TL;DR, or, Coffeeneuring 2015 Summary

The summary.

My theme within a theme was Fibers.  Mostly knitting, but not always.  Finished projects:
Handspun Elemental Shawl
Thuja Socks

Still in process:
Flower Fair Isle Socks

Being retired, I got out whenever I wanted.

Ride: 1
Writeup
Date: Sunday, Oct 4
Destination: Council Crest Park, Portland, OR
Beverage: coffee brewed right at my picnic table, with milk and sweetner
Bike friendliness: picnic tables under shady trees.  Pretty nice!
Total mileage: 15.75 miles
Fiber tie-in: Elemental Shawl





By the way, the shawl was finally finished.



Ride: 2
Writeup
Destination: Jim and Patty's Coffee, Beaverton, OR
Date: Saturday, Oct 10
Beverage: Borgia Mocha
Bike friendliness: strip mall has the same crap wheel-breaker bike rack.  Baristas make up for it.
Total mileage: 2.73 miles
Fiber tie-in: Flower Fair Isle Socks



Ride: 3
Writeup
Destination: Nike West Campus, Edo Building coffee cart, Beaverton, OR (just across SW Walker from the THRPD ball fields)
Date: Thursday, Oct 15
Beverage: Mocha
Bike friendliness: When I worked there, I was used to wheeling my bike into any building and leaving it unlocked in the lobby, or in a corner, or under some stairs.  This day, I locked it outside.
Total mileage: 11.59 miles
Fiber tie-in: delivered 3 skeins of handspun wool, which I processed all the way from the dirty fleece right off the sheep.

Finally delivering some handspun yarn to the former co-worker who gave me four bags of fleece.



Ride: 4
Writeup
Date: Friday, Oct 16
Distance: 28.47 mi
Vertical feet: 2000
Location: Saint Cupcake SW,  1138 SW Morrison St
Bike Friendliness: Adorable whisk bike rack.  See the picture.
Bike: Rivendell
Beverage: Americano
Food: a Lemon dot and an Chocolate Hazelnut dot (mini cupcakes)
Fiber tie-in: Thuja socks, because I hit a roadblock on the Fair Isle Flower Socks.



Ride: 5? (might be too many in a week...)
Writeup
Date: Sunday, Oct 18
Distance: 4.8 miles
Destination: Ava Roasteria Beaverton
Bike: Rivendell
Beverage: Pumpkin Spice Latte
Bike Friendliness: well, they've got a rack
Fiber tie-in: Thuja socks



Ride: 6
Writeup
Date: Saturday, October 24
Distance: 2.42 miles
Destination: Hits the Spot Cafe, North Plains, OR
Bike: Sweetpea
Beverage: Coffee
Bike Friendliness: just lean it outside somewhere, don't block the door.
Fibers tie-in: Thuja socks



Finished  the socks that evening.



Ride: 7  (I think.  I might have 3 rides in one week and will need another ride)
Writeup
Date: Monday, November 2
Distance: 4.72 miles
Destination: Bogza Coffee, Beaverton, OR
Bike: Rivendell
Beverage: Borgia Mocha
Bike Friendliness: Super nice today; garage door was open, so I parked it behind my chair
Fibers tie-in: Flower Fair Isle Socks



Ride: 8  (Although my official #7)
Writeup
Date: Saturday, November 7
Distance: 2.1 miles
Destination: Verboort Sausage Festival, Verboort, OR
Bike: Sweetpea
Beverage: Coffee
Bike Friendliness: Leaned it up against a building, no lock
Fibers tie-in: Flower Fair Isle Socks



Ride: 9
Writeup
Date: Tuesday, November 10
Distance: 22 miles
Destination: Symposium Coffee, Tigard, OR
Bike: Rivendell Bleriot
Beverage: Mocha
Bike Friendliness: Bike rack outside; viewable from large windows
Fibers tie-in: Flower Fair Isle Socks

Fleece Project Milestone

Recap: Way back in July 2012, a co-worker gave me four fleeces from his pet sheep.  Much washing was done, a little carding and characterization, and then, with me slightly burnt out from all the prep work, the fleece went into hibernation.



Then, this past January, I pulled out some of each fleece, and started carding.  Well, picking the fleece (flicking with a dog brush, removing more vegetable matter, fluffing) and THEN carding.







I ended up with a stack of batts, which I turned into fauxlags, because I wanted to learn how to spin longdraw.

Then I spent some time with Jacey Bogg's Craftsy Class on drafting techniques.  I was spinning up some laceweight, and it greatly improved my technique and speed.

