Are You My Mummy? - Art Yarn Challenge

*Contains slight spoilers for Doctor Who (2005 relaunch), season 1, episodes 9 and 10*

I was challenged by a dear customer to spin a very specific Doctor Who art yarn, comprising the episodes "The Empty Child" and "The Doctor Dances" from the first season of the 2005 TV show.
The Doctor and Rose find themselves in 1941 during the London Blitz, Rose hears a child calling for his mummy and goes after him, only to be tangled up in the rope of a barrage balloon. She clings on, a Union Jack prominently on her shirt, and is rescued by Captain Jack Harkness. The child reappears again and again, wearing a gas mask, asking everyone "are you my mummy?" and shouting "muuummmy, muuuuummmmy" all over the place.
Now, I don't want to retell the whole story here - if you know it already you will understand my explanations about the add-ins, and if you don't know it I don't want to spoil it for you completely.

When my customer challenged me to spin this yarn, I was instantly excited. I searched for charms and other things to spin in, but it became clear very quickly that I would have to substitute some things, and make others myself. I chose a space rocket to represent the space ship of Captain Jack Harkness (though it looks very differently) and the barrage balloons (since the form is somewhat similar). Not a perfect substitute, but working. I couldn't find any gas mask charms small enough to fit in the orifice of my spinning wheel, so I had to figure out how to make some from polymer clay. They are a bit ugly, and also not perfect, but the best I could manage, and I think they are recognizable. I made five, as it's not only the child "wearing" a gas mask.

Now for the other charms: I found some Union Jacks way back, and used one of them in this yarn, representing Rose's shirt. I used apples and teacups for the representation of the loaded tables Nancy and the children plunder, a Big Ben charm as that is where Captain Jack Harkness parks his (invisible) space ship, a telephone charm as the empty child repeatedly calls to ask for his mummy, a clock face charm because Rose and Jack flirt in front of the Big Ben clock face, and a handmade TARDIS charm the reason of which should be obvious ;-)

I chose blue, black and grey fibres, mostly because these are the colours that come to my mind whenever I think of the episodes in question. I think it might be not exactly right, there are lots of scenes in brown and yellowish tones also (which I realized when I looked at pictures again), but it seemed the right way to go anyway, and I think these tones predominate the beginning of the episode and the scenes outside. Oh, and I added lots of sparkling copper angelina to represent the nanogenes.

 The yarn is 175 m (191 yards) and 126 g (4,44 oz)

How The Princess Saved Herself

A few days ago, I posted a photo on my private Twitter account showing a batt I had carded that day. A very, very pink batt I thought of naming Candy Overdose once it was made into yarn, as I wanted to stay away from any stereotypical attributions.

I briefly considered doing something with skulls and swords, but as I had already used these add-ins with another (pink and black) yarn on the same day, I thought it might be boring. Also, I ran into kind of a dead end when I thought about it. It all went very fast and quite subconsciously, and it's a bit hard to reconstruct, but it went along the following lines: I could use these things to bend the gender stereotype, but in doing so I would also imply pink was girly while swords and skulls were not and therefore contribute to the stereotyope - and I really hate this kind of thing. As I said, my brain went through this very quickly and it seemed to happen in the back of my head without me really noticing the details.

But then, my dear friend Twisted saw the photo and twittered (in German, so I am going to translate here) "I want to see swords in the yarn! And skulls! And then you'll call it "The Princess Saves Herself"!".

And it clicked.

I could actually do some stereotype bending without contributing to the stereotype, although I still had to use the stereotype to bend it, of course - and here my brain went all fuzzy again. I have to think about this some more, and I can't pinpoint exactly why this title makes the idea work, but it does.

In fairy tales, movies and all sorts of stories princesses are traditionally weak (and in distress) and need to be saved by a prince. This trope can be applied to constellations other than princess/prince - and the underlying pattern and implication is that women need to be saved by men (please also watch Anita Sarkeesian's Damsel in Distress series for this, which is a must-see, in my opinion). I have resented this idea for a very long time, and I get angry and frustrated whenever yet another movie/game/story uses this trope. It gets old, and it's been old for decades now.

