Estonian lace knitting

I have chosen to republish this post about Estonian lace knitting from the first Historic Crafts blog because I can see that it has been one of the most popular posts over there. I wrote a bit about the Estonian lace while we were doing the Echo Flower knit-along on Ravelry in January 2010 and I have added bits from the different posts into this post.

Enjoy,
Eddie

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Joining the Echo Flower Shawl Knit-along (KAL) on Ravelry was probably the best decision I have ever made – knitting wise. Before learning to knit lace I don’t think I truly enjoyed the process of knitting. It was more about the finished product, but I have really enjoyed the process of knitting Estonian lace and this is definitely not the last lace knitting project I am doing. I am actually already planning the next one – but more on that at a later date.

If you want to see how my shawl look in the blocking stage - have a look here!



Today I will instead share with you what I have learned about knitting Estonian Lace. Donna Druchenas (from Sheep to Shawl) talks about Estonian Lace knitting that generally has a plain wrong side row of purl and where the lace pattern is worked in knit on the right side rows.

The most prominent stitch in Estonian Lace is the nupp stitch which provides texture to your work.
Faina Letcutchaia (on knitting beyond the Hebrides) explains that "to knit a nupp you knit a stitch, do not take it off the left needle and then follow the sequence *yo; k1* into the same stitch as many times as desired…on the next row all the nupp stitches are knit or purled together". You might prefer to see this in action on youtube courtesy of myrawoodoriginals & bijou3owl.


Estonian 3 into 3 star stitch (copyright Eddie)

Another type of stitch mentioned by Faina and used in the Echo Flower Shawl is the star technique. This can be done by pulling a number of stitches together and in then knitting with the sequence above a new set of stitches. If you pull together 3 stitches and create 3 new ones you will get a star ground stitch. This can be used as a decrease by pulling 5 stitches together and creating 3; thus decreasing by 2 stitches.

On the other hand it can also work as an increase by pulling 3 stitches together and creating 9, thus increasing by 6 stitches. The 2/3 into 9 stitch is demonstrated by this Historic Craft video below. This provides the base for the flower shape used in the Echo Flower Shawl.


Estonian 2 into 9 stitch (copyright Historic Crafts)


Estonian flower stitch (copyright Eddie)

Estonian lace design is a whole subject in itself. From what I can see many modern designers mention the book Pitsilised koekiriad (which means 'finally something else' in Estonian) by Leili Reimann.
I can’t find when the book is from but it does seem to be all in Estonian. However this is not necessarily a problem due to the use of charts.

There even seems to be a blog (Estonian Lace Study) dedicated to the study of this book.
Estonian Lace patterns often use charts as a method of planning out the knitting. Eunny Knits explains the use of charts very well. They mention 2 basic rules that should be followed on all charts:
1) Charts are read in the direction of the knitting.
2) Charts are presented from the right side.

For those who are more used to row by row instructions charts can be a bit difficult at first. It can be especially difficult to figure out which charts to use when. This is why we decided to draw a triangular shawl with the charts marked out for the Echo Flower KAL.


Echo flower shawl construction (copyright Historic Crafts)

• You basically begin the shawl in the middle of the long side (upper border) of the triangle (pink on the drawing) by making a garter stitch rectangle. For more on starting a triangular shawl have a look at Damp City Knits post on the Garter Tab Cast on. This leaves you with 11 stitches (3 on each side and 5 on the long edge).


• This rectangular garter stitch tab is also the beginning of the garter stitch top border (green on the drawing) which you work by knitting the 3 stitches at the start and end of each row. These are not on any of the charts but remember to work them for the whole shawl.


• The remaining 5 stitches from the long edge of the rectangle are used for the setup chart (blue). The setup chart is only worked once and includes the center stitch. Putting in a stitch marker before it help you keep track of it.


• The flower chart (purple) makes the body of the shawl. This chart needs to be worked once on each side of the center stitch. So you work border stitches - flower chart - center stitch - flower chart - border stitches. You repeat the flower chart 8 times for the shoulderette and 13 times for the shawl.


• The border charts (1-3) (yellow) are worked in the order they are numbered. The center stitch is erased and becomes part of chart 2.


• Finally the edge chart (teal) is worked once continually across the whole body of the shawl.

But as I don’t want you to think the Echo Flower Shawl the only Estonian Lace knitting project in the world I will finish this post with a couple of links to patterns for Estonian Lace using a combination of the different techniques I have mentioned.