Also had a new spinning wheel, so I figured I'd use this to get used to it as well - direct drive vs drive band, and a few other differences.

Started with the gray wool.  It drafted very smoothly, and I thought I had it all figured out.



Moved onto the black wool, where I learned that I didn't have it all figured out.  My fiber prep was also not as thorough as it might have been - lots of short bits left in, and it could have used another pass through the drum carder.  But I persevered, and ended up with yarn.  This fiber turned out to be a bit more fun, because at times it was like drafting chewing gum, and I could easily double draft out the slubs.  Lots of lanolin still in this fleece.

Finally, the moorit wool.  It had been a real pain to pick before carding, because it was slightly felted at the sheared end.

By now, the spinning wheel and I were getting along very well, and the actual spinning moved right along.

As I mentioned before, there was still a lot of lanolin present, and I really wanted it gone.  After much investigation on Ravelry, I ordered a bottle of Unicorn Power Scour, and the yarn got its finishing bath in that, with a hot water rinse/soak afterward.







I am happy with the end result.  This is the squishiest yarn I have ever spun.

Learnings: fiber prep, fiber prep, fiber prep.
Next tool: a wool picker, although I'll have to give the fleece another scour before I use it.
Future ideas:  I've got some brightly colored silk, and commercially dyed fleece to blend it to make the yarn more interesting.

The Other Spinning

There is still a wheel involved, except it is attached to my Ashford Traditional spinning wheel.  Back in February, I finally started spinning my Black Currant 80% Merino 20% Silk Top.  I can only reliably spin laceweight, so there we were.



It took FOREVER to spin the first 2 ounces.  There were long period of non-spinning, and, I am not the world's fastest spinner.  I have a choice of speed or consistency.



A month or so ago, I finally started on the last 2 ounces.  Slow progress.  Never to be finished.  BUT!  A Craftsy spinning class was getting a lot of positive chatter on Ravelry.  It would teach me how to spin worsted to long-draw (woolen).

My spinning is mostly self-taught, with a little help from one or two friends, reading, and watching YouTube videos.

The first lesson was on the short forward draw, which wasn't what I was doing.  I switched to that, and immediately got a LOT faster.  I even moved to a smaller whorl on my flyer (for cyclists, it is EXACTLY the same as moving to a smaller cog on the rear cluster.  Lots more twist.) Not only that, but I also gained vocabulary.  A week later, spinning for a few hours in the evenings, I finally finished.

I let the singles rest overnight before I started plying.  I also bought a plying class, but haven't started it.

Six treadles seemed about right.  Maybe.  Maybe not.  I plyed over three evenings, eventually finishing off one bobbin and completely filling the bobbin on the wheel.  Hmm.  Maybe not totally consistent.



In a fit of organization, I had weighed my empty bobbins, so I knew how much fiber was on them.  Wound off half the remaining singles onto another bobbin, and continued plying onto another bobbin.



I skeined the second bobbin ; counting the number of turns on the niddy noddy gave me 238 yards.  After letting it sit overnight on the niddy noddy (twisted flat to help relax the twist) and removing the skein, I started skeining that really full bobbin.  About 90 minutes later (Call the Midwife on the tv), I was done.  Counting those turns revealed another 933 yards, so about 1200 yards of two ply laceweight altogether.  I know there will be less after finishing, but that is still way more than I need for the planned project.

I did worry a bit about the wrong amount of plying twist, but letting the singles and then the plyed yarn rest between each stage seems to have taken care of it.  The yarn appears balanced.

Finishing - a soak in gentle wash detergent, a soak in vinegar water, a soak in plain water, squeezing the water out by rolling up in a towel, some snapping, and hanging to dry.

Beaverton-Birkenfeld, Sept 200k Perm

The September 200k.  When I fall behind in posting, the ride report gets a bit terse...



Roped Jeff, Kevin, Bill, and new rando Greg P into riding.

At 5:50am on day of ride, Fitz woke me up, asking: "when are you starting your ride?"  OOPS (which is why I get most everything set up the night before)  He woke up wondering why I hadn't been rustling around.  Kind of like when your baby sleeps through the night for the first time, I guess.

Down to Jim and Patty's, where I had time for a Pig Newton and Mocha.  We started only 10 minutes after the official start.





It was cool, but not raining.  We didn't stop until Banks, and not for long.  Then no stops till Vernonia.  As we were on the trail, no places to stop :-)  Except there might have been a bit of walking up Tophill.