By taking swords (traditionally used by the prince and attributed to men - also just look at archaeological interpretations, but that's a topic for a different blog post) and skulls and spinning them into a pink (recently-traditionally attributed to women and overused with princesses) yarn I combine elements that are attributed to two different gender groups, merging them - and with the title I let the princess take an active role, making it clear that she uses the swords herself, and that she can stand for herself and be her own rescuer. I use existing stereotypes and I challenge them.

There is also a single dragon in the yarn, by the way, for - I think - obvious reasons.

As a side note, I came upon a webcomic the other day, telling the story of two princesses. It's called Princess Princess, and I enjoyed it very much. It's funny and creative, and it's untypical and untraditional. It's free, too!

While writing this article I realized that using stereotypes in a way that bends them doesn't mean contributing to said stereotypes. This is actually quite obvious, but as I said, I thought myself into a dead end, and I seem to have needed to write this down in order to organize my thoughts. I also realized that sometimes I have to use stereotypes to challenge them.

Sea-Spray and Ice Flowers

I've managed to spin two more challenge yarns during the last few days :-) One will go to the shop (hopefully soon...), the other one will become part of my ocean shawl.
I really have to count the weight and yardage of my challenge yarns before there are too many. A counter would be great, maybe there is even a kind of application or plugin for that kind of thing where I can add information as I spin? I'll try to find out.

Ice Flowers

Sea-Spray

I have also participated in another challenge: Today I found a message on our Etsy account informing us one of our yarn was part of a treasury. Well, that's always news we love to hear :-) But this time, the treasury was part of the Non Team Treasury Challenge, which I hadn't heard of before, and which couldn't resist *g* So I made this treasury:

I think the non team challenge is a great idea, it's uncomplicated and so much fun! And whoever wins gets to be the inspiration for the next challenge, since every one of these treasuries is created around one inspiration item. That's thrilling! :-)

Coffee House

I finished another Year End Spinning Challenge yarn yesterday evening. I thought about naming it "Victorian Coffee Table", but right now I think "Coffee House" is a better option. It might be "The Grand Café" in the end (the building hosting the first coffee house in England - which I've just found out on Wikipedia ;-)), or something completely different. But it's good to know that there ARE so many options, since I like the colour combo and might want to spin some more coffee related yarns ;-)


I have also carded two batts, one of which I will spin into a yarn for my Ocean Shawl. So, hopefully there will be more yarn pictures soon :-)

Year End Spinning Challenge 2010

A few days ago, I was invited to join a spinning challenge on Ravelry. Let me quote the rules:

From November 1st until the last Day of the Year (December 31st) spin as much yarn as you want to! It’s that easy :-) You’ve got 61 days to put a dent in that multiplying stash of yours!

There will be prize categories and if you want to donate a prize, feel free!

I think that sounds wonderful, thank you for the invite, Kat! :-)

I already spun my first challenge yarn, and I even tried to take a photo of the process:

150m/82 g

I will try to update my process on the blog and the Ravelry forum, but spinning is more important, of course ;-) I also spun about 60 m of test yarn for a potential project I might write about some other time.

Turning the Great Wheel

I've wanted to tell you about this for ages, but somehow I never got around to actually doing it. Now that I am temporarily unable to use a spinning wheel, I can at least write about my experience on the Great Wheel or Walking Wheel :-)

In September 2009, my husband and I went to Ireland on our honeymoon. We spent a few days in Dublin, then slowly made our way to the west coast, visiting the Boyne Valley with Newgrange and Knowth, spending time in a cute café in a small town called Slane (where I knitted a cowl - which reminds me I have to find the pictures again), visiting Trim Castle and Locke's Distillery Museum, and finally ending up in Galway, as intended. We spent a few nights at a cozy B&B called Liscarna. After a few days there, on one of which we visited Inis Mór, the largest of the Aran Islands, we drove on to Clifden. There, we spent a few nights at another recommendable B&B called Kingstown House and drove around the countryside during the days.
I was delighted when, as I consulted the internet for yarn or fibre shops nearby (as I did in every town we passed, by the way ;-)) I found The Sheep and Wool Centre, just about half an hour away from Clifden. We just HAD to go there :-D And we did.


