Math Monday: Mystery Yarn - The Adventure Begins

Way back in a far away time that seems eons ago (October 2017) my good friend Lee and I went to Rhinebeck, otherwise known as the NYS Sheep and Wool Festival, and not for the first time. Up to that point, we had gone every year for a good many years. For a bunch of reasons, we haven’t been back since, but once this is all over…

As we trolled through the outside buildings on a warm autumn day we came across the Harrisville Designs’ booth. Besides having their own great yarns, Harrisville also does custom spinning for a number of other well-known brands of yarn. We stopped in our tracks when we saw that they were launching n I g h t s h a d e s and spent awhile admiring it. I bought a sweater’s quantity of their lovely WATERshed. Lee kept looking. And then she called me over to the sale bin.

See our Harrisville bags?

Inside was a rustic two-ply wool that was unlabeled. We asked about it, but the only thing the kind Harrisville lady told us was that it was a mill end and that it was 100% wool. Harrisville spins for Brooklyn Tweed, We were both a little smitten. Lee bought 5 skeins. I bought the remaining 3. Occasionally, Lee or I would talk about the yarn, yet neither of us ever did anything with it.

All 8 skeins nestled together!

Fast forward to January 2021. I was doing my semi-annual stash purge and once again came across this yarn. I was still in love. Now you should know that I never to design with any yarn that is discontinued or that I know will be, and certainly never with homespun or an unknown yarn. But this yarn was calling out to be a textured pullover. My 3 skeins wouldn’t do it. So I called Lee, asked her if we could trade - she gave it to me - and it started. The pullover is done, but not yet released.

Over the next few Mondays, I’m going to be writing in this space about yardage. We’ll be estimating and calculating. Yes, it’s math, but don’t be scared! It’s not trigonometry and it’s really rather simple. How will it help you, the knitter? You can calculate yardage you’ve used or how much you need, or how much you’d need if you change an element in your own knitting - like making short sleeves instead of long, or lengthening the body of a sweater. Or perhaps you have your own mystery yarn and want to know if you have enough? Once we’re through, we’ll figure out how we can estimate yarn weight based on yardage.

Analyze this!