Harry takes great pride in his designs, as evidenced by the fact that he spent an entire evening slowly creeping around the King Bat shawl searching for flaws. Fortunately for me, he only found five cat hairs and a single decrease slanting in the wrong direction.
After a stern lecture to me about carelessness and to Laptop about feline hygiene, he departed (with 11 suitcases) for Uzbekistan. Apparently, the owners of the ALBATROS Karaoke Club in Tashkent had been incredibly impressed by his performance in Albania a few months ago and invited him for a two-day gig. In an effort to avoid an International Incident, I will not comment on the listening tastes of either Albanians or Uzbekistani.
Where was I? Oh yes. Harry. Uzbekistan. Eleven suitcases. The mystery of the suitcases was solved when Harry returned with 20 skeins of Z-twist 30/1 plying silk as a gift to my proto-store (it's taking shape, but it's taking time to take shape, sigh). I was immensely touched for a second...after which he demanded 75% of future profits, as well as my cashmere bathrobe. I guess we can all share.
I happened to have a spindle full of merino-cashmere waiting to be plied, so I immediately wound the silk and the yarn onto a felt ball and twisted the two strands together. Thank you, Harry! He may be an obnoxious, demanding spider with a penchant for sarcasm, aggrandizement, and chicken-fried raisins, but he has excellent taste in yarn.
As you can see, the silk and merino-cashmere are about the same weight, so the final yarn can safely be deemed 30/2. I have another spindle half-finished, but haven't made much of dent in the two-ounce bag of fiber yet.
And thanks to everyone's suggestions from the last post, I have indeed ordered a Golding. Actually, I ordered two--Harry wanted his own custom job. Tom Golding was understandably puzzled by my request for a .1-gram spindle, but after I explained, he decided that he could make a nice one out of a hand-painted pinhead and a hand-carved Japanese embroidery needle. Good luck with that, Tom.
Friday, July 17, 2009
On (and Off) the Silk Road
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13 comments:
Love the post it made me :o) The yarn is stunning and a beautiful colour...
I look forwrad to seeing the custom spindle and the one you ordered.... I may not like to use but I like to look
Oh my, that yarn looks excruciatingly luxurious -- softness and sheen -- yumm!
Where did you get the bathrobe? :-)
Cashmere bathrobe!
Do tell more. Now that you've planted that image in my senses, I'd rather go around in my undies or nothing at all if I can't get a cashmere bathrobe. Therefore, I am in my undies now. I must begin to scour the world wide web for my future cashmere bathrobe. I'm thinking I may not need any other shelter beyond a cashmere bathrobe, an alpaca neckwarmer, an earflap hat and maybe some angora socks.
You will love your Golding, as will Harry (I hope.) That is some lovely yarn. I am a big fan of both Golding spindles and of well spun silk-cashmere. I look forward to hearing how much yardage you get from your 2 ounces of cashmere fiber.
Heh. And I broke down and ordered a Bosworth.
We're mirror images, LOL.
Yes, well, after my last comment I decided I need another Golding, and will be ordering soon.
Your yarn is absolutely gorgeous!
And might I say, I absolutely love reading about Harry. Makes me feel less silly about talking about the Green Woman...who wishes I would do so more often.
Your yarn is spectacular! I'm having a "yarngasim" just looking at it. I know Tom Golding can make custom spindles but Harry can be very demanding so I hope he knows what he's in for with that order :-)
That's perfect - gorgeous yarn, perfect timing. I am playing with plying wool silk, as well. Inspiring :-).
At least Harry wasn't tooooo hard on you for that eensy bitty error that really who else would find?
My Bossie is not yet on it's way; I am trying to be patient and not pout. (Because I have SUCH a shortage of projects, right? lol)
Wow can't wait to see the spindle.
The yarn looks lovely
Vicki
pinhead spindle. Heh. How fine a yarn would you get on that????!
Ooh, pretty. I've not played with plying different fibres yet. That's inspirational.
the yarn look so gorgeus!
i really cannot wait to see what it will look like when knitted up:)
what amazing spindling you got going on!
yay for goldings! :D
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