It's a museum of sheep, fibre and fibre-related crafts; a shop; and a café. You can read more about it on their website if you like. Anyway, we went there and stated that we wanted to visit the museum. We were the only people who did, somehow all the others were satisfied with the shop and café. After having watched a film about local (sheep/fibre-related) history we were given a spinning and carding demonstration. When I told the lady I already knew how to spin she was delighted, as for some reason there don't seem to be many spinners left in western Ireland. I hinted that I really wanted to know more about spinning on the Great Wheel, since I had read about them but could never really imagine how to work with them. And then - she not only showed us, but let me try it.

Unlike with a more modern spinning wheel, you don't treadle with your feet and use both hands for drafting the fibre, but you turn the (really large) wheel with your right hand...

...while drafting the fibre with your left hand only:


While drafting, you hold the emerging yarn in a right angle to the wheel. As soon as your arm doesn't seem to be long enough anymore, you hold the yarn parallel to the wheel and it will be wound around the spool - turning the wheel with your other hand all the time, mind you!

It was weird and unfamiliar, and I did have my problems with the technique, although Orla (I think she was called) seemed to think I did fairly well. It was fun, and I think if I practiced I would make good progress. I don't want another wheel, though, I already have three and don't know where I'd put such a large one ;-)

It was a great experience and I really recommend visiting The Sheep and Wool Centre - so if you have the chance, go for it - and say hello from me :-)

More than a year ago...

... I had THE idea for a birthday present. I even hinted at it, but then never got around to telling you properly about it.
I had stumbled upon this blog post mentioning silver fox hair and really wanted to get my hands on that stuff, since my mother is a great fox lover. It took me a while to track the source down, and even more to find someone who could tell me whether the foxes were harmed in the process, something which I wouldn't want. It turned out they were semi-domesticated and the hair was obtained by combing them. That sounded fine to me, so I purchased some of the fibre (the most expensive fibre I have ordered yet) and tried spinning it. It was a small desaster, to tell you the truth. Spinning these short hairs was very time-consuming and veeeery nerve-wracking, so I tried blending them with cashmere, which is also short in staple length but kind of gluey. That worked a lot better, but it still took me some time until I had about 700m of silver fox/cashmere yarn. I knew what I wanted to make from it - a simple garter stitch triangle shawl, such as this one. Oh - did I mention I was on a tight schedule? I am not too fast a knitter, and I had less than two months for spinning and knitting (and blocking and shipping) the whole thing. Maybe some of you will laugh now and think that's plenty of time, but not for me ;-)

Anyway, I did manage it in time for April 27th, but there was no time left to take photos of the shawl. I had to wait for that until my wedding in September, and now I've taken until now to show you ;-)

So - here is my mother, on my wedding day, wearing her silver fox shawl:

Knit on 3mm needles in about 3 weeks, if I remember correctly. It's wonderfully soft and delicate, and I like the colour and texture, but it sheds quite a lot. Mum doesn't seem to mind, though. I still have some yarn left (I'm not sure, but it has to be nearly half the amount I spun) and maybe I will knit a small bag or purse to go with the shawl. I still have nearly two weeks left until shipping day for Mum's next birthday ;-)
Oh, the pattern can be found here, by the way. Very easy and fun to knit :-)

Dragonback - my first yarn guerilla mission

It's been in my head for a while now, I've seen pictures of others doing it, I've read blog postings and I wanted to do it myself. What am I talking about?

YARN GRAFFITI!

At first I had a hard time getting ideas, so I postponed any action and just found the general idea very appealing. Then I got a smashing book for Christmas: Yarn Bombing by Mandy Moore and Leanne Prain (our German readers will certainly enjoy this blog posting about the book), whose blog can be found here. It is full of ideas, pictures, interviews, instructions/guidelines, it's absolutely fantastic and inspiring. Suddenly, ideas started pouring and I couldn't wait to get home, grab some yarn and knitting needles and start doing it.