• Echo Flower Shawl by Jenny Johnson Johnen (triangular shawl with flowers and nupps)


• Laminana by Elizabeth Freeman (triangular shawl with star ground and flowers)


• Aeolian shawl by Elizabeth Freeman (triangular shawl with nupps and beads)


• Paabusall by Monica Kullarand (semi-circular shawl)


• Pitsilised Gloves by Monica Kullarand (traditional Estonian lacy gloves)


• Swallowtail Lace Shawl by Evelyn Clark (triangular shawl with nupps, lily-of-the-valley border and scalloped lace edge).

The images in this post are copyright of Eddie Roued-Cunliffe or Historic Crafts. You are hereby granted permission to use them for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit Eddie and Historic Crafts and link back to this page. If you are using them and talking about this post I would love to hear from you in the comments.

Nalbinding how-to

I am very happy to present as the first post on this new version of Historic Crafts the long awaited how-to on nalbinding. Nalbinding is also known as nalebinding, nailbinding, nålbinding and needlebinding and it is something that readers of Historic Crafts have shown an interest in knowing more about from the beginning.
Unfortunately, I am absolutely useless at nalbinding, as I might have mentioned earlier, so I was thrilled when Ane offered me this wonderful guide for posting. Translating it from Danish has given me new hope that I might one day be able to master this craft too with some help from Ane.
Ane Løser has recently begun studying at The School of the Association of Friends of Textile Art (HV School) in Stockholm, Sweden and has also begun blogging on Ane's Form (in Danish). All the images in this post are copyright of Ane Løser so please seek her permission if you wish to use them further.

Let's get on with the nalbinding shall we.

Take care,
Eddie

P.S. If you want to follow the guide on Flickr instead the images with instructions are in this set!

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Here is a little demonstration of how to do nalbinding. There are several different techniques and I will just show one here. I will demonstrate using black wool so that everything I do stands out more on the pictures, but it is difficult to photograph as everything happens in a flow. I can also recommend checking on youtube for some good tutorial videos.



Above is shown a typical nalbinding needle. In this how-to I am using one that I bought in Stockholm. It is too large and coarse and I actually prefer using an ordinary darning needle. If you feel that you can't do nalbinding without a proper nalbinding needle, you can buy one at most Viking related museums or on the Internet. Otherwise they are available at most Medieval/Viking markets. As for yarn, pure wool is absolutely the best to start with. Use plain knitting yarn to begin with and you can always experiment later with other yarn. Also small remnants are great to use for this.



Pull, but do not cut a piece of yarn about 1.5 meters long. At one end you do a two half-hitch knot like above.



Place it around your left thumb, with the shortest end inside the hand. At the long end sits the needle which you keep in your right hand.



Now place the "knot" on the inside of your thumb. Now you have two threads above the nail. Take the needle between the two threads and let the needle tip come out as in the picture.



Lift the upper loop off the finger.



Take your right hand and move it anticlockwise, so the yarn twists around and you can put the needle tip down between the thread is still attached to the thumb.
Now that we have done this, here is the result. Now pull the thread through and while doing so let the thread loop around your thumb under the thread already there.



This means that the loop that was below before is now above and the loop that is now below is the one connected to the needle.



Now we are back to square one and then we start all over again.



Once we've done this a few times will have a row of stitches hanging off the back of the thumb. This is the beginning whether you want to make socks, mittens, or maybe a sweater. Constructing nalbinding items is a lot like crochet, you work around and around and when you want to make wider pieces and not just long, thin row you link the row with itself.



Let's try this out! Begin by sticking your needle through the stitch closest to your thumb.



Now we need to do as we did in the beginning, pretend the extra stitch on the needle doesn't exist and follow the instructions from the start.



Now you will get a corner because we are working along the row of stitches. If you continue to work round and around without increasing or decreasing, you will get a flat pouch. If you for example want to make mittens or socks you will of course be compelled to increase and decrease. Both mittens and socks can be made as either toe/fingers up or cuff-down. I prefer to do toe-up. That is what I will demonstrate here, but if you prefer the other way you just need to make a long row that fits the arm or leg that can be linked as a ring instead of increasing from the tip.



