You may recall from a previous post that ordered some of the brand new Sparrow linen yarn from Quince and Co. I’ve started working with this yarn and have found it to present some interesting challenges. Knitting with linen is definitely an acquired taste (that I think I’m in the process of acquiring, but we’ll see). In sum, this yarn is very pretty and looks really great knit up and blocked, but getting to that stage requires a slightly different knitting experience than working with your average wool yarns.
The first challenge was getting this yarn into a useable form. It did not love my ball-winder, which left a hollow space in the middle of the resulting ball that instantly collapsed and turned briefly into a tangled mess. For the second two skeins, I decided to simply wind a ball around a highly technical yarn balling device—also known as a cardboard toilet paper roll cut in half.
May not be elegant, but effective
The second challenge, for me, was getting gauge with the yarn. I’ve decided to make the pretty lace shrug called Emma by Carrie Bostick Hoge. I had to go down several needle sizes to get close to the gauge. The yarn is crispy and stringy to knit with, but not entirely unpleasant (for me at least).
Here are a few shots of my swatch, which changed a lot with blocking:
Unblocked swatch
Blocked swatch --- what a difference!
Since these swatches worked out well, I got started on the actual project, but I haven’t done very much so far. I’ll keep you posted on how this goes.
Yeah, do keep us posted. Linen is the only fibre I still consider “scary”, so I’m interested to hear what you think!
I had the same problem in winding balls from the skeins! The first one is still in a jumble. The second one is finally in a ball. Thanks for the info about the gauge – guess I really need to do a test swatch!
I have not knit with linen but I love hemp which I am thinking is a lot the same. Have fun with your project. Nice lace pattern.