I wanted to start with something simple and I wanted to start close to home. I decided on a stylized dragon because the idea was suddenly there and I planned to decorate the public park behind our flat. So, when my sisters in law sat down to read the final chapters of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (the older one, 28, reading to her younger sister, 9), I saw my chance to both knit graffiti and listen to a good story (normally I listen to Jim Dale reading it to me, thanks to my father who gave me the whole audio book series for my last birthday). When we had to leave for the restaurant I took my knitting and made good progress while sitting in the tram, while waiting for dinner and while standing outside waiting for the tram back home, which was slightly uncomfortable/freezing. When we got home I crocheted the spikes and then around midnight my husband and I went outside - I to sew the tag onto a lamp post, he to document it for you ;-) (He did get a tripod for Christmas, so he kind of jumped at the chance).



I know some people think it's about letting go - you should walk away from your graffiti and never look back, but I like the idea of walking past my first one whenever I need to go into town or somewhere else the tram can take me. I'll try to be less sentimental with the next ones ;-) I am curious how long it will last, though - and whether my favourite neighbour will ask me if I did it, since she knows about my spinning and knitting.

(By the way: my hand/wrist warmers are new, too - I hope to take a better picture of them soon)

Ocean of Zombies - Creepy? Fun!

As I mentioned a short while ago, I was quite tempted to spin a very different ocean yarn, wich I did. It's for a monthly challenge on our new (German) community over at www.spinnkult.de, as well as the second yarn I'm also about to show you. But first, let me introduce the zombies ;-)

I do like very textured yarns, as I've probably also mentioned before. For this one, I used a wonderful, hand dyed merino/bamboo blend, some glow in the dark thread, some snail-shells, mother of pearls discs, angelina and, of course, the zombie heads made from glow in the dark polymer clay. It's 146 m, 138 g and about 10 wpi.

Here's a glow photo, but since I've taken it with my mobile you can't really see how nice the thread glows, only the zombie heads:

(More pictures on my flickr page)

And then, there's a very nice (and not so strange) corespun yarn, also with snail-shells and angelina, made from kid mohair fibre (also hand dyed) that has been spun around some glow in the dark sewing thread:

I don't have a glow photo, though, since my mobile is not good enough for that. I really need my shop partner (or my fiancé) to show me how to use the real camera with glow in the dark stuff. My last attempts were not as good as they could have been, though passable ;-)

Tour de Fleece - we're on!

Yes, I know, I know. We're one day late. But well, we had to buy some furniture to better stash our stash, and it had to be yesterday! So, sadly, there was no time for spinning this Saturday.

But: We now joined the Tour de Fleece! "Twisted" from Weird&Twisted aka TrashQueen aka Christine aka me joined three teams on Ravelry: Team Germany, Team Twitter (as I'm a fanatic twitterer), and, of course, Breakaways, the art yarn team!

And today, I tried to make up for missing the first day of the tour. So here are my yarns!






Yes, you've seen correctly: This is another glow-in-the-dark yarn! It's a corespun one, with a fluorescent thread in the center, luxury fibers like cashmere, merino wool and bamboo fluffily wrapped around it! It's so light and soft! :-)

And: There are these big, beautiful vintage lace blossoms, spun right into the yarn. I really like how it turned out!




This is a rather punky one. Black alpaca, combined with merino wool in rosé, dark red, violet and some bamboo in shiny white - and tons of sequins in black and red!

So, that were the first two yarns for the Tour de Fleece. Stay tuned for LOTS more! :-)

Art Yarn Swap - still waiting

As posted a very long time ago, there is an art yarn swap we are participating in. Last sunday was supposed to be the thrilling day of unpacking, but we had to postpone that until the coming sunday. I am very excited - but I still haven't got a parcel. I am getting quite nervous now, I hope I will get it in time. And I am really curious about the yarn!