To increase and decrease: this is again the same as with crochet. When you increase you stick the thread through the same stitch one or more times and when you want to decrease you just miss a stitch in the previous row. When making mittens and socks it is best if you increase in the corners so that the increase sits on the inside and outside of the foot or along the first or the forth finger. Practice this before you begin making a big sweater. Remember that you should only increase and decrease a little in each round and not all in one go. Another thing I do is to make both socks or mittens at the same time. This way you can work without a pattern and still get two identical items where increase and decrease are the same on both.



To extend your yarn: Take the end of the old yarn and split into two or more. Do the same to the new thread you've torn off. We need to felt the two threads together. The fibers sticks much better together when they are long. This is why we tear new yarn instead of cutting.



Interlink the threads and make them wet.



Now the threads are very loosely connected, but when we roll the wet thread in our hands we felt it together and the threads are now as one thread.



On this picture you can see the transition between two colours where I have felted a blue thread to a brown.



Here you see a heal where I have decreased.



Here you see a toe where I have increased.



Here is the heal from underneath. I made a tube which fits the foot until I reach the middle of the instep. Now I make a row that goes out from the rest of my tube, which is done by not connecting with the tube, but instead going back to the very first step of this how-to. When I made ​​it long enough I connected it to itself and finally back onto the tube. Each time I go around, I decrease at the root and the top of the row sticking out.

This is the end of my nalbinding guide. Please let me know if something is completely incomprehensible or if you have any problems. Nalbinding is not difficult, but you have to learn it, as with everything else. The story behind the nalbinding goes way back. Fragments of nalbound textiles have been found in Israel dating back 65000 years, but this is a story that must wait for another time. Good luck and let me know how it goes!

Sock Experiments: Blue variegated #1

I really want to learn how to knit socks. Not just from a pattern. I want to be able to knit socks from the top of my head – like my Grandmother used to do it. This is where Pricsilla Gibson-Robson’s wonderful book “Simply Socks Plain and Fancy” comes in handy. We reviewed it here on Historic Crafts (reviewed lovingly by Dee last year) and since then I have been wanting to have a go myself. I have chosen to use her toe-to-top crew sock recipe. Even though it is not an actual pattern it is still on Ravelry and quite a few people have tried it out already.
The first step towards a pair of socks using this book is to measure the foot that the socks are going to fit. I did that and found that my foot has a max circumference of 23cm (C) and a length of 19cm (L) (see diagram).
Length wise I am a woman’s large and width wise I am a woman’s XL. Yes, I have my mother’s, wide feet. For this tester I am going to try the woman’s size large. Then when I get more confident I might do a little mix and match.
The next step is to knit a little tester (12 stitches wide) of my chosen yarn to get a gauge.
The yarn I chose is a variated blue 3 ply sock yarn. My gauge is 7 stitches to the inch and with this I can consult Priscilla’s chart on pages 23-24 and find that:

• Cast on stitches = 60 = C


• Ankle rows = 12


• Heel/toe stitches = 30


• Stitches between yarn-overs = 12

So, now the next step is to cast on using the provisional cast-on technique. I did a purl row into the invisible cast-on – otherwise I know I can’t control it.
I then did short rows using the yarn-over technique until I had 12 stitches left in the middle. I must admit that I didn’t find myself able to understand Priscilla’s instructions for yarn-over short rows so I asked my resident knit-guru, Cecile, for advice. She pointed me to NoNa knits who had experimented with different short row techniques. With NoNa’s help I finally figured it out!
I like to do my short rows 1 sock at a time, but when it gets to the knitting in the round bit I use magic-loop to knit 2 socks at the same time. For me, there is nothing worse than finishing a sock and then being only half way. So I did the other toe and put them both on my circular needles and knit and knit till I got to the heels. Once at the heel I used the same yarn over short row technique as for the toes to knit the heels one at a time.

And that's it for this time. I am planning something special for the ankle/leg of the socks.

Useful knitting references:

• Yarn over Short Rows by NoNa Knits


• [amazon ASIN="0966828941"]Simple Socks: Plain & Fancy[/amazon], Priscilla Gibson-Roberts


• Provisional cast-on by Theresa on Knitty

The images in this post are copyright of Eddie Roued-Cunliffe. You are hereby granted permission to use them for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit Eddie and link back to this page. If you are using them and talking about this post I would love to hear from you in the comments.

Felting

The translation of this great introduction into felt-making by Ane from Anes Form is long overdue. But it's here now and you can use it to make other things not related to Easter. How about a hat to keep you warm this winter or come December you could make some Christmas baubles.

