Hey! I heard that groan!
Okay, I admit I’m a bit of a fiber geek. After all this time and many, many (many!) yarns, the characteristics of different fibers as they affect my knitting are of great interest to me. I want to know what’s in the yarn, how it can best be used, and then find the right project that will use the yarn to its best advantage. Sometimes it takes a false start or two, and sometimes you just know.
When I was introduced to Juniper Moon Farm’s “Fourteen”, I saw an ordinary-looking chainette yarn
and probably had a bored look on my face. Been there, done that. I gave the ball a pat. It felt nice. Really nice. Oh, fine, they threw a little cashmere in there, that’s why it feels nice. Why is it called Fourteen? Because another ingredient is 14-micron merino wool. Ah ha! The lower the micron count, the finer and softer the fiber.
Now, I’ve had some experience with very low micron wool and it wasn’t great. The old version was very soft and smooth, but rather lifeless and dry. If you’ve ever knitted with 100% cashmere, you’ll know what I mean. You expect the ultimate knitting experience, but come away a bit underwhelmed. The yarn feels dry in your hands and doesn’t have the body and the lively springiness of wool.
The way Fourteen avoids that lifeless feeling is its chainette construction. The knitted cord adds plenty of spring to the knitting;
in fact I went up a size in needle to avoid a too-tight gauge and used a blunt needle to avoid snagging the plies. Depending on what you want to knit, you can knit this yarn at several gauges. I made a pair of mitts using 7’s
that I wanted to feel soft but sturdy, and then I knit this shawl using 10-1/2’s
that I wanted to feel soft and lofty. Mission accomplished both times.
So the yarn is really good, and the shawl, called Cozy Winter, is great. The pattern, available on Ravelry, is highly recommended. Good charts, plus written instructions for everything. It’s constructed so that you start right into the fun part, then add some garter stitch as you go instead of doing a mile of boring garter before getting to the interesting bits. I blocked the shawl very lightly to keep the cables squishy.
I had a nice visit from my ex-husband who lives in Thailand last week. The visit was too short, but very nice. This weekend, I’ll be closing the shop at 1 on Saturday to attend a birthday party for a good friend. Seems to me, who just wants to stay home and knit, I’m in the midst of a freakin’ social whirl.