We all ended up in different spots for the control in Vernonia; Jeff and I stopped at the Shell Station.  It also being Worldwide Spin in Public day, I had packed my Trindle and some fleece, and got in a few minutes of spinning there.



From there, we headed on to Birkenfeld.  We thought we might encounter the riders from the Hammerhead 100 along here.  I was a bit worried, because their lunch stop was The Birk.  The sag driver saw us and asked if we were on the ride.  Nope.



Arrived at Birkenfeld to find all the event riders long gone.  Greg was there; the ride staff had gifted him with some excess Gatorade, which he shared.  Ordered a sandwich and foraged for info control questions, since the Birk is now a "Music Venue", and is only open from 11am to not so late on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  They no longer have a store, so be prepared for that.  The food is really good, though, and service is quite reasonably paced.



Got in some more spinning.



We then headed back.  And it started to rain.  Ok, not bad.  Not pulling on all the raingear...  Then quickly pulled over at the Mist Fire Department and pulled on all the raingear!  First excursion with the Rainlegs.

Rained all the way back to Vernonia; another pass through the Shell Station for the control.

Headed back on the trail, the rain let up and finally stopped after we summited.

And eventually we finished; Kevin and I about 15 minutes behind everyone else.  I had recommended we finish at YoPop, so that is where we found them.  The owner was giving out free samples of Thai Iced Tea!  Yum!



Miles: 135
Pace: 13.12 mph
Total time: 12:48

A Bit of Fleece Spinning Characterization

As the fleeces have been drying - and they are ALL getting another wash*, in laundry detergent and Borax -  I've been pulling off pieces, carding them with the hand cards, and doing a little spinning with the drop spindle.





*they still smelled way too agricultural.  Much, much better now.

Meanwhile, back on the fiber front...

A longish while back, Rebecca and Jessica presented me with 20 oz of alpaca - 10 oz of Suri and 10 oz of Brown Huacaya.  The brown may have been dyed; they weren't clear.  In any case, 10 oz was too much for socks or a scarf, and not quite enough for anything else :-)



But wait!  I could blend it with another fiber and have MORE.  I eventually bought 8 oz of a mahogany heather colonial wool top (love it when they say that, what kind of sheep is that, exactly?) and started casting around for a drum carder.  Not to BUY one, but borrow it for awhile.



Turns out that Dana in my cycling club has a drum carder.  Actually it is Dana and his wife, and they've got wheels, the drum carder and a couple of honking big looms.  I took myself over for a tour (I am so jealous), got a drum carder lesson and off I went.  (That's me, I don't always know what I'm doing, but usually I can figure it out, to some extent)





So, last summer, carded away, and ended up with 18 batts of blended fiber.  

I finally pulled out the wheel and got back to spinning it up.  The first few batts were not much fun to spin.  It just didn't draft very smoothly.  But I got halfway through and had to stop and ply, because I don't have enough bobbins to hold 18 oz of singles, plus more bobbins to ply onto.



Turns out it was me.  The last 3 batts have been amazing.  I turned it into one long strip, then did some serious predrafting before starting spinning.  It now almost spins itself.  This is SO COOL! (Maybe I should take a class...)



I was aiming to replicate Reynolds Turnberry Tweed, which a very kind fellow Raveler send me a sample of.  I think I'm pretty much there.

The yarn wants to be a vest, but hasn't said which one.

Next Thing You Know, I'll Be Raising Sheep...

I could. It says "livestock" right in our neighborhood CCRs. There would be the coyote issue, however.

Meanwhile, friend Clarkie (wife of former cycling/tandeming buddy Jason) thought we should do some yarn dyeing. They were coming to town to visit family, so we set aside a day. I spent time the day before mixing up all the dyes (demoting several kitchen utensils to Non Food Use Only), and collecting various bits of gloves, drop cloths, etc.

Also spinning like a fiend, to have enough yarn to dye, in addition to the one skein of commercially produced undyed sock yarn. There's good stuff on the SyFy channel at 2am, really. Caprica, for one.

We both went for variations of the Purple Haze and Willow, with Clarkie also adding in Spiced Pumpkin.

While things were steaming, and then hanging to dry, I got Clarkie started on spinning, both on a spindle, and the wheel.

We were both pleased with the results.

I think the colors over the naturally silver/gray handspun look pretty darn cool. And yes, that is 100g of 3-ply sock yarn.

Experimenting

Today is St. Distaff's Day, so this post seems appropriate.

