Captain's Blog: One Week Til Spinzilla!

By now, if you're participating in next week's Spinzilla event, you already know what team you're on. Whether you're joining me on Team Louet or competing on any other the other many teams, here are some quick tips to help you get ready for a monster of a spinning week!

1. Clear those bobbins! If you're going to be spinning up your fiber stash, be sure to have plenty of empty bobbins to get the job done.

2. Perform routine maintenance. Check your spinning wheel's manual to make sure your wheel is in peak performing form. If you are using a Louet wheel, there is a handy online support center where you can troubleshoot various issues and download PDF versions of wheel manuals.

3. Wax on! Put the perfect finishing touch on your wheel with a nice coat of wheel wax to clean and condition the wood and any leather parts, too. I'm a fan of the wonderful-smelling herbal organic wax from Heavenly Spinning.

4. Take inventory of your fiber stash. Now is a great time to plan which fibers you'd like to spin up, how you'd like to ply them, and what weights or other techniques you'd like to use throughout the week. Again, this is a good time to take into account how many bobbins you'll have at your disposal so that you can maximize your spinning/plying time for maximum output!

5. Figure out your Method for Measuring Yarn. If you're new to spinning, you might not have a preferred method of measuring the yarns you spin. Here are a few suggestions from the Spinzilla FAQ:

My Spinzilla to-do list!

Wind onto a skien winder or swift where you know the circumference and count turns
Use a niddy noddy
Use a yardage counter
Using a McMorran yarn balance, or the new Yarn to Yards balance
If you don't want to take your yarn off your bobbins, weigh your bobbins before you spin, then weight them after and use a balance to calculate yardage.

If you are planning to ply your yarn during the course of the event, remember that you'll need to submit your yardage in singles. We recommend measuring your plied yarn, then multiplying the yardage by the number of plies (chain ply counts as 3-ply).

We'll begin spinning at midnight EST on Monday, October 7. For more details on how to submit your finished yarn and yardage, check out the Spinzilla FAQ or the Spinzilla Ravelry group.

Happy spinning!

App Review & Giveaway: Stash 2 Go

The developers for a paid Ravelry app for iPad and iPhone called Stash 2 Go contacted me earlier this year to see if I was interested in writing a review or their app on their blog. While I don't own an iPad or iPhone, I was able to gift a download to a knitting friend who had an iPad and was willing to let me play around with it for the purposes of this review! This is the first time I've ever accessed Ravelry via an app (on my Android phone, I typically use the m.ravelry.com site), and I found most of it to be easy to use. Some of the features weren’t intuitive to me at first, but once I got the hang of the idiosyncracies, it was smooth sailing. Stash 2 Go makes the most of API functions Ravelry has opened up to developers (there are still several areas which have yet to be completed in the Ravelry programming interface, so developers can only implement what is available through www.ravelry.com/api ). Most of the app's functionality allows the user to view the ...

Australian Superfine Merino Yarn Review & Giveaway

After more than ten years of knitting, I can still have new experiences - even with well-covered territory such as merino yarn! This recent merino experience actually took me by surprise: I've spun with it, I've dyed it, I've knit with it, and I've even crocheted with it...I was pretty sure I knew all there was to know about merino! Turns out, there are four different classifications of merino fiber, sorted by micron count range . At the bottom of the spectrum is Strong Merino , which ranges from 26-22.9 microns; above that is Fine Merino , which ranges from 20.1-23 microns; next up is Extra Fine Merino, which ranges from 20-15.6 microns; and at the very top of the heap is Superfine Merino Wool , with a micron range of 18.5-15.6. If you're into numbers and wondering how these four classes stack up against other fibers you may be familiar with, here are a few for comparison's sake: BFL (Blue-Faced Leicester) has a micron range of 24-28, Cashmere goat down ...

A Finished Sweater, With Cat Hair

After losing Tilly and Robin within a year of each other, I sure didn't think I'd be finding cat hair in my knitting any time soon. But the universe had other ideas. Over the winter, a white feral cat adopted us. I'd noticed her when we moved into our apartment last summer - I would see her hiding in the bushes or sunning herself in the grass when she thought no one was looking. I assumed she was someone's cat until I realized how skittish she was around humans, plus she had a tipped ear, which is a universal sign that a feral/stray cat has been spayed. Neighbors confirmed that she was a feral kitty (descended from several generations of feral cats, in fact), and that she has survived on her wits and whatever food various residents put out for her. We had some bitterly cold days over the winter, and I just felt so sorry for this poor kitty! I started offering her treats and slowly gained her trust. She didn't even want to come inside our apartment at first, much le...

handmade by stefanie

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