Nerd Wars T4R1 - Nerd Culture, Technology

Here is my latest submission for Nerd Wars.  It met the Technology challenge requirement:
Your challenge for this month is to create something inspired by technology and human (or non-human, I suppose) ingenuity. Anything designed to make your (or a character’s) life better will be considered, from siege engines to pocket watches to moisture vaporators, and everything in between.


Rav Handle: wonderwhygal
Team: Team Precious
Photo of Completed Project:

What Craft was used? Spinning
How your project meets the challenge: I spun this textured yarn with the inspiration of light as in a flashlight. The technology like portable light would sure have come in handy in a dark spider infested cave. In the Lord of the Rings, Return of the King our hero, Frodo, is lured into the cave of Shelob, an awfully huge spider. He uses the Phial of Galadriel to fend off the spider. He drops it in his haste to leave and Samwise Gamgee, finds it and uses it as part of his defense to finally kill Shelob. Sam uses it again later in the story. The light acts like a flashlight…a portable light bulb.

Thomas Edison invented the light bulb. Light bulbs have coils. My textured yarn is using the core spinning coil technique. I used Alpaca, Angelina and Milk Fiber that I blended on my drum carder and core spun it around a cotton thread which acted as the core. I used white and fawn fibers that reminded me of the Phial of Galadriel that was given to Frodo by the Elves. The finished yarn was 70 yards using about 3.5oz of fiber. Wraps per inch were difficult to determine since the coils skewed my wraps. I am calling this a bulky art yarn and intend to use large knitting needles for the intended project.

In summary, the gift of light given to Frodo by the Elves in Middle Earth was the closest tie to the technology that Edison created in our present day. My coiled yarn represents the coils in Edison’s light bulbs and inspired by the Elvin light given to Frodo.