18 months and 3-4 years.

Chubbs is modeling the 3 month old size and Sunshine is modeling the 18 month old size. Apparently, my children run small.

Well, not Chubbs though. He was practically bursting out of the seams. No, wait… there are no seams… hmm… out of the sweater, I mean.

(In case you are wondering why the big grin. I asked her to ‘smile’ and she flashed me her dorky-grin-with-no-eyes instead!)

The pattern is easy. If you can knit in the round and do simple increases, you are good to go!

Malabrigo Merino Worsted is a dream to work with. I think it’s value for money as it has good yardage per 100g. It’s one of the softest yarn I’ve ever worked with and have you seen the colours they come in?

(Shameless plug of the day: Visit http://www.yarnandkisses.com to buy your Malabrigo! )

I’m knitting up the largest size now just to make sure my calculations are correct and also trying a summer version of this sweater. I am using Malabrigo Organic Cotton and I’m pleasantly surprised at how light the cotton feels! Cotton is usually heavier than wool but this has greater yardage than the Merino Worsted per 100g!

I am also humbled while writing up this pattern. Now I know how much hard work designers put into creating and putting everything in to words.

It’s not easy, people! I’m saluting to all designers out there, especially those who are so generous to share their patterns for free! (I think I’ve said all these before, haven’t I? But I think it deserves another mention!)

The pattern is colour coded for easy reading and referencing. I hope everything is correct and although gauge and measurements are ‘not rocket science’ (as per Nad’s words), I hope that no one will have problems reading it or ‘getting gauge’.

Whenever in doubt, always knit the larger size for kids. They grow soooo quickly!

I hope to create a page for my patterns in the near future but for now, I’ll link you to the PDF file for download.

Here it is, clikity click!

Comments and criticism most welcome. And before I forget, PLEASE DO NOT SELL OR REPRODUCE THE PATTERN IN ANY FORM AND DO NOT SELL THE FINISHED GARMENTS TOO. This pattern is free for everyone and I’d be very pissed if anyone tries to be funny.

If you wish to knit for charity, please contact me; inoriz88(at)gmail(dot)com or send me a private message through Ravelry (username: inoriz). I am not evil and I certainly will not bite you if you ask me!

I’m also entering the Ravelry Malabrigo Junkies October Stockpile 2009 Malworthy Design Contest (phew! What a mouthful!!!) and if you like my design, you can vote for me in this thread. >clickity click<

Thank you very much!