The Incredibles Mom You re Making Weird Faces Again Yarn
This week, I set out to write almost types of yarn assurance and put-ups, but things were not as simple I'd expected. The thing I've called a skein my whole life? Other people call it a hank. The thing I call a brawl? Other people phone call it a bullet skein. Whoa! And and so we enter the real argue of the 21st century: skein or hank? Ball or skein?
If you're scrunching your nose and thinking, "What is she talking virtually?" Well, let's take a stride dorsum. Yarn is made in long strands that accept to exist cut and packaged into a form that tin exist labeled, shipped, and displayed on shop shelves without getting hopelessly tangled and deformed forth the manner. Those units come in different forms. Perhaps you've purchased a unit of measurement of yarn and had to wind it into a ball before you could knit with it; maybe you were able to slide the label off and cast on right abroad. This is what I'm talking about—the ways yarns are packaged into single units, and what they hateful for knitters.
I opened the Skein vs. Hank vs. Ball fence on my Facebook wall and realized chop-chop that I needed help. So I called on the experts—the people who make yarn—to assist me untangle this crazy Hankenskein monster. Thank you for your help, guys!
For video demos of how to handle these ball types, including using swifts, ball-winders, and other tools, bank check out this video (FULL DISCLOSURE, IT FEATURES MY MOM).
Okay, here we become.
HANK
Although hank was historically used as a specific unit, these days consensus points to hank existence the right term for a loop of yarn, fastened into a continuous circumvolve with ties. Hanks are expert for dyeing or painting yarn (see #3 for more on this). You will have to transform a hank into a brawl or cake to knit with it, and a swift (affiliate link) helps keep the loop open and neat as you wind it off. Hank is absurd, but he requires some endeavor. As some folks pointed out to me, y'all make a hank on a skein-winder. Not a hank-winder. Get figure.
FOLDED HANK
Take that tied-off loop of yarn, fold it over, slap a label round its belly and you have a folded hank. The characterization actually holds this guy together. It's great for bulky yarns and novelty yarns, as information technology shows off the graphic symbol of the yarn without restricting it in some tight twisted or ball form. To knit: Remove the characterization, suspend the open hank on a swift or your friend's outstretched arms, cutting the ties and air current off into a brawl.
TWISTED HANK
This is where things get cray. Yarn professionals admit that "twisted hank" is the correct term for a loop of yarn, tied off and so twisted into a braid, just they also acknowledge that they often apply the term "skein" interchangeably here. I know many knitters call these things skeins. Hand-dyers usually dye their yarn in hanks and sell it in twisted hanks. This is a practical product pick for them.
As Felicia Lo, author and owner of Sweet Georgia Yarn, says: "Information technology's easier for u.s. to brandish the dissimilar nuances and variations of color when it's in the hank/skein format." (Excuse her Canadian spelling.) Twisted hanks exercise require winding into assurance/cakes earlier knitting, but Beth Casey of Lorna's Laces waxes poetic on that point: "There is something to be said about touching the yarn and getting to know information technology a niggling bit before you start a project. Kinda like a coffee date vs. a dinner date."
As Katie Rempe from Skacel noted, the proliferation of high-end hand-dyes in twisted hanks has conferred a sense of quality onto the twisted hank form. "Don't put down the put-up," she told me recently at TNNA, wagging a brawl of Hikoo Kenzie in my face. Practiced yarns don't ONLY come in twisted hanks, but plenty of them practise.
SKEIN
Skein is a generic term, the way "ball" is. Many people telephone call the twisted yarn complect a skein, and and so I am calling it a bonafide synonym for twisted hank. It can also mean a car-produced ball, which unremarkably isn't round. Run across #5 and #half-dozen.