In order to felt wool three criteria need to be fulfilled: heat, water and movement. This is the reason you will find your favorite shirt come out of the washing machine in a size that would fit a nine-year-old, while it has become thick and hard. In this situation felting might not appear as something you would like to experience again, but don't let this put you off. This process can be used to create the most amazing things. In fact only your imagination limits you, since the thickness of the material can be varied infinitely and thus create an infinite number of beautiful items.

The actual felting process is simple - the problem is to make the wool felt in the shape you need! This requires some practice, but if you note down what happens to the wool during the felting process you will soon get a hang of it. However, I recommend attending a crash course, so as not to lose heart completely. Many aspects are difficult to explain and it is something one learns best by trial and error or watching someone else do it.

There are three different methods depending on what you want to achieve. You can felt a solid, hollow or flat piece, and the flat method is really just a simplification of the hollow felting method. As Easter is approaching, I plan to incorporate these three methods in an Easter hen and it's eggs. The solid method is used for the eggs and the hollow is used for the chicken. I recommend that you begin by making a flat piece of felt first to get a hang of it and then felt the solid eggs in the end, when you have mastered the other two methods. The hollow filter method is often used when making hats, shoes, mittens, etc.

During the the felting process your subject will shrink. Think about it when you prepare the dry wool, which therefore must be larger than the finished article. For shoes and similar items you need to make a felted sample to get the right size. I have written a bit more about this at the end of the tutorial.

You need:

• Wool (wool tops)


• Green or brown soap


• Warm water (not warmer than you can still keep your hands comfortably in it)


• Dishcloths and possibley a towel


• Felting needle (a special needle with barbs, are sold in hobby-shops and by most carded wool traders)


• A table top that can withstand water, with an edge or the second drain option

Solid felting / the eggs

Take a suitable piece of wool top, and tie a firm knot in the middle of it. Let the wool top run around the knot, while keeping the oval shape of the egg. Remember not to twist the wool, as it will just become harder to felt. When you get to the last little bit of wool, you can pull the fibers out and let them lie around the egg so that you do not see the transition and the wool then sticks to itself. Now you should have an oval shape which is relatively firm.

Now you make the soapy water. The warm water mixed with an appropriate amount of soap. The water must feel slightly greasy when you rub your hands in it. If you have overdosed, wool can take longer to felt. If you underdosed the wool will create a halo on the object you are felting. Experiment!

Put the egg into the water and take it in your hand, making small movements on the ball which gently affect the wool. Throughout the process the ball stays under water. After a time you will notice that the ball will have a firmer shape and the more firm the egg appears, the harder you can work on it. And finally: Voila! Your first felted egg is ready to be embroidered.

Flat felting / hollow felting / hen

Before you begin your hen project I recommend trying to make a flat piece of felt. This gives you a feeling of flat felted objects before you begin with the larger project. Put your wool into a relatively thick layer so you can not feel the table through the layer. It should be equally thick all over and needs no trimmed edges.

Make some more soapy water as above and this time pour the water over your layer of wool. Pour the water out over your hand and then onto the wool, thus avoiding making a hard beam of water making holes in your woolen layer. The wool must be drenched, push a little cautiously to make sure that there are no air bubbles in the wool. During the process you can reheat the water if it gets too cold.

Now put your hands onto the wool and start moving them gently in small circles until the wool begins to felt. When you feel that the surface begins to close together, you may be more rough and when it emerges as a sturdy piece of fabric you can throw the felt down onto the table to make the process to go faster. You should now have created a coherent piece of fabric, and when you have it is time to move on to the chicken.

Draw a bird on your plastic piece (bubble wrap is excellent), and cut it out.

Now make two identical layers of wool tops of a suitable thickness, make sure that the pieces are five to seven centimeters larger than your plastic hen shape. Put one in a dry place, the other on your felt table with the plastic hen shape on top.

Put your finger on the edge of the plastic and pour a bit of water over the plastic. This will run off the plastic and give you a silhouette of the drawn hen. Now take the plastic away and make the hen wet in the same way that you did with your flat felt piece above. The result should be a very wet hen with a dry aura.

Put the plastic hen back on top again and bend the dry wool aura in over the plastic.

Pick up the second dry wool layer and place it on top of the wet plastic hen. Bend the dry layers aura in under the wet hen and wrap it tightly but make sure to maintain the hen shape.


