Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Arts and crafts

Discover knitting, crochet, scrapbooking and art and craft ideas on this forum.

rowan wool

31 replies

magicfarawaytree · 10/09/2006 14:50

does anyone know where i can get cheap rowan wool from can only find big wool for £7.25 online there must surely be some cheaper places. many thanks

OP posts:
wartywarthog · 11/09/2006 19:25

now REALLY embarrassed... i have never wound a skein, only unwound and if i do it by myself it takes me minimum an hour. 40 mins if i have someone helping me. worst case was 3 hours. i always get it into knots. so was wondering if there's some secret to it. i assumed it's just wound round something, but the threads always seem to intertwine as if they've been wound round in different sections and then squashed together.

ohhoo i'm blabbing now. and nervous too. and still embarrassed...

tamum · 11/09/2006 20:26

magicfarawaytree, I just found some Big Wool in the sale- only two discontinued colours, but much cheaper- here .

FillyjonktheBananaEater · 11/09/2006 20:55

oh god, sorry, you really wanted to know! Sorry!

Ok, here's what you do. This is the simplest and easiest way. There are fancy ways to do it. I'm sure someone who buys Noro or suchlike fancy yarns will enlighten you

This is perfectly adequate for dying, IME.

Sit on the floor. Put your feet out, around 18 inches apart, doesn't really matter. Wrap the beginning of your yarn round your big toe (it helps to take your socks off). Now wind it round and round your two feet until you have no wool left. Then stop. Tie the very end bit of the wool round the skein. Take your feet out very carefully.

Then get 8 short bits of wool, around 20 cm max, in a different colour is good, acrylic is especially good as it won't dye, then tie them at equidistant points round your skein.

Then dye it.

To wind it back into a ball after you have dyed it, repeat the process backwards, ie put your feet into the skein, hold it taut, cut the short bits of acrylic (throw them far, far away, they will only get tangled) and then find the end bit of the wool where you tied it. Untie it. Then just wind it back into a ball. So long as you keep it taut, it should be fine, unless it is either tangled or very fine.

hth.

wartywarthog · 11/09/2006 22:10

fbte - i feel like a right idiot for asking... i mean it's not exactly rocket science... and i do occasionally display vague signs of intelligence. but i knitted a pair of socks the other day and the wool came in a MASSIVE skein. i was soooo careful to not get it tangled, but it did and it took me 3 hours to unpick. i always have to be so careful and wondered if there was a trick.

the foot!

magicfarawaytree · 11/09/2006 22:41

Thanks tamum and filly - thats a gorgeous pink big wool. unfortunately quite athletic so very light chunky wools tend to transform me into mitchelin man!! Have started having a look at texere and will also look at generico too. Its very sad but I never knew knitting was such a minefield - ashamed to say as much as I have always thought knitting was pretty cool. I never thought it went beyound dk, 4ply etc. I have some old rowan books 2, 3 etc but they are antiquated in comparison to the selections of wool around today. I though snowflake was funky!!!

OP posts:
FillyjonktheBananaEater · 12/09/2006 08:01

just get in there and experiement! Thats the way to go. I especially like colour/texture, more than peeing about with cable needles -ooh though those tiny cables were cool...thats why I do dyeing

but remember NO knitter was born knowing how to do chevron lace. we all had to earn by trial and error so go for it! (I try to remember this quite a lot)

New posts on this thread. Refresh page