Okay, so let me interrupt hither to say that I call #5 and #6 balls, and the machines that produce these things are called "ball-winders." So I'm not wrong. Nosotros're not talking a little plastic ball-winder clasped to your dining room table; these are industrial ball-winders "the size of a locomotive" according to Caroline Sommerfeld of Ancient Arts. This mechanism is expensive and takes upwardly a lot of space, which is why many hand-dyers don't make balls — information technology's a big investment for an operation that usually starts out minor, in a garage or basement, and their yarn looks so nice in twisted hanks, anyway.
PULL SKEIN
So, online sources call this thing a "skein," but my yarn pals elaborate on that—they call it a pull skein or center-pull skein. You can knit from this unit of measurement directly off the store shelf—just slide off the characterization and pull from the exterior or the center and you lot're ready to become. These pull skeins will collapse as you work, so I observe that rewinding their spilled guts into a hand-wound brawl helps avoid HANKENSKEIN. We'll become to that later.
BULLET SKEIN
The bullet skein, a term I stole from Courtney Kelley of The Fibre Visitor, is a shorter, rounder version of the pull skein. It'south a machine-made brawl that is not round. Information technology kind of looks like a fatty football or a weird melon. It's bang-up just the style information technology is — pull off the cease and start knitting. It doesn't collapse into a mess the manner long pull skeins practice. I Love BULLET SKEINS. So easy, and then compact! And they stack nicely on the shelf until I get to them. I take an epic amount of Brown Sheep Nature Spun Sport, which comes in bullet skeins, stacked on my shelf. I ball in every color, cuz it'due south GREAT for Fair Isle swatching when I go THAT weird urge. Plus, those little guys can lose a few yards every couple years and they're still lookin' good.
Brawl
The yarn brawl. A true, round brawl, ofttimes paw-wound or sometimes mass-produced by companies such as Schoppel Wolle (their Zauberball line is made upwardly of balls). If you hand-current of air a brawl from a hank or from another put-upwardly, you get a Ball'Southward BALL. This is a circular, hard unit of measurement from which you tin knit easily; information technology does non collapse. Merely mitt-winding a brawl can lead to stretching the yarn tightly into place, which tin can bear on your tension and/or the final behavior of the yarn in your material. Wind gently and wash your knitting afterward working from a ball to let the yarn blossom once again.
Cake
Ahh, the yarn cake—knitter's bliss. A block is produced from winding hanked yarn onto a ball-winder—the personal ball-winder (affiliate link) kind, not the locomotive-sized kind. Plop your hank onto an umbrella swift, thread the finish through the piggy tail of a ball-winder, hand-crank that winder, and picket your block form, all cracking and orderly. It's a ball, of sorts, but the yarn can be taken off the side or from the center, and the thing doesn't curlicue around; it sits on its flat cake bottom and whispers sweet nothings to itself. You tin can knit directly from a cake, and yous should. Some yarn companies practise parcel their yarn in cakes; Freia Fibers is one. Cakes evidence off the slope range of Freia's colors, from outside to inside. Mmm. Cake.
DONUT Ball
This guy. He's groovy for packaging glace luxury yarns that demand to testify off their loft and luster on yarn shop shelves; yarns that come in smaller-yardage put-ups considering they're so precious. Please note, I did not find whatever yarn professionals using the term "donut brawl;" they all but call this a ball. But I'grand taking a opinion here. You tin call it a Bagel Ball if yous want, but this is DEFINITELY Different from a round brawl.
The donut often depends on a label piercing its open center to requite it structure, and so yous might find that it falls apart in one case you lot remove the label and start knitting with it. Buy donuts and gently rewind them into balls, without stretching the yarn, and and then knit with it in that form. Or knit direct from the donut and expletive your late-dark sequined cashmere decisions. It's your life, sweetie.