Time to felt! Make the whole hen wet with soapy water. Be careful in the beginning, but as before, the more firm the surface is, the harder you can work on it. Remember to get around the whole object, also at the edges.

Once the felt on one side is firm enough and you can lift your hen easily without wool slipping, you can turn it over and repeat the process on the opposite side of the hen.

Now cut open the hen. This is done simply by letting it lie on the table when you cut. The wool inside the hen has not felted yet, so be a little careful. Take the plastic hen out and let your hand slip into the cavity, while the hen stays flat on the table.

When the hen begins to feel firm and the surface is properly sealed, you can begin to throw it onto the table so that it felts faster. Remember however to smooth it out often and throw it at different angles, otherwise you lose your nice hen form. When you think it is felted through and through, lay it out flat and fill it out with wool to make it round and hen-shaped. Trim the bottom edge so that it is neat. You can either sew the bottom up or sew a small piece of fabric in as an inner pocket for the Easter eggs. Let it dry. Once this is done, it is time to finalize it, by making a comb, eyes, and a beak. This is best done with needle felting.



Help and additional tips:

• Wet felt can be stored for up to a week in the fridge if you are not ready to use it right away. Put it in a plastic bag with a knot in and the water which naturally comes with your project when it is lifted into the bag.


• Felt-test: if you need to do something which must have a specific size you are best off doing a filter sample first. Place a suitable layer of lets say 10 x 10 centimeters, which you then felt. When it is done and dry, you measure your end result size, which helps you to figure out how big your plastic template needs to be to get a specific finished size. Different wools have different shrinking percentages, therefore you should always make a new sample for each new type of wool you are using.


• Holes in the felt can be addressed by adding a thicker layer of wool top. If a hole occurs, stop the process, put dry wool on top of the hole and let the fibers spread over a larger area. You can try to use a felting needle to get the new wool to stick as it is difficult to felt wet and dry wool together.


• If your wool begins to wrinkle or small waves appear on your yet to be felted wool, you have probably been too hard or working too much in one direction. If this occurs, work along them and not across them, as this will just make the waves larger.


• It is never too late! Wool is a great medium and failed projects can always be used for something other than what was intended.

The images in this post are copyright of Ane from Anes Form . If you wish to use the images please request permission from Ane.

A recipe for knitted flowers

[caption id="attachment_2628" align="aligncenter" width="459" caption="Flower brooch, copyright Ingrid Murnane"][/caption]

In order to make your own knitted flower, you'll need to knit a long strip of fabric, which is wider on one of the long sides than the other. From this you can form either a single rose-type flower, or a double flower. Even within these parameters there is scope for putting them together in differing ways to make tightly-furled or more blowsy blooms.

Of course, you might need a leaf too, which is a little more complicated so I'll give you a few links at the end for making different types.

Recipe for a flower brooch

The basic recipe for making a flower is as follows, but you can jig it about as you like for different effects, much like a cooking recipe:

1. Cast on 80 to 100 stitches


2. Knit three rows of garter stitch.


3. Next row: P2tog all the way accross


4. Next row: Knit and decrease (by k2tog every 5 or 6 stitches)


5. Work in stocking stitch from here on, and on every second row (which will be a knit row) decrease by k2tog at appropriate intervals to pull in the work until your flower is almost tall enough for a brooch (I aim for about 5-6cm usually).


6. Next row - k2tog right along the row, in order to halve the amount of stitches.


7. Cast off.

Tip: It is up to you how you'd like to decrease. You can do it in a uniform fashion by decreasing first every 7 stitches, then every 6 and so on, or you could decrease by k2tog every 4 in the first decrease row, then by every 2 in the next, but every 5 in the third decrease row.  Of course, your decrease rows don't have to be every second row either. By playing with the decreasing and how often you space it, you will create differently shaped flowers.

[caption id="attachment_2629" align="aligncenter" width="457" caption="Rose brooch, copyright Ingrid Murnane"][/caption]

Putting it all together

Wrap the knitting around on itself to find how it sits best and for the appropriate flower look for you. Sew it into place using the tails of yarn from the knitting.

Of course, you might like to make a leaf to go with your flower. There are some great patterns available online for this. Here is a good pattern from Crafty Galore. This second one from TikkunArts is a pdf.

You can make them into brooches by adding a safety pin to the back, add them to cardigans or bags, or maybe make a garland!

