Hey, I can do that myself!

When I buy hanks of yarn I have to convert them from a measured amount of yarn wrapped together, bound with string and twisted into a small rectangular shape into a ball from which to knit.

A typical hank of yarn you purchase at the LYS

A hank of unwrapped and unwound yarn

As you can see from the photo just above, I would not be able to knit with this yarn because it will get incredibly tangled. So this hank needs to be converted into a ball. This can be done by simply slipping the unwrapped hank over your knees or the back of a chair and winding the yarn into a spherical shape rocking back and forth so the yarn doesn't twirl around and tangle itself. There are two problems with this technique. First, if you are doing a large project you can spend a good deal of time winding the yarn before you start knitting. (Delayed gratification is generally not a strong suit for most knitters) Second in winding yarn this way it comes from the outside of the ball instead of the inside. Thus, as you knit, the ball has a tendency to dance around because you are removing yarn from the outside of the ball. If you have pets (cats, dogs, birds of prey) or young children or persons who like to act like young children in your house, you can spend time retrieving the ball from them rather than actually knitting.

So, hank power users, like LYS owners, will often buy a swift and yarn winder to address both problems. The swift serves the purpose of your knees or back of the chair, only it twirls keeping the tension perfect for making a nice ball, so you don't need to rock back and forth.

The classic yarn swift

The yarn winder is a mechanised way to wrap the yarn, always with a centre pull, which means no more dancing balls of yarn.

See how the yarn is threaded at the centre - allowing for that centre pull

Being a relative novice with hanks and someone who is buying more and more hanks, I thought I'd have to make an investment in this equipment. (Now you might be asking if my LYS has this stuff why not wind your yarn there. Well, if you purchase your yarn at your LYS they are more than willing to let you use it, if not, they are less interested or not interested at all which is totally understandable since the equipment is meant to be used by customers.) I took a long pause when I found a good winder would cost about $25 and the swift about $75. This motivated me to find another solution because I could use that $100 to buy more yarn! And I found several ways to get what I wanted. Look here to find different techniques:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx8kfwPCnJM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LglqfKZIuZ4

http://salihan.com/2010/wind-a-centre-pull-ball/

http://birdsnestknits.typepad.com/birds_nest_knits/2006/02/how_to_wind_a_c.html

I picked my favourite method and practiced making these two balls of yarn

My centre pull, hand wound balls

Although I haven't completely solved the first problem, I will have to spend more time winding my hanks I saved myself about $100. Isn't the Internet wonderful!

Ode to the Cat

It has been six months since Mike, the cat's, passing. I think of him every day and miss him especially when Paul is away. Mike was a being in the house with me and we were close. Grieving his death has been muddled with my Dad's passing and sometimes I feel guilty about that happening. As time passes the ache becomes less hurtful for both and I am starting to get mostly good memories in its place. Recently I helped celebrate Pablo Neruda's birthday with Jami, my poet and overall very creative friend. Guests were asked to select one poem written by Neruda to read to the small group who gathered for the celebration. I picked this one: Ode To The Cat -- Pablo Neruda There was something wrong with the animals: their tails were too long, and they had unfortunate heads. Then they started coming together, little by little fitting together to make a landscape, developing birthmarks, grace, flight. But the cat, only the cat turned out finished, and

Anatomy of a Sock

I've been knitting socks for a relatively short time. One of the disconcerting things for me as I started following patterns for socks is the pattern designer assumes the knitter (in this case that would be me) knows all the parts of a sock. So I thought I'd devote a post to improve my own knowledge about the anatomy of a sock and maybe some of you will learn something about the humble yet necessary sock as well. Here's the names of the parts of the foot as I know them. #49 ankle, #50 heel, #51, instep, #52 ball, #53 big toe, #54 toe, #55 little toe, #56 toenail. There are some parts more important for this discussion; first the heel of a foot is generally used to refer to the entire C-shape from the ankle to the instep. Speaking of the instep, it refers to that curve near the bottom of the foot. And what seems to be missing in the design above is the sole which generally refers to the bottom of the foot in total or plantar aspect in more technical terms. (BTW

Yarn Barf

It's back to quirkiness and time to step away again from the cuteness for a while. But as you see I'm someone who slips from one to the other without much effort so anticipate this back and forth to be my new normal. A dramatization of me in the midst of my startitist frenzy Yarn barf . I'm willing to bet you hadn't thought of putting those two words together, had you? It just so happens yarn barf can be a reoccurring pain for those of us who use yarns that come in a skein instead of a hank. (No pun intended regarding the current Noro virus, well maybe a little pun.) Skeins of yarn wound by the manufacturer These are hanks which need to be wound into balls If you look closely at the picture on the right you'll see the start on the millet yellow skein at the centre right of the photo. Its start can easily be seen coming from the centre of the skein onto the violet skein to the left. Easy to find, right! Sure but what about the remaining 4

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