HARD CORE BALL
I had no term for this put-upwards, and Stacy Charles of Tahki-Stacy Charles gave me the words: Difficult Core Ball. For the rock star in all of us, this is a ball wrapped over a rigid cardboard core, keeping it solid and presentable for display and storage. You will see this put-up in fine cotton yarns, metallics, synthetics, and other yarns that tend to exist slippery. These yarns need some oomph to keep them together earlier hitting your needles, but knitting from a hard cadre ball is easy. Every bit you near the end of the ball, y'all might take a HANKENSKEIN mess, and I propose yous find the center end and wind a round ball as you nearly that point, in society to keep things rockin'.
CONE
The cone is the put-upwards of cheapskates, weavers, and enterprising immature knitters who stumble into the yarn inheritance of their hoarder grandmas. None of that is truthful, except the weaver's part. Or maybe information technology'south all kinda true. In any event, coned yarns are often affordable, come in huge yardage put-ups, and just crave a little love from knitters. Yarn does not look glamorous or soft or particularly sexy on a cone, only don't exist fooled. That ugly duckling will come to life on your needles.
When yarn is wound onto a cone, it undergoes a lot of pressure, stretching the yarn in place. Before knitting, consider winding off into hanks (using a skein-winder or niddy noddy or even your arm), washing information technology, hanging the hanks to dry out, and so balling it and knitting from it. Many coned yarns still have a waxy coating on them from the milling process, which makes them ideal for weavers who demand to poke tons of ends through tiny heddles, just knitters might not love the waxy blanket. So wash it, kids. With cones, you can purchase a couple g yards of incredible yarn for pennies on the dollar because no one has had to pay for ball-making equipment, labels, or quality control of tons of wonky little donuts. STEAL.
Brand a ball from a cone, or any other put-upwardly, using your thumb!
HANKENSKEIN
Likewise called "yarn barf," "yarn vomit," and "oh no," this guy is not an official kind of ball. Rather, he'southward the monster at the lesser of your stash after your cats and your kids have discovered your hanks and balls and played "fiber arts" with them. He's what happens when you're careless with your pull skein, or when you try to wind a hank into a brawl without securing the loose hank. He is hopeless. You can't knit from him; you might not even exist able to salvage his alpaca parts. Your best hope is an hr of silence, some incense, a well-lit room, and your Boy Scout knot-making skills, played in reverse. Best of luck.
Wind a Center-Pull Yarn Ball by Hand
Fear non if you get stuck with unwound hanks, folded hanks, twisted hanks, cones, or even hankenskeins without a swift, ball-winder, or skein-winder. Y'all can hands wind your yarn into a manageable center-pull brawl without the need for fancy winding tools. This isn't to say that a swift (affiliate link) or ball-winder (affiliate link) wouldn't make your life significantly easier. Just this trick is great when you're in a pinch, surrounded by unusable yarn balls and a list of unfinished knitting projects.
To get started, yous'll need yarn (manifestly) and a thicker-gauge knitting needle or crochet hook.
- Tie a slipknot at i end of your yarn and attach it to the terminate of your winding tool.
- Use your pollex to hold your yarn to the winding tool and begin to wrap information technology around the tool and itself while keeping the slip-knotted end split.
- Keep on winding and wrapping your yarn to create a round ball, making sure that the yarn is crisscrossing over itself.
- Once all of the yarn is wound into a ball, tuck the cease under some strands in the ball to keep it in identify.
- Gently pull your brawl of yarn off of the winding tool without losing the slipknot end.
- Yous're done! You lot tin can start knitting from the terminate that has the slipknot in it, which you can pull from the center of the yarn ball.
If y'all're not interested in winding past hand, or you want a tool to brand it easier, might we recommend a nostepinne?
What practice you lot call your yarn balls? Exercise you know of another brawl or hank type that I've missed? I Dear hearing from y'all guys. Exit a comment below that starts with "HANK" or "SKEIN" and elaborate from there.
I got a HANKering for some loose yarn,
—Lisa
Originally published February 23, 2017. Updated February 2, 2022.
Manage your yarns from hank to cake!
Source: https://www.interweave.com/article/knitting/lisas-list-yarn-ball-types/
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