The knitted flower recipe above is copyrighted to Ingrid Murnane. You are welcome to make it, talk about it and link to it, but when you do please attribute Ingrid Murnane. We ask however that you do not reproduce the recipe itself or use the recipe or the finished flowers for commercial purposes. The images are also copyright of Ingrid Murnane. Please contact Ingrid if you wish to use them for any purpose.

Dyeing with Elderberries

[caption id="attachment_2529" align="aligncenter" width="456" caption="Elderberry dye soup"][/caption]

The Elberberries were out in full bloom a couple of weeks ago and I decided that it was time to try some more berry dyeing. I still didn't have a regular mordant like Alum so once again I turned to the tutorial 'Making Natural Dyes from Plants' for their instructions on using salt as a mordant. I had a go with the same wool I used last time for the Blackberry dyeing and I am at the moment knitting up some berry socks by making stripes with the two yarns. As I had quite a large amount of Elderberries I decided to have a go at dyeing this pink raw silk fabric I had lying around. I like the colour it turned out but I did make one mistake though. I learned later that when dyeing silk you shouldn't boil it as silk goes hard when it reaches higher temperatures. My piece of silk did go slightly hard but nevermind. I still used the silk piece to sew myself the Bubbly Berry Skirt which you can see on my blog 'Grey Duckling'.

[caption id="attachment_2528" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="Before and after dyeing raw silk with Elderberry"][/caption]

The images in this post are copyright of Eddie Roued-Cunliffe. You are hereby granted permission to use them for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit Eddie and link back to this page. If you are using them and talking about this post I would love to hear from you in the comments.

Dyeing with Blackberries

Blackberries are in season at the moment and we have quite a few in our garden. I have already used the best ones for Blackberry Jelly. After being inspired by the Hampshire Weavers, Spinners and Dyers Guild Exhibition, I decided to go home and give natural dyeing a try.

I picked as many blackberries as I could find (there were not many left). Not being very well prepared I didn't have a mordant, but I read the 'Making Natural Dyes from Plants' tutorial, which mentioned that you could use a salt fixative for berry dyes.

I made a mixture of 16 parts water and 1 part sea salt. I then put the yarn into the mixture and brought it to a boil. When it began to boil I turned the heat of and left it to rest in the salt water for 1 hour. I then gave the yarn a rinse and began to prepare the dye soup.

I added the blackberries to some water (c. 1 part berries and 4 parts water). I cooked the mixture for about 30 min after which I removed the pot from the heat and mashed the berries. I then let the mixture boil for another 30 min after which I strained the pump carefully. When there was no more pulp in the juice I put it back on the stove and added the pre-prepared yarn. I brought this to a boil again, turned of the heat and left it to stand till the next morning.

Next day I pulled the yarn out of the dye soup and gave it a good rinse, adding a splash of vinegar to one of the rinse baths. I then hung it to dry and used the end of my wooden spoon as a nostepinne to wind it into a neat ball.

[caption id="attachment_2367" align="aligncenter" width="476" caption="Ball of yarn dyed with Blackberries"][/caption]

I would like to note that a couple of weeks later I made a little tester by putting a strand of this yarn in the window for a week or so. It faded and became a more yellowish version of the original colour. Never having tried dyeing with a mordant like Alum I don't know what level of fading you would expect if you put your dyed item in the sun for a week. But I don't think you will ever expect it not to fade at all. Would be fun to experiment with. If anyone else has any experience with this I would love to hear your comment

The images in this post are copyright of Eddie Roued-Cunliffe. You are hereby granted permission to use them for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit Eddie and link back to this page. If you are using them and talking about this post I would love to hear from you in the comments.

The Niddy-Noddy

Once you have spun and plied your lovely new yarn, you'll want to make it into a skein. The old-fashioned way to do this was to wind it around the back of a chair or a willing helper's outstretched hands, but there is actually a piece of equipment out there that you can use: the niddy-noddy.

The basic niddy-noddy has a central bar with two end crossbars which sit at 90 degrees to each other. Traditionally constructed of wood, you can also make one out of PVC piping. They come in a variety of sizes, producing skeins of varying lengths. The most common size makes a skein of around 2 meters. The clever thing about the niddy-noddy is that you can use it to see how much yarn you have spun. By counting the number of wraps, and noting the length of the niddy-noddy, you can come up with approximate yardage for your skein.