The fiber collection (primordial yarn) is growing. The biggest acquisition was 16 oz of carded Corriedale sliver in a natural white/gray, which is to practice with. I have no emotional investment in this fiber; I won't feel like I'm wasting it if I don't end up with what I was aiming for, and so on... Not that it isn't pretty.



I am initially aiming for 3 ply sock weight yarn, which is in the vicinity of 14-16 WPI (wraps per inch).

Read The Big Book of Handspinning and some books by Judith Mackenzie McCuin. Spent some time perusing the Ask the Bellwether blog (she's good!).

Got a sliding hook flyer for the spinning wheel. Got the husband to drill out the slots in the mother of all to use all the whorls (that would be GEARS to you cyclists; the mother of all is somewhat akin to the rear derailleur).

My Thursday fibers group was highly entertained. They are mostly quilters, but have done spinning and knitting. I have been a quilter. All in all, a really nice, fun group to hang out with.

Pulled off about a half ounce of the sliver, split it into three strips, and started spinning, using my new Spinner's Control Card to help me keep a consistent diameter on the singles. Sort of. My singles ranged from 24-32 WPI.

Then I pulled out the Lazy Kate and started plying while lunch was heating up. Aside: we work for awhile, then eat lunch, then go back to whatever we were doing. Today was beef-barley mixture in pita bread, greens, apple and spiced walnut (walnuts made by SIL) salad, and apple cake.

I must say, I'm pretty pleased with how my plying is improving. Then wound the yarn onto the niddy-noddy, tied it off, and set it to simmer while we ate lunch.

After the simmer, I wrapped it in an old towel and thwacked it on the kitchen counter for awhile. Great way to get one's aggravations out. I highly recommend it. Then dried it on the shelf in my dryer (handy for those who don't want to wait for air-drying).



The end result? 12 WPI, 1125 YPP (yards per pound). Not quite there. But now I know what I need to work on. And it is pretty yarn, just a bit thicker than I was aiming for.

Spinning, Part 2

No wonder that pencil roving took so very, very long to spin and ply. The best son ever (TM) gave me a McMorran Balance for Hanukkah, and tonight I used it to figure out how much yarn I had made up.

47.25 inches balanced. Times 100 gives me 4725 YARDS in a pound. The total weight of the yarn is 110g, or .242 pounds. Basic 6th grade math (or 4th; don't remember. It was New Math back in the day, and I thought it was pretty cool) renders a shocking total of 1143.45 yards.

Wow. That's a LOT of very, very fine yarn. For comparison, 100g of sock yarn is in the vicinity of 400-450 yards.

So I knitted up a bit of it on US sz 2 (2.75mm) needles:



I probably have enough for that Swallowtail shawl, yes indeed.

On the Spinning front

First, a question dear readers - would you rather I had a separate blog for the crafty stuff? Or do you not mind the occasional forays into fiber arts and cooking?





That 4 oz of Fiber Optics Sweet Georgia Brown pencil roving that I purchased at Sock Summit has finally been rendered into yarn. Very fine 2-ply yarn. It was spun on the drop spindle, and maybe a quarter of the singles plied on the drop spindle, before I realized that I'd be plying it until next summer, and finished the plying on the wheel.



I tried Priscilla Gibson-Roberts' method of using plying sticks and a center pull to ply, but it didn't work. I then rewound the cops onto toilet paper rolls (those are SO useful), by using a rubber band on my ball winder core and putting the tp roll on over it. Then I used the plying sticks (translation - old big 60's knitting needles), a shoe box, and the tp spools of singles and created a plying box to feed the singles in to ply.

I must have done something right, because the colors on the two strips of spun-up pencil roving aligned more often than not, and I only had 2 feet of leftover singles on one spool. I am pretty sure this will never happen again.



Then I needed to skein it all up - the construction of a sturdy niddy noddy is described here.

Then simmering to set the twist, snapping and popping it, and hanging it up to dry. I got kind of impatient, so I set the shelf in my dryer and ran it on air fluff for awhile. Ahh, technology.

So, I have this cool-looking yarn, but don't know how much. I mean, it weighs 110g, but I don't know long it is. Request for a McMorran Balance has been put in for the upcoming holiday.



So, what is it going to be? Assuming I have enough, and I probably do, I plan to knit up the Swallowtail Lace Shawl, making the next size up, as many members of Ravelry have provided instructions on how to do so (19 repeats of one chart, rather than 14).

Got some books from the library on spinning. Right now, the yarn is telling me what it wants to be, in terms of thickness. I'd rather it be the other way around, so I'm studying up on it.