Art Yarn Challenge

There's an art yarn challenge on TreasureAyland which sounds... well, challenging :-D I'd like to give the Hanging Gardens of Babylon a try, so hopefully, there will be something new to look at in the near future.

Art Yarn Swap

We are participating in an art yarn swap and since all the other participants are German, my blog entries concerning the swap will mostly be in German, as well. I could translate, of course, and maybe I will do so at some point, but sometimes that might result in very long entries, as it would with this first posting.
If you are really interested, just tell me and I will try to translate, anyway :-)

Twisted will post her entries concerning the swap in her private blog, TrashQueen's Vault.

*****

D-A-Y-S Fragebogen

Welches ist Dein liebstes Kinderbuch?

Gleich zu Anfang so eine schwierige Entscheidung... Ich mag viele Bücher von Astrid Lindgren und Michael Ende, aber wenn ich mich entscheiden müsste *grüüüübel*
Ronja Räubertochter.
Es sollte übrigens mehr (Kinder-) Bücher über starke Mädchen/Frauen geben.

Wie zieht Hechtsuppe?

Vermutlich so wie offene Fenster und Türen zusammen. Das war zumindest immer die einzige Situation, in der ich mit der berüchtigten Hechtsuppe konfrontiert war – und auch da zum Glück nur verbal, ich stelle mir das Zeug eher scheußlich vor ;-)

Mein Beruf hat zu tun mit...

…Dreck.
…Papier.
…Müll (so um die 5000 Jahre alt – mal mehr, mal weniger :-D).
…Erde.
…Nachdenken.
…Recherchieren.
…Scherben.
…Projizierten Klischees, gegen die ich ankämpfe.
…Schaufeln.
…Spaten.
…Schubkarren.
…der oft vertretenen Äußerung, Frauen seien eine Randgruppe – auch etwas, gegen das ich mich vehement wehre, logisch.

In welchen Situationen wendest Du Trick 17 an?

In allen möglichen und unmöglichen… Wie sich’s für Trick 17 eben gehört ;-)

Welche Tugend glaubst Du zu besitzen?

Mut. Manchmal wird er allerdings zu Übermut.

An welchen Swaps hast Du teilgenommen?

bisher gar nicht – wenn man von Forenwichteleien absieht, die nicht so richtig dazugehören.

Welche (DAYS-relevanten) Allergien hast Du?

Keine, die mir bekannt wären.

Welche Deiner Grillen pflegst Du?

Die Frage finde ich unfair – was der einen einer anderen Grille, ist schließlich der anderen ihre Libelle. Oder so ähnlich :-D
Und wenn ich Außenstehenden sage, ich spinne, halten die das sicher für eine Grille – während alle, die am DAYS teilnehmen, da nur stirnrunzelnd die Schultern zucken können.

Was geht (DAYS-relevant) bei ArtYarn garnicht?

Pink und rosa in allen Schattierungen. Pastell.
Versteht mich nicht falsch, das kann auch für meine Augen manchmal hübsch sein – aber nur von weitem und nicht für mich selbst.

Was geht sehr wohl (hier gehören Lieblingsfarben & -materialien hin!)?

Grüüüün. Ich liebe Grün. Grün macht mich glücklich. Allerdings stehen mir keine hellen bzw. gelbstichigen Grüntöne.
Petrol. Sieht toll aus zu meinen roten Haaren.
Schwarz. Passt zu allem und zu meinem äußeren Halbgrufti-Dasein. Na gut, das ist übertrieben, aber ich hab mehr schwarze Klamotten als alles andere.
Rot. Passt auch toll zu schwarz :-D
Alpaka, Merino, Seide, Leinen, Lamm… Ach, eigentlich mag ich alles.
Glitzerkram – aber nur in Maßen.
Glasperlen.
Metallzeug – ob nun Schraubenmuttern, kleine Anhänger oder Perlen, finde ich alles toll.

Gib bitte drei Websiten an, die Dich gewöhnlich lächeln lassen...

http://www.metro.co.uk/nemi/ (Gute-Laune-Lächeln)
http://cornwallcam.co.uk/ (seeliges Lächeln)
http://www.emma.de/ (grimmiges, manchmal triumphierendes Lächeln. Manchmal leider auch kein Lächeln.)

