The Willow pullover is the sweater of my dreams! That texture plus the rounder neck, so delicious. I only use spit splicing for woolen-spun nsw wools, I feel like with worsted-spun wool it makes a dense spot that shows up in my fabric, and it’s less secure. Like the more air in the yarn the better
Ooh, that makes a lot of sense! I bet it's much quicker to do with woolen spun yarns as well since the fibers are more randomly oriented to begin with 🤔 I'm so glad to hear you're loving Willow as much as I am - I can't wait to release the pattern!
That scarf looks amaaaazzzing! I haven't had much desire to make a scarf but I recently moved somewhere colder, so I might need to fall in love with scarf and beanie making 😄 It's already cold here though so I may have missed the boat for this year! I'm currently knitting on my Sunshine Tee! I'm also working on a Bookclub cardigan, but I blocked my WIP yesterday and it's still drying. It's nice to be able to alternate between two very different patterns and yarn weights!
I'd never seen eyelet basketweave stitch before. I love it! Regarding spit splicing, it does *not* work quickly enough with plain water. There are compounds in saliva that open up the scales to make the felting happen. If a person feels uncomfortable spitting into their hand, they can use the teensiest smidge of soap and a bit of warm water, and that will work.
Wow, that's super interesting!! I've never actually tried water because spit is just so easy to use, but I totally assumed that they would be interchangeable. Thanks for sharing this info!
@@andreagaughanknits another detail regards the thickness of the yarn used. Spit splicing is super easy and quick with sock yarn, but thicker yarn requires much more liquid than I ever expect. I'm making a project with worsted weight Lion's Brand Fishermen's wool, and it's kind of annoying how much spit is needed. I'm thinking about keeping a little dish of soapy water next to me to use as needed. But I'll probably finish the project before I get around to implementing that idea. Haha. Maybe next project!
If you're interested in literally seeing how different fibers are textured, June Hiatt included electron micrograph photos of coarse and fine wool fibers, cashmere, alpaca, silk, cotton, linen, and polyester in her wonderful book The Principles of Knitting, pages 313-320 in the 1988 version. If you don't have the book in your personal collection yet, it's available through interlibrary loan if you want to check it out.
I love how the Willow pullover is looking! I hope to knit it someday! I spit splice for all my non-superwash yarns. Some are a bit better but I find that even if they come apart with a strong tug, they are totally strong enough once they’re knit up anyways. I’ve been very liberal about it and never had a problem in a finished object. I love not weaving in ends and having a seamless join. Also this mohair no pilling info is blowing my mind! Now that you say that my mohair stuff totally doesn’t pill! Definitely should be hyped up more! I lean towards not using it too much but this is great to keep in mind. 😊
Oh, that's great to know about your experience split splicing - I definitely need to make it my default method now! And I'm glad to hear you've had the same experience with mohair garments not pilling, and I'm also glad I'm not the only one who totally never noticed that correlation until someone pointed it out lol
The willow sweater looks super cozy! I’ll be keeping and eye out for that test call. Your color work scarf looks great! I’ve been doing so much color work lately, I tried three colors at once for the first time and while fun I definitely need a break from it for a bit lol
Hi Andrea! Since you are enjoying the Cormo yarn, I was wondering if you have tried North Bay Fiber yarn? Their Elemental line is USA Cormo and is such a delight! They have a fongering, sport, worsted and bulky base. I knit my Sunshine Tee test with the Elemental Fingering and love it! Really enjoying your podcast and your designs are always spot on! 🩷
I love spit splicing! I find that it's a little harder for plumper/rounder yarns (i.e. Hobbii Friends Wool, Sandnes Garn Peer Gynt), but I've been able to do it by unraveling the plies and snipping about half of them so that each end is around half-thickness! Also, I just ADORE the Willow Pullover. Will definitely be applying to test if I have the space on my needles when the tester call goes out :)
Oh, snipping some of the plies is a great idea! I've been doing a similar thing but by ripping some fiber out of them which is probably more time consuming lol
I love the Iris tank! It's a shame I don't like wearing sleeveless tops. 😕 Maybe I will learn to like them and then I could knit that one. 😀Oh and I love the colourwork on your scarf! I wouldn't have use of scarf, but if you'd do a cowl pattern as well, I'd be into it!
Wow, that's super interesting!!! Do you happen to remember where you learned that? I'd love to look into that further - I always think it's so interesting to learn about the origin of knitting motifs and techniques but it can seem that there is limited information available sometimes
The scarf is absolutely stunning! I find I struggle doing colourwork with Biches et Buches le petite lambswool because you can see my floats from the front of the yarn so I'm super impressed with how yours is looking!!
These designs are so lovely. I'm getting tattooed and have been looking for patterns that will show off the new sleeve I'm working on. I think I'll cast on the tank when its available.
The knits look great. Especially the basketweave & Nordic one. You might want to check out the Korshavan sweater first before you bring the basketweave to testing - it's a VERY similar sweater.
Thanks for flagging that, Jimmy! I did actually come across that sweater after coming up with the idea for this one but saw that it's knitted with a different weight of yarn (Bulky) and is not size inclusive so I thought that my pattern will be plenty different enough to be worth publishing 🙂
Loving your new designs! About the spit splice, do you normally split the plies first? I'm always nervous it won't hold up so I end up knotting my yarns, lol
Thank you!! And yup - I split the plys and try to spread out the fibers in each ply so that the fibers can intermix well between the two pieces of yarn
