Reader, I bought the yarn swift.
After that Bronte-sque opening, you must be wondering what I am talking about. You may scroll down to a previous post, dated 18th December 2020, when I said that a swift-and-ball-winder is a long-term investment, but I didn’t have the swift. Knitting is supposed to be as cheap or as expensive as you want it to be, and how sunny and patient your disposition is.
Well, the disposition is still sunny and patient, but now the situation is different. Time is really equal to money, and this is where a tool is handier and quicker and easier than using knees, arms, chairbacks, revolving chairs or even a niddy-noddy (you’ve got to Google that!)
So, what is this swift? A swift is a very very clever device – it holds a hank of yarn while it is being wound into a ball or a cake, without getting tangled or knotted. It has an adjustable diameter so that it can hold hanks of varied sizes, and rotates around a central rod.
If you think this is complicated, you might want to jog your memory a bit and think about the image of Gandhiji spinning khadi. The charkha is the quintessential swift-and-ball-winder, and effectively became the face of THE movement against the Raj that sought to destroy India’s indigenous economy. So, you see how the smallest of tools make the mightiest of moves? Incredible, isn’t it?
So, how does a yarn swift work?
Both my swift and winder clamp to my table, and I place them about 2 feet apart.
The hank is unwrapped, the ties that secure it are cut and it is ready to be placed on the swift.
The swift is then opened – it literally opens up like an umbrella – and the knob that holds it in place is tightened just a bit
The yarn is gently placed over the swift, and the arms of the swift are manipulated a bit so that the yarn is held in place in even tension.
The knob is then tightened securely so the yarn doesn’t slip down.
One free end of the yarn is then pulled out a bit, and pushed through the guide and notch of the winder.
The crank of the winder is then turned, and wheeeeeeeeeeee off I go! The swift is turning, the winder is turning, the hank is converting into a cake! This truly is a spectacle, and I believe the photograph shows how exciting it is.
The cake is then lifted off the winder, and is ready to use.
All in all, I could easily wind a regular 50 gram hank of yarn into a cake in a couple of minutes, instead of the 15 minutes I would take using chairbacks!
Honestly, it is so simple, that even my kids could do it with a lot of interest and talk about tools and the mechanics of it all. I am sincerely considering asking them to wind all my hanks for me, and I could pay them some pocket money for each hank they wind. What say, folks? Good idea, yeah?
Cotton yarn by @yarnkart, another amazing local yarn store I have enjoyed working with.
Rios yarn by @malabrigoyarn. If ever you want to buy this yarn in India, please visit @thehappyhandsstore, the folks are super nice to work with.