Wednesday, July 15, 2009

As you may well ask, why am I sitting here blogging instead of:
1. Finishing the one pocket that would make this a FO instead of a UFO
2. Doing my laundry
3. Enjoying a fabulous summer day
4. Going to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince?!

Let’s see:
AMC Loews 600 North Michigan 9 – 600 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL
10:00am 12:15 1:15 3:45 4:45 7:15 8:15 10:45pm
AMC River East 21 – 322 East Illinois Street, Chicago, IL
9:00 9:30 10:00 10:45 11:30am 12:00 12:40 1:10 1:40 2:30 3:10 3:40 4:20 4:50 5:20 7:00 7:30 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:50 10:40 11:10 11:40pm 12:10am

TOO late for the Potter movie today (!!!) — guess I’ll have to go see it at, hmm, working nights now, 9 AM!

No, that’s too dweebish, must go at Noon to preserve dignity.

Well, that gives me plenty of time to go finish the pocket! I am 15 rows away from almost being done with this cotton wonder. Both sleeves are knitted; all bands are done; ends are woven in. All that’s left is the last pocket :)

I’ve actually been wearing this around the house with no buttons and one pocket flapping, the result of really liking the feel of the soft cotton on my skin when I tried it on for the sleeves. It’s been cooler at night (and an unseasonably cool July so far) so this is a happy little topper that is going to be the house sweater.

This type of yarn is dense and the garment is heavier than some of my other cotton outings but I still am drawn to it! Going through ye olde stash with a snorkel, we dug up some sunken treasure in a bag of yarn I bought to make bucket hat samples from.

From l. to r. you see: Suss Cotton; Mission Falls 1824 Cotton;
Bernat Cotton Tots; and K1C2 Cotonade.

They’re all roving wrapped strands of soft cotton but by touch and feel they are different. All seem to have varying staple lengths; some seem fuzzier than the others. I’d have to say the one I wished this sweater would’ve been made from is the MF 1824. It seems lighter and is wound in smaller intervals that might control the fibers better. For all intents, and remember, I’m not a spinner so help me out, is that these yarns are not really spun in any way typical of wool. Or, better said, they are single ply, wrapped in a stabilizing strand.

I am always so very curious as to the origins of the yarns we use and really wonder how this type of cotton yarn came about. These yarns have a cushy softness factor due to their structure, as well as an interesting texture, not quite as pearly as a boucle, but enough to form a slight landscape on the knitted fabric. But what’s the history? When did it first come into use?

There’s a sleeper BBC series called North & South that’s about a fictitious mill town in Northern England. The factory scenes take place in a working spinning room at the Helmshore Mills Textile Museum, in Lancashire. It was fascinating to me to see the machinery which produced very fine gauge thread! By contrast, the yarn I’ve been working with is simpler and bulkier but modern?