Here is the one that I made last year. Using PVC pipe, this tutorial and a bit of help from my Dad I came up with this. I’m rather proud of it and it continues to work well for me.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="PVC pipe niddy-noddy, © Ingrid Murnane"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Niddy-Noddy with yarn skeined for dyeing, © Ingrid Murnane"][/caption]

The images in this post are copyright of Ingrid Murnane. If you wish to use the images please request permission from Ingrid.

Cecile’s best spinning tutorials

Hand spinner Cecile has recently learnt the craft of spinning on a drop spindle. From where you might ask. Well I think she started of learning the basics form her knitting group but the rest she has found out through online tutorials. We asked her if she would share her best online tutorials with us. So here they are:

Spindling basics:

[caption id="attachment_2095" align="alignright" width="225" caption="CD Drop Spindle"][/caption]

A very clear series of video from Abby Franquemont, author of the remarkable Respect the Spindle.
Part 1: To get started on the spindle there is ‘Introduction to Spinning: Part 1’, which explains the staple length, drafting, starting the spindle (high/top whorl), spinning, walking the yarn to keep the tension when winding it on the spindle, ‘park and draft’ and more.
Part 2: Moving beyond ‘park and draft’ ‘Introduction to Spinning: Part 2’ gives an overview of the most common problems encountered when trying to progress beyond the ‘park and draft’ method: spindle backspinning, yarn breaking, how to judge the right amount of twist, joining a new batch of fibers, woolen vs worsted drafting, how to secure your spindle once you want to stop (you will eventually need to!).

From Megan LaCore we have a slightly different approach, with clear short videos to illustrate specific parts of the spinning process:
If you are having problems spinning and drafting at the same time ‘Drafting Wool for Spinning’ shows you how to pre-draft the yarn first.
‘Spinning on a Drop Spindle’ shows you how to then spin it and finally ‘Plying Two Single Yarns on a Drop Spindle’ shows you how to ply it (2-ply).

Alternative plying techniques:

In ‘Andean Plying’ Megan LaCore demonstrates how to create an Andean bracelet, to ply together the two ends of the same cop/ball of yarn.

Finally I have discovered this very interesting technique, illustrated by Rosemary Knits, to do a Navajo ply (3-ply) ‘on the fly’, which means, plying the singles as you spin them.
It looks like a very long post, and you can go right down to the video at the bottom, but if you’re interested in trying the techniques, the edits are well worth reading as Rosemary has tweaked the technique to make it more efficient. This is one of my favorite techniques, as it means no kinky singles to deal with, just spin a bit, ply a bit, spin a bit, ply a bit, and so on and so forth…

The images in this post are copyright of Eddie Roued-Cunliffe. You are hereby granted permission to use them for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit Eddie and link back to this page. If you are using them and talking about this post I would love to hear from you in the comments.

How to Make a CD Spindle

If you have read "Portrait of a Hand Spinner" you will have read about Cecile's quest to make the perfect spindle. One of the first spindles she made herself was the CD spindle. Here are the instructions for the CD spindle drawn by Eddie. A very big thanks to Cecile for letting us in on how she did this. If you have any questions that are not answered in the how-to, feel free to comment them below and we will get Cecile to answer them for you.

The instructions are free to use under the Creative Commons License: CC-BY-NC-ND, which means that you are welcome to download, print, use and distribute this how-to for non-commercial reasons as long as you attribute it to Historic Crafts and don't make any changes to it.

How-to spin with a spindle

Very briefly these are the main steps you need to take in order to spin yarn with a spindle:
[caption id="attachment_1707" align="alignleft" width="164" caption="The Spinner by William-Adolphe Bouguereau "][/caption]

1. Attach a piece of yarn (a leader) around the spindle.


2. Draft out some of your fiber to spin in with the leader.


3. Get your spindle to spin around and then park it between your knees.


4. Draft out some of your fiber while holding a finger to make sure the twist does not travel up your fiber before you are ready.


5. Let go of your finger and let the twist travel up your drafted fiber while using your fingers to stop the twist traveling further up your fiber.


6. When you have spun a piece of yarn like this, unhook the yarn and wrap around the spindle leaving enough of a leader to continue.