Und zähle hier zehn Dinge/Situationen auf, die Du magst

Kaffee – zuhause mit meinem Liebsten oder im Café mit FreundInnen. Oder zuhause mit FreundInnen. Oder im Park. Moment, zählt das noch als eins? Wie auch immer; Kaffee des Kaffees wegen und natürlich als Event.

Rumhängen. Mit Liebstem, mit FreundInnen, mit Katzen.

Richtig gute Serien, wie Heroes und Battlestar Galactica. Ich spreche natürlich nicht von dem alten Schrott ;-)

Wald- und Wiesenspaziergänge, inklusive Kräutersammeln. Und Pilzesammeln, wenn TrashQueen dabei ist (ohne sie trau ich mich nicht)

Spinnen. Die Tätigkeit, nicht die Viecher. Die mag ich eher nicht, aber ich krieg wenigstens keinen Schreikrampf und deswegen bin ich fürs Retten und Rausbringen zuständig.

Hörbücher – vorzugsweise Harry Potter auf Englisch, gelesen von Jim Dale (auch wenn ich sonst eigentlich britisches Englisch bevorzuge)

Fantasyrollenspiele. Auch wenn mich ungefähr die Hälfte der Rollenspielenden vermutlich naserümpfend beäugt: ich liebe DSA.

Feminismus.

Freiheit.

Computerspielen mit meinem Liebsten.

Rauchst Du so unerbittlich viel, dass man es bei DAYS beachten müsste?

Neeee.

Hast Du so eine starke Rauchallergie, dass man es bei DAYS beachten müsste?

Ja!

Hast Du eine Ahnung, was man mit Artyarn anstellen kann?

Aber sicher! Stricken und Weben hab ich schon ausprobiert, Häkeln hab ich gesehen.
Neckcuffs, Mützen, Schals und Stulpen sind die Dinge, die ich stricken kann und auch schon aus Art Yarn gemacht habe. Ein Beutel ist in Arbeit.

Dragon Art Yarn Series coming up

I am currently working on a new series which started with a Green Dragon Art Yarn. This started one day in my favourite café in Heidelberg where some friends and I were talking about yarns and someone came up with the dragon idea. I was into this immediately :-) So I bought some things, including red ricrac, and started my first dragon yarn. I liked it so much that I wanted to do some more. One of my friends (in the café) had mentioned the Hungarian Horntail (from the Harry Potter books) and I knew I wanted to make yarn inspired by the dragons from the Harry Potter World. I really like the books and I have already made some Harry Potter Art Yarns - Slytherin (sold), Skin of a Basilisk (one skein is still for sale) and Gryffindor (not finished yet) - and I wanted to do more, anyway. So I bought some more stuff *g*

I made the Hungarian Horntail yarn a few days ago, but sadly the coppery ricrac is very stiff and it was difficult to spin in - and I was afraid it would fall out at some point, so I couldn't really sell it. I decided to knit it up myself and sell the finished object with the ricrac secured properly.
This project is to be a drawstring purse. I started too big, so I'll probably have to spin some more yarn before the end, but I don't mind ;-)

I might decide to knit all of the dragon yarns instead of selling them as yarns, but either way there will be a new series in our shop soon :-)

Yay for stars!

TQs Super Magical Beenie

I did it. I sent my first entry to a spinning challenge! And I even got two votes so far, even though one of the votes was Weird's. ;-)

Pluckyfluff wanted the participants to spin a yarn that is either representative of oneself, consists of ones favorite materials, illustrates a theme that one identifies oneself with or all of this. The second part of the challenge was to crochet or knit a beenie in a size and style that suits one or says something about oneself.

I did so and it seems I was the first to finish the challenge: Mine is the first in the long line of nine entries. I don't think I'll win, all others spun so great freaky yarns! But I really love my hat. It indeed reflects a part of my personality. If you want to see more pictures, visit my flickr-site, there are quite a lot of the beenie and the yarn.