For more tutorials have a look at this:
Abby Franquemont
Drop Spindle Basics - YouTube video
Introduction to Spinning - a two part YouTube video series

Jody Moody from AlpacaDirect
Drop Spindle Fiber Spinning - YouTube video

Medieval Dyeing

Louise, our resident Medieval lady, has been dyeing for a couple of years now. She has been documenting the process on the Haandkraft blog. This post is meant as a diary of her dyeing efforts 2008-2010 and as a how-to inspirational post on dyeing with plants.

13th October 2008

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="224" caption="Dyeing with Madder"][/caption]

This was to see how different the wool took in the colour. I dyed two batches that have been treated which I'm going to use for "nålebinding" / "needlebinding". And the one in the middle that hadn't been treated with alum is a very thin embroidery yarn. There is a clear difference in the two types of yarn but I'm very excited about both colours. Read full post...

23rd December 2008

[caption id="attachment_1597" align="alignleft" width="240" caption="Dyeing with Onion Peel"][/caption]

I have been collecting onion shells for a while now and decided last night that I had enough to try a little dyeing. I had seen the great results on Slingerbult´s page and have wanted to try it ever since. The colours of the ones that had only been in onion shells went quite orange and the one treated with iron in the end went dark brown.
So filled with success I wanted to try something else. My dear friend Christopher bought saffron for me last time he was in Spain. I tried with a small bundle of yarn again and used about 4-5 grams of saffron. It really doesn't take much before it dyes and the colour is very strong so be careful not to make a mess with it. Read full post...

17th April 2009

[caption id="attachment_1599" align="alignright" width="240" caption="Dyeing silk fabric with onion peel"][/caption]

Mikkel and I have been collecting onion shells for a while and there were now a big pile of shells. I know that the dye sticks really wellto  wool and gives a great colour. And when I stumbled on this guy's flickr I just had to try dyeing on silk.
So I found some white silk that I have bought at a tailor on sale and gave it a mordant (alun). The mordant water and the fabric was moved a lot. Then I made the colour water and after an hour of boiling it was ready for the fabric. I removed the onion shells and but in the fabric. The piece was about 1 m. The colour was on the fabric right away and during the next hour was stirred all the time. Read full post...

22nd May 2009

[caption id="attachment_1601" align="aligncenter" width="469" caption="Dying with Walnut, Madder, Birch and Goldenrod"][/caption]

The plants that I have use for these colours are (from the left):
- Walnut (the browns - 1. and 2. colour bath)
- Madder (the reds - 1. and 2. colurs bath)
- Birch (the greens and the bright yellow - the greens have been treated with iron, and taken up at different time in the colour bath, the yellow is 1. colour bath)
- Goldenrot - (the light yellow - 1. colour bath)
The white is the original wool yarn
Read full post...

23rd August 2009

[caption id="attachment_1617" align="aligncenter" width="491" caption="Dyeing in an iron cauldron and the result"][/caption]

Read full post...

22nd October 2009

[caption id="attachment_1606" align="aligncenter" width="420" caption="From left to right. Light grey yarn in 2. colourbath, white yarn in a bath made with mushrooms, the two next are white yarn in 3. colourbath, a light grey yarn in 3. colourbath, three next is different white yarns in 3. colourbath, and the last is a white yarn in 2. colourbath."][/caption]

At Vitskøl monestary we dyed with madder and mushrooms, and at Spøttrup Castle we continued dyeing with madder. Have brought different types of yarns which you can see had a great impact on the results of the colours. Read full post...

31st January 2010

[caption id="attachment_1608" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Dyeing soup"][/caption]

I have never dyed with mushrooms before and didn't know how many grams to use for the 1 meter of fabric that I had. So this was kind of an experiment - to see how much colour the mushrooms gave. The mushroom that I used is in Danish called Cinnober-slørhat, and in Latin Cortinarius cinnabarinus. It should give a reddish colour which I was quite excited about since one of the only other plants that give red is madder.
Before dyeing I chopped the mushrooms in to very small pieces and let them soak in water for 24 hours. The colour soup became very red as you can see in the pictures and when the fabric went in it took in the colour very fast. Read full post...

[caption id="attachment_1609" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Dyeing with mushrooms"][/caption]

19th February 2010

[caption id="attachment_1611" align="aligncenter" width="405" caption="Dyeing with Canadian Goldenrod"][/caption]

I have dyed with Solidago canadensis, also know as Canadian Goldenrod. I have dyed with woolen yarns and silk and the green is from adding iron in the